OT: Oh Deere

From recent Manward Digest:

Here's something most folks don't know... Smoking near your Apple computer can void the warranty. The internet is filled with horror stories of folks who took their devices to the company for repairs but were denied coverage due to evidence the machine had been subjected to smoke. Apple says you can't smoke on its corporate campus... or at home. Our new farm needs a new tractor. But the only thing we've found so far is a fresh scandal... and proof that the world is changing faster than many folks would like.

What's happening this week cuts to the core of so much that we stand for.

We learned to drive from the front seat of cars that we fixed up. The first car we bought was more than 40 years old... the next had been on the street for nearly 30 years.

To get them to get us where we wanted to go, we brought out our box of wrenches. We fixed... we upgraded... and we modified.

It taught us essential Know-How that we're convinced makes us who we are today.

But the era of doing it ourselves has officially died.

On its gravestone will be a picture of - of all things - a John Deere tractor.

Big Green Gets Greedy

You see, the iconic equipment maker just inked a big deal with a big group. Deere somehow got the California Farm Bureau to sign off on a move that keeps farmers from working on their own tractors.

If farmers want to upgrade, modify or repair their equipment, they won't be able to pull into their garage and do it themselves. Nope, they'll have to pick up the phone and open their wallets.

It's a huge blow to the Right to Repair Movement.

It's sad that a movement like this even needs to exist. But what's happening is no surprise.

Margins for big-name manufacturers have been slashed over the last two decades as overseas competitors not only have increased the quality of their product but have done it for a lower price.

Instead of making money on a one-time sale, tractor makers are now relying on decades' worth of follow-up care to turn a profit.

But they can't make those bucks if somebody else is.

Deere needs to force its customers back to its shops.

The Future of DIY

It's not just Deere, of course. Many say it's Apple that has pioneered the trend.

If you've ever tried to go to a third party to fix an Apple product, you know what we mean.

Take, for example, the poor folks who may have recently had their iPhone

8s repaired by somebody other than Apple. When the behemoth company recently released a software update... those folks suddenly weren't able to use their phones.

The company locked them out.

Their only choice? Take their phone to Apple... and pay up.

It's good money for the phone company.

And now that so much of what drives our economy is powered by electronics, the trend is certainly going to spread.

More and more manufacturers are putting electronic locks on their computer-aided systems... and they're allowed to do it because they have the full blessing of Uncle Sam.

Under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, a tractor owner commits a crime if he tries to go around these security measures.

Whether he owns the tractor or not... the technology that makes it run is patented and protected.

It means tractor owners can no longer download tweaks to their computers. They can no longer modify onboard systems to improve efficiency or get rid of systems they don't need. And it means, when emission laws change, farmers won't be able to modify their old equipment... they'll be forced to buy new.

Consumers' Choice

We don't like what's happening. We don't like this business model.

We like to buy something and truly own it.

Our old friend Capitalism is powerful. If enough buyers don't like what's happening, the fact that their money will flow elsewhere will ensure it stops happening.

But, as usual, Washington has stepped in the way.

While Washington rushes to debate the virginity of a Supreme Court pick, it refuses to remove its antiquated copyright laws from the books.

Instead of protecting software for the typical period of 90 years or more, many folks are begging Congress to change the time frame to a mere

10 years. It's a much more realistic figure for the product it's meant to protect.

But we're not in the lobbying game. We'll let much greedier folks figure out what comes next.

Instead, we're in the idea business.

And this is an idea that has us scratching our head. We don't like it, but we understand it.

As a consumer, we know we're screwed.

As a citizen, we know that our government's inaction is costing us our money and our Liberty.

As an investor, we know that the idea is both lucrative and dangerous. It's adding dollars to the bottom line, but consumers aren't happy.

And finally, we know our system gives us a choice. We choose to get our hands dirty.

Our next tractor won't be green.

Reply to
Robert Baer
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Robert Baer presented

So, yesterday I was wondering when the 'merrican reality show manager puts more and more pressure on China if they will strike back by declaring all US copyright void. What's the US going to do about it? Bomb it? May as well bomb Apple.

Apple is a sad case, will never buy that crap, 1000$ for a few chips and something that will be outdated and mostly useless next year. S. Jobs was a good salesman, hypnotized his buyers I believe.

Yesterday I was re-configuring my old eeepc 701 that came with Linux, as a gateway router. At least it has a job again...

Only buy things that run open source, modify and fix all you want. Better security. no unwanted updates.

Who can stop you from replacing your car's controller by a Microchip PIC? Or by a Raspberry or its clones? Building your own plane?

No need to reverse engineer, start from scratch, open source it, the rest will follow.

Reply to
<698839253X6D445TD

It's tempting to just say don't buy it. But the simpler more diy repairable product options too often don't offer adequate performance or run costs no wadays. Chinese products are ever improving, but I still would not buy a Ch inese car. I like safety & reliability too much. And tbh the new linux phon e compares badly to the old Apple. It sort of works.

A lot of the time I can avoid the modern bs, but sometimes it's not really viable - what can you do then but suck it up.

NT

Reply to
tabbypurr

Smoking _near_ a computer doesn't void anything it's all the tar and smoke residue that gets inside it from habitually smoking in the same room as the computer that voids the warranty. They're not monitoring you

24/7 via camera to see where you smoke (at least not yet.)

Like if you took a turkey baster and injected a bunch of tar into the machine would that void the warranty? same thing. so just don't do that.

Reply to
bitrex

Robert Baer wrote in news:GhCrD.78061$uJ2.4148 @fx27.iad:

What? You somehow think that the "follow up care" is not needed? You think they profit? Hardly. They barely make enough to pay the techs they have do the work.

Reply to
DLUNU

This could be a future profession for tech-minded young people; ripping the 'brains' out of these things and re-wiring them back to totally manual control. It's gone too far AFAIC. I just discovered the car I bought uses encoded mux control signals and computerised front-ends for all its control modules. I call that unnecessary BS and I'll never buy another one. I'll probably drive vintage classics *at least* 35 years old for the rest of my days now.

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Reply to
Cursitor Doom

You haven't been paying attention to how the DMCA is being (mis)used.

Reply to
Tom Gardner

I refuse to attempt any repairs on smoke-polluted electronics. It's disgusting. Everything is sticky and stinks. You're sure to have poor contacts when you put it back together again.

Jeroen Belleman

Reply to
Jeroen Belleman

Jeroen Belleman

Ha, I have had TV sets in for minor repairs with the remark 'picture is not bright either' and all you needed to do for that was take some alcohol and clean the screen. Why not repair? Never had an electrical problem related to smoking. If that Apple stuff fails on a layer of nicotine and tar then it never was any good anyways. Apple is a bunch of make believe high end. If you are THAT much of a dork to not want to repair your own shit, very expensive shit at that, you deserve to be taken of the market, by law if must be, bunch of hypocrites, polluting air in China with their factories, and THERE it is OK? Jeroen you never fixed a car either? Those get very dirty too.... asbestos in the old wheel brakes, poisonous oils, dead insects, road dirt, shit, haha, I repaired my own car, took the whole engine apart, was member of the company's car club. You should see me after an afternoon under the bridge replacing the clutch on a car. You are spoiled! And on top of that, CERN uses so much energy, produces so much CO2, is responsible for so much global warming flooding, death, far from your bed is OK sort of thing? Poor polar bears. hehe ;-)

Reply to
<698839253X6D445TD

h on a car. "

Been there, done that, got the T shirt.

But for me it was a driveway, and a thunderstorm. About an inch or so of ra in on the ground at my back as I lifted the transmission up to put it back on the bell housing. I heard the thunder and thought to myself - Man, this is about as grounded as it gets but I wasn't going to leave it hanging by t he input shaft and bend the new clutch. So needless to say, lightning did n ot strike me.

Reply to
jurb6006

The article has it wrong. They don't want these homespun DIY mechanics mess ing with anything that impacts efficiency and emissions.

Reply to
bloggs.fredbloggs.fred

Regarding the Apple repair, this guy does non Authorized Apple repairs. He's fighting for the right to repair movement. I find his videos very interesting and he does really nice work.

Videos of actual repairs under the microscope.

Apple SUES iPhone screen repair shop and LOSES!

Best Buy & Genius Bar tag team defenseless Macbook :'(

Page with all his repair videos.

Mikek

Reply to
amdx

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messing with anything that impacts efficiency and emissions.

That I can see, I used to get requests from people wanting to program their car's EPROM with code they found online...I'm sure that would work

just fine and there could be no risk at all!

John :-#(#

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Reply to
John Robertson

[...]

[...]

So why buy this tractor? I would have gone to either another company or, if they all play such nasty games, get a used one.

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Regards, Joerg 

http://www.analogconsultants.com/
Reply to
Joerg

The problem is there's a limit to how much you can do that. I drive an ECUed vehicle because it uses half as much fuel and is several times safer. On a farm you can't afford to be using technology from the history books.

NT

Reply to
tabbypurr

I fix computahs, monitors, printers, etc to support my decadent and lavish lifestyle. When I'm asked to fix a device that has been coated with a condensed layer of smelly brown tar and combustion product, I either charge a fairly large amount for the cleaning, or I refuse to fix it. There are plenty of failures that can be directly attributed to this layer crud. For example, the fans tend to stick, optical limit switches in printers stop functioning, CD/DVD drive optical pickups don't work, controls become sticky, and push button switches fail to make contact.

When cleaning, I don't want to volatize that crap and make my palatial office stink equally disgusting. So, I do the work outside, which is somewhat awkward. The 24" monitor I'm currently using at home (Samsung SyncMaster 243T) was given to me for free by a frustrated smoker who couldn't understand why every repair shop in town refused to fix her monitor. It took about 1.5 gallons of 91% alcohol, some ecologically incorrect cleaner, and a large plastic tub to remove the crud. Even so, the stink didn't go away completely, so I had to baptize the monitor again a week later, this time scrubbing the tar away with a brush. Three years later, it still produces a slight tobacco stench on a hot day.

I'm very much in favor of the right to repair, but not when the owner doesn't know how to take care of the equipment, or just doesn't bother or care.

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Jeff Liebermann     jeffl@cruzio.com 
150 Felker St #D    http://www.LearnByDestroying.com 
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Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

I recall reading, years ago, that tobacco-smoke tar was the terror of audio servicers working on tape decks. The tar would gunk up the heads something awful. There were other problems with preamps and receivers... volume and balance controls would become noisy, selector switches intermittent, and so forth.

One trick that can help, apparently, is to open the chassis up and expose it to direct, bright summer sunlight for several days. The heat and UV can help break down the tars.

Consumer Reports used to (and perhaps still does) use tobacco-smoke tar as the exemplar "difficult to remove" test material for comparing glass cleaners and surface cleaners.

Reply to
Dave Platt

Wow, that's pretty far out, man. Outa sight! I've just about caught up with the vernacular of the day about half a century ago. Like most Conservatives, I don't like change.

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Reply to
Cursitor Doom

,

Cursitor Doom imagines that he is Conservative. In reality he's just a very slow learner, and all too prone to learn stuff that is actually incorrect and misleading.

Admittedly, most Conservatives seem to have the same problem, but there are clever examples who are - in fact - reactionaries and want to change the w orld back to the way is was, or what they fondly remember to be the way it was, which is to say, they are clever but seriously deluded.

Nobody is ever going to call Cursitor Doom clever. He believes what the rea ds in the Daily Mail and what he is told by Russia Today.

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Bill Sloman, Sydney
Reply to
bill.sloman

When I was fixing tape recorders (about 1966) I didn't seem much tobacco damage. That's because I was doing mostly warranty work, where the tape recorder wasn't in service long enough to have accumulated sufficient smoke to become a nuisance. However, the out of warranty repairs were often full of tar and stench, exhibiting all the symptoms you describe. Even so, it was rare because much of the low end audio equipment of the day (including those with tubes) did NOT include a cooling fan.

Nope. Light, heat, and possibly UV hardens the tar into a varnish like coating which amazingly is not very sticky. That works fine until the device is exposed to any VoC (volatile organic compound) or solvent, such as furniture polish, room freshener, air pollution, household cleaners, etc where it again becomes a sticky and smelly goo.

I would classify cat spray as the worst. Cats like to mark their ownership of the things they like, which often includes nice warm monitors and laptops: Removing the cat is almost as difficult as removing the smell.

What makes tobacco smog difficult to remove is that it tends to be uniformly distributed throughout the inside of the device. Literally everything has to be wiped down with alcohol, usually several times. Inaccessible locations contain enough tar to perpetuate the stench. I've found that alcohol immersion therapy to be the only effective solution (pardon the pun).

I'm undecided if saving the used cleaning alcohol is a good idea. I have about 4 gallons of filthy, smelly, and flammable alcohol available for the purpose. I've found no easy way to purify the alcohol. It's rather expensive having to buy more every time I need to clean something big: So I've saved some of the used alcohol in a paint locker at home and drag it to the office as needed.

Self-repair manifesto:

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Jeff Liebermann     jeffl@cruzio.com 
150 Felker St #D    http://www.LearnByDestroying.com 
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Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

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