Media Mentions
televised interviewed with NBC Boston on consumer electronics right to repair
“People are clearly becoming a little bit more aware of how ridiculous it is, how often we need to replace these expensive electronics. And so they're changing their behavior because of that,” said Stephanie Markowitz, with MASSPIRG. “And they're paying attention to how much money it's costing them.”
“This is just an essential part of what we consider ownership over our stuff,” Markowitz said. “You should be able to have the resources and the information that you need to keep it working.”
Markowitz notes Americans could save a combined $40 billion if they were able to repair instead of replace their items over the course of a year.
“This is a real issue for consumers who are trying to shop on a budget or not dedicate so much of their budget to buying new phones and computers every couple of years,” Markowitz said.
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“Apple really took this huge leap forward where the iPhone 16 is really one of the most repairable mainstream cellphones to be released,” said Markowitz. “When manufacturers are making those repairs easier, they're really tapping into that, increasing awareness from consumers that this is a problem.”
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“People are just becoming more aware of the fact that when your battery stops taking charge doesn't mean that you need to go through this phone and drop $800 on a whole new one,” said Markowitz. “It might mean that you should be able to go and replace that battery with a repair technician.”
quoted extensively in The Register on Chromebook repairability
"According to my research, at least 15 Chromebook models have already expired across most of the top manufacturers (Google, Acer, Dell, HP, Samsung, Asus, and Lenovo). Models released before 2021 don't have the guaranteed ten years of updates, so more devices will continue to expire each year," Stephanie Markowitz, a Designed to Last Campaign Associate at PIRG, told The Register.
"In general, end-of-support dates for consumer tech like laptops act as 'slow death' dates," according to Markowitz. "The devices won't necessarily lose function immediately, but without security updates and bug patches, the device will eventually become incompatible with the most up-to-date software, and the device itself will no longer be secure against malware and other issues."
While it is inevitable that manufacturers will eventually stop supporting products, they are not always upfront about these timelines with consumers at the point of purchase, Markowitz added. The same can be said of many other products, of course – smartphones typically only offer a few years of updates.
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"There are many open source operating systems available, which basically means users can switch to free, publicly available software that will keep getting updates and security patches regardless of the device it's being used on," Markowitz said, "but many manufacturers make this difficult or impossible to do on their devices, even after they have stopped offering support."