Deere must face US farmers' 'right-to-repair' lawsuits, judge rules
Deere must face US farmers' 'right-to-repair' lawsuits, judge rules
www.reuters.com
Deere must face US farmers' 'right-to-repair' lawsuits, judge rules
37 comments
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Deere is fleecing farmers so badly. It's ridiculous that they can't fix their own equipment. In the 1950s and 1960s, farmers got a lot of mechanical knowledge from learning to fix their tractors and other vehicles, so they not only saved money, they gained practical skills they could apply to other vehicles. At the very least, they should be able to take these things to a third party, preferably locally-owned, mechanic shop to get them fixed.
I realize right to repair is important for our internet devices, but this is so much more important. This makes our food prices higher.
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Exactly there is so many different fields effected by the right to repair. Farmers in my opinion got it the worst. So many simple and basic repairs prevented because of it too. Loads of them went from not being super tech savvy to learning how to hack their machines or hiring people who specialize in doing so.
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I realize right to repair is important for our internet devices, but this is so much more important. This makes our food prices higher.
It's not a competition. I was disappointed to see the progress that had been made was limited to only certain markets. No one should have a monopoly on repairing or customizing anything from tractors to phones and computers to appliances to cars and whatever other directions I haven't thought of. It should only be knowledge, skills, tools, and parts that determine whether or not you can repair something, not design (including requiring tools for their obscurity rather than for their usefulness).
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As someone that owns several Deere tractors, there are no restrictions on mechanical repairs, I can buy parts all day long to do everything up to and including replacing every one of the 20,000 parts on a tractor.
I don't know what people are pointing to as not being able to repair, but I've never encountered it. Maybe flashing a custom firmware on the ECM? But why the hell would I want to do that, except to blow the engine up when I need the damn thing?
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You have to understand Farmers.
It's not about right to repair. They are perfectly capable of repairing their equipment. And no one is forcing them to buy John Deere. There are a LOT of OEM's out there in all sectors to choose from. If they don't like the black box that's running their equipment, there's nothing stopping them from buying a blank controller and programming it themselves.
It's about them wanting to circumvent systems. Whether they are safety systems to prevent injury, safety systems to prevent excessive damage to the machine, or regulatorily systems for emissions.
Famers want to bypass that shit constantly.
They want to put cheap shit diesel into their engine and who gives a shit about the environment.
They want to run their machine at 120% constantly. And then removed to the OEM their machine broke too soon and wants warranty.
They don't want to wear a seatbelt, or have a seat switch in their cab, or a spring return propel joystick. They want to rig up a bungy cord to the throttle and get out of their seat to go look at something while it drives.Farmers weld up some of the STUPIDEST and most dangerous contraptions that I've ever seen with absolutely no education/calculations as far as frame weight/load or torque requirements/etc. "My Daddy did it back in his day, so I should do it too!!!"
And yet we get farm accidents/injuries constantly, including CHILDREN. And yet none of them are ever charged or imprisoned with running an un-safe environment/operation like any other industry would. You can't have a 14-year old driving around a forklift in a factory without getting into serious trouble, but sure let them run a combine or tractor.
Farmers wanting access to source code is 100% because they want to disable shit.
It has nothing to do with repair, it has nothing to do with adding 3rd party shit. You can already do that. I do that on a daily basis for a huge list of OEM's both in and out of the ag industry.They already have the right to repair. Nothing is stopping them. The only thing stopping them is that you need a little more knowledge these days than basic mechanics and some welding skill.
If someone doesn't like John Deere. Stop buying fucking John Deere. You want to have full control of your machine? Grab a mobile controller and have at it. No one is stopping you.
There's nothing special about John Deere. 90% of their shit is standard J1939 protocol, and the few proprietary messaging that is John Deere specific is available if you ask, or you can sniff it out easily.
All locked down maintenance stuff is 100% there to record and verify that the farmer is taking care of the equipment properly.
The amount of "I want warranty!!!!" removed, but they didn't change any filters, abused the machine, or used it for something it wasn't designed for is far worse than any car mechanic shop you've ever seen.
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So ... what part of that has anything to do with a farmer getting screwed when their equipment breaks down and they're locked out of effecting a repair they're more than capable of doing?
When they're racing time and the weather waiting on an overbooked repair tech that can get them in at their convenience a few days from now, and charge an arm and a leg for the pleasure? Who's liable to tell them they need to bring it to the shop 50+ miles away?
Sure: they could buy another brand ... that doesn't work as nearly as well. That's not compatible with the $500k+ of JD equipment and attachments they already own. That isn't well supported in their region.
Farmers aren't pissed because JD is preventing them from doing stupid shit. They're pissed because JD is using every anti-consumer practice in the book to extract as much money as possible from a captive market and fucking them at the same time.
warranty
Warranties don't cover damage from abuse, misuse, and user modifications already.
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That's hella interesting. What's your field if I may ask?
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You are not wrong.
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John Deere is creating a national security issue by not allowing tractors to be repaired, change my mind.
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The war in Ukraine proves that farm equipment can and will be converted to war machines during times of crisis. Irreparable tractors will leave our boys in the heartland unable to adequately defend themselves in a land war! We need national security arguments for more things. Our overseas presence is strong, but our homeland is a mess.
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National Security?
Bro, you're thinking too small - this affects the security of all mankind on Earth. With falling yields from Ukraine and other conflict growing around the world, I except agricultural output to dip DRASTICALLY in the coming years. This means it will more than likely fall to the Deer dominated production area to take up the slack and feed humanity.
I wish US regulators would see the importance of agriculture and would stop letting multi-billion dollar companies bully the actual producers of our food chain.
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For those not familiar, John Deere did the Keurig 2.0 thing with their tractors. Instead of unofficial coffee pods though, it's every part of a tractor.
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Keurig tried to QR code all of their pods so third party ones wouldn't work. Super simple hacks were quickly released. It was in the name of "consumer safety" or some shit like that.
https://www.mashupmom.com/top-four-ways-to-hack-your-keurig-2-0/
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You mean the Apple thing.
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The company told the court that it has "never hidden" that some repairs require the company's dealers.
“Everything’s cool because we told people ahead of time that we were fucking them!”
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This has been going on for more than a decade.
Copyright law. The same hill Obama decided Aaron Schwartz should die on to protect the profitability of private journals command over academia.
Neo-liberalism needs thrown into the "Nationalists Christians" pile.
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It's creeped into the car market as well. Can't even clear codes on new Dodges
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Nov 27 (Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Monday said Deere & Co (DE.N) must face claims from crop farms and farmers that the agricultural machinery maker has unlawfully conspired to restrict services for maintenance and repair.
U.S. District Judge Iain Johnston in Rockford, Illinois, rejected Deere's effort to dismiss consolidated lawsuits accusing the Moline, Illinois-based company of violating U.S. antitrust law.
The judge said the plaintiffs had met legal thresholds to pursue their claims.
"According to the complaint's allegations, Deere has the ultimate control of the repair services market," Johnston wrote in his 89-page order. "These allegations are not mere legal conclusions. The complaint is chock-full of factual allegations to support this conclusion."
Deere has denied the allegations and will have a chance at a later stage in the case to dispute the merits of the farmers' claims.
A Deere spokesperson and attorneys for the company at Jones Day on Monday did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
A lead plaintiffs' attorney in the case, Daniel Hedlund of law firm Gustafson Gluek in Minneapolis, said they "look forward to continuing to pursue the claims of their farmer clients in this right to repair antitrust case."
The case is part of a growing push from consumers and others challenging restrictions on maintenance and repair. A U.S. judge in California this month dismissed a right-to-repair case against Tesla but said drivers could refile an amended complaint.
The Biden administration broadly has backed a federal legislative effort to end restrictive repair practices, which critics argue raises costs for consumers.
In the Deere litigation, six prospective class actions were consolidated last year before Johnston. The cases allege Deere has conspired with dealerships to control where and how machines are maintained and repaired.
The complaint said farmers are "prevented from using trusted, less expensive, and more conveniently located skilled mechanics who are not affiliated with Deere."
Lawyers for Deere have argued that only a "small subset" of repairs must be done at Deere-authorized dealerships. The company told the court that it has "never hidden" that some repairs require the company's dealers.
In a filing, the lawyers said federal antitrust law does not require "Deere to give all of its proprietary repair tools and software to anyone who happens to want them."
The case is In re: Deere & Co Repair Service Antitrust Litigation, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, 3:22-cv-50188.
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