[HN Gopher] Alabama farmer sues John Deere for 'right to repair'
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Alabama farmer sues John Deere for 'right to repair'
Author : SQL2219
Score : 200 points
Date : 2022-01-23 19:10 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.al.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.al.com)
| jbkiv wrote:
| This has become a general problem. There seems to be more money
| in "software services" than in building tractors and motors.
|
| John Deere is not unique. All common rail engines require a visit
| from a "certified engineer" who has access to the software. This
| is terrible in the marine industry where you can't get one in the
| middle of the ocean and you can't repair yourself either. What do
| you do? Do you sail to a harbor? You can't unless you have a
| sailboat. Get a tow to the nearest Volvo/Yanmar dealer? You must
| be kidding, thousand of miles away?
|
| So yes, that lawsuit makes sense.
|
| As for a class action lawsuit some of the comments in the thread
| misunderstand how it works: 1. Secure one or two plaintiffs. Two
| or three is better. Make sure they represent owners well: no
| conflicts, not paid to sue, good/clean plaintiffs. 2. Find the
| right location for the lawsuit. Location is very important in the
| US. Not only the state but the county. This is VERY important.
| Good plaintiff lawyers know where to sue. 3. Get your judge to
| certify the class action. "this lawsuit is on behalf of all users
| of John Deere tractors, etc". This is ALSO very important. John
| Deere will fight that. They will claim that those two plaintiffs
| do not represent the class, blabla. 4. Fight in court. Other
| plaintiffs have nothing to do. If the class action lawsuit wins
| on behalf of thousands of owners this represents a lot of money.
| It costs nothing to plaintiffs. Lawyers typically get 30%,
| sometimes less. If they are too greedy (they all are) the judge
| may object and cut down the fees. 5. Users can "opt out" of the
| payment if John Deere loses in court after appeals. Most
| plaintiffs do not opt out because they can't afford to fight big
| corporations.
|
| Unfortunately corporations are not always fair. We have seen
| many, many cases when poor farmer John just could not pay the
| exorbitant costs imposed by John Deere. Understand that these
| people have learned to be self-sufficient. They weld their broken
| massive tools in the field. They call the mobile repair shop to
| fix and tune their engines. Now they can't do anything. That
| massive, expensive John Deer is like a beached whale. Nothing you
| can do about it.
|
| Hence class action lawsuits in the US. Some of them are abusive
| (i.e.recent att phone bills, 100M customers collect $1, lawyers
| collect $30M), but sometimes there are no other ways (asbestos,
| workplace injuries, brain damage near chemical waste from
| mining). Folks outside the US struggle to understand the system.
|
| It is why today you can enjoy Non-Apple store repairs to your
| phone, non OEM parts for your car or non branded cartridges for
| your printer.
|
| I wish that such a lawsuit will force John Deere to change its
| practices, like it forced other companies to do so.
| aaron_m04 wrote:
| Can't John Deere just have customers sign away their right to
| sue or be party to a class action? They could make that a
| requirement for new customers or customers seeking repairs.
| jbkiv wrote:
| They can. Up to a point. If you push too much one day you
| will face a jury composed of normal people. We have
| experienced that in some states with non compete agreements.
| It got to the point that you could no longer work anywhere
| else. Sometimes the company would make you sign documents
| saying that they owned the IP you were creating AFTER your
| departure. Don't push too hard because at one point you will
| that jury of normal people. And they will make their mind
| very quickly.
| bluGill wrote:
| What about after the tractor is sold to someone else?
|
| The EPA also doesn't like the idea of people making things
| not pass emissions.
| verisimi wrote:
| I get what you are saying.... that we can use the law to gain
| the right to repair.
|
| But step back - how is any of that morally right? Why should
| people have to fight corporation in court to get a basic right
| to repair the thing they bought? Its insane!
|
| Surely, if there was any sense to this, the presumption would
| be in favour of the purchaser by default! Regardless of any
| service contract or other legal agreement. That it should be
| for the corporation to argue in court that there are some
| special circumstances that mean that default ruling does not
| apply, even though you bought (not rented) their product.
|
| The fact it is this way round tells you all you need to know.
| At best, the consumer can waste time (10 years?) and money
| (lots) to hopefully (but perhaps not) prove the obvious case.
| OTOH, there is no incentive for the corporation not to try the
| dirtiest most unfriendly tactics they think they can get away
| with. Esp. if they have a near monopoly in their domain (eg
| John Deere).
|
| For this reason and others, I see governance and law as
| captured entities - they are captured by corporations and we
| the consumers are there to have our wealth extracted from while
| retaining very few rights. Frankly, it is neo-feudalism. Or
| fascism (corporate+government together).
| iamstupidsimple wrote:
| Stallman and FSF predicted this decades ago, but they failed
| to foresee not many people really care about being able to
| control their computers as much as big expensive hardware
| purchases like vehicles. DRM and general lack of free-
| software rights is the root-cause.
| jbkiv wrote:
| I agree with you say verisimi. Pretty sad. As much as I hate
| trial lawyers, as of today we would not be better off without
| them. Bad corporations will squeeze money out of you as much
| as they can.
| tempnow987 wrote:
| Some ideas:
|
| If folks actually value "right to repair" support companies that
| offer right to repair.
|
| If no tractor company exists that offer the type of open setup
| you want and you think this is critical - start a company up and
| take out Deere and others.
|
| Deere's views on software changes by users in the field is pretty
| darn clear.
|
| My own view - having watched individuals and dealers etc "tune"
| trucks etc (with all the endless problems involved) - is that for
| something like a 10,000 part count + heavy piece of equipment -
| Deere is going to want to keep stuff locked up tight to preserve
| brand value. Apple has done this with iphones, and the resale
| value after 5 years on an iphone is incredible compared to
| players pushing out android phones.
| eesmith wrote:
| It was easier to pass an automotive right to repair passed in
| Massachusetts in 2012 than it was to start a successful auto
| company that could have anywhere near the same impact.
|
| The car companies, threatened by having to comply with
| different laws in different states, came to an agreement that
| the car companies would follow the Massachusetts law across the
| US.
|
| You can watch individuals and dealers etc "tune" trucks now as
| a direct consequence of that 10 year old law passing.
|
| There's no obligation for the law to preserve brand value when
| considering an anti-monopoly case. Standard Oil wasn't broken
| apart because of gung-ho oil companies.
| _dain_ wrote:
| "don't like it? just build your own X" isn't a solution, it's a
| sneering dismissal: let them eat cake.
|
| we need regulation. force companies to provide a minimum
| standard of repairability.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| Unfortunately 'regulation' is entirely in Deere's favor,
| thanks to the USPTO and their habit of allowing companies to
| claim underlying ideas rather than specific implementations.
|
| E.g., US8874261 mentioned in this article:
|
| https://www.ipwatchdog.com/2015/02/18/john-deere-patents-
| hyb...
|
| https://patents.google.com/patent/US8874261B2/en?oq=8874261
|
| Claim 1 from that patent:
|
| A method for operating a mobile robot, the method comprising:
|
| - Collecting range data of one or more objects in an
| environment around the robot;
|
| - Identifying uniquely identifiable ones of the objects as
| navigation landmarks:
|
| - Storing a reference map of the navigation landmarks based
| on the collected range data;
|
| - Establishing a list or sequence of way points for the robot
| to visit, each way point defined with reference to one or
| more landmarks;
|
| - Reading a message on a tag posted at or near one or more
| way points; and
|
| - Managing a task based on the read message.
|
| When this claim was granted by the USPTO, John Deere was
| given exclusive rights to the general _concept_ of robot
| navigation between waypoiints with the addition of "reading
| a message on a tag" and acting accordingly. To the layman
| this language sounds specific enough, but those skilled in
| the art (or in possession of an HN user name) will recognize
| it as Turing equivalence. Indeed, the next few claims make it
| clear that ownership of the idea of conditional execution of
| tasks at waypoints is exactly the goal of the patent.
|
| So, good luck building a competing farm implement that
| actually does anything useful. The "innovators" at Deere have
| made sure that you can do no such thing for the next 12
| years.
| ChrisLomont wrote:
| That's not how patents work. Each claim is not a patented
| thing. A chain of claims forms the patented thing. There's
| at least 9 dependent claims hanging on that first one.
| Kon-Peki wrote:
| Right. It's best to think of the claims in a patent as a
| set of DAGs (a single patent can contain multiple
| "inventions"). To infringe, you have to go from a
| starting node to a connected ending node and
| implement/match all nodes along the path.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| The dependency chain flows upward, not downward. Later
| claims depend on the earlier ones that they reference
| ("2. The method of claim 1..."), but the presence of
| claim 2 does not alter the meaning or enforcability of
| claim 1.
|
| (I should point out that IANAL, so if there are instances
| in which this isn't strictly correct, it'd be interesting
| to learn about them. Downvoting without comment doesn't
| enlighten anyone.)
| Imaiomus wrote:
| My question is what is wrong with the other brand?
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AGCO
| noselasd wrote:
| JD may effectively have a monopoly where the farmer lives.
| You're quite dependent on getting parts, help , knowledge,
| service, etc. locally with equipment like this.
| markdown wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahindra_Tractors
|
| FTFY.
|
| Seriously though, the point isn't that there are alternatives,
| but that one should have the right to repair whatever machine
| they _own_.
| nimbius wrote:
| disclosure: im a diesel mechanic by trade and Mahindra's are
| a real treat!!
|
| I absolutely endorse Mahindra but if youre outside TN theyre
| kinda hard to come by. the tractors are less reliable than
| more modern western designs but faster and easier to repair
| by far. new head seals rocker arms valve guide seals and an
| oil change was 6 hours of labor and i actually started to
| enjoy it. bolts are over-built for what you need in some
| cases. the gyrovator has some of the beefiest engine mounts
| ive come across in a long time (looking at you Western Star)
|
| im sure every one comes with a free "you dont want that" from
| the usual scumbags at the dealer but if you have an engine
| lift you can service your own Jivo very easily from tip to
| tail. the only reason our shop saw one was because the owner
| couldnt safely work on the engine (gyrovator series) as he
| was 71 years old.
| userbinator wrote:
| _less reliable than more modern western designs but faster
| and easier to repair by far_
|
| This sounds similar to the contrast between older and newer
| cars too; the older ones were designed to last with
| periodic scheduled maintenance, whereas newer ones are
| designed to have no maintenance for their "design life",
| after which it's difficult to repair.
| jacquesm wrote:
| I had a Kubota and loved it. Easy to work on, parts readily
| available, affordable and no more electronics than it
| really needed to have.
|
| How do Kubota and Mahindra compare side-by-side?
| LgWoodenBadger wrote:
| Aftermarket support. JD and Kubota are almost guaranteed
| to have attachments, enhancements, etc made specifically
| for them.
|
| My Massey Ferguson has some offerings, but not nearly as
| many as those two. It's similar for the other also-rans:
| New Holland, Kioti, Mahindra, RK, Bronson, and so on.
| nimbius wrote:
| kubota parts were faster for us to order since theyre
| used in construction all over the US and theyre a little
| more interchangeable, but you make that difference up
| with mahindra because you can fix more of it in the field
| to begin with.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Thank you for answering.
|
| I lived in a area where there were a lot of small and
| fairly poor farmers. I also had a machine shop. You can
| see where this is going: come harvest time tons of stuff
| that had been sitting for a year suddenly had to work 16
| hours per day and predictably quite a bit of it would
| break in the field, usually simple stuff, bearings,
| shafts, welds. So once word got around that I was an ok
| welder with a machine shop every year a couple of farmers
| would find their way to my door with broken balers, older
| harvesters and s on. Fixing those would keep us in
| produce and meat for months. But I never ran into a
| Mahindra, though they were in use.
| CivBase wrote:
| You assume the customer has the information needed to make that
| decision before the purchase. In reality, most people don't
| have a reliable way to compare the repairability of
| products/brands before making a purchase. Even if they did, if
| the majority of the market doesn't valie repair, that can
| easily ruin it for those who do. It especially punishes those
| who are behind economically and can't afford replacements or
| "authorized" repair options (assuming they are even available).
| robbedpeter wrote:
| Farmers are equipment nerds. It comes with the territory.
| They aren't an ignorant consumer market, which is why we're
| seeing a big push for right to repair from that industry -
| hopefully they carry the torch for ignorant consumers in
| computers and cars and other markets.
| CivBase wrote:
| Some are. Some aren't. I know farmers on both sides. You
| can't paint massive demographics with broad strokes like
| that.
| LgWoodenBadger wrote:
| From what I've seen, maintenance is an afterthought, and
| even then only until something breaks. That's where the
| right to repair comes in. Had they done the preventative
| maintenance, it likely wouldn't have broken, alas...
| Gustomaximus wrote:
| I dont understand why people keep buying JD tractors.
|
| They have a reputation for reliability, so do many other brands.
| Kubota, Deutz, Fent, Massy, Case, New Holland... a bunch more.
|
| It's amazing the brand loyalty hold JD have on farmers.
| Raed667 wrote:
| A pretty good video on the subject
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGH6pxNouCY
| rafale wrote:
| John Deere will just claim they never sold him a tractor, but
| rather signed a custom contract with him that gives him access
| and custody of one in return of some constraints he agreed upon.
|
| If the government intervenes, it would undermine the free market.
| But you could argue it's already undermined, both by the
| government itself and the fact that somehow John Deere managed to
| achieve a monopoly in a sector critical to national security.
| lostgame wrote:
| While this is great news; I unfortunately have to wonder how
| effective this is going to be. We need likely a much, much larger
| subset of farmers joining such a class action lawsuit - ideally
| from as many states as possible - to get this to change.
|
| Out of their greed; John Deere will fight this with all they
| have.
|
| I still think the best solution to this is still a startup that
| can create tractors that don't require repairs by a first party.
| I understand the difficulties behind such an operation, but I'm
| unfortunately not sure how successful such a lawsuit will be in
| America without the hell of a lot more 'ooomph' behind it.
| spicybright wrote:
| I've been hearing about farmers trying to organize for at least
| the past 5 years to tackle this. I'm not going to hold my
| breath for much progress, sadly.
|
| An "open tractor" from a new company is also going to be hard
| to justify with how thin margins are with farming.
|
| Maybe some techies can get together to make repair easier. New
| electronic control boards, diagrams of how to machine their own
| replacement parts, etc. for the most popular tractors people
| own.
|
| It's a tough problem to solve, but one worth fighting any way
| we can.
| NexRebular wrote:
| Wonder if they could start buying company stock to get enough
| voting power to make a difference...
| bluGill wrote:
| No entity can legally own more than 10% of John Deere's
| stock. I forget why that rule is. Something they are in,
| perhaps finance? If farmers are acting as a group they
| probably would be in trouble for individual purchases that
| collectively violate the rules.
| thr0wawayf00 wrote:
| > I still think the best solution to this is still a startup
| that can create tractors that don't require repairs by a first
| party.
|
| You're still going up against massively entrenched and
| influential opposition that could likely undercut a startup's
| prices and then raise them again once the competition dies.
|
| We saw it with the rideshare companies. Their business models
| are flexible enough to take losses when necessary in order to
| beat out alternatives and then programmatically raise the
| prices again once they've captured the market again.
| Retric wrote:
| The issue is they are operating in the printer ink model
| where the initial price is discounted based on expected
| future revenue. That's a hard nut to crack because any open
| competition is fighting from a seeming price disadvantage.
| MrsPeaches wrote:
| Just wanted to say thank you for the insightful comment.
|
| > That's a hard nut to crack because any open competition
| is fighting from a seeming price disadvantage.
|
| What other markets are there, where new entrants face the
| same problem?
| cabalamat wrote:
| > I still think the best solution to this is still a startup
| that can create tractors that don't require repairs by a first
| party.
|
| Do other tractor manufacturers have Deere-style DRM? I imagine
| some don't.
| Overtonwindow wrote:
| Is it possible to invest in this lawsuit? Considering how Peter
| Theil invested in the Hogan lawsuit, perhaps there should be a
| legal investment concept.
|
| Edit: Well, it appears there is something like this already.
| "Crowd Justice" https://www.crowdjustice.com/
| imglorp wrote:
| I would like to see a much broader decision, something
| * applying to all products, not just ag * allowing my
| choice of parts * allow me or my choice of shop to
| work on it * no cryptographic DRM'ed parts *
| access to schematics, shop manuals, and admin/interface
| software
| loonster wrote:
| IIRC, investing in lawsuits can also open you up to liability
| if you lose.
| djoldman wrote:
| Instead of a special right to repair law, it may be more prudent
| to expand anti-competition law to include the practice of
| precluding competition via impeding repair.
| cletus wrote:
| The example is of course egregious ($600 for a software update
| for a wire that got wet, basically). I fully support being able
| to repair your own stuff but I have no idea how you regulate this
| so companies don't gouge "owners" for aftermarket services.
|
| Earlier today there was a thread about e-bike battery prices
| (tl'dr they're ridiculous expensive). I really wish rechargeable
| batteries had interchangeable form factors like normal batteries.
| I can't help but feel that if AA batteries were invented today
| there's no way there'd be a standard form factor.
|
| But this issue is complicated. As much as first-party parts and
| accessories cost too much, there can be deadly consequences with
| shoddy third party products [1]:
|
| > In July, a Chinese woman died after being electrocuted from a
| charging iPhone 5. Later that week, another man in China suffered
| a similar injury from a charging iPhone 4, leaving him comatose.
| In both cases, the victims were using an unofficial third-party
| adapter to charge their device.
|
| So how do you guarantee something third-party will do what it
| claims to? If you use bad RAM chips in a Macbook, the consumer is
| going to blame Apple not whoever supplied cheap, shoddy parts
| (for the record, I hate soldered in RAM).
|
| As an aside, I was unsurprised to see in this article this is a
| small farm. The harsh truth is that family farms and small farms
| in general are a dying way of life and just aren't competitive
| with industrial-scale agriculture. You can't fight the incoming
| tide forever.
|
| [1]: https://appleinsider.com/articles/13/11/28/thai-man-dies-
| aft...
| imgabe wrote:
| Apple can make the customer whole and then go sue the 3rd party
| manufacturer. Apple has far more resources and clout to hold
| manufacturers accountable than any one customer. "Don't make
| crappy parts or Apple will send a team of lawyers to bankrupt
| you" would be a credible threat.
| userbinator wrote:
| _So how do you guarantee something third-party will do what it
| claims to?_
|
| You don't. There's something called freedom and personal
| responsibility. Unfortunately the corporations and governments
| seem quite determined to take them away from us.
| consp wrote:
| > Earlier today there was a thread about e-bike battery prices
| (tl'dr they're ridiculous expensive)
|
| Small rant about those since I missed the earlier thread today:
| It's even worse. They are stupidly expensive yes, but even if
| you source them yourself they will cost you another 100
| dollar/euro/pound to "enable". It's DRM for batteries and
| serves no real purpose except price gouging. If you rip out the
| 18650 cells (which are in almost all detachable models which is
| the majority) and replace them you have to re-enable the
| device. If the battery somehow drains "completely" and you are
| able to get it out of safe mode, which is quite possible since
| the battery isn't actually dead, you have to go to a dealer and
| pay the surcharge as well. There are plenty of good second hand
| models available which are useless due to the battery DRM since
| the price of the battery will be about 3-5 times the bike.
|
| > So how do you guarantee something third-party will do what it
| claims to? If you use bad RAM chips in a Macbook, the consumer
| is going to blame Apple not whoever supplied cheap, shoddy
| parts (for the record, I hate soldered in RAM).
|
| Just like when your car goes to a garage and doesn't work
| afterwards: the person who 'fixed' it. I can't get it in my
| head why people think this will be different for other things
| than cars.
| AdamJacobMuller wrote:
| > I have no idea how you regulate this
|
| This is my concern too, but, I think way more broadly than you.
|
| I _love_ the idea of right to repair. I agree on a fundamental
| level, this is your device, you bought it, you own it, you
| should be able to do with it as you please.
|
| What I don't agree with is creating additional regulatory or
| legislative burdens on companies. I have a number of concerns
| with doing so, but, philosophically I don't see it as the
| government's right to unduly interfere in apple (or samsung, or
| john deere's) right to sell me a product I want to buy.
|
| More directly, I am worried about right to repair stifling
| innovation and competition. I could easily see a regulatory
| body require all phone's have user-replaceable batteries and
| that is not something which I fundamentally want in a phone. It
| has tradeoffs which I don't want to make.
|
| That said, I think companies like Apple refusing to sell
| genuine replacement parts at any price is egregious.
|
| However, I also think the government forcing private companies
| to disclose things like engineering or repair manuals which
| contain secret/trade information is equally egregious.
|
| All of this is a long way around to saying that while I love
| the concept of right to repair, the devil is in the details and
| I haven't seen anyone really enumerate the details of what
| they'd actually like to put into law.
|
| Am I wrong and is there anyone with actual proposed
| legislation?
| kube-system wrote:
| > I really wish rechargeable batteries had interchangeable form
| factors like normal batteries.
|
| They largely do. For example, the famous 18650 which powers all
| kinds of devices from power banks to laptops to cars.
|
| If what you're referring to is their common inclusion into
| proprietary battery _packs_ , there are some technical reasons
| for that difference, like cell balancing, safety protections,
| etc. While it could be possible to engineer some (but not all)
| of these concerns out of the equation, you'd end up with a more
| expensive larger and heavier product.
| pessimizer wrote:
| Hopefully people are directly lobbying Biden on this right now.
| Anti-monopoly action has been his only significant priority (and
| only deviation from the status quo.) IMO that's why he's being
| continually slammed in the media on easily predictable
| legislative failures on "progressive" legislation in this
| particular Congress. I'd suspect if polled on each component of
| his anti-monopoly orders, the public would give them 90%+
| support, but those the papers ignore (allowing them to be quietly
| rolled back under the next POTUS, unnoticed.)
| [deleted]
| shagie wrote:
| For industrial equipment (such as a tractor), who is liable for
| injuries if the equipment is repaired or modified by a 3rd party
| and it goes to court later?
|
| https://www.biren.com/blog/2020/september/defective-machiner...
|
| In particular https://www.justia.com/trials-
| litigation/docs/caci/1200/1245...
|
| > The [misuse/ [or] modification] was so highly extraordinary
| that it was not reasonably foreseeable to [name of defendant],
| and therefore should be considered as the sole cause of [name of
| plaintiff]'s harm.
|
| So, if it was foreseeable that a 3rd party may modify some
| equipment in some way, the manufacturer must specifically warn
| the purchaser about "don't do that."
|
| With software, this becomes a much more difficult challenge.
|
| Additionally, https://www.justia.com/trials-
| litigation/docs/caci/1200/1244...
|
| > [Name of defendant] claims that [he/she/nonbinary pronoun/it]
| is notresponsible for any harm to [name of plaintiff] based on a
| failure to warn because [name of plaintiff] is a sophisticated
| user of the [product]. To succeed on this defense, [name of
| defendant] must prove that, at the time of the injury, [name of
| plaintiff], because of [his/her/nonbinary pronoun]particular
| position, training, experience, knowledge, or skill, knew or
| should have known of the [product]'s risk, harm, or danger.
|
| So with software, either the user is a sophisticated user and
| aware of the implications of installing their own patches on the
| system and what that could do (over fertilize a field because of
| an incorrect setting on the gps calibration)... or they aren't.
| If they _aren 't_ a sophisticated user of the system, then it
| should be locked down sufficiently to prevent those changes.
|
| > "The sophisticated user defense concerns warnings.
| Sophisticated users 'arecharged with knowing the particular
| product's dangers.' 'The rationale supporting the defense is that
| "the failure to provide warnings about risks already known to a
| sophisticated purchaser usually is not a proximate cause of harm
| resulting from those risks suffered by the buyer's employees or
| downstream purchasers."
|
| So are we expecting farmers to be software engineers too?
| Rygian wrote:
| No, we're not expecting farmers to be software engineers. But
| we expect they can hire actual software engineers other than
| Deere's.
| heavyset_go wrote:
| Any idiot who tinkers with cars can flash custom firmware on
| their car's ECU without a problem, and cars can very easily
| maim or kill users and the people around them. I don't buy this
| argument.
| shagie wrote:
| Cars are not industrial equipment though and the insurance
| liabilities on those are different.
|
| https://www.mcguirewoods.com/news-
| resources/publications/us-...
|
| It has similar Misuse or Alteration of Product defense...
| but...
|
| https://ggrmlawfirm.com/blog/personal-injury/car-
| customizati...
|
| > A hobbyist who does his or her own customization work often
| assumes the risk that some part of the work wasn't completed
| correctly. Making changes to a car in a way that renders the
| car unsafe could expose the hobbyist to liability for any
| resulting injuries. Absent insurance that specifically covers
| it, the hobbyist could be left bearing all of the cost of the
| ensuing litigation and compensation to injured parties.
|
| It is the hobbyist that has the liability. So if you change
| your car's ECU its _you_ that are liable when it gets in a
| wreck, not the car company for having a faulty product.
|
| For industrial equipment, that doesn't exist. If you can make
| a change to the industrial equipment and the equipment
| manufacturer doesn't try to stop you, the equipment
| manufacturer is likely liable for damages.
|
| There's a powerpoint (awkward to read in a web browser -
| "Product Liability Law in the Farm Equipment Industry" from
| agrability.org also as part of a recorded webinar at
| https://youtu.be/NdN577BbnSY ). 11:33 talks about Strict
| Liability and 19:24 talks about farm equipment being
| "reasonably safe". The case studies are also interesting -
| pay attention at 42:23 where it points out who is paying for
| the injury.
| mistrial9 wrote:
| ok - "you are too stupid to own this equipment" and "we know
| what is best for you" basically?
| [deleted]
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