Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

fujifilm-x.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 123 posts

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#31

Post by detaro »

EMIRELADERO wrote: post #25

> Subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement, Fujifilm hereby grants to you a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, and royalty-free license to; (a) use, modify and make a limited number of copies of the SDK solely for the purpose of the Development; Later in the same agreement... > 3.5 You shall not (and shall not permit others), to reverse engineer, reverse compile, or disassemble the SDK in any way(…

You can do all modifications that do not involve things banned in the second quote?

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#32

Post by EMIRELADERO »

detaro wrote: post #31
EMIRELADERO wrote: post #25

> Subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement, Fujifilm hereby grants to you a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, and royalty-free license to; (a) use, modify and make a limited number of copies of the SDK solely for the purpose of the Development; Later in the same agreement... > 3.5 You shall not (and shall not permit others), to reverse engineer, reverse compile, or disassemble the SDK in any way(…

You can do all modifications that do not involve things banned in the second quote?

And what would those entail? How could one modify an SDK without disassembling or even debugging?

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#33

Post by Manuel_D »

muhehe wrote: post #30
ceeg wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

wouldnt shutter control give the possibility of the image sensor overheating from extended exposures? I could absolutely be talking out of my ass but I thought I remembered that being a risk when I flashed ML to my Canon for star photos.

Basically every camera I have had has a "bulb", which is pretty much as-long-as-you-want exposure. Never heard of sensor overheating even after hours of exposure.

Overheating is more of an issue for the image processor, at high frame rates. During bulb mode, the sensor is on for a long time but it's only one frame being handled by the image processor.

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#34

Post by gambiting »

EMIRELADERO wrote: post #32
detaro wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can do all modifications that do not involve things banned in the second quote?

And what would those entail? How could one modify an SDK without disassembling or even debugging?

An SDK typically isn't a binary blob - it's usually a collection of header files you can integrate into your projects, media assets, config files etc. All of those can by modified by hand without disassembling anything.

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#35

Post by EMIRELADERO »

gambiting wrote: post #34
EMIRELADERO wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And what would those entail? How could one modify an SDK without disassembling or even debugging?

An SDK typically isn't a binary blob - it's usually a collection of header files you can integrate into your projects, media assets, config files etc. All of those can by modified by hand without disassembling anything.

That is true. It would be interesting to see this played out in court. When there are doubts around a certain clause on a contract of adhesion/license with non-negotiable terms, courts tend to side with the interpretation most favorable to the consumer.

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#36

Post by MrStonedOne »

Manuel_D wrote: post #28
hexo wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's not valid. At all. I think it is illegal in some countries and should be illegal everywhere. It was enough of these "practices".

If I swap out my car's engine with a more powerful one and screw up the drivetrain will warranty cover it? If I load broken firmware onto my device that screws it up, why should the company be on the hook? Replacing firmware is no different than replacing any other component. What countries force companies to provide warranty when users load faulty firmware onto devices?

> If I swap out my car's engine with a more powerful one

yes, legally required to be covered in the us.

> and screw up the drivetrain will warranty cover it?

No, not legally required to be covered in the us.

The difference is the law specifies the manufacturer can not assume a leads to b, they have to a reason to think b was caused by a.

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#37

Post by deathanatos »

judge2020 wrote: post #20
opencl wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The SDK basically gives remote shutter control and file transfer. There is nothing in it that could plausibly damage anything.

There are a lot of changeable settings listed in those header files, chances are some combination of settings or other highly-tuned SDK usage could put the camera to work and potentially cause it to overheat (eg. forcing a specific shutter speed while also capping the movie shutter speed, perhaps) since they're not testing the use cases you could theoretically enable via the SDK.

Then that's a defect in the product, not the fault of the user, and should be covered under warranty.

(& the defect should get fixed. Nobody wants to brick their camera.)

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#38

Post by DannyBee »

AlexandrB wrote: post #2

> 5.2 YOU AGREE AND ACKNOWLEDGE THAT, ONCE A PRODUCT IS USED OR CONTROLLED BY OR THROUGH THE DIGITAL IMAGING SYSTEM, SUCH PRODUCT SHALL BE OUT OF SUCH MANUFACTURER-WARRANTY WITH RESPECT TO THE PRODUCT AS SEPARATELY SPECIFIED BY FUJIFILM, FUJIFILM’S AFFILIATES, OR THEIR BUSINESS PARTNERS. Brutal. Consumer protections are lagging badly behind in the software era. It's bad enough that commercial software has broad discl…

Even in consumer places like the US, this is generally illegal.

They would not be able to refuse warranty service without showing that your use of the SDK was the reason the camera failed (and the burden would be on them).

IE they can't say "Yes, the lens popped out because it was defective, but you used the SDK so tough crap"

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#39

Post by cge »

Manuel_D wrote: post #28
hexo wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's not valid. At all. I think it is illegal in some countries and should be illegal everywhere. It was enough of these "practices".

If I swap out my car's engine with a more powerful one and screw up the drivetrain will warranty cover it? If I load broken firmware onto my device that screws it up, why should the company be on the hook? Replacing firmware is no different than replacing any other component. What countries force companies to provide warranty when users load faulty firmware onto devices?

That's not the problem. The problem here is that Fuji appears to be claiming that any use of the SDK voids the warranty entirely, regardless of the defect. t would be like if you swapped out your car's engine with a more powerful one, and then, from a completely unrelated fault, its navigation system stops working.

In the US, my understanding is that this is explicitly not legal, per the Magnuson–Moss Warranty Act. FujiFilm can choose not to offer a warranty at all, but if they offer one, then it must cover defects on modified devices unless they can show that the modification caused or contributed to the defect.

In the EU, it is my understanding that it is legal to have a guarantee with terms like these. However, regardless of any guarantee the manufacturer may offer, there is a statutory guarantee in the EU for most products, which completely ignores the terms that the manufacturer might prefer. This usually ends up being weaker than Magnuson–Moss in terms of duration and modifications. But it usually means that for six months, the seller must prove that the fault with the product was caused by the consumer, and for two years, if you can show that the problem is from a defect with the device originally and not from you, then you can still get repairs, replacement, or a refund.

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#40

Post by DannyBee »

Manuel_D wrote: post #28
hexo wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's not valid. At all. I think it is illegal in some countries and should be illegal everywhere. It was enough of these "practices".

If I swap out my car's engine with a more powerful one and screw up the drivetrain will warranty cover it? If I load broken firmware onto my device that screws it up, why should the company be on the hook? Replacing firmware is no different than replacing any other component. What countries force companies to provide warranty when users load faulty firmware onto devices?

The short answer is: The warranty must cover damage not caused by your modification.

There are no countries i'm aware of that require you warranty damage caused by user modification. Lots of countries require that you do not void the entire warranty, or refuse service, of any damage not caused by the modification, and generally the manufacturer has to show the damage was caused by the modification if they want to refuse service.

In this case, Fuji is trying to void the entire warranty. That is not legal in a lot of countries.

Post reply on HN