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Apple Will Fight 'Right To Repair' Legislation (vice.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: Apple is planning to fight proposed electronics "Right to Repair" legislation being considered by the Nebraska state legislature, according to a source within the legislature who is familiar with the bill's path through the statehouse. The legislation would require Apple and other electronics manufacturers to sell repair parts to consumers and independent repair shops, and would require manufacturers to make diagnostic and service manuals available to the public. Nebraska is one of eight states that are considering right to repair bills; last month, Nebraska, Minnesota, New York, Massachusetts, Kansas, and Wyoming introduced legislation. Last week, lawmakers in Illinois and Tennessee officially introduced similar bills. According to the source, an Apple representative, staffer, or lobbyist will testify against the bill at a hearing in Lincoln on March 9. ATT will also argue against the bill, the source said. The source told me that at least one of the companies plans to say that consumers who repair their own phones could cause lithium batteries to catch fire. So far, Nebraska is the only state to schedule a hearing for its legislation.
It's actually pretty easy. They just have to not glue the battery to the case....
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
If this were just about computers/devices, you might have a point. But this legislation got it's start with farm equipment, and new EULAs that forbade fixing it yourself. Which is historically how smaller farmers were able to afford to use heavy equipment - they repaired it themselves. Apple is just the one complaining the loudest, because this would ostensibly affect them, too.
It's not just about Apple. This legislation has merit.
The point is that once a company has enough control of the market to restrict supply chains and/or information about how the device works, they can effectively limit compatibility, prevent repairs and other long-term maintenance, and ultimately constrain the continued use of the device, even if such use would otherwise be viable.
That leads directly to problems like built-in obsolescence, excessive repair charges for devices that fail earlier than might reasonably have been expected, wastage of limited natural resources used in manufacture, and devices that are hard to recycle or otherwise dispose of in safe and environmentally friendly ways.
Hardware producers in the tech industry have become very, very bad at these kinds of things, and they've made a lot of money as a result, and so now it looks like legal/regulatory action is needed. This is hardly a new concern and they've had years to get their own houses in order and have failed to do so, so I have no sympathy for them at all.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
Nothing stops you from cracking it open, removing the ROM components and replacing the software.
Part of the problem is that it's hard to know how true that is any more.
The right-to-repair debate obviously covers much broader interests than just Apple products, and elsewhere we've seen things like farmers' ability to maintain their tractors being impaired by intellectual property laws. I'm not sure what promoting invention, discovery and new creative works has to do with preventing tractor repair, but somehow I doubt that's how the original proponents of those laws or the public intended them to be used.
Whether Apple could or would employ any similar tactics to undermine efforts to repair Apple products is a different question, but looking at the way they've treated iFixit as an example, the way they manage their supply chains and their choices of components, or indeed their opposition to the proposals we're talking about here, the signs aren't exactly good.
But how about instead supporting manufacturers that do what you want?
Some of us do. But when you reach a point where most or all of the major suppliers in a particular market are employing similar tactics, you often reach a point where the general public just gives up and accepts the tactics as inevitable. This is exactly why we have regulatory oversight and consumer protection rules backed by the force of law.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
A battery compartment is for removable batteries, and maybe if the Note 7 actually had a removable battery it wouldn't have been such a disaster for them.
Bullshit. Ask me how I know.
Alright. How do you know?
Because for 50+ years I've used thousands of devices that had battery compartments (including mobile devices) and 99.9% of them consisted of a simple plastic enclosure that worked fine and didn't require a Masters degree to design.
In fact, for decades the default design was a battery compartment with removable batteries- it's only recently that manufacturers have started fucking shit up by sealing batteries in the device and making it non-replaceable.
If anyone thinks that advances in technology have somehow made it harder to build battery compartments then they're simply mistaken.
It's the result of trying to save money in parts and the breathless pursuit of a thinner case.
FACT: Most people don't give a shit if their phone is 1mm thicker or thinner, and many would happily trade a millimeter or two of thickness for a larger battery. But somehow the Powers That Be have decided that what people want isn't as important as saving a dollar in production costs.
Seriously, please don't give me this stuff about "battery compartments are really difficult". They're not.
We've walked on the Moon, and we routinely replace hearts, livers, and hip joints. Thousands of people go in to have their eyes lasered into 20-20 vision every day. We've landed a fucking research probe on a comet. We can put 1.7billion transistors on a chip and sell it for $30.
In light of all that, somehow the "battery compartments are really difficult" argument just doesn't wash.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...