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We Can’t Let John Deere Destroy the Idea of Ownership

wired.com

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Re: We Can’t Let John Deere Destroy the Idea of Ownership

#41

Post by bryanlarsen »

briantakita wrote: post #30
beat wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just mega-tractors that are software-controlled these days. It's all tractors. Including those used by "small family farms".

Perennial polyculture food forests reduces the advantage of high tech equipment. Nature does the work of growing. Replanting is rare. Harvesting is more of a manual process.

Polyculture farming may be the next big thing in farming, enabled by machine vision automated systems.

A typical small farmer in Saskatchewan can harvest 100-200 acres of wheat by himself on a single day using a modern combine harvester. Manual harvesting is not an option.

Re: We Can’t Let John Deere Destroy the Idea of Ownership

#42

Post by cbd1984 »

briantakita wrote: post #30
beat wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just mega-tractors that are software-controlled these days. It's all tractors. Including those used by "small family farms".

Perennial polyculture food forests reduces the advantage of high tech equipment. Nature does the work of growing. Replanting is rare. Harvesting is more of a manual process.

What are the yields like? What would doing that for all food do to the price of food?

Re: We Can’t Let John Deere Destroy the Idea of Ownership

#43

Post by vonmoltke »

jkot wrote: post #29

Article is just wrong. One does not own software on device he buys. Software ownership means that one can issue new licenses, which is clearly not a case here. One can not just start selling Windows, because he bought laptop where they are installed. You just get license to use software. But other side is customer protection. One buys tractor with expectation to be able to fix it and modify it. If that is not true, J…

> Article is just wrong. One does not own software on device he buys. Software ownership means that one can issue new licenses, which is clearly not a case here. One can not just start selling Windows, because he bought laptop where they are installed. You just get license to use software.

This idea needs to die. Copyright ownership means that one can make and distribute copies of software. Software ownership means you own one or more copies, which you should be able to with as you wish within the bounds of copyright law. You do not need a license to use a book; you do to copy it. Software should be the same, and that companies like Deere, GM, and 8,476 software companies are trying to assert the validity of this "license to use" is a perversion of copyright law.

Re: We Can’t Let John Deere Destroy the Idea of Ownership

#44

Post by mitchell_h »

Loughla wrote: post #12

The people who have the money to buy the mega-tractors you see in the article don't care. That's why, unless someone outside the industry makes a stink, nothing will happen. These are giga-corporations who are 'family owned' in name only. If they don't rent, they operate that machine for a few years, play the tax game, and trade it even-money for a new one. To them, ownership doesn't matter. Their service contracts w…

Maybe a BIT off topic...but I've got some experience here...We're seeing the death of EXCLUSIVELY family farms. The truly family farms that are surviving and even thriving are those that are diversifying. They're using their tractors to plant their soy beans than leasing them to the neighbor to plant their corn or wheat. Leasing their neighbors trucks to deliver their corn while the neighbors use them for wheat. All the while keeping the trucks/tractors/* on the move the entire year.

The issue in the article is starting to hit medium sized farms. When old tractors broke they pulled them into the shop and fixed them. Now they can't even diagnose without having the local dealer come out. During harvest time a tractor being down for 12 hours is HUGE. Like make it or break your year huge.

Even the "medium sized" tractors require a service tech with a laptop to come out for almost everything. Want to shift around your planting? Tech. Get a new field? Tech. Changing the type of seeds? tech. Farmers HATE those techs.

Also this issue is a HUGE issue in cars and other consumer things. Which is where it will probably be fought in the end. If I buy a car today, in 20 years it's pretty assured I will NOT be able to find a computer or any information about the ECU on how to tune the engine or use the ECU to diagnose drive train issues. They're hiding the ECU specs in the name of safety and emissions. In the end it's hurting consumers and shops in a big way.

Re: We Can’t Let John Deere Destroy the Idea of Ownership

#46

Post by ebbv »

Loughla wrote: post #12

The people who have the money to buy the mega-tractors you see in the article don't care. That's why, unless someone outside the industry makes a stink, nothing will happen. These are giga-corporations who are 'family owned' in name only. If they don't rent, they operate that machine for a few years, play the tax game, and trade it even-money for a new one. To them, ownership doesn't matter. Their service contracts w…

Independent farming is under siege by corporate agriculture, but it isn't dead. And independent farmers need tractors too.

Re: We Can’t Let John Deere Destroy the Idea of Ownership

#47

Post by Loughla »

hharnisch wrote: post #39
Loughla wrote: post #12

The people who have the money to buy the mega-tractors you see in the article don't care. That's why, unless someone outside the industry makes a stink, nothing will happen. These are giga-corporations who are 'family owned' in name only. If they don't rent, they operate that machine for a few years, play the tax game, and trade it even-money for a new one. To them, ownership doesn't matter. Their service contracts w…

Disagree. The family owned farmers care too. For the big equipment, like combines, there's a handful of people everyone pays to have their fields harvested. This person get's compensation in the form of money and other services (someone else will plow their field for instance). People own their own tractors and share time to get things done, otherwise you'd have to own all of the equipment (which is only justified wh…

I know they care, too. But, they lack the political pull, money and time to address these issues.

Small town Illinois is similar to Iowa apparently, except for the last section. We do share labor, and rent/trade labor for the use of large machinery. But, the market for older machinery is still very strong. I bought 2 1970's masseys at auction last year, and one small mid-90's JD this year. The bids were competitive, but the price was fair.

Re: We Can’t Let John Deere Destroy the Idea of Ownership

#48

Post by apricot »

Richard Stallman spent the last 30 years telling us this would happen.

As soon as books become computer files, you don't buy them anymore, you lease usage rights.

As soon as tractors contain computer code, you don't own them anymore, you are granted a license to use them.

When will it stop? More and more everyday objects are incorporating software and firmware in many different forms.

I remember reading Stallman's short story "The Right to Read" in the 1990s. I found it alarmist and completely unrealistic. I read it today and am forced to recognize that Stallman was exactly right.

Re: We Can’t Let John Deere Destroy the Idea of Ownership

#49

Post by JoeAltmaier »

jasonlotito wrote: post #20
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #10

Huh. So, like an iPhone, you don't get to see or modify the software on a tractor. What's new about that? Its the same with my desktop computer, come to think of it.

Are you saying you can't install the software you want on your computer? You can't replace the OS? Are you suggesting that this should be acceptable?

No, just the part about not allowed to modify nor even examine the code on my computer, that is under license.

As for the iPhone, I think the way it works is definitely not acceptable.

Re: We Can’t Let John Deere Destroy the Idea of Ownership

#50

Post by brudgers »

[IANAL]

The big play isn't about ownership. It's about liability.

If you own the tractor and something bad happens, it's product liability. Our intuitions of responsibility go back to the Code of Hammurabi.

If a builder build a house for some one, and does not construct it properly, and the house which he built fall in and kill its owner, then that builder shall be put to death.

If you license the tractor, well that's not quite so intuitive and there's lots of room to argue over the terms of the license rather than the arguing over legal precedent.

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