The products covered by the obligation to repair currently include:
- washing machines and washer-dryers
- dishwashers
- refrigerators
- electronic displays
- welding equipment
- servers and data storage products
- mobile phones, cordless phones and tablets
- tumble dryers
- e-bikes and e-scooters batteries (from 18 February 2027)
- local space heaters
Oh trust me, I’m no fan of Samsung, but I tend to value control of my devices over…whatever it is Apple does. I had an iPhone until I discovered replacing the home button myself artificially bricked the device due to DRM forcing customers to go to an Apple store for repairs. Never again
Control over your devices is on the way out regardless of the major manufacturer.
Unfortunately, this is very true.
For what it’s worth, I still try to maintain as much control as possible by using OSes like Graphene or Linux. I also have just started refusing to pay for things I can’t own. That includes gaming consoles, cloud services, smart home devices, Samsung/Apple phones, leased cars, etc. If Google keeps killing and locking down AOSP, it may soon include all Android phones too.
I’m hoping we can get some regulations pushed through before that point.