Right to Repair bill killed in Canada after tech giants lobbied hard against it

[Bouzoo]

So this might cause a stir here, considering this is a Canadian forum. 

 

Sadly, it seems that the right to repair bill, that was put forward by Michael Coteau in February, didn't pass the vote after tech giants lobbied hard against it. It failed. 

Quote

Some PC members argued that the bill cut against the Ontario government’s new “open for business” slogan by compromising US companies’ intellectual property rights to the point that they would not sell their products in Ontario, a province that contains nearly half of Canada’s total population. MPP Kaleed Rasheed claimed that the bill would force companies to hand their “codes” and “security stuff” to average consumers, though it only called for repair manuals, diagnostic tools, and parts. When it came to a vote, the bill was killed on the floor.

 

According to Coteau, he was approached by EPSC (which is basically every big tech giant out there), which was expected, with a stance "that it’s dangerous for people to open up electronic devices and fix it themselves, that it could harm them". As opposed to fixing a car for instance.Their arguments are ridiculous:

Quote

In a phone call, Coteau told me he expected resistance. After proposing the bill, he was approached by Electronics Product Stewardship Canada (EPSC)—an industry group that represents Apple, Panasonic, and other major tech companies—as well as representatives from from Apple and Panasonic, he told me. “I had an Apple senior counsel fly in...to come and see me,” Coteau said.
The group’s collective position, Coteau said, was that the bill would compromise companies’ intellectual property rights and that home repair was a public safety issue, meaning “that it’s dangerous for people to open up electronic devices and fix it themselves, that it could harm them,” Coteau said. Samsung also got in touch, he told me.

 

Furthermore, just to show how ridiculous the whole argument is:

Quote

A May 1 letter from the Ontario Chamber of Commerce to Bill Walker, Ontario’s Minister of Government and Consumer Services, obtained by Motherboard reiterates this point almost exactly.

“Another concern is safety,” the letter stated. “Consumers need to be assured that their medical devices, appliances, laptops, and other electronic devices are being repaired correctly in order to minimize risks to their safety. Manufacturers are best suited to provide this assurance. For example, at present, products containing high-energy lithium ion batteries are only repaired by trained professionals who understand the hazards associated with breakage of these batteries.”

Minister Walker pointed to the supposed danger of home repair during question period on Tuesday when asked about the right to repair bill by MPP Coteau. “You repair your toaster, and at the end of the day, your house burns down—who’s protecting that?” the Minister said.

“The proposed legislation sounds good in theory but is completely unenforceable in practice and threatens consumer choice,” the statement from the Minister read.

 

Another day, another win for the big tech. Every media is only naming the Apple as the leader of the opposing force, but we need to call out every single OEM that is against this bill. Is this surprising? As an outsider, not really. Considering this is a Canadian thing, I am sure quite a few will have something to say about this.

 

Best you read the whole article:

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/9kxayy/right-to-repair-bill-killed-after-big-tech-lobbying-in-ontario

[YaBoiWill]

Wait...

So, I can service my car, and could get it completely wrong and be a complete liability to everyone else on the road

Or I can rig a 50kg light poorly, so that it could fall on a person or two and kill them

But opening my phone? don't be ridiculous that could harm me.

LOGIC 

[YaBoiWill]

29 minutes ago, Bouzoo said:

repaired correctly in order to minimize risks to their safety

Also,

As a company we could send lights back to cahuvet. This would cost us a lot. Or we could do it ourselves. Which are we going to do? 

This shit just dosen't make sense

[TempestCatto]

Pardon my French but FUCK Canada! Yes, let me just poorly put my lug nuts on my wheels, drive down the road at 80kph and go sailing into the opposing lane as my wheels fly off my car because I did a shit job and not be blamed for it. That could kill me and many more people too. Oh but if I take apart my GPU to replace the shit thermal paste that manufactures seem to think is "good enough" then it's my fault if it fails in the warranty period? Sure, I guess someone could scratch the die, or bend a capacitor off. But that would be obvious to the manufacture when they get it back for RMA, then they could fight it from there.

 

You know what though? My mechanic doesn't work on newer cars mostly because they're simply too new. Too many sensors, too much shit crammed in an area to get to anything. He told me this "Car makers are purposely designing them so you can't work on them, whether you're an average guy or a licensed and experienced guy like me. They want you to either take it to them to fix, or just buy a whole new one. It's a scam now-a-days to buy anything new. You're just gonna throw it away in the next two years!" To be honest, he's 100% right.

[Bouzoo]

3 minutes ago, YaBoiWill said:

Also,

As a company we could send lights back to cahuvet. This would cost us a lot. Or we could do it ourselves. Which are we going to do? 

This shit just dosen't make sense

You know what makes sense? 

Spoiler

$$$

 

[DrMacintosh]

*Angry Louis Rossmann noises* 

[TheGlenlivet]

If you can fix your old iphone/Galaxy/etc, you won't buy a new iphone/Galaxy/etc...

[TempestCatto]

Just now, TheGlenlivet said:

If you can fix your old iphone/Galaxy/etc, you won't buy a new iphone/Galaxy/etc...

Then why not just rollout an update that slows them down?

 

Oh wait...

[Bouzoo]

Just now, TheGlenlivet said:

If you can fix your old iphone/Galaxy/etc, you won't buy a new iphone/Galaxy/etc...

It's not only about that. For instance, it is believed that Apple alone makes up to $2B per year with only repairs. We repair it alone, they lose money. The math is simple. 

[YaBoiWill]

5 minutes ago, TempestCatto said:

It's a scam now-a-days to buy anything new. You're just gonna throw it away in the next two years!" To be honest, he's 100% right.

Some of the gears on the servos for lights are made of shitty plastic. When a light is moving, it has a lot of inertia. After a season of touring festivals in the summer, 6/10 of these plastic bits of shit either have teeth missing or are completely stripped. 

Manufacture won't replace them as we have opened the housing to see why the light won't move. 

employer gets a 3D printer to print moulds for new ones to be case from steel.

Cheaper then buying them new from the manufacture 

[thorhammerz]

5 minutes ago, TempestCatto said:

Then why not just rollout an update that slows them down?

 

Oh wait...

Why not both?

Multiple compounding factors to foster obsolescence equates to a faster rate of recurring sales.

[PlayStation 2]

canadians btfo again

[mr moose]

I learned my lesson with the ipad, unless it's really cheap, if I can't buy parts for it I am not buying it. 

[Thaldor]

Write down the names of those who opposed and search their last campaing budget and compare it to their next campaing budget. That's how maf...democracy works. As we in Finland say: Cronyism isn't corruption, it's just a manner.

[Hellion]

And this is exactly why the west needs to seperate from the east. All the incompetent tools making decisions in Ottawa are far too easily influenced by idiocy. Ontario and Quebec politicians calling the shots that can't tell their corrupt face from their corrupt ass.

[Misanthrope]

Let's see: planned obsolescence is one of the last frontiers available to mass producers on near 0 margin products so what made anybody think that a Capitalist run government lobbied by Capitalists would basically go against them and vote this in?

 

This kinds of bills have no chance in fucking hell of ever passing. People just got invested because of other controversies like net neutrality but you gotta remember that net neutrality is/was an issue not because of popular support but because mega corporations had opposing interests they were battling out in public.

 

On this case is large corporations, lobbyists and donors vs literal fucking nobodies (No offense mind you, this is true for most of the population) so who do you think will win every single time?

[Gullerback]

bribers gona bribe.  Phff "lobbyists"

[MITTLE]

Makes you wonder who is coming up with these garbage ideas! 

[Bouzoo]

18 minutes ago, MITTLE said:

Makes you wonder who is coming up with these garbage ideas! 

You think Right to Repair is garbage?

[Delicieuxz]

It was bad timing for this bill to be presented. Due to former leader of the Ontario Liberal Party, Kathleen Wynne, who, having been an immensely unpopular premier then was stubborn in refusing to step down before the previous provincial election despite all the writing on the wall, Ontario's legislature became stacked with Conservatives MPs, who always side with big business.

 

If the legislature's seat distribution were like it was before the 2018 election, it probably would have passed.

 

If a future election gives the majority of seats to Liberal and NDP candidates, then the bill might have a strong chance of being passed and should be reintroduced.

[D13H4RD]

I don't know whether to laugh or cry. 

 

What's next? Sealing up cars so I HAVE to go to the dealer to do a stupidly simple oil change? 

[wanderingfool2]

To an extent, I do agree with the bill being killed.

Truthfully, most of the legislation imo goes too far in the "right to repair".  I am a bit on the fence on this entire thing actually, I believe that people should be able to buy parts for their devices, but I do recognize that there becomes an issue if the laws badly enforce the requirement to provide parts.  An example I would make is imagine you own a Noctua fan, and a blade breaks...should Noctua be forced by law to offer replacement parts for the fan?  While it is a bit obscured, I feel that many right to repair bills could unwittingly create situations such as this where companies are forced to support a market that would add quite a burden to the companies.

 

At the same time, I feel that legislation does need to be put in place to prevent companies from making designs to prevent attempts of unauthorized repair.  An example being John Deere parts, I feel that there should be legislation preventing that sort of behavior (ie companies are not allowed to design components with the sole intent of preventing competition or 3rd party components)

[Bouzoo]

1 minute ago, wanderingfool2 said:

An example I would make is imagine you own a Noctua fan, and a blade breaks...should Noctua be forced by law to offer replacement parts for the fan?

I am pretty sure it falls under current warranty that such physical damages do not fall under warranty, unless it is a special kind of warranty offered from OEM himself. I do see where you are coming from, obviously not everything can't fall under warranty since the possibility of misuse is huge, however the current system is really bad and needs a redesign. On a global scale. Currently it's basically every OEM that is misusing their position. 

[wanderingfool2]

20 minutes ago, Bouzoo said:

I am pretty sure it falls under current warranty that such physical damages do not fall under warranty, unless it is a special kind of warranty offered from OEM himself. I do see where you are coming from, obviously not everything can't fall under warranty since the possibility of misuse is huge, however the current system is really bad and needs a redesign. On a global scale. Currently it's basically every OEM that is misusing their position. 

Yea, I will agree with that.  I just worry that the "right to repair" swinging things in the other direction.  I am on the fence when it comes to a lot of these kinds of bills, mainly because I can see how a wrongly enacted legislation (and it is very easy to do with this) could create havoc down the road (and for startups).  If the wrong laws are put in place, I could see manufacturers making their products intentionally un-repairable, or intentionally design the products to be near impossible to repair without breaking it

[FezBoy]

This pisses me off.  'Nuff said.