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Not having easily replaceable batteries (and pardon me but I don’t consider requiring 79 lbs of equipment and a 1200$ deposit “easy”) in modern phones is akin t

Not having easily replaceable batteries (and pardon me but I don’t consider requiring 79 lbs of equipment and a 1200$ deposit “easy”) in modern phones is akin to selling cars with the tires welded on. It is ridiculous, consumer hostile, and wasteful. Batteries are consumable, they should not be a reason to throw the phone away once they stopped working. You don’t throw your house away when the garbage bag is full or when the tap starts leaking. These are things you’re expected to replace and it can easily be done with simple tools. Phones shouldn’t be any different when it comes to their parts, especially consumable ones.

seanmcdirmid 4y ago
If my house was 90% garbage bag, I’m not sure. Houses get razed and rebuilt all the time, especially in Japan. They are not as modular as we’d like them to be, as I’m finding out in planning a kitchen renovation.
- cesaref 4y ago
  Around by us in a city in the UK i'm unaware of any house that has been knocked down and rebuilt except for situations where a large house is knocked down and replaced by flats. For someone to knock down their own house to re-use the plot for a new (single occupancy) house is just not how we do things here. But saying that, we do tend to build houses with materials like bricks which are designed to last hundreds of years, and this is not necessarily how it's done elsewhere. We tend to renovate rather that demolish and rebuild. Our home for example is 110 years old, and is in a street of similar age houses. There are some missing ones down a neighbouring street, but I believe these were destroyed by bombing in WW2.
snowwrestler 4y ago
Whoa whoa hold on. You can pay Apple to replace your battery. That’s been true for years. I’ve done it with multiple phones. We just had Apple replace the battery in my wife’s iPhone SE (the original version) and it’s working great. The metaphorical tires are not welded on; you can keep an old phone going with a new battery. But just like tires, if you insist on doing the work yourself, you’re going to need some special equipment.
- shkkmo 4y ago
  > The metaphorical tires are not welded on; you can keep an old phone going with a new battery. The metaphorical tires are DRM'd on by a company that has been actively trying to prevent third party repair shops from being able to work on your car. The doubt of Apple's intentions here is not happening in a vacuum, but against their consistent and ongoing efforts to make self-repair unnecessarily difficult.
  - Bud 4y ago
    There is absolutely no evidence about Apple's "intentions" or "efforts" here, despite constant hectoring and bad-faith, zero-evidence arguments from people like you. "Unnecessarily" difficult? Whatever. What you really mean is that Apple has been optimizing for durability, water-resistance, and smaller size, and people like you don't like those choices, so you are having a tantrum. Those choices, of necessity, mean that repairs are going to be a bit of a pain.
  - snowwrestler 4y ago
    When we’re talking about “right to repair,” we need to distinguish between: a) the use of DRM to prevent repairs b) the physical challenge of working on complex things c) planned obsolescence via consumables The big problem with Apple and many companies is a), and I support efforts to make that illegal. Problem b) is unavoidable for complex things. And there are design trade-offs that deliver benefits for costs, for example thin waterproof smartphones have hard-to-replace batteries. I’m not a fan of trying to use the law to force one set of design decisions on everyone. Problem c) is an issue for some Apple products like EarPods. But not for iPhones, as I point out above.
    - shkkmo 4y ago
      Problem B may not be completely unavoidable but it also isn't a valid excuse for deliberately anti-repair design choices. Some things are indeed tradeoffs in terma s of repairabilty vs. features or costs, but some design decisions have little to no effect on features / cost but a large effect on repairability or durabilty. Now, you can't always legally separate which tradeoffs are which, but I do think there is real value to finding ways to incentivize companies that make durable, repairable products. Those products produce a lot of value for society but manufactures can have a hard time recouping much of that value in the sale price, leading to bad incentives.
mmcnl 4y ago
This analogy only supports Apple's method? Car shops have a lift for easy access to the car and machines for balancing your tires. Very expensive equipment that almost no one has, which also goes for the tools for replacing an iPhone battery. Also Apple is not "consumer hostile", come on. That's a ridiculous accusation.
- deschutes 4y ago
  Anyone can mount a wheel. Clearly the author is talking about a hypothetical vehicle where the wheel has been welded to the axle assembly. Actually replacing the tire on a wheel has practical engineering constraints that leave it best suited for shops. Even changing bicycle tires is non trivial and the performance and durability demands there are negligible in comparison.
  - mmcnl 4y ago
    That's subjective. I don't think the procedure to replace the battery with the tools provided by Apple is complicated.
jmull 4y ago
There is an easy option: have Apple or a repair shop replace the battery. All your complaints are addressed in the light of that simple and well-known fact.

seanmcdirmid 4y ago

If my house was 90% garbage bag, I’m not sure. Houses get razed and rebuilt all the time, especially in Japan. They are not as modular as we’d like them to be, as I’m finding out in planning a kitchen renovation.

cesaref 4y ago
Around by us in a city in the UK i'm unaware of any house that has been knocked down and rebuilt except for situations where a large house is knocked down and replaced by flats. For someone to knock down their own house to re-use the plot for a new (single occupancy) house is just not how we do things here. But saying that, we do tend to build houses with materials like bricks which are designed to last hundreds of years, and this is not necessarily how it's done elsewhere. We tend to renovate rather that demolish and rebuild. Our home for example is 110 years old, and is in a street of similar age houses. There are some missing ones down a neighbouring street, but I believe these were destroyed by bombing in WW2.

snowwrestler 4y ago

Whoa whoa hold on. You can pay Apple to replace your battery. That’s been true for years. I’ve done it with multiple phones. We just had Apple replace the battery in my wife’s iPhone SE (the original version) and it’s working great. The metaphorical tires are not welded on; you can keep an old phone going with a new battery. But just like tires, if you insist on doing the work yourself, you’re going to need some special equipment.

shkkmo 4y ago
> The metaphorical tires are not welded on; you can keep an old phone going with a new battery. The metaphorical tires are DRM'd on by a company that has been actively trying to prevent third party repair shops from being able to work on your car. The doubt of Apple's intentions here is not happening in a vacuum, but against their consistent and ongoing efforts to make self-repair unnecessarily difficult.
- Bud 4y ago
  There is absolutely no evidence about Apple's "intentions" or "efforts" here, despite constant hectoring and bad-faith, zero-evidence arguments from people like you. "Unnecessarily" difficult? Whatever. What you really mean is that Apple has been optimizing for durability, water-resistance, and smaller size, and people like you don't like those choices, so you are having a tantrum. Those choices, of necessity, mean that repairs are going to be a bit of a pain.
- snowwrestler 4y ago
  When we’re talking about “right to repair,” we need to distinguish between: a) the use of DRM to prevent repairs b) the physical challenge of working on complex things c) planned obsolescence via consumables The big problem with Apple and many companies is a), and I support efforts to make that illegal. Problem b) is unavoidable for complex things. And there are design trade-offs that deliver benefits for costs, for example thin waterproof smartphones have hard-to-replace batteries. I’m not a fan of trying to use the law to force one set of design decisions on everyone. Problem c) is an issue for some Apple products like EarPods. But not for iPhones, as I point out above.
  - shkkmo 4y ago
    Problem B may not be completely unavoidable but it also isn't a valid excuse for deliberately anti-repair design choices. Some things are indeed tradeoffs in terma s of repairabilty vs. features or costs, but some design decisions have little to no effect on features / cost but a large effect on repairability or durabilty. Now, you can't always legally separate which tradeoffs are which, but I do think there is real value to finding ways to incentivize companies that make durable, repairable products. Those products produce a lot of value for society but manufactures can have a hard time recouping much of that value in the sale price, leading to bad incentives.

mmcnl 4y ago

This analogy only supports Apple's method? Car shops have a lift for easy access to the car and machines for balancing your tires. Very expensive equipment that almost no one has, which also goes for the tools for replacing an iPhone battery. Also Apple is not "consumer hostile", come on. That's a ridiculous accusation.

deschutes 4y ago
Anyone can mount a wheel. Clearly the author is talking about a hypothetical vehicle where the wheel has been welded to the axle assembly. Actually replacing the tire on a wheel has practical engineering constraints that leave it best suited for shops. Even changing bicycle tires is non trivial and the performance and durability demands there are negligible in comparison.
- mmcnl 4y ago
  That's subjective. I don't think the procedure to replace the battery with the tools provided by Apple is complicated.

jmull 4y ago

There is an easy option: have Apple or a repair shop replace the battery. All your complaints are addressed in the light of that simple and well-known fact.