Last weekend I finally got out the tools and replaced the keyboard on my Microsoft Laptop 2. I picked up the laptop years ago to use as a traveler and it served me in the capacity it was designed to. When the machine started to slow down and failed to keep up with the photo and video editing I was doing at the time, I looked for ways to upgrade the machine.
Famously, there were none. I would find out later that iFixit rated the machine a 0/10 on the “repairability scale.” Opening up the laptop meant risking not getting it back together again.
I assembled a desktop computer with the components I needed and used it as my workhorse, relegating the laptop to travel needs until half of the keyboard stopped working. Repairing the keyboard through Microsoft would run about $600 – nearly the cost of the machine if I were to buy it anew. Spare parts weren’t exactly available.
I set up a few ebay searches and set the machine on a shelf, moving on with my life. Two years later the exact replacement keyboard I was looking for popped up. I bought it for $40 and a week later I set to getting the Microsoft laptop working again. iFixit wasn’t kidding – removing the laptop required a surgical precision. The entire machine was glued together. Even the replacement I purchased had been salvaged from another machine – traces of the adhesive still stuck to the corners.
A little elbow grease and a lot of care, the new keyboard was successfully installed, and the laptop was reassembled…with glue.
I made a short little video about the ethos behind resuscitating old tech and it took off (over 6K views – I’m calling that “viral” baby!). The responses seemed split: half were folks who did this sort of thing all the time – reformatting devices to run on more basic, open source OS or cobbling together machines to extend their lifespan. The other half was a population who were interested but had no place to start. They had no idea what to do with their old tech except throw it out in their municipal garbage. Or they wanted to learn, but had no idea where to take a class.
Overall, I get the feeling that a lot of folks are just burnt out on having to replace their technology every few years. Remember when you got a new phone every two years when you renewed your contract with the wireless company? Then phones got expensive and that went away, but now the upgrades were baked in with the price of the contract.
Sure, you could trade your old phone in, but what did that do?
I stumble across a link on Are.na for PermaComputing
Permacomputing is both a concept and a community of practice oriented around issues of resilience and regenerativity in computer and network technology inspired by permaculture.
Permaculture: a worldwide holistic agricultural and land management design approach that attempts to mimic patterns found in surrounding natural ecosystems to reduce waste, prevent pollution, maximize sustainability, protect wildlife, and improve the land’s resiliency and biodiversity.
Permaculture was minted in the 70s during the oil crisis when individual food security was a valid concern. The communes who had a bit of land did what they could to produce as much food as sustainably and regeneratively as possible. Of course, before technology created the “factory farm” methods riddled with means of synthetic production, “permaculture” was just how farms worked. The output of one thing fed into the next. Waste was minimal. The cycle just knew what to do. It may not have been pretty, but it was reliable.
Permatech is the opposite of planned obsolescence – the sinister thing where manufacturers intentionally make their products obsolete after a certain time with the express purpose of forcing the consumer to buy something again. Sometimes this is the little plastic thing that breaks off and now you have to get a new one, or it is the dying battery in your phone, or the processor that can no longer work at the level the latest version of the operating system.
The software outpaces the hardware. Or they no longer make the port for that USB dongle anymore. Or cars that no longer have CD players because there is more money to be made in subscription music services. Take a thing that works just fine and break it, all in the name of progress.
Result: waste. So much waste. Landfills full of toxic waste and exploding/ leaking batteries. An entire industry in underdeveloped countries tasked with harvesting rare earths from junked devices because no one thinks about what it took to harvest that much lithium or cadmium to make the device they use to play Candy Crush for hours at a time.
Tech Waste is a widespread problem – every industry, every vertical.
Consider the farmer lawsuit against John Deere for the right to repair their own machinery. Software in new farm equipment effectively locked farmers out – if they modified or repaired on their own, their tractor would lock itself until an authorized tech could do a repair (usually at an outsized cost). Apple, likely after numerous similar lawsuits, announced it supported a widespread right to repair on their own devices.
I mean, it’s still impossible to dig into the devices unless you know what you’re doing. And their initiative is likely focused on ensuring their devices remain on OEM parts – letting them keep their walled garden as impenetrable as possible.
Largely, few manufacturers are considering the end-of-life for their products. The assumption: it gets trashed and replaced. The need: We need to be responsible for what happens to this after its use is exhausted. Consider how plastics producers shifted the responsibility of the wasted product from manufacturer to consumer.
Other Issues:
Local support – From workshops about how to repair to the fellow neighbor who says “let me show you how to do it” (or, rather, they could just do it for you), most areas don’t have this sort of community unless it is part of a for profit repair business.
Lack of tools and Tool Aptitude – A lot of homes lack screwdrivers. Most of my peers have tool kits acquired from IKEA.
Availability of replacement parts – This will always be a chokepoint. Components are created for specific product releases. Certain batteries or processors are designed to fit specific models. Once the model is phased out, the components also go with it and manufacturers are no longer incentivized to produce parts for repair.
Or, products are so new that third party manufacturers aren’t caught up yet. My wife got into a accident with her next-to-new car (the first year the Honda HRV was for sale). The body shop had to ship everything in from Japan to get the repairs done – all premium parts (thank god for insurance) – because the places the shop typically relied upon just didn’t have anything that worked.
Solutions On The Horizon and Ideas for Next Steps
I like what FairPhone is doing. Modular design, buy the upgrades as needed, install on your own. I don’t like that FairPhone is nowhere close to launching in the US. I’m also not hot on the idea of buying a new device – I just want the one I have to work for at least another 10-20 years.
iFixit has been the leader in providing tools and repair guides for as long as the internet has been a thing. While they are expanding access to tools and components, the cost (financial, time, etc) is still kind of high for the casual consumer. Still, with the right ethos, a screwdriver and an hour of YouTube can fix quite a bit.
There are loads of grassroots groups on social media platforms that are giving away and trading their old tech. I see loads of reports of people reverting back to “dumb phones” as a way to take a step back from smartphone addiction – finding that the devices are just better made with batteries that last way longer.
I’d love to get some kind of community workshop together a few times a month. A collection of tools and tinkerers, bring your broken tech, and we work on it. At the same time we could buy used tech in bulk and upgrade/ repair devices for those in needs (shelters, schools, etc).
