I am a real believer in right to repair. But I wonder, if we are unable to achieve legislative results, what can be done to build hardware on open standards?
That was a dumb idea to begin with. We don't need phones that work like lego. Just reverting to how phones worked 5 years ago would be a massive improvement. For almost all users all they will ever need to do is replace the battery. We used to be able to replace the battery with no tools or skills and the screen was pretty easy if you had some skill at all.
The problem we face now is that the user can't fix anything at all, repair stores can fix things with great difficulty but they can't get new parts, and apple themselves can't even fix most things because the individual parts can't even be replaced on their own without replacing the whole thing. (The macbook keyboard which was prone to fail was attached with 50 rivets)
All we need is user replaceable batteries, and for service centres to have access to all the parts they need. Lewis rossman can't get access to a chip that was >$1 on the old macbooks and is prone to fail. The newer version of the chip is impossible to source meaning those macbooks either get binned or pay apple for a whole new mobo which costs more than the laptop is worth.
For real, all I want is for us to go back to the time where you could pop off the back cover of your phone by at worst unscrewing some screws, and the easily replace the battery.
Then maybe Apple wouldn't need to send out a backdoor patch to underclock old devices. People that still want the long battery life the device had on purchase could go out and purchase a new battery (or attempt to force Apple to give them a new one) - those folks that are fine being tethered to a power outlet can choose to ignore the shortening battery lifespan. Either way, it'd move the decision into the hands of the consumer instead of Apple making that choice for you. And don't forget that Apple did get into trouble over their stupid underclocking "We hope no one notices that we don't allow people to repair things" patch.
This doesn't work. You can't rely on individual action for massive scale initiatives. Look how far that got us for the ozone layer (solved through governmental action), climate change (unsolved, because there is no governmental action), decent working conditions (everything achieved was through unions, protests and government intervention), etc
The market could fix this issue if a significant enough chunk of consumers comprehended what they were losing when going with Apple and were willing to put their money where their mouth was. That's simply not going to happen and a market based solution is unreasonable - this is a time where subject matter experts need to help make an informed decision for the population at large.
Except.. They're not the only ones who can repair it (even though they act like it). And their efforts to hurt independent repairshops show signs of antitrust, which is the topic at hand.
But in many cases this is achieved solely by supply-side restriction of replacement parts - stopping IC manufacturers from supplying those chips to people who could easily repair the device given those parts (macbook power IC springs to mind - same device as a commercial one, just a different pinout for the unobtainable Apple version), or making replacements locked down (such as on new macbooks - you can't just swap a screen now).
It just isn't something most people buying electronics care about, and there are real tradeoffs with size, weight, and aesthetic design choices. Combine those factors, and it's easy to see why the economics don't work. Making your device easily serviceable makes it more attractive to a tiny segment of the market, while making it less attractive to a much bigger segment.
I disagree that making your device easily serviceable necessarily makes it less attractive to that portion of the population. I think that making your device brittle, fragile and easy to tamper with makes it less attractive to that portion of the population - having open documentation about the ways to approach repair and then letting the electronics repair shops all be able to repair your device makes it really attractive to pretty much all of the population.
If your ease of repair comes at the cost of quality people will complain about the lack of quality - but nobody specifically wants something that can only be repaired by one market entrant that has full control over the price of repairs.
Also, if you really want to emphasize quality you can run a repair certification program that distributes high priced stickers to aide in people's confidence.
I think the point was that making it easier to repair will compromise something like device size or weight, making it less attractive to the larger portion of the population.
If they could provide the same form factor and make it easily repairable, then I think you would be right that would be attractive to all, however I think small size and repairability are mutually exclusive properties.
Ten minutes watching YouTube will demonstrate that amateurs are certainly capable of repairing todays devices, even down to something small like an apple watch, so small size and reparability are clearly not mutually exclusive. Why would they be anyway? Certified repair technicians aren't magic, they just have access to training, parts and tools that help.
You should see the insanely tiny pads I had to solder to on my Xbox 360 to install the RGH mod. With a 10$ solder iron, homemade flux, miracle I was able to do it. But I did repeat it and given the same incentive even if they made it smaller next time I would get some jewellers glasses and a better iron.
Right to repair is not about redesigning products to become easily serviceable, its about access to same tools and parts manufacturer uses for its own internal service.
https://www.theverge.com/2016/9/2/12775922/google-project-ar...
I think there is no money in letting people repair and upgrade components.