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Support for right-to-repair laws slowly grows

arstechnica.com

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Re: Support for right-to-repair laws slowly grows

#221

Post by woliveirajr »

Aromasin wrote: post #220
woliveirajr wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, but even in your example your thinking in spending $20k for a $500 piece for being able to use something that costs much more than $20k. Perhaps I should made it clear in the original reply: what I expect is to own the thing I buy. And owning it means that I should be able to do whatever I want with it, including fix it using third-party suppliers. Of course, if we think of extremes, I think that SpaceX will char…

Poor example then, but I have worked with aircraft where we've paid hundreds for a bolt, which is more than the price of the thing we're fixing, just so we don't have to go through the pain of replacing the whole unit - even though it would be cheaper. Again, I don't think when it comes to spares we should expect a company to continue to support a legacy product indefinitely. I don't expect Apple to continue producin…

I understand you, and when I wrote the first post I was thinking on regular things, things that are (more or less) used by everybody on a regular basis. I understand that many exceptions are possible, many niche markets, many specific situations.

I'm just complaining that while we have many discussion on where to dump electronic garbage, how to protect landfills from heavy metals, how to avoid so many mili- micro- nano- plastic fragments from being ingested with tap water... we also consider that programmed obsolescense is just business pratice. Not being able to repair something is ok to protect business, prevent terrorists and protect children. And in the end it's even consumer fault, because we could buy things that aren't disposable. And when we spend $300 on a printer, instead of $50, everybody assumption is that at first you bought the cheaper option. And that even $300 is the cheaper, you should have spent $500.

Then everybody complains that someone else should do something concious about environment, and everybody forgets that "everybody should do something" is exactly why governments exists, are elected and legislate. Because government shouldn't be more than "everybody".

Re: Support for right-to-repair laws slowly grows

#222

Post by antisemiotic »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #218
brandonmenc wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because I print like ten pages a year, and I'd rather not have to drop half a grand or more on a printer like in the old days just for that.

If you print ten pages a year, I'd rather you go to a print shop instead of being yet another person whose inkjet printer will end up in a landfill in a year.

Or buy a laser printer, they don't seem to mind sitting on a shelf for years.

Re: Support for right-to-repair laws slowly grows

#223

Post by magduf »

larkost wrote: post #120

I am generally in favor of being able to repair things, but this is complicated and I have yet to see a good discussion (let alone legislative proposal) that takes into account all of the nuance I see as necessary: 1. There has definitely been abuse of cryptographic locking by parties such as John Deer. I feel that places where such locking is used only to prevent third-party repairs it should be illegal. 2. I feel t…

>4. Devices that are built to be repaired are in the general best-interests of everyone at large (e.g.: environmental issues), but the forces of capitalism are generally against reuse. So we clearly need some system to rebalance the scales a bit, but how to do this without killing progress seems difficult (e.g.: the system-on-a-chip makes most of the guts of a cell phone one piece, and that is the direction of better devices).

I don't see how it's a difficult concept that not everything needs to be repairable at the molecular level. Is a phone "less repairable" because it uses a CPU instead of discrete logic chips? Is some 1971-vintage arcade game "less repairable" because it uses discrete logic chips instead of resistors and transistors? Is some electronic item from the 60s "less repairable" because it uses resistors and transistors instead of resistors and diodes?

It's pretty simple: if a part is easily available in a factory for assembly into a final device, that's probably a repair part. For a modern smartphone, that would be the motherboard, not the CPU. (It is possible to replace cellphone CPUs however, but it's a very difficult operation requiring special equipment and training.)

For legal issues, however, I think it's pretty simple: if the manufacturer is able to repair it, then anyone should be able to offer that same service, if they can acquire the tools. No one should be held back by laws that only benefit the manufacturer.

>1. There has definitely been abuse of cryptographic locking by parties such as John Deer. I feel that places where such locking is used only to prevent third-party repairs it should be illegal.

This is much trickier than the SoC issue, but I agree with you: if the only purpose of something is to prevent 3rd-party repairs or replacement parts (as with printer ink/toner), then it should be illegal.

Re: Support for right-to-repair laws slowly grows

#224

Post by magduf »

CDSlice wrote: post #198
laughinghan wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love everything about your discussion. 1. 100% agree 2. I've thought a little bit about this. I think it would be fine if the warranty can't be voided if the consumer can show in court that there's a preponderance of evidence that the issue they're having is unrelated to the third-party repair. This might mean in practice warranties hard to enforce if you've gone in for third-party repair, but I feel like usually i…

I think that for 3 the problem isn't having a spyware fingerprint sensor that steals your fingerprint but rather having a fake fingerprint reader that always reports a match which would let you break into any iPhone.

I know someone else said this, but why would the sensor be verifying anything at all? It should just be reading the pattern of the fingerprint, and feeding that to the CPU where it's verified in software.

Does your keyboard store all your passwords and let your OS know your login was valid? Of course not. The keyboard just tells the OS which keys you pressed.

Re: Support for right-to-repair laws slowly grows

#225

Post by magduf »

naikrovek wrote: post #124

I hate that Deere is singularly picked on, here. Other vehicle manufacturers have followed in John Deere's footsteps with this, and no one cites those manufacturers' actions; only John Deere. I guess it's because they were first?

Do you have any actual examples showing how Deere's competitors are as bad? No, "other vehicle manufacturers" don't count; this whole thing started because farmers couldn't get their machinery working and harvest crops on time, so Mercedes or BMW doing something similar is irrelevant since they don't make farm equipment.

Re: Support for right-to-repair laws slowly grows

#226

Post by magduf »

artursapek wrote: post #26

I recently discovered Louis Rossman's Youtube channel and it planted a virus in my head to make me want to try much harder to repair things. Recently my water bottle leaked on my $2000 Thinkpad and fried the LAN card. Ubuntu started complaining that it couldn't find the Wireless adapter to find wifi networks. I think a couple years ago, I'd have just thrown in the towel right away and bought a new computer. Instead I…

>Recently my water bottle leaked on my $2000 Thinkpad and fried the LAN card. ... Instead I did some research and found a $20 replacement card on Amazon. It took me 15 minutes to fix my laptop. I felt a great sense of pride afterwards for avoiding a great amount of environmental and financial waste.

Laptop parts are commonly available on Ebay for very cheap. Laptops are generally very serviceable (especially Thinkpads, Latitudes, and other business-class ones; MS Surfaces are not however) and it's not that hard, with a small screwdriver, to take them apart and replace various circuit boards. Considering how much a new laptop costs, and how cheap something like a miniPCIe WiFi card is, it's absolutely worth it to repair.

Another important thing is that many mass-produced things fail in the same way, so you can frequently Google for your product and failure mode, and find someone talking about what the problem was and how they fixed it. YouTube is an excellent source for repair videos for many things; frequently companies selling repair parts (such as for appliances) will make these videos themselves, to help boost sales and as free advertising (which they actually get paid a little for if lots of people watch the video).

Re: Support for right-to-repair laws slowly grows

#227

Post by magduf »

wrycoder wrote: post #199
cr0sh wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In some cases, this is attributed to bad design or bad materials choice; and maybe in some cases, it's done to make you purchase a new model. But in many cases, such breakable parts are put in place for a reason. They are called "mechanical fuses" - also known by a few other names: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacrificial_part https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shear_pin They are designed to break if the machine comes un…

Yea, if you can get Kitchenaid to sell it to you. They absolutely refuse to sell me, as a consumer, the grease they use to lubricate the gear head. Even after arguing for half an hour with customer service.

Grease isn't something that Kitchenaid makes. You should be able to easily buy appropriate grease anywhere for dirt-cheap. For small appliances with plastic gears, it's most likely some kind of white lithium grease. A little research online should tell you what kind of grease is appropriate for that application, and then it should be easy to get some inexpensively, perhaps even at your local auto parts store in a tiny single-use packet for $1.

Re: Support for right-to-repair laws slowly grows

#228

Post by thefiregecko »

cr0sh wrote: post #150
thefiregecko wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Forcing a company to have a diagnostic tool or team to identify a problem you might not have them fix is silly IMO. As a counter point, OBD-2 works and everyone can use it.

As a counter to that point - unless you're willing to spend mega-$$$ on a high-end scan tool, you won't be able to read all of the OBD-2 codes. Even with such a scan tool - there may still be certain codes that are "manufacturer only" readable.

The more I learn about this the more disappointed I am. In my own experience the standard codes have always been enough to show me what needed fixing. I'm not a mechanic though so my range of experience with it isn't that large.

Re: Support for right-to-repair laws slowly grows

#229

Post by plufz »

hanniabu wrote: post #74
looeee wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How did you get involved with that? Did you just phone up and offer your services?

I'd imagine it going something like this: "Hello, I have information that would likely be useful as evidence for the antitrust lawsuit against Google." "Thanks, but I think we have it covered" -or- "Thanks, let me take a note so we both feel good about this interaction and never actually follow up on this."

Do you imagine or do you have experience? My contacts with the government has been okay, not amazing but okay. Shouldn’t we try to increase communication between the government and its citizens?

Re: Support for right-to-repair laws slowly grows

#230

Post by laughinghan »

cycrutchfield wrote: post #173
laughinghan wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ex·ter·nal·i·ty noun a side effect or consequence of an industrial or commercial activity that affects other parties without this being reflected in the cost of the goods or services involved (emphasis added) https://www.google.com/search?q=define+externality

Oh wow, thanks. They must not have covered that topic in all of the Economics classes I took in college. Thank goodness you were here to regurgitate the definition of such a basic concept to me on this fateful day. I will be forever grateful.

I was clarifying. Interesting that you clearly read this and the other reply yet you don't have a substantive response.
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