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A “right to repair” movement tools up
271–280 of 321 posts
Re: A “right to repair” movement tools up
#272I will admit that I am not a fan of the "right to repair" movement in terms of what I've seen from it so far when it comes to actual legislative proposals, and I also find a lot of the way it talks down to current consumers and market forces distasteful and short sighted. I can absolutely see how in some areas of production narrowly tailored rules might be beneficial in terms of efforts manufacturers make to prevent…
You wrote too much, you should start a blog instead.
The battery issue is your weakest argument. Batteries are consumables, they should be replaceable. Apple could make it a little bit easier to accomplish that simple task without compromising their design. It doesn't have to be like an Android phone with a removable back, it just has to not break so damn easily when a tech person opens it. It is absurd that a $1000 smartphone can't be repaired in any meaningful way except for a full factory refurbishment. Huge imposition on the "owner" of that product.
Re: A “right to repair” movement tools up
#273How about right to use your stuff how you want? Like not paying 10s of thousands for a Tesla that has a clause against using autopilot with ride sharing services other than Tesla.
Where do I find all this mythical stuff that I want? I want a new car with no software, no computers, no GPS, no radio, no power windows, no keyless entry, no thermostat. Where do I find it? Realistically I can only chose between crap I don't want. And if I buy an older car, not only I have to deal with problems that would otherwise be avoidable if I bought a new car, but the government doesn't want me to use old car…
I disagree--the incentives to own and operate older cars are there. My new car has a huge license fee that degrades as the car ages. Same with insurance--my 30 year old BMW with only basic liability coverage is a couple hundred bucks a years whereas our new 2017 Toyota with all the bells and whistles is nearly a grand.
Re: A “right to repair” movement tools up
#274Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If you tax gas, you effectively tax everything, and that's not okay for any economy. Why? The purpose of the carbon tax is to capture the negative externality of carbon pollution, and to encourage more energy-efficient industries. Not all parts of the economy use equal amounts of energy, and we should encourage the energy-efficient ones. I burn carbon when I drive my car to work. I burn much less carbon when I take…
> I burn much less carbon when I take the bus to work. I understand that. It's the obvious reasoning behind a gas tax. My entire point is that there are also other effects. If gas prices raise significantly, then the price of everything - groceries, medication, clothing, cleaning supplies, solar panels, everything - raises, meaning simple things that everyone relies on suddenly become unaffordable to low-wage workers…
I'm running some code through the profiler right now. I'm working on improving that function that is using 17% of CPU, rather than the dozens clocking in at less than 1%.
If I can get that 17% function to run in 94% of the time, that is a greater gain from less effort than making any of those The same principle applies to air pollution. Focus on the container ships burning bunker oil and the power plants burning coal first. Personal transportation using internal combustion engines is one of those 1% things, and even then, just taxing the gasoline won't help all that much.
As parent mentioned, it will also stifle the economic activity that could allow ordinary people to afford capital investments like at-home solar energy systems. And while one presumes that a "carbon tax" on gasoline fuel should be used to combat air pollution elsewhere, that is not necessarily how it will be spent.
Re: A “right to repair” movement tools up
#275I hope at some point we'll start including recycling/disassembly and replacement externalities into price somehow. I don't know how you would do that in a fair way, but it is frustrating that there aren't a ton of corrective market forces to encourage manufacturers to make highly reusable, repairable, recyclable devices. All of this electronics churn is environmentally terrible, and it's frustrating that, as with car…
That already happens, but on a different scale. When Apple has to repair or replace an iPhone, they're giving you a remanufactured iPhone using reused internal parts like screws or shielding. This is factored into the costs of an iPhone which keeps them 'lower' / profit margins higher.
A digression, but I doubt screws are one of the parts the retain for re-manufactured devices, is that really true? I thought those screws they use with the thread-lock coatings were only rated for one insertion.
Re: A “right to repair” movement tools up
#276Planned obsolescence is why I will never invest more than 100 euros into a phone. I will always wait to buy low-priced, fast enough for me hardware. I still remember how my macbook pro started to be slow and unusable after OSX updates. My real wish is that one day, computer or smartphone hardware might last at least 5 or even 10 years. I know software is evolving quickly, but there comes a point where I don't think y…
My laptop (Thinkpad X60) is over 10 years old and still works well for what I use it for. There's even an FSF-approved free BIOS for it. My desktop is approaching 8 years, and I haven't found it limiting either, only buying more storage for it over time. I also have a backup server that's nearly 20 years old. All it does is serve disks so it doesn't need to be very fast either. It really depends on what you do and ho…
I have found that dual-core+ desktop machines from the mid-2000s last quite awhile. Laptops can be a mixed bag depending on how upgradable the internals are / how powerful the internal GPU is.
I gave my sister recently a T420s that I had lying around, and the thing still screams.
Re: A “right to repair” movement tools up
#277Earlier quoted context omitted.
In Poland, and I believe it's an EU regulation, every seller is obligated to take your old appliances when you buy new ones in the same category. For example when you buy a freezer you can drop your old one for recycling free of charge (so the cost is included in the retail price). Sometimes it's even used in marketing ("bring your old TV, get new one 10% cheaper"), maybe because they need to meet some quotas so they…
This is very common in the US, although there is no regulation governing it. Most places will take your old appliances away when they deliver your new ones. Heck, our power company will pay you $35 if you recycle a working fridge or freezer through them. With them coming out to pick it up for free. The idea being that a lot of people stick their old, inefficient fridge in the basement or garage when they get a new on…
They didn't start doing that of their own accord.
Re: A “right to repair” movement tools up
#278Honorable mention to the coffee grinders' manufacturer Baratza. They publish detailed instructions on how to repair their grinders, make videos showing how it's done, sell replacement parts and recommend service centers. [0] https://www.baratza.com
This actually factored into my purchasing decision when I got a baratza grinder. I'd been using a hand crank burr grinder for about a year, and figured it was worth getting an electric one. Mine is pretty easy to disassemble, there's mods available (mostly ways to trick it out) and I've taken it apart to adjust the grind already (plus to clean it and so on).
For me, it was youtube videos of the grinders being used / reassembled / cleaned that made up my mind. I mean, if you're going to spend $200+ on a grinder, it's nice to know ahead of time that you can fiddle with it.
Re: A “right to repair” movement tools up
#279Earlier quoted context omitted.
I love his personal philosophy videos. Really sharp guy.
Only if you agree with a simplistic "taxes bad, equality bad, free markets good" philosophy. I find it rather tiresome and not very thoughtful.
I'm neutral on his political stances. I think either a strong shift towards extremely free markets (i.e., healthcare and education highly privatized and non-subsidized), or towards highly regulated markets (i.e., healthcare and education fully publicized and price-regulated) would both be a step in the right direction. Either case seems like it lends towards cheaper services. There's something to be said for age old Adam Smith principles, but I think the "FEWER REGULATIONS!" statement requires more nuance than most people who espouse it tend to afford.
I feel like we're at the very bottom of a parabolic curve right now where everyone is getting fucked due to fake money being injected into these systems. I think above all, what everyone can agree on, is that the individual should come first, and policy should follow. The amount of large businesses with their hands in politics is really the struggle he's crusading against.
I can definitely see where he comes from as a small business owner -- it seems like the same injustice that individuals feel towards certain sections of the upper class is magnified. I think it's helpful to hear small-business owners' side of the argument, because they really are the ones who stand to be hurt most by moving further left, unless done with careful tact.
Re: A “right to repair” movement tools up
#280Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sure but it seems a little inefficient to send them individually is my point.
You never ship them individually, you use containers. And it's probably quite efficient: the shipping boats have to return to China anyway to get more stuff.
I'm referring to the shipping of the broken goods to amazon individually. That's the part I'm critical of.
Sure, send them back to China, I don't care, it just seems silly that we would all just mail our broken junk back one piece at a time to AMazon who then puts it in a container and sends it to China.
Better to take it to alocal recycling facility for them to send it en masse. Have Amazon give you a voucher to handle the recycling fee.