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

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431–440 of 562 posts

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

#431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> those shops illegally obtain the parts (whether counterfeit or stolen, since Apple won't intentionally sell them to anyone) and resources (schematics, software, etc) to be able to do so. This situation is both good and bad. Stolen parts are good I really doubt that many of those genuine repair parts for iphones and macbooks are stolen , in the sense that somebody loaded up a pallet and took it from its manufacturer…

What kind of theft, and from whom? My understanding is that a person with decision making power at these factories are negotiating with third party repair shops, agreeing on a price, and selling authentic Apple badged components or Apple schematics to them. In that sense, it is not theft. My understanding is that this is in absolute violation of Apple's license agreements and contracts with these factories. Those fac…

Theft is the wrong word here.

No IP violation is a theft unless it involves "a person intentionally takes personal property of another without permission or consent and with the intent to convert it to the taker's use".

It's a violation of copyright, trademark, trade secrets, counterfeiting or patent, but it is not theft. The usage of the verbiage "theft" started in the late eighties to early nineties as part of a campaign to make intellectual property violation sound more severe than it actually is.

The key difference is that, by depriving another person of their property, you are preventing them from using it, where in intellectual property violations, you are merely gaining use without denying use to the creator.

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

#432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't mean chips per-se, I mean complete assemblies like iPhone displays. As far as I know, there's no "legitimate" source for those, it's all either outright stolen, counterfeit or bad/rejected parts. > because reverse logistics (how you deal broken/returned goods) is already a huge cost center and the legislation as proposed would make it more so How would right to repair affect that? And if it wasn't profit-moti…

> I mean complete assemblies like iPhone displays. As far as I know, there's no "legitimate" source for those So how are legitimate high street shops in the west doing it? You can’t convince me every town in the UK has a criminal operation working in the open doing screen replacements?

https://www.alibaba.com/trade/search?SearchText=iphone+repla...

the only way you'd get the plod even vaguely interested would be if these arrived in boxes that claimed they were genuine parts, and even then...

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

#433

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason it can be done in China is because those shops illegally obtain the parts (whether counterfeit or stolen, since Apple won't intentionally sell them to anyone) and resources (schematics, software, etc) to be able to do so. This situation is both good and bad. Stolen parts are good, in the sense that this grey market at least allows consumers to repair devices cost-effectively. It's also bad, because besides…

> those shops illegally obtain the parts (whether counterfeit or stolen, since Apple won't intentionally sell them to anyone) and resources (schematics, software, etc) to be able to do so. This situation is both good and bad. Stolen parts are good I really doubt that many of those genuine repair parts for iphones and macbooks are stolen , in the sense that somebody loaded up a pallet and took it from its manufacturer…

>in the sense that somebody loaded up a pallet and took it from its manufacturer without paying.

Pay is involved, and its Apple authorized recyclers who are selling parts on the black market breaching Apple contract stating everything needs to go into Shredder and get pulverized into dust.

Here is just one example "Apple sues GEEP for not shredding reusable iPhones" https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/10/07/apple-g...

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

#434
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…

> Rossman's motives are purely financial and self promoting.

How does he benefit by teaching others on how to repair stuff for free. You can start your own repair business by watching and learning from his videos.

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

#435
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The repairability Rossmann is talking about is not user-replaceable components. His repairs usually require soldering to replace components. One of his main critique points is that Apple makes it hard to repair their products, even for electronics professionals. In the past, Apple has also altered designs so that small electrical problems suddenly fry the most expensive component on the board, the CPU. Either this is…

Maybe it's neither of those things. Maybe the design of the board saved a few dollars, maybe it was required by some other design constraint the vlogger doesn't perceive. I don't personally have the time to watch a 20-minute video to see what the hell he's talking about, but his overall shtick of acting like one random vlogger can readily pinpoint what thousands of professional EEs didn't notice in the design phase i…

Why do you argue against something you don't want to take the time to understand? It's clear from you comment you didn't watch the video - even if you hadn't said so yourself. If you watch it you might both understand it better and have something interesting to add. I don't get why people comment on articles (and videos) they didn't look at.

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

#437
post #306

Tip: if you're curious enough to watch a video of Rossmann's, do that in the incognito mode. Otherwise you'll be pestered with recommendations of the other two thousand of his videos, until the end of your days. Perhaps you'll even be able to follow the epic of his fight by the titles of new videos.

There is a Chrome ext that allows you to quickly open a link/video in incognito by clicking it while holding a meta key like shift, highly recommend for avoiding the Youtube recommendation hell [0].

[0] https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/key-ncognito/lilom...

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

#438

Living in Shenzhen, it’s shocking how easy it is to go out and repair stuff. Living in Palo Alto, it’s frustrating how hard it is. I’m thinking maybe, just maybe, introducing repairability laws won’t solve the problem. I am perfectly happy upgrading the memory on my MacBook Air with a reflow air station rather than swapping out some dims if it means my laptop is half as thick and twice as rugged. I’m also just as hap…

The reason it can be done in China is because those shops illegally obtain the parts (whether counterfeit or stolen, since Apple won't intentionally sell them to anyone) and resources (schematics, software, etc) to be able to do so. This situation is both good and bad. Stolen parts are good, in the sense that this grey market at least allows consumers to repair devices cost-effectively. It's also bad, because besides…

This smells like anti-Chinese FUD IYAM.

There are plenty of differing qualities of parts, but they're not all official while some are the same.

If R2R were a thing in the US and parts were commonly-available, there wouldn't be a need for white-, gray-, and black- marketplaces. Sure, there could be lower-quality ones when someone wants to do it cheaper, like there are right now. The problem is the giant corporation locking-up the schematics, the tools, the guides, and the parts to be able to repair their shit at a sane cost and reasonable effort.

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

#439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> “People do surface mount rework all the time” What percentage of Apple customers are doing surface mount rework, or even hiring other people to do this, in your estimation? My guess is less than .01%. And how much could that really be increased if Apple were forced to make their parts accessible and available in the aftermarket? Vs the carbon footprint of the extra manufacturing effort and having to set up distribu…

> My guess is less than .01%. Because it's prohibitively expensive vs the cost of a new device due to the policies being discussed in this thread. There was a time I could get a screen replaced in a phone for $40-50. Today, Apple literally bricks the device for swapping out a broken button, even if the part is an authentic Apple component. The trend has been getting progressively worse, and while this thread is mostl…

I spent 3 months researching how to build a SFF gaming PC and a year after I was done, Apple came out with the M1 Mac Mini which covers 90% my PC's use case (And beats it on many dimensions). PC repair is a dying trade, let's not regulate to keep it alive.

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

#440
"But Rossmann hopes to raise it. As a repair technician slash right to repair advocate slash YouTube personality, he has expertise and clout that he’s looking to leverage in his latest endeavor: trying to put the right to repair for consumer electronics on the ballot in Massachusetts.

To do so, Rossmann started the Repair Group Preservation Action Fund, a 501(c)(4) social welfare organization, and launched a fundraiser on March 30. So far, he has raised more than $700,000 toward his $6 million goal, which by all accounts isn’t nearly enough, given his potential opponents could be tech and telecom giants like Apple, Verizon and T-Mobile.

“It’s not that we’re against it,” said Gordon-Byrne. “God bless him for trying. But I think our ability to sponsor that is very limited. We gotta find some friendly billionaires.”

The move is risky, even if Rossmann can raise $6 million.

“If you lose on the ballot, that really makes it tough to get other people to pick it up again, because it’s kind of like you’ve lost your proof of concept,” said Nathan Proctor, director of the U.S. Public Interest Research Group’s right to repair campaign.5"

1. I hope Louis succeeds for his state's sake.

2. My fear is what the big companies did CA. A few legislators introduced bills aimed at ending E-waste, or Right to Repair. The big boys used their money to squash the bills, and succeeded stupendously. All it took was a few scare commercials.

3. The big pocketed companies made these rediculious commercials. They featured a thief, or rapist, gaining access to your vechicle in a dark parking lot. This was supposedly due to the bad guy having access to schematics.

California has had 2, or 3 bills over (E-waste) Right to Repair Bills; and they all failed.

Failed-----------. This is beyond frustrating to me.

Corporations own Sacramento. Be it tech, insurance, or Realator's, they are making our lives more expensive. I won't even get started on the Insurance industry Lobbiests. (My blood pressure is climbing)

We Californians need to smarten up.

If we get another shot at Right to Repair, I guarantee you won't be raped in a parking garage because someone reverse engineered a gadget to take over your vechicle, or you.

If you main concern is someone taking control of your vehicle I would allow all security schematics exempt from Right to Repair.

Now let's the next bill passed.

I would like a Proposition, but they would Uber us?

(I'm not angry over just Right to Repair. It a lot. It mandatory vechicle insurance, smog checks that are pricey, and too frequent, Insurance rates that I guarantee are price colluded, outrageous traffic fines for infractions, driving past 10 pm, and being pulled over for no reason. Cops think we all get hammered like they do?, harassing homeless for sleeping, etc.)

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