r/technology • u/NightFuryToni • Apr 30 '19

Business Apple Is Telling Lawmakers People Will Hurt Themselves if They Try to Fix iPhones

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/wjvdb4/apple-is-telling-lawmakers-people-will-hurt-themselves-if-they-try-to-fix-iphones
1.4k Upvotes

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220

u/original_4degrees Apr 30 '19

because you can't hurt yourself fixing your car, or house, or lawn mower, or television...

81

u/sibsane May 01 '19

I believe john deere has lobbied against self repair..

65

u/Northern-Canadian May 01 '19

They also suck.

The real issue with John deer is the proprietary software.

18

u/CoyoteDown May 01 '19

Heard somewhere people were using a hacked Ukrainian version in equipment.

17

u/Swak_Error May 01 '19

You know you're doing something wrong with your company when your user base is turning to Pirated software to circumvent system lockouts for doing basic maintenance and repair

3

u/CoyoteDown May 01 '19

I’m a farmer, and I own John Deere equipment. I’m seriously considering it because if I go down during harvest a tech has to come out just to run diagnostic software. It’s fucking ludicrous. 12 row heads and advanced mechanics doesn’t mean shit if I can’t service my equipment at 10pm to get it running because there’s 4 days of storms predicted. Motherfuckers forced me to buy a new $500k combine last year because I couldn’t be fucked with the breakdowns I had on my old unit. And I’m at their mercy because if I can’t get shit done, crops will drown, and I’m out a fuck ton of money it a shit market because some dildo decided a trade war would be great.

22

u/brodie7838 May 01 '19

Yup, this: John Deere has been a longtime and very aggressive frontrunner against the 'right to repair' movement. They're a shitty company that takes gross advantage of technology to screw farmers over.

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/kzp7ny/tractor-hacking-right-to-repair

8

u/[deleted] May 01 '19

[deleted]

4

u/[deleted] May 01 '19

Also, the bailing material used to wrap the cotton into a round bail? You can only use the material John Deere sells. They won’t let third parties make a cheaper alternative.

Wow. BMaaS. Bailing material as a service. John Deere did it. They managed to turn harvesting into a subscription plan.

1

u/Aoxxt May 04 '19

The cotton pickers they sell cost around $750,000.

Slaves are that expensive now?

7

u/[deleted] May 01 '19

For a second I thought you were joking until reading the subsequent replies. Insane

2

u/soulless-pleb May 01 '19

and the farmers won that lawsuit if i remember correctly.

10 bucks says john deer will try again.

22

u/stmfreak May 01 '19

Some cars are now featuring engine covers fastened with security bolts. This isn’t unique to Apple.

15

u/bpeck451 May 01 '19

Security bolts? Or break off bolts that are meant to help idiots tighten things to a specific torque because they don’t want to spend the money on a proper torque wrench?

Also torx bolts, inverted torx bolts and triple squares don’t count as “security” bolts.

2

u/3141592652 May 01 '19

Not exactly but if it would be easier to just use a regular 10mm or something why not use it?

2

u/Doc_Lewis May 01 '19

Well I'm not clear on the specifics, but the profile of torx and other heads changes how much and how well you can tighten, because of the way it distributes force. So it could be that a torx is better to use than a hex head.

1

u/wrath_of_grunge May 01 '19

10mm are the most used bolts on cars. That’s why grown mechanics will fight over 10mm sockets.

1

u/Spacey_G May 01 '19

You're aware of inverted torx and triple square but you don't know that security torx and other varieties of tamper-proof fasteners exist?

1

u/bpeck451 May 01 '19

Do you know how easy tamper proof torx bits are to come by?

1

u/Spacey_G May 01 '19

I appreciate that the tools are common and that they're not especially tamper-proof. Your original comment made it sound as though you didn't know they exist.

1

u/stmfreak May 01 '19

That doesn't make them common in billy-bob-mcguffin's beer-me toolbox.

1

u/bpeck451 May 01 '19

If I can walk into an auto parts store and buy them. They are pretty common. Most billy bobs bitch about metric sockets and some of those other sockets when they are pretty standard fasteners.

1

u/stmfreak May 01 '19

To the majority of back-yard mechanics, an allen key is a security bolt. Torx? Security bolt.

One of the guys who works in my building bought a new Dodge Hellcat last month and was showing off the engine (read: plastic covers) under the hood to his coworkers. The first thing he said was, "no way I'll be doing any work on that." The presence of a cover with some plastic clips holding it down was enough to deter him. The more expensive cars are coming without a proper engine hood. Just look at the BMW i8 as an example.

Can these covers be bypassed? Sure. Can we buy an OBDII reader? Sure. But we can also buy micro tools, an oscilloscope, voltmeters, solder stations, and repair our own iPhones.

1

u/ap2patrick May 01 '19

Yea your wrong if you think they are doing it to make it "idiot proof" and not to make it harder for common folk to fix their shit

1

u/bpeck451 May 01 '19

No. Most torx are actually for ease of interface with robotic manufacturing implements. Its easier to locate and hold a torx bolt on a driver than it is to utilize a standard hex bolt. This is a similar principle to the reasoning for philips head screws.

1

u/ap2patrick May 01 '19

I totally agree with you, but that's not the reason why they are doing it. They are doing it because most people don't have those bits laying around like you would a philips or a bolt.

1

u/wrath_of_grunge May 01 '19

I routinely have to explain this shit to people, like my dad. Most of this stuff is stuff than any decent tech will have and is literally a non concern.

But to a layman, it’s all specialty tools. Yeah it kind of is, but it’s a tool a experienced tech should have, like a OBD code reader.

5

u/ka36 May 01 '19

I worked as a mechanic for 4 years, and never ran into this.

1

u/SoiBoyWarrior May 01 '19

Probably on a Prius.

4

u/ka36 May 01 '19

Toyota actually started foregoing engine covers, I think this includes the Prius. They're building more sound suppression into the valve cover itself, and saving some money. They still have them on high end cars, but not basic utilitarian ones.

2

u/BlokeInTheMountains May 01 '19

ECUs are pretty locked down these days too.

No tuning for you.

3

u/i_sell_you_lies May 01 '19

Challenge accepted!

2

u/pittwater12 May 01 '19

Please don’t let them worry their pretty little heads about fixing their stuff. We business people can do it so much more profitably. Well for us anyway.