From @pluralistic:

"Earlier this year, many people with Argus optical implants – which allow blind people to see – lost their vision when the manufacturer, Second Sight, went bust.

"Nano Precision Medical, the company's new owners, aren't interested in maintaining the implants, so that's the end of the road for everyone with one of Argus's 'bionic' eyes. The $150,000 per eye that those people paid is gone, and they have failing hardware permanently wired into their nervous systems.

"Having a bricked eye implant doesn't just rob you of your sight – many Argus users experience crippling vertigo and other side effects of nonfunctional implants. The company has promised to 'do our best to provide virtual support' to people whose Argus implants fail – but no more parts and no more patches."

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/12/unsafe-at-any-speed/#this-is-literally-your-brain-on-capitalism

Pluralistic: Orphaned neurological implants (12 Dec 2022) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow

@Marmoset @pluralistic It's bullshit like this that inspired my "cyberpunk standards" post a few years ago (https://www.joncamfield.com/blog/2019.02/cyberpunk-standards.html , https://github.com/joncamfield/cyberpunkstandards/ ) - implants should either be fully open source from the hardware up, or have baked-in openness at the first whiff of support drying up. Honestly, WTAF.
Cyberpunk Standards

The future of technology requires a dramatic shift from the present to place ownership and control back in the hands of consumers

Jon Camfield Dot Com