- Since the car's inception,
Americans have loved to fix them.
It's been in our blood since the dawn of what, The Model T?
Not only does knowing how to turn a wrench save us a penny
when it comes to making repairs,
it also helps us understand how our vehicles work.
But these aren't the days
of our great-great grand daddies and grand mommies.
Back then, if you needed something fixed,
you'd order a new part, install it, and be on your way.
Not so much anymore.
A couple of cold ones and a little red toolbox
aren't gonna get you very far when working
on a modern car.
We've all encountered situations
when we can't make a simple repair
because it's literally impossible for anyone outside
of the car company to fix it.
It shouldn't be this hard.
Without the language, i.e. impossible to buy technology
to communicate with your vehicle's computer,
you don't stand a chance.
Today we're taking a look at why manufacturers are bending
over backwards to take away customers abilities
to work on their vehicles, what progress has been made,
and if you stick around until the end,
we'll talk about how we can fight together
to demand the right to repair our own vehicles
in the future.
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From iPhones to John Deere tractors, X-Box to Facebook,
right to repair has become a blazing hot issue
in industries around the world.
Simply put right to repair
requires original equipment manufacturers
to provide consumers, and independent businesses,
the same access to repair documentation, diagnostics,
tools, service parts, and firmware
as their authorized repair providers.
Think about going to an Apple Store
versus going to the guy down the street
that has the I fix cracked iPhone screens,
or even trying to order the parts yourself.
Now, I don't have to tell you that right to repair
is also a huge deal in the auto industry.
Not only are we dealing with complex computer systems today,
but we often can't even access the gosh dang things
because of stuff like impossible to remove engine shrouds
and lack of specialty tools.
Anyone ever tried servicing their BMW i8 by themselves?
How'd that go?
Not very well, did it?
The reason this has turned into such a poop storm
in recent years is because many of the biggest companies
in the world want to limit our access.
But why?
OEM's say that sharing their repair information
will diminish quality, tarnish their reputations,
and risk copyright infringements.
They've also argued that consumers could damage the product
or hurt themselves if they attempt
to hack these new computer systems.
As a result, even if a customer wanted to try
to fix their ride, many manufacturers void warranties
if they get even the slightest whiff
of any outside maintenance.
(Nolan sniffs) What is that, an oil change?
On the other side, independent repair shops
and consumers argue that automakers
are keeping this information from us
because of one reason,
money. (cash register dings)
I would pull cash out of my wallet,
but I don't have any.
Companies want to protect their authorized providers
and force us to pay for repairs.
Needless to say, independent repair shops
and consumers are fed up and want the government
to force manufacturers to share their product information
with the general public.
Ah, time for some good old-fashioned, American politics.
Get those papers in line.
We gotta talk to the ambassador.
That's a worst idea then JD Salinger going on vacation,
blah, blah, blah.
Some reference to playwrights I don't know.
We have to go way back to 1990 to understand
how the right to repair battle began.
That year Congress passed the Clean Air Act Amendments bill,
which required all vehicles built after 1994
to contain a computer system to track emissions.
You may know it as OBD1.
For the first time manufacturers were working with rare,
expensive technology that the common man
had absolutely no access to.
Advocacy groups for independent repair shops
knew this was gonna be an issue.
So they made sure that the 1990 bill also said
that manufacturers had to share the new emissions technology
with consumers.
The problem was that as the decade went on,
technology rapidly developed and new vehicles began
to rely on their computers for a hell of a lot more
than just emissions tracking.
Traditional diagnostics went out the window.
Throttle by wire, steer by wire,
everything was now controlled by the ECU
or at least linked to it.
And that meant that if your engine light came on,
it was vague and you didn't know what was wrong with it.
You needed to pay someone to plug in their scanner
because cheap OBD scanners weren't available at the time.
Repairing vehicles was now a high-tech operation.
And there was no law requiring car companies
to provide the necessary intel for computer-based repairs
to anyone on the outside.
Do you see how this could be a problem?
By the time the 2000s rolled around,
consumers had had enough.
Right to repair was considered at the federal level
for years, but it wasn't until 2012,
that any real progress was made.
That year, Massachusetts passed the Right-to-Repair bill,
which meant that finally car companies were required
to provide independent shops the same technology
that their authorized providers were given.
Hallelujah. (sound echoes)
The Massachusetts bill led to a nationwide memorandum
of understanding where every major car manufacturer,
except Tesla who dodged it
because they didn't have any dealerships
or technicians outside of their plant,
agreed to follow the Massachusetts law as long
as advocacy groups for independent mechanics stopped trying
for more right to repair legislation.
At last, there was hope for a level playing field.
But would it last?
The fact that I'm asking that question, probably means no.
All because one little word was excluded from the bill.
Telematics.
Telematics is the communication technology
that translates information flowing to and from a vehicle.
It's a constant give and take of data
where your car's information gets wirelessly transmitted
to the manufacturer while they're simultaneously
pushing other data like weather forecasts,
stock market updates, a ton of stuff back to the vehicle.
It's kind of weird.
Telematics started in the late nineties, remember OnStar,
but the advent of the smartphone,
which led to rising consumer expectation
for constant connectivity
is what really made the technology take off.
Obviously it's become a massively important part
of making repairs but manufacturers have exclusive access
to the programs and the devices required to understand it.
So once again, independent shops
and consumers don't have the information they need
to make their own repairs.
Everyone is rightfully pissed off.
Ah, I feel like we're back in the nineties,
Braveheart, baseball, and blatant attempts
by car manufacturers to hide technology from us
through a loophole in the law.
Now, of course, manufacturers say
that by targeting the telematics systems there's a conflict
with the federal Motor Vehicle Safeties Act,
which says that OEMs are required to protect customers
from potentially dangerous repairs.
When was the last time we heard about a guy blowing himself
up while changing his alternator?
They want consumers to believe that this stranglehold
is actually helping them.
Don't worry, little car customer.
We're charging you this much because you could get hurt
if you try to fix it by yourself.
I can't wait to tell you a story about this a little later
in the video, it is a good one.
But first more legislation.
In 2020 when a new right to repair law was proposed
in Massachusetts, things got significantly more nasty.
Lobbying groups for some of the biggest car makers
on the planet tried various angles of fear-mongering
to sway voters against the bill,
including a warning that if telematics were open-sourced,
sexual predators would hack your personal information
and follow you around town.
Wow car lobby, that's what you're going to go with?
Sex predators?
Awesome.
Thankfully, the scare tactics didn't work.
A whopping 75% of Massachusettites, Massachusites,
Massachusettshin?
- [Offscreen] Mass holes.
- Mass holes.
Once again, voted for landmark legislation.
Well done.
This time by specifically targeting telematics
and requiring automakers to provide an open source system
beginning in 2022.
I say good on you Bay Staters, good job.
Another step in the right direction is that
in July of this year,
the president signed an executive order,
which encouraged the Federal Trade Commission
to consider beefing up their anti-competitive restrictions.
And soon after the FTC voted to increase their efforts
to punish companies who violate right to repair laws.
Hey, that sounds pretty good, but I sense another problem.
The executive order may sound like a nice win
and it kind of is, but when it comes
to the automotive industry, we still have plenty
to be concerned about.
Remember that memorandum automakers agreed to back in 2012,
the one where the companies agreed to share their intel
as long as right to repair advocates stopped pushing
for more laws?
Well, because of that car manufacturers threatened
to throw a major fit.
So the new executive order excludes the automotive industry.
(Nolan huffs laugh) Yay.
As a result, reps from several auto advocacy groups
are saying that the executive order
needs serious improvement.
But any suggested amendments are going
to be tough to come by because of groups
like the Alliance for Automotive Innovation,
a consulting firm that's been paid tens of millions
of dollars by some of the heaviest hitters in the game.
We're talking Nissan, GM, Ford, Toyota, Volkswagen.
All of them have been challenging the new Massachusetts law
and fending off similar bills in other states.
(sighs) Shocker.
That is pretty depressing but I gotta share one funny story
that happened earlier this month that's hopefully a sign
of things to come.
So Ford paid $4 million to a cybersecurity firm
to challenge the new Massachusetts bill.
The same one that came up with the sex predator ad campaign.
Well on August 15th, a few weeks ago,
news broke that a bug was discovered at Ford
and they actually failed to protect their own data.
That's right.
The very risk they argued as being the whole reason
they need to keep their telematics private turned out
to bite them in the butt.
Employee records, customer databases,
finance account numbers,
a ton of Ford intel was compromised.
Man, I would have loved to have been in the meeting
after that news broke. (explosion sound)
All of this legal stuff, money,
and politics makes you wonder if this is just going
to keep happening.
Will technology continues to develop so quickly
that this gap in repair capabilities grows even wider?
Will ordinary people ever have the opportunity
to work on their own cars again?
Look it's obvious that the line between cars
and computers is gonna become more and more blurred
in the coming years.
We all want faster, newer, cooler vehicles
and with new car sales at an all time high,
the issues concerning right to repair
clearly aren't stopping us from buying them.
We can't help ourselves but that doesn't mean
that manufacturers shouldn't be held accountable
or that there's nothing consumers can do about it.
Throughout this glorious history lesson,
we've learned that legislation is often decades behind
when addressing these problems.
The new Massachusetts law and the executive order
will hopefully lead to more progress nationwide.
But that's only going to happen if politicians
and state governments propose new bills in the first place.
This is where we actually do have some power.
We might not be able to work on our cars anymore,
but by God, we could still vote.
Democracy, contact your representatives
at both the state and federal level
and let them know that you want to control
how your vehicle's data is used and by whom.
Remind them that many of these all-American companies,
ironically have some very un-American takes on repair laws.
You know who you are.
The big takeaway as usual is that we got
to make our voices heard.
You know, I love bugging state government officials.
So go do it for yourself as well.
I got to give a big shout out to Louis Rossmann.
He's a right to repair activist
and has a great YouTube channel
where he breaks down right to repair laws
across a bunch of different industries.
I got a boatload of information from his videos.
And if you want to learn more about this topic,
I can't recommend his channel enough.
Check him out.
I'll leave a link down in the description to Louis' channel.
New shirt alert.
(Nolan laughs) That's stupid.
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Yeah, it's an important issue.
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