Sonos 'recycle mode' intentionally bricks devices?

Trade Up programme ignores environmental impact

by Andy Bassett
Hi-Fi News

161

Sonos 'recycle mode' intentionally bricks devices?

A pioneer of multiroom audio, Sonos has drawn the ire of users with a Trade Up initiative that prevents speakers from being recycled properly.

First picked up on social media by Twitter user @atomicthumbs, Sonos’s Trade Up programme - whereby owners of older speaker models can get a 30 percent discount on newer models such as the Sonos One or Move if they recycle their existing Sonos speakers - comes with a hidden impact, the ‘recycled’ speakers are rendered useless.

Sonos introduced the Trade Up offer recently and initially, it seems like a cost effective way for Sonos fans to get their hands on a newer model - and who doesn’t love a hardware upgrade? However, the programme requires that owners have to put their ‘traded in’ speakers into what the company calls ‘Recycle Mode’. This activates a21-dayy countdown at which point the user receives the 30 percent discount. At the end of the 21 days, the speaker becomes blacklisted on the Sonos serviers, effectively preventing it from ever working again - euphemistically called ‘bricking’ since that’s all the device is now good for.

Once the 21 day countdown has been initiated it cannot be stopped, reversed or undone, meaning anyone who changes their mind can do nothing about it, so offering this period appears to serve no purpose. If anything it allows those without scruples to gain their 30 percent discount and sell on a device that is undergoing a countdown, only for the unaware buyer to be left with a non functioning speaker and a case of buyer’s remorse. Anyone who inadvertently initiates Recycle Mode is advised to contact Sonos Support as soon as possible. 

Sonos recommends that the disabled speaker is either returned to themselves or taken to a local recycling centre. And it’s here that @atomicthumbs, as an employee at an e-waste recycle outfit, discovered five Sonos speakers in good condition and each with a resale value of $200 - 250 that were impossible to recycle or reuse in any way and could only be scrapped. Once he posted his findings and voiced his disappointment at Sonos’s approach to recycling to Twitter, it became apparent that many other people were of a similar mind.

@atomicthumbs took the opportunity to remind everyone of the preferred sequence of options when it comes to reducing the environmental impact of consumers appetite for the latest and greatest tech.
Sonos 'recycle mode' intentionally bricks devices?

What is especially galling to users is that Sonos are championing their Trade Up position under the veil of slogans such as ‘Sustainability is non-negotiable’ and that they design products to minimize environmental impact, yet the drive to persuade its customers to upgrade to its newest products seems to be running counter to this.

Sonos website indicates that the deactivation process is to make sure that the speakers are “cleared of data and permanently deactivated so you can safely recycle.”

Well designed and constructed audio devices form the heart of a thriving second hand market amongst Hi-Fi enthusiasts and often encourages new fans to get started and grow their hobby. Here at AVForums, there are always plenty of ‘For Sale’ and ‘Wanted’ posts from members wanting to trade, buy or sell Hi-Fi devices via our busy Classified Adverts forums.

Upgrading kit is something that Hi-Fi and tech fans are normally keen to do, especially with the incentive of a discount but what do members think about Sonos’s approach to upgrading? Misguided or manipulative?

Source: Twitter, www.bbc.com, www.gizmondo.com
Image Source: Ifixit.com
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