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That does sound like a pretty good solution, if it can be done for a broken phone. The major issue I see is that refurbish companies are already complaining abo

That does sound like a pretty good solution, if it can be done for a broken phone. The major issue I see is that refurbish companies are already complaining about "bricked" MacBooks, because nobody actually cared enough to ensure that those laptops where reset before being sold. I don't see the same industry being capable of guiding users through resetting permissions for spare parts. A better solutions is to take the direction FairPhone has chosen and make the things that break user-serviceable and offer the parts for sale on Apples own website. If the issue is that phones are being stolen and sold for parts, just flood the market with cheap parts. The new iPhones are absolutely massive, so I'm not buying that you can't make them a bit thicker and allow a user to take them apart. How many people use their phone without a cover anyway? If Apple is serious about being more environmentally friendly, then make a user serviceable phone. Not replacing your phone because fixing it is either impossible or impossibly expensive is going to have a much bigger impact than buying carbon credits for people who charge their watch. My best guess is that Apple is so obsessed with just-in-time production and so hostile to the idea of stocking parts, that they can even see the potential benefits.

hedora 3y ago
According to iFixit, they've solved the "this is physically hard to repair" problem. Also, Apple aggressively recycles components, and is making bold claims about carbon neutrality of manufacturing this release cycle. On top of that, the cost of repairs is dramatically lower for the new models (again, according to the iFixit article). So, I think those issues are mostly fixed, or at least best-in-class. The problem of "I bought your laptop, but you didn't disable anti-theft" is questionable. Here's how to sell a macbook so that it can be used by the purchaser and so that your data is wiped: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT212749 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT212749 It takes 4 clicks (and probably a password entry), and it's easy for the purchaser to confirm it was done before forking over cash (assuming they turn on the machine to confirm it can POST). If the seller forgets to do this, they can initiate the wipe + unlock remotely via iCloud. Apple parts are pretty cheap already, so that's not the issue either. As far as I can tell, all the complaints boil down to people wanting to fix phones without Apple's authorization. Its a valid complaint, but it only really impacts independent repair shops at this point. I'd also like to see better support for third-party replacement parts (like with PC's), but I don't think there is any realistic market demand for that, and it is not what people are asking for.

hedora 3y ago

According to iFixit, they've solved the "this is physically hard to repair" problem. Also, Apple aggressively recycles components, and is making bold claims about carbon neutrality of manufacturing this release cycle. On top of that, the cost of repairs is dramatically lower for the new models (again, according to the iFixit article). So, I think those issues are mostly fixed, or at least best-in-class. The problem of "I bought your laptop, but you didn't disable anti-theft" is questionable. Here's how to sell a macbook so that it can be used by the purchaser and so that your data is wiped: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT212749 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT212749 It takes 4 clicks (and probably a password entry), and it's easy for the purchaser to confirm it was done before forking over cash (assuming they turn on the machine to confirm it can POST). If the seller forgets to do this, they can initiate the wipe + unlock remotely via iCloud. Apple parts are pretty cheap already, so that's not the issue either. As far as I can tell, all the complaints boil down to people wanting to fix phones without Apple's authorization. Its a valid complaint, but it only really impacts independent repair shops at this point. I'd also like to see better support for third-party replacement parts (like with PC's), but I don't think there is any realistic market demand for that, and it is not what people are asking for.