For tech-weary Midwest farmers, 40-year-old tractors now a hot commodity • Hacker News Board

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

#381

Post by simpss » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:53 AM UTC

NicoJuicy wrote: post #348

nine_k wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. It's never been harder to compete by producing a long-term, very reliable machine. * You have to make your machine good the first time. The customer buys it completely, no chance to update and fix things. * Your machine is marketed as reliable. This means it has to be reliable, so you put a lot of effort / material / money into your machine, when your competition puts in much less. * If your machine is in…

Most things that break are electrical, not mechanical. The mechanics of reliable machines are taught in school and are widely available + relatively easy to repair. And I'm speaking from growing up in a village with the highest agricultural % of population in Belgium. Which my family is also pretty involved with ( my dad is a veterinarian for farm animals, my uncle has ~40 tractors) Also: a cousin with a garage, some…

Let me introduce you to the lada 4x4(previously known as the lada niva all over the ex-soviet countries).

https://www.lada.ru/en/cars/4x4/3dv/about.html

it hasn't changed much, it's still serviceable with a hammer and a couple of pulleys and wrenches. Not sure if it's available in Belgium(it is in eastern europe) and it sure as hell isn't as comfy as a BMW or a MB, but it's cheap to buy and maintain.

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

#382

Post by nine_k » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:53 AM UTC

shakna wrote: post #374

nine_k wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. It's never been harder to compete by producing a long-term, very reliable machine. * You have to make your machine good the first time. The customer buys it completely, no chance to update and fix things. * Your machine is marketed as reliable. This means it has to be reliable, so you put a lot of effort / material / money into your machine, when your competition puts in much less. * If your machine is in…

It looks like the standard business model of sell product, receive payment might not be the best idea for something like this, but there are other models. What if the primary form of business is selling the parts instead? Then repair shops become the primary customer, with home repairs and selling the actual vehicle just being the PR model for adoption? You say they won't need many spare parts. But thanks to emission…

> Simple things that are easy to replace, but you still need the parts.

AFAICT, say, John Deere do nearly the same thing. But they insist on your using their own spare parts (not cheaper third-party parts, or something you fixed yourself), and go to great lengths way to ensure that (with chips, online activation, etc).

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

#383

Post by philwelch » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:55 AM UTC

titanomachy wrote: post #371

Balgair wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can't fix things. This one sticks out to me from a job-market POV. Plumbers are already on par with psychiatrists in terms of pay. Sure, the work is hard, but from a supply-demand POV, the markets are saying that they do work that is of equal value (all this varies highly, but stick with me here). Most repair work takes a LOT of experience until the employee is anywhere near proficient. Farmers will tell you that…

Quick look at usnews suggests median plumber (in US) makes ~50k and median psychiatrist makes ~200k. I'm sure there are some plumbers that make more than some psychiatrists, but that doesn't really support the assertion that the market values their skills equally.

I think it depends a lot on the local market.

It's also a little misleading to compare the numbers that way. It usually takes a lot longer to become a psychiatrist in the first place. Your cumulative earnings in the first ten years after graduating high school might be higher as a plumber; in fact, I suspect most people who become doctors actually lose net worth throughout those ten years due to student loans. They just don't count towards the median income for a psychiatrist because they spend much more time not being a psychiatrist.

Once the plumber and psychiatrist are both in a position where they're running their own business or practice, their income is more of a conscious choice than it is for someone who's working for an employer. Self-employed people can and do sometimes choose to earn less money in exchange for more free time, and it's a lot easier to do that when you don't have six figures of debt at the start of your career.

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

#384

Post by zozbot234 » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:55 AM UTC

nine_k wrote: post #378

NicoJuicy wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most things that break are electrical, not mechanical. The mechanics of reliable machines are taught in school and are widely available + relatively easy to repair. And I'm speaking from growing up in a village with the highest agricultural % of population in Belgium. Which my family is also pretty involved with ( my dad is a veterinarian for farm animals, my uncle has ~40 tractors) Also: a cousin with a garage, some…

> Because it's simple to fix and it didn't need a official licensed laptop to be serviced. This is exactly my point. Imagine that you are selling cars. If you sell a reliable, easy to fix car, you don't get any recurring revenue. But you need to make as much money as the competition who sells less reliable cars, and more because you can't cut corners. So your upfront cost is higher. The competition, which sells less…

The manufacturer of the more reliable car can win by offering a warranty and/or "discounted" repairs. That way, even a naïve customer who doesn't expect the manufacturer to make a reliable car will be incented to buy it anyway. Of course, this will only work if building a more reliable car really is more efficient than doing constant repairs on a less-reliable one. IOW, it actually leads to properly-aligned incentives all around.

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

#385

Post by castratikron » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:59 AM UTC

ajmurmann wrote: post #266

Waterluvian wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for sharing this about your grandfather. > The world changes and sometimes it sucks but that is how progress is made. This touches on something I think a lot about. Massive driverless farms, in my mind's eye, looks like one puzzle piece towards the utopia of the future. But you do lose the human aspect. It reminds me of Star Trek where Picard is working with his hands on a vineyard. Capitalism is abolished so…

I think the transition from capitalism to Star Trek Utopia is where basic income guarantee can be very helpful

In Star Trek the transition from capitalism to utopia involved a global nuclear war.

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

#386

Post by m463 » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 5:04 AM UTC

ken wrote: post #314

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…

It sounds like the "pets / cattle" metaphor is finally returning to actual ranches. I don't think software is eating the whole world but it's eating that one. That tells me it's ripe for disruption.

Hobby farm with printed tractors running on the gig economy.

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

#387

Post by m463 » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 5:17 AM UTC

ydb wrote: post #265

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.

It looks like the neoliberal cult of "progress" has its acolytes on Hacker News, but that really shouldn't surprise. What is sad, though, is the distinct lack of empathy that this ideology instills in its adherents. Leaving people behind is not a sign of progress; instead, it's a sign of an ill society.

I found it interesting reading the book The Box[1] because it showed how shipping was transformed over the last century or so.

The book is a giant analogy for huge inevitable changes that affect society.

It also showed how society dealt with the changes. Some people were supported by unions. On the other hand, some goverments tried to control things too much and the shipping industry just left and went to other cities or states.

[1] The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger

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

#388

Post by waste_monk » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 5:20 AM UTC

thulecitizen wrote: post #375

killjoywashere wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't want a car where someone can push safety critical changes the way we push shitty software updates now. I don't trust them to get it right. I don't want to be sold a car that tries to kill me after a mandatory software update. It's not needed, and it's a bad idea. I don't want a bridge where someone can make repairs the way we make shitty pothole repairs now. I don't trust them to get it right. I don't want…

> Here's a neat idea: maybe regulating software engineering like other engineering disciplines is actually overdue? Yet at the same time, failure rate will never be zero. Please could you describe this more? I’m intrigued. I don’t know anything about this and what systems or mechanisms are used to regulate engineering, so any links or simple explanations are appreciated!

Overview of professional engineer process: https://www.nspe.org/resources/licensure/what-pe . It varies from place to place (although transferrable from country to country via the Washington Accord https://www.ieagreements.org/accords/washington/).

If you want to e.g. build a bridge it needs to be signed off on by an appropriately licensed and qualified Professional Engineer. Essentially the parent comment is saying there should be streams of software development that meet the requirements to become a Professional Engineer. Then places e.g. medical, defence, power plants could say "we need software that's been signed off by an engineer" and have assurance that the final product is of a known quality and unlikely to have any life and safety endangering defects. They are strongly incentivised to only sign off on properly engineered projects as they can be held personally liable e.g. if a bridge fails and kills someone.

An example of the level of quality that would be delivered is the software that ran on the space shuttle. See this article https://www.fastcompany.com/28121/they-write-right-stuff for an insight into how it was developed and the practises required.

I don't think all software developers should be software Engineers, but being able to lead a team to enforce quality (and not sign off on poorly thought out "MVP" crapware) would guarantee that the software that came out of that team would be reliable and well designed. It would be good for software engineering overall to be recognised as a legitimate branch of engineering. Unfortunately it seems like most of the industry does not have the sort of rigour needed for engineering tasks.

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

#389

Post by solatic » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 5:24 AM UTC

chalupa-man wrote: post #247

solatic wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In today's market, your argument doesn't hold water. A new brand would need to start from smaller than scratch? So what? People start new companies every day. It would require tens of millions of dollars of investment? So what? We keep being told how capital markets are just sloshing with cash looking for investment opportunities; that one of the reasons for rising inequality is due to the dearth of investment opport…

The moment you started to see any real success with a company like this and become significant competition, John Deere would reverse their equipment-as-a-service DRM-based model, and you would be instantly crushed by their far more familiar and established brand with all the accumulated knowledge and trust people already have. It's so certain that you have essentially no chance of long-term success. John Deere can op…

Brand isn't everything, it doesn't "crush" competitors in markets without winner-takes-all characteristics (i.e. network effects). People buy smartphones that aren't iPhones; people buy burgers not made by McDonald's; people rent hotel rooms not offered by Hilton or Marriott. By the time the upstarts get competitive enough to force the incumbent to act, the upstarts already have branding and market power of their own, and are not so easily crushed.

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

#390

Post by mikorym » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 5:59 AM UTC

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…

You need a way to reconcile the family side of things and the corporate side. It may be sad to lose the personal touch of a single owner single farm (I always say you know it's corporate when the owner doesn't personally sign off each birthday present) but one should also see the value of a business becoming a company.

One important thing is that a healthy business will survive any particular person's death. And this is very important especially for a family business. Imagine a farmer suddenly passing away in his 40s or 50s with 5 children and no other adult that can take over the business. (This actually happened in my family, but luckily his wife was a badass and saved the farm during a difficult period when other farms were going out of business.)

Another advantage of a business as opposed to a single owner is that the rest of the family is afforded a niche. In my case, I can do scientific analysis, mathematics, music and lots of other things and at the same time I don't have the burden that my grandfather had when he had to run the then very poor and tiny farm at the age of 16.

With regards to the loss of character and the loss of the idyllic romantic image of a farm with its owner: It will happen to a smaller or larger extent and it's really a challenge to figure out how to retain the initial pioneer spirit of a farm.

In my case, I decided to prolong the legacy of those before me by focusing on what I can do that they couldn't. I have quite a few useful innovations that I am working on in weather and agricultural analysis. But it's difficult, and maybe I won't achieve much, but I feel the only way to personalise a corporate business is to be a sort of wild man with an orderly style in an orderly society. I think that kind of economic freedom was what those before us worked hard to gain.

Maybe birthdays will be generic, but it's easier to give a profitable business a personal flair than to make a personal business profitable.