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All rights are manmade. Rights are social constructs. I'm not looking for stone tablets anywhere. But simply saying that a right exists does not make it so. If

All rights are manmade. Rights are social constructs. I'm not looking for stone tablets anywhere. But simply saying that a right exists does not make it so. If that is all it takes, please excuse me for a moment while I go declare, and then exercise, my right to rob a bank. Like any social construct, a right exists when it is broadly accepted as a fact and is operational within society. It helps if you make it a law, too. Don't provide truisms about why the market is not always correct. That doesn't prove anything. You need to prove that this particular circumstance, of repairability in products, is one of the times when the market is not correct. On the contrary, a company's right to encumber products with repair-resistant features is not a imaginary or asserted right -- it is protected by laws which have been passed for that purpose, such as the DMCA in the case of DRM, which have been challenged and upheld in court. So this is really about an imaginary right to repair versus an actual, legal, broadly recognized right to encumber.

pessimizer 10y ago
As you say, all rights are social constructs. Therefore you don't "prove" a right exists, as you demanded, you make a right exist by discussing it and lobbying for it. That's what happening here. I say that the market is not correct because it leads to bad outcomes. You seem to be saying that the outcome isn't bad because the market doesn't lead to it. I'm making an assertion that I believe the right to repair is a positive (for many reasons.) You seem to be making an assertion that markets are always right. I just have to convince - because I'm making a statement about what I think we should prefer in society. You have to prove, because you're making a claim of objective fact.
- twblalock 10y ago
  What is happening here is that people are claiming that the right to repair already exists, and is being violated by companies. If they think it should exist, that's what they should have argued. But that isn't what they wrote. They wrote that the right does exist. Almost everyone in this thread used that language. That's what I'm arguing against. I'm not saying that market outcomes are good or bad in general -- they are just there, as the pre-existing default position that may or may not demand a regulatory response. Any action taken should be on the basis that the default position is suboptimal in some way, and that regulation will make a positive difference. Otherwise, it is best to leave things as they are by default, especially when you consider the expense and unintended side effects that accompany regulation. It seems to me that the only problem with the market outcome in this particular discussion is that some people aren't happy that the products being produced do not have a certain feature they like, namely repairability. This is clearly not the personal preference of most consumers, because if it was, companies would produce products to appeal to that preference. So clearly we are dealing with a small number of consumers who want this feature. That's not a strong case to change the outcome.
wfo 10y ago
For the entire history of the United States, it has been the case that when you buy a product, you may repair it. You may disassemble it. You may do as you like with devices that you purchase. It was never illegal to take apart a musket. It was never illegal to fix a broken wheel on a carriage. It was never illegal to replace a piece of the electronics on a radio with a new piece. But now it is. What is "broadly accepted as fact" is that if you purchase an item, it belongs to you, and you may take it apart, fix it, modify it, as you like. It is fundamentally "weird" and new to people (and the only people aware of these laws are the ones unlucky enough to run up against them), the notion that you can simultaneously own an item and be locked in a cage for taking it apart. It disassembles and redefines ownership in a fundamental way, and ownership is a fundamental concept in our society and has been for hundreds of years. We should not let companies redefine it for their profit overnight without our notice or a fight. That's what this fight is.
lerpa 10y ago
> Rights are social constructs. What you're saying is that might makes right(s), pun intended. And that's just as silly as it gets, that's the reason people get all sort of authoritatians systems...people decided to call them witches and kill them so they were on the right...

pessimizer 10y ago

As you say, all rights are social constructs. Therefore you don't "prove" a right exists, as you demanded, you make a right exist by discussing it and lobbying for it. That's what happening here. I say that the market is not correct because it leads to bad outcomes. You seem to be saying that the outcome isn't bad because the market doesn't lead to it. I'm making an assertion that I believe the right to repair is a positive (for many reasons.) You seem to be making an assertion that markets are always right. I just have to convince - because I'm making a statement about what I think we should prefer in society. You have to prove, because you're making a claim of objective fact.

twblalock 10y ago
What is happening here is that people are claiming that the right to repair already exists, and is being violated by companies. If they think it should exist, that's what they should have argued. But that isn't what they wrote. They wrote that the right does exist. Almost everyone in this thread used that language. That's what I'm arguing against. I'm not saying that market outcomes are good or bad in general -- they are just there, as the pre-existing default position that may or may not demand a regulatory response. Any action taken should be on the basis that the default position is suboptimal in some way, and that regulation will make a positive difference. Otherwise, it is best to leave things as they are by default, especially when you consider the expense and unintended side effects that accompany regulation. It seems to me that the only problem with the market outcome in this particular discussion is that some people aren't happy that the products being produced do not have a certain feature they like, namely repairability. This is clearly not the personal preference of most consumers, because if it was, companies would produce products to appeal to that preference. So clearly we are dealing with a small number of consumers who want this feature. That's not a strong case to change the outcome.

wfo 10y ago

For the entire history of the United States, it has been the case that when you buy a product, you may repair it. You may disassemble it. You may do as you like with devices that you purchase. It was never illegal to take apart a musket. It was never illegal to fix a broken wheel on a carriage. It was never illegal to replace a piece of the electronics on a radio with a new piece. But now it is. What is "broadly accepted as fact" is that if you purchase an item, it belongs to you, and you may take it apart, fix it, modify it, as you like. It is fundamentally "weird" and new to people (and the only people aware of these laws are the ones unlucky enough to run up against them), the notion that you can simultaneously own an item and be locked in a cage for taking it apart. It disassembles and redefines ownership in a fundamental way, and ownership is a fundamental concept in our society and has been for hundreds of years. We should not let companies redefine it for their profit overnight without our notice or a fight. That's what this fight is.

lerpa 10y ago

> Rights are social constructs. What you're saying is that might makes right(s), pun intended. And that's just as silly as it gets, that's the reason people get all sort of authoritatians systems...people decided to call them witches and kill them so they were on the right...