Apple, forced to rate product repair potential in France, gives itself modest marks
- Reference: 1614406393
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2021/02/27/apple_recycling_scores/
- Source link:
Cook & Co score themselves on repairability however, and Cupertino kit sometimes fares better under internal interpretation of the criteria
[3]PDF
than it does under ratings awarded by independent organizations.[4]
For example, Apple gave its 2019 model year 16-inch MacBook Pro (A2141) a repairability score of [5]6.3 out of 10 . According to iFixit, a repair community website, that MacBook Pro model deserves a score of [6]1 out of 10 .
Apple's evaluation of its products aligns more closely with independent assessment when it comes to phones. Apple gives its iPhone 12 Pro a repairability [7]score of six , which matches [8]the middling score bestowed by iFixit.
[9]
"It's self-reporting right now," said Gay Gordon-Byrne, executive director of The Repair Association, a repair advocacy group, in an email to The Register . "No audit, no validation, yet. I think there is another year before there are any penalties for lying."
Nonetheless, Gordon-Byrne expressed optimism about the impact of the French law.
"We've been looking forward to seeing the repairability index details since the idea was first proposed," she said. "It's the first view any of us have had that allows us, as consumers, to pick products that can be more easily repaired. Even if buyers decide to buy products with lousy scores – they will at least know ahead of time. "
Calls for 'right to repair' electronics laws grow louder across Europe [10]READ MORE
The focus of the French law is to fight waste and encourage recycling across multiple market segments, not just electronics. But e-waste remains a significant issue.
According to The Global E-waste Monitor 2020
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, a report from the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the Sustainable Cycles (SCYCLE) Program run by the United Nations, and the International Solid Waste Association (ISWA), there were 53.6m metric tons (Mt) of e-waste, consisting of discarded tech products and components, generated worldwide in 2019, an increase of 9.2 Mt over five years.In 2019, only about 17.4 per cent of e-waste was recycled. And over the past year, with Apple Stores closed in many places due to the pandemic, repairs for Apple products have been more challenging to arrange than usual.
Signs of progress
Apple doesn't make it easy.
Right from the start Steve Jobs didn't want people mucking around on the inside of his kit. In latter years Cupertino has pioneered ways to make it difficult to upgrade and repair - from new screw heads to manufacturing techniques that make cracking and fixing your laptop very difficult.
Kyle Wiens, CEO of iFixit, also expressed enthusiasm for France's regulatory intervention.
"iFixit has been advocating for improved repairability for Apple's products for a long time," he said in an email to The Register . "From gluing in batteries to hiding their service manuals, Apple has systematically stymied their customers who just want to fix their stuff."
"Finally, thanks to the brave work of the French government, Apple is publicly admitting what we've been saying for a long time: they have a repair problem. Apple's products should last longer."
Wiens said he hopes the rules will encourage Apple to rethink its design process.
"Gluing unreplaceable batteries into the AirPods is planned obsolescence," he said. "It's bad for the environment, it's bad for customers, and it's bad for society."
[12]
Apple, which we rate at one out of ten for willingness to speak with the press, did not respond to a request for comment. ®
Get our [13]Tech Resources
[1] https://support.apple.com/fr-fr/circular-economy-repairability-indices
[2] https://www.ecologie.gouv.fr/loi-anti-gaspillage
[3] https://www.indicereparabilite.fr/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/210107_Instructions-manual-repairability-index.pdf
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_personal_tech/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2YDomS9xB3GwEmE9OeTDgqQAAAEI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[5] https://support.apple.com/content/dam/edam/applecare/images/fr_FR/otherassets/compliance/pdf/201028_INDICE_DE_REPARABILITE_A2141.pdf
[6] https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Pro+16-Inch+2019+Teardown/128106
[7] https://support.apple.com/content/dam/edam/applecare/images/fr_FR/otherassets/compliance/pdf/210126_INDICE_DE_REPARABILITE_A2407.pdf
[8] https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/iPhone+12+and+12+Pro+Teardown/137669
[9] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_personal_tech/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33YDomS9xB3GwEmE9OeTDgqQAAAEI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2020/11/26/parliaments_environmental_audit_committee_calls/
[11] https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Environment/Documents/Toolbox/GEM_2020_def.pdf
[12] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_personal_tech/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YDomS9xB3GwEmE9OeTDgqQAAAEI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[13] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
3rd Party Verification should be law.
A company should not be able to assign their own scores, those should only be accepted from unafiliated 3rd parties that make all such tests (process & results) openly available to anyone that asks, preferably as part of the page giving the product score in the first place.
If a bunch of 3rd parties each grab a random sample off a retailer's shelves in multiple random locations, do 3 tests across 3 samples, & post the average score of the 3, then if any one of them consistently gives low/high scores that seem out of line, their methods & results can be examined in excrutiating detail to determine why. Meanwhile, if 7 out of 10 such reviews all fall within a point of each other, you can be pretty sure that they're all on the same page.
Even better is that, the more such testers doing the reviews, the harder (not impossible, just more expensive) to bribe them all to fudge the results in the company's favor.
Then the government can set a minimum threshold for scores such that any product failing to meet said minimums will be quickly removed from product shelves while the company is given a legal slap upside the head & told to fix their shit to be better for everyone & the environment.
Apple would wind up getting the shit smacked out of themselves so often it would make their CEO look like a masochist.
Proprietary screws, glued together, custom clips that break if opened, & the mobo one giant lump of solder? One moment while we fetch the Slap-O-Matic 9000 & some popcorn...
Re: 3rd Party Verification should be law.
those should only be accepted from unafiliated 3rd parties
Sadly I fear that the only result of that would be to enrich the lawyers paid to challenge them.
Re: 3rd Party Verification should be law.
You could have a set of standards designed by production engineers. For example, one could be battery replacement using a standard toolkit. The standard includes a model (not a real phone) that scores 10/10 and the time to replace the battery is recorded. Then Apple (or whoever) just have to demonstrate battery replacement on their device. They can use only the standard toolkit, but they can bring trained techs if they want. Time it and then apply a formula to score it based on how much longer it took than the standard model.
You could have these for a whole set of tasks - screen replacement, connector replacement, memory upgrade, keyboard repair, etc.
Then, there should be repairability sales tax added to devices price, with low-scoring devices having eye-watering levels of tax added.
Software and security updates mandatory for five years to prevent them hobbling their devices to boost sales once the repairability and supportability starts having an effect.
Re: 3rd Party Verification should be law.
"A company should not be able to assign their own scores"
As long as there are stiff penalties for lying, why not? That's how plenty of certification works, with decent results overall and the occasional major scandal.
"those should only be accepted from unafiliated 3rd parties"
A nice idea, but in practice, how do you make that work? First, who pays for the work of those 3rd parties? the companies themselves? That wouldn't make them "unaffiliated", right? The government then? So, a new underfunded, overwhelmed government agency is born that people can complain about?
Re: 3rd Party Verification should be law.
As long as there are stiff penalties for lying, why not? That's how plenty of certification works, with decent results overall and the occasional major scandal.
Like the Boeing 737 MAX?
Yes...I went there.
I admire the French for this but
I would go a step or two further. I would have an automatic right to a full noao argument refund for any product where the user is not satisfied in the first 2 years and a no argument requirement for free at the customers home or office repair for 10 years. This would push up requirements on design testing repairability and manufacture. For example i have 2 Lenovo laptops that are scrap because the design bozo made it so when the battery charge circuit fails they won't run even when plugged in the mains, satisfaction zero. I have a Nokia Android phone, the screen freezes and touch screen stops working, getting worse in every forced update, should never have been sold. I have cars where changing a headlamp bulb requires a workshop (God knows why the Germans allow them to be sold when you have to have a bulb kit in your car so you can change bulbs at the side of the road but you don't need to have the mobile workshop that is required for the job)
Extend to cars
Why does it take 8 (yes eight) hours to disassemble the dash enough to change a dash bulb? Why do you need to take all of the air filter out to change s headlamp bulb (or worse on the other side the whole battery compartment) Why do you have wheel bolts which means you can't put the wheel on at night in the pouring rain when you have a puncture, why do you have to take 15 bolts out and 4 under bonnet panels off to see and top up the brake fluid? Why cambelts? There have been mechanisms since Bentley in the 30s for driving overhead cams without belts or chains. Modern cars are deliberately designed for lack of repairability in a way that makes apple look amateurs, all that trim clipped in by one way non removable clips.... Just so you can't repair it.
We deserve a wider and improved EU regulation.
Thanks France for being brave enough to be the first one.
What really irks is they solder the SSD down in the name of security, but this security comes at the cost of reparability. The ram I can get slightly less bothered about as it tends not to die like SSDs do as they don’t wear the same. That all said the skeptic in me thinks they do this to artificially push the price of the higher end upgrades up rather than as a space saving measure.
Apple give theirselves a 10 out of 10 in willingness to speak to the press if they get to set the narrative.