Bose should not receive praise for this move. Bose only took this action after community backlash. In an older version of their end-of-life announcement, most functionality of the speaker systems would have removed and transformed the devices into dumb-speakers/amps.

Good that they changed their statement and took the right action. Even better for the community for stepping up and 'forcing' Bose to do so.

Sources: https://web.archive.org/web/20251201051242/https://www.bose.... https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/10/bose-soundtouch-home...

This def needs to be celebrated and rewarded. I am more likely to purchase Bose now.

This this also good marketing, if other companies I currently buy speakers from follow their footsteps I'll keep supporting them, but I might otherwise just move towards Bose in the future. I wish Apple would do this for their ultra legacy stuff, Microsoft does it for their legacy stuff. Not sure if we'll ever get a fully open sourced legacy version of Windows (ignoring the source code leak) but it would be cool to one day see the Windows XP source code on GitHub.

Exactly, I wish EU enforced this.

Maybe the general rule should be like, if something isn’t in the users control and the user doesn’t want it anymore or can no longer function despite not being damaged, then the company should take back the hardware and refund the user.

So the company still have two options, either refund or open-source the systems needed for the device so that the user or third-party can continue supporting it.

This is the way! (And should be the law, maybe enforced by mandalorians taking greedy CEOs!)

This should be in the law imho. No hardware or software should have its support abandonned unless the spec / schematics / parts list and/or source code is released in a public repo.

I agree, but there can be IP rights involved that make this difficult.

I wish there was a law that forced them to do that

This should be added into write-to-repair laws.

++1

I do not get why not more companies are doing this! Also it pays so much into your brand perception etc.; also you will always have all ecological folks on your side because of "not producing new stuff".

This is the cheapest and best way to get the most out of your investment after it entered end-of-life.

Ideally this would be a legal requirement

I wish meta would do the same for its portal devices. The devices are solid hardware. They removed a ton of app support that needed cloud services.

I loved their camera tracking and picture frame along with their speaker quality.

Looking at you, Sonos.

Or they could have offered local control from launch and not had this issue.

i’d love for this to be required by law. i’m probably not thinking of some great reason why that might be a bad idea, but it seems like an effective way to reduce e-waste.

Yes! This! If only my Sonos speakers were open-sourced....

Yes, precisely.

I am no fan of Bose for a lot of reasons, but this is seriously standup behavior for sure.

It's definitely laudable. But does raise the question... why was the API not open in the first place.

> More companies should follow this approach

No, the law must mandate that. You either provide active support, or if you end it you must open-source all tools necessary to perform maintenance. It's one of those things that has to be mandated by law to provide a uniform floor on all companies and manufacturers, like food safety laws, fire codes, or accessibility for the physically disabled.

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This could fail if too many players start to abandon/open source their products at the same time. It could lead to an overload.

Plus, I purchased my product thinking it will last forever. Sudden announcements for EOL is a terrible trend. Laws should regulate having proper disclosures that a product is promised to be serviced for x number of years at minimum, and/or mandate manufacturers themselves provide updates to allow the product to work independently of them.