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Right to Repair Gaining Momentum

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71–80 of 124 posts

Re: Right to Repair Gaining Momentum

#71

> When your stuff breaks, you should be able to fix it yourself. This concept is inherently flawed. These complex devices were built by teams of highly skilled and specialized engineers. The concept that you should be able to repair it with a screwdriver and a 6-pack is outdated. I grew up on a cattle ranch, and we had lots of tractors and equipment -- some of it over 100 years old. I rebuilt an International Farmall…

Correct me if I'm wrong, but does your argument reduce down to "some people could possibly do things wrong, therefore we should give monopoly-power to Apple to fix our products, and trust that they won't overcharge us"?

Re: Right to Repair Gaining Momentum

#72
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Apple is justifiably terrified of a 3rd party battery, installed by someone with 5 minutes of training, causing a fire and making headlines.

Okay, then why is the camera serialized and not the battery (which, incidentally, you CAN replace on the iPhone 12)?

> Okay, then why is the camera serialized and not the battery (which, incidentally, you CAN replace on the iPhone 12)?

on my macbook I can see the battery serial number in System Information under the Power section and the camera unique ID under the Camera section. not sure why it would be any different on the iphone.

Re: Right to Repair Gaining Momentum

#73
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do replacement cameras and screens cause fires too?

Worse, they cause unsatisfied customers who don't want their next phone to be an Apple.

That's a problem for Apple. Why is it a problem for consumers?

Re: Right to Repair Gaining Momentum

#74

> When your stuff breaks, you should be able to fix it yourself. This concept is inherently flawed. These complex devices were built by teams of highly skilled and specialized engineers. The concept that you should be able to repair it with a screwdriver and a 6-pack is outdated. I grew up on a cattle ranch, and we had lots of tractors and equipment -- some of it over 100 years old. I rebuilt an International Farmall…

I originally disagreed with you but on the other hand there are merits to your position. I don't believe it refutes the need for pushing the right to repair to its limits. But it does show that there are limits, coming from the increasing sophistication of technology and thus the amount of specialized knowledge required to maintain it.

However, arguments can be made in the opposite direction that restrict total system throughput in favor of greater robustness of its parts. To push technology to operate at higher throughputs we often need to make it more complex.

My specific arguments reduce to "let's just consume less as a civilization so we can last longer overall" which is a moot point though

Re: Right to Repair Gaining Momentum

#75
post #8

I was re-reading (ok, actually trying to finish yet again) Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and I think some of what Pirsig says at the beginning of the book applies here. Namely, the division between people who just want things to work and hope "somebody" else will step in when a fix is needed, and those who understand the abstraction sometimes leaks, and you need to be able to dig in and at least know how…

The thing is even if people don't wanna repair themselves they might wanna change a battery. Or get something minor done cheaply by a 3rd party. But Apple goes so far out of the way to kill third party repair. They even put special screws in their machines to screw you. Edit: The EU pushed right to repair, right? Now see what Apple did to screw France [1]. Their latest and greatest devices somehow have a repairabilit…

Their scores on number 5 give them 2 points already (notification of update and their content, free shipping for repairs, able to re-install software). On most of the rest (like number 4 access and price of parts) they get a shitty score of between 1.6 and 0.9

Re: Right to Repair Gaining Momentum

#76
post #71

> When your stuff breaks, you should be able to fix it yourself. This concept is inherently flawed. These complex devices were built by teams of highly skilled and specialized engineers. The concept that you should be able to repair it with a screwdriver and a 6-pack is outdated. I grew up on a cattle ranch, and we had lots of tractors and equipment -- some of it over 100 years old. I rebuilt an International Farmall…

Correct me if I'm wrong, but does your argument reduce down to "some people could possibly do things wrong, therefore we should give monopoly-power to Apple to fix our products, and trust that they won't overcharge us"?

Yeah, I admit the open-source/IP part of the argument seems incidental to other parts of this point

Re: Right to Repair Gaining Momentum

#77
How does this entire article have no references to the DMCA and copyright?

Like, the ENTIRETY of the "right-to-repair" issue could be resolved by repealing the worst parts (or all of) the DMCA and updating copyright law with respect to machine code or object code to make it fair for buyers.

If I buy a book, cut it up and make a collage, the original author can't claim copyright.

Do the same with some object code, you break the law.

Re: Right to Repair Gaining Momentum

#78
post #62
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pirsig couldn't fix or understand every component of his motorcycle, but he advocated having some degree of control over the components he did understand and knew how to fix or jury-rig. His anecdote about using tin from beer cans to jury-rig a simple fix -- and the wounded reaction to it by his friend John -- is enlightening. It's not all or nothing.

Pragmatism and the application of it is an art all of it's own. A pragmatist may change their own clutch, but get a professional to do their wiring. It's about addressing the situation and making a reasonable choice.

Oh, fully agreed! And I think Pirsig would have agreed, too.

Regardless, you need some level of understanding to make the call. A particularly funny anecdote from the book, if you read it, is when he decides some fix is too delicate for him and takes his motorcycle to a repair shop. Right from the start he gets a bad vibe -- the mechanics are all kids listening to loud music and seemingly not paying attention to what they are doing. This is later confirmed: they return his bike without fixing the problem, then try to fix it more seriously but forget to screw some vital parts, leading to additional damage, and in the end they completely fail to fix the problem. What's important is that right from the start Pirsig got the feeling something was off about this repair shop, and he could sense this because he know enough about the components of his bike (for example, he guessed they had forgotten to screw something down simply because it's easy to miss and he knew this screw was there).

If, like his friend John, you decide "I have something else to spend my time on, better leave this to the professionals", it might seem superficially a pragmatic choice but it could also make you fail to notice the repairmen who are bad at their jobs, until it's too late and your piece of machinery fails catastrophically.

Re: Right to Repair Gaining Momentum

#79

> When your stuff breaks, you should be able to fix it yourself. This concept is inherently flawed. These complex devices were built by teams of highly skilled and specialized engineers. The concept that you should be able to repair it with a screwdriver and a 6-pack is outdated. I grew up on a cattle ranch, and we had lots of tractors and equipment -- some of it over 100 years old. I rebuilt an International Farmall…

>The concept that you should be able to repair it with a screwdriver and a 6-pack is outdated.

Nobody is saying that. Right to repair is basically the right for independent repair shops to even be able to acquire the equipment and parts necessary to do repairs. If an individual has the capital, and wishes to perform their own repairs, then yes that is an option.

Apple prevents you from taking two brand new authentic iPhone 12s and swapping the cameras. In this case, both cameras are authentic Apple hardware. For what reason should that not be permitted?

Re: Right to Repair Gaining Momentum

#80
post #58

I remember back when I was young opening up an older stereo my parents had and right inside was the schematic and wiring diagram for the whole machine. My father had a shop manual for his 1962 Ford Thunderbird and not only did it tell you how to fix it but it also showed how to make any needed "special tools" for the car. I am not saying every single thing in the world is going to be user serviced...but it is a shame…

I think of farmers as intuitive understanders of physics, chemistry, and biology. Manipulating these things is essentially what they do all day long.
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