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The right to repair is in my opinion a controversial topic. It basically boils down to costs of labor in western societies. Essentially it is too expensive to s

The right to repair is in my opinion a controversial topic. It basically boils down to costs of labor in western societies. Essentially it is too expensive to store parts, manuals and trained labor to repair products. It is way cheaper to just produce a new product from scratch.

rvp-x 6y ago
The price threshold for repairing stuff in the west is simply a bit higher. Would you like to be limited to just the car shop that's certified by your car manufacturer for car repairs? I had a phone with a user-serviceable battery. It took no special parts to replace it. And so I used a machine that otherwise would've gone to electronic waste for several more years.
orev 6y ago
Your assessment is off the mark. The point of right to repair is for manufacturers to simply stop being hostile to repairing. Using screws with special/custom heads, forcing authentication of spare parts, etc., are all hostile. One could argue more about the use of glue in everything, but that’s more about the limitations of a specific design and not necessarily intentionally hostile (though in some cases it is). The cost of labor has absolutely nothing to do with this. A single person who wants to fix their own phone or tractor should be able to do it without having to jump through ridiculous hurdles or being outright blocked from doing so by the manufacturer.
- matz1 6y ago
  >The point of right to repair is for manufacturers to simply stop being hostile to repairing I'm all for right to repair that allow consumer freedom to repair their own device, i.e the manufacturer can't sue you for repairing your own device. What I won't support is if it require the manufacturer to design the product differently, i.e forcing apple to make thicker device/using different screw in order to make battery replaceable.
  - genocidicbunny 6y ago
    Why not? Why can we not require companies to design their products differently? I'm sure car manufacturers would love to exclude all those pesky expensive safety features from their new cars, but they're not allowed to do that. We've required them to design parts of their product in specific ways. Or how about airplanes? Boeing sure seems enthusiastic to get rid of safety features on their airplanes, should we really allow them to do so? Or how about the phone you might have in your pocket? It talks to a cell tower right? We've restricted the designs of the radios in the phones and cell towers such that they don't emit more EM than a set limit. Surely Verizon could get much better coverage if they just crank up their signal, drowning out everyone else? Point is, we regularly and consistently restrict how manufacturers can design, manufacture and eventually operate various goods. Why should Apple get a pass?
    - zepto 6y ago
      Apple doesn’t get a pass when it comes to health and safety regulations.
      - genocidicbunny 6y ago
        That's missing the point. The point is there is precedent to control how companies design and manufacture products when it suits us as a society to control them. As such, I do not see why it would be wrong to impose additional controls on Apple (and other companies -- I'm not singling out Apple) to such effect. If you really need a way to spin this as a net positive to society, how about that we would throw away fewer phones and thus do less damage to the environment?
        zepto 6y ago
        It’s not missing the point you suggested Apple gets a pass where other companies don’t. That’s false they have to comply with the same kinds of safety and environmental regulations as you mentioned. As to the government controlling design of products, the precedent is narrow and scoped only to prevent direct harm to consumers for a reason - liberal democracy is based on the principle of freedom as long as you aren’t harming anyone. If you broaden the scope to the government imposing arbitrary design decisions on companies, you stop having a liberal democracy, and move into fascism. I know that’s an inflammatory word to use - but state control of companies is a defining feature of fascism, and limiting state control to only what is needed to prevent direct harms is a defining feature of liberalism. So I think we must oppose the generalization. The environmental argument is reasonable to consider, in the sense that it is within the scope of liberal democracy to control environmental harms, because those are ways we harm other people through our actions. By this logic, design changes could only be required if they had a substantial impact on reducing waste. Apple themselves are investing an enormous amount in increasing the life of their products, especially phones. I think it’s likely that if they had to compromise their designs in arbitrary ways, there would almost certainly be more broken phones and more waste, not fewer. This is where the rubber meets the road for me. Does making a phone easier to repair make it last longer? I’d say most likely not. Things that make phones last longer are more robust physical designs so they can withstand heavy use, and everyday use without breaking. Reasonable people may disagree on this, but for me this is where the argument gets interesting. What designs lead to the most sustainable products?
simion314 6y ago
Explain to me what is the danger of this things: - make public the schematics of electronics - let your users buy spare parts, don't use lawers or DRM to prevent using an un-official part as long is a choice I am making ( who would like that his car won't work if you replace the stereo or a light bulb with an equivalent or better one but that is not from the approved companies) - let anyone use the debugging software and ports, I should not have to travel and pay so some guy would use a proprietary tool to read and translate an error code. - let people salvage parts from broken devices and fix with them other broken devices, don't be evil and DRM stuff or destroy good parts because you want to sell new shiny things. - if you sell a device you should not have the right to brick it with an update, if you can't support it anymore you should be forced to unlock it and if is IoT thing open it up enough so people can use their own server alternative. I am sure someone will say something about batteries exploding but from my memory we had devices with batteries for a long time and we could change the batteries, we could mod the cars, we could mod the computers and no precious billion dollars companies "shiny" image had to suffer for it.
- jrace 6y ago
  The only danger is to the companies profit margin. Why buy new when you can just fix old? I 100% agree with your comment.
- zepto 6y ago
  I generally support the sentiment. However the biggest arguments I can see are around security and counterfeiting. I don’t want to worry about whether the device I’m buying has been compromised with replacement parts that leak data, or render otherwise render the device insecure.
  - simion314 6y ago
    Buy a new device or buy a second hand one from the approved companies. Second hand always has a risk and the price reflects that. I know the stress my family had before deciding what second hand car to buy. But I also know the fact that they could replace a car mirror,body parts and even an engine with parts from cars in the junk yards - in the future your Apple/Tesla car will not let you start it if you replaced the windshield with one from a different car, you will need to use official replacement parts and use an official dealership that will remove the DRM locks for a big price. In this future a car with a broken engine will be scrapped instead no part will be reusable because it will be more profitable to make a new car or only fix the cars in the official dealerships.

rvp-x 6y ago

The price threshold for repairing stuff in the west is simply a bit higher. Would you like to be limited to just the car shop that's certified by your car manufacturer for car repairs? I had a phone with a user-serviceable battery. It took no special parts to replace it. And so I used a machine that otherwise would've gone to electronic waste for several more years.

orev 6y ago

Your assessment is off the mark. The point of right to repair is for manufacturers to simply stop being hostile to repairing. Using screws with special/custom heads, forcing authentication of spare parts, etc., are all hostile. One could argue more about the use of glue in everything, but that’s more about the limitations of a specific design and not necessarily intentionally hostile (though in some cases it is). The cost of labor has absolutely nothing to do with this. A single person who wants to fix their own phone or tractor should be able to do it without having to jump through ridiculous hurdles or being outright blocked from doing so by the manufacturer.

matz1 6y ago
>The point of right to repair is for manufacturers to simply stop being hostile to repairing I'm all for right to repair that allow consumer freedom to repair their own device, i.e the manufacturer can't sue you for repairing your own device. What I won't support is if it require the manufacturer to design the product differently, i.e forcing apple to make thicker device/using different screw in order to make battery replaceable.
- genocidicbunny 6y ago
  Why not? Why can we not require companies to design their products differently? I'm sure car manufacturers would love to exclude all those pesky expensive safety features from their new cars, but they're not allowed to do that. We've required them to design parts of their product in specific ways. Or how about airplanes? Boeing sure seems enthusiastic to get rid of safety features on their airplanes, should we really allow them to do so? Or how about the phone you might have in your pocket? It talks to a cell tower right? We've restricted the designs of the radios in the phones and cell towers such that they don't emit more EM than a set limit. Surely Verizon could get much better coverage if they just crank up their signal, drowning out everyone else? Point is, we regularly and consistently restrict how manufacturers can design, manufacture and eventually operate various goods. Why should Apple get a pass?
  - zepto 6y ago
    Apple doesn’t get a pass when it comes to health and safety regulations.
    - genocidicbunny 6y ago
      That's missing the point. The point is there is precedent to control how companies design and manufacture products when it suits us as a society to control them. As such, I do not see why it would be wrong to impose additional controls on Apple (and other companies -- I'm not singling out Apple) to such effect. If you really need a way to spin this as a net positive to society, how about that we would throw away fewer phones and thus do less damage to the environment?
      - zepto 6y ago
        It’s not missing the point you suggested Apple gets a pass where other companies don’t. That’s false they have to comply with the same kinds of safety and environmental regulations as you mentioned. As to the government controlling design of products, the precedent is narrow and scoped only to prevent direct harm to consumers for a reason - liberal democracy is based on the principle of freedom as long as you aren’t harming anyone. If you broaden the scope to the government imposing arbitrary design decisions on companies, you stop having a liberal democracy, and move into fascism. I know that’s an inflammatory word to use - but state control of companies is a defining feature of fascism, and limiting state control to only what is needed to prevent direct harms is a defining feature of liberalism. So I think we must oppose the generalization. The environmental argument is reasonable to consider, in the sense that it is within the scope of liberal democracy to control environmental harms, because those are ways we harm other people through our actions. By this logic, design changes could only be required if they had a substantial impact on reducing waste. Apple themselves are investing an enormous amount in increasing the life of their products, especially phones. I think it’s likely that if they had to compromise their designs in arbitrary ways, there would almost certainly be more broken phones and more waste, not fewer. This is where the rubber meets the road for me. Does making a phone easier to repair make it last longer? I’d say most likely not. Things that make phones last longer are more robust physical designs so they can withstand heavy use, and everyday use without breaking. Reasonable people may disagree on this, but for me this is where the argument gets interesting. What designs lead to the most sustainable products?

simion314 6y ago

Explain to me what is the danger of this things: - make public the schematics of electronics - let your users buy spare parts, don't use lawers or DRM to prevent using an un-official part as long is a choice I am making ( who would like that his car won't work if you replace the stereo or a light bulb with an equivalent or better one but that is not from the approved companies) - let anyone use the debugging software and ports, I should not have to travel and pay so some guy would use a proprietary tool to read and translate an error code. - let people salvage parts from broken devices and fix with them other broken devices, don't be evil and DRM stuff or destroy good parts because you want to sell new shiny things. - if you sell a device you should not have the right to brick it with an update, if you can't support it anymore you should be forced to unlock it and if is IoT thing open it up enough so people can use their own server alternative. I am sure someone will say something about batteries exploding but from my memory we had devices with batteries for a long time and we could change the batteries, we could mod the cars, we could mod the computers and no precious billion dollars companies "shiny" image had to suffer for it.

jrace 6y ago
The only danger is to the companies profit margin. Why buy new when you can just fix old? I 100% agree with your comment.
zepto 6y ago
I generally support the sentiment. However the biggest arguments I can see are around security and counterfeiting. I don’t want to worry about whether the device I’m buying has been compromised with replacement parts that leak data, or render otherwise render the device insecure.
- simion314 6y ago
  Buy a new device or buy a second hand one from the approved companies. Second hand always has a risk and the price reflects that. I know the stress my family had before deciding what second hand car to buy. But I also know the fact that they could replace a car mirror,body parts and even an engine with parts from cars in the junk yards - in the future your Apple/Tesla car will not let you start it if you replaced the windshield with one from a different car, you will need to use official replacement parts and use an official dealership that will remove the DRM locks for a big price. In this future a car with a broken engine will be scrapped instead no part will be reusable because it will be more profitable to make a new car or only fix the cars in the official dealerships.