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Colorado passes agricultural Right to Repair
- oofta-boofta 3y agoGood! A massive win for moving away from a throwaway society.
- DrThunder 3y agoFarm equipment != smartphone. No one is throwing away high dollar farm equipment.
- AnimalMuppet 3y agoI'm pretty sure that John Deere tractors are not a throwaway item, even if the dealer is holding you hostage on a repair.
- TaylorAlexander 3y agoI suspect many of the parts on a John Deere tractor get thrown away when they could be repaired.
- redeeman 3y agoultimately you can repair an awful lot of things, so... suppose some small metal bracket holding something up has begun rusting because something scraped the paint off, or hit it, and its also a bit bent. this piece of metal costs $50 or so from the manufacturer, which admittedly is borderline theft, but what can you do?, while i have the cab off the tractor, i may aswell replace it. I could opt to strip the paint off, either by using toxic chemicals, or abrasively. But now I need to also do a little welding to fix it up, then sand it down again, degrease it, and give it a new paint job. This took me around 2-3 hours to do. Do we repair this item or chuck it in the scrap pile?
- dataflow 3y agoDoes the governor not need to sign it? Or has it been signed already? Because I wouldn't be celebrating yet until it's signed into law (if even then). NY's right to repair law was destroyed at the governor's desk at the 11th hour. [1] [1] https://www.theverge.com/2022/12/29/23530733/right-to-repair-law-new-york-tech-hochul-oems-parts https://www.theverge.com/2022/12/29/23530733/right-to-repair...
- kwiens 3y agoGovernor Polis still needs to sign it, and you are right to be skeptical after New York. Two reasons to be optimistic: * In CO, the Governor can't mess with the bill like NY, only sign or veto it * Gov Polis is very good on tech issues, and has signalled to us (the coalition) that he will sign it
- dataflow 3y agoW.r.t. the first bullet point, I don't think NY was any different - AFAIK the governor didn't "mess" with it (despite the reporting making it look that way); she just didn't sign it until the legislature revised it. The second one is nice to hear though.
- z3c0 3y agoI was about to say the same. It appears the NY bill was ineffective from the jump and wouldn't have amounted to more than pageantry for the companies refusing to give such rights. It was a good thing that is was killed at the last minute.
- kwiens 3y agoNew York's chapter amendment process is totally novel in my legislative experience, haven't come across it anywhere else. Gives the governor a lot of power.
- paws 3y agoDo you have links about this? I was extremely disappointed [1] when I learned about Hochul's last minute nerfing of right to repair and I'd be curious to learn more how the governors office acquired that power. IANAL but thought separation of powers was supposed to be guaranteed by the Constitutions, both US and NY. What happened? [1] https://twitter.com/onpaws/status/1618787954306211840 https://twitter.com/onpaws/status/1618787954306211840
- TedDoesntTalk 3y agoBut will John Deere do what Apple did? Here’s one example: “Apple shipped me a 79-pound iPhone repair kit to fix a 1.1-ounce battery” https://www.theverge.com/2022/5/21/23079058/apple-self-service-iphone-repair-kit-hands-on https://www.theverge.com/2022/5/21/23079058/apple-self-servi... “I’m starting to think Apple doesn’t want us to repair them”
- andreareina 3y agoThat's just the fixture Apple uses isn't it? You're not required to use it.
- MBCook 3y agoThey ship you the tools their stores and authorized third parties seem to use to do a proper quality repair. Yeah it’s heavy. But you don’t buy it, it’s lent to you (via a hold on your credit card). I know people complain about this but should they send the battery in an envelope and say “good luck”? Even if they design the phones to be more repairable (which I know many hope for), nothing can change the design of the phone you bought 2 years ago. And what Apple is doing is miles better than what they were doing before.
- CivBase 3y agoHeaven forbid you want to replace a blown capacitor.
- inconceivable 3y agoso what happens if the kit gets "stolen"? $1200 for all of that stuff sounds like kind of a deal, especially with 2 pelicans.
- dataflow 3y agoWhat would you do with the kit? Replace other parts in other phones and start a business? Aren't you still beholden to Apple for authenticating the part to the phone every time?
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- voakbasda 3y agoI suspect that John Deere and friends will find a way to challenge this in court and -- if they eventually lose -- find a way to maliciously comply with the law. Their behavior has been actively hostile to their customers for years, and they have zero incentive to change. Like Apple's repair kits mentioned in another comment, I suspect their strategy will involve providing tools that cost nearly as much to rent as it would take to buy a new machine. Then, only the most well-capitalized farmers will be able to afford to lock up the extraordinary amounts of cash required to perform their own repairs. Without legislation that absolutely eviscerates their monopolistic business practices, I would be shocked if anything changes for the average farmer.
- userbinator 3y agoLike Apple's repair kits mentioned in another comment, I suspect their strategy will involve providing tools that cost nearly as much to rent as it would take to buy a new machine. That reminds me of how much things have changed since the "good old days". I have some service manuals for mid-century equipment that don't need much in the way of special tools, and where one is needed or would be helpful, they tell you how to make one.
- kelseyfrog 3y agoName, shame, and industry blacklist Deere product managers. It's the only way. Stop acting like there's nothing that can be done.
- TimTheTinker 3y agoGood coverage of the issue by news outlets, including naming John Deere specifically, would be far more effective not only at motivating Deere to improve their practices, but also helping the populace at large to understand the problem, build popular support for good legislation, motivating legislators to deal with the problem, and motivating other companies to avoid copying Deere's example. Naming and shaming individuals (besides a CEO) within a company is unnecessary, and can cause destruction to lives, families, and communities that have nothing to do with the problem. It also overestimates the individual agency these people hold over what is most often a cultural and policy issue at a company.
- m0llusk 3y agoRight to repair is a great thing, but it seems like we need to be honest about this business and its customers. Agriculture, at least in the US, is primarily a government subsidized big business. Many if not most John Deere customers are corporations that like having their operating fleets be maintained and managed with help from the provider. The farmers getting screwed are smaller operators who are far less profitable for John Deere and really should seek or develop other options if at all possible. Comparisons with Apple hardware are not very good because Apple is primarily a consumer brand. Apple does in a sense sell fleets to companies and schools, but most rely on other companies to configure and maintain their computing gear. The market for laptops is very different from the market for large tractors.
- Gustomaximus 3y agoWhat I don't understand is why a couple of the higher quality tractor companies have not started pushing hard to brand "we support repair" and having available online manuals and software to support this. This seems a perfect marketing/product platform for an underdog that also believes this. Massey, Fendt or similar could really differentiate themself and take market share on the back of this I suspect. Especially with online world having reached farmers as the dealer networks increasingly mean less when you can order equiptment and spares online so JD loses some of the strength they hold by their dominating physical presence alone.
- LinuxBender 3y agoMassey, Fendt or similar could really differentiate themself and take market share on the back of this I suspect. I love the idea. I wish that were a thing but I suspect that it would be seen as a lack of profit model and businesses are more competitive than ever now. I have a 1947 Fordson 2n tractor and there is a large community of people that support it as well as a couple 3rd party parts manufacturers that make parts for many old tractors. I suspect that even if Ford wanted to manufacture parts there are not enough of us to make it profitable. Adding to that modern tractors are much more complicated and have many more parts. It would be really cool if some college were to take on a project to build the "most capable" yet "simplest" tractors that could do everything the modern fancy computer driven tractors can do but using as few parts and as simple and generic parts as possible and then license everything in a way that businesses could not make it proprietary. Perhaps I have an odd fantasy. Open Source Hardware so to speak. If it were to become popular enough perhaps that college could fund their entire department making human and robotic driven simple and pragmatic tractors if for no other reason than bragging rights. "Our $100K tractor can do everything your $2M tractor can do and more." Bonus if it has some Easter-egg hardware like many hidden beer bottle openers. Perhaps colleges could get DARPA and similar funding in the name of international and national security for each country to create something like this to Feed the World as food scarcity becomes more of a thing. Make farming profitable again.
- silexia 3y agoParents on tons of ridiculous tractor related concepts prevent this. We badly need patent reform or outright abolishment of parents. Parents are the greatest source of monopoly in America.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- walterbell 3y ago"Repairing Your Car in Your Own Garage Is Considered Illegal in Sacramento, CA", 400+ comments, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34081331 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34081331 "50k repair manuals for most vehicles 1982-2013", https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35491294 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35491294
- eru 3y agoHooray for even more regulation.. Surely this particular piece of well-intended regulation will go work out exactly as hoped for, and won't have any unintended consequences that stifle things in the longer run.
- ttyprintk 3y agoWe’ll get to see! With Europe, Biden and some states on one side; and more-reticent states on the other. As HBR put it, “Will manufacturers follow a margin strategy and raise new product prices to capitalize on easier repair? Will manufacturers follow a volume strategy and cut new product prices to lure consumers into replacing instead of repairing a glitchy product?” Or, in places without it, will farmers resort to crudely deleting emissions-control because it interferes in the long-term?
- thomastjeffery 3y ago...and the alternative had no consequences? Get your head out of the sand.
- eru 3y agoThe alternative is to let people make their own decisions about what to buy and what contracts to enter. If there's some other regulation standing in the way of making that useful, perhaps we should dismantle that one, instead of adding more?
- thomastjeffery 3y agoThat's not an alternative, that's the status quo. There is no regulation standing in the way of allowing customers to repair their property. What is standing in the way is a perverse incentive.
- eru 3y agoThose perverse incentives might come from some regulation. (Perhaps intellectual property laws..)
- jensenbox 3y agoI think this should be the next priority for https://frame.work https://frame.work :)
- ShadowBanThis01 3y agoThis seems like a good step, but the piecemeal approach is aggravating. Are they going to pass a separate right-to-repair law for every industry and product category, one at a time? "Last year, they passed the first US Right to Repair bill since 2012, protecting Coloradans’ right to fix their own powered wheelchairs" This is absurd. They need to pass comprehensive right-to-repair legislation and then amend it as problems and loopholes emerge.
- javajosh 3y agoI agree. But the way to get a comprehensive solution is to understand the technology changes that have changed our world profoundly, and why current law is no longer sufficient. To wit, humans have invented invisibility, and now we must deal with a wide range of surprising repurcussions of this technology. Now, we don't have real invisibility, but we do have functional invisibility. Every chip, and and every piece of software, is invisible to the user. This is entirely novel and could not have been anticipated by the framers - who very much cared about innovation and invention, given that the patent system is described in the Constitution. But the invention of invisibility changes the calculus of product creation and distribution profoundly, to the point that it may require an Amendment to address fully. I suggest something along the lines of "If you sell an Invisibly Small Good, then you Must provide to the buyer a Microscope also".)