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Leaked Apple Training Videos Show How It Undermines Third-Party Repair:
Leaked training videos Apple made for its authorized repair partners show how the company trains repair technicians to undermine third party companies and talk customers into buying more expensive first party repairs.
[...] The training videos are meant to help Apple’s certified repair stores navigate a world where customers can get replacement parts far cheaper than what Apple charges for basic repairs. For years, Apple has made it harder for independent repair stores to fix phones, nudging customers to go to Apple stores instead. In response, there's been a rising right-to-repair movement that wants to make it easier for people to repair their own stuff.
Andrey Shumeyko, a member of a community of Apple enthusiasts that seek, publicize, and trade any kind of information that Apple would like to keep under wraps, sent the eight videos with Motherboard. The videos are not public, as they are only intended for Apple store employees and authorized independent repair technicians (these are called Apple Authorized Service Providers (AASP). Shumeyko said the videos were stored on an Apple platform, where a bug allowed him to access them without having to provide a login.
AASP launched in 2016 as a way for some independent stores to make basic repairs to Apple devices. AASP stores must open their stores to unannounced audits by Apple, and face a mountain of restrictions on what they can and can’t fix.
[...] Fixing your own stuff or having an independent store do it can be much cheaper than going directly to Apple. Contrary to what Apple said in the training videos, the parts are often exactly the same. Factories will often overproduce Apple parts like screens then sell the excess to independent vendors. If color calibration is off or the light doesn’t get quite as bright as it did before, it’s often because Apple has software locks and calibration profiles it could release to make repairs easier but refuses to.
Every video in the training series is aimed at boosting the morale of Apple’s AASPs and training them to convince customers to spend more when they could spend less.
"As someone who works as an Apple Authorized repair technician, I see on a daily basis how many devices the manufacturer claims are unrepairable but that third party repair shops have shown time and again that they can solve, letting people recover precious documents and memories that, because of manufacturer restrictions, I am not allowed to help with,” an AASP told Motherboard on the condition we keep them anonymous because they fear retaliation from Apple.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Saturday September 25 2021, @02:54AM (12 children)
So anyone got any experience with a PinePhone?
I like Plasma; I don't care for Android and I really dislike iOS, and $200 is about the max I can justify for a phone (I don't use a phone for much beyond calls). And I like their keyboard dock idea (instant netbook). So it's intriguing, but I'd rather not be the guinea pig.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Freeman on Tuesday September 28 2021, @02:40PM (1 child)
It's essentially, one giant experiment. It's about the only choice you have, if you don't want your data to be directly siphoned by Google/Apple. There are other options, but they tend to be non-smartphone options. $200 isn't a bad price. There's just not much of a warranty. Thus, in the event that you do have trouble, you are going to be stuck spending $$ or $$$ to fix/replace.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday September 28 2021, @03:16PM
Yeah, the lack of warranty is kind of off-putting if you can't afford to drop $200 like that. But I sure like the idea. Just not seeing a lot of people with experience using 'em yet.
Agreed on the data siphoning. I use a flip phone for everyday, dumb as a rock but it makes calls just fine. Anything else, I've got a perfectly good desktop, and I don't need it that portable.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by hendrikboom on Thursday September 30 2021, @12:29AM (9 children)
Pinephone is interesting, especially because I'm about to need a new phone soon for forced-upgrade reasons.
I have some interoperability questions.
There are a few apps I use in Android.
Facebook Lite (the allegedly minimal version of Facebook chat)
Google Calendar.
I do need to be interoperable with these. I don't need to run the actual Android apps the new Pinephone, but I do need something that will interoperate with others that use them (especially my family members), is easy to launch, and is capable of notifying me when something is up.
Ideally, also, the covid contact detecting app, and Quebec's covid vaccination certificate.
-- hendrik
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Thursday September 30 2021, @12:43AM (3 children)
There exist Android emulators for linux -- no idea if they'd work on the PinePhone incarnation of Manjaro, but might be something to look into.
https://fossbytes.com/best-android-emulators-linux/ [fossbytes.com]
https://anbox.io/#collapse7 [anbox.io]
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by hendrikboom on Thursday September 30 2021, @01:10AM (2 children)
Well, an Android emulator on Linux is better than a Linux emulator on Android,
but I was hoping for some more direct interoperability with just the apps I use.
And do these emulators have access to the app store?
-- hendrik
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Thursday September 30 2021, @01:25AM
Evidently you are not the first with this question (I have no idea):
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=can+android+emulators+access+google+store&t=h_&ia=web [duckduckgo.com]
Apparently the Store is preinstalled on some emulators, so there's a good start.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Thursday September 30 2021, @04:01AM
And by sheer coincidence....
https://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20210927#news [distrowatch.com]
"People who would like to be able to run Android applications on a GNU/Linux platform received good news recently. The Waydroid project is developing container-based software which allows a desktop Linux system to run an Android-compatible environment based on LineageOS. "Waydroid uses Linux namespaces (user, pid, uts, net, mount, ipc) to run a full Android system in a container and provide Android applications on any GNU/Linux-based platform. The Android inside the container has direct access to needed hardware. The Android runtime environment ships with a minimal customized Android system image based on LineageOS. The used image is currently based on Android 10." Waydroid is currently available pre-packaged for some distributions such as Ubuntu. It requires a Wayland session to run and Python 3 to be available on the host system. "
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Friday October 01 2021, @01:48PM (4 children)
And I just got reminded that this independent phone also exists, tho the price is outta my league:
https://shop.puri.sm/shop/librem-5/ [shop.puri.sm]
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by hendrikboom on Saturday October 02 2021, @07:19PM (3 children)
I know of that one. It likely has the same compatibility problems, but it's built with faster, possibly more reliable and larger, and definitely more expensive hardware.
But I already have a very good laptop from Purism, and I am unable to replace the battery (which now has a lifetime of about one minute). Works fine when still plugged in to the mains.
Yes, they sell replacement batteries at a reasonable price. No, there is some regulation that prohibits them shipping a battery outside the USA unless they ship it with a phone or computer. I live outside the USA.
I suppose phones and laptops computers need to have batteries, so I suppose that's why you can ship a battery with a computer -- a loophole in the no-ship-batteries rule? Anyway it's clear that if I buy another computer form them, they can ship me an extra battery.
Not clear if I want to spend that kind of money.
There needs to be some way around this.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Saturday October 02 2021, @07:55PM (2 children)
Good to hear the hardware is quality, but that battery problem ... I suppose the way around it is find a friend to buy and ship you the battery, complete with some discarded laptop if necessary to fulfill any regulatory nonsense. Tho last time I looked at international mail rates... a whole new laptop would be cheaper...
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Monday October 04 2021, @07:58PM (1 child)
Hadn't thought of using a discarded laptop. Now if only I had one of those ... Or my friend did.
I've written Purism to ask about sourcing those batteries in Canada. I do have the impression they use standard replaceable components, and there just might be a compatible standard battery. I'm hoping.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Monday October 04 2021, @08:43PM
Wishing you good luck on this. Yeah, would be nice if it were some standard component!
If all else fails... I once owned a venerable laptop whose previous owner had replaced the original battery by taking it apart and soldering in off-the-shelf rechargeable batteries. Head-scratcher to look at, but worked fine. Nowadays you can buy the proper cells, tho there's a huge disparity between Chinese (junk) and Anyone Else's (better).
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.