Farmers Are Fighting for Our Right to Repair Our iPhones
Tractor owners are on the frontlines of the fight for consumers to be able to fix their own stuff, and legislators are listening.
That shiny new tractor is going to have to be repaired some day.
Photographer: Patrick T. Fallon/AFP/Getty Images
The average Tesla-driving, iPhone-using suburbanite isn’t spending a lot of time worrying about tractor software payloads. They should, though.
Fixing a broken-down farm tractor used to take just a wrench set and some elbow grease. Now repairs might require a mobile-device interface, online diagnostic tools and secure software updates, too. And that stuff isn't just sitting around in the barn. It’s mostly held at a shrinking number of manufacturer-authorized dealerships. As a result, simple breakdowns that in the past might have been repaired in hours can now take days or weeks. During busy times, such as spring planting, long delays can harm a farm’s crops and profitability.