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One man’s fight for the right to repair broken MacBooks

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Re: One man’s fight for the right to repair broken MacBooks

#171
post #24

Rossmann is seriously a national treasure. Along with Lex Fridman the two Youtube personalities irrefutably prove fair mindedness, humility & sincerity is valued. My fears that content online would eventually consist of nothing but selfies, food pics & competitive victimhood are somewhat reduced. I'd like to see Rossmann on Fridman's podcast.

I find Rossman insufferable due to his hyperbolic approach to shaming Apple and having a bone to pick with just about everyone- he's the definition of a narcissist. I agree in principle to "right to repair", but Rossman's motives are purely financial and self promoting. I've watched over 100 hours of his content and realized that his audience is primarily made up of anti-apple PC Master Race fanatics that just want t…

If your largest problem is "negativity" and not about wether it's true the problem is somewhere between your chair and the keyboard. People can have very good reasons to be negative.

He makes very valid arguments, how is this "financial and self promoting"? Dont lie about someone's intentions just because you don't agree with their reasoning.

Re: One man’s fight for the right to repair broken MacBooks

#172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this a character assassination post? It really feels like it. Rossmann opensourced his repair manuals and has detailed videos of how to repair equipment, you can literally start your own repair business of that. If that is not being for right to repair I don't know what is. Reading your post again it is a character assassination post. Shifting goalpost and attacking personal characteristics instead of the point.

A character assassination would be something like "He does something morally reprehensible (cheating, selling ads to three year olds, etc". The above post is more like "He harps on multiple things he maybe shouldn't, and has an outraged user-base he keeps stoked, so that should be taken into account." If I said, "I find his voice really grating and his outrage mostly makes me dislike him" that isn't a character assas…

> If I said, "I find his voice really grating and his outrage mostly makes me dislike him" that isn't a character assassination- just my opinion he is unlikeable.

If you were in court for an act you didn't commit and the prosecutor said:

"I find his voice really grating and his outrage mostly makes me dislike him"

What would you said to this?

This commenthas noting to do with anything. Its a pointless opinion nothing to do with given case. And its a vague ad-hominem attack.

Re: One man’s fight for the right to repair broken MacBooks

#173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> not wanting to have to actually get certified to do authorised repairs There is no such thing as "authorized repair" when it comes to Apple. It's authorized "overpriced parts-changing" at best. Their "independent repair programme" is a bullshit PR tactic that thankfully seems to have failed. Apple's IRP is absolutely not viable for a repair shop. You can't even stock parts in advance (so the minimum turnaround time…

> There is no such thing as "authorized repair" when it comes to Apple. I guess the authorised service centers I've taken Macs to since the late 90s were figments of my imagination then?

I'll bet the following happened, which Louis is actively fighting against...

1) you didn't get your data back if it was a hard drive issue

2) the service center replaced an entire part, not a .50cent component, and may have charged you for the full part.

3) it was not really authorized, because the third party authorized service center is new within 18months, and you can only replace screens and in few cases, batteries.

With today's devices, it's really just about getting your data back. If the machine can be repaired enough for even 15min with just a simple popped capacitor change, that's enough to rescue your latest photos, and that's what Louis is fighting for. While publishing schematics would be a bonus, the big thing is don't strongarm manufacturers with legal constraints so they can't sell that 50 cent part to other parties so repair shops/individuals can get those 15min.

Re: One man’s fight for the right to repair broken MacBooks

#174
post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Just open youtube.com in a private window and you'll understand Eh it doesn't work like that. Youtube is actually very good at reliably determining it's you who's in that private window and Youtube is even known to track you with WebGL fingerprinting tactics to determine it's the same device. Doing things like spoofing your IP and useragent and using private mode browsing doesn't work. (I still get recommendations…

In incognito, I get nothing similar to what I would actually watch. Nothing is even remotely similar. It's scarily different, and none of it interests me.

> In incognito, I get nothing similar to what I would actually watch. Nothing is even remotely similar. It's scarily different, and none of it interests me.

Same here. 100% generic clickbait crap and exactly the same stuff that shows in a Ungoogled Chromium incognito window. I hardly ever use Chromium.

I use Cookie AutoDelete, uBlock Origin, Decentraleyes and a VPN for casual surfing though.

Re: One man’s fight for the right to repair broken MacBooks

#175
post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've seen very little of him, and didn't know he was 'The Right To Repair Guy', but I saw him freak out over an Apple laptop because he took the back off and the fan was not directly over the chip like in gamer PCs. This, in a machine that's been designed for generations to have a fan pull air aggressively THROUGH a channel, the only path the air can go, that goes directly across the CPU heatsink. This is not a 'circ…

Sounds like you misunderstood the criticisms of that laptops cooling design (which was abysmal to the point where it pretty much had to be deliberate). I would suggest refraining from calling people dumber than yourself, until you're totally sure how dumb you actually are.

Unfortunately Rossman’s critique of the cooling design really is as silly as Applejinx suggests. For some reason he seems to think that fans need to be next to the things that they are cooling.

Re: One man’s fight for the right to repair broken MacBooks

#176
post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no such thing as "authorized repair" when it comes to Apple. I guess the authorised service centers I've taken Macs to since the late 90s were figments of my imagination then?

That 30 yr old program is not the current program he is describing.

I've taken a Mac to one such authorised repair centre in the last 3 years.

Re: One man’s fight for the right to repair broken MacBooks

#177
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a shame to see this downvoted because even if it’s against what many people believe (we all have “hero’s” and “villains” I suppose, and our hero’s do no wrong) it’s something I also see. I used to watch a lot of Rossman and glossed over his Apple hate because ultimately Apple are putting him and people like him out of a job, so it’s fair to be salty. But a large portion of his content (a few years ago at least)…

Completely agree. He spews contempt, anger and vile, brings out the worst of people and this is what makes him very appealing. It’s a reality show. Same way how Reddit hooks people in to outrage and justice gifs. With regards to arrogance, it’s difficult to see his arguments for R2R while he is showing off his desoldering skills for a 170 pin BGA. If you want to promote R2R, look at iFixit and EFFs efforts. If HN thi…

Textbook ad hominem attack.

Re: One man’s fight for the right to repair broken MacBooks

#178
post #170
post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this trolling? Did you read past that sentence you quoted?

You replaced a capacitor. Is that supposed to render what I said invalid?

> Neither "right to repair" nor my original comment advocate for being able to repair your own devices at home.

Did you read that part?

Re: One man’s fight for the right to repair broken MacBooks

#179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no such thing as "authorized repair" when it comes to Apple. I guess the authorised service centers I've taken Macs to since the late 90s were figments of my imagination then?

My point is, none of it is repair. It's blindly replacing parts, the same thing that the Apple Store would do, at the exact same prices. Given that Louis Rossmann appears to have made a successful business out of his "unauthorized" repair, consumers demand more cost-efficient options, which also happens to be better for the planet as it's less wasteful.

> My point is, none of it is repair.

So your logic is: if a part is replaced, the thing isn't actually repaired.

> It's blindly replacing parts

Blindly? Really? Every repair I've had done - even the ones where the tech doesn't speak the same fucking language as me - have clearly identified what's at fault, and told me what's being done. Hardly seems "blind".

> at the exact same prices.

If the genuine parts cost the same, why are you surprised the labour costs the same?

> which also happens to be better for the planet as it's less wasteful

Based on what? Have you really never heard of Repair/Refurbish for sale?

Re: One man’s fight for the right to repair broken MacBooks

#180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This happens a lot, I have done it myself. When you buy enough volume you can buy custom packaging, or custom chips from these vendors. The license can be exclusive, for example if Apple asked for some development that cost them some NRE fees, or it can be non-exclusive, and the vendor can decide not to sell the custom version due to insufficient demand or some other non-technical reason.

Fair enough, but the final result of that change is that what used to be a 50c + labour repair is now a full motherboard replacement because you can't buy the chip separately.

Also, something that put me off about him is that he always assumes that Apple is doing this because they are nefarious, so he sometimes fails to see the bigger picture.

If I was a big company for example, protecting the chip I may have helped design from being used in other products is boilerplate legal agreement. I don't have an evil motive or want to stop repair and screw Louis, it's just one of the default things I throw in my legal agreements so Huawei doesn't make their Matebooks or whatever with the same chip I helped improve.

Louis always assumes Apple hates repair and is fighting actively against him but doesn't take a look to see some of the broader reasons why. He doesn't make a video explaining, for example, some of the more logical less-diabolical reasons Apple might do something.

This doesn't mean you have to agree with Apple. I just think Louis would be far better off if he just gave some logical reasons why Apple might have done something and tried to rebut those instead of assuming Apple is evil, because that's an easy straw-man to fight.

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