Victory Is Sweet: We Can Now Fix McDonald’s Ice Cream Machines
www.ifixit.com
The Copyright Office just handed down a big Right to Repair win: we can now legally repair commercial food preparation equipment, including McDonald’s machines.
  • Kazumara@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
    1·
    2 days ago

    Ah this bit is sad. The exception only covers bypassing DMCA protections to fix your own stuff not distributing the tooling for it.

    It is still a crime for iFixit to sell a tool to fix ice cream machines, and that’s a real shame. The ruling doesn’t change the underlying statute making it illegal to share or sell tools that bypass software locks. This leaves most of the repair work inaccessible to the average person, since the technical barriers remain high. Without these tools, this exemption is largely theoretical for many small businesses that don’t have in-house repair experts.

    • asdfasdfasdf@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      23 hours ago

      I wonder if someone could invent a new open source machine of some sort along with a tool to fix that, and that tool just happens to also be able to fix the McDonald’s ice cream machines?

      • themoonisacheese@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        1·
        14 hours ago

        I mean, you could. The problem becomes “do you have more money and lawyers than McDonald’s” to keep pretending it has nothing to do with it in court.

    • JohnEdwa@sopuli.xyzEnglish
      0·
      2 days ago

      Illegal like sharing pirated media.
      It can’t be commercialised, but if you just “happen” to find the software somewhere, you are allowed to use it.

  • Uninvited Guest@lemmy.caEnglish
    11·
    3 days ago

    While there is feel good framing, write ups like this just reinforce what a dystopian hell hole we live in. It is depressing.

    • Paradachshund@lemmy.todayEnglish
      1·
      2 days ago

      You’re not wrong, but I’d still encourage everyone to celebrate the small victories. If we wait for perfection it may never come.

      • Benjaben@lemmy.worldEnglish
        0·
        2 days ago

        “Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the merely good” is one (imo important) way to state it.

        • unrelatedkeg@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
          1·
          2 days ago

          Yes, but framing is important. Saying “Oh look what our perfect corporate buddies over at Taylor let us do even though it’s their call” (a huge lie btw.) vs. saying “We finally got this victory, we can finally do part of what we should’ve never have been unable to do due to corporate greed, thank you Taylor for getting some sense, it seems like your scrooges still have some semblance of a soul left” is a big difference. As always, the truth is somewhere in between these two extremes. However, I’m inclned to lean towards the latter more than the former on the spectrum.