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The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#151

Post by twblalock »

ekimekim wrote: post #141
twblalock wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What right has not been protected? You do not have a right to require manufacturers to create repairable items. If you think such a right exists, prove it. That's what this "right" to repair really is -- it is forcing manufacturers to make things that they don't currently make, and that most people don't want to buy. (If people wanted to buy them, someone would already be selling them and making money on that segment…

I don't mind manufacturers making design decisions that, as a side effect, impact repairability (phones with removable batteries being the main example here). But it's another thing altogether to add tamper indicators, DRM, etc for the express purpose of preventing people from doing things with items they own.

Why shouldn't manufacturers have the right to include tamper-resistant features and DRM if they want to?

If you don't like those features, don't buy the products. If enough people share your preferences in this matter, companies will start tailoring products to those preferences. If too few people share those preferences for the companies to change their products, how is that anything other than the free market at work? You are not entitled to exactly the products you want, no matter what the market for those products is like.

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#152

Post by blastrat »

foota wrote: post #127
Obi_Juan_Kenobi wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Self-driving cars can also limit speed such that they'll always be able to stop for stationary obstacles. If it's a blind corner, they'll slow down.

True, but seeing as the article was about the ability of people to modify their car to for instance not do that I see where there could be a dilemma here.

thank your for saying this!!!

Because the article was completely about people REPAIRING technology they purchased, and not at all about mods, modding or modifications.

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#153

Post by [deleted] »

twblalock wrote: post #45
Aelinsaar wrote: post #2

A lot of issues surrounding the move to make anything and everything a "Service" are starting to become very clear. The issues with IoT devices being bricked, Tesla 'ownership', and so on really do need scrutiny from a functional body with a hint of the public's interest at heart.

> The issues with IoT devices being bricked, Tesla 'ownership', and so on really do need scrutiny from a functional body with a hint of the public's interest at heart. Oh great, another bureaucracy. Why should manufacturers be forced to make their products repairable by users? Why don't they have the right to make a non-repairable product, and let the market decide whether or not it succeeds? If people really want re…

[deleted]

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#154

Post by twblalock »

mindslight wrote: post #139
twblalock wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course market dynamics are a valid argument! They matter very much, because changes in the market affect peoples' quality of life. Policies that distort the market in a way that adversely affects peoples' quality of life should not be implemented without very good reasons. Even policies that are not expected to introduce such distortions often do, so it's good to be cautious about any proposals which could have un…

You're simultaneously wed to copyright because it's here, and arguing against a "right" to repair because it is not. So you're just repeating rationalizations for the current status quo. For the third time now - copyright and patents presume to create a type of creative product wherein it is not the manufacture of the product that is really being sold to the consumer, but the design of it. A person buys a cell phone…

> You're simultaneously wed to copyright because it's here, and arguing against a "right" to repair because it is not. So you're just repeating rationalizations for the current status quo.

Oh, so you're a mind reader who can figure out my motivations? By the way, those are arguments, not rationalizations. They are pretty good, too.

> For the third time now - copyright and patents presume to create a type of creative product wherein it is not the manufacture of the product that is really being sold to the consumer, but the design of it. A person buys a cell phone not for the plastic and doped silicon it is made of, but ostensibly for the abstract structure of the way that they are arranged.

So what? Nothing in this logically necessitates any conclusions about repairability of products.

> Since the person is buying an instance of a design, it stands to reason that they should have the ability to service the physical manifestation and otherwise directly interact with that design.

How exactly does your previous statement logically necessitate this? Show your work. Otherwise, it is a handwavy "stands to reason," "it's just obvious" kind of assertion.

> It's not surprising that companies want to have their cake and eat it too - implementing only the half of an abstraction that takes away a consumer's rights while ignoring the second half and leaving them subject to law-of-the-jungle.

What rights are being taken away? In your first sentence, you argued that a right to repair is not "here." How then can it then be violated or taken away by companies? How can anyone violate a non-existent right?

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#155

Post by blastrat »

The_Hoff wrote: post #11

For me, Apple devices are always what come to mind when thinking about ability to repair and modify. I used to not mind when I couldn't open my iPod Classic to replace the battery, because failures like this rarely occurred and when they did Apple repaired them easily. Today however, when something as trivial as a computer memory upgrade is restricted, and the Genius Bar is overloaded with iPhone screen repairs, I fi…

Even when others cared and decried the walled gardens...

...I used to not mind when I couldn't open my iPod Classic to replace the battery, because failures like this rarely occurred and when they did Apple repaired them easily...

...then when I started to need to care, there were no brands left that cared for me.

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#156

Post by drdeca »

dragonwriter wrote: post #85
mikeash wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Per hour" is rather ridiculous. I'm talking about per crash . There are a couple million vehicle crashes in the US each year, so if it really is 99.9999%, that's two or three ethical crises per year here. Among a billion vehicles it would be maybe ten per year. And honestly I'd be surprised if it's that many. When have you ever heard of a crash where there was any kind of ethical dilemma in the response? People keep…

> I'm talking about the car's ethical choices in crashes, not the ethics of the programmers. Cars are not entities to which ethics can be ascribed; the humans building, designing, and programming them are.

I think another way to phrase what you are saying is that "Cars are not moral agents." .

Apparently there has been some disagreement as to whether cars can be moral agents?

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#157

Post by foota »

blastrat wrote: post #152
foota wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, but seeing as the article was about the ability of people to modify their car to for instance not do that I see where there could be a dilemma here.

thank your for saying this!!! Because the article was completely about people REPAIRING technology they purchased, and not at all about mods, modding or modifications.

They're pretty much one and the same, how can you allow someone to repair something without allowing them to modify it as well? What if they repair it badly?

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#158

Post by [deleted] »

twblalock wrote: post #151
ekimekim wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't mind manufacturers making design decisions that, as a side effect, impact repairability (phones with removable batteries being the main example here). But it's another thing altogether to add tamper indicators, DRM, etc for the express purpose of preventing people from doing things with items they own.

Why shouldn't manufacturers have the right to include tamper-resistant features and DRM if they want to? If you don't like those features, don't buy the products. If enough people share your preferences in this matter, companies will start tailoring products to those preferences. If too few people share those preferences for the companies to change their products, how is that anything other than the free market at wo…

[deleted]

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#159

Post by femto »

Houshalter wrote: post #123
CodeCube wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious to hear what these advantages would be ... not saying there aren't, just having a hard time thinking about what you might mean.

Getting to your destination faster. Driving slightly faster than the speed limit, keeping less distance from cars, cutting them off, etc. I'm not sure if anyone would be willing or able to reprogram a self driving car to do that. But I do think its plausible people would abuse self driving cars. E.g. carelessly walking into traffic knowing the self driving cars will reliably still stop and be passive.

Keep in mind that self-driving cars will be loaded with sensors. Car's will basically be running continuous surveillance on their neighbours, and any "rogue" car will probably be reported by surrounding vehicles.

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#160

Post by ryandrake »

twblalock wrote: post #149
dwaltrip wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you think the government regulates food labels? Clearly, no one wants to buy food with standardized labels, the government is just forcing it on us poor citizens, right? If you are actually arguing that any government policy that requires companies to modify their products in a way that they weren't already doing is bad, you have created a very difficult position for yourself to defend.

> If you are actually arguing that any government policy that requires companies to modify their products in a way that they weren't already doing is bad, you have created a very difficult position for yourself to defend. I don't know why you interpret my argument that way. It's not a blanket statement against government regulation of products, and none of what I wrote can logically necessitate or lead to that positi…

The "right" to repair one's own stuff is as made-up as the "right" to encumber products with repair-resistant features.

This is not a question of what's etched into stone tablets somewhere, it's a question of what we value as society. When what people want to do conflicts with what companies want people to do, who gets to win? The simplistic answer is to just throw your hands up and "let the market decide." But the market is not always correct, which is why we have warning labels on cigarettes and why companies can't dump industrial waste into the closest river. Society decided that we have a made-up right to be informed about dangerous products and a made-up right to not have to drink arsenic.

The argument put forward here is that our made-up right to be able to repair our own stuff is more valuable than some company's made-up right to stop us.

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