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Supreme Court Sides with Consumers–Affirms Your Right to Repair Stuff

nationaleconomicseditorial.com

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Re: Supreme Court Sides with Consumers–Affirms Your Right to Repair Stuff

#31

Post by jaredklewis »

yladiz wrote: post #26
jaredklewis wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This case rules on patents because the case before them was about patents. But for me, when I read the decision I got sense that the court felt the pendulum had swung too far away from consumers, and that things need to be balanced out with a stronger view of the first sale doctrine. Given this change in thinking, I am optimistic future cases dealing with non-patent issues will yield similar results.

Maybe, but this suit rules only on patents and you can't infer beyond that. Take, for example, this line in the case (on page 10, under pp II A): > The single-use/no-resale restrictions in Lexmark’s contracts with customers may have been clear and enforceable under contract law... IANAL, but this makes me think that the case would only be applied to patent issues, because it doesn't rule about anything concerning con…

Sure I don't dispute that it only rules on patent issues. But, I think it is often possible to get a sense of how the court will rule on future decisions by reading their past rulings to get a sense of their thinking. And while there is a lot to be said for each justice's individual personality, on this issue they were unanimous.

My reading of the decision was that the court wasn't just clarifying the bounds of patent law, with no real interest in the consumer perspective. I felt a court that was concerned about the way consumer rights are heading.

If companies start spamming the public with grabby adhesion contracts for everyday purchases, I think the court is going to be very concerned.

Of course, this is just my intuition and reading. We won't know for sure until the next consumer rights case, but I am optimistic.

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Consumers–Affirms Your Right to Repair Stuff

#34

Post by duskwuff »

extrapickles wrote: post #16
jfoutz wrote: post #5

Man, if only they'd made the cartridge play a little tune when the chip is disabled. Then they could do the full DMCA game. Seems like the key to modern security is to have something copyrighted behind a terrible lock

TrackIR uses a shitty poem as part of its initialization routine so it will fall under copyright so the makers can control who writes software for it.

That seems unlikely to hold up in court. Sega v. Accolade was a very similar situation, and the court found that Accolade's use of a copyrighted string (the "Trademark Security System") was acceptable as an unavoidable requirement of Sega's console.

Details: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega_v._Accolade

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Consumers–Affirms Your Right to Repair Stuff

#35

Post by concede_pluto »

matt4077 wrote: post #12
lsiebert wrote: post #2

I expect we will only have a license to operate printers/ink cartridges at some point in the future, rather then owning them.

Well, this Supreme Court opinion says the exact opposite, so your expectation probably wrong for points in the short- and medium-term future.

The industry has two choices: stop trying to impose post-sale restrictions, or start openly leasing products for a limited time instead of selling them.

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Consumers–Affirms Your Right to Repair Stuff

#36

Post by throwaway91111 »

yladiz wrote: post #9

Here is the ruling if anyone is interested (the opinion starts on page 6): https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/16pdf/15-1189_ebfj.pdf I think this article is taking what the ruling says and bringing it a bit far. Essentially this suit was about Lexmark suing a "remanufacturer", Impression Products, Inc., that takes used ink cartridges and refills them, instead of the consumer returning them to Lexmark, for parent i…

The issue is in defining sales; for instance, John Deere licenses the software to their vehicles.

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Consumers–Affirms Your Right to Repair Stuff

#37

Post by avmich »

The article has this:

> Impression v Lexmark Isn’t About Printer Ink, It’s About Property Rights

to which one can agree. The object of discussion isn't limited to these two companies and this one product.

Then later article says:

> Also, how much weight do we assign those forms that no one ever reads?

and one would assume this could be given an even bigger weight. People accuse Bitcoin in wasting electricity but an obvious question with laws and law practices at least in US which commands a lot of resources is raised relatively rarely.

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Consumers–Affirms Your Right to Repair Stuff

#38

Post by yorwba »

icantdrive55 wrote: post #8
CaliforniaKarl wrote: post #3

This case was covered on HN recently, in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14446261 I think this editorial is making this case out to be more than it is. There are many ways that a company can work to restrict a person's ability to modify a product that they have purchased. Patent infringement is one way, and that argument's effectiveness has been reduced. But there are other ways that a person's ability can be re…

Or, a company just refuses to sell you parts. If the Rolex on my wrist stops working, I can take it apart, and clean/oil it, but couldn't buy a part from Rolex. That is without going through a lot of expensive training, and certification. Even then--their master plan is just restricting parts, so you need to send it back to them. "Here is you $900 bill from the Rolex factory". Companies will just start ramping up the…

It seems like you have been shadowbanned for quite a while now. I looked at your comment history and didn't see anything that would deserve that. I think if you emailed the mods you could get that ban reverted.

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Consumers–Affirms Your Right to Repair Stuff

#39

Post by extrapickles »

B0073D wrote: post #25
extrapickles wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TrackIR uses a shitty poem as part of its initialization routine so it will fall under copyright so the makers can control who writes software for it.

Do you have a source for that? (no pun intended)

You can find one of their DCMA notices here: https://www.lumendatabase.org/notices/63305#
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