John Deere is not unique. All common rail engines require a visit from a "certified engineer" who has access to the software. This is terrible in the marine industry where you can't get one in the middle of the ocean and you can't repair yourself either. What do you do? Do you sail to a harbor? You can't unless you have a sailboat. Get a tow to the nearest Volvo/Yanmar dealer? You must be kidding, thousand of miles away?
So yes, that lawsuit makes sense.
As for a class action lawsuit some of the comments in the thread misunderstand how it works: 1. Secure one or two plaintiffs. Two or three is better. Make sure they represent owners well: no conflicts, not paid to sue, good/clean plaintiffs. 2. Find the right location for the lawsuit. Location is very important in the US. Not only the state but the county. This is VERY important. Good plaintiff lawyers know where to sue. 3. Get your judge to certify the class action. "this lawsuit is on behalf of all users of John Deere tractors, etc". This is ALSO very important. John Deere will fight that. They will claim that those two plaintiffs do not represent the class, blabla. 4. Fight in court. Other plaintiffs have nothing to do. If the class action lawsuit wins on behalf of thousands of owners this represents a lot of money. It costs nothing to plaintiffs. Lawyers typically get 30%, sometimes less. If they are too greedy (they all are) the judge may object and cut down the fees. 5. Users can “opt out” of the payment if John Deere loses in court after appeals. Most plaintiffs do not opt out because they can’t afford to fight big corporations.
Unfortunately corporations are not always fair. We have seen many, many cases when poor farmer John just could not pay the exorbitant costs imposed by John Deere. Understand that these people have learned to be self-sufficient. They weld their broken massive tools in the field. They call the mobile repair shop to fix and tune their engines. Now they can't do anything. That massive, expensive John Deer is like a beached whale. Nothing you can do about it.
Hence class action lawsuits in the US. Some of them are abusive (i.e.recent att phone bills, 100M customers collect $1, lawyers collect $30M), but sometimes there are no other ways (asbestos, workplace injuries, brain damage near chemical waste from mining). Folks outside the US struggle to understand the system.
It is why today you can enjoy Non-Apple store repairs to your phone, non OEM parts for your car or non branded cartridges for your printer.
I wish that such a lawsuit will force John Deere to change its practices, like it forced other companies to do so.