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The Videogame Industry Is Fighting 'Right To Repair' Laws (vice.com)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the proprietary-consoles dept.

An anonymous reader quotes Motherboard: The video game industry is lobbying against legislation that would make it easier for gamers to repair their consoles and for consumers to repair all electronics more generally. The Entertainment Software Association, a trade organization that includes Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, as well as dozens of video game developers and publishers, is opposing a "right to repair" bill in Nebraska, which would give hardware manufacturers fewer rights to control the end-of-life of electronics that they have sold to their customers...

Bills making their way through the Nebraska, New York, Minnesota, Wyoming, Tennessee, Kansas, Massachusetts, and Illinois statehouses will require manufacturers to sell replacement parts and repair tools to independent repair companies and consumers at the same price they are sold to authorized repair centers. The bill also requires that manufacturers make diagnostic manuals public and requires them to offer software tools or firmware to revert an electronic device to its original functioning state in the case that software locks that prevent independent repair are built into a device. The bills are a huge threat to the repair monopolies these companies have enjoyed, and so just about every major manufacturer has brought lobbyists to Nebraska, where the legislation is currently furthest along... This setup has allowed companies like Apple to monopolize iPhone repair, John Deere to monopolize tractor repair, and Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo to monopolize console repair...
Motherboard's reporter was unable to get a comment from Microsoft, Apple, and Sony, and adds that "In two years of covering this issue, no manufacturer has ever spoken to me about it either on or off the record."

11 of 266 comments (clear)

  1. This type of legal protection for consumers.. by ChodaBoyUSA · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...is why you are not required to only have the dealer repair your vehicle. Consumers must have the same freedom with electronic devices.

  2. They did it to themselves by thundercattt · · Score: 5, Insightful

    When you make HUGE price tags to repair items, people are going to repair it themselves. I previously worked for Lenovo/Asus repair depot. To replace an LCD was over $300. Part on eBay is about$60 takes maybe 10 mins depending on the model. So when you flease the customer long enough, they attempt it themselves because the $300+tax or buy a new one for $400. Most think I'll give it a shot for $50.

    1. Re:They did it to themselves by dwywit · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You're correct about the morality of it, but it's been a sound business model since planned obsolesence was first thought of.

      It's a better long-term business strategy to keep selling another unit to a customer - frequently and repeatedly - rather than make a product that is 1. long lived (reliable), and 2. economically repairable.

      Farming hardware - tractors, harvesters, etc - has traditionally been *very* reliable and long-lived. In other words, what you might call "overbuilt". They have a hard time comprehending why their computers don't last longer than 3-4 years. I have to try to explain modern economics to them.

      --
      They sentenced me to twenty years of boredom
    2. Re:They did it to themselves by Kjella · · Score: 5, Insightful

      When you make HUGE price tags to repair items, people are going to repair it themselves. I previously worked for Lenovo/Asus repair depot. To replace an LCD was over $300. Part on eBay is about$60 takes maybe 10 mins depending on the model. So when you flease the customer long enough, they attempt it themselves because the $300+tax or buy a new one for $400. Most think I'll give it a shot for $50.

      I think the biggest issue for any repair shop is they can't deliver "I'll give it a shot" service. If it doesn't work, people aren't very likely to pay you $50 or even believe you really tried at all. If it turns out something else is broken too, they won't be very happy being stuck with a bill and a still broken machine. In fact you could end up in an argument about what was broke or if you broke it. If you do it yourself as a last-ditch attempt before throwing it in the trash you got nothing to lose, but deliver it to a repair shop and the customer will never accept that. They want a quote and a repaired machine for that price and you're burdened with the risk of delivering that. If those parts on eBay turns out to be faulty or shoddy knock-offs that don't quite work right or have quality issues that could become your problem too. Also if bad shit happens shortly after it comes from your shop they'll try to blame it on your repair, whether it's actually correct or not.

      All of this starts amounting to quite a bit of overhead, if someone comes in with a machine you probably can't make an off the cuff estimate. First you have to figure out roughly what's wrong, what parts costs, the time you'll spend and the risk you're taking then give a quote based on that. And very often the customer will say it's not worth it and go buy a new machine and that time is lost. And then you'll have customers who want time estimates or worse yet guarantees and you have supply chain issues you'll spend time dealing with customer complains and they might haggle or cancel their business and you might get stuck with the bill. And you will have all the ordinary business overhead of having a shop, maintaining an inventory and billing system, taxes etc. and people that don't ever come to collect or pay. And if you're shipping you will spent time wrapping and unwrapping, collecting and delivering, dealing with transport damage etc.

      I have some friends that are in the construction industry, they say pretty much the same. If you take away all the overhead, preparation and cleanup and just look at the time the handyman actually does this craft the hourly rate looks bizarre. But after dealing with "everything else" it's not like they walk away with that much per hour worked. It's the cost of doing it as a business, if they were just working on their own house they could do it way, way cheaper. It's simply a matter of trust and risk management, like I rented an apartment from an ex-classmate some years ago. Even though we weren't exactly friends he'd much rather rent to me than to some stranger, simply because he knew I'd be a no fuss tenant. The money is in easy business, dealing with complex and unique situations lie half-broken machines is often unreasonably time consuming and thus expensive. Getting a "known good" one off the assembly line often wins on simplicity.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    3. Re:They did it to themselves by swb · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If you were running a shop fixing these things, you would have some process surrounding the job which took into account paperwork, getting the parts and laptop to the bench, opening the parts (which would no doubt be packaged up the wazoo), installing them, finishing paperwork, putting the laptop back and dealing with the old parts (electronics waste process) and putting the laptop back on the pickup shelf.

      You'd be crazy if you didn't bill this as a one hour job and covering your labor costs would make it a $200 repair pretty easily. And if you were a smart business person, you'd probably also survey the market and price according to market options -- ie, buying a new laptop for $900 -- and extract another $100 in pricing.

      Bam. $300 repair job. Sure, Lenovo's pricing is way out of line but they are in the business of selling new laptops, so they are going to structure pricing to motivate you to buy a new laptop.

      But in the bigger picture, people fixing things as a business have other costs to consider that have to met by their labor charges. There's no such thing as pricing a labor job based solely on the time to do the primary repair. The *process* takes longer and that process is necessary to run the business and that cost has to be covered. Your personal repair speed isn't the basis of a business process.

  3. Re:Good by Anubis+IV · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Yes it is. If you own the item, then all of the rights of ownership are to be afforded to you. You get to do with it as you please, and that includes repairing it.

    It's a derived right, to be sure, but it is a right, nonetheless.

  4. Re:definitions? by wierd_w · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Much of that "difficulty" is artificially introduced by the console developer, to discourage experimentation and reverse engineering attempts, in order to keep the console "secure."

    EG, things like the E-Fuses in the 360 preventing the flashing of older firmwares over the top of newer ones, etc.

    They ONLY reason they exist, *IS TO BRICK CONSOLES*, when people attempt to gain control of the console.

  5. MS used to ban people for useing there own hdd's by Joe_Dragon · · Score: 4, Insightful

    MS used to ban people for useing there own hdd's (much cheaper ones) in the 360. And the 360 used Ext case ones. At the same time the ps3 was open to any 2.5 one.

  6. Re:definitions? by dbIII · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What's happened for a very long time is third party manuals. My Grandmother's copy of "Book of The Ford" was a guide to repairing the Model T and was not written by the Ford Motor Company. That was in the early 1920s and was nowhere near the first edition. Ford had their own manuals but they were not that only ones, and apart from the DCMA there has been little to stop third party manuals since.
    So IMHO there's nothing wrong with them saying "purchase and install Comprehensive Assembly #012934" so long as third parties are allowed to publish alternative manuals and supply alternative parts.

  7. That's because you're a fucking consumer by MrKaos · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Now shut the fuck up and send more money.

    Signed - Microsoft, Apple, Sony

    --
    My ism, it's full of beliefs.
  8. As a tech (component level repair) by inflex · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Being able to get *access* to schematics and boardviews in a timely, and legal manner would be a real nice thing and one of the big pushes behind trying to get this "Right to repair" bill through. Seems a lot of the counter-fight is trying to detail how "poor dumb consumers" shouldn't be near this stuff in the first place ( and to a degree they're right ) as opposed to techs already skilled in the processes involved in the repair work., In reality what a lot of people such as myself and Louis Rossmann (who'll be there speaking in favour of the bill) would like to have is the ability to obtain the information required directly from the manufacturer, even at a fair-and-reasonable price.

    In the old days (80's~90's) you could call up the service dept of most equipment manufacturers and for $15~$20 they would mail you the documents you wanted. These days you have to hope someone leaks it out to the internet. The businesses claim "trade secrets" but in reality there's nothing secret in those schematics, almost every section is pretty much a lift from the 'suggested/example layouts' from the part/chip manufacturer in the first place.

    Ultimately it's all about preventing people from holding off buying a new product, but rebuffed under the guise of "safety" or "secrets".