cross-posted from: https://poptalk.scrubbles.tech/post/567593
Haier hits Home Assistant plugin dev with takedown notice
I’m not really big on “let’s make a movement”, but this independent dev has been hit with a cease-and-desist from making a FOSS Home Assistant addon for their Haier air conditioners.
Haier claims that they are losing out on millions of dollars due to this plugin which… lets you control their air conditions from home assistant. They haven’t bothered to explain how that’s possibly worth millions of dollars - they’re just claiming it.
So of course they hit the Streisand button and are demanding that he takes it down. He of course is complying… in a couple of days. Maybe you see where this is going.
It would be an absolute shame if any of you just happened to create a fork, or clone the code, or mirror it in your own instance. An absolute shame.
Just so everyone here knows which repositories NOT to clone or fork, here are the two links:
and please, don’t repost this anywhere, or share it in other communities, or anything like that. It’s a shame that so many people already know and are making clones. I’m just letting you know so you don’t do anything like telling others who may make their own copies.
(sidenote: Haier owns GE Appliance, so for our American folks it may affect you folks too)
Specifically, the plug-ins are using our services in an unauthorized manner, which is causing significant economic harm to our Company.
How does this cause them “significant economic harm?” My immediate thought is they are losing out on data or ads, hence it being a privacy concern.
Can’t wait for them to learn all about the Streisand Effect. I had been considering them for a new mini split system, but not anymore.
The plug in has already received like a 1000 forks its awesome, to me that’s Streisand effect. Hopefully people forked off github like someone else said. They may remove all IP stuff
I know they are not the best but I put in Mr cool and then ditched their dongle for one built with esphome. Now I have total local control and native Home Assistant control.
And I thought Chamberlain was bad for intentionally breaking MyQ integrations. This is downright absurd. I guess Haier can lose some more potential business.
I’m still so upset about Chamberlain disabling my smart garage with all that (I’m not about to use their damn app).
Thankfully the open source community have reverse engineered something but still, now I have to spend $40 because Chamberlain got butt hurt that people didn’t want to use their app.
I just installed a ratgdo as well because of this. It’s great but shouldn’t have been necessary for the reasons you state.
Woah I would never do it and would never tell you that I did it because I 100% didn’t do it. The fact there are two new repos in my github is totally a coincidence.
If you don’t have a local copy you’re likely to lose it.
Nobody has the intention to fork and clone opensource projects to keep them alive. :)
Careful I hope this doesn’t spark a war with them going after HA devs to block the use of the code in HA. I know there isn’t much they can do to block it but I would hate the devs having to try to fight a lawsuit.
It’s unofficial and 3rd party, by that logic any OS could be sued.
I am worried about frivolous suits ones just used to punish people that can’t afford to fight.
You’re right, even if you could win, countless huge companies will steamroll you.
Naw, once they get their lawyer heads out of their asses, they’ll go directlp to Github and have all of the forks removed.
Within 5 hours yesterday, the github repo was forked nearly 1000 times.
yeah, it was glorious!
Why does that building look like a failed print?
I was gonna say air filter.
A royally abused heat pump.
Too bad they own Hoover as well
