A Runner's Ramblings

Title: The Right to Repair Reclaiming the Things We Own

Author: Aaron Perzanowski

Completed: Aug 2026 (Full list of books)

Overview: I’ve been trying to repair broken stuff since I was a kid. When I was about 7, my walkie-talkie stopped working. With my dad’s help, I took it apart, found a broken wire, soldered it back in place, and to my amazement, it worked again.

It’s never made sense to me why companies are so concerned about people fixing their devices. They add all kinds of warning stickers and are unwilling to share repair guides they have, even after they stop manufacturing devices. The Right to Repair has clearly been a cause I support for a while and reading more about the struggle convinced me we need to continue to push for this. (Among other reasons, it’s one topic that brings conservative farmers and liberal environmentalist into agreement and there are remarkably few such topics these days).

This book covers how we went from a country of fixers and tinkerers to one where we just throw away broken things. I also covers much of the work that’s been done to rebuild the repair culture.

As if to show the importance of being able to repair the things we own, when I got to the section about washing machines being one of the least likely appliances to be repaired, my 17 year old washing machine needed repairs (again). By this point, I was very comfortable moving the dryer, taking the top off it and poking around inside. It first broke about 7 or 8 years ago so by repairing it, I was able to double it’s lifespan for a fraction of what it would cost to replace.

I would certainly recommend this book. I would also recommend trying to fix stuff. Remember, if something’s broken and you’re thinking about replacing it, the absolute worst way you could mess it up by trying to repair it would cause you to… replace it. You might be able to fix it, saving money and learning how things work in the process.

Highlights:

• Jibo illustrates the risks to repair posed by the Internet of Things. The robot’s physical components could be repaired. If its screen was on the fritz, it could be replaced. If a sensor wasn’t working properly, it could be recalibrated. Even the embedded software in the device could be updated and patched. But most of Jibo’s features were not housed in its plastic shell. Instead, they resided on a server that Jibo owners could not access, let alone repair. Jibo’s basic operation, as purchasers eventually learned, depended on hardware and software over which they had no control. The tether connecting devices to remote servers in unknown locations is a core, if not defining, feature of smart devices. On a fundamental level, the Internet of Things as currently constructed is incompatible with repair
• three sets of concrete benefits that flow from repair. First, repair helps consumers save money by extending the lifespan of products and fostering secondary markets. Second, repair lessens the massive environmental burden of modern consumerism, from the extraction of natural resources to the eventual disposal of the devices we buy. Finally, repair helps us grow and flourish as people. Through repai / 7 — r, we become better informed about the world around us, develop analytical and problem-solving skills, exercise greater autonomy, and build stronger communities.
• If we can slow the replacement cycle, we will spend less over the course of our lives on clothes, cars, and electronics. And those expenses add up. Collectively, we spend unthinkable sums on new devices–$500 billion a year on smartphones, and roughly the same on household appliances. Both of those figures, however, are dwarfed by the nearly $3 trillion we spend every year buying cars.
• In perhaps the most extreme example, a customer took his Mac Book Pro to Apple because the display was completely dark. After months of attempted repairs totaling more than $10,000–including two replaced logic boards and eventually an entirely new laptop–an Apple technician uncovered the issue. The screen brightness was turned to zero, a problem solved with a single keystroke.
• fill your water bottle, and strap on your helmet, only to discover a flat tire. If you have the parts, tools, and know-how to swap out a punctured innertube, the flat is an annoyance, a mere stumbling block. But without the ability to repair, your plans are undone. You are defeated by circumstance. Repair cultivates a sense of self-sufficiency and autonomy that is increasingly rare in a world shaped by networked technologies.
• consider how the inability to repair motorized wheelchairs can leave their users immobile and isolated. When the battery in the motorized wheelchair Kenny Maestas used couldn’t hold a charge, the device maker told him it would be a month before a technician could look at it. Even if the company had the necessary parts in stock, its policy insisted on separate inspection and repair appointments. In the end, it took more than two months before Kenny’s wheelchair was running again.
• repair helps develop valuable problem-solving skills. Repairs vary in their difficulty. Some failures are easy to diagnose and simple to fix. But often, repair is far from straight forward. There is no simple algorithm or checklist to follow. It requires a creative, even improvisatory approach. These more challenging repairs require you to start with an immediate problem–your car won’t start–and identify potential causes within a complex system. Maybe the battery is dead, or maybe it’s one of a dozen other possible problems: a failed timing belt, a clogged fuel filter, carbon-fouled sparkplugs, a cracked distributor cap, a bad fuel pump, or an oversensitive security system, among others. Determining the right diagnosis requires some combination of experience, intuition, educated guessing, and trial and error.
• By deliberately directing attention to the cracks and their repair, kintsugi draws on the Japanese notions of mottainai a feeling of regret over waste–and wabi-sabi–an aesthetic tradition that embraces imperfection and impermanence. Not only does kintsugi extend the useful life of objects, but it respects the effort and artistry of the original creator and the repairer inequal measure.
• Landlords sat idly by as their tenants endured deteriorating buildings. Device makers, on the other hand, play a far more active role in obstructing repair. Imagine you have a leaky pipe flooding your kitchen. There are worse things your landlord could do than ignore your pleas for a fix. They could buy up all the wrenches in town and refuses to sell you one. They could refuse to let your plumber in the building, insisting you hire their Preferred Plumbing Partner who happens to charge twice the market rate. They could conceal your pipes behind a locked door and refuse to give you a key. When it comes to our devices, that’s too often the sort of reaction we can expect from the most powerful and profitable companies on the planet.
• Replacement bearings are generally not terribly expensive, only $40 or so. But the job is labor intensive, as it involves the removal of the drum and the reassembly of the machine. The price for a repair is often nearly as much as buying a replacement.
• As Douglas Adams wrote in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, “The major difference between a thing that might go wrong and a thing that cannot possibly go wrong is that when a thing that cannot possibly go wrong goes wrong, it usually turns out to be impossible to get at or repair.”
• we ought to be incredibly skeptical of any technology deployed to undo the very idea of interchangeable parts.
• a supply chain focused on making new products is more efficient if it devotes minimal resources to servicing old ones, even if they end up in landfills. In the same way, Uber is more profitable if it refuses to recognize drivers as employees, Facebook is more profitable if it opens its platform to disinformation, and fossil-fuel companies are more profitable if they can pollute at will. Companies profit by externalizing costs. That doesn’t mean we should let them.
• Despite the dire warnings, there are no laws, rules, or regulations in the United States concerning used or expired car seats. And regulators in countries like Sweden, which has some of the most stringent child safety laws in the world, actually encourage the use of secondhand car seats. When pressed by Minter, leading car-seat manufacturers and retailers offered no evidence supporting their claims.
• The iPhone was also the best predictor of educational attainment. Back in 1992, before computing technology became pervasive, the best predictor was Grey Poupon mustard.
• Even with in the internal logic of intellectual property law, repair deserves greater emphasis. Rather than a purely countervailing consideration, repair is intertwined with questions of innovation and progress. Our approach to repair influences what sort of innovations we are likely to see, who can access Repair and Intellectual Property, and under what conditions. In that sense, our attitudes about repair reflect what sort of technological and social progress we value.
• But annual product releases aren’t compatible with truly innovative breakthroughs, at least not on any regular basis. Even if Apple, Samsung, and other device makers could churn out major new features every year, why bother? People need phones, cars, and dishwashers. If they can’t fix their current devices, they’ll buy new ones even without new major technological advances. In contrast, an environment that encourages repair creates stronger incentives for genuine innovation. If you can reliably and cheaply keep your four-year-old phone or decade-old car working, you’re more likely to holdout for some significant new functionality before replacing it.
• As a matter of legislative history, Bork’s assertions have been thoroughly debunked. Nonetheless,they found a receptive audience in the Supreme Court. Beginning in the mid-1970s, the Court’s approach to antitrust began to shift, adopting the consumer welfare framing of the Chicago School. By the mid 2000s, Justice Scalia–writing for a unanimous Court–was praising monopolies: “The mere possession of monopoly power, and the concomitant charging of monopoly prices, is not only not unlawful; it is an important element of the free market system. The opportunity to charge monopoly prices–at least for a short period–is what attracts ‘business acumen’ in the first place; it induces risk taking that produces innovation and economic growth.”
• As Justice Louis Brandeis put it, “We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can’t have both.”
• Firms are also obligated to maintain a stock of parts available to third-party repair providers. Makers of electronics and appliances with wholesale prices above $50 must make parts and information available for at least three years. For devices over $100 at wholesale, that requirement extends to seven years. Given California’s size, the Song-Beverly Act has shaped device maker policies nationwide.
• Depending on the product, between 62 and 83 percent of European consumers elected to repair their products in the experiment. But when the level of effort was increased, the experimenters found a significant decline in repairs. When repair is less convenient, fewer people do it. Rather disconcertingly, the same was not true for replacement. When the effort needed to replace a product increased, there was no notable drop in replacement.
• A number of Austrian states and cities offer “repair bonuses” that cover as much as 50 percent of the cost of repairs. And in 2020, France launched a program that offers individuals €50 to spend on professional bike repairs in an effort to reduce traffic.
• And as the Commission pointed out, if repair presents safety risks, manufacturers are best positioned to mitigate them through design changes.