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For tech-weary Midwest farmers, 40-year-old tractors now a hot commodity

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Re: For tech-weary Midwest farmers, 40-year-old tractors now a hot commodity

#221

Post by jay_kyburz »

ngneer wrote: post #215

This may be the single most important information security problem worth solving on our planet. This is not about who gets to see the latest movie at what resolution, it is about vendors and farmers fighting for control of the plant, in this case the tractor, and indirectly its yields. I think the world needs an open source tractor, or else am hoping the right to repair movement addresses these difficulties.

It's more than that. I'm in Australia, hiding inside away from the smoke haze, thinking about where global warming is going. Seems clear to me that in the next 20-30 years most farming will need to move indoors into climate controlled environments. We'll need to have closed systems where the air, water, soils, and our biodiversity is carefully managed.

Re: For tech-weary Midwest farmers, 40-year-old tractors now a hot commodity

#222

Post by Armisael16 »

jv22222 wrote: post #217
earlINmeyerkeg wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The greatest innovation in the history of mankind was a land consolidation. It took what 100 peasants all making enough food for subsistence living to 100 peasants be able to make enough food for thousands of people. It's not sad, it's progress.

I heard somewhere that the greatest innovation (the most impactful at the particular stage of our evolution) was the bicycle, because, it enabled human cross breeding over much larger distances at a much faster rate than possible before.

That seems rather implausible given that railroads came about at the same time.

Re: For tech-weary Midwest farmers, 40-year-old tractors now a hot commodity

#223

Post by jay_kyburz »

Diederich wrote: post #85
svachalek wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. I also put large household appliances in this category. They've been getting more expensive and more fragile for decades, without much real progress other than energy efficiency which is unrelated to the fragility afaik.

Do you think normal gas powered cars have have been getting less reliable? I agree with what many others here have said about how hard it is to service new vehicles. After he died, I kept my grandpa's 1970 Chevy C-10 pickup going for years. It was simple and very easy to fix/work on. But it needed a lot more attention than modern cars, and I think that while the age played a factor, it was just inherently less reliab…

I think cars are different because there _is_ so much competition in the market.

Re: For tech-weary Midwest farmers, 40-year-old tractors now a hot commodity

#225

Post by dsego »

ultrarunner wrote: post #168
minikites wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? Which products are getting more repairable with time? Nobody is bringing back easily repairable washing machines or easily repairable automobiles.

Being suddenly in the market for a new washing machine myself, I might argue that a large portion of the value of a washing machine is in its aesthetics. Same (probably more so) for cars. I'd probably need to put more thought into that, but I am fairly certain that aesthetics don't count for much in a tractor on a farm. It's possible that classic-styled tractors might even be mark in their favor. Either way, I suspec…

Quality of materials [1], workmanship, capacity, ease of loading, max spin speed, gentle spin option, energy rating, water consumption, quietness, quick wash function, drums that reduce creasing and so on. Good quality washing machines are more expensive but not because of aesthetics.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGGhmKknKXo

Re: For tech-weary Midwest farmers, 40-year-old tractors now a hot commodity

#226

Post by jv22222 »

Armisael16 wrote: post #222
jv22222 wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I heard somewhere that the greatest innovation (the most impactful at the particular stage of our evolution) was the bicycle, because, it enabled human cross breeding over much larger distances at a much faster rate than possible before.

That seems rather implausible given that railroads came about at the same time.

Well, there would be a lot more bicycles and they could go a lot more places a lot faster, no? I.E. They would enable a much faster rate of genetic mutation.

Re: For tech-weary Midwest farmers, 40-year-old tractors now a hot commodity

#227

Post by BoorishBears »

xnyan wrote: post #47
pleasantpeasant wrote: post #29

Right to repair laws need to be put in place. American corporations are trying to reach a point where you don't own products. You are merely long-term renting or leasing products from them. And any alterations or repairs will come with a heavy price. It's already hard enough to repair your own vehicle without taking it to a dealership. How long until small car shops can't even fix any cars if they don't have the tool…

It's already here. The only reason I can do my own work on my N20 engine BMW is because they implemented really bad and vulnerable car DRM that can be trivially defeated, but they have improved on that in latter models.

You can't work on them, or you can't flash them with emissions control defeating tunes?

Re: For tech-weary Midwest farmers, 40-year-old tractors now a hot commodity

#228

Post by vonnik »

earlINmeyerkeg wrote: post #128
macinjosh wrote: post #98

My grandfather, rest his soul, was a 3rd generation rancher and farmer. He bought 2 John Deere tractors in the '80s and used them for 35 years. They are still being used to this day on the ranch. Growing up, I visited the ranch regularly. Farming and ranching is very hard on equipment so the tractors often needed repair. My father and grandfather could seemingly fix anything on the tractor without even needing to go…

The greatest innovation in the history of mankind was a land consolidation. It took what 100 peasants all making enough food for subsistence living to 100 peasants be able to make enough food for thousands of people. It's not sad, it's progress.

Who says progress can't be sad?

The consolidation you're talking about was a massive disruption, which brought a lot of change to families and societies. Most kinds of change are painful even when they lead to greater efficiency.

While the transformation of agriculture has led to great prosperity, prosperity also brings hierarchy; i.e. more unequal social forms.

Much of the US has transitioned from a relatively agrarian and egalitarian society to one that is much richer, but also less equal and more divided, in the last 150 years.

There are clear tradeoffs in that transition, which some people might call the march of progress. Ways of life die off, and those who knew them in childhood often regret their passage, regardless of whether the world's wheat production increases.

Re: For tech-weary Midwest farmers, 40-year-old tractors now a hot commodity

#229

Post by giggles_giggles »

ahoy wrote: post #190
jessant wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing stopping people from doing that.

There is an enormous body of law in the US that incentivizes a top-down corporate business structure and disincentives a co-op business structure.

This is quite a claim, but it's too vague for me to research independently. Where would I even start in exploring the "enormous body of law" that "incentivizes a top-down corporate business structure?" I am not asking rhetorically -- this is news to me and I'd like to know the details.

Of course, co-ops aren't common in the US, but they do exist (like REI) so I'm just curious about the details of this criticism of the legal landscape in the US but without further information am unable to research the claim.

Re: For tech-weary Midwest farmers, 40-year-old tractors now a hot commodity

#230

Post by EETruth »

macinjosh wrote: post #98

My grandfather, rest his soul, was a 3rd generation rancher and farmer. He bought 2 John Deere tractors in the '80s and used them for 35 years. They are still being used to this day on the ranch. Growing up, I visited the ranch regularly. Farming and ranching is very hard on equipment so the tractors often needed repair. My father and grandfather could seemingly fix anything on the tractor without even needing to go…

Perfect, they should bring back serfdom and have the filthy rurals work and keep it quiet. Might allow them to go to church every Sunday tho.
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