A lot of issues surrounding the move to make anything and everything a "Service" are starting to become very clear. The issues with IoT devices being bricked, Tesla 'ownership', and so on really do need scrutiny from a functional body with a hint of the public's interest at heart.
> The issues with IoT devices being bricked, Tesla 'ownership', and so on really do need scrutiny from a functional body with a hint of the public's interest at heart.
Oh great, another bureaucracy.
Why should manufacturers be forced to make their products repairable by users? Why don't they have the right to make a non-repairable product, and let the market decide whether or not it succeeds? If people really want repairable products, some company will be able to make money by selling them. The market is an excellent way to track consumer preferences -- far better than a bureaucracy telling companies how to make their products.
Okay, but to be consistent you have to argue for getting rid of copyrights and patents as well. It makes no sense to regard these devices as "creative works", yet then deny that the end user has been sold an instance of this abstract structure.
It is certainly not a logical conclusion of my argument that all bureaucracies that interfere with the market ought to be abolished, or that the market should be free in all cases. My point was that in this particular case, the market would be a better way to solve the problem than a bureaucracy.
Therefore, advocating the existence of some bureaucracies and not others does not contradict my argument, nor is it inconsistent with my argument.
In general, while market dynamics are quite important, "the market" doesn't actually constitute a valid argument for anything (as said thing would happen anyway), and usually indicates an attempt to stubbornly ignore differing opinions.
The point is that companies are already asking for state intervention to protect their products as being a creative endeavor. So this is no longer some noble two-party private transaction. (Which I would be all in favor for, but we're just not in that realm!)
Demanding the protections of their creative work while shirking the responsibilities (an end-user accessing and modifying the whole creative work that they've purchased) may not be definitively inconsistent, but it's extremely one-sided.
Of course market dynamics are a valid argument! They matter very much, because changes in the market affect peoples' quality of life. Policies that distort the market in a way that adversely affects peoples' quality of life should not be implemented without very good reasons. Even policies that are not expected to introduce such distortions often do, so it's good to be cautious about any proposals which could have unintended economic consequences.
Copyright and patent protection are not one-sided. Consumers benefit from them, because copyrights and patents incentivize the creation of things which would not have been created otherwise.
Many lifesaving medicines never would have been invented if pharmaceutical companies would not have been able to protect them via patents and get rich. Similarly, much of the music, movies, books, etc. that consumers enjoy never would have been created if their authors and publishers were not able to protect them via copyright, and thereby get rich.
A lot of medical, technological, and cultural progress has been made by people trying to get rich. Patents and copyrights are ingenious because they channel peoples' desire to get rich into outcomes that are overall beneficial to society. The benefits compensate for the market restrictions they accompany, and overall, patents and copyrights have made society better off than it would have been otherwise.
Finally, what responsibilities do you think companies shirking? A responsibility to make products repairable by the consumers?
No such responsibility exists. Nor do you have the right to demand that a company design its products to include a feature you like, such as repairability. If you think such responsibilities or rights exist, prove it.
If you think they don't exist, but should be created, prove that the benefit they will bring to society will compensate for the market distortions they will produce (which will be quite significant if you think through all of the extra development, support, and liability costs that manufacturers will have to endure).
You're simultaneously wed to copyright because it's here, and arguing against a "right" to repair because it is not. So you're just repeating rationalizations for the current status quo.
For the third time now - copyright and patents presume to create a type of creative product wherein it is not the manufacture of the product that is really being sold to the consumer, but the design of it. A person buys a cell phone not for the plastic and doped silicon it is made of, but ostensibly for the abstract structure of the way that they are arranged.
Since the person is buying an instance of a design, it stands to reason that they should have the ability to service the physical manifestation and otherwise directly interact with that design.
It's not surprising that companies want to have their cake and eat it too - implementing only the half of an abstraction that takes away a consumer's rights while ignoring the second half and leaving them subject to law-of-the-jungle. They successfully wrote law like this for scratched cds, binary software, and DRM. But that hardly implies that their land grab is in the public's interest, appeals to "trickle-down" benefits notwithstanding.
> You're simultaneously wed to copyright because it's here, and arguing against a "right" to repair because it is not. So you're just repeating rationalizations for the current status quo.
Oh, so you're a mind reader who can figure out my motivations? By the way, those are arguments, not rationalizations. They are pretty good, too.
> For the third time now - copyright and patents presume to create a type of creative product wherein it is not the manufacture of the product that is really being sold to the consumer, but the design of it. A person buys a cell phone not for the plastic and doped silicon it is made of, but ostensibly for the abstract structure of the way that they are arranged.
So what? Nothing in this logically necessitates any conclusions about repairability of products.
> Since the person is buying an instance of a design, it stands to reason that they should have the ability to service the physical manifestation and otherwise directly interact with that design.
How exactly does your previous statement logically necessitate this? Show your work. Otherwise, it is a handwavy "stands to reason," "it's just obvious" kind of assertion.
> It's not surprising that companies want to have their cake and eat it too - implementing only the half of an abstraction that takes away a consumer's rights while ignoring the second half and leaving them subject to law-of-the-jungle.
What rights are being taken away? In your first sentence, you argued that a right to repair is not "here." How then can it then be violated or taken away by companies? How can anyone violate a non-existent right?
It doesn't take an ability to read minds to characterize a comment. In a universe with no copyright, arguments about its benefits would fall flat. In a universe with a right to repair, all the consumer benefits would be "manifestly true" in the way you're treating the arguments for copyright. You're demanding a level of proof that can only be met by having the condition already existing, and thus just defending the status quo.
> show your work
So you've expressed your arguments in terms of ZFC or whatever? Coming up with new concepts is obviously intuitive work - I've laid out what I see as a simple deeper abstraction behind copyright, which you've done nothing but ignore along with every other argument.
> What rights are being taken away?
Rather than get into semantics over the word "right", let's say lawful ability. In the case of a CD,
what has been taken away is your ability to simply make copies of that CD. Instead, the publisher purports to sell you a license to only listen to the music. Yet they conveniently forget the second half of that abstraction - if the CD is scratched, they don't send you a new one!
> In a universe with no copyright, arguments about its benefits would fall flat.
They must not have, because we once lived in a universe without it, and now we don't. How do you suppose that happened?
Similarly, when the US patent system was created, arguments very similar to mine were presented in its defense, even though patents did not already exist. They worked. The arguments in favor of the status quo predate the status quo, and were convincing in a world without the status quo. That's because they are good arguments.
> Coming up with new concepts is obviously intuitive work - I've laid out what I see as a simple deeper abstraction behind copyright, which you've done nothing but ignore along with every other argument.
Intuition is not a valid or convincing argument. It does not deserve to be considered.
Because if consumers wanted repairable devices, companies would make them. To not do so would be to ignore an opportunity to sell products and make money.
So, if people really want repairable devices, they would exist. The fact that they do not exist in large numbers indicates that consumers don't really want them very much. If consumers don't want them, why should companies be forced to manufacture them?
Requiring and enforcing repairability in products would therefore cause the government to take action to promote the personal preferences of a small number of consumers. That does not seem justifiable.
Lemons (the economical model, not the fruit) would argue against that claim. People want cars that work, but they also want pay as little as possible. Since customer can't easily determine the additional costs of not being able to repair a product outside of "approved dealers", the market will favor cheaper products even if they are less desirable for the customer. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Market_for_Lemons
Here is a solution: Lets have a mandatory class in every public school that teach children the cost difference between an "open" market where anyone can repair a product, and a closed monopoly where only the approved shops are allowed to do the after-market repairs. Then customers will be armed with the knowledge to compare products. Do you think companies will keep making products that you can't repair, or will the market promote the preferences of the majority?
Alternative solution: Add a market requirement that the sticker price include the price of repairs and failure rates over the expected life cycle of the product. This allow the customer to directly compare products and decide if they want to pay a cheaper car that cost 10x to repair and the owner is prevented to do it themselves, or a more expensive car where anyone can do the repair, including the owner. Again we would see a shift in market behavior, both by customers and manufacturers.
Those are all definite issues, but even in the case of simple computer hardware there's a problem when the manufacturer tries to lock the owners out of repairing with special screws, glue, etc., so that they can make money off the repairs themselves. New MacBook Pros have their batteries glued in and they can't really be replaced without replacing the entire top case they're glued to at the same time. They claim this is necessary for the thinness they want, but the MacBook Air is thinner and doesn't have a glued battery.
My older MacBook Pro has a screwed in battery which uses tri-wing screws to keep people from replacing it themselves, but a $5 tool online can let you replace it anyway, and it takes literally just a couple minutes.
They're doing it physically, or they're doing it legally, but through one avenue or another they're all starting to do it. 'Surface as a Service', all of what you said about Macs and their batteries, and so on.
MacBooks and MBPs are becoming throw away devices after 3 or 4 years. In 2013 I upgraded my 2011 MBP to have more RAM and a larger SSD. The new ones have the RAM soddared on so I guess I'll need to max it out when I buy and forfeit the possibility of a future upgrade. The custom SSD is expensive and only one maker seems to have decent quality ones.[1]
I know laptops aren't increasing in power/abilities like they used to be. It's still nice to be able to add more to an old laptop and get a couple more years.
I still have a 2011 as well, and have no intention of upgrading beyond it for the foreseeable future. It still works great, I've maxed out the RAM and added a 750 GB SSD, it does everything I need to do with the performance I need, and I'm happy. I've replaced the keyboard myself, and replaced the battery as well with an aftermarket replacement. I don't need anything newer, and I like being able to repair it myself for minimal cost.
I doubt it's as fast but the flash is made by Samsung and if it's using triple layer cells I'm worried about the longevity of the drives.
In 3 years of heavy use will the drive still have the same amount of space? The olds ones I could pop a new drive in as advancements are made in the SSD space, which I have done twice.
I have a company Dell that's horrible. Had many Vaios in the past that were great but the new ones aren't that great. Don't want a tablet or a touch screen as my main device or an Internet only device (chrome book).
