from Hacker News

Colorado passes agricultural Right to Repair

by kwiens on 4/11/23, 10:25 PM with 124 comments

• by Gustomaximus on 4/12/23, 12:53 AM

  What I don't understand is why a couple of the higher quality tractor companies have not started pushing hard to brand "we support repair" and having available online manuals and software to support this. This seems a perfect marketing/product platform for an underdog that also believes this.

  Massey, Fendt or similar could really differentiate themself and take market share on the back of this I suspect.

  Especially with online world having reached farmers as the dealer networks increasingly mean less when you can order equiptment and spares online so JD loses some of the strength they hold by their dominating physical presence alone.

• by voakbasda on 4/11/23, 11:47 PM

  I suspect that John Deere and friends will find a way to challenge this in court and -- if they eventually lose -- find a way to maliciously comply with the law. Their behavior has been actively hostile to their customers for years, and they have zero incentive to change.

  Like Apple's repair kits mentioned in another comment, I suspect their strategy will involve providing tools that cost nearly as much to rent as it would take to buy a new machine. Then, only the most well-capitalized farmers will be able to afford to lock up the extraordinary amounts of cash required to perform their own repairs.

  Without legislation that absolutely eviscerates their monopolistic business practices, I would be shocked if anything changes for the average farmer.

• by dataflow on 4/11/23, 11:02 PM

  Does the governor not need to sign it? Or has it been signed already? Because I wouldn't be celebrating yet until it's signed into law (if even then). NY's right to repair law was destroyed at the governor's desk at the 11th hour. [1]

  [1] https://www.theverge.com/2022/12/29/23530733/right-to-repair...

• by TedDoesntTalk on 4/11/23, 11:17 PM

  But will John Deere do what Apple did? Here’s one example:

  “Apple shipped me a 79-pound iPhone repair kit to fix a 1.1-ounce battery”

  https://www.theverge.com/2022/5/21/23079058/apple-self-servi...

  “I’m starting to think Apple doesn’t want us to repair them”

• by walterbell on 4/12/23, 1:40 AM

  "Repairing Your Car in Your Own Garage Is Considered Illegal in Sacramento, CA", 400+ comments, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34081331

  "50k repair manuals for most vehicles 1982-2013", https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35491294

• by ShadowBanThis01 on 4/12/23, 8:27 AM

  This seems like a good step, but the piecemeal approach is aggravating. Are they going to pass a separate right-to-repair law for every industry and product category, one at a time?

  "Last year, they passed the first US Right to Repair bill since 2012, protecting Coloradans’ right to fix their own powered wheelchairs"

  This is absurd. They need to pass comprehensive right-to-repair legislation and then amend it as problems and loopholes emerge.

• by m0llusk on 4/12/23, 12:49 AM

  Right to repair is a great thing, but it seems like we need to be honest about this business and its customers. Agriculture, at least in the US, is primarily a government subsidized big business. Many if not most John Deere customers are corporations that like having their operating fleets be maintained and managed with help from the provider. The farmers getting screwed are smaller operators who are far less profitable for John Deere and really should seek or develop other options if at all possible.

  Comparisons with Apple hardware are not very good because Apple is primarily a consumer brand. Apple does in a sense sell fleets to companies and schools, but most rely on other companies to configure and maintain their computing gear. The market for laptops is very different from the market for large tractors.

• by oofta-boofta on 4/11/23, 11:01 PM

  Good! A massive win for moving away from a throwaway society.

• by jensenbox on 4/12/23, 5:42 AM

  I think this should be the next priority for https://frame.work :)

• by eru on 4/12/23, 2:36 AM

  Hooray for even more regulation..

  Surely this particular piece of well-intended regulation will go work out exactly as hoped for, and won't have any unintended consequences that stifle things in the longer run.