Apple: iPhones Are Too 'Complex' To Allow Unauthorized Repair (vice.com)

Jason Koebler writes: Apple's top environmental officer made the company's most extensive statements about the repairability of Apple hardware on Tuesday: "Our first thought is, 'You don't need to repair this.' When you do, we want the repair to be fairly priced and accessible to you," Lisa Jackson, Apple's vice president of policy and social initiatives said at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco. "To think about these very complex products and say the answer to all our problems is that you should have anybody to repair and have access to the parts is not looking at the whole problem."

Apple has lobbied against "Fair Repair" bills in 11 states that would require the company to make its repair guides available and to sell replacement parts to the general public. Instead, it has focused on an "authorized service provider" model that allows the company to control the price and availability of repair.

Comments

Re: You don't need to repair this.

[Kjella]

Well repair of small electronics has been dying for 30 years, Apple isn't helping but the overall trend is much broader. But as long as Apple is making manuals and parts for themselves I have no problem with them being forced to offer it to the public. They can reject warranty cases they believe are due to botched repairs, make the phones less repairable if they want but not monopolize after-market services. If it was up to me monopolizing after-market accessories would be outlawed too, if you want to hook something up to lightning port the interface should be documented and free. Proprietary formats, protocols and interfaces are a pox on society.

Re: And then there's this

[Anonymous Coward]

Ubuntu Linux runs great on my old MacBook pro. All the drivers work, even for my Wacom graphics tablet. Linux seems to be a great way to extend the useful life of aging computers.

Re: Whaaaaaat?

[Miamicanes]

A lithium battery has a finite lifespan. It's guaranteed to eventually need replacement, and unless Apple is literally molding the lithium gel around the circuit board in a way that makes its replacement physically impossible, they should be required to sell replacement batteries at a fair price (or if they don't want to, then they shouldn't be allowed to prevent anyone ELSE from making compatible replacements).

A mechanical button or poorly-attached microUSB likewise has a finite life... a life that might very well be less than the reasonably-expected life of the phone.

Screens break and crack. It's just something that happens to glass when dropped.

A good step forward would be for the FTC to require manufactures to explicitly disclose the repair cost & minimum availability for key components at purchase. Ex:

Battery: 1 year free warranty, guaranteed availability for a maximum charge of $n until yyyy/MM/dd(*)

Screen: 1 year free warranty for defects, guaranteed availability for a maximum charge of $x until yyyy/MM/dd, and $y until YyYy/Mm/Dd

Electrolytic Capacitors: 10 year warranty, or replacement with newer model (not necessarily the newEST model) that's at least as good.

Buttons & connectors: 1 year warranty, 5 year guaranteed availability of repair with maximum charge of $k(*).

(*) And if they can't satisfy the repairability guarantee, they'll have to refund some fair fraction of the original purchase price based on age (say, 100% up to 18 months, 80% after 18-24 months, decreasing by another 10% per 6 months thereafter).

I'd even allow them to be assholes & enforce absurdly-short (or outrageously expensive) terms... as long as they were required to accurately & effectively communicate those terms to buyers at purchase, and really bend over backwards to make sure consumers know about terms the FTC deemed 'unreasonable'

concrete example: Consumer buys new iPhone 17 (or Samsung Galaxy S16, or Google VoxelQ). The manufacturer guarantees battery-availability only until 8/31/22, which is less than 60 months from the date of first sale. After opening the box, the phone is in another sealed box with prominent federally-mandated warning (in English & Spanish for US phones) that says something like, "Warning, the manufacturer of this phone has chosen to not guarantee the availability of replacement batteries after 8/31/22. The FTC has determined that 80% of batteries will have less than 50% of their original capacity after 8/31/21. By law, you have an absolute right to return this phone to the seller for 100% refund and full cancellation of all contractual obligations and shipping charges arising from its purchase without charge as long as this seal is not broken. This right can not be waived or limited, regardless of seller policy or conditions of sale."

ie, the Feds couldn't *stop* Apple (& others) from being assholes, but they could ensure that consumers KNOW Apple (& others) are being assholes & protect them from being victims unless they're absolutely HELLBENT on being victims. As long as the FTC's threshold for requiring the warning was reasonable enough for most vendors to avoid, its presence would be effective & would subject the mfr. to criticism & ridicule from magazines, reviewers, and probably late-night comedians. The key is to make sure it doesn't turn into a stupid, pointless warning, like "Warning: may contain peanuts" on a jar of peanuts or peanut butter.

Consumer protection laws with teeth can and do work. Just ask anyone who was given a hard time by underlings or junior staff about getting a warranty repair for a jailbroken iphone or rooted Android phone until they summoned the manager & invoked the magic phrase, "Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act"... at which point the manager, if he had any sense & valued his job, apologized *profusely* for the "misunderstanding" and *personally* made sure the phone got fixed, because anything else would risk a $50,000 per incident fine and mountain of subs