Regarding ridiculously-expensive Apple heirloom tools: Go to eBay right now, and buy any Activation-Locked Apple device. It's OK, I'll wait.
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OK, now: try to use it to do something. Anything. Something as simple as write a NOTEPAD note, or play one song from iTunes.
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Nope! You are surely getting screenfulls of information telling you, this Apple device has been locked and only the original owner can unlock it.
I suppose this is to prevent people from stealing Apple devices and reselling them to pawn shops or on eBay and Craigslist, and it must be working. All thieves everywhere must know by now, don't even bother to try to steal an Apple device or a Tesla car, for as soon as you do it gets bricked from all the satellites in space.
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I'm writing this because I bought a nine year old iPad on eBay and have spent the last two weeks trying to get through to AL-SUPPORT Activation Lock support at Apple, asking them to unlock it. And of course they don't care, I am not the original owner of the device, and unless I am, it is as useless as a digital brick. Battery life, screen quality, beautiful craftsmanship of the item itself, nothing matters. It just sits there telling me I'm practically a criminal for even owning this device.
No matter that the original owner gave up on it long ago, when even the simplest apps like YouTube and Gmail stopped working on it, by design, intentional planned-obsolescence coming down from Apple themselves. With the iOS getting relentlessly updated every year, all the apps get forcibly recompiled and anything old just doesn't work any more at all.
They don't care about this device any more. It was just a real-world dongle they used to get information from and about the original owner, information they've got stored in their giant database in the Cloud. They don't really care about me at all.
I imagine the universe is now littered with these devices, an Oort Cloud of them completely surrounding the planet, mentally bricked by annual iOS updates and physically bricked by Activation Locks, I'm a criminal for owning one, and were I to bring it to an Apple store to complain, they would have no useful help for me at all, "Buy a new one!" they'll tell me, "that's our company policy!"
If it was stolen from the original owner then you don't really own the device legally and this is the anti-theft part of activation lock functioning as designed. If you're an innocent third party to the original theft, your remedy is to get a full refund.
If it was just because the original owner forgot to disable activation lock, you should be chasing them to unlock it for you. If they refuse, your remedy is to get a full refund.
edit: reputable recycling places require you to have disabled activation lock on functional devices, or they don't pay out.
I've got a bizarre situation in which an OS upgrade bricked my Mac. I can't remember the details now, but it was something about an interface change in which I had managed to activate 2FA, but the login interface didn't have an input box for it.
The device was old enough that I just heaved a sigh and gave it to Apple for recycling.
> What if I use two-factor authentication on a device running older software?
> If you use two-factor authentication with devices running older OS versions – such as an Apple TV (2nd or 3rd generation) – you may be asked to add your six-digit verification code to the end of your password when signing in. Get your verification code from a trusted device running iOS 9 and later or OS X El Capitan and later, or have it sent to your trusted phone number. Then type your password followed by the six-digit verification code directly into the password field.
This weirdly works in some other places. Iirc one of the Amazon's seller login pages accepts the 2FA code appended to the password to avoid having to go through another page.
> It just sits there telling me I'm practically a criminal
I mean, you bought stolen goods. The law says you are culpable to some degree. If this was a legit sale, the original owner would be willing to do what's needed to make it useable.
If you bought it from a less than reputable vendor, then this is the kind of thing that happens. If a reseller purchased this from the original owner in this condition, I would not call them a reputable dealer.
Apologies if this sounds like victim blaming, it's not what I'm going for. Just trying to enlighten on how to avoid this in the future.
=== ====
OK, now: try to use it to do something. Anything. Something as simple as write a NOTEPAD note, or play one song from iTunes.
=== ====
Nope! You are surely getting screenfulls of information telling you, this Apple device has been locked and only the original owner can unlock it.
I suppose this is to prevent people from stealing Apple devices and reselling them to pawn shops or on eBay and Craigslist, and it must be working. All thieves everywhere must know by now, don't even bother to try to steal an Apple device or a Tesla car, for as soon as you do it gets bricked from all the satellites in space.
=== ====
I'm writing this because I bought a nine year old iPad on eBay and have spent the last two weeks trying to get through to AL-SUPPORT Activation Lock support at Apple, asking them to unlock it. And of course they don't care, I am not the original owner of the device, and unless I am, it is as useless as a digital brick. Battery life, screen quality, beautiful craftsmanship of the item itself, nothing matters. It just sits there telling me I'm practically a criminal for even owning this device.
No matter that the original owner gave up on it long ago, when even the simplest apps like YouTube and Gmail stopped working on it, by design, intentional planned-obsolescence coming down from Apple themselves. With the iOS getting relentlessly updated every year, all the apps get forcibly recompiled and anything old just doesn't work any more at all.
They don't care about this device any more. It was just a real-world dongle they used to get information from and about the original owner, information they've got stored in their giant database in the Cloud. They don't really care about me at all.
I imagine the universe is now littered with these devices, an Oort Cloud of them completely surrounding the planet, mentally bricked by annual iOS updates and physically bricked by Activation Locks, I'm a criminal for owning one, and were I to bring it to an Apple store to complain, they would have no useful help for me at all, "Buy a new one!" they'll tell me, "that's our company policy!"
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Who is causing the problem here --- me, or Apple?