You would never know by reading this Apple press release how revolutionary this is. The notoriously proprietary company, thanks to the Federal Trade Commission, is acknowledging that preventing consumers from repairing their own purchases is illegal in many cases. They’re also trying to head off Right To Repair legislation:
CUPERTINO, CALIFORNIA — Apple today announced Self Service Repair, which will allow customers who are comfortable with completing their own repairs access to Apple genuine parts and tools.
Available first for the iPhone 12 and iPhone 13 lineups, and soon to be followed by Mac computers featuring M1 chips, Self Service Repair will be available early next year in the US and expand to additional countries throughout 2022. Customers join more than 5,000 Apple Authorized Service Providers (AASPs) and 2,800 Independent Repair Providers who have access to these parts, tools, and manuals.
The initial phase of the program will focus on the most commonly serviced modules, such as the iPhone display, battery, and camera. The ability for additional repairs will be available later next year.
Of course, there’s a catch: You won’t be able to harvest parts from old phones.
This is likely to avoid too much scrutiny and backlash in the mounting political pressure to legislate on the Right to Repair.
Clever Apple tactic.
Also, there will be NO SWAPPING and REUSING parts between phones.https://t.co/b3OiMu48QY
— Jes Conradsen (@jesconradsen) November 17, 2021
If you want to know more about the grass-roots Right to Repair movement and how it has managed to get a trillion dollar company Apple to allow owners of their products to change the battery on their phones ect – @FiRo99 and I did a podcast series for BBC: https://t.co/nDUrV1RvWt
— Mark Miodownik (@markmiodownik) November 17, 2021