Submitted 2 weeks ago by Joker@sh.itjust.works to technology@lemmy.zip
https://www.digitalrightsbytes.org/topics/why-is-printer-ink-so-expensive
liquids are more precious than printer ink, but that’s not because ink is expensive to make. How can HP— and its handful of competitors in the highly concentrated printer market—get away with charging these kinds of markups?
How do they? Because there is enough illusion of competition that anti trust investigations won’t be launched.
Printers are cursed abominations unleashed upon our world by Those No One Dares Mention.
One of the secrets of the printer “manufacturers” is that they don’t actually know how printer ink is made.
They just know they have to chant the incantations written down by hands unseen on scrolls bound in human flesh, sacrifice a sysadmin, and a new shipment will materialize in their warehouse.
Same thing with razors and razor blades. Sell the razor at a loss and make a fortune selling the blades
King Gillette basically invented the captured customer. check food prices in airports and theme parks and movie theatres and ballparks.
ch00f@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Image
Two printers. One costs 3x+ more than the other.
Ink for the cheap printer: $54 for 440 pages of black and since the cartridge combines color and black, you have to throw the extra ink out.
Ink for the cheap printer: $14 for 6000 pages. I couldn’t even find the official Epson ink since there are so many third party options. Because Epson doesn’t have to lock down their ink because you paid full price for their printer.
jerkface@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
I had a chance to get an Epson last week and I bought an HP instead because it advertised more ink in the box. “Great,” thinks I, “I’ll never likely print 3000 pages, and I’ll just throw it away if I ever do. Suckers!!”
I get it and I find out that it’s bricked until you register an account and it calls home; won’t print unless it’s signed up to auto-order new ink. I’m sure there are ways of ameliorating this, but they got me. They fucking got me. I knew it was a scam, I thought I was smarter, but nope, they got me. Fuckers.
qprimed@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
time to return a clearly defective product. boomerang that crap right back at the store/mfcr.