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Comment by VonGuard | Hacker News Reader

This is a HUGE problem. If John Deere were to go out of business tomorrow, a huge swath of our world's farmers would be unable to produce anything thanks to tractors turning off and not working properly. Remember that old game you like with online validation for single player mode? Remember how it stopped working when the servers went offline. There's a DMCA fair use exception to allow you to circumvent that DRM thanks to the EFF and the MADE, but there is no such fair use allowance for tractors....

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If John Deere were to go out of business tomorrow, a huge swath of our world's farmers would be unable to produce anything thanks to tractors turning off and not working properly.

Ergo, you can count on JD not going out of business any time soon. "Too big to fail" and all that. JD's master plan has now come to fruition.

But can you count on their tractor DRM servers not being DoS'ed, or hacked and taken down for an extended period?

Hmm. That would imply that it's not just a fairness problem or a copyright politics problem, but a national security problem.

The downside to computerizing & networking everything is the multitude of vulnerabilities you open.

If left on the open internet and not an intranet.

All networks have vulnerabilities, regardless if they're connected to the internet.

There's that angle, yeah, but it's the creation of a single point of failure that I was thinking about. And not even in all that tech-centric a way.

My hometown used to make a sizable chunk of the US's fasteners, and there was real concern during the Cold War that dropping a single bomb on it could cripple the entire nation's industrial capacity. Here, it seems like there may be an unacceptable strategic risk that a bomb dropped on Moline, Illinois could cripple the entire nation's food production capacity.

But then it will not be a problem of business greed and stupidity... it will become a "national security threat", which will require more taxpayer money to solve, and of course may lead us closer to a war with whatever countries remain to be invaded by this immoral government. And "poor" JD will be just a victim of this vile threat "against us all".

What if the server rack is in the farmers house and not connected to the internet? Deere could just send a regional technician as needed to patch or troubleshoot. They probably already send regional salesmen to farmers regularly, what's another seat in the car?

I haven't seen anything indicating that the operation or repair process requires some sort of online authorization.

What if they got bought up by a hedge fund, raided, and sold for scrap?

And some models can simply lose support as they age, which is something just accelerates planned obsolescence.

My father owns a John Deere, kind of old, and it is a good machine. It is not that sophisticated, and all the electronics we use are bought separately. We do not have this kind of problem yet.

The convenience and added benefit of a self-guided, GPS/RTK oriented tractor has this annoying cost. John Deere wants a share of what farmers save with more efficient machines, and then some more.

At some point in the near future won't many of the tractors be fully automated?

Perhaps, but "fully automated" does not mean that the machine has to be dependent on an outside service to operate.

Maybe. Or maybe they'll be just like regular tractors with a side module for your AI of choosing.

In which case you still won't be locked out of your machine, in the sense that you can choose the company with the best farming AI.

The only way for a quick automation scenario is to make crops a lot more predictable. In our days, this means linearly sown and harvested, artifact free crops.

If we choose a more hands-on approach to farming (and food production in general for that matter), then automation ceases to be as interesting.

> Maybe. Or maybe they'll be just like regular tractors with a side module for your AI of choosing.

We can't even get interop between instant messaging platforms, and video calling platforms. Why would we anticipate that companies manufacturing $200,000+ pieces of equipment are going to work together when they have the option of lock-in?

If you decide to spend thousands on a tractor with an AI sophisticated enough to do everything a regular human tractor driver does, but nothing other than that; and if once you buy that piece of equipment you've committed yourself with a service contract for rest of the equipment's life; then what you are doing is basically either handing over your business or something equivalent to hiring a human being for a 20+ year long contract that only does one job.

I would never do that, unless I was actually renting the land. Some people do rent their land, and perhaps committing to such a contract could make sense to them.

The alternative is to simply buy a tractor and then hire someone that does many other things, like driving other tractors, cleaning them and do some repairs and maintenance. (If I could do that to my own AI-powered tractor, maybe then I would buy one). This is about who controls your business.

I believe there's future in modularity, but I also believe some kinds of equipment won't fall into the automation ratchet or the "evolve to AI or die" category.

What makes you think that John Deere would allow you to install any arbitrary AI module into their tractors?

People are already ditching John Deere for not letting them repair the tractors they own.

If you are developing an AI sophisticated enough to pilot a tractor, would it only be able to drive one model? If John Deere ever achieved this goal, the AI should be adaptable to other brands as well.

Car manufacturers are doing this already with Android. They do not develop the OS, they simple accommodate their cars for it.

I have a working GPS system that belonged to my father's John Deere tractor. I cannot use it anymore, even in other John Deere tractors. This is wasteful and makes no sense. People working in farms, close to nature and subject to profit margins they do not completely control feel very uncomfortable with this.

It's surprising to me that these major equipment manufacturers have so much power over our economy and yet (as far as I'm aware) aren't required to earmark emergency funds for this kind of scenario. A bank that goes out of business doesn't just shut the lights off one day and leave customers to figure things out on their own. Each state and the federal government have funds set aside contributed by banks to fund continuing operations while customers navigate the transition. That doesn't seem unreasonable in this scenario either.

Several US politicians (Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, former Colorado governor John Hickenlooper) are advocating for federal right to repair legislation for farmers.

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/8xzqmp/bernie-sanders-cal...

As always, if this matters to you, get involved and vote.

I would have suspected that the US and other countries had old laws that could dusted off and take over JD if it was impacting Critical infrastructure.

I think I prefer right-to-repair laws compared to a government takeover of John Deere.

The US isn't old enough to have old laws.

That's why many states expressly import the common law from Old Blighty as they existed on independence day, Louisiana's civilian law preferences excepted. My own state's example discussed at https://www.floridasupremecourt.org/About-the-Court/History-...

Let’s hope they don’t make a law specifically for farmers. It should be the same for all goods.

You are right, but I am a bit concerned about self-driving cars.

In what way?

If someone was to add their own ...umm... improvements to the software, or perform shoddy repair work on the hardware for steering, then there would perhaps be negative effects.

That's no different than the current situation. I can do anything I want to my car, even if it kills me and the people in the car ahead of me. Like not fixing my brakes correctly, or driving without brakes altogether¹.

¹ Which I have actually done, carefully, on my way to the mechanic 20 miles away to get them fixed.

A broken killing machine that's 'intelligent' is a lot more scary than a broken killing machine that's dumb.

There's nothing possible for a self-driving car that isn't possible for a human operated car.

There's also nothing possible for a murderer that isn't possible for you or me, but I'd still be terrified about meeting one.

> I can do anything I want to my car, even if it kills me and the people in the car ahead of me.

Actually no, and driving without brakes is a perfect example. Driving a car without brakes on a public road is a crime. Arranging approval for autonomous driving on public roads is an involved and highly regulated process. Hacking in your own "improvements" is similarly criminal.

It is definitely illegal, but there's nothing stopping anyone from doing it. I'm not saying people should do that, just that they can and do, with little negative effects.

I also acknowledge that handing control to a modified computer is a little different than manually controlling a modified car, and it could have much more disastrous effects. But I don't think anyone will actually do that.

(As for when I did drive without brakes that one time, my car had a manual transmission and a fully-functioning hand brake, and I was in full control of the vehicle at all times. I drove slowly and carefully along back roads, and kept a 100 m gap ahead of me at all times. I was well-practiced at down-shifting to slow down, and used to regularly come to a complete stop from freeway speeds down the ramp without touching the brake pedal, just because I could. And "no brakes" is a slight exaggeration; I had some brakes, but there was a leak and I didn't want to use them unless I absolutely had to, and I didn't have to. Would I do it again? Probably not, but I was young and willing to take minor risks like that.)

A lot of these risks apply to today’s cars already. If you change a tire and aren’t careful the wheel may come off later in traffic. I think there is way too much downside to companies maintaining tight control after selling something. Otherwise we are slowly converting the concept of “owning” to “renting”. This is pretty much the dream of capitalists. They own and rent things out to others.

Sure, but these risks are well understood and the owner tends to take special care if they do something. Would that be true of an auto-driver? Maybe.

I'm definitely of the "if you can't open it you don't own it" philosophy. I just think right now there is not enough care around auto-drivers by the companies making them, let alone the owners.

Didn't mean to derail the conversation, tractors are a whole different thing. No high speeds, no oncoming traffic.

IMHO the manufacturers will come up with some type of safety certification for the software to run and part of that will be having a complete service history from authorized service centres. Self driving cars will be the end of self repair.

Yes, if a dominant player disappears it will result in chaos. This is not unique to agriculture, imagine Boeing disappearing. Or Amazon (see ya later AWS!). The thing is big companies don't really disappear. They might go bankrupt, but even then the valuable bits will continue to be valuable and run by new management.

If the reality is as you describe it then John Deere is effectively a government entity now, there is no way the feds/state would actually allow them to collapse and all those fields to die off. If you work at or buy John Deere products you're just living on the taxpayer dime, call it what it is.

I'm not sure why half our economy suddenly seems to be structured around these "too essential to fail" business models, but it's brand new and really really stupid. I guess this is the end result of a generation of people coming up while a gaggle of billionaires get bailed out while absolutely nobody went to prison.

> really really stupid

Sounds like it's really, really smart from a business perspective.

I think it's similar to the idea of, "if you owe the bank a million, that's your problem, but if you owe the bank a trillion, it's their problem." Would you rather have the gov't bail out JD or risk massive food shortages? I know my choice.

> > really really stupid

> Sounds like it's really, really smart from a business perspective.

> I think it's similar to the idea of, "if you owe the bank a million, that's your problem, but if you owe the bank a trillion, it's their problem." Would you rather have the gov't bail out JD or risk massive food shortages? I know my choice.

What kind of society are we building where it is sound business strategy, effectively, to hold a gun to the head of government?

You would think tractor usability would be of far greater importance compared to game availability!

Is it the case that if the servers are down/unreachable the tractor will refuse to start, or simply that the automation features will fail? In the latter case you have to go back to the old system of having a human behind the wheel directing the machine. Most of the time that is the farmer, his family, and some hired help on really big farms. Food prices go up due to increased wages, but it's not a catastrophic food shortage as grain rots in the fields.

If it's the former then John Deere has set itself up for some massive liabilities if their servers crap out for extended periods during critical planting/harvest windows.

Is this true or theoretical? In many rural areas cell reception is not good.

Turns out farmers really like their WiFi because driving around in a tractor all day is really boring without some entertainment.

That's the truth. Give a tractor wifi and you will soon see a farmer riding with Netflix.

That is not an assumption or a guess. I've deployed Wi-Fi to farms and the first thing they reach for is an iPad and Netflix.

I recently got to set up a hunter’s tree stand in the middle of the woods with a directional waveguide WiFi “cantenna” link to their house... because Netflix.

For many years now my grandfather has read ebooks from the cab of his tractor. He puts his sony ereader in a ziplock bag to protect it from the dust and reads a few pages each row.

Despite his age he was a really early ebook adopter since they live in such a rural spot. The library can transfer books from bigger cities, but the shipping time is so slow and there is a limit to the number of books you can check out at once. Basically the netflix disc problem before they switched to streaming. Taking out ebooks from the library is really easy and a great way to pass the dull time spent on the tractor.

I've watched a German tractor driver on Twitch livestreaming before. It was surreal.

There's a whole genre of youtube channels of farmers explaining what they do and how their tractors work. As a city dweller I find them pretty interesting.

Any favorite examples to link? Sounds interesting.

I enjoy "MN Millennial Farmer": https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCp0rRUsMDlJ1meYAQ6_37Dw

I saw an article today about how farmers are streaming Netflix while running their JD tractors. PR piece for sure. Bread and Circus. Smoke and mirrors.

I know there isn't exactly much to hit around there but I am still surprised that sort of distracted operation is safe - beyond say Pandora or podcasts.

Tractors usually move at a deliberately very slow speed, so piloting a vehicle moving 3mph over terrain utterly devoid of obstacles, and which often has some kind of automatic driving assist, is really not that hard.

Some of the more sophisticated tractors are like being in a plane on auto-pilot. Some you can even pilot remotely if you're really not in the mood to drive it, like a gigantic Roomba.

I don't think any can be officially piloted remotely, but clever farmers have done this.

Legal fears scare tractor manufacturers from making something truly autonomous; there's supposed to be a human in the driver's seat at all times. That said, John Deere has had self-driving tractors for almost 20 years, now. And I mean they automatically steer themselves, they don't just go straight for a predetermined amount of time (though they can do that, too.)

Yeah, except that if they were to start failing and needed a bailout, you can bet that would fall on the farmers, because they have enough of a stranglehold on the business that it would be their only option.

If they went out of business, you could buy and install third party boards.

Not that I like that John Deer is the Apple of Farming, but let's not act like people can't hot wire and program electrical systems.

It's not that simple when everything runs on software including cylinder firing and timing.

Where did I imply it was simple?

Writing a controller is a non trivial task. But it can be done.

There are companies that will sell you an entire diesel-electric hybrid drivetrain to retrofit into old tractors, and autosteer systems to go with it. It is not cheap though.

We are absolutely no where near this reality for some industries, and sadly may never be. See how fervently Apple is fighting consumers being able to repair their devices.

John Deere will never go out of business in the manner you suppose. Worst case is restructuring through bankruptcy.

Yeah and Lehman Brothers are too big to fail... Oh.

They would just switch to e.g. CNH tractors. I don't see the problem.

Yeah, this is kind of faux outrage. John Deere doesn't even have near the monopoly that GP is eluding to.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Tractor_manufacturers...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tractor_manufacturers

JD has a monopoly on repairing John Deere tractors and their electronics.

And JD does _not_ have a monopoly on the tractor market as GP was claiming in their nightmare hypothetical.

These are two different things.

The issue would be in transitioning to any alternative. Equipment is super expensive - and tractors are wayyy expensive, especially if you're a small-scale farmer with only two or three of them. Plus, if your equipment quits working, farmers would have a hard time selling beyond salvage value and would have no way to make more money (aside from existing inventory) to buy new equipment.

> would have no way to make more money (aside from existing inventory) to buy new equipment.

It seems likely to me a bank would be thrilled to loan money to a consistently profitable farmer whose machines just shut themselves off because Reasons and need replacing ASAP.

Very true. Certainly, this can be the case, but even small farms have overhead where a loan can create instability.

I don't want to make the mistake of assuming farmers can't manage their finances, they certainly can. But on the farmer's end, there's lots of variables that can be in play, adding unexpected debt can only increase that.

On the bank's side, if "widespread tractor failure" is a real event, banks would be issuing potential risky loans in the millions to farms, businesses, and people. Though yes, if it was a local credit union, dealing with just a couple clients, it might be a risk worth taking. Maybe it'd help out some small local banks as well as small farmers - but whether that's scalable could be a challenging business question.

Pro-tip: "there's lots of variables that can be in play, adding unexpected debt can only increase that." -- this explains everyone's finances, at least those of us that work for a living.

It sounds like something insurance should be addressing. If insurers covered such industry-wide machinery failures in a DRM-ridden automated world, they would be incentivized to fight on the farmer's behalf in preventing the outcome.

The problem isn't really that the tractor breaks down and becomes scrap metal. The problem is that if the tractor breaks down during harvest, you will lose a lot of produce during the week or two it takes to repair the tractor. A better solution would probably be to force JD to provide farmers with a replacement tractor within 24 hours for free until the broken tractor has been fixed.

International Harvester is the biggest selling tractor company ..more so than JD ..in the US. But JD has an international reach. And they are very cosy with Monsanto(now Bayer). They wanted to buy Monsanto’s Climate Corp before Bayer deal but DoJ said No and killed it.

Surely some party would come in and fill the gap, reverse engineer the thing, whatever is necessary. Food security is a national security priority for the United States. We wouldn't go hungry if John Deere went under instantly. There would be a response.

That is certainly the hope. What is the plan?

People are already hacking JD equipment with firmware found online. I don't have an exact answer to your question, but this thread seems over-blown. Somebody will know how it works, or learn how to work on it. I trust the ingenuity of this nation wouldn't leave us with an unmaintainable or unhackable tractors without "John Deere" the business existing, in the same way the technique for jailbreaking the latest version of iOS comes relatively quickly. The country that went to the moon can reverse engineer a tractor. It's not like we need to prove P = NP or not to start getting people fed again, to fix the problem.

I personally agree the problem's being overblown here, and I agree with what you say about technology like that, but, just to counter a bit, when it comes to agriculture, time's not always available. Depending on when that theoretical stopping of Deere's servers were to occur. There could be massive crop failures. It's all well and good to get everything back up again, but by this time a loaf of bread costs $50 and everyone's flipping their shit.

Not that I think any of this is ever likely to happen, but even small disruptions to the food supply can have large consequences.

That's the "Is there an adult in the room" plan.

I'm not even sure it would reach the level of the federal government having to intervene. I imagine it would be more like:

1) Non-DRM'd tractors for this kind of thing would suddenly become valuable and used much more intensely (e.g. 24 hours a day).

2) Food prices would go up a bit as people shift to alternatives.

3) Everyone in the US cuts back on a few low-value uses of the grain (probably marginal livestock).

4) Some politicians bluster about the need for lower food prices, but there's no real will for significant change.

Then, after all the reverse engineering happens, things go back to normal.

I would be surprised if there weren’t several Chinese companies trying.

It would be really funny if one was Huawei.

Don't other countries have their own tractor makers?

I know Italy has Lamborghini. Put that sticker on the back of your work truck: "My other vehicle is a Lambo."

The story how they came to producing sports cars is a fun one.

I just had to look that up:

http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2011/03/lamborghini-...

Most interesting: "Ferruccio Lamborghini confessed that he never actually invented anything, rather, would simply copy and try to improve on others’ work." Nothing to confess, in my view, but be proud of - he certainly created something unique out of it.

The biggest european tractor are case new holland (cnh) and claas.

Then there are other in eastern europe and china, but not available in europe

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