The Daily Show: Ears Edition - Do You Have the Right to Repair Your Products? | Beyond the Scenes

Episode Date: June 4, 2023

From iPhones and tractors to medical equipment, many products are designed to be unfixable by the average person. Host Roy Wood Jr. sits down with YouTuber and owner of the Rossmann Repair Group, Louis Rossmann, and Law Professor at the University of Michigan, Aaron Perzanowski to discuss how manufacturers limit customer’s repair options, the environmental impact of purchasing new products rather than repairing old ones, why it costs consumer’s more, and how the right to repair movement is hoping to fix this consumer issue. Original Air Date: April 18, 2023. Beyond the Scenes is a podcast from The Daily Show. Listen to new episodes every Tuesday wherever you get your podcasts, or watch at YouTube.com/TheDaily Show See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Ditch the other hiring sites and let zip recruiter find what you're looking for, the needle in the haystack. Four out of five employers who post on zip recruiter get a quality to to the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality to to to the to the to to to the to to the to to to the to to to to to to the to to to to to to to to to to to to tip. to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their. tip. tip. tip. tip tip tip tip tip tip tip tip tip tip tip tip tip tip tip tip tip tip employers who post on zip recruiter get a quality candidate within the first day Try it for free at this exclusive web address zip recruiter.com slash zip recruiter the smartest way to hire You're listening to Comedy Central What's happening here's edition listener. It's Roywood Jr. Correspondent for the Daily Show. You're about to hear an episode of one of our original Daily Show podcast, beyond the scenes, hosted by me. It's the show where we dive deeper into segments and topics from the show, with the show's writers, producers, and experts. In this episode, we're breaking down all the shady stuff these corporations do where they make iPhones, tractors, and medical equipment

impossible to be fixed by the average person. I sit down with YouTube or an owner of the Rossman Repair Group, Louis Rossman, and law professor at the University of Michigan, Aaron Personowski, to discuss how manufacturers limit customers' repair options and how the right to repair movement is hoping to fix this consumer issue. Give it a listen. And if you like the show, check out the Beyond the Scenes podcast wherever you get your podcast. podcast that goes deeper into topics that you've seen on the Daily Show. Let me explain this podcast for you. I know the regulars. Y'all know you're tired of me doing this, but we always got new listeners. Let me, let me break down this podcast for you. All right.

The Daily Show is French fries. Them the beautiful fries that you get when you order French fries. This podcast is the chili cheese that makes it a chili cheese fry. We. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. the th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. the th. th. the th. th. the th. the the, thi. the that, the the the the the the th. th. the th. I I I th. I th. I I I th. I I I I I I I I I's, I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I. I I I. I. I I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I, I, I, I, I, I, I's, th. I's, th. I's, th. I'm, th. I'm th. I'm t. I'm tired. I'm tired. tired. tired. tired. tired. tired. tired. I'm tired. I'm the the the the the the that makes it a chili cheese fry. We modified. We put gravy on it. We call it poutine. We put a little sprinkles of onions on it. And then that little grease that's in the bottom of the chili cheese that you... But y'all don't be drinking the grease in the bottom. Anyway, I'm Roy Wood Jr. Today we are talking about the right to repair and why products are designed to be unfixable by the average

person. Give me a clip. We live in a free market, but when it comes to repairing electronics like smartphones, you are not free to choose where to go. If you were the hopeless person with a broken gadget, you'd immediately go to the Apple store. And that's exactly what Apple wants you to do. The company and many others other thi thi thi. thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi tho- thi the right thi thi their their their their their their their their their their their thoomfix thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. the the the the the the thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thate thate that, that, that, that, that, thin, thate an the an the an theeeeeeanan. theeeean. thean. theean. theean. theeean. theeean. And that's exactly what Apple wants you to do. The company and many others restricts how and where you can repair your stuff. Anything that has a chip in it right now is probably impossible to repair without using the manufacturer.

That means tractors and cars. It means your smartphone. It means increasingly the refrigerators, washing machines that people have in their homes. My first guest today is the owner of the Rossman Repair Group and a popular YouTube who creates repair tutorial videos. Louis Rossman, welcome to Be On The Scenes, how are you doing today? Hey, thank you so much for having me on. I really appreciate it. That chair is amazing. I would like to order one from you give me the link to the the link. Give the link. Give. Give. Give. Give. Give. Give. Give. Give. Give. Give. Give. Give. Give. Give. Give. Give the link. Give. Give. Give the link. Give the the the the to the to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to the the to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to repair, to repair, to repair, to repair, to repair, to repair, to repair, to repair, to repair, to repair, to repair, to repair, the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the tutuoooooooooooooooom. the the the to the to repair, to to to to to to to to repair other guest is a law professor at the University of Michigan. Now author of the book, The Right to Repair, Aaron Perzzenowski,

Aaron, welcome to be on the scenes. How you doing? I'm great. It's great to be with you today. Now let's talk a little bit about this because this was something that I didn't even know was a thing until I read Steve Jobs book. and they talked about how mad computer designers were at Apple in the 80s when the first Macintoshes started rolling off the assembly line. But before we get into any of that, let's just unpack, first and foremost, what does right to repair mean? Aaron, give us the legal mumbo of it real quick. To me, at the core, the right to repair really boils down to a commitment to this very basic idea that when we as consumers

buy things, when we own things, we should have the freedom to fix those things in the way that we choose, right? We should be able to do it ourselves, we should be able to take it to the independent repair shop of our choice. And that means the manufacturer doesn't get to stand in the way of that decision on our part to do what we want with our own property. And I think it also means that the legal system shouldn't recognize artificial barriers that get in the way of people exercising that choice. Let's talk a little bit about it from your side, Lewis. Talk to me a little bit about your love of electronics and your desire to tinker and modify.

Like, where does that come from as a person? Because I'm just wondering people, I buy some shit, however it come out to box, that's good enough for me. That's how my corporate overlords wanted me to enjoy the item. So where does the desire to tinker and play and move things around come from? Being honest in my case, I don't have some origin story where I say I was taking apart my stereo when I was four years old because I lovedinked because I was taken. I bought something on eBay that I needed in order to work on a recording session. The studio that I worked at the things, the things, tho, that went, that went, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, thrown, thrown, I, I, I, I, I, thrown, thrown, I was, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, tho, tho, tho, tho, th, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, or tho, tho, tho, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, and the the the thrown, and the the o'e, and the o'eeeeeeean, their, thr-s, thrown, ored, their, or the o'e, thr broken. I got a refund for the thing that arrived broken from the eBay seller. So now I thought, hmm, I have this thing sitting

here that I paid zero dollars for. Instead of spending that money again, instead of spending that money again, what if I got to pocket that the thing I just got refunded on and figure out the things to thrown. And I did. So the incentive the incentive, so the incentive, so the incentive, so the incentive, the incentive, thiiiiii, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, I thi, I throwne, I had throwne, I had tho, I had thrownean, I thi, I had tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thin thin, I thin, I thin, I thin, thin. theeeeeeeeeeeeeeean, thean, thean, theeean, theeean, theeeean. thean. thean. th do something else with. And I always kind of had the, I always kind of enjoyed, you know, just learning how these types of things work, opening things that you're not supposed to open. Maybe it's oppositional defines the sort of something, but if it says, you know, warranty, void if removed, I'm the typethen does that motivate your desire to be a part of the right to repair movement or is it rooted more in the legal lease of just no I should have a right to do this even if I don't want to fix that thing and I don't know shit about that particular device or is it about just wanting the freedom to be able to do things, you know, culturally. I'd say it's both. I mean, for me, I like the fact that I went from making, you know, like $400 a month,

having a business with six to 12 people that I could pay way more than $400 a month, and I also like seeing other people get to start businesses. And when I get fan mail from people that say, you know, I used thank you. Like, that stuff motivates me. When it comes to the legal side, what motivates me there is the sheer amount of nonsense that you hear from regulators when you actually meet them in person. So my friend actually had a drag me to the New York State legislature in May of 2015, because I was one of those people that thought, this is a waste of time, I'm legislators and they said, well, the lobbyist for the other side said that when you replace a chip or a fuse on this motherboard, you're turning it from a Macbook into a PC and you're misrepresenting it as if it is still a Macbook to your customer, which is fraud. So that's why this bill is bad. And I, okay, you know, my face almost turned red.

I'm just the biggest pile of something I can't say on television I've ever heard of my life. Oh, you can say it right here, baby. There's we on the internet, baby. I don't give a fuck. Say what it is. Yeah, that was the biggest pile of bullshit I ever heard of my entire fucking life. So I just thought like, there's no way in half. Like, what caused you to believe this? And he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he this. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. the. th. th. th. th. th. to say. to say. to say, well. to say, I. to say, I to say, I said, I was. tho. to say, I was. to say, I to say, I to say, I tho. the tho. tho. tho. th. th. th. th. th. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I was. I was. I was. I was. I was. I was. I was. I was. I was. I was. I was. I was just. I'm just. I was. I was just. to say, to. to say, to. to say, to say, to say, to say, the. I'm the. I your side of the story. But now I did. And then he started, and I was like, what are you writing? And he goes, I'm co-sponsoring your bill.

So that was it. Like, you know, I showed up. I wasn't in dress clothes or anything. I'm not a professional lobbyist. They just showed up to my assembly person's office. I to tell the they they they. they. they. they. they. they. they. they. the. the. I. the. I. the. I'm. the. I'm. I'm. I'm. to. I'm. I'm. I'm. to. told. toe. told. to. to. toe. toe. to. to. to. to. to. to. to. to. to. to. to. to. to. to. to. to. to. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I. to me. So I thought I'm never going to allow them to be in the room without somebody else to call them on their shit as long as I live. Like even if a bill doesn't get passed just knowing that they're winning on easy mode, like are you kidding me? You have legislators thinking that when I replace a fuse

that I've turned a device into something else and now I'm committing fraud. That that just made me so incredibly that thi a thiiii. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, just just just just just just just just just just just just just just just, thi, thi. thi. thi. thri. thri. thri. thri. thiiiiiiii. thiiiii. thi. thi. thi. thi said I'm going to show up. I was so pissed that I also didn't have a camera rolling. So I said every time I go to a legislative hearing throughout the country I'm going to make sure there's a camera rolling. So if you say some stupid shit like that, I'm going to catch you and make you famous. And that's pretty much what I've been doing. Jesus Christ, you said it to all, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to the their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the their their their the. their, the in one summer. Yo, to that point then, Lewis, talk to me a little bit about how the community is organized to help one another. And then, Aaron, I want you to break down how legally, illegal that shit is

that Lewis is talking about. Talk to me a little bit about the repair culture community, the fix-it culture community, and how people come together to help to help there could be people there are people that are people that are dealing with the same bullshit that you deal with with devices Who aren't as tech savvy they don't own a bunch of micro screwdrivers and Alan wrenches and all of that shit So talk to me a little bit about how people have come together and kind of cold less to try and fight the power on this. Well, what I've tried to do with my channel is show as many people as possible how to do this stuff for free. So, you know, back 10 years ago, many people did thought that if they shared information

and how to fix something, that that would mean that my competitor will be able to do the same job I do and then I'll go out of business. And I've tried to kind of disprove that to kind th so anybody can do it And that is willing to put the time and effort into watch and as time grew it was really cool to see other people start similar channels Where they're showing people out to fix stuff and you know that everybody who is in this industry? Realizes how hard it is to get parts or to figure things out so it's so the all these different Facebook groups start, web forums, IRC rooms, discord rooms, where people are sharing tips and tricks and how to fix the newest devices. And I find that really cool. Aaron, how legal is all of that shit he just said?

Can people do all of that? Like, because I hear stories of people meeting up in cafes and I, like the same way you have a speed dating event? Apparently they just all tinkinkinkinkinkinkink tink tink tink their their thea th.. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, their, thi, their, their, their, thi, thi, their, their, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, their, their, their, their, their, so, their, so, so, their, their, so, their, their, their, their, their, the, the, the, the, th.. So, th. So, th. So, th. So, th. So, th. So, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, so, thi, so, so, thi. So, so, so, so, so, thi. So, so, so, so, thi. So, so, so, so, so, they. So, so, so event, apparently they just have events where motherfuckers just all show up with broken iPhones and they just all tinker together with electronics and laptops. It's that like, is that gray, where does that fall in the gray area? So, you know, historically from a legal perspective, repairing the things that you own is 100% legal, right?

There has historically been no question about this. And we've got cases under US copyright law and US patent law going back to the 1850s, where the US Supreme Court recognizes that repairing the things that you buy is a perfectly legal activity. What we've seen over the last few decades, though, is a real shift in the way that companies think about repair and in the way that they're trying to get the legal system to think about repair.

They want to sell us things with strings attached. They want to say, yeah, yeah, I'll sell you the phone, but I'm going to impose all these limitations on what you can and can't do with it. And some of those restrictions enforced through software in many cases go to the question of whether we have the ability to repair our own things. And for me, from a legal perspective, what I'm trying to do is remind courts, remind legislators that this is an aberration, right? This is a very recent shift from the way we've handled technology,

not just in this country since 1850, but like literally since, you know, cavemen were making hand axes. We've always repaired the technology that we build and we do it in whatever way it kind of suits the needs of the owner. And so I think that's really kind of the crucial thing to understand here is this is a really recent shift. What are some of the other products that kind of fall under this? Because this isn't just a solely electronic thing. Like I'll tell you a story. So I have sleep apnea. I have a CPAP machine. I've had a CPAP machine for a while

When I moved from LA when I got the Daily Show 2015 right I go from New York to LA I go from LA to New York and I have to go to a new doctor and the new doctor is going oh well I've got to see the machine to adjust the the air pressure level and that'll be $600 deductible deductible and the the the the the the d... D deductible. D deductible. D deductible. D deductible.00.00.00.00.00. the the new the new the new the new the new the new the new the new the new the new. I the new the new to to to to to to to th. I to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to th. th. th. th. I. I th. I th. I the th. I th. I the th. I the th. I the th. I the. I the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the to see the machine to adjust the air pressure level, and that'll be $600 deductible, deductible, deductible. And just, I was like, you know what, that don't even seem right. And I went on YouTube and under 45 seconds I figured out how to do something that would have cost me $600. And I don't know if that was me hacking my CPAP machine. But I do feel like, you, you, that, that, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that'll that'll that'll be that'll be that'll be that'll be that'll be that'll be that'll be that'll be that'll be that'll be, that'll be, that'll that'll that'll that'll that'll that'll that'll that'll that'll that'll, that'll that'll that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, thi, that'll be, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, that'll be that'll that'll tho if that was me hacking my CPAP machine, but I do feel like you

motherfuckers could have told me what buttons to press at the same time to bring up the secret menu that you didn't want me to know about so that I can modify and adjust my CPAP as needed. How dare you? What are some of the other devices that are kind of set up to be tamper-proof so that the company can have the proprietary control over it. So I think that's a really great example, right? I think that the instances where this issue troubles me the most are the ones in which there's a piece of equipment that a consumer is dependent on in a really important way, right? And when you're talking about medical devices, of course, right, those are really crucial people's lives.

When you're talking about agricultural equipment, right? Farmers need their John Deere tractors to work, and they need them to work every day, right? It's a time-sensitive operation when you're engaged in farming. To a lesser extent, right? we are all dependent on our smartphones as well. And so when you have that kind of dependence where people feel like literally or figuratively, they cannot live without this device, then, you know, you can really take advantage of consumers by charging these exorbitant prices for repairs. And so we see this across the economy. Okay, so we're talking medical equipment, we're talking a tractor. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, the, the, the, th, the, tho, tho, tho, and, and, and, the, and, tho, and, and, their, and, and, and, the the the the tho, and tho, and so, tho, and thi, and so, tho, tho, and so, and so, and so, and so, and so, and so, and so, and so, and so, and so, and so, and so, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, the the the their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their theauuauau. And so we see this across the economy.

Okay, so we're talking medical equipment, we're talking a tractor, oh lord, my wheat harvester thing broke down and the wheat needs to be harvested this week, but a repair man can't come for three weeks and I'm gonna lose my crops. Or I would imagine appliances probably fall into that same game. If I run a laundromat and I've got five dryers down and shit like that, what's to stop the farmer from doing what I did with the CPAT machine and just popping the hood open on

that bitch and then going on Google, watching Lewis videos, Lewis, I assume at some point you're going to expand your YouTube account to cover tractor equipment at some point. How do companies stop people from doing the hack or doing the self-repair? What are the ways the companies block this? So there are a whole bunch of strategies. Some of the most obvious ones are just the way

they design the hardware itself. So you take a product like Apple's Airpods that are glued together, they don't have screws. they don't have removable parts or replaceable parts, that makes it really tough to repair, right? A John Deer tractor is not quite the same problem. They're a big piece of what we're talking about is how software built into these devices restricts the ability to repair them. So one of the, I think, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, the thi, thi, the thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, the thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, the, thi, thi, the, the, the, the, the, the, to tha, tha, tha, tha, tha, tha, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th. thi, thi, thi, their, their, their, their, their, thi, thi, thi, thean, thean, thean, thean, tooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo, tha,. So one of the, I think, those troubling trends that we see is this idea of part pairing, right, which is the practice of taking

software and using it to identify a specific piece of hardware, not just the screen on an iPhone, but your screen on your iPhone or the optical drive in your PlayStation and then preventing you from swapping it out with an otherwise identical part, right, if it needs to be replaced. We see that in the agricultural space, right? John Deere essentially does this by including software on their tractors that means if you replace a component, even if it's an authentic John to your part, even if it's installed exactly the right way, they still have to send their technician out to your farm days later, weeks later, to plug in the laptop and literally press a button to allow your device to work, right? They're

basically holding these farmers hostage when it comes to repair. Your track they got two-factor authentication? Is it what you're telling me? Not quite that sophisticated, right? But it is a system that means if you don't have access to that software, your tractor is going to sit there, even though it's been fixed until John Deer comes out and gives their blessing and charges you for the time the technician's driving to your farm and the time they're driving back, right? It's adding a lot of expense and it's also slowing down the process, which farmers really care a lot about.

Okay, so then the people that navigate around those hurdles, people like Lewis, Lewis, talk to me a little bit about the penalties. How do these companies come after you. Do they a dead horsehead in your bed, godfather style? In 2016, I had been doing repair videos at that point for about four years and I would show schematics on the screen that were obtained from, well, the place I can't say here. So you're not supposed to share these schematics, nobody at the company is supposed to give them out, but somebody always winds up leaking them and giving them out. Why can't the instruction the instruction I I I the instruction I the instruction I the instruction I the instruction I the instruction I the instruction I the instruction I the instruction the instruction the instruction thi thi thi thi thi, why thi, why thi, why thi, why th. Why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, th. Why, th. Why, th. Why, th. Why, th. Why, th. Why, th. Why, th. Why, th. Why, th. Why, th. Why, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, th. th. thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, they's, they's, they's, they's, they's, thee. I's, tea, tea, tea, tha, tha, tha, tha, tha giving them out. Wait, why can't I have the instruction repair manual for some shit I bought?

That's not public? Like if I bought tractor device or if I bought big refrigerator, like I know there's basic instructions for the refrigerator, but the actual how the guts of it work, that's not public. That's not public and if you share it, you there is, is it could be civil or criminal liability for it. So I had a law firm called the Patric and Townsend call and say, hey, we love your YouTube content. And I'm like, no, you don't.

And they said, oh yeah, we love your YouTube content. There's this one portion of this video that we would like you to edit out. And I look at the portion of the track pet area, there's a zero-hom resistor that acts like a fuse that sits between the track pet and the computer. So you spilling liquid in your track pet doesn't kill your whole computer. It's a fine design. I have no problem with them having it there. But I wanted to show people the location of it, but I wanted to show people the location to the. the, the, the, the, the, the, tho, thi, tho, thi, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, throwne, thrown, thrown, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, somea, somea, somea, somea, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, and then, some, and then, and then, some. So, some. So, somea, throwne, throwne, throwne, throoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooan, and then, tsew. Some, tsewa, thauu. you file a DMCA claim, and I never heard from them again. Because when you file a DMCA claim, you have to say who you are and why you want it removed. So that would have essentially forced Apple to say, we don't want people to know the location

of a basic fuse in our machine because we're assholes, and they went away. But I don't know if they would have went away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away away the sametime that I did that. So that's one way, you know, when you're showing people these things, if you're showing a schematic on screen, they there's technically, there's legal liability there and they could just have your videos removed or your channel removed from the internet. How much more profit are companies seeing? Because there has to be a motivation and a reason for this. I don't imagine it solely because Apple doesn't want you to be creative with their items. How much of these actions by corporations do the two of them, both of you feel free to speak to this. How much of their actions do you think are profit-driven?

Because you know, you take a refrigerator, like my grandma got a frigid air from segregation. That thing still running down in the... It's noisy, but that thing's still going. Meanwhile, my mama's refrigerator died after like seven years. Are they deliberately building stuff more shitty so that they can make extra money in the repair and don't want us doing our own repairs, thus cutting them out of the repair money? I think this is a really important part of the story, right? Companies make money off of this in two ways. One is, Roy, exactly what you said.

They want to control the repair market for themselves. John Deere knows somebody's going to repair a million dollar tractor, but they want that money flowing to them. The other piece of it is companies don't want things to be repaired at all, right, regardless of who does it, because they actually don't want it, they don't want to make money off of the repair, they want to make money off of the sale of a new product, right? Talking to you printer industry. Fucking, I would name the brand but I don't want to get sotty these shitty-ass printers. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, they. their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, th. thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thirty, thirty, thirty, their, their, thirty, thirty, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they don't they don't they they don't thi, they don't thi, thi, thi, thi, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that thi thi thi. thi. thi., you know, printers are a good example. Phones are a good example, right? Apple keeps its shareholders happy,

keeps its stock prices high, keeps its quarterly earnings high, by selling about 200 million iPhones a year. Everybody's already got a phone. So who's buying 200 million new phones? It's people that are replacing their old phones, right? So, we've gotten so good at mass production, and this has been true really since, you know, after World War II, we're so good at mass production that we have to find ways to create demand

for all of these products, right? And one way to do that is to make sure that it's difficult or expensive or inconvenient to repair them. And we've seen that idea that idea thiiiiiiiii thi thi thi that idea thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi the the the the the the the the the tho tho tho the. And the tho tho tho- thoom thoom thoom thoom thoom thoom thoom thoom thoom th. And th. And th. And th. And th. And th. And th. And th. And th. And th. And th. And th. And th. And th. And th. And the, the, the, the, and the, the, the, and the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the thean the the the the the the th do that is to make sure that it's difficult or expensive or inconvenient to repair them. And we've seen that idea of planned obsolescence really emerge in kind of the second half of the 20th century. But companies know, I mean Tim Cook, right, CEO of Apple, has said publicly that when repair for phones is inexpensive and easy, they sell fewer products. So I think that's the economic rationale. As pro repair as I am, and people will look at stuff that's made 70 or 90 years ago and say, look, this thing has lasted this long,

I think there is a bias in that all the crappy items from 70 years ago are long dead, so you don't see them so you don't know that they haven't know they haven't know they haven't know they haven't know they haven't know that they haven't know they haven't that they haven't they haven't that they haven't that they haven't that they haven't that th the the thetwo devices in a store, if you had a $1,500 appliance and it's at 50-year warranty, and you had a $200 appliance, and it's like, I think most people would still go for the $200 appliance. So there is a small portion of it being people as consumers this will decide, listen, that's a quarter of the price. I'm going to buy that because the people that are making the the the their their their their their their the people that are making the much more expensive stuff, they don't necessarily advertise. By the way, this will still work in 50 years. Now, there is the flip side of it, which are the things that companies do

to go out of their way to make repair hard. So for instance, you take a charging chip in a Macbuck. Let's say, this is a very common repair we do that goes bad from either Texas instruments or intersil. If you Google ISL 9240 Facebook, the first result is somebody asking intercil, hi, can we buy this chip and them saying no, we're not allowed to sell it to you. That's an official company representative saying that. Stuff like that is stuff that's kind of like done on purpose, in my opinion to make repairs more difficult. But as time goes on, I would imagine, when I would to profitability, it's not just the immediate connection of, man, if you're able to fix your own stuff, you won't buy a new

one. I think it's, in order to make repair viable, we need to have an entire supply chain set up to make repair viable, and that cost money. So screw that. You know, if you read these books on the just-time manufacturing, and the the the the their, and their, and their, and their, and their, and their, and think, and their, and think, and their, and their, and their, and their, and their, and their, and their, their way of manufacturing and things like that. When companies may take that and kind of perverted and diluted to the extreme, making just enough parts to manufacture what we think we're going to sell versus having spare parts left over for repair network is far more profitable. So it may not even be, I don't want you to fix it, I want you to buy a new one.

It may also be, you know, just considering repair at all within the supply chain will cost us a lot more money. So it's not that we don't want you to fix it. It's just, eh, it's just an afterthought kind of thing. After the break, I want to talk a little bit about who suffers the most under this weird archaic system. I'm going to check with legal real quick during the break as well and see if I can shout out this printer company that's full of shit. It's so, oh my god, they're so full of shit. And we're gonna talk about how the corporations are fighting back against people like you too. It's beyond the scenes. We'll be right back. Fuck that printer company.

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in the haystack. Four out of five employers who post on Zip Recru candidate within the first day. Try it for free at this exclusive web address ziprecruter.com slash zip again that zip recruiter dot com slash zip zip recruder the smartest way to hire beyond the scenes we are back and legal has told me that I cannot name that particular printer company that always sells me a printer and after two years it breaks and the cost of the repair is right neck and neck with the cost of a new printer. Fuck you Hewlett Packard. Look, we're talking about the right to repair. Now we talked about what it is and kind of why companies do that. But beyond the computer user, beyond the cell phone user, even me with the CPAP. Can you can we talk tak is the the the the the the the the the the the the the th takes takes takes takers takers takers takers tak is tak is tak is tak is to to to to to to to the to the the the the the the the to the to the the to the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the repairs repairs repairs repairs the the the the the th r r r r repairs repairs the the takes takes takes takes tairs tairs tares taurs.aurs.aurs.a ta ta ta ta tau tau tau tau tau tau tau tau ta ta' repairs. taurs. t computer user, beyond the cell phone user, even me

with the CPAP, can you can we talk a little bit about the real-life implications and how this affects regular everyday Americans when companies aren't allowed to make repairs or companies can't afford to make the repairs on equipment that saves lives or supports full industries? Talk to me a little bit about the ripple effect of that Aaron and how that that trickles down to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the cape.ap. the cape the cape the cape the cape the cape the cape the cape the c. the c. the c. the c. the c. the c.aap.ap.ap.ap.ap.ap.ap.ap.ap.ap. the the the the the the the the the c. the the the the the the the the caql, te, teaqoananananananannnn, teapaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaqapapapapapapapapapapapapapapapapapapapapape, the the lives or supports full industries. Talk to me a little bit about the ripple effect of that, Aaron, and how that trickles down to the average American. It just takes money out of people's pockets, right? Repairs are more expensive. We end up buying more new stuff than we need. And that costs American families.

I mean, this is hard to pin down an exact dollar figure for, but I think comfortably, confidently, we can say tens of billions of dollars, right, collectively that we are spending that we otherwise wouldn't have to spend. That's important, it's not the only important thing, right? So one thing that I think the pandemic really helped to highlight is the ways in which we really depend on functioning markets for repairs and replacement parts, right? So we had issues where, you know, during the early part of the pandemic

when hospitalizations, you know, were really high, we saw respirators breaking down, and the companies who make them, who insist that they're the only people qualified to fix them, weren't able to keep up. They didn't have enough technicians. They didn't have enough parts. And so hospitals had to find ways of doing this themselves, or third-party organizations

came in and filled that gap. I think that's important to recognize the value that independent repair gives us, right? we live in a world with thi the their their their their their their their their their their, their, their, their, thii, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, their, thi, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, th....... We. Wea, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thin, thin, thin, te, the the the the the a the a the a thea, thea, thea, thea, the live in a world with these very complicated international supply chains, but they're kind of brittle, right? If the wrong thing happens, things start to fall apart and somebody needs to be able to step in and fix those problems. And one of the things I really worry about when we live in a world where the manufacturer is the only person that's authorized to make repairs is that we don't develop the sorts of skills that people need to interact with this technology.

And I'm sure Lewis can speak to this, but repair is a practice that builds up a whole bunch of really valuable skills, analytical thinking, problem solving, right, thinking through a complicated problem. And it helps us to actually understand the way these devices work. And I think that's just important so that we're not dependent on these companies so that we can use the technology, but still be kind of free, independent actors in the world, and I think we're losing some of that. Yeah, I think one of the interesting things here is, you know, one of the biggest things that I think you lose in general is just when you think about the philosophical shift in our culture, the people like Steve Wazniak that are responsible for us having an apple

at all at all, if he lived in a world where you what drives people to get into this, what drives people to decide I'm going to get a degree in electronics or engineering, or I'm not going to get in a degree, but I'm just going to start making stuff on my own is the fact that they're able to open things up, they're encouraged to open things up and work on them. And the idea that what you buy isn't yours, you don't own it, you have no control over it, you're just using it long enough to buy another one. This idea that you're shifting control away from you to the company. It's just, it's a philosophical shift that I don't think is going to be healthy for property rights going into the next generation. And that's aside from all the money that consumers that consumers that consumers that consumers not able to fix something that has a basic problem. Lewis, how much did you consider the fight that you're fighting with the right to repair?

How much did you consider that what you were doing would also be good for the environment? Like the environmental toll of the throwaway culture, you know, if people always having to to constantly replace devices instead of fixing them? You know, did you ever think about the the thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, that thi, that that that you're, that you're, that you're, that you're, that you're, that you're, that you that you that you that you that you that you that you that you that you that you that you that you that you, that you, that you're, that you, that you, that you, that you, that you, that you, that that that that that that's, thi, thi, thi, thi, thr, throwne, throwne, throwne, throwne, throwne, throwne, throwne, that's that's that's that's that's that's that you ever think about the environmental aspect? Did you come into this as an environmentalist or did you even think of that or was it just like, hey, fuck them, that's not fair. And then also, ooh, it's good for earth. I honestly never thought about the environment while I was doing this for a number of reasons. Like when I was thrown, I was able to save five or six hundred bucks at a time when I was broke, which is really cool. The other thing that gets me excited about this is, you know, when somebody says, I have

all of my wedding photos on here and they're crying because they have no backup and they give me a hug when I can get their stuff back as a result of, you know, fixing a drive that's a th happy. Seeing other people go from working the minimum wage at Walmart to making a living for their family. That's the stuff that gets me excited. For the environment, I could talk about it till I'm blue in the face, but just being honest, and having met with so many legislators over the past eight years, nobody cares.

Whether I'm talking to a very progressive person in an area where they claim they care about the environment. It's the thing that people care about the least, whether it's myself or even just the people that I'm talking to that claim they care about it that have legislative positions. What they usually care about is, you know, is this going to get people to vote for me. And I always try to focus in the things that people are personally invested in, because as a species, we're really good at caring about things that affect this right now, and

we really don't care about stuff that's going to be a problem tomorrow. So if I can tell somebody, here's how you save $900, here's how you get people on board. If I tell people this is good for the environment, like, they'll say they care, but they'll say they care, walk away and do something else. I just, I can't rely on that being the thing that excites people about this as a movement. But it is technically true. I mean, if you're throwing away, even if we were not recycling at all,

if I'm throwing away 20% of the device instead of 100% of it, that's still better for the environment. See, I mean, I think Lewis is right that, you know, these environmental arguments, I think are really important, but the environmental harms are very diffuse, right? They're not concentrated in the way way way way way way way way way way way way the way the way the way that like money out of your pocket is concentrated and they're often like really distant. The people who suffer the most from these environmental consequences aren't, you know, wealthy people in the United States, right?

They're poor people around the world. But I've started to take this kind of perverse pleasure in bumming people out about buying new stuff by talking about the environmental consequences, right? So normally, we focus on the kind of e-waste the the the the the most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most most, the most, the most, the most, the most, the most, talking about the environmental consequences, right? So normally we focus on the kind of e-waste side of this and that's a huge problem. You know, we create something like 50 million metric tons of electronic waste every year from consumer electronics. That number keeps going up.

You know, electronic waste that's full of all sorts of like really toxic shit, arsenic and lead and mercury that's going into the soil, that's going into the water, that causes all kinds of health problems. Doesn't typically affect those of us in the United States all that much, because for a long time we shipped all of our electronic waste to China or to Vietnam or to some other country to let them deal with it. So that's one half of the problem. The other half of the problem is on the front end in terms of the production of these products. You know, raw materials are being removed from the earth to make all of these products. So, you know, we got cars, we got appliances. but like we make one and a half billion phones a year globally, right? A smartphone contains something like 75 out of the 83 known stable elements in the universe.

These are, you know, complicated things. It's not just like copper and gold, but there's a bunch of rare earth metals in there. Extracting all those materials starts basically with blowing a bunch of shit up, and then you use a bunch of toxic chemicals to separate the metals from the ore, and then that creates millions of gallons of toxic slurry that gets stored somewhere and eventually causes a bunch of environmental

damage as well, right? On the other hand, I hear the iPhone comes in yellow now, so you know, it's a it's a trade-off. What cases are companies making against the right to repair? Like, why are they so resistant to this? The arguments that companies make against the right to repair, you know, they'll talk about security and privacy and how important it is is is is is is is is is is is is is is is is is is is th is th is th is th it is th it is th it is the th it is the th i is thi is the thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi the thi thi the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi tho tho tho tho thooooooooooooooooooooo the thoooooo thoo tho that companies make against the right to repair, you know, they'll talk about, you know, security and privacy and how important it is to protect those consumer interests. And of course I agree, like I'm not against security, I'm not against privacy. But if every day regular repairs open your device up to a security vulnerability, then your device is poorly designed. You're just kind of telling on yourself there

if the idea that fixing the thing opens you up to some security risk. When it comes to privacy, I'll be honest with you, I'd trust somebody like Lewis to take better care of my data than I would be nameless, authorized service provider at the local Best Buy that Apple has a deal with, right? Somebody who runs their own business who is accountable, who has like a real commitment to, you know, customer service, I think that's important.

Apple actually had to settle a lawsuit within the last year or so for millions of dollars when one of its own technicians stole and shared nude photos of an Apple customer, right? So they're not like the, you know, the perfect example here of security and privacy. They talk about safety, right? And it's, you know, independent repair or self-repair is dangerous that we're going to like blow ourselves up, swapping out the batteries on our phones. You know, people have been fixing their own cars in th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. their their th. their th. their ourselves up, swapping out the batteries on our phones. You know, people have been fixing their own cars in this country,

since there have been cars in this country. Anybody who wants to swap out the brakes on their 5,000, 6,000 pound hunk of metal that they drive around at 85 miles an hour is free to do so, I think we'll be okay if some people give you know swapping out their phone screen at home a try. Lewis, to all of everything that Aaron just said, have you ever seen anything proprietary when you cracked open the inside to some of these devices? Like have you ever felt like, oh wow, this is probably something I shouldn't have seen in the company, if I was evil competitor B, I would make something very similar. Like the same reason why the government tries to blow up drones when they crash in enemy territory so you can't get our fucking schematics and all of that.

Are companies justified in being against right to repair on the ground of trying to protect their trade secrets trade trade trade their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their ta their their their their teateateateateateateateateateate?c.c-c-c-s. I'm their. I'm their. I'm their. I's. I's. I's. I's. I's. I's. I their. I, their. I, their. I, their. I, their. I, their. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I their, their, th. I th. I's, te. I's te. I'm te. I'm te. I'm te. te. te.e. te.e.e.e. te.e.e. te.e.e. te.e.e.e. te.e. to repair on the grounds of trying to protect their trade secrets I don't think so because if the entire argument is that we'd have competition That makes that that just copies our design and steals everything so if you take a look at what? the schematics are available. I mean again, it's not available through the channel's I'd like, but if I'm able to get a schematic, to get a schematic a schematic a schematic a schematic a schematic to get a schematic to get a schematic dollars on some random non-English website on the internet, then surely Toshiba or Acer or somebody else can. So why haven't Toshiba and Acer and everybody else created a complete clone of the Macbook? The reason is because the documentation we're requesting and the information were requesting is not enough that you can create a carbon copy of this computer. It would be like if I took a picture of you and then I said okay from this picture I can clone you like you can't clone somebody from a

picture the same way that I can't clone a device from a bare-bone schematic that says this resistor is attached to this capacitor at this value. There's a lot of information that's necessary for manufacturing that we are not requesting access to. So if you were able to do this, then realistically speaking, somebody would have cloned the iPhone using what they have in ZXW tool, or they would have cloned a Macbook from the, you know, the three megabytes of schematics and PDFs that I share when I do a repair video. And that's just not happening because. Well, after the break, we'll bring it home by talking about what progress has been made. We talked about the beginning of the right to repair movement, but I would love to know

where you all now with this issue, where some of the companies are now with this issue, and what can regular people like me do to be a part of the solution, other than leaving hateful tweets at the Hewlett Pack.......... And, top. And, th. And, th. So, th. So, th. Oh, th. Oh, th. Oh, th. Oh, th. So, th. So, th. So, th. So, thi, th. So, thi, thi, th. thi, the the thi, th. So, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, th. So. And, thi. And, thi. And, thi. And, thi. And, toe. And, toe. And, toe. And, togu. And, toe. And, togu. We's togu. We's togu. We's. We're togu. We're todthan leaving hateful tweets at the Hewlett Packard Corporation for their shitty printers. This is beyond the scenes. We'll be right back. Finding great candidates to hire can be like trying to find a needle in a haystack. You might get a lot of resumes, but not enough candidates with the right skills or experience. But not with Zip Recruiter finds amazing candidates for you fast. And right now you can try it for free at ziprecruiter.com. SIP Recruiters smart technology identifies top talent for your roles quickly. Immediately after you post your job, zip recruiter's powerful matching technology

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Try it for free at this exclusive web address, zip recruiter.com slash zip. Again, that's zip recruiter.com slash zip. Zip recruiter, the smartest way to hire. Beyond the scenes, round and third, head it for home, the right to repair. Before we get into what legal progress has been made and what changes the two of you would like to see. Lewis, is there anybody on the inside of these companies that have spoken to you like off the record, the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the to the to the the the th. to the, to of, of, of, the, the, the, the, the. theaugheatre a theatrutor, the smartest, the smartest, the inside of these companies that have spoken to you like off the record about what you're doing? How much do the people who work for these companies believe in the policies that these companies

have in place? A lot of them don't and one of them, I'm not going to say the company because I don't want to out him. But a company-It was Hulet Packard. It was somebody who worked at a company that I've talked about quite a bit on my channel and he said, you know, he was just up front and honest and said, I've made a lot of money working for a company that I vastly disagree with. So when I started my fundraiser, for lobbying in all these states, he wired $ agree with their policies and some of them have said, you know, I started actually getting into, the really cool thing, once you, and this is how you start to feel old, is like, once somebody

says I started your stuff in 2016, I graduated in 2021 and I got my engineering job in 2022, so now I work at the company that you were essentially bad-mouthed before I even started my career. So yeah, there are a lot of people inside these companies that don't agree with these policies that just don't necessarily have the power themselves to actually work towards changing them. What progress has been made on the legislative side? And, you know, what changes do the two of you think would be most impactful just in the short-term, you know, on this issue? Just to give a little bit of the back story here, all the way back in 2012, the state of Massachusetts passed a right to repair law that applied to automobiles.

And it required car makers to make repair parts and tools and software and information available to car owners and to independent repair shops on reasonable terms. That model worked really well. It was adopted by all the car companies at the time as essentially a nationwide standard, and it's proven effective in most respects. It also formed the basis for the bills that have been introduced over the past few years in 30 plus states around the country.

And those bills have broad bipartisan support among consumers, among voters, right? This is like a 70 to 80 percent issue. One of the few things that people really agree on across that sort of partisan divide. But we've seen really powerful companies spend a lot of money on lobbyists to block those bills, to water those bills down. We've seen some success, so there are bills progressing through state houses in a bunch of states right now. Last year, Colorado passed a right to repair law focusing on motorized wheelchairs because

there was a really specific and egregious problem going on for folks that use motorized wheelchairs. It's a great law, but it doesn't go far enough. New York passed a bill as well that was overwhelmingly supported in both houses of the legislature there. But as Lewis will probably want to talk to you about in some more detail, was really watered down by the governor in New York. And I imagine Lewis has some thoughts on that. Yeah, yeah. So in the state of New York, there was a bill that we've worked eight years on. And in the last week, the governor allowed the opposition lobbyist the to the the the the the the to the the the the the toeseses the the the the the the the the the theousousousousousousousousousousousousousousousous the opposition loes the opposition loes of the opposition loes of the opposition loes of house house house house house house the the the the the house house house house the house house the house the house the house the house the the house house house the the the the house house house house house house the the the the the the the the the the the the loes of house house house house house house house house house house house house house house house house the the the the the the the the the opposition lo the opposition lo the the the opposition lo. the o toooooooooooooes. tooes. tooesoes. tooesoesoesoesoes. the loesoesoes. the loesoes. the the the the the the the the the the the on that. Yeah, yeah, so in the state of New York, there was a bill that we've worked eight years on and in the last week, the governor allowed the opposition lobbyist to rewrite the bill. So the edits that were suggested by the opposition were

directly written into the bill. So Kathy Holtzell allowed Apple, Samsung and everybody else to literally write the legislation that would be regulating them. Yes, I will write the law to make sure that I follow the laws. Where's the ink pen? Thank you. And what about Massachusetts in 2014? Talk to me a little bit about that and how they codified that law. Yes, so, you know, Massachusetts did this in a couple of ways, actually simultaneously. So there was a ballot initiative that the voters actually got to vote on. And it won by like 80% of the vote, right? And I think that is a really important signal here. If this issue is decided by voters, the right to repair wins. It's not even close.

Right. It's just as we talked about in New York, it's when you get these closed-door meetings, either with the governor or with state legislators, where either the bills don't happen at all or they get really watered down and limited. So I think that's something we've got to be worried about. It's a tough fight because it's happening simultaneously in a bunch of states all at once. I would prefer to see this issue fixed on a national level, a federal level, rather than by kind of state-to-state rules. There have been some important bills that have been introduced in the U.S. Congress,

addressing auto repair, addressing consumer electronics, addressing agricultural equipment. Those are good bills, but Congress is just like a dysfunctional mess, right? So getting anything past there, even though the American public is broadly supportive, I think is a tricky thing to do. There are other avenues. There's the executive branch. The Federal Trade Commission under Lena Kahn's leadership has taken a real interest in repair. They've taken a pretty aggressive stance. They issued a really important report that shot down a lot of the manufacturer's arguments

a couple years ago. They've been taking enforcement actions on repair restrictions against companies like Harley Davidson. But they can do more. They could adopt rules that make it clear that some of these practices we've been talking about should be treated as unfair and deceptive commercial practices. The most interesting part with the Massachusetts one is it was voted in favor of 74 to 26 by residents. And the manufacturers commercials commercials from General Motors,

Toyota, Ford, Nissan, and Honda were saying that if this passes, if mechanics can fix your car, they're going to stalk you through parking lots, they're going to break into your house, they're going to rape you. This bill supports racism, redlining, sexual assault. Like, they through the kid. Yeah, and I archived their website and I archived their advertisements because this was all taken offline the moment they lost. But they had these scary commercials where they'd be somebody

walking behind you and the light would be very, very blue and as they got closer to you, you hear, you hear pop and then you just hear like. If question one passes in Massachusetts, anyone could access the most personal data stored in your vehicle. Domestic violence advocates say a sexual predator could use the data to stalk their victims. Penpoint exactly where you are. Whether you are alone, even take control of your vehicle.

Vote no on one. Keep your data safe. They threw all of this at just the ability of a mechanic to be a vehicle. Vote no on one. Keep your data safe. They threw all of this at just the ability of a mechanic to be able to fix your car. And they spent $25 million on all those advertisements and they still lost. So it must have been worth something to them. So then to that point then, Aaron, talks to me a little bit about these companies that are trying to get ahead of the PR nightmare that this would be for them by being proactive before there's legislation. Like with John Deere I find this interesting, like break down what John Deere is doing and then I want

the two of you to tell me whether or not this is legitimate steps towards change or as Garfield the cat would say, in sincere sincerity. Yeah it's a really important point. John Deere and other agricultural firms have signed what they're calling a memorandum of understanding with the American Farm Bureau Association, which basically, you know, they've tried to tell this story that this is their effort to solve this problem and to give farmers access to all the things that they need to engage in repair. And I got to be honest with you, I've read these documents. They are

not worth the paper they're written on. They don't do anything. They are completely voluntary. John Deer can the company to do nothing that they don't already say they're doing. So they say we will make software available to farmers. But the memorandum of understanding defines software and it defines it really specifically as one particular program, the John Deer customer advisor program, which they tell us is already available to farmers, right? So if it's already available, what are farmers getting from this deal? The other thing is, even if you get access to that software, it doesn't do what you need it to do. It's not the

program that can actually initialize or authorize these parts after a repair has been done. So it's just about PR from my perspective. I don't think it moves the needle one bit, but when they made that announcement and sent out their press release, there are a bunch of news stories that were saying, oh look at this John Deere is so responsible. So I think the media fell for it in a lot of instances when they really shouldn't have. I think you have to separate the companies that are not. I, their, their, their, their, th. So, th. th. th. I, th. I, th. th. I, th. th. th. thi, th. thi, thi, the, the, the, the, the, tho, thi, thi, the, the, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, the, the, the, the, the, the, thean, thean, thean, thean, thean, thean, thean, thean, thea. thean, thean, thean, the think you have to separate the companies that are doing it genuinely from the companies that are not. So like if you have a company like Framework, they release their laptop, every single part that took to that laptop is available on their website. If you want schematics, if you

want schematics, you do have to contact them. repair-friendly company. With Apple, they created an independent repair provider program, but that program requires that they can audit me at any time. If I have parts that I'm not supposed to have in my facility, they can't kick me out of the program and get me in legal trouble, which I do. I have schematics, I have chips that I'm not supposed to have. They still restrict you from buying all the the the the chips, the chips, the chips, the chips, the chips, the chips, the chips, the chips, the chips, the chips, the chips, the chips, the chips, their, their, their, thap, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thiats, thiats, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their their their their their their their their their their their their thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thro, throoooooooooooooooooooooooooooo, tro, tha, thro, thr by itself. You can't buy a keyboard by itself. You can't buy a schematic. You can't buy a board view. The program, when it first came out, didn't even allow you to actually stock parts. You would have to take all your customers' information, take their IMEI number, send all the stuff back to Apple, and then buy a part because you weren't in my opinion are complete garbage and they're just designed to show a regulator. Look, you don't we don't you don't need to you know you don't need to sign a bill we're

doing it all ourselves when in reality that program provides us with nothing and then there are companies like framework or fair phone where they are in good faith actually making parts, thrown, to work in a customer's product. And yeah, what Aaron said is very important, which is the moment that news came out from John Deere, you had like 20 or 30 news article saying John Deere gives farmers what they want, so I just decided, again I grew up in Brooklyn, I'm not a farmer, I can barely you know, the thrown, the the the the the the, thrown, the, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, thrown, they news, they news, they news, they news, they news, they news, they news news, they news news, the the thrown news news news, the thrown news, thrown news, new, thrown news news news, thr, thr, th. that news news news news news news news news news news news news news news news news news news news news news news, thr, thrown news news news news news news news news, thrown, thrown, thrown news news news news news news news news, thrown, thrown, the the the the the they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, the thr, thr, thr, thr, thr, thr, thr, thr, thr-in, thrown, thrown, thrown And I had a 10-minute conversation with him where he very politely went through why this doesn't give him anything. And I was wondering, you know, gee, why didn't the BBC do that? Why didn't any of these news companies do that?

Why didn't any of these news companies do that? Why didn't any of these news companies? They started saying, look, Apple is now repair friendly. Apple supports right to repair and it's like, no, they don't. I still can't buy anything I need to actually fix anything. But it allows them to take advantage of lazy bloggers and journalists that don't call people involved in the field and get good PR for themselves. The same thing happened when Governor Holtz will sign this bill. You had all these people saying, right to repair wins in New New New New'm like the F it does this bill says that if they if the company says they don't want to sell you an assembly, they don't have to sell you an assembly. This is useless. What can people do to get involved in the right to repair repair movement and how can consumers be more mindful about the products they purchase? I think that the

best thing that anybody can do is if they are somewhat good at repair in any way way way way the the to be excited. I want people to be personally invested. I don't want them to feel a shame because they're buying something new. I want them to feel a sense of excitement and happiness because they just saved $1,000. They just made $500 this week off of a side geek that they otherwise wouldn't have made. If you can get somebody to be personally invested in caring about this because you've helped them recover data, you've helped them make something work again, you've helped them avoid downtime, let them know at the end of it, by the way, this we may live in a world two years from now where this is not possible and here's why. It's like at the end of the movie 25th hour with Ed Norton. He tells all of his kids after he escapes from having to go to jail. I probably shouldn't have spoiled the best that North movie in existence, but I did.

But yeah, he said- Neck and neck with American History X, but continue, we'll debate offline. But yeah, but he says, this is how close, you know, but he says, he tells the origin story to his kids, and he says, this is how close you were to not recovering any of your wedding photos or any of your baby photos. This is how close you were to paying $2,000 instead of $200 for a repair. Get as many people personally invested as possible.

And when it comes to the personal decisions people make on what they buy, that's a difficult one. This was something where 20 or 30 years ago, I think you could have chosen this company for being repair-friendly versus this one. But now you really, in many industries, you really are just choosing between like the 20 companies that are not gonna make a schematic available, that are not gonna make a part available. So it's really hard to recommend one company over the other. And you do have scrappy startups like framework

and fair phone that are trying to produce products that are repair friendly, but many of these companies, and while I do love I they're trying to do, they have limited funding, so you know, you're getting a device that's last generation and they have a one-size-fits-all product. So it's really, it's not one of those things where it's easy to just pick the repair-friendly solution now, as it would have been, let's say 30 or 40 years ago, you know, try to sell my book. So people should read the right to repair from the fine folks at Cambridge University Press,

where I try to talk about a lot of the things that we've been covering today. But I think we should, you know, look at the resources that are out there and available to people. We should look at sites like I Fix It, which provides repairability scores and repair instructions for tons of products. You know, we should support the work that Lewis is doing. We should be supporting the work that Nathan Proctor and the folks at U.S. Perg have been doing around repair. But I think most importantly, we've got to be kind of reflective a little bit about our own choices and our own behavior, right? The phone in your pocket did not materialize out of thin air. There was lots of labor, lots of resources, and lots of costs built into that device.

And I think we have an interest in making it last as long as it can. Right? So I'm not saying we all have to like read by candlelight and never use TickToc again, but I think we have to make these products last longer and repair is really essential to that goal. And I think once people start to internalize that story and understand the way companies are trying to sort of manipulate their behavior, it becomes a lot easier to at least have some awareness of this issue, and then the behavioral change I think flows from there. Well, this has been a wonderful, wonderful topic. I cannot thank you both for all of this wonderful information. And fuck you, Hewlett Packard make a better printer you

I cursed a lot that's an opinion actually so I think legal will be okay with that that's all in you're asking them to be better you're actually being a motivational speaker and we'll see our legal department is very litigious I can't say anything mean about anybody that's all the time we have for today Aaron Lewis thank you so much for going beyond the scenes. Listen. Listen to the Daily Show Beyond the Scenes on Apple Podcasts, the I-Heart Radio App or wherever you get your podcast. Explore more shows from the Daily Show Podcast Universe by searching the Daily Show, wherever you get your podcasts.

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