ifixit, an organization founded by Kyle Wiens and Luke Soules to share knowledge about repairing everything, has consistently rated each iteration of the Apple AirPods a 0 out of 10 in repairability, citing competitors with similar features that make it easier to switch batteries and repair common failure points.
Apple’s answer is that the product is unchanged because it is the best product possible, with the best set of tradeoffs for the user, zero score be damned.
The Right to Repair debate is between those who believe that users have the right to modify their own products, and those who believe that, in a capitalist system, creators should be able to sell whatever products they think the market values most––regardless of what customers are able to do with those products afterwards.
Because technology is everywhere, the debates take place everywhere, often hinging on public opinion to determine how the law is made and interpreted. The debates typically center around what activities may void the warranty, who is allowed to fix a device (//i.e. only licensed service providers, or any repair shop), whether creators must design devices with repairability in mind, and how much creators are required to support consumers who wish to continue using a device long after the company has stopped selling it.
The Right to Repair debate holds a special place in the heart of a unique and important group: builders. But the debate is unique in that the tech community at large has no definitive say on the right to repair.
Roughly, on one side of the debate sits an exemplary capitalist archetype: the rugged individual consumer, who longs to live autonomously and repair his own machines with his bare hands. Many engineers learned to build by taking apart and servicing some system, whether it be a car, a PC, or even an operating system; denying future generations the opportunity because electronics were replaced with unopenable black boxes seems like a tragedy.
However, on the other side of the Right to Repair debate sits another, even more lionized capitalist archetype: the all-knowing creator, an idiosyncratic genius whose taste is constrained only by the whims of the market. If the ability to repair a device is so valuable, then shouldn’t the market produce repairable devices without legislative intervention? And if I like my AirPods super-slick and closed-source, then why shouldn’t Apple be able to sell me an unrepairable product, if I want to spend money on it?
As of now, the state of debate is unusually good. After years of trash-talking each other in the media, companies and consumer advocates are finding common ground, like a recent California Right to Repair bill that Apple supported after years of intense lobbying for stasis. This situation is undoubtedly a compromise, leaving both sides unhappy but feeling heard and not threatened strategically. It’s far from over though. As long as the interests of the Rugged Individual are misaligned with that of the Genius Creator, the battle for machines’ souls will continue.
The story of Right to Repair begins in 1990. For the first time, a new piece of federal legislation known as the Clean Air Act Amendments required auto manufacturers to include a computer in their vehicles to monitor emissions. The computer allowed repair shops to check if the emissions were in compliance.; if not, shops were authorized to charge the customer for any repairs needed to bring it into compliance.
While writing the law, the legislators knew they had to avoid a consumer nightmare. By requiring a new device and ongoing emissions checks, they were potentially handing auto manufacturers a new, exclusive revenue stream: if you build a device that only your dealerships can check and repair, then customers would have no choice but to work with your authorized dealers in order to be in federal compliance. Auto dealerships could then charge consumers exorbitant prices in order to have their devices repaired––since, if customers refused to pay the fee, they would have to take their car off the road. To prevent such monopolistic dynamics from forming, federal legislators required that auto manufacturers share their tools and knowledge with independent repair shops. California even added their own additional legislation, requiring that auto manufacturers not only provide this information, but that they do so “in the same form and manner and to the same extent as is made available to dealers and authorized repair facilities utilizing said repair information system” and “at cost and terms that are no greater than fair market value and nondiscriminatory as compared with the terms and costs charged to dealers or authorized repair facilities.”
The federal government specifically mandated that independent shops be able to repair air quality monitoring devices, but not all software that auto manufacturers might put in their cars. As cars become more software heavy, the number of unrepairable components increased exponentially. When auto manufacturers put electronics and software into every other component of the car, they had no such obligation to enable potential competitors. Software gave manufacturers the ability to create their own monopoly in servicing vehicles.
By 2001, it was a common experience for consumers to be turned away from an independent shop because they lacked the diagnostic tools and software to service a modern vehicle. Consumers had little choice but to work through official dealers. And, as the legislators in 1990 had anticipated, official service shops began to take enormous liberty with the price and quality of their services now that they no longer needed to compete for business. In testimony before the Senate, the American Service Association––the lobbying arm for the independent service shops––estimated that $18 billion in sales to independent shops were being lost every year due to proprietary telematics, which accounts for roughly 10% of the auto repair market before these dynamics hit en masse.
Stuck with failing vehicles they could either pay exorbitant fees to repair, or replace altogether, consumers seemingly had no choice but to seeth. But over time, politicians began to take notice. In 2002, Sen. Wellstone of Minnesota introduced the Motor Vehicle Owners’ Right to Repair Act in the U.S. Senate (displayed on facing page).
It did not have traction to become legislation, but the bill created the basic framework for how Right to Repair laws would look: manufacturers must disclose information and tools necessary for aftermarket support but not at the expense of trade secrets.
Then, in 2012, Massachusetts took up the mantle. It is not obvious that the issues in Massachusetts was particularly aggravated relative to other states or even relative to a decade before, as data about the issue is elusive. What can be said definitively is that public opinion soured on the topic, as evidenced by two significant popular motives.
First, state legislators introduced a bill enshrining a Right to Repair motor vehicles for all Massachusetts residents. Second and simultaneously, Right to Repair advocates introduced a ballot initiative to mandate Right to Repair for motor vehicles.
Ultimately, both would pass overwhelmingly, though they differed slightly in definitions and would only require reconciliation in 2013. Now, auto manufacturers intending to sell vehicles into the state also had to sell the tools and knowledge needed to make repairs with the public.
The Massachusetts Right to Repair Act of 2012 revealed two facts about the Right to Repair debate. First, consumers loved it, with the ballot measure passing with 86% of the vote. Second, once the tools are on the market in a state, there is no easy way to keep them in that state. Information wants to be free, and once customers in one state have access to information about how to repair a product, they can sell it to whomever they want, in whatever state they want. Functionally, therefore, any state’s right to repair bill requiring a market for tools and knowledge would become the law of the land. Soon after the MA law passed, creators quickly had to contend with both facts. In 2014, a coalition of automotive industry manufacturers issued their own memorandum indicating that “…for Model Year 2002 motor vehicles and thereafter, a manufacturer of motor vehicles sold in United States shall make available for purchase by owners of motor vehicles manufactured by such manufacturer and by independent repair facilities the same diagnostic and repair information, including repair technical updates, that such manufacturer makes available to its dealers… Each manufacturer shall provide access to such manufacturer’s diagnostic and repair information system for purchase by owners and independent repair facilities on a daily, monthly and yearly subscription basis and upon fair and reasonable terms.”
As software ate the world in the 2010s, the importance of The Right to Repair grew. Embedded electronics and software gave companies new levels of optimization over their products and enabled them to offer many new kinds of features. However, software also allowed companies to track and monitor their products after sale. (and control what kinds of repairs are made with more precision)
Software is everywhere, so the Right to Repair issue is not just limited to vehicles. Many kinds of appliances, consumer devices, and industrial devices face these issues. Creators know how popular Right to Repair bills are (what kind of consumer wouldn’t want more rights?), and they know they can only lose one state. As a result, they will fight tooth and nail to preserve their revenue streams.
But the drive to preserve the creator’s rights to make products as they please is not just selfish. At the same time that customers demand a Right to Repair, creators also face relentless pressure to innovate and delight customers, as well as to create enough profits to earn the right to keep investing in R&D. The same customers that demand a Right to Repair also demand seamless, specialized products. Americans negotiate the conflict between innovation and restriction, freedom and fair-use, everyday.
To fully understand the intentions surrounding the Right to Repair debate, one must understand the twin faces of the American spirit: the iconoclastic creator, and the rugged individual consumer. Both represent the best of individualism. But when it comes to the Right to Repair, their interests come apart.
Let’s begin with the perspective of the creator. Creators want to make the best product possible. The worst possible thing for a creator is a rule dictating how their product must be built. Any restrictions beyond the necessary constraints of time, money, and the laws of physics can only hurt, never help, when one is trying to make the best product possible. The second worst thing for a creator is a rule dictating how the product can be sold. Bundling or unbundling features and services is an important way for innovators to meet consumers’ needs. In a world of connected devices, the best performance can be often achieved by tightly integrating hardware and software. Apple is the company most famous for leveraging this strategy, tightly coupling their software with the chips they design. Ben Thompson of Stratechery makes the case that integration offers three key advantages for creators:
Integration provides for a super user experience i.e. “…differentiation based on design which, while it can’t be measured, can certainly be felt by consumers who are both buyers and users.”
Integration maximizes the likelihood of success for new products. A superior user experience can be enough to get customers to adopt the product despite high switching costs e.g. at launch, customers left Verizon for AT&T to access the iPhone despite having to abandon prior phone numbers.
Integration is incredibly profitable because a creator has a monopoly on their product and can make a relatively high amount of profit and sustain it over time. Hardware over time is almost always copied and commoditized. Software is easy to differentiate but easily copyable. But… “by combining the differentiable qualities of software with hardware that requires real assets and commodities to manufacture, Apple is able to charge an incredible premium for its products.”
To be clear, Apple does not design and manufacture all the parts in their products; nor do the other creators following similar models. Rather, they have control over what they make, what they buy, how it is all assembled. Any attempt to limit control over the product experience will be met with suspicion and hostility by creators, especially if it is by government regulators with no experience in designing these products. That includes repairability. Recalling the AirPods with a 0-of-10 repairability score, making a product with that performance, at that size and weight, and with that cost may not be possible if the government were to mandate certain components must be repairable. Because this topic is so sensitive to innovation and serviceability itself can be subjective, creators believe it should be left to the market to decide what is the best tradeoff of user experience, price, and repairability, not government regulators.
Beyond product-level innovation, a creator wants to maintain economic control over their product after it is sold. The most common way for creators to interact with consumers after a sale is through a warranty. For example, if a user does something dumb with a hammer, should the creator be responsible for giving them a replacement? Intuitively, no. At the same time, if a customer uses a hammer for its intended purpose (i.e. hammering something) and it falls apart, then the customer should probably be able to get a new one. Liberal warranty policies give consumers the confidence to try new products. But as a result, the creator wants absolute control over defining what constitutes “dumb stuff” or the “intended use”, lest this lever be pulled too much.
One challenge from consumers is that warranties are far from new, so how hard could it be to regulate them and demand some standardized expectations from consumers? This argument does not fully account for how much innovation has happened in post-sales support. The classic argument is that, by offering dedicated service plans, companies can offer different solutions to different customers. For example, Formlabs sells 3D printers used by many companies for prototyping. At $4,500, Formlabs’ printers are affordable for businesses that want quality prints but printing is not essential to their business. As a result, their warranty only covers hardware defects for up to one year. Spare parts and better warranties are available, starting at $549 or another 12% of the purchase price. Selling service is a nice side business for them, but by offering a base tier with minimal service, Formlabs expects some customers to prefer a low price and fixing their own problems versus an expensive warranty included.
For contrast, in the 1960s, Rolls-Royce switched their entire jet engine business from selling jet engines to selling service based on rate-per-flight-hour or RPFH. Instead of the airlines owning the cost of service, airlines could now buy flight-hours from the engine providers. If the engine needed service and could not fly, it would be the engine providers paying. This structure better aligned their incentives, such that engine manufacturers now had an interest in reliability, repairability, and serviceability. The industry broadly adopted this structure, and in 2024 GE Aviation made roughly triple the revenue from its service contracts as from its equipment sales. Sometimes, service is the entire business and sometimes it isn’t. The creator thinks the market should decide.
The final concern Creators have with industrial machines is leaking IP. Consumer devices are expected to be torn apart and studied; however, the secrets of how industrial machines achieve their performance can be worth billions. If competitors can access the inside of a machine or even access a guide for how to service a machine, they can glean insights into how the machine operates. I can speak with some authority here, because I have reverse engineered competitors’ performance directly from their (publicly available) service guide. Of course, many companies know reverse-engineering will happen and do it anyway because it is not that interesting or easy to replicate their business. For others, it is a matter of their growth, survival, and even geopolitics. For example, ASML, a Dutch company, is the sole producer of machines critical for making the best possible semiconductor chips. The Netherlands has partnered with the United States to prevent China from accessing these machines directly, and ASML has long been a subject of digital espionage campaigns to learn its secrets, attacks which it attributes to China. Having direct access makes this much simpler, as devices can be photographed and scanned while its programming can be copied and reverse-engineered. As a result, companies can be extremely protective of who can directly access the machine, whether it be their own technicians or authorized, trained specialists at their customer’s site who are under extreme scrutiny in how they use and share information.
Ultimately, creators want the maximum flexibility to create products and businesses with the absolute minimal regulation required. As demonstrated, there is no one-size fits all that applies to repairability. Every piece matters to the creator to make great products, differentiate from competitors, and ensure the company earns a sufficient amount to continue operating and innovating.
Self sufficiency is a prized American value, as it is essential to our sense of individuality. Self-sufficiency for consumers centers primarily on:
Right to good service. If a product breaks, a consumer wants to be able to have it fixed in a reasonable amount of time at a fair price. If a creator cannot deliver that, a consumer should be able to take their business elsewhere.
Freedom of use. A consumer should be able to use the product as they see fit without the creator disabling the device, even if it voids the warranty.
Freedom to keep using devices. Products should be obsolete when consumers decide they are obsolete rather than when creators decide to no longer support them.
Good service is frustrating for consumers but existential for small businesses. US farmers have found their self-sufficiency under assault when they purchased farm equipment from John Deere. For years, farmers have long contended John Deere imposes unreasonable restrictions on their ability to access diagnostic tools, software, and repair information in order to perform timely and cost-effective repairs. Farmers argue that these limitations force them to rely on authorized dealers and lead to increased downtime and expenses, especially during critical farming periods. Some American farmers have even resorted to alternative solutions to maintain their equipment. In March 2017, Vice reported on Nebraska farmers working with unauthorized technicians to install “hacked” firmware out of fear of John Deere disabling the tractor. Vice quoted Kevin Kenney, a farmer and Right to Repair advocate: “You want to replace a transmission and you take it to an independent mechanic—he can put in the new transmission but the tractor can’t drive out of the shop. Deere charges $230, plus $130 an hour for a technician to drive out and plug a connector into their USB port to authorize the part.” Another farmer who admitted to using the hacked software shared: “I’m not a big business or anything, but let’s say you’ve got a guy here who has a tractor and something goes wrong with it—the nearest dealership is 40 miles away, but you’ve got me or a diesel shop a mile away. The only way we can fix things is illegally, which is what’s holding back free enterprise more than anything and hampers a farmer’s ability to get stuff done, too.” Using this software voided the warranty for an expensive piece of hardware, but what use is a warranty if a farmer goes bankrupt from missing the harvest? If consumers cannot access good service from a company, then they will be forced to do it themselves.
Another issue in the Right to Repair debate is whether a creator should ever be able to control how a product is used after purchase. Historically, if you bought a product, you could use it however you wanted––because creators had no way to control their products after you took them off of their hands. If you buy a hammer, and use the hammer to kill someone, the hammer manufacturer is not responsible. However, with software products, creators are now able to monitor and control their products from afar. Creators can now draw a sharp line between “acceptable” and “unacceptable” use cases for years after a product is sold, and continuously monitor for compliance thanks to software. Through a technique known as “part pairing”, creators can use software databases to ensure only their official parts can be used with the product. If a consumer tries to use a different part, the functionality may be degraded or the product disabled. The examples here are numerous. Apple displays warning messages if using unauthorized parts and, in some cases, will refuse to start the device. In 2016, HP pushed an update that caused many third-party ink cartridges to stop working, retroactively changing the compatibility on the printer. In some cases, Tesla has blocked certain over-the-air updates unless the repairs are inspected and cleared by Tesla’s own service centers. This unprecedented ability for companies to control products after they’ve been sold shifts power away from consumers, raising profound questions about ownership, autonomy, and the balance between innovation and personal freedom.
Furthermore, without the tools and knowledge to fix devices, consumers are often stranded when creators end production of the products. D-Link, a router manufacturer, recently refused to patch 60,000 devices with a critical security flaw because it had declared them to be end-of-life. The devices perform just as well as their first day and could be fixed with a software update, but D-Link wanted to force consumers to upgrade. Owners of salvaged Teslas have reported losing access to Tesla’s Supercharger network after software updates that detect the vehicle’s status. Reportedly, the cars’ function and safety is restored, Tesla would just prefer they purchase a new vehicle than repair a broken one. Consumers should get to decide when they are done with the product, not manufacturers.
In the case of industrial machines, monopolies on service also harm customers who are not the direct purchaser. Many consumers had the experience of visiting a McDonald’s only to find the McFlurry is unavailable. The McFlurry, an ice-cream like dessert somewhere between a sundae and a milkshake, is produced by machine with a single purpose. Franchisees must buy that machine and, if it malfunctions, must work with manufacturer-authorized technicians to repair it. Any attempt by the franchisee to fix it on their own would run afoul of copyright laws. However, paying the official McDonald’s technician is often so expensive and so slow that many franchisees simply did not bother––the revenue from the McFlurry is insufficient to cover the costs.
iFixIt took a direct role in pushing for food preparation software to be exempt from copyright law. The exemption makes it so that any McDonald’s franchisee with the right technical knowledge can legally repair their machine without waiting for an expensive service repair. This is a first step towards enabling a competitive market for fixing these devices, but we still have much further to go.
Self-sufficiency is more than a cherished American value—it is a practical necessity in our increasingly interconnected, digital world. The Right to Repair movement highlights the tension between consumers’ desire for autonomy and corporations’ pursuit of control over their products long after purchase. When farmers hack their own tractors, drivers lose access to basic car functions, or small businesses face crippling service fees, it becomes clear that current systems disproportionately benefit manufacturers at the expense of individuals’ freedom to maintain and use what they rightfully own. While steps like iFixIt’s push for repair exemptions are encouraging, they are just the beginning of a broader fight to restore consumer agency. Real progress will require ongoing advocacy to reshape laws, ensure fair service options, and ultimately return power to the hands of consumers. Only then can we uphold the principle that ownership means control—not dependence on the whims of a distant creator.
The political will to create a Right to Repair has been building. In 2023, Colorado passed the Consumer Right to Repair Agricultural Equipment Act mandating that farm equipment providers must provide tools, software, and resources. Under the law, failure to do so is considered a “deceptive business act.” In March 2024, Oregon joined New York, California, and Minnesota in passing a law requiring manufacturers to provide the same parts, tools, and documentation to individuals and repair shops that they provide to their own repair teams. The EU recently addressed planned obsolescence, mandating that sellers must be able to repair devices for at least 12 months after the sale, with the 12 month repair window resetting after each repair. In 2023, John Deere and the American Farm Bureau Federation signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) that essentially promised John Deere would give the tools and access necessary for independent repair shops to fix their tractors, and farmers wouldn’t support new Right to Repair legislation. Since signing the MOU, farmers report John Deere not honoring their obligations, and, in October 2024, Sen. Warren of Massachusetts threatened John Deere with an investigation into the matter.
Most concerningly for creators is that, in recent years, politicians have expressed a newfound willingness to control their designs. The EU has actually regulated a design choice: they mandated that smartphones must use a USB-C charger, which forced Apple to switch the design of their charge port. While the push for standardized USB-C was not about repair, the precedent of a government regulating design choices has repair advocates thinking that repairability could be regulated as well. And while Apple lost the USB-C battle, their tune on repairability has changed in recent years. In 2023, Apple wrote to state legislators stating their support for a California Right to Repair bill (SB-244) that would require creators to continue selling repair manuals and tools after the company stopped selling the product for at least 3 years for products priced at or above $50 and 7 years for products priced at or above $100. In September 2023, the California Right to Repair Act passed.
The Right to Repair debate is far from settled. While many individual states have, not all state laws generalize across state lines the way the Massachusetts Right to Repair Act of 2012. For example, while food preparation software is exempted from copyright, the exception only applies to the direct customer—it is still illegal for a McDonald’s franchisee to hire someone to fix the McFlurry machine, or buy a tool to fix the machine, even they are allowed to fix it themselves. Many farmers still believe John Deere is intentionally crippling their ability to repair devices by classifying more information about their machines as “IP” than is necessary to protect their copyright––side-stepping the legal requirement to share information relevant to repairs. And consumers (like me) still suspect our iPhones run a little slower whenever Apple announces a new phone.
In 2024, our world is almost completely connected. Software is in literally every device. Creators can see and control devices to a degree never before imagined in world history. However, in a capitalist system, consumers still have the ultimate power: the power to decide what to buy. As a result, we should expect consumers to have the final say on what constitutes fair practice. In our world, the machine shares its soul between the creator and owner, and they have to talk it out.
