Nirav Patel built Framework around a simple idea: when you buy a laptop, it should actually be yours. You should be able to swap out the ports, upgrade the memory, and replace the battery without asking permission. Now the CEO of the modular laptop company is warning that the PC industry is drifting in the opposite direction, toward a future where subscription fees determine which features on your own machine you can use.
Patel’s concerns, voiced during recent industry discussions and reported through event coverage in early 2025, center on a pattern that has been building for years. Software-as-a-service pricing has migrated from cloud applications into the hardware layer. Security tools, performance features, and management capabilities that once shipped with a PC purchase are increasingly gated behind recurring payments. Stop paying, and functionality you assumed was part of the machine disappears.
His warning lands at a moment when regulators, courts, and state legislatures are all pulling in different directions on the question of what “owning” a digital device actually means in 2026.
Why Framework’s position matters
Framework is not a typical PC company. Since launching in 2021, it has sold laptops designed from the ground up to be repaired, upgraded, and customized by their owners. Swappable expansion cards let users change their port configuration. RAM, storage, and batteries are user-replaceable. The company publishes repair guides and sells individual components directly.
That business model puts Patel in a distinct position to comment on ownership erosion. Framework’s entire value proposition depends on the idea that hardware belongs to the person who bought it. Subscription-locked features represent the philosophical opposite: a model where the manufacturer retains ongoing control over what the device can do.
Patel has not published a detailed policy white paper or released a full transcript of his remarks through official Framework channels. His comments have surfaced through secondary event recaps, which means the precise scope of his critique is not fully documented in the public record. But the concerns he has flagged align with regulatory and legal developments that are already reshaping the landscape.
The federal regulatory picture is fractured
In October 2024, the Federal Trade Commission finalized its Click-to-Cancel rule, which was designed to make it as easy to end a subscription as it is to start one. The rule targeted dark-pattern cancellation flows and required businesses to provide straightforward opt-out mechanisms for recurring charges.
But the rule ran into legal trouble. A federal appeals court blocked key provisions from taking effect, according to Associated Press reporting, leaving enforcement in limbo. As of spring 2026, the federal standard remains unsettled. The FTC has not publicly announced whether it will revise the rule, appeal, or pursue alternative enforcement strategies.
That stalemate has elevated the importance of state-level protections. California Attorney General Rob Bonta issued a consumer alert reinforcing the state’s Automatic Renewal Law, one of the strongest in the country. The law requires businesses to clearly disclose subscription terms before enrollment and provide simple cancellation methods. It applies to all auto-renewing services, from streaming platforms to software tools bundled with hardware.
For consumers outside California and the handful of states with similar statutes, the gap is real. Without enforceable federal rules, they may face confusing sign-up processes, buried cancellation options, and limited recourse when a company makes ending a subscription unreasonably difficult.
Copyright law adds another layer
Subscription transparency is only part of the problem. A deeper question is whether consumers can legally work around software locks on devices they own, and that question runs through the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
DMCA Section 1201 prohibits bypassing technological protection measures on copyrighted works. Every three years, the U.S. Copyright Office reviews whether specific uses deserve temporary exemptions through its Triennial Section 1201 Proceeding. Past cycles have granted exemptions for activities like vehicle repair, phone unlocking, and security research. The 2024 cycle covers a broad range of software-enabled devices, including consumer electronics.
Here is where the ownership debate gets concrete. If a PC manufacturer ties a hardware feature to subscription-authenticated software, and a consumer bypasses that lock after canceling the subscription, Section 1201 could make that act illegal, even though the consumer owns the physical machine. Without a specific exemption covering that scenario, the law effectively gives vendors a tool to maintain control over hardware long after the point of sale.
No specific petition or ruling addressing subscription-gated PC firmware has been identified in the current cycle’s public docket. The proceeding’s outcomes will not be finalized until the Copyright Office completes its review and issues recommendations to the Librarian of Congress. But the framework is clear: the exemptions granted in this process will shape, in practical terms, how much control PC owners retain over their own devices.
The trend is visible, even without hard numbers
Comprehensive industry data on how many PC features are currently locked behind subscriptions does not exist in the public record. But the pattern Patel describes is not hypothetical.
Microsoft’s shift to Microsoft 365 moved core productivity software from a one-time purchase to a recurring fee. HP’s Instant Ink program ties printer functionality to a subscription, with the company remotely disabling cartridges if a customer cancels. BMW briefly experimented with charging a monthly fee to unlock heated seats that were already physically installed in the vehicle. Each case follows the same logic: hardware ships with capabilities that the manufacturer can activate or deactivate based on payment status.
In the PC space specifically, security suites, cloud backup, and remote management tools are commonly bundled as subscription add-ons. Some manufacturers have explored tying performance optimization features to ongoing service plans. The line between “value-added service” and “feature you already paid for” is not always clear to the buyer.
The right-to-repair movement has pushed back on related practices with notable success. Oregon, Minnesota, California, and New York have all passed right-to-repair legislation in recent years, requiring manufacturers to provide parts, tools, and documentation to independent repair shops and consumers. Those laws address physical repair access, but they signal a broader shift in how legislators think about post-purchase control.
What consumers are navigating
The picture that emerges from these overlapping legal and regulatory threads is not simple. Consumers who want to maintain full control over their PCs are navigating a patchwork: copyright rules that can criminalize circumvention of software locks, federal subscription protections that are stalled in court, state laws that vary widely in strength, and hardware ecosystems that increasingly treat ongoing payments as a default.
Patel’s warning, even without a detailed transcript, points at a real and widening gap between what people believe they are buying when they purchase a computer and the rights they can actually enforce. The regulatory infrastructure around digital ownership is fragmented, contested, and moving slowly relative to the pace at which subscription models are spreading across the industry.
For now, the strongest consumer protections remain at the state level, and the strongest ownership-first hardware comes from companies like Framework that have made repairability and user control a core product feature rather than an afterthought. Whether the rest of the industry follows that lead, or doubles down on recurring revenue, will depend on how the legal and regulatory battles of the next few years play out.
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*This article was researched with the help of AI, with human editors creating the final content.
