12 ms·

Farming Co. Says John Deere Is Monopolizing Repair Market

210 points by cwwc 5y ago

newaccount2021 5y ago
stevenharrison 5y ago
Source is paywalled, this might be better: https://topclassactions.com/lawsuit-settlements/consumer-products/auto-news/john-deere-class-action-claims-company-illegally-monopolized-repair-market-for-agricultural-equipment/ https://topclassactions.com/lawsuit-settlements/consumer-pro... There's other tractor manufacturers, farmers don't have to use JD.
- DamnYuppie 5y ago
  The tech analogy is basically similar to those who have their tech stack as Microsoft .NET vs Go. You can switch but it isn't as easy as just buying all new equipment. Another point is JD is far more than just tractors so if you run a farm you will have many large pieces of equipment which you paid millions for so not so easy to just go and buy new stuff.
- randomdata 5y ago
  > farmers don't have to use JD. I have a bunch of different colours in my shed. The only appreciable difference I've noticed is that when I needed the service manual to fix something, the CaseIH dealer slapped a book down in front of me. The tech at the Deere dealer had to enter a password on a computer to decrypt it for me. Neither seemed terribly concerned about providing the information, though.
kentf 5y ago
Nilay Patel had a great interview with John Deere's CTO where he pressed him on the right to repair for farmers. Highly recommend the episode, and all decoder episodes, Nilay is a fantastic reporter and doesn't let his quests squeak away with half answers. https://www.theverge.com/22533735/john-deere-cto-hindman-decoder-interview-right-to-repair-tractors https://www.theverge.com/22533735/john-deere-cto-hindman-dec...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
excalibur 5y ago
Text is accurate, headline is misleading. Deere has had this market cornered for a while and nobody has done anything to stop them.
- Cthulhu_ 5y ago
  I'm sure we'll see a Tesla tractor (Teslactor? Tesla model T? Elon Deere?) being announced at some point, never to actually make it production. Built for farming on Mars. With gullwing doors and autopilot (I'm aware that modern tractors have autopilot too), made out of stainless steel.
  - nyxtom 5y ago
    Believe it or not Lamborghini for instance does make a tractor that is pretty beefy https://www.lamborghini-tractors.com/en-eu/ https://www.lamborghini-tractors.com/en-eu/ I would not be surprised to see Tesla enter that market some time down the road
    - throwaway6734 5y ago
      Iirc Lamborghini started as a tractor company
      - mijoharas 5y ago
        Yep, he actually started making cars after getting into an argument with Enzo Ferrari. I just googled to find the reference[0], but apparantly he had a problem with his clutch, went to ferrari and suggested some easy ways that ferrari could make their clutches last longer. Ferrari responds with: > “Let me make cars. You stick to making tractors.” - Enzo Ferrari Which obviously didn't go down too well. Then Lamborghini started making cars. [0] https://www.granturismoevents.com/story-the-epic-story-behind-the-ferrari-and-lamborghini-rivalry/ https://www.granturismoevents.com/story-the-epic-story-behin...
    - kwhitefoot 5y ago
      Jeremy Clarkson has a Lamborghini tractor,it's huge compared to most that you see in the UK..
assbuttbuttass 5y ago
I'm sure we on hacker news are more familiar with the tech side of right to repair, but farming is also a huge problem. JD walked so that Apple could run
- n4r9 5y ago
  Absolutely; Apple is the well-known offender but the issue extends to medical equipment, white goods, televisions and probably a whole lot more. This really is about preventing monopolies and I've seen basically no tenable argument against strengthening right to repair laws.
  - all2 5y ago
    > white goods White fabrics, usually of cotton or linen.Household merchandise, as bed sheets and curtains, formerly made from white fabrics, but now often colored.Large household appliances, as ovens and refrigerators, formerly finished with white enamel, but now often colored. - American Heritage Dictionary
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - n4r9 5y ago
      Ah sorry, didn't know that phrase was ambiguous. In the UK it often refers to large household appliances such as fridges, washing machines etc...
      - all2 5y ago
        No worries. I had no clue what those were, so I looked it up. I figured others might have a similar knowledge gap, so I left a comment.
coding123 5y ago
So I'm gearing up to buy a Kubota FEL soon. Two reasons we passed on JD FEL is 1) financing isn't as good 2) you have to pay JD a yearly maintenance package AND take it in once a year otherwise your warranty is shit. That could be incorrect and just one dealer we spoke to, but it didn't add up with the better stuff we're hearing from the Kubota side.
- randomdata 5y ago
  Interestingly, all my neighbours who have tried them are back to running Green machines. A good friend is the mechanic at the Kubota dealership and he speaks quite highly of them, though. May be a case of Deere getting aggressive. Another friend bought a new Steiger series tractor a few years ago and before it even showed up in his yard, Deere rolled in to make him an offer he couldn't refuse to trade it in.
- abakker 5y ago
  I'm curious about the Value prop for an FEL. I bought a bobcat T590 last year because it had a lot of capacity - both PTO power and absolute ability to lift. It isn't good for turf, but I can pick up a 4000lb pallet. FELs all seemed to max out at ~1000 lbs for the same footprint. is the bucket really just not the use case for a FEL anymore?
  - coding123 5y ago
    I think it is the use-case. I'm just working on my property. It's like a big lawn mower and landscaping tool. I am getting the backhoe so that I can do some light trenching work. I can also use it to plow through medium levels of bush in the way. Also good to help with spreading gravel or smoothing out a building pad. It's like - if you have a normal size house with 10k sq ft lot, you own a lawn mower. When you own 10 acres or more, you probably need a tractor of some kind. edit: Sorry I see you were specifically discussing the FEL that can handle 4k vs 1k. Mostly Gravel is my largest use-case. I won't be able to pallet lift a ton of bricks, that is correct. But for the rest of the tool it's like a swiss army knife in that it has different attachments both on the front, the back (and the bottom).
rdudek 5y ago
Wonder how difficult it would be for some opensource startup to come out and make a simple Generic Tractor at low cost, low maintenance? I grew up on a small farm and the tractor we had was very basic. Didn't have any of the latest tech which has pathing and seeding controls.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- 7thaccount 5y ago
  I'm not a farmer, but this comes up a lot. Most modern farming (the type done for money commercially and not as a hobby)is fiendishly complex. The tractors are massive and are driven by GPS and have all kinds of massive machines connected to them. If you want a simple and cheap tractor, you can find a Farmall from like 40 years ago and restore it easily for like a grand or two (at least my friends dad was still doing this in 2008). Typically whenever a once competitive firm becomes a lazy monopolist, at some point others want to break in and get a piece of the profit pie. It could happen someday.
  - frankfrankfrank 5y ago
    Although I am not doubting you, I find it rather curious that you would describe tractors and/or other farm equipment as "fiendishly complex". I am not sure if there is a term or concept for this issue, but I get a strong sense from this whole concept that what is really happening is the generation of artificial and intentional complexity, if not just the perception of complexity. There is nothing inherently complex about, e.g., a tractor that has some method of automatic steering, locates itself by GPS, and follows a path set by coordinates and vectors. Another aspect of what we are experiencing here I think is essentially a multi-level/nested con job that uses that artificial and perception of complexity to extract ever higher and compounding levels of what what are essentially rents. The established industry players are banking on the high barrier to entry (heavy machinery production) and brand recognition (Runs like a Deere) to con the whole sector, and therefore extract wealth from the whole of society trying to feed itself. Please feel free to challenge my perspective.
frankfrankfrank 5y ago
Is there a reason that some Asian or even European competitors can't just come in and offer the same kind of features and services without all the lock-in, actively taking market share by being the anti-monopolist? Maybe I'm missing something, but I can't see the brand loyalty to Deere lasting too much longer, especially if some of the Asian competitors can make offerings without all the shackling.
- ChuckNorris89 5y ago
  Because it's a heavily entrenched industry that's not easily disrupted, where each brand has carved it's on territory by geography and there's this silent gentlemen's agreement of "you stay out of my market, I stay out of yours and we all win" since even if the other competitor would attempt to come in the other market, it would face an uphill and insanely expensive battle just to enter the market, as in order to capture any market share it would need to undercut its competitor on cost while offering superior quality, while spending insane money on the supply chains and world class service and tech network which guarantees the up-time of your machinery, thereby weakening the profit margins not just for themselves but potentially the whole market. So why would you want to do something as risky and foolish as that when you got a good thing going?
  - giantg2 5y ago
    I'm not sure which brands are owned by Deere, but there are quite a few available in the US, depending on scale. I specifically think that LS is foreign, but don't remember for sure.
  - onion2k 5y ago
    silent gentlemen's agreement We assume it's silent but we probably shouldn't. It could be a boring old cartel. Someone should check.
  - gunapologist99 5y ago
    > Because it's a heavily entrenched industry that's not easily disrupted, where each brand has carved it's on territory by geography and there's this silent gentlemen's agreement of "you stay out of my market, I stay out of yours and we all win Do you know that this is the case or are you speculating? It seems like there's an intense amount of competition, especially with imported farming equipment. (I have no idea if John Deere sells overseas or if it's mostly a domestic brand.) Some other manufacturers that seem to have big branding in the U.S. are New Holland (just found out they're owned by Fiat.. small world), Mahindra, and Kubota. Are those all part of this cartel that you're alleging exists?
gunapologist99 5y ago
This view might not be very popular, so I want to preface it with: I am very supportive of the right of repair, especially when it's being used to force expensive proprietary repairs, probably from a long way away (I'm sure shipping a tractor isn't quite like shipping an iphone), or when it's used to enforce a sort of planned obsolescence when the manufacturer just decides to stop maintaining in order to force you to upgrade. I'm curious, however, how much (in practical terms) John Deere would have to give or open up in terms of trade secrets in order to enable repairs (especially of super advanced stuff like fully autonomous farming), and to what extent they would need to open things up that offshore competitors might easily clone without having invested the millions (or billions?) that John Deere has already invested. Put another way, right now, today, we have a farming equipment manufacturer based in the U.S. that is actually injecting some serious tech into a rather staid industry. John Deere seems to be turning into a highly innovative tech mfg company, in, ironically, one of the most expensive places to run a heavy equipment manufacturer. I view them as a huge asset, developing what appears to be interesting ideas in what was a pretty tech-adverse industry, and fully automated farming is probably also a key component for food security across the globe, U.S. national security, international stability, and probably needs to be a part of any climate change conversation. So, how much are we asking them to give up of their know-how where it might be cloned or worked-around by other companies? In the immortal words of Dr. Ian Malcolm, "You stood on the shoulders of geniuses to accomplish something as fast as you could, and before you even knew what you had, you patented it, and packaged it, and slapped it on a plastic lunchbox, and now you wanna sell it." What if FOTMA or Yucheng Dadi Machinery Co (https://sdycdadi.en.made-in-china.com/product/EvdncAtVZXkZ/China-Farm-Machinery-Tractor-Rotary-Tiller-1GQNK-140D-.html https://sdycdadi.en.made-in-china.com/product/EvdncAtVZXkZ/C...) or something like that decide to clone the most advanced John Deere tractors with their new access? If you are buying a quarter-million-dollar John Deere combine, you have probably already evaluated the rest of the industry and decided that the draconian DRM or whatever they're using is worth that very substantial investment. It's not like you might have just been browsing in the store for a $1 bottle of shampoo -- I'm sure you can't be a farmer without knowing, in detail, about this unable-to-repair problem with John Deere specifically, and might have even formed some strong opinions about it! And if you decide that it's not worth it, then you would choose something else.. the market would punish John Deere for their overstep. (I'm not a farmer and have zero contact with this industry, but it seems that the Indian company Mahindra has pretty competitive pricing from a quick browse of tractor dealerships.) You could also sue John Deere if they were delivering a vehicle that wasn't performing according to their specifications, and ultimately their reputation would suffer. (It took thirty years for American auto mfgs to rebuild their reputation after the garbage they made way back in the 70's.) The other thing where the market would help to fix this, without needing a legislative fix, is if a competitor steps up with an easy to repair tractor, like https://frame.work/ https://frame.work/ did for laptops. If this is a real problem, then some smart entrepreneur eventually will, even if they end up having their first tractors built in China. John Deere relies on the trust of farmers just as much as the other way around. Just some food for thought. This seems to be a nuanced and very emotional issue for some people, but it does seem like there are at least two sides to this story.
xondono 5y ago
I have to say, I’m still very divided about right to repair. I think it’s hard to keep a consistent world view where right to repair is a thing, and at the same time anything but open source is outright illegal.
- toss1 5y ago
  Why does a right to repair require open-source to be the only legal option? It seems that I could have a highly proprietary device and still be able to repair it. It would just require availability of 1) documentation 2) diagnostics, 3) parts at market prices, 4) parts not locked by DRM code. E.g., the iPhone could still have all their proprietary code, as long as I can read about the components and their relationships, diagnose a problem, replace a component and/or flash new data/code onto the device. Same for a car or tractor. Meaningful repair doesn't require that we be able to dismantle and re-solder sub-board-level components, only identify the particular component, obtain it at a reasonable availability and cost, and replace it, or be able to substitute an upgraded part. Am I missing something here?
  - xondono 5y ago
    > the iPhone could still have all their proprietary code, as long as I can read about the components and their relationships, diagnose a problem, replace a component and/or flash new data/code onto the device. As a group heavily populated by programmers and coders, I think it’s fairly hypocritical to say that everyone should make their IP like schematics freely available while we keep software under copyright. > Am I missing something here? - How is a defect like an aged battery different than a non-updated software? - Why is it inmoral for a company to limit your ability to swap a battery but totally okay to not give you the code so that you can patch their software to work on your machine? At least in the case of the battery they can argue that inappropriate handling of faulty batteries is dangerous. > Meaningful repair doesn't require that we be able to dismantle and re-solder sub-board-level components, only identify the particular component, obtain it at a reasonable availability and cost, and replace it, or be able to substitute an upgraded part. That “only” is doing a lot of work there. That “only” is the work of a lot of people who deserve to get good salaries too. Why should their work become a commodity while programmers keep their “machines” protected with the laws for art?
fartcannon 5y ago
The future of life on earth depends on there being no limitations on repairing, modifying, or extending the things we buy.
frankfrankfrank 5y ago
On a related side note. I find that this is yet another topic that highlights the need for efforts to bring legislation back in line with Constitutional principles of being outcome, not method oriented; descriptive, not prescriptive. What that may mean is that legislation would require, e.g., that anyone doing any business with the government or using any government/public services (e.g., GPS) must utilize technologies that are common and compatible with each other both physically (parts) and data (communications, controls, etc.). We are facing a situation that was last encountered or at least recognized in the late 80s and 90s, where silos and cartels were starting to emerge that led to massive waste and pillage of at least the public coffers. That led to a wave of standardization efforts in the late 90s and early 00s. That wave seems to have started dying out and really needs to be revitalized.
- conradev 5y ago
  1000% For example, California wants to electrify lawn equipment: https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/our-work/programs/zero-emission-landscaping-equipment https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/our-work/programs/zero-emission-lands... There are a number of competing ecosystems of batteries. They each have a leaf blower that takes a different form factor battery: https://www.ryobitools.com/products/details/46396029911 https://www.ryobitools.com/products/details/46396029911 https://www.dewalt.com/products/outdoor/blowers/20v-max-lithium-ion-xr-brushless-handheld-blower-bare/dcbl722b https://www.dewalt.com/products/outdoor/blowers/20v-max-lith... https://www.milwaukeetool.com/Products/Safety-Solutions/Emissions/2724-20 https://www.milwaukeetool.com/Products/Safety-Solutions/Emis... Batteries are expensive and use a lot of carbon to produce, so the world would be better off if these batteries were fully interchangeable.
  - aardvarkr 5y ago
    Action like that would freeze innovation at a time when we want to keep pushing the boundaries of what is possible. All three of those systems use different voltages or designs that change power output and weight distribution. On top of that, each brand is incentivized to keep experimenting to improve the battery design for their specific use cases. Dewalt, for example, is making lawn mowers that use two of their 20v batteries in parallel so you can use the same batteries in your mower as you do in your drill. The Ryobi batteries haven't changed since they were first introduced so the old drill that you bought in 2014 is still usable with today's batteries.
Cupertino95014 5y ago
On agricultural issues: be careful about making assumptions. I was talking about the labels on fruits (you know, those labels you just peel off so you don't eat them) with someone who knew about this sort of thing . I ignorantly said "that's gotta be a low-margin business." He said, "Actually, it's a high-margin business." If you get a monopoly in some market that's very difficult to enter, you've got yourself a steady cash flow. I don't think "repairing tractors out in the middle of nowhere" is a very easy one to get into.
- throwawayboise 5y ago
  I understand the tractor repair example to some degree, though "difficult to enter" in the case of Deere is largely because Deere is making it difficult. But how is the market for fruit labels difficult to enter?
  - AlbertCory 5y ago
    Well, I can only speculate, not having tried. It could be that the farmers & handlers already know the main suppliers and they're satisfied with them: low prices, good service, acceptable quality. And they're not looking for even lower prices. If you have a monopoly and you've ridden the learning curve far enough that you're making a good profit while not pissing off your customers, and the market is pretty static, you're in. But I could be wrong.
    - ethbr0 5y ago
      I'd hazard it's probably due to order of magnitude different absolute profit amounts. E.g. you can double your margins on fruit labels, and still be a rounding error for fruit producers Consequently, being invisible and fanatically attentive to what your customers want (e.g. ease of use) means the hassle of switching suppliers outweighs the cost savings.
      - AlbertCory 5y ago
        I was pondering this while walking the dog: family-run businesses, small business, etc. In some businesses, having been around for a long time, being part of the community, and knowing your customers is worth WAY more than a few points of profit. In fact, those businesses are everywhere. Look and see who buys the ads for the high school sports teams. Tractor repair ought to be like that. Not the monopoly of John Deere. (I don't know anything about who owns fruit-labelling, and it might even be some giant conglomerate.) But let's say someone owns such a loyalty business, everything is great, and then they die or retire. Then what? It's the source of a million dramas, like Yellowstone or King Lear. Maybe a son or daughter takes over. Then they're incompetent. Or not. Maybe the kids fight over it. The possibilities are endless. Or maybe the giant conglomerate DOES buy it. Promising "nothing will change" of course.
dogman144 5y ago
Omaha has had a relatively robust tech meetup scene for a while because of stuff like this and interesting open source projects come out of the region+. The tractors have as much SW in them as a car does these days, and it was locked down to repair except by the manufacturer.
thereddaikon 5y ago
John Deere is a symptom of a wider problem in regards to right to repair. Legally speaking there is a lot of progress that needs to be made in the realm of consumer electronics. But for vehicles be they road cars or tractors it can all be fixed with one good federal court case. What John Deere, and Tesla and most automakers are trying to do is basically circumvent the Sherman Act through an abuse of copyright law. SCOTUS has been pretty crappy on tying lately and has raised the bar, the opposite of what should be happening. But it seems right to repair is gaining a lot of broad political support so hopefully that will soon be undone.
- dawsmik 5y ago
  Then Congress should step in. This seems like something that would get bipartisan support.
  - thereddaikon 5y ago
    A new law could work but I feel like this should be able to be solved on the judicial side because its already illegal. We just have another case of the law not being enforced.
vishvananda 5y ago
I hadn't been following the "Right to Repair" movement too closely until I discovered that NordicTrack recently locked their users out of Privileged Mode[0], which makes it virtually impossible to install 3rd party software like Netflix on my treadmill. I just want to watch a video while I exercise! [0]: https://www.wired.com/story/nordictrack-ifit-treadmill-privilege-mode/ https://www.wired.com/story/nordictrack-ifit-treadmill-privi...
trembonator 5y ago

210 points by cwwc 5y ago

newaccount2021 5y ago

Source is paywalled, this might be better: https://topclassactions.com/lawsuit-settlements/consumer-products/auto-news/john-deere-class-action-claims-company-illegally-monopolized-repair-market-for-agricultural-equipment/ https://topclassactions.com/lawsuit-settlements/consumer-pro... There's other tractor manufacturers, farmers don't have to use JD.

DamnYuppie 5y ago
The tech analogy is basically similar to those who have their tech stack as Microsoft .NET vs Go. You can switch but it isn't as easy as just buying all new equipment. Another point is JD is far more than just tractors so if you run a farm you will have many large pieces of equipment which you paid millions for so not so easy to just go and buy new stuff.
randomdata 5y ago
> farmers don't have to use JD. I have a bunch of different colours in my shed. The only appreciable difference I've noticed is that when I needed the service manual to fix something, the CaseIH dealer slapped a book down in front of me. The tech at the Deere dealer had to enter a password on a computer to decrypt it for me. Neither seemed terribly concerned about providing the information, though.

kentf 5y ago

Nilay Patel had a great interview with John Deere's CTO where he pressed him on the right to repair for farmers. Highly recommend the episode, and all decoder episodes, Nilay is a fantastic reporter and doesn't let his quests squeak away with half answers. https://www.theverge.com/22533735/john-deere-cto-hindman-decoder-interview-right-to-repair-tractors https://www.theverge.com/22533735/john-deere-cto-hindman-dec...

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

excalibur 5y ago

Text is accurate, headline is misleading. Deere has had this market cornered for a while and nobody has done anything to stop them.

Cthulhu_ 5y ago
I'm sure we'll see a Tesla tractor (Teslactor? Tesla model T? Elon Deere?) being announced at some point, never to actually make it production. Built for farming on Mars. With gullwing doors and autopilot (I'm aware that modern tractors have autopilot too), made out of stainless steel.
- nyxtom 5y ago
  Believe it or not Lamborghini for instance does make a tractor that is pretty beefy https://www.lamborghini-tractors.com/en-eu/ https://www.lamborghini-tractors.com/en-eu/ I would not be surprised to see Tesla enter that market some time down the road
  - throwaway6734 5y ago
    Iirc Lamborghini started as a tractor company
    - mijoharas 5y ago
      Yep, he actually started making cars after getting into an argument with Enzo Ferrari. I just googled to find the reference[0], but apparantly he had a problem with his clutch, went to ferrari and suggested some easy ways that ferrari could make their clutches last longer. Ferrari responds with: > “Let me make cars. You stick to making tractors.” - Enzo Ferrari Which obviously didn't go down too well. Then Lamborghini started making cars. [0] https://www.granturismoevents.com/story-the-epic-story-behind-the-ferrari-and-lamborghini-rivalry/ https://www.granturismoevents.com/story-the-epic-story-behin...
  - kwhitefoot 5y ago
    Jeremy Clarkson has a Lamborghini tractor,it's huge compared to most that you see in the UK..

assbuttbuttass 5y ago

I'm sure we on hacker news are more familiar with the tech side of right to repair, but farming is also a huge problem. JD walked so that Apple could run

n4r9 5y ago
Absolutely; Apple is the well-known offender but the issue extends to medical equipment, white goods, televisions and probably a whole lot more. This really is about preventing monopolies and I've seen basically no tenable argument against strengthening right to repair laws.
- all2 5y ago
  > white goods White fabrics, usually of cotton or linen.Household merchandise, as bed sheets and curtains, formerly made from white fabrics, but now often colored.Large household appliances, as ovens and refrigerators, formerly finished with white enamel, but now often colored. - American Heritage Dictionary
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - n4r9 5y ago
    Ah sorry, didn't know that phrase was ambiguous. In the UK it often refers to large household appliances such as fridges, washing machines etc...
    - all2 5y ago
      No worries. I had no clue what those were, so I looked it up. I figured others might have a similar knowledge gap, so I left a comment.

coding123 5y ago

So I'm gearing up to buy a Kubota FEL soon. Two reasons we passed on JD FEL is 1) financing isn't as good 2) you have to pay JD a yearly maintenance package AND take it in once a year otherwise your warranty is shit. That could be incorrect and just one dealer we spoke to, but it didn't add up with the better stuff we're hearing from the Kubota side.

randomdata 5y ago
Interestingly, all my neighbours who have tried them are back to running Green machines. A good friend is the mechanic at the Kubota dealership and he speaks quite highly of them, though. May be a case of Deere getting aggressive. Another friend bought a new Steiger series tractor a few years ago and before it even showed up in his yard, Deere rolled in to make him an offer he couldn't refuse to trade it in.
abakker 5y ago
I'm curious about the Value prop for an FEL. I bought a bobcat T590 last year because it had a lot of capacity - both PTO power and absolute ability to lift. It isn't good for turf, but I can pick up a 4000lb pallet. FELs all seemed to max out at ~1000 lbs for the same footprint. is the bucket really just not the use case for a FEL anymore?
- coding123 5y ago
  I think it is the use-case. I'm just working on my property. It's like a big lawn mower and landscaping tool. I am getting the backhoe so that I can do some light trenching work. I can also use it to plow through medium levels of bush in the way. Also good to help with spreading gravel or smoothing out a building pad. It's like - if you have a normal size house with 10k sq ft lot, you own a lawn mower. When you own 10 acres or more, you probably need a tractor of some kind. edit: Sorry I see you were specifically discussing the FEL that can handle 4k vs 1k. Mostly Gravel is my largest use-case. I won't be able to pallet lift a ton of bricks, that is correct. But for the rest of the tool it's like a swiss army knife in that it has different attachments both on the front, the back (and the bottom).

rdudek 5y ago

Wonder how difficult it would be for some opensource startup to come out and make a simple Generic Tractor at low cost, low maintenance? I grew up on a small farm and the tractor we had was very basic. Didn't have any of the latest tech which has pathing and seeding controls.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
7thaccount 5y ago
I'm not a farmer, but this comes up a lot. Most modern farming (the type done for money commercially and not as a hobby)is fiendishly complex. The tractors are massive and are driven by GPS and have all kinds of massive machines connected to them. If you want a simple and cheap tractor, you can find a Farmall from like 40 years ago and restore it easily for like a grand or two (at least my friends dad was still doing this in 2008). Typically whenever a once competitive firm becomes a lazy monopolist, at some point others want to break in and get a piece of the profit pie. It could happen someday.
- frankfrankfrank 5y ago
  Although I am not doubting you, I find it rather curious that you would describe tractors and/or other farm equipment as "fiendishly complex". I am not sure if there is a term or concept for this issue, but I get a strong sense from this whole concept that what is really happening is the generation of artificial and intentional complexity, if not just the perception of complexity. There is nothing inherently complex about, e.g., a tractor that has some method of automatic steering, locates itself by GPS, and follows a path set by coordinates and vectors. Another aspect of what we are experiencing here I think is essentially a multi-level/nested con job that uses that artificial and perception of complexity to extract ever higher and compounding levels of what what are essentially rents. The established industry players are banking on the high barrier to entry (heavy machinery production) and brand recognition (Runs like a Deere) to con the whole sector, and therefore extract wealth from the whole of society trying to feed itself. Please feel free to challenge my perspective.

frankfrankfrank 5y ago

Is there a reason that some Asian or even European competitors can't just come in and offer the same kind of features and services without all the lock-in, actively taking market share by being the anti-monopolist? Maybe I'm missing something, but I can't see the brand loyalty to Deere lasting too much longer, especially if some of the Asian competitors can make offerings without all the shackling.

ChuckNorris89 5y ago
Because it's a heavily entrenched industry that's not easily disrupted, where each brand has carved it's on territory by geography and there's this silent gentlemen's agreement of "you stay out of my market, I stay out of yours and we all win" since even if the other competitor would attempt to come in the other market, it would face an uphill and insanely expensive battle just to enter the market, as in order to capture any market share it would need to undercut its competitor on cost while offering superior quality, while spending insane money on the supply chains and world class service and tech network which guarantees the up-time of your machinery, thereby weakening the profit margins not just for themselves but potentially the whole market. So why would you want to do something as risky and foolish as that when you got a good thing going?
- giantg2 5y ago
  I'm not sure which brands are owned by Deere, but there are quite a few available in the US, depending on scale. I specifically think that LS is foreign, but don't remember for sure.
- onion2k 5y ago
  silent gentlemen's agreement We assume it's silent but we probably shouldn't. It could be a boring old cartel. Someone should check.
- gunapologist99 5y ago
  > Because it's a heavily entrenched industry that's not easily disrupted, where each brand has carved it's on territory by geography and there's this silent gentlemen's agreement of "you stay out of my market, I stay out of yours and we all win Do you know that this is the case or are you speculating? It seems like there's an intense amount of competition, especially with imported farming equipment. (I have no idea if John Deere sells overseas or if it's mostly a domestic brand.) Some other manufacturers that seem to have big branding in the U.S. are New Holland (just found out they're owned by Fiat.. small world), Mahindra, and Kubota. Are those all part of this cartel that you're alleging exists?

gunapologist99 5y ago

This view might not be very popular, so I want to preface it with: I am very supportive of the right of repair, especially when it's being used to force expensive proprietary repairs, probably from a long way away (I'm sure shipping a tractor isn't quite like shipping an iphone), or when it's used to enforce a sort of planned obsolescence when the manufacturer just decides to stop maintaining in order to force you to upgrade. I'm curious, however, how much (in practical terms) John Deere would have to give or open up in terms of trade secrets in order to enable repairs (especially of super advanced stuff like fully autonomous farming), and to what extent they would need to open things up that offshore competitors might easily clone without having invested the millions (or billions?) that John Deere has already invested. Put another way, right now, today, we have a farming equipment manufacturer based in the U.S. that is actually injecting some serious tech into a rather staid industry. John Deere seems to be turning into a highly innovative tech mfg company, in, ironically, one of the most expensive places to run a heavy equipment manufacturer. I view them as a huge asset, developing what appears to be interesting ideas in what was a pretty tech-adverse industry, and fully automated farming is probably also a key component for food security across the globe, U.S. national security, international stability, and probably needs to be a part of any climate change conversation. So, how much are we asking them to give up of their know-how where it might be cloned or worked-around by other companies? In the immortal words of Dr. Ian Malcolm, "You stood on the shoulders of geniuses to accomplish something as fast as you could, and before you even knew what you had, you patented it, and packaged it, and slapped it on a plastic lunchbox, and now you wanna sell it." What if FOTMA or Yucheng Dadi Machinery Co (https://sdycdadi.en.made-in-china.com/product/EvdncAtVZXkZ/China-Farm-Machinery-Tractor-Rotary-Tiller-1GQNK-140D-.html https://sdycdadi.en.made-in-china.com/product/EvdncAtVZXkZ/C...) or something like that decide to clone the most advanced John Deere tractors with their new access? If you are buying a quarter-million-dollar John Deere combine, you have probably already evaluated the rest of the industry and decided that the draconian DRM or whatever they're using is worth that very substantial investment. It's not like you might have just been browsing in the store for a $1 bottle of shampoo -- I'm sure you can't be a farmer without knowing, in detail, about this unable-to-repair problem with John Deere specifically, and might have even formed some strong opinions about it! And if you decide that it's not worth it, then you would choose something else.. the market would punish John Deere for their overstep. (I'm not a farmer and have zero contact with this industry, but it seems that the Indian company Mahindra has pretty competitive pricing from a quick browse of tractor dealerships.) You could also sue John Deere if they were delivering a vehicle that wasn't performing according to their specifications, and ultimately their reputation would suffer. (It took thirty years for American auto mfgs to rebuild their reputation after the garbage they made way back in the 70's.) The other thing where the market would help to fix this, without needing a legislative fix, is if a competitor steps up with an easy to repair tractor, like https://frame.work/ https://frame.work/ did for laptops. If this is a real problem, then some smart entrepreneur eventually will, even if they end up having their first tractors built in China. John Deere relies on the trust of farmers just as much as the other way around. Just some food for thought. This seems to be a nuanced and very emotional issue for some people, but it does seem like there are at least two sides to this story.

xondono 5y ago

I have to say, I’m still very divided about right to repair. I think it’s hard to keep a consistent world view where right to repair is a thing, and at the same time anything but open source is outright illegal.

toss1 5y ago
Why does a right to repair require open-source to be the only legal option? It seems that I could have a highly proprietary device and still be able to repair it. It would just require availability of 1) documentation 2) diagnostics, 3) parts at market prices, 4) parts not locked by DRM code. E.g., the iPhone could still have all their proprietary code, as long as I can read about the components and their relationships, diagnose a problem, replace a component and/or flash new data/code onto the device. Same for a car or tractor. Meaningful repair doesn't require that we be able to dismantle and re-solder sub-board-level components, only identify the particular component, obtain it at a reasonable availability and cost, and replace it, or be able to substitute an upgraded part. Am I missing something here?
- xondono 5y ago
  > the iPhone could still have all their proprietary code, as long as I can read about the components and their relationships, diagnose a problem, replace a component and/or flash new data/code onto the device. As a group heavily populated by programmers and coders, I think it’s fairly hypocritical to say that everyone should make their IP like schematics freely available while we keep software under copyright. > Am I missing something here? - How is a defect like an aged battery different than a non-updated software? - Why is it inmoral for a company to limit your ability to swap a battery but totally okay to not give you the code so that you can patch their software to work on your machine? At least in the case of the battery they can argue that inappropriate handling of faulty batteries is dangerous. > Meaningful repair doesn't require that we be able to dismantle and re-solder sub-board-level components, only identify the particular component, obtain it at a reasonable availability and cost, and replace it, or be able to substitute an upgraded part. That “only” is doing a lot of work there. That “only” is the work of a lot of people who deserve to get good salaries too. Why should their work become a commodity while programmers keep their “machines” protected with the laws for art?

fartcannon 5y ago

The future of life on earth depends on there being no limitations on repairing, modifying, or extending the things we buy.

frankfrankfrank 5y ago

On a related side note. I find that this is yet another topic that highlights the need for efforts to bring legislation back in line with Constitutional principles of being outcome, not method oriented; descriptive, not prescriptive. What that may mean is that legislation would require, e.g., that anyone doing any business with the government or using any government/public services (e.g., GPS) must utilize technologies that are common and compatible with each other both physically (parts) and data (communications, controls, etc.). We are facing a situation that was last encountered or at least recognized in the late 80s and 90s, where silos and cartels were starting to emerge that led to massive waste and pillage of at least the public coffers. That led to a wave of standardization efforts in the late 90s and early 00s. That wave seems to have started dying out and really needs to be revitalized.

conradev 5y ago
1000% For example, California wants to electrify lawn equipment: https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/our-work/programs/zero-emission-landscaping-equipment https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/our-work/programs/zero-emission-lands... There are a number of competing ecosystems of batteries. They each have a leaf blower that takes a different form factor battery: https://www.ryobitools.com/products/details/46396029911 https://www.ryobitools.com/products/details/46396029911 https://www.dewalt.com/products/outdoor/blowers/20v-max-lithium-ion-xr-brushless-handheld-blower-bare/dcbl722b https://www.dewalt.com/products/outdoor/blowers/20v-max-lith... https://www.milwaukeetool.com/Products/Safety-Solutions/Emissions/2724-20 https://www.milwaukeetool.com/Products/Safety-Solutions/Emis... Batteries are expensive and use a lot of carbon to produce, so the world would be better off if these batteries were fully interchangeable.
- aardvarkr 5y ago
  Action like that would freeze innovation at a time when we want to keep pushing the boundaries of what is possible. All three of those systems use different voltages or designs that change power output and weight distribution. On top of that, each brand is incentivized to keep experimenting to improve the battery design for their specific use cases. Dewalt, for example, is making lawn mowers that use two of their 20v batteries in parallel so you can use the same batteries in your mower as you do in your drill. The Ryobi batteries haven't changed since they were first introduced so the old drill that you bought in 2014 is still usable with today's batteries.

Cupertino95014 5y ago

On agricultural issues: be careful about making assumptions. I was talking about the labels on fruits (you know, those labels you just peel off so you don't eat them) with someone who knew about this sort of thing . I ignorantly said "that's gotta be a low-margin business." He said, "Actually, it's a high-margin business." If you get a monopoly in some market that's very difficult to enter, you've got yourself a steady cash flow. I don't think "repairing tractors out in the middle of nowhere" is a very easy one to get into.

throwawayboise 5y ago
I understand the tractor repair example to some degree, though "difficult to enter" in the case of Deere is largely because Deere is making it difficult. But how is the market for fruit labels difficult to enter?
- AlbertCory 5y ago
  Well, I can only speculate, not having tried. It could be that the farmers & handlers already know the main suppliers and they're satisfied with them: low prices, good service, acceptable quality. And they're not looking for even lower prices. If you have a monopoly and you've ridden the learning curve far enough that you're making a good profit while not pissing off your customers, and the market is pretty static, you're in. But I could be wrong.
  - ethbr0 5y ago
    I'd hazard it's probably due to order of magnitude different absolute profit amounts. E.g. you can double your margins on fruit labels, and still be a rounding error for fruit producers Consequently, being invisible and fanatically attentive to what your customers want (e.g. ease of use) means the hassle of switching suppliers outweighs the cost savings.
    - AlbertCory 5y ago
      I was pondering this while walking the dog: family-run businesses, small business, etc. In some businesses, having been around for a long time, being part of the community, and knowing your customers is worth WAY more than a few points of profit. In fact, those businesses are everywhere. Look and see who buys the ads for the high school sports teams. Tractor repair ought to be like that. Not the monopoly of John Deere. (I don't know anything about who owns fruit-labelling, and it might even be some giant conglomerate.) But let's say someone owns such a loyalty business, everything is great, and then they die or retire. Then what? It's the source of a million dramas, like Yellowstone or King Lear. Maybe a son or daughter takes over. Then they're incompetent. Or not. Maybe the kids fight over it. The possibilities are endless. Or maybe the giant conglomerate DOES buy it. Promising "nothing will change" of course.

dogman144 5y ago

Omaha has had a relatively robust tech meetup scene for a while because of stuff like this and interesting open source projects come out of the region+. The tractors have as much SW in them as a car does these days, and it was locked down to repair except by the manufacturer.

thereddaikon 5y ago

John Deere is a symptom of a wider problem in regards to right to repair. Legally speaking there is a lot of progress that needs to be made in the realm of consumer electronics. But for vehicles be they road cars or tractors it can all be fixed with one good federal court case. What John Deere, and Tesla and most automakers are trying to do is basically circumvent the Sherman Act through an abuse of copyright law. SCOTUS has been pretty crappy on tying lately and has raised the bar, the opposite of what should be happening. But it seems right to repair is gaining a lot of broad political support so hopefully that will soon be undone.

dawsmik 5y ago
Then Congress should step in. This seems like something that would get bipartisan support.
- thereddaikon 5y ago
  A new law could work but I feel like this should be able to be solved on the judicial side because its already illegal. We just have another case of the law not being enforced.

vishvananda 5y ago

I hadn't been following the "Right to Repair" movement too closely until I discovered that NordicTrack recently locked their users out of Privileged Mode[0], which makes it virtually impossible to install 3rd party software like Netflix on my treadmill. I just want to watch a video while I exercise! [0]: https://www.wired.com/story/nordictrack-ifit-treadmill-privilege-mode/ https://www.wired.com/story/nordictrack-ifit-treadmill-privi...

trembonator 5y ago