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Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

npr.org

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Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#31

Post by pacaro »

cmurf wrote: post #25
andrepd wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The result of a free market is that the better products will always win out. Just two words, capital costs, suffice to throw that entire line of thought to the ground.

It's a huge barrier to market entry effectively making for a natural monopoly. In farm equipment it's John Deere and Caterpillar and they don't have that much overlap product wise these days. If you go through the long list of farming equipment companies, they're all gone now. Defunct, or conglomeration.

At some point anti-trust should kick in, regardless of the origin of the monopoly, the theory behind anti-trust is to protect the consumer

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#32

Post by elgenie »

notliketherest wrote: post #14
digitalzombie wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why can't a company take the initiative and grab all the customers who value this? You make it sounds so easy to start a tractor company.

The result of a free market is that the better products will always win out. By your logic your statement could just have easily as been "to start a car company" or "to start a rocket company" or "to start a computer company". These are all examples of industries whose existing players were supplanted by a better idea with smart, passionate and dedicated entrepreneurs.

The result of a free market is that the better products will always win out. Then if the firms behind those products are well-run, they will use the dominant market position their products have granted them to try to raise barriers to entry and smother upstart competitors in their crib.

"Car company" and "rocket company" are interesting examples, since the "smart, passionate and dedicated entrepreneurs" in those areas needed billions in government subsidies to get off the ground []. And "computer company" includes the software side, with its low capital costs, and the hardware side, where the competitors are firmly entrenched (what's the last laptop/desktop upstart to hit it big?).

[] http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hy-musk-subsidies-2015...

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#33

Post by andrewchambers »

digitalzombie wrote: post #7
andrewchambers wrote: post #2

I don't like the idea that we have to pass laws to force companies to make a better product. Why can't a company take the initiative and grab all the customers who value this?

> Why can't a company take the initiative and grab all the customers who value this? You make it sounds so easy to start a tractor company.

I didn't say start one, there are lots of existing companies, perhaps someone with a lower market share could try it.

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#34

Post by Pyxl101 »

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #26

I think we'd all be better off if basically everything was open source, by way of eliminating intellectual property protections provided by governments. As an alternate solution, those of us with engineering skills can work to create an open source economy with open source factories, computers, and products. This would never be a problem nor would it be likely to happen if genuinely competitive options existed for fa…

"Everything open source" would take away the incentive for people to create essentially all media professionally: software, music, TVs/movies, podcasts, journalism, and more. Many industries would be destroyed if they didn't have the right to sell their creations (if anyone could copy them and give them away). I personally enjoy the media created by many organizations such as NPR, which made the article we're reading now. I enjoy many audio and written books and podcasts and video games. The professional software industry would vanish, as would the entire video games industry, and NPR. Programs for creating art and video would stop being made for sale.

If there was no IP protection, anyone could redistribute NPR's podcasts and news articles while stripping the advertising from them. Advertisers would stop sponsoring NPR, and its budget would diminish substantially. It would stop producing quality content like this article. The ability to lawfully distribute free copies of all video games and video content would diminish their sales to a fraction of today, and shut those industries down. The only media industries left would be ones based on live performance / live display.

I'd like to retain the incentives for these creators to continue thriving by publishing good work, which means retaining these intellectual property protections. I think we can fix the problem that appears to exist in this situation in other ways, such as by strictly curtailing the rights of equipment manufacturers to restrict what purchasers can do via licenses, and by buffing the first sale doctrine to include right of repair, and perhaps creating or strengthening legal requirements that when you purchase a physical good, must not hinder the ability to repair it, and the software needed to operate the good must be included in the price and must operate (must not be intentionally time-limited) for a reasonable period of time. The duration of copyright should also be significantly reduced, to something like 20 years maximum.

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#35

Post by cookiecaper »

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #26

I think we'd all be better off if basically everything was open source, by way of eliminating intellectual property protections provided by governments. As an alternate solution, those of us with engineering skills can work to create an open source economy with open source factories, computers, and products. This would never be a problem nor would it be likely to happen if genuinely competitive options existed for fa…

Yes, people seriously underestimate the damage done by carrying over the near-absolute monopolies granted by copyright, which were originally intended for superfluous creative works.

A good compromise may be that software is only eligible for legal protections like copyright if it's source is registered with the Copyright Office, and then the scope of that copyright would limit the commercial resell for 10 years, but would not limit individual or hobbyist use or distribution.

Whatever we do, with core components of basically everything falling under copyright protection due to software, we badly need to revise the law.

There is a large body of law where we have just sloppily slapped a physical metaphor on top of the relevant technology and pretended like that was OK. We need to acknowledge that there are differences and that we need a first-class body of law to address these issues, not just loosely applied law that never could have anticipated the world as it is today.

One example: copies of content kept in RAM qualify as infringing copies under the Copyright Act. Judges have been lamenting that in their decisions since the first one, but they feel the law must be interpreted that way. This has a lot of complicated consequences, and it's just a single example of how our technology law is badly damaged and needs repair.

The biggest reason we don't get this sorely-needed legal renovation is that big companies don't want to even the playing field. They like using the law to bully small innovators.

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#36

Post by cmurf »

notliketherest wrote: post #11

When we buy a piece of software, we own and "physically" posses a binary which we feel we can rightly take apart, modify, and mess with it because we view it as analogous to owning a toaster or stereo in the physical world. It's in our home, we can touch it, and we in essence control it. Now the same is never said for software as a service. We buy subscriptions to services all the time but don't demand an ability to…

Buy a piece of software? Since ancient times there's no such thing for mere mortals. Read the EULA. You do not own that software. You've bought a temporary, rather one-sided, and revocable license. You absolutely do not have any right to take it apart or modify it. That's the entire point of free and open source software (note not merely open source).

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#37

Post by olewhalehunter »

Pyxl101 wrote: post #34
TaylorAlexander wrote: post #26

I think we'd all be better off if basically everything was open source, by way of eliminating intellectual property protections provided by governments. As an alternate solution, those of us with engineering skills can work to create an open source economy with open source factories, computers, and products. This would never be a problem nor would it be likely to happen if genuinely competitive options existed for fa…

"Everything open source" would take away the incentive for people to create essentially all media professionally: software, music, TVs/movies, podcasts, journalism, and more. Many industries would be destroyed if they didn't have the right to sell their creations (if anyone could copy them and give them away). I personally enjoy the media created by many organizations such as NPR, which made the article we're reading…

because good music, games, journalism, and useful algorithms didn't arrive in humanity until the invention of (EDIT) intellectual property law

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#38

Post by skybrian »

olewhalehunter wrote: post #37
Pyxl101 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Everything open source" would take away the incentive for people to create essentially all media professionally: software, music, TVs/movies, podcasts, journalism, and more. Many industries would be destroyed if they didn't have the right to sell their creations (if anyone could copy them and give them away). I personally enjoy the media created by many organizations such as NPR, which made the article we're reading…

because good music, games, journalism, and useful algorithms didn't arrive in humanity until the invention of (EDIT) intellectual property law

Patent law and copyright are two different things.

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#39

Post by cmurf »

TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #12
notliketherest wrote: post #11

When we buy a piece of software, we own and "physically" posses a binary which we feel we can rightly take apart, modify, and mess with it because we view it as analogous to owning a toaster or stereo in the physical world. It's in our home, we can touch it, and we in essence control it. Now the same is never said for software as a service. We buy subscriptions to services all the time but don't demand an ability to…

Because software as a service is the wrong model for farmers. When equipment breaks in the middle of the field during harvest you do what needs to be done to fix it right then and there. Edit: grammar

I'd have less of a problem with this if it were a free and open source license, and therefore there's competition available for the service, including do it yourself service should you choose.

But most farms are now corporate so it sorta makes sense those types will drive this kind of closed loop proprietary fixed cost maintenance model.

Re: Farmers look for ways to circumvent tractor software locks

#40

Post by froindt »

thearn4 wrote: post #8
andrewchambers wrote: post #2

I don't like the idea that we have to pass laws to force companies to make a better product. Why can't a company take the initiative and grab all the customers who value this?

There is a fair amount of competition in this space. Around me, I see a lot of Kubota, New Holland, etc. Not too many John Deeres actually.

> Around me, I see a lot of Kubota, New Holland, etc. Not too many John Deeres actually.

Around Iowa I see these brands as well, but I don't see Kubota and New Holland as being as massive and innovative as Deere and Cat are/can be. John Deere has been notorious in the legal system in its pursuit of these locks on software. They have very good autonomy software which gets better every season, and distinguishes them from Kubota and New Holland. Their autonomy seems to be up-and-coming, but isn't in primetime just yet.

What area of the country are you in? I wonder if it is more of a geographic difference in brand choice, or if John Deere doesn't handle the local crops in your area as well.

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