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Industries are being computerised, so it's not too surprising that business practices are bleeding over. I don't really see too much of a difference between bu

Industries are being computerised, so it's not too surprising that business practices are bleeding over. I don't really see too much of a difference between buying a tractor from John Deere and buying a fancy SAN from Oracle. In either case you're paying a premium for the name and the associated service contract for a time-sensitive mission-critical locked-down (and to some extent black-box) function which is presumably crucial to your business's ability to generate revenue. JD have competitors, and I'd imagine that if this episode hasn't tanked their business it's due to risk-aversion from buyers (à la IBM), vendor lock-in, or customers being set in their ways. It's also a bit like the Creative sector when Adobe moved to a subscription model; people balked and held out for a time, but ultimately they voted with their wallets and bought [subscriptions to] the magic product that could be provided by only one company on Earth, and without which they couldn't possibly continue to make art-work [commercially, in a productive manner, and in keeping with their prior experience]. I'm just cynical about how often people will knowingly make themselves reliant on a single company without reading through the small print or thinking through the implications of what is essentially entering into a long-term strategic partnership with a vastly unequal partner without a having a hedging strategy. If you can't imagine not using their products after the next refresh, you've put yourself in a very poor negotiating position.

manigandham 6y ago
There's a vast difference in costs, expected lifetime, depreciation, maintenance requirements, capital efficiency, time-sensitivity, and criticality to a business between a fancy SAN and a tractor. Right-to-repair is all about people being able to repair their own products, or at the very least use certified 3rd-party mechanics, instead of being forced to go to the manufacturer for every possible problem.
- brippalcharrid 6y ago
  I think all of those differences (time-scales, capital intensity/efficiency, credit access) are accounted for by the translation between the type of company that would buy a combine harvester Vs the kind of company that would buy a SAN. I totally get the desire from consumers for a right to repair, but ultimately I feel that this shouldn't override the freedom of economic actors to make voluntary agreements in the marketplace. And in the case of agricultural equipment I can see why some vendors would want to move to a Trusted Computing model whereby every component authenticated with every other component via HSMs, addressing the problems such as theft (which is widespread in some parts of the world) by making stolen devices/parts practically useless, which would obviously conflict with a Right to Repair (as well as any purposefully user-hostile ambitions that they had).
  - manigandham 6y ago
    Free markets still need some guardrails, and the limited competition combined with the importance of agriculture makes this a complex situation. Besides, if you have ever used a warranty recently then it’s a good bet that it was legislated to act that way. Right to repair is similar in focus to help consumers.
    - brippalcharrid 6y ago
      I disagree with the idea that free markets need guardrails for the reasons that I mentioned before: I believe that consensual agreements between people shouldn't normally be regulated by the state, and that when you take a free market and then add "guardrails" to it, it's no longer a "free" market. All that minimum warranty legislation does is to remove the freedom that people previously had to buy products with shorter warranties, or without one. It means that they can't even buy the same product together with an optional warranty from the manufacturer, thereby ending up with a situation that's functionally identical. Warranties for practically every type of durable product existed before these changes were introduced, and people have always tended to weigh up the projected lifetime (which they can infer from factors such as the availability of manufacturer or third-party warranties or insurance), manufacturer reputation and projected total costs of ownership whenever they have bought something sufficiently expensive. Agriculture is of course an important industry, but I don't think there's any wider threat to agriculture in this particular case, and if these practices were to create one in the future, the market would respond by punishing a company like JD (and no doubt the state would as well in light of the strategic implications). It just seems like a slow and painful realisation for parts of the industry that things have changed. Hopefully we'll now see plenty of disruption and innovation (and modding ;)).

manigandham 6y ago

There's a vast difference in costs, expected lifetime, depreciation, maintenance requirements, capital efficiency, time-sensitivity, and criticality to a business between a fancy SAN and a tractor. Right-to-repair is all about people being able to repair their own products, or at the very least use certified 3rd-party mechanics, instead of being forced to go to the manufacturer for every possible problem.

brippalcharrid 6y ago
I think all of those differences (time-scales, capital intensity/efficiency, credit access) are accounted for by the translation between the type of company that would buy a combine harvester Vs the kind of company that would buy a SAN. I totally get the desire from consumers for a right to repair, but ultimately I feel that this shouldn't override the freedom of economic actors to make voluntary agreements in the marketplace. And in the case of agricultural equipment I can see why some vendors would want to move to a Trusted Computing model whereby every component authenticated with every other component via HSMs, addressing the problems such as theft (which is widespread in some parts of the world) by making stolen devices/parts practically useless, which would obviously conflict with a Right to Repair (as well as any purposefully user-hostile ambitions that they had).
- manigandham 6y ago
  Free markets still need some guardrails, and the limited competition combined with the importance of agriculture makes this a complex situation. Besides, if you have ever used a warranty recently then it’s a good bet that it was legislated to act that way. Right to repair is similar in focus to help consumers.
  - brippalcharrid 6y ago
    I disagree with the idea that free markets need guardrails for the reasons that I mentioned before: I believe that consensual agreements between people shouldn't normally be regulated by the state, and that when you take a free market and then add "guardrails" to it, it's no longer a "free" market. All that minimum warranty legislation does is to remove the freedom that people previously had to buy products with shorter warranties, or without one. It means that they can't even buy the same product together with an optional warranty from the manufacturer, thereby ending up with a situation that's functionally identical. Warranties for practically every type of durable product existed before these changes were introduced, and people have always tended to weigh up the projected lifetime (which they can infer from factors such as the availability of manufacturer or third-party warranties or insurance), manufacturer reputation and projected total costs of ownership whenever they have bought something sufficiently expensive. Agriculture is of course an important industry, but I don't think there's any wider threat to agriculture in this particular case, and if these practices were to create one in the future, the market would respond by punishing a company like JD (and no doubt the state would as well in light of the strategic implications). It just seems like a slow and painful realisation for parts of the industry that things have changed. Hopefully we'll now see plenty of disruption and innovation (and modding ;)).