British right to repair law excludes smartphones and computers • Hacker News Board

Re: British right to repair law excludes smartphones and computers

#351

Post by bluGill » Fri, Jul 02, 2021, 12:40 PM UTC

Silhouette wrote: post #239

R0b0t1 wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not always true. There are chips where the radio DSP cores have their program loaded into main memory and it's unsigned. You talk to them with mutexes and shared memory pages. There is also no legal basis for requiring radio controllers to have signature enforced firmware loading. He's being sarcastic. It's think of the children but with electronics and PII.

There is also no legal basis for requiring radio controllers to have signature enforced firmware loading. If someone actually tried to write their own radio firmware and made a mistake, there very soon would be. Messing around with radio transmission is not a game. Make enough noise on the wrong frequency and now you're interfering with communications for emergency services responding to a disaster or air traffic con…

Note that for engines the EPA has been cracking down on all the mods that bypass software emission controls. The fines (though rare from what I know) have been large to small scale people selling such things. You can probably still make/mod your own engine by yourself, but if you sell and engine mod software you better meet emissions - I suspect that they will crack down on "free" open source mods as well which will kill collaboration (unless those involved are extremely careful to meet emission standards).

The FCC hasn't cracked down - yet. As other have pointed out that is probably because they don't see a widespread problem and so the politics aren't worth it. I'm sure someone reading this is involved with radio, I hope they take the warning (I believe their response will be a form of we already know)

Re: British right to repair law excludes smartphones and computers

#352

Post by greyhair » Fri, Jul 02, 2021, 12:48 PM UTC

bluescrn wrote: post #255

samatman wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

User-replaceable has nothing whatsoever to do with right to repair. Zero, zip, nada. A right to repair law might mandate that any device with a battery also have the battery sold, by the manufacturer, for a reasonable period of time. That gives you a practical right to repair the device by replacing the battery, and it's well-defined. "User replaceable" is not well defined. Does it mean you need to be able to do this…

But there's not much point having the right to repair if products are designed to be non-repairable and spare parts are unavailable. A battery is a consumable and should be user-replaceable. It might be a bit fiddly, with tiny screws and fragile connectors, but shouldn't require heat guns and chemicals to remove adhesives... (And if we're about to replace billions of vehicles with EVs, perhaps consuming the entire pl…

Fiddly doesn't cover devices that need to be environmentally sealed. People want devices that can survive a drop into water or even devices designed to be submerged. Making a device with environmentally sealed, and having hatches, covers, etc., is very difficult. Without making the product really bulky.

My guess is people just want to be able to take their device to a repair shop and have the battery replaced.

My biggest gripe is that you cannot find OEM batteries from the manufacturer. The batteries I have replaced (through some effort) have been generally a disappointment. Particularly laptop batteries. The replacement market for laptop batteries is a scam.

Re: British right to repair law excludes smartphones and computers

#353

Post by greyhair » Fri, Jul 02, 2021, 12:57 PM UTC

MrStonedOne wrote: post #262

spoonjim wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

User-replaceable battery means that entire product categories like wireless earbuds e.g. Airpods cannot exist. A better solution is that the manufacturer must provide battery replacement services at a cost specified at the time of purchase and only allowed to increase at the rate of inflation.

> User-replaceable battery means that entire product categories like wireless earbuds e.g. Airpods cannot exist. Acceptable, why turn an entire device into ewaste for a single component dying, especially one with a known limited service life, like a battery. 10 year warranties minimum on all electronics. Regardless of size and fragility. Any electronic device that can't last 10 years in service is unnecessarily contr…

So basically, drive the cost of all products up to the point that only rich people can afford them, and disenfranchise an entire slice of the population.

If you want to have the ability to purchase ten year warrantied devices, that is a separate issue. And no one, no one, is going to 'reset' your ten year warranty at the time of repair/replacement. Never going to happen.

Re: British right to repair law excludes smartphones and computers

#354

Post by Silhouette » Fri, Jul 02, 2021, 1:00 PM UTC

netr0ute wrote: post #350

Silhouette wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have seen the "very little demonstrable harm" you mentioned with my own eyes in real time. It was little more than serendipity that saved lives that day. If someone did do what you described then IMHO they would be recklessly endangering the lives of others and should be treated accordingly.

What proof do you have? If you can't give a specific example, your argument might as well be corporate PR.

You're new here, so I will gently point out that this isn't Reddit and it certainly isn't Slashdot. Asking everyone for proof of everything or implying that they are shilling is boring and unconstructive.

I've been on HN for more than a decade. You can check my comment history to see that I contribute sensibly. I have no reason to make anything about this up, but I'm obviously not going to doxx myself by providing the kind of proof that would be convincing. You're free to take me at my word or to disbelieve me, but if you aren't interested in substantial discussion in good faith, please consider simply ignoring a comment and moving on to something that interests you more.

Re: British right to repair law excludes smartphones and computers

#355

Post by thatthatis » Fri, Jul 02, 2021, 1:00 PM UTC

aeorgnoieang wrote: post #197

yarcob wrote: post #163

It's a pity that this law has apparently been so watered down, and basically just cements the status quo. Spares for dishwashers and washing machines are already available, and 10 years doesn't really sound that long for big appliances. I don't see whether the law addresses the problem of overpriced spares. For example, I don't see why an original Miele heating element for a washing machine costs 100€, while an unbra…

I can understand (in a very vague, general sense) why spare parts might be relatively expensive – it's probably fairly expensive to make, store, and maintain a distribution network for the parts, i.e. the price isn't just for the price of the part, but the entire system (e.g. customer support) to send it to a customer in response to their request. I'm _sure_ there's also an 'original manufacturer' premium too, and ma…

Spare parts are expensive because they’re priced to willingness to pay which is usually “if it’s significantly less to repair than replace, repair”. $100 part + $200 labor is cheaper than a new $500 machine. Repair let’s tend to have much much higher margin for manufacturers than the original machine.

Re: British right to repair law excludes smartphones and computers

#356

Post by netr0ute » Fri, Jul 02, 2021, 1:08 PM UTC

Silhouette wrote: post #354

netr0ute wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What proof do you have? If you can't give a specific example, your argument might as well be corporate PR.

You're new here, so I will gently point out that this isn't Reddit and it certainly isn't Slashdot. Asking everyone for proof of everything or implying that they are shilling is boring and unconstructive. I've been on HN for more than a decade. You can check my comment history to see that I contribute sensibly. I have no reason to make anything about this up, but I'm obviously not going to doxx myself by providing th…

I'm just interested in substantial discussion by wanting to know what exactly happened with modification of some radio device.

Re: British right to repair law excludes smartphones and computers

#357

Post by cannabis_sam » Fri, Jul 02, 2021, 1:15 PM UTC

The current British government is a pathetic joke, why would anyone expect them to handle even the simplest things competently, let alone something complex?

Unless your problems can be solved by shouting “Vaccines! Vaccines” Boris Johnson literally has nothing to offer you (unless you’re a tory donor or his mistress of course).

Re: British right to repair law excludes smartphones and computers

#358

Post by Silhouette » Fri, Jul 02, 2021, 1:21 PM UTC

bluGill wrote: post #351

Silhouette wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is also no legal basis for requiring radio controllers to have signature enforced firmware loading. If someone actually tried to write their own radio firmware and made a mistake, there very soon would be. Messing around with radio transmission is not a game. Make enough noise on the wrong frequency and now you're interfering with communications for emergency services responding to a disaster or air traffic con…

Note that for engines the EPA has been cracking down on all the mods that bypass software emission controls. The fines (though rare from what I know) have been large to small scale people selling such things. You can probably still make/mod your own engine by yourself, but if you sell and engine mod software you better meet emissions - I suspect that they will crack down on "free" open source mods as well which will…

Indeed. Not a lot of people are interested enough to experiment with radio transmission and fortunately the ones who are tend to be keen hobbyists who understand how the systems work and take care not to break things for everyone else.

The kinds of outage that can be caused by rogue transmitters are rare. Often it's a hardware failure that is to blame when they do happen. Hardware failures are also rare but when you might have millions of transmitters within a small city, sometimes you discover that rare is not the same as never!

There is always the possibility of malicious or negligent interference if an operator has the ability to modify their transmitter's behaviour sufficiently though. I would personally be OK with limiting the sale or use of equipment with those capabilities to only people who have shown they are competent, for much the same reasons that I am personally OK with restricting the use of cars to people who have passed a test. It obviously doesn't prevent all failures but it certainly lowers the risk of failures that could endanger many other people.

Re: British right to repair law excludes smartphones and computers

#359

Post by apocalypstyx » Fri, Jul 02, 2021, 2:42 PM UTC

rocqua wrote: post #106

apocalypstyx wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some brands/models can't even be setup without an internet connection and setting up accounts (and sometimes credit card information). Eventually, they'll probably have their own independent 5g connection.

Source / link? I would love to dive into such an example.

I can't remember the brand. I think it was one of the cheaper Roku tvs produced by a Chinese company I saw when I was looking for a replacement for my parents (reminds me of the issues with Onyx Boox devices).

At this point, I just assume everything is spying.

(Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to harvest your data, I guess.)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/09/18/you-wat...

https://www.tomsguide.com/news/skyworth-tv-spying

Re: British right to repair law excludes smartphones and computers

#360

Post by oneplane » Fri, Jul 02, 2021, 3:50 PM UTC

swiley wrote: post #141

oneplane wrote: post #14

I want to be all positive here and say "maybe it is just a stopgap while they work on solving those issues in a later stage"... but I'm most likely completely wrong.

I remember thinking that about the iPhone. I regret giving Apple the benefit of the doubt.

I'm partially in the same boat there... but I also see that most other brands do the same thing in perhaps a different variation.

Generally most of them just shift the problem around; i.e. for Samsung devices you can sometimes have good access to OEM replacement parts, but support and lifecycle in general is so short that it doesn't really matter in the long run. Or sometimes you get both but the performance is bad. Or you get both and good performance but the price is bad. Or everything is 'just right' about the product, but then the platform is lacking and there is no buy-in from the larger community or consumer market.

Sometimes it seems there is no 'total' solution, except in a few niche markets.