(Adam from Free Geek here) Thank you so much for taking the time to interview us. This is good legislation that will hopefully receive a few tweaks in the future.

Good news that musical instruments are not excluded. Always good to be able to obtain service manuals for synthesisers and mixing boards etc.

Thank you, Minnesota!!👍👍 Thinking of Walter Mondale, Hubert Humphrey, and Eugene McCarthy.

Not meaning to offend my American friends but your country tends to be at the donkeys end when it comes to consumer rights, so this is great. Things like what you talk about and even the infamous John Deere change are good news for yourselves and the rest of the world.

I'm from Minnesota too and I was pretty excited when I saw our region mentioned on Louis Rossman's channel, especially considering how long the fight for this has been going on for!

Great news! I'm European and interested in R2R on our side of the pond, but I watch Louis Rossmann and his battles. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, but hopefully it's gonna be a big win in the long run. Loved the episode :)

We used to have a Free Geek here in Vancouver until it shut down back in November under murky circumstances. I volunteered there over a decade ago. I learned the ins and outs of refurbishing and recycling computers, and even got to adopt a Free Geek build after 24 volunteer hours. It had a 2.2 GHz Athlon 64 3500+, an 80 GB mechanical hard drive and came installed with Ubuntu 12.04. That was my daily PC for a few years, I experimented with various Ubuntu-based distros (like Mint 13 Cinammon edition and Lubuntu/Xubuntu 13.xx) and I even learned how to use bash on it. Although I underwent a lot of suffering trying to get Ubuntu to play nice on that potato hardware, I also learned more about what goes on under the hood, so to speak. Younger generations are less computer literate because, ironically, of how slick and "just works" the modern smartphone/tablet user experience is. Free Geek Vancouver also had open help nights on Wednesdays which saved my bacon on multiple occassions. I bought a Wii there for $35 CAD in 2017, long before Wii prices went through the roof. I'll always be grateful to Free Geek for making me a smarter computer user.

I'm predicting that a lot of components are going to be classified as "trade secrets" in order to skirt the law. I really hope I'm wrong. :( But I agree 100%, the fight isn't over, there's still much more work to do. Thank you for putting out this excellent video - the more public awareness we can get on the Right To Repair issue, the better!

The carve-out for medical devices is really painful to me, especially for implantable medical devices. I think of bionic eyes like the Argus II and the Dobelle Artificial Vision System as examples of undocumented and unserviceable implants that have been abandoned by their manufacturers, and have been rendered a ticking time-bomb to the patients that have them. Patients weren't even informed of the possibility that this could happen when they had the implants installed.

My Congress person Marie Glussenkamp Perez 3rd district of Washington State is a Auto shop owner with her husband and is working on a right to repair bill i have hopes.

Even though the carve outs are questionable, this is definitely a step in the right direction. Hopefully more states will take notice and start doing the same. I'm a big fan of Free Geek, I've purchased several laptops from Free Geek Chicago and they've all run perfectly fine for many years beyond their "shelf life".

I'm loving the STANCE you've taken. As a repair engineer, I'm really looking forward to this and hopefully it will make my and a lot of others jobs easier. Not only will this be good for the consumer but also the planet! Farming equipment sounds like *Cough* a dear John scenario.. *cough* As always, you're awesome.

This is great news. Let's hope more States do something similar. Those Free Geek guys were so dedicated.

It is a huge victory, and it's just common sense. Louis Rossmann is a KZfaqr who has been working on this for farm equipment, and I think his efforts have recently met with some success as well.

I myself have stopped buying anything that I cannot repair, this is the first consideration of wither or not I will purchase a product.

I really envy the quality of your dot-matrix printer; not a single missing dot among all those paragraphs, consistent black color across lines, no smearing and the use of continuous feed paper makes your printing a 5/5 stars.

Another similar issue is HP issuing a "printer update" that makes their printers not work unless all the ink cartridges are HP brand. In Europe that is illegal and HP has been fined millions of dollars there. Should be illegal here.

I love that "Guaranteed Offer" thumbnail! That's a little too perfect 😀

Pinned comment! Big thanks to Adam and Amanda from Free Geek for chatting. Adam has a channel ( kzfaq.info ) that you should check out. Also, I wrote a blog post about the idea that companies will leave Minnesota over this new law. I don't think that's likely for a few reasons and I outlined them here: vkc.sh/no-the-digital-fair-repair-act-will-not-cause-companies-to-leave-minnesota/

That's amazing! Good job Minnesota

Huzzah from Minnesota! There are dozens of us. DOZENS!

Love that passive aggressive snark about the carve-outs.

This is a great step in the right direction. Thanks for the video!

Such a great video! Thorough and packed so full of Minnesota flavor, I almost thought it was a hotdish! I also love how you printed the legislation on continuous form paper. Your videos rock.

It is so comfy to be here. Love your channel ❤

Thanks for the video ! I don't know if this has to do with the work that Louis Rossman has been doing over the last years with apple and other pc manufacturers, he went to speak in the Congress(Washington) for the right to repair about three years ago and that helped a lot.

Thank you so much for making this informative video!! I am actually excited for the prospects that this new law may provide to all end-user/consumers throughout the u.s.! :)

Woot! Go Minnesota! We've been passing some great laws lately.

The parts of the code show here have some pretty big loopholes though: 1. A manufacturer/distributor can slap on a label that says "not for sale in Minnesota". 2. There's an exception if the docs are not available. Which means contract manufacturing will lose them. 3. Documentation will only be made available on really expensive gold leaf paper, which can be charged for. 4. Trade secrets (as mentioned).

Being from Minnesota is nothing to be ashamed of.

Nice to see that Minnesota is doing something on this too - EU is working on the "Right to repair: Making repair easier for consumers". Sorry, can't link to it, as KZfaq keeps deleting my post, as they don't allow linking.

The cyber-security carve-out smells rather strongly to me... "security by obscurity" and all that.

1000% with you on all your points about right to repair and the need for sustainable, repairable products. You betcha, Minnesota! 👍❤

This is excellent news! Thanks for the great video, Veronica. Also congratz Minnesota!

Welcome back good to see you uploading

Those are some nice Star Trek Voyager DVDs you got back there. The video quality gets really good on the later seasons especially.

As I was watching the video, I found myself planning and plotting this 'comment', since so much to say by the fact that I agree with on so many levels ... but really it just boils down to the fact that you rock and that is why I keep coming back! I live in Ontario and am unclear on its position in this regard... You have instigated this pursuit ... Thanks again Veronica :)

Ah, htop in the background. One of my favorite cli commands.

As always writing a comment to support the channel

I used to have the service manual for my SONY MDP-850D back in the 90s. Right now considering buying a Mac Studio or more memory for one of the SuperMicros running proxmox.

HUGE Free Geek TC fan here! This was stellar!

I remember getting the electronics schematic with my TV in the 90s (in the good-old through-hole times). This fits your love for ye-olde-times well. Going to shout-out your channel to my students (aged 15-17 ish, place them in your local school system where applicable ;) )

This is awesome, I really hope this expands

Everyone repeat after me: THANK YOU LOUIS

They will make them available, but the amount of specialist tools and other junk that will be required will still stop most people being able to do it. Anyone that has tried repairing some of the latest smartphones will know what I am talking about, absolute nightmare compared to even a generation or so back.

htop in the background >> cmatrix in the background

Let see the kickbacks the state has gotten from those companies like Toro. Cmon complete transparency with all govt agencies. Lets see your bank statements just like you would demand ours.

Oh, this is a way bigger deal than I thought. It'll be interesting to see whether this holds up to legal challenges. (Also, Free Geek PDX fan and volunteer here. That reminds me, I should do another tour of volunteering...)

If anyone is interested, Louis Rossman is one of the ppl pushing to pass the right to repair laws in the US. He has a youtube channel with that name in case you want to know more about the proceedengs and how to help more in order to get this laws passed all around the country

It has to start somewhere. Definitely would be nice to see farming equipment to be repairable and I am sure it will get there over time. Medical Equipment should at least give the ability to make 3rd parties able to be certified to get repair (at least easier). It seems the bar for entry means having to be employed by the bio-med company to even touch the product.

Is this good news? YES! You betcha. just subscribed too.

Brilliant thumbnail. Great job as always, Veronica

This is a very promising start. I hope that other states follow suit. Thanks for your outstanding report.

Thanks for sharing.

dude, this is hella rad !

I live in the UK this type of law should be world wide. The farm machine from memory something happened to John Deere on the BBC web site US farmers win right to repair John Deere equipment(9 Jan 2023)?

We've got the dollars, so we have the power. Start putting your foot down on what you will and won't buy.

Did I just see a Dymo tape from a Dymo label maker ? Holy retro label makers Batman!!!

I think it would be cool to see a colab between Veronica and ThisDoesNotComp. Same region, same city even maybe?

Fairphone, Framework and UHK are ready today for this legislation. They're the three manufacturer's that I know of. Are there others?

I repair (or attempt to repair) stuff in my free time. I would love to volunteer in a place like that ;(

"Passive aggressively" changes the state of repair HAha that's the most MN thing I ever heard

Minnesota? So it's just a matter of centuries for the rest of the world!

Greaaaat news. (Are electronic appliances actually still landing on a landfill in the US? Still, repair is far better than recycling.)

Strictly-business question: Is Minnesota a large enough market that companies won't simply ... stop selling in the state (i.e., market exit) to avoid compliance?

Will the warranty be voided if we work on it? Or do we have to be certified and trained before we work on it in order to keep the support? This will just make it easier for companies to not accept returns and just say you tried to fix it and you are not certified so we can't accept it back.

The carve out for farm equipment and road vehicles is just plane wrong.

We have to fund somebody to buy one of everything.

They will design new hardware so that they are not repairable. I’ve also noticed that things like servers are getting harder to repair or upgrade. Ie having to buy genuine ram over generic stuff even though it’s the same spec.

Hopefully laptops like Framework and System76 becomes mainstream. The same should apply to the cell phones and printers. As Veronica proves, nobody should need more than 1 printer during their lifetime.

So I worked in a hospital&university research lab for +13 years doing among other things medical device design. No there isn't a reason to except it. Sure this stuff often doesn't have any security but that doesn't mean the repair manual shouldn't be public as newer products created after the law would I assume be created with security baked in.

As an unemployed tech writer, this is welcome news indeed! 😅 btw, what's the cool punk band in the outtro?

Oh Deere!

Kinda hoping the carve-out issue will fix itself. All it will take is one manufacturer to offer repairability as a sales argument and the others will follow.

Oh what I wouldnt give to volunteer there.

i'm predicting some brands will stop selling their products in this state

Yay, we might finally go back to what has been the norm for a century.

6:36 "It seems kinda SCSI" 🤪

They will own no one and be very unhappy.

My cousin has been in IT for a while now and they emulate hardware in the cloud now. It's all fluff and magic. BA

Not gonna fix the mcdonalds milkshakes!

star trek voyager fan ❤

There used to manuals for cars, but since everything is integrated electronics - different story. I remember the day when I got a Service Manual for my Atari 1040STE. 😃 The carve outs s are probably lobbied and don’t make any sense ATT ALL. Why should you not be able to repair something and rather become landfill? What would the lobbyists says, if we took broken device, especially cars and farming equipment 😅, and dump it in their front yard? 😆

Thank you for this very interesting information. I hope that this law will impact the right to repair everywhere in the world. Although many devices require a such law, I am however having a few words of caution. Are you aware that, for example, a poorly repaired insulin pump can kill its user? There are cases and devices that, as a consumer, I do *NOT* want to repair myself.

Are you saying that I will not be able to enter into an agreement with a manufacturer to buy a product that has no repair manuals? Or that if I don't want to do repairs I will still pay the same price as those who do? I will in effect subsidize the repair manuals for others? If these are true, I don't like it one bit. Giving up freedom for security never ends well.

Get every Battery device to have removable batteries, by LAW. No more glued together crap from Apple, Samsung, etc. If it has a battery, the device must be open-able and the battery removeable.

uh... they... they'll just stop selling a bunch of stuff in minnesota ._.

I can kinda see why one wouldn't want random folks doing repairs on medical equipment for safety reasons. On the other hand, in a medical crisis (like, oh I don't know, a global pandemic?), healthcare providers being able to make emergency repairs can mean a difference between life and death. Also, producers should be obligated to release all the necessary documentation and tools to the public whenever they abandon a product, be it medical or otherwise. So a separate piece of legislation perhaps?

My VPN doesn't have a MN link. Rats!

3

2:30 "Medical devices" I am 100% for a right to repair, but you simply should not mess with medical devices. Simple example: A grandma has a heartrate monitor and it beeps an errorcode. Her grandson, who is in fact a moron, decides to "repair" it and get's it not-quite-right because he doesn't have a calibration device (those are either expensive and good, or cheap and inaccurate) and now the monitor reports a rate that is ever so slightly too high. Grandma is elated, uses the device, gets a high heartrate, takes her medicine and she's happy she caught it in time. An hour later her heartrate is still on the high side so she takes another pill, and another and another and a few hours later grandma is just able to call 911 as she is dying due to heartfailure. Now think glucose monitor, oxygen saturation, bloodpressure and let's not talk about the horrors of insuline injectors that are fixed badly and start injecting air... I don't want to even think about how many people are going to get eachother killed by "helping them beat big-pharma" No seriously, don't fix medical devices. You're simply not good enough to get the quality of work and when something inevitably does go wrong then *YOU* become personally responsible for the damages. Don't think you can blame the repair manual because they will start with a notice that says that if you open up the device they will drop all responsibility for what happens from then on. :Warrenty void if seal broken" so to speak. Please don't be a d*ck, get your medical devices fixed responsibly. (and to those who are typing an angry reply: You are probably exactly the kind of person who is going to get somebody killed because you overestimated your abilities.

This is the hippest. I hope the carve outs go away.

Apple keep going on about the gaming capabilities of their latest laptops. Nobody believes them obviously, but are they trying to position it as a "gaming console" to claim it is exempt from this law?

DEFINITELY A RIGHT TO REPAIR GUY.

imagine a world where you can upgrade your Vintage computer with modern parts the way you can with Vintage cars, If henry ford had made cars the way Apple makes computers today where would the car industry be today just Black?

I guess Apple will stop selling their products in/to Minnesota and Minnesotans will have to go to neighboring states to buy their iPhones and MacBooks.

The farm equipment getting a free pass is a kick in the gut. John Deere, you suck.

Farming equipment being exempt? Why do I smell John Deere here?

I'm torn on the medical device carve out. I don't know that I want a lay person doing medical device repairs....I feel like that could have unintended consequences. But like, also it would bring medical device costs down, so I don't know. I'm torn.

Of course farm equipment 🙄