Pipe down. I am allowed to have an opinion. When I bought MY phone, I was promised upgrades to the phones OS.
If a company is releasing a phone into a market they should know how their suppliers are distributing, so if they know in the UK most mobile companies dont do 12 month contracts, then they shouldnt tell us after 12 months that your phone is old news. I know that technology moves fast, but is it to much to ask to have a phone that moves on with the times.
And finally, rooting should not be an option. It is clearly against my warranty so I shouldnt have to depend on it.
I gotta ask, who promised you upgrades?
if that was a network provider, then they only did this to get you to buy....as many have commented on this thread and others....Network providers, especially in this country are damn ruthless, unscrupulous bastards who don't care what you buy as long as they tie you in.
Though I will say, thank god the EU banned 36 month contracts here....otherwise it would be a big world of hurt for many. Saying that, im on a 24 month contract and cant only change handset, a 106 days or so before the end of the 24 months....
As to manufacturers not knowing bout the UK's 'few 12 month contracts', well yes I will agree partly in this....but as you said yourself, tech moves fast, so fast that once one product hits the shelves then its already obsolete as they are working on its replacement(s). So for HTC to have covered the Desire *THIS* long, is actually something of a big thing. Hell Nokia were STILL releasing new firmwares for the VERY old, 5800 music phone (though this kind of cover is rare really).
You have to look at it from a business point of view, its not cost effective to really keep supporting an 'older' phone when the public want 'bigger, faster etc'. Granted though I know 'most' of the market don't care bout new, companies will always look to the ones that *DO*....just look at Apple, rumoured to be releasing the iPad3 (supposedly) in september months after the second one came out...as well as the iPhone 4 white version months before the iPhone 5, of which the same people who bought an original 4, bought the white, will only buy the 5 too.....its called consumer demand and its sickening at times to see things operate that way.
All that said, I will agree that companies should support products for longer and in noway is this post a dig at anything you said....cos I agree with you...even about the rooting argument...we shouldn't really have to break warranty to get the most out of the phone if it a) was too locked down, b) upgrades don't do what you want etc.....
But then again, I bought 2 cheap bookcases from argos and cut holes in the back board so I can run game console cables and speaker cables through them, because buying bookcases that HAVE either no back board or purpose built for that usually cost a fortune....so you know we see this kind of "break warranty for full use of product" everywhere really...
I dunno where I was going with this lol
I haven't really checked into the status of rooting the official 2.3 as I never bothered with it...I've been rooted/rom'd for ages now and sit with GingerVillian anyway..