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Comment by threatofrain | Hacker News Reader

Plus a lot of people repair things by taking it to a repair person.

So where‘s the problem? People who fix them are out there and spare parts are available.

I don't think the GP meant that to be a problem. What I got from it was "even if safety concerns are legitimate, trained professionals often do the work."

So the safety angle becomes even more silly.

For general public, I am not do sure. There‘s a reason why I‘m not attempting replacing the battery in my 2015 mbp or in an iphone. I just don‘t want to cause the damage but I can imagine random people not even waiting until the battery is fully discharged before going in.

Yet there are any number of equally dangerous activities the average citizen can participate in if they like. There are 100 things in your home that can kill you if you decide to start fiddling. Why are Apple products any different? Why should Apple own the repair aspect? Does Maytag tell me that only a Maytag authorized repair shop is allowed to service my water heater?

But they are not. Go on ifixit, order parts and fix, if you wish. Why the downvoting. Heh.

This article is literally about Apple lobbying to make it harder for independent operations to repair their devices. They won't sell people parts. What does that say to you?

Source them from places where such laws do not exist?

I said:

>Why should Apple own the repair aspect?

And received a response:

>But they are [sic] not

Whether or not you can work around Apple not shipping parts is irrelevant. They are actively trying to make it harder to source parts and fix your devices.

> Why should Apple own the repair aspect?

I guess that would be relevant if they were trying to retrieve all spares back. Them not wanting make sourcing spares easier does not mean they own the repair aspect.

The difficulty of sourcing parts is _directly_ related to how much ownership one has over repairability. If the sourcing of parts becomes overly difficult or impossible, one effectively loses the ability to repair the device how they wish.

Tesla also does not sell spares to general public. Yet, there are people who manage to fix them. There are always spares available.

So? Whataboutism isn't a strong case. There are also FAR fewer Teslas out there than there are iPhones and iPads.

Whataboutism, whataboutism. Major argument on HN to drop the conversation. It's a comparable example. You know, like a relevant case showing that things are possible without supplier support. Some people here behave like they are totally square headed. Do not deviate an inch away from an example or you get accused of whataboutism. Geez.

> There are also FAR fewer Teslas out there than there are iPhones and iPads.

Which ultimately makes sourcing iPhone / iPad parts even easier.

> It's a comparable example.

But irrelevant. That one entity is doing something bad in no way means that it's OK for another entity to do the same thing.

Besides, the right to repair movement is not focusing on computer products. It's covering a wide variety of products, including Teslas and (perhaps the most egregious) farm equipment.

Yeah, it‘s irrelevant because it in the negative context. If it was towards something positive, it would be then relevant. Seen so many examples of this here. But hey, I‘m doing „whataboutism“ again. Meh.

No, it's irrelevant because an action cannot be judged as right or wrong based on whether or not others are doing it.

Why would we hope that in the future they didn't get better at shutting down 3rd party repairs instead of making them support that case?

There are more of us then there are of them. Break it down to the smaller case. Imagine 7 of us are in a lifeboat and 1 person has most of the food and the rest of us have a handful of dinner mints and candy bars. Do we vote to make the one guy share the food or do we hope our candy bars last us until we get rescued.

If necessary not only will we eat his food eventually the rest of us might decide to eat him.

It shouldn't be so hard to understand the problem. Let me give you an example. Apple develops a product with components that are doing the same thing as standard components that are ready available at the market. But instead of using those readily available components they make some twist on it just to ruin compatibility. Then they forbid the company that made that component to sell it to anyone but Apple. That basically gives Apple a monopoly on repairing the device. You talk about sourcing parts, but in this case no one can source parts except Apple unless they salvage parts from other devices which is not always viable.

Well, as long as Tesla is the only one, it's not a big deal if you can live without a Tesla. But people are naturally concerned that it might lead to a change in the way others do business if it is not regulated.

They made that problem with the batteries for themselves. I have owned a couple of different mac laptops, and the ones from 2011 and earlier used to have a built in bracket on the battery that stabilised it and made it trivial to fasten and unfasten with screws.

The brackets did not take up all that much space, but apparently it was worth it to them to save a few minutes in manufacturing and a few seconds in assembly and just use adhesives directly against the unibody for fastening and stabilising.

But ultimately it does not stop those who want to try. I don‘t see a problem. Will this right to repair revocation put those who attempt in prison? What‘s the underlying problem.

Look, I bought a new car. It comes with cameras in the bumper. It made replacing a damaged bumper inherently more difficult for an average Joe. It doesn't mean though that it is impossible to replace it without visiting an authorised service centre. Same logic.

The "spare" parts come from donor boards that are obtained via unsanctioned back channels. Authorized repair shops are generally not allowed to actually fix anything. Instead they tell you it can't be fixed, your data is gone, please buy a new device.

The 2011 ones were even easier than that. You pressed a lever then half the bottom case came off, exposing the hard drive and battery. The battery came off by just pulling a plastic tab, the hard drive had a couple screws iirc. The 2012 one that I'm typing on now requires unscrewing the bottom case, but still everything is right there behind a couple obvious screws and you can upgrade RAM/HDD/battery/replace disc drive with second hard drive in 20 minutes if you are working slow. I knew it was the beginning of the end when the 2013 macbook shipped with soldered RAM.

The problem is that only Apple approved people can repair and can order parts. Keep in mind that there are not Apple stores in all locations around the world where there are plenty of third party repair shops.

Apple Store isn‘t the only place where things can be fixed. There are authorised service centres, like Gravis in Germany.

And the parts? Just went to iFixit, they‘re all there to buy. I‘m sure anybody serious about fixing these things professionally can source the parts.

> And the parts? Just went to iFixit, they‘re all there to buy. I‘m sure anybody serious about fixing these things professionally can source the parts.

You'd be surprised. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkPUoUJPJAQ

Even Apple had the famous episode of releasing an update that bricked phones with replacement parts that weren't sanctioned. They reversed it after much public outcry.

For less common hardware the situation is just as bad. Agriculture equipment has been a pain point for many to get repaired, as the parts are much harder to find and the limited number of certified repair shops can be pressured to stop servicing equipment deemed end of life by the manufacturer

At least try to understand the issue, even if you don't agree.

Maybe it's OK to you to live in a world where you car can only be repaired by the dealer. "No big deal!" A valid opinion.

But that's fine until they want to charge you $2000 for something you can do yourself. Thank god the dealer will sell you the part and you can do that. Let me do it even if you don't want to.

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