Comment by supernova87a | Hacker News Reader

Comment by supernova87a | Hacker News Reader

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Contrary to the inflated anti-competitive suspicions by others below (or that "Apple has an army of staff attorneys with nothing better to do"), there are pretty legit reasons for Apple to object.

If you've ever looked at buying a used or refurbished phone, it's a total wild west out there with people claiming (or being purposefully deceiving) that the phones are refurbed to the quality of Apple or similar. Or you find out after buying that you end up getting a poor quality uneven brightness display from prior-generation China factories, microphones that don't work right, etc. The guy in the story was importing counterfeit parts.

Apple (and other manufacturers) have a big interest to not have people feel that their hardware is shitty.

And if Apple were really trying to make people's technology obsolete, why would they support the OS of legacy phones for multiple (4-5) years longer than most other phone manufacturers? I guess they're so evil they're trying to confuse us with good cop/bad cop.

Inject some reality into your thinking.

> Apple (and other manufacturers) have a big interest to not have people feel that their hardware is shitty.

I haven't heard anyone claim Apple does this because they have indigestion or really like the smell of landfills. Of course they have interests.

They are not, however necessarily legitimate interests, or ones that outweigh the interests of those who purchase their devices.

We, as a species, have a lot of history with artifacts we make and trade with one another. And by and large, we've come to the conclusion that if I sell you something, I cease having a legitimate interest in what you do with it.

This notion has been blurred by the need for operating system updates (hammers didn't need those) and the proliferation of "cloud"/OPC services. And now we are trying to find the right balance.

But there's a pretty good bet that abusing trademark law to control a secondary market with what amounts to literally an engineered legal argument is a pretty good indication that Apple is... getting creative, and I think the fact of the matter is that "we" won't put up with that shit long-term. Most humans value their property rights over HugeCo's reputational concerns.

> Inject some reality into your thinking.

Physician, heal thyself.

They may have a big interest, but should they have a big legal right to deny someone the opportunity to do something stupid with property that person owns.

If apple (and other manufacturers) did not want to make people technology obsolete they would support right to repair, provide open access to parts and schematics, and allow independent repair shops to do board level repairs with out threat of lawsuit

They created the environment where counterfeits and shady dealers are required by prohibiting any official ways to repair things

So I do not have any sympathy for your argument. The day I can go to apple.com to buy a capacitor and order a schematic is the day I will agree with you

Apple's products have FAR higher resale and expected life than almost any competitors.

Your insistence that folks buy trash phones that get thrown away (and are totally unsupported software side almost from date of mfg) is ridiculous and actively harms the environment.

By increasing confidence in their products, including used products, apple does a LOT to enhance the perceived long term value of their product. There is a very active apple refurb market, and you can take your phone and get new batteries etc from apple.

They have a huge retail presence with walk in repairs. They have authorized third party repairs. And they have mail in repairs.

Ohh Please. the "higher resale value" is simply a product of their insane new price, charging 100's of dollars for $30 of ram for example

as to their retail stores and "authorized repair" centers, I urge you to look at any of investigative reports on these place, or any of Louis Rossmann's video's, or read any of the 1000's of reports from consumer who have been denied repair or quoted repair costs that exceed the replacement cost of the device, or have been told that repair can not include data recovery, or about 100 other things

Apple stores and apple "Authorized repair" shops are not Repair centers, they are board replacement houses. It is akin to having a fouled plug in my engine and the dealership telling me the only way to fix that is to replace the engine then they walk me over to the showroom to sell me a shiny new car... That is what the apple store is

> FAR higher resale and expected life than almost any competitors.

Possibly in mobile space, but not in PC/desktop space. My desktop has 2x the lifespan of any macbook/iMac/whatever, will be on the latest of Windows/Linux for 20 years and every nut and bolt is replaceable. Even a single component, like graphics card, can be repaired on a chip-by-chip if need be.

Gaming rigs enjoy high resale value, it roughly tracks their performance compared to whatever is currently available on the market + 10% discount for being used.

It's your last argument on the other hand, given its (maybe deliberately) extreme position, that I can't find much sympathy for. How far does Apple or another manufacturer have to go to satisfy your increasingly unrealistic demands?

Do they have to sell you a replacement secure enclave chip, enable you to solder it in, provide the certificates to match it up to the rest of the phone? Sell you their source code so you can make your own patches and mix and match parts as you like? What if they only sell the main board as a whole component? What if their pricing for it is 2/3 the cost of the new phone? Do you mandate that they sell it to you for a certain cost too?

It starts to get a little ridiculous and out of sync with how electronics are built and operate, if you take this to where some people would insist that it go.

Maybe they should stop selling devices then and only lease them.

When I BUY a device I should have access to all the schematics, all of the components, etc. otherwise I do not OWN it, I am simply borrowing it

I fail to see why electronics should hold a special place that other manufactured goods do not, for example we disallowed car manufactures from locking down the cars we own and they used the EXACT same excuses that modern electronics manufacturers do

Now we are starting to see modern car companies, like Tesla, want to bring back those Anti-Consumer policies to the automotive world

I am sadden that soo many people want to BUY a product but still have the manufacture get complete control over it. That is not ownership, that is serfdom

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