Garmin Connect+, “now with AI features” but only a matter of time before they start paywalling what they used to give away for free. The backlash will be fierce, but shareholders don’t care about sentiment until it hurts the bottom line, and they are courting lots of new users who want marginally better battery life but still need the (illustrious) shiny AMOLED screens.

It’s clear that Garmin has started adopting the enshifficiation playbook. It’s going to be moving away from their core value proposition towards courting more users and squeezing more money out of them, and leaving behind the people that used the product for the thoughtful value and experience that it initially offered that differentiated it from its competitors.

If they are wise at all, and don’t want to (or care about) alienating early adopters then will will do what Oura and ReMarkable have done and offer lifetime subscriptions to those folks (which I’m sure they won’t because they are already a more established brand than that.