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> A right to repair law would make most products equally servicable How is that possible to enforce? If a company comes up with a design that is less service

> A right to repair law would make most products equally servicable How is that possible to enforce? If a company comes up with a design that is less serviceable than its competitors, but has other advantages, is it forbidden from selling its new design? If a company comes up with a design that is more serviceable than its competitors, are all the competitors now forbidden from selling their old design?

gostsamo 5y ago
They usually call it the "invisible hand". If servicibility is not a feature, then it is an implementation detail. The other positive sides of a design will be picked by competitors while servicibility will be an additional feature. The first generation of bad products will be displaced after a few years by a new generation of products that will be cheaper to own and will be as good as the unservicible ones.
Doxin 5y ago
Just banning all the zany things manufacturers come up with to thwart repair should be fine. No security screws, no tamper seals, no plastic clips that you must break, no cryptographic verification of components, cartridges, or firmware. I'm probably missing a load of other tricks, but just doing the above would go a long way to ensuring products can be repaired reasonably.
- csunbird 5y ago
  > ... no cryptographic verification of components, cartridges, or firmware No, I definitely think that the verification on the parts to make sure that they are original should stay, but it should not disallow non official parts to be installed. Because, if I want to replace a part with an original, there should be a way to verify the part is not counterfeit, and I think it would be super beneficial for consumer if the part was able to verify itself as genuine. But, I should also be able to install non genuine parts as well.
  - Doxin 5y ago
    I'd be fine with doing verification of parts like that if and only if it doesn't lead to nonsense such as scary popups warning of damage or reduced functionality or what have you. Obviously this also implies that to create a replacement part you don't need to ask the original manufacturer for permission. A "third party signing" key should be publicly available.

gostsamo 5y ago

They usually call it the "invisible hand". If servicibility is not a feature, then it is an implementation detail. The other positive sides of a design will be picked by competitors while servicibility will be an additional feature. The first generation of bad products will be displaced after a few years by a new generation of products that will be cheaper to own and will be as good as the unservicible ones.

Doxin 5y ago

Just banning all the zany things manufacturers come up with to thwart repair should be fine. No security screws, no tamper seals, no plastic clips that you must break, no cryptographic verification of components, cartridges, or firmware. I'm probably missing a load of other tricks, but just doing the above would go a long way to ensuring products can be repaired reasonably.

csunbird 5y ago
> ... no cryptographic verification of components, cartridges, or firmware No, I definitely think that the verification on the parts to make sure that they are original should stay, but it should not disallow non official parts to be installed. Because, if I want to replace a part with an original, there should be a way to verify the part is not counterfeit, and I think it would be super beneficial for consumer if the part was able to verify itself as genuine. But, I should also be able to install non genuine parts as well.
- Doxin 5y ago
  I'd be fine with doing verification of parts like that if and only if it doesn't lead to nonsense such as scary popups warning of damage or reduced functionality or what have you. Obviously this also implies that to create a replacement part you don't need to ask the original manufacturer for permission. A "third party signing" key should be publicly available.