In my opinion, the ability to modify and repair things that you own should be a fundamental right, not a controversy. This coincides with my other “you should own what you buy” ideas.. crazy, I know.

Quick side note: I’m not going into politics or law in this post.

I volunteer at my local Repair Café in Colorado. If you haven’t heard of it before, it’s an initiative where people can bring broken items like electronics, clothing, wood, or anything else and we’ll try to fix them free of charge.

Learning

I specialize in small electronics repair, so things like phones and laptops. I initially got into electronics repair from modding a certain handheld game console - it was my first ever project, and I was very ambitious. Shell swapping my Switch!

Safe to say, I just about destroyed it. It still worked, but there wasn’t any Bluetooth or Wi-Fi anymore, and one of the Joycon rails wasn’t clicking. The screw also stripped, so there’s nothing I can do about that now.

Even with all this, I kept going and didn’t give up on it. Over the coming months, I managed to get it in near-perfect working order, learning more about the process while I was at it. During that time, I also modded a few unrelated controllers and fixed a Google Pixel 4 with a dead battery.

It took a while, but through projects and YouTube, I learned the ins and outs of small electronics repair. I also picked up soldering for some Arduino projects that I wrote about here. Which I’ve since gotten very good at.

Right to Repair

Right to repair is the power to the consumer to open and fix their own electronics without restriction from the companies who make them. Because of greedy companies, this does involve lots of law and regulation - mostly done by the EU and California. Again, not getting into that here, there are lots of amazing resources if you want to learn more.

What I will get into is corporate greed and how that plays into things.

Have you ever been to a repair shop, maybe an Apple store for a simple fix and been quoted a ridiculous amount? Yeah, there’s a reason beyond labor - greed. And the reason that companies like Apple are able to do this is because they control the entire repair system, blocking third-party shops from sufficiently fixing their products.

A common practice for these companies is called “parts pairing” wherein the parts from certain products can’t be used on another, even if there isn’t a good reason. Often, these companies won’t fully shut the user out, but subtly change things like biometrics not working or auto-brightness malfunctioning.

The biggest culprit of these practices is Apple. They’ve been known to lobby against RTR laws, parts pair, and charge ridiculous prices for simple jobs. I could rant about their practices for days on end if given the chance, but I’ll stop at four paragraphs here.

Repair Café and its Deeper Benefit

While on the surface, Repair Café may just seem like a place to bring your things for a quick fix, it’s so much more than that. Many people are rightfully afraid to try to open and fix their own electronics - the fear of breaking things further or hurting themselves is valid.

At Repair Café, we show people around that repair isn’t as scary as people think it is. All it takes is the ambition to do it yourself!

On top of that, we also welcome everyone. If someone isn’t able to afford repairing their things or are otherwise incapable, we’re a community that’s just there to help.

One of my goals as a volunteer is to give more people the confidence in repairing their things, showing them that it isn’t as bad as it can seem. Giving them that push.

Wrapping Up

Alright. Support right to repair, and Repair Café is a communal effort. The courage to DIY takes grit.

Thanks for reading.