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The Right to Repair Is Law in Washington State

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Re: The Right to Repair Is Law in Washington State

#71

Post by tadfisher »

pavon wrote: post #30
mschuster91 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Road vehicles should already be covered by existing right-to-repair rights, are they not? Otherwise, how would independent repair shops still exist?

Purely due to industry norms, no laws that I am aware of. For example Tesla makes it much harder for third parties to repair vehicles both by not making parts available and by using DRM/part-pairing/phoning-home to require authorization from them to replace some parts.

It's a traditional benefit of decoupling the sales and maintenance of vehicles from the manufacturer. The manufacturer should not care who buys their parts, so it should be purely an additional revenue stream. ASE certification means any shop can carry out warranty repairs and the manufacturer doesn't have to have repair shops and staff in every city/town.

That said, it's not just Tesla that has broken this model; Volkswagen Auto Group in particular are famous for requiring proprietary tools and software packages to diagnose and repair their vehicles, and refusing to sell tools/software to independent shops. I think some manufacturers are just more tightly coupled to dealerships, so there's a profit motive in forcing all repairs to happen through them.

Re: The Right to Repair Is Law in Washington State

#72

Post by dmonitor »

walterbell wrote: post #3

https://www.ifixit.com/News/110039/double-trouble-for-repair... Come January 1, 2026, manufacturers must also stop using parts pairing to block repairs for these devices. That means no more pop-ups that say “unknown part” when you swap in a working screen. No more downgrading your camera or fingerprint sensor just because you repaired your own phone. SB 5680 goes even further for wheelchair users. It covers power whe…

Hopefully this doesn't mean the system can't report a non-OEM part being installed at all. Buying a used product that's been hacked apart would be frustrating.

Re: The Right to Repair Is Law in Washington State

#73

Post by connicpu »

alpb wrote: post #67
connicpu wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Low earth orbit broadband gear" is incredibly specific lol, I believe there's exactly 2 companies with large offices in Washington that would apply to.

Doesn't that include all home Starlink devices?

Plus Amazon's Kuiper when it eventually launches

Re: The Right to Repair Is Law in Washington State

#74

Post by sidewndr46 »

dghlsakjg wrote: post #6
sleepybrett wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This law does not apply to tractors or game consoles. It's neutered as all fuck. From the article: Of course, these wins come with carve-outs. HB 1483 exempts: Video game consoles Medical devices Motor vehicles Agricultural and construction equipment Security systems and alarm equipment Internet and TV equipment from ISPs Off-road recreational vehicles Large-scale energy storage and solar gear Low earth orbit broadba…

By 2026 my dishwasher is going to have a forced update to run Doom in an effort to be classified as a video game console, isn’t it?

Anything connected to the internet ought to be a "Security system" and should therefore be exempt as well

Re: The Right to Repair Is Law in Washington State

#75

Post by crooked-v »

balls187 wrote: post #47
zootboy wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Commercial Tier 4F diesels of the John Deere variety have latching fault codes when they relate to the aftertreatment system. It requires the manufacturer's proprietary scan tool (which they will not sell to you) to clear the code, even if the actual issue was something as simple as a connector left unplugged for too long.

Requiring proprietary dongles/software to clear fault codes are not uncommon, but I'm surprised there hasn't been enough interest for there to be a 3rd party tool. Like McDonald's Shake Machines had a 3rd party tool to help diagnose issues.

The McDonald's stuff in particular is a red herring. Their requirements are contract requirements, put in place after too many franchisees tarnished their name with listeria outbreaks.

Re: The Right to Repair Is Law in Washington State

#76

Post by sidewndr46 »

sleepybrett wrote: post #4
froggertoaster wrote: post #2

Companies like John Deere have way overplayed their hand, and I'm glad to see the regulatory winds are changing.

This law does not apply to tractors or game consoles. It's neutered as all fuck. From the article: Of course, these wins come with carve-outs. HB 1483 exempts: Video game consoles Medical devices Motor vehicles Agricultural and construction equipment Security systems and alarm equipment Internet and TV equipment from ISPs Off-road recreational vehicles Large-scale energy storage and solar gear Low earth orbit broadba…

So it carves out most of the stuff I could reasonably expect to be covered under this? The only thing I can see covered would be cell phones and DVD players

Re: The Right to Repair Is Law in Washington State

#77

Post by ZeWaka »

ender341341 wrote: post #63
ZeWaka wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very interesting, there's a carveout for video game consoles: > Nothing in this chapter shall be construed to require any original manufacturer or authorized repair provider to make available any parts, tools, or documentation required for the diagnosis, maintenance, or repair of a video game console and its components and peripherals. Wonder if Valve/Xbox/Nintendo asked for that, this being Washington State.

Given the support valve provides for the steam deck I'd be surprised if it was them. They seem much more interested in having a viable alternative to keep Microsoft from walling windows in such a way to kill steam than caring that they make the actual devices. I would 100% percent expect both Microsoft & Nintendo to have had a hand in that though.

Yeah, I figure so - they were just the first company in Washington to come to mind given that I own their product, unlike the others :)

Re: The Right to Repair Is Law in Washington State

#79

Post by rkagerer »

Axis locks out certain useful features in their IP cameras unless you install an Axis-branded SD card.

Since Axis doesn't actually manufacture SD cards, they are obviously rebranded high-endurance cards from one of the major fabs (possibly with some minor firmware parameter tweaks). Except, they cost twice as much and aren't as generally available.

Would this law have any bearing on that business practice?

Re: The Right to Repair Is Law in Washington State

#80

Post by pnw »

While this is overall good progress, this bill was watered down by WA politicians after meeting with their corporate donors. Someone already mentioned the video game console exemption, there were a number of other changes, detailed here: https://ethicalhour.com/ethicalbusiness/microsofts-bold-move...
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