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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”

#171

Post by ksk »

twblalock wrote: post #165
ksk wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What right has not been protected? The right to complete ownership of an item you paid full price on. More and more manufacturers want to erode this right and make it "illegal" for people to repair products they paid for. Did you not read the article?

Ownership is not all-encompassing. For example, it would be illegal for me to make and sell copies of the books I own. It would also be illegal for me to drive over the speed limit in the car I own. If I owned a gun, I couldn't just shoot anyone I wanted. What makes you certain that the right to repair something is a built-in feature of ownership, when ownership clearly does not confer all possible rights? Ownership…

So first, you produce an example that literally has nothing to do with repair. Then your point about the gun is even more absurd. Depriving somebody else of their right to life has absolutely nothing to do with what we're talking about here. Sorry, you will have to excuse me as I have better things to do and do not wish to engage you further.

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#172

Post by pessimizer »

twblalock wrote: post #162
ryandrake wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 m…

All rights are manmade. Rights are social constructs. I'm not looking for stone tablets anywhere. But simply saying that a right exists does not make it so. If that is all it takes, please excuse me for a moment while I go declare, and then exercise, my right to rob a bank. Like any social construct, a right exists when it is broadly accepted as a fact and is operational within society. It helps if you make it a law,…

As you say, all rights are social constructs. Therefore you don't "prove" a right exists, as you demanded, you make a right exist by discussing it and lobbying for it. That's what happening here. I say that the market is not correct because it leads to bad outcomes. You seem to be saying that the outcome isn't bad because the market doesn't lead to it. I'm making an assertion that I believe the right to repair is a positive (for many reasons.) You seem to be making an assertion that markets are always right. I just have to convince - because I'm making a statement about what I think we should prefer in society. You have to prove, because you're making a claim of objective fact.

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#173

Post by ams6110 »

eru wrote: post #113
mikeash wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the ethical question is greatly overblown. The odds of being in a situation where there's any sort of ethical choice to make are so remote as to not really be worth considering. 99.9999% of the time, the correct choice when faced with an impending crash will be to brake as hard as the driving surface allows and steer to avoid obstacles as much as possible. In any case, tinkering and commons already intersect…

Wow, I just looked up "rolling coal". I can maybe get the political protest aspect---even if I disagree, but blowing the smoke at pedestrians, cyclist or even just other cars seems like one of the most dickish things ever.

I've seen it happen firsthand a couple of times. In both cases it was done after the cyclists stayed two abreast instead of singling up to let traffic pass.

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#174

Post by pessimizer »

azraomega wrote: post #119
jlg23 wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> While I hate companies suing people for repairing their own properties, "right" has been overused so many places. I don't think it is outrageous to claim ownership to something that I bought. If a company does not want me to repair my own property, put a big "not for sale, only for lease" label on the package.

How's it resemble "for lease"? They didn't sue people for repairing, they sued for illegally obtaining their internal documentation. We are talking about our "right" to force other to do something rather than protecting ourselves from being forced. It should be business issue, not an actual human right issue.

All business issues are issues of property and contract rights.

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#175

Post by em3rgent0rdr »

No need for a "Right" to repair. What is needed is abolishment of intellectual property laws which allow companies to claim what you think is your legitimately purchased property. The core problem with intellectual property is that it trumps physical property.

Companies shouldn't be forced by government to make repairable devices. A better way would be some sort of "Repair Coalition" of consumers and companies which agree to boycott unrepairable products and respectively produce repairable products with instructions.

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#176

Post by avindroth »

I once had to fix a fairly complex piece of electronics and when I asked the company for a repair, they told me the directions over the phone. Unscrew this, take that out, check this, boom.

I was more than impressed by their confidence in their hardware.

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#177

Post by Fomite »

mikeash wrote: post #46
rando3826 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think the ethical question is greatly overblown. Not at all. One programmer is going to make choices that affect ~ a billion vehicles one day, so something that doesn't happen 99.9999% per hour will happen 100 times per hour. And it's going to be more mundane things, like programming the speed limit 1 mph slower results in 500 less deaths per year, or using drm/copyright to stop poor people from getting driving s…

"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 like how you're going to fight about other people's numbers, but act like "99.9999%" is in any way meaningful.

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#178

Post by gohrt »

mikeash wrote: post #19
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #4

I think this whole open source and right to repair/modify will be very interesting with self-driving cars, because of their interaction with the commons. Here are some issues. There have been some discussions about the ethics of self-driving cars if it should sacrifice the lives of the people in the cars to save more lives. In a right to repair/modify wouldn't a lot of people pay to have the algorithm changed for the…

I think the ethical question is greatly overblown. The odds of being in a situation where there's any sort of ethical choice to make are so remote as to not really be worth considering. 99.9999% of the time, the correct choice when faced with an impending crash will be to brake as hard as the driving surface allows and steer to avoid obstacles as much as possible. In any case, tinkering and commons already intersect…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolling_coal

Amazing. Intentional, premeditated, assault and battery and vandalism carries a penalty of just $5,000.

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#179

Post by twblalock »

ksk wrote: post #171
twblalock wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ownership is not all-encompassing. For example, it would be illegal for me to make and sell copies of the books I own. It would also be illegal for me to drive over the speed limit in the car I own. If I owned a gun, I couldn't just shoot anyone I wanted. What makes you certain that the right to repair something is a built-in feature of ownership, when ownership clearly does not confer all possible rights? Ownership…

So first, you produce an example that literally has nothing to do with repair. Then your point about the gun is even more absurd. Depriving somebody else of their right to life has absolutely nothing to do with what we're talking about here. Sorry, you will have to excuse me as I have better things to do and do not wish to engage you further.

You are very good at missing the point.

Those examples demonstrate that ownership does not automatically give one the right to do whatever they want with the things they own. Therefore, one cannot assume that any right, including one to repair the things you own, is in the category of rights automatically granted by ownership. After all, not even making copies is in that category. Why would repair be?

Re: The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

#180

Post by twblalock »

pessimizer wrote: post #172
twblalock wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All rights are manmade. Rights are social constructs. I'm not looking for stone tablets anywhere. But simply saying that a right exists does not make it so. If that is all it takes, please excuse me for a moment while I go declare, and then exercise, my right to rob a bank. Like any social construct, a right exists when it is broadly accepted as a fact and is operational within society. It helps if you make it a law,…

As you say, all rights are social constructs. Therefore you don't "prove" a right exists, as you demanded, you make a right exist by discussing it and lobbying for it. That's what happening here. I say that the market is not correct because it leads to bad outcomes. You seem to be saying that the outcome isn't bad because the market doesn't lead to it. I'm making an assertion that I believe the right to repair is a p…

What is happening here is that people are claiming that the right to repair already exists, and is being violated by companies. If they think it should exist, that's what they should have argued. But that isn't what they wrote. They wrote that the right does exist. Almost everyone in this thread used that language. That's what I'm arguing against.

I'm not saying that market outcomes are good or bad in general -- they are just there, as the pre-existing default position that may or may not demand a regulatory response. Any action taken should be on the basis that the default position is suboptimal in some way, and that regulation will make a positive difference. Otherwise, it is best to leave things as they are by default, especially when you consider the expense and unintended side effects that accompany regulation.

It seems to me that the only problem with the market outcome in this particular discussion is that some people aren't happy that the products being produced do not have a certain feature they like, namely repairability. This is clearly not the personal preference of most consumers, because if it was, companies would produce products to appeal to that preference. So clearly we are dealing with a small number of consumers who want this feature. That's not a strong case to change the outcome.

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