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Farmers are an independent group. They are used to relying on their own skills and hard work to make a living, and they are not going to tolerate this. I think

Farmers are an independent group. They are used to relying on their own skills and hard work to make a living, and they are not going to tolerate this. I think it is an overreach for John Deere and other manufacturers to control what I do with my (my!) devices. I really hope this law gets passed to prevent companies from doing this. Farmers can really help, because everyone knows we depend on them for our food, so anything that messes with them, messes with all of us. I think they picked a fight with the wrong people.

kelvin0 10y ago
I think you are right, however it kinda seems they already put up with a lot more from companies selling them their 'patented' seeds and the constraints that come with those seeds. I once saw a doc mentioning a farmer that got 'fined' by a seed company because he had some seeds he did not pay for in his crop, these few plants that grew because the neighboring farmer was using them and the wind blew some on the side of his lot. Also, they are no longer allowed to stock up on the seeds, they need to renew their stock... Has anyone seen this also?
- secfirstmd 10y ago
  Yeah that sounds familiar. I think it was a documentary about Monsanto. Can't remember the exact name, might have been a BBC program?
  - 09bjb 10y ago
    You're probably remembering "Food, Inc."
- j_s 10y ago
  "Monsanto wins landmark patent case in Supreme Court" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5700514 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5700514 tptacek 1408 days ago: Once again regarding this story: to understand what's happening here, it's very important that you understand that the farmer didn't just acquire Monsanto seeds, but also used glyphospate herbicides on the crops. The point of Monsanto's invention is that it survives Roundup; if you spray Roundup on normal crops, they die. Most people who see this story play out seem to think that it implies a Monsanto seed could blow onto your field and then get you sued. But of course, if you didn't know you were planting Monsanto seeds, you wouldn't think to try to kill them with Roundup.
- bazzert 10y ago
  Myth # 2 ... http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2012/10/18/163034053/top-five-myths-of-genetically-modified-seeds-busted http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2012/10/18/163034053/top...
- whalesalad 10y ago
  You make a decent point, but if you're unhappy with a patented seed variety, you can change that the following season. When you buy a combine you are making a pretty big commitment. They are many hundreds of thousands of dollars. Not only that, but it's mostly in your best interest to buy the same brand to buy-in to the ecosystem of parts, dealers, knowledge, etc... so sometimes there is inertia to overcome if you want to transition from, say Deere to Case IH. It would be like switching from Apple/Lightning to Android/USB-C except instead of a few thousand bucks on devices and maybe a hundred on cables, you're talking millions of dollars.
walshemj 10y ago
Lol no offence but farmers are a major recipient of state welfare you don't get farmer palmer in Viz form no where
throwaway729 10y ago
> Farmers are an independent group ...who receive billions in federal subsidies. > They are used to relying on their own skills and hard work Almost universally using machines and seeds designed by engineers and scientists in "The City". (excluding Amish farmers, in which case, my sincerest apologies for the skepticism.) > I think it is an overreach for John Deere and other manufacturers to control what I do with my (my!) devices. I really hope this law gets passed to prevent companies from doing this. Agreed. And in return for that legal protection, farmers should concede their subsidies. > I think they picked a fight with the wrong people. Definitely. Not because farmers are rugged individualists, but because they have extremely effective lobbying organizations and are very well-connected in DC.
- got2surf 10y ago
  I think there may be a disconnect between individual "farmers", who are perceived as rugged individualists, and well-connected farm companies with deeper pockets and lobbyists. It seems like John Deere's restrictions are more harmful to small family farms than to large agricultural corporations, right? Would large farm lobbying groups fight against Deere's practices, when harming small family farms drives business to larger agri-businesses?
  - throwaway729 10y ago
    > I think there may be a disconnect between individual "farmers", who are perceived as rugged individualists, and well-connected farm companies with deeper pockets and lobbyists Disagree. Small family farms provide the votes, farming companies provide the lobbying $. They're symbiotic, and both benefit from subsidies (to the extent that small family farms own the land they farm, which many do). In any case, the "rugged individualist farmer" myth is a myth. And as long as my tax dollars subsidize their profits, I'll continue to point out the hypocrisy. 99.9% of farming really is just one more inter-connected industry these days. There's nothing wrong with inter-connectedness and inter-dependency, BTW. But it is extraordinary hypocritical to appeal to one's self-sustenance as a justification for preferential legal/policy treatment when you're working in an industry that relies not only a myriad of other industries, but also huge federal subsidies. > Would large farm lobbying groups fight against Deere's practices, when harming small family farms drives business to larger agri-businesses? Sure. Decreasing maintenance costs helps their bottom line too. And decreasing their operational costs is probably a more sustainable and probable way to drive out family farms anyways. > It seems like John Deere's restrictions are more harmful to small family farms than to large agricultural corporations, right? Really only in the sense of diminishing marginal utility of money. (As I said above, I'm not siding with John Deere. So we agree. But I'm also not siding against John Deere because of any level of sympathy for farmers' romantic self image of "independence".)
Kalium 10y ago
> Farmers can really help, because everyone knows we depend on them for our food, so anything that messes with them, messes with all of us. Really? Because I'm perfectly happy getting my produce from Mexico and my rice from Thailand instead of American farmers. Farmers as a group feed the planet, but American farmers we don't need at all.
- alasdair_ 10y ago
  >Farmers as a group feed the planet, but American farmers we don't need at all. Until something happens to knock out the supply chain for a while, then we're fucked.
  - Kalium 10y ago
    Given that most Americans don't subsist on domestically produced foods, we're fucked without that supply chain anyway.
dragonwriter 10y ago
> Farmers are an independent group. They are used to relying on their own skills and hard work to make a living, and they are not going to tolerate this. In the increasingly-distant-from-reality world of yeoman farmers rather than corporate agribusiness.

kelvin0 10y ago

I think you are right, however it kinda seems they already put up with a lot more from companies selling them their 'patented' seeds and the constraints that come with those seeds. I once saw a doc mentioning a farmer that got 'fined' by a seed company because he had some seeds he did not pay for in his crop, these few plants that grew because the neighboring farmer was using them and the wind blew some on the side of his lot. Also, they are no longer allowed to stock up on the seeds, they need to renew their stock... Has anyone seen this also?

secfirstmd 10y ago
Yeah that sounds familiar. I think it was a documentary about Monsanto. Can't remember the exact name, might have been a BBC program?
- 09bjb 10y ago
  You're probably remembering "Food, Inc."
j_s 10y ago
"Monsanto wins landmark patent case in Supreme Court" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5700514 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5700514 tptacek 1408 days ago: Once again regarding this story: to understand what's happening here, it's very important that you understand that the farmer didn't just acquire Monsanto seeds, but also used glyphospate herbicides on the crops. The point of Monsanto's invention is that it survives Roundup; if you spray Roundup on normal crops, they die. Most people who see this story play out seem to think that it implies a Monsanto seed could blow onto your field and then get you sued. But of course, if you didn't know you were planting Monsanto seeds, you wouldn't think to try to kill them with Roundup.
bazzert 10y ago
Myth # 2 ... http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2012/10/18/163034053/top-five-myths-of-genetically-modified-seeds-busted http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2012/10/18/163034053/top...
whalesalad 10y ago
You make a decent point, but if you're unhappy with a patented seed variety, you can change that the following season. When you buy a combine you are making a pretty big commitment. They are many hundreds of thousands of dollars. Not only that, but it's mostly in your best interest to buy the same brand to buy-in to the ecosystem of parts, dealers, knowledge, etc... so sometimes there is inertia to overcome if you want to transition from, say Deere to Case IH. It would be like switching from Apple/Lightning to Android/USB-C except instead of a few thousand bucks on devices and maybe a hundred on cables, you're talking millions of dollars.

walshemj 10y ago

Lol no offence but farmers are a major recipient of state welfare you don't get farmer palmer in Viz form no where

throwaway729 10y ago

> Farmers are an independent group ...who receive billions in federal subsidies. > They are used to relying on their own skills and hard work Almost universally using machines and seeds designed by engineers and scientists in "The City". (excluding Amish farmers, in which case, my sincerest apologies for the skepticism.) > I think it is an overreach for John Deere and other manufacturers to control what I do with my (my!) devices. I really hope this law gets passed to prevent companies from doing this. Agreed. And in return for that legal protection, farmers should concede their subsidies. > I think they picked a fight with the wrong people. Definitely. Not because farmers are rugged individualists, but because they have extremely effective lobbying organizations and are very well-connected in DC.

got2surf 10y ago
I think there may be a disconnect between individual "farmers", who are perceived as rugged individualists, and well-connected farm companies with deeper pockets and lobbyists. It seems like John Deere's restrictions are more harmful to small family farms than to large agricultural corporations, right? Would large farm lobbying groups fight against Deere's practices, when harming small family farms drives business to larger agri-businesses?
- throwaway729 10y ago
  > I think there may be a disconnect between individual "farmers", who are perceived as rugged individualists, and well-connected farm companies with deeper pockets and lobbyists Disagree. Small family farms provide the votes, farming companies provide the lobbying $. They're symbiotic, and both benefit from subsidies (to the extent that small family farms own the land they farm, which many do). In any case, the "rugged individualist farmer" myth is a myth. And as long as my tax dollars subsidize their profits, I'll continue to point out the hypocrisy. 99.9% of farming really is just one more inter-connected industry these days. There's nothing wrong with inter-connectedness and inter-dependency, BTW. But it is extraordinary hypocritical to appeal to one's self-sustenance as a justification for preferential legal/policy treatment when you're working in an industry that relies not only a myriad of other industries, but also huge federal subsidies. > Would large farm lobbying groups fight against Deere's practices, when harming small family farms drives business to larger agri-businesses? Sure. Decreasing maintenance costs helps their bottom line too. And decreasing their operational costs is probably a more sustainable and probable way to drive out family farms anyways. > It seems like John Deere's restrictions are more harmful to small family farms than to large agricultural corporations, right? Really only in the sense of diminishing marginal utility of money. (As I said above, I'm not siding with John Deere. So we agree. But I'm also not siding against John Deere because of any level of sympathy for farmers' romantic self image of "independence".)

Kalium 10y ago

> Farmers can really help, because everyone knows we depend on them for our food, so anything that messes with them, messes with all of us. Really? Because I'm perfectly happy getting my produce from Mexico and my rice from Thailand instead of American farmers. Farmers as a group feed the planet, but American farmers we don't need at all.

alasdair_ 10y ago
>Farmers as a group feed the planet, but American farmers we don't need at all. Until something happens to knock out the supply chain for a while, then we're fucked.
- Kalium 10y ago
  Given that most Americans don't subsist on domestically produced foods, we're fucked without that supply chain anyway.

dragonwriter 10y ago

> Farmers are an independent group. They are used to relying on their own skills and hard work to make a living, and they are not going to tolerate this. In the increasingly-distant-from-reality world of yeoman farmers rather than corporate agribusiness.