Search Results for shops

Inside the iPhone repair ecosystem: Where do replacement parts come from and can you trust them?

Written by

Juli Clover, MacRumors:

There’s a thriving market for unofficial, aftermarket iPhone parts, and in China, there are entire massive factories that are dedicated to producing these components for repair shops unable to get ahold of parts that have been produced by Apple.

The entire Apple device repair ecosystem is fascinating, complex, and oftentimes confusing to consumers given the disconnect between Apple, Apple Authorized Service Providers, third-party factories, and independent repair shops, so we thought we’d delve into the complicated world of Apple repairs.

Terrific, fascinating read.

Making manuscripts

Written by

Amazing video showing some of the work that went into creating illuminated manuscripts.

VinylHub

Written by

Discogs: Our mission is to document every physical record shop and record event on the planet. With your help, we can create an accurate listing of all record shops & record events, useful to diggers and travelers everywhere. What a … Continued

iFixit CEO on the death of the repair culture

Written by

Bloomberg:

Late in the evening of Sept. 21, X-rays of the innards of the iPhone 8 appeared on Twitter. The images didn’t come from Apple. They were posted by a team from iFixit Inc., a repair-parts, tool and software company in San Luis Obispo, California, that had flown to Australia to take advantage of the 18-hour time difference to buy the new model before it became available in the U.S. When U.S.-based Apple fans woke on iPhone 8 release day, iFixit had a step-by-step guide posted for taking apart the new phone.

Wow! That is commitment.

Over the last decade, the repair culture that spawned generations of driveway mechanics, vacuum-cleaner shops and itinerant TV-fixers has been eroded by manufacturers keen to claim service contracts and revenues. They’ve used intellectual-property laws to restrict access to repair manuals and repair software for products ranging from iPhones to John Deere tractors.

This makes me crazy. I want to be able to fix something that breaks, rather than be forced to buy a new one. To me, the ability to repair my own gear should be a right.

From the interview with iFixit CEO Kyle Wiens:

If you take an iPhone, it’s around $5 in labor that Apple pays Foxconn to assemble an iPhone. It’s far more labor when you take your phone into a repair shop – it might be $50 in labor. And if your phone needs two or three battery swaps over its lifetime, that’s $150 in labor in the U.S. over its lifetime compared to $5 on the manufacturing side.

Making products repairable is better for the environment (less waste, more reusability) and better for consumers (cost and time savings on repairs). This might sound like “get off my lawn” griping, but read the interview, judge for yourself.

Here’s a sneak peek at Disney’s coming Star Wars Land

Written by

Disney doesn’t add entire new lands that frequently. A new land is an entire new, heavily themed area for the park, with new rides, new attractions and, of course, new shops.

In this case, both DisneyWorld and Disneyland are getting a new Star Wars Land, which is said to open in 2019. TechCrunch Editor-in-Chief Matthew Panzarino wrangled an invite to see what the new land is going to look like. Follow the headline link to step through the slide show, and check the video embedded in the tweet in the main Loop post for a panning shot of the 3D model.

[UPDATE] Source: Apple will fight ‘Right to Repair’ legislation

Written by

Jason Koebler, Motherboard:

Apple is planning to fight proposed electronics “Right to Repair” legislation being considered by the Nebraska state legislature, according to a source within the legislature who is familiar with the bill’s path through the statehouse.

And:

The legislation would require Apple and other electronics manufacturers to sell repair parts to consumers and independent repair shops, and would require manufacturers to make diagnostic and service manuals available to the public.

Nebraska is one of eight states that are considering right to repair bills; last month, Nebraska, Minnesota, New York, Massachusetts, Kansas, and Wyoming introduced legislation. Last week, lawmakers in Illinois and Tennessee officially introduced similar bills.

And:

The bills nationwide are being pushed by Repair.org, a trade organization made up of independent repair shops who say that their companies have been harmed by an attempt by manufacturers to gain a monopoly over the repair business. Even without readily available repair parts or service manuals, a healthy DIY repair hobby has thrived thanks to online crowdsourced instruction manuals on sites like iFixit and grey market parts that are available directly from factories in China or can be salvaged from recycled devices.

The idea that it’s “unsafe” to repair your own devices is one that manufacturers have been promoting for years. Last year, industry lobbyists told lawmakers in Minnesota that broken glass could cut the fingers of consumers who try to repair their screens, according to Gay Gordon-Byrne, executive director of Repair.org.

First things first, this is a one sided post, almost a marketing piece from Repair.org. That said, repairability has become more and more of an issue. I’d like to hear Apple’s side of this. Macs, iPhones, and iPads have certainly become harder and harder to repair yourself.

But I think the claim that self-repair is unsafe is disingenuous. I think most self-repairers would agree to voiding their warrantee in exchange for self repair, and also be willing to hold Apple harmless for damage done doing a self-repair.

That said, let’s see what happens on March 9th:

According to the source, an Apple representative, staffer, or lobbyist will testify against the bill at a hearing in Lincoln on March 9. AT&T will also argue against the bill, the source said. The source told me that at least one of the companies plans to say that consumers who repair their own phones could cause lithium batteries to catch fire.

Until then, this is just a sourced rumor.

UPDATE: A little birdie told me about an Apple Store that had to be evacuated when a trained technician accidentally put a tiny screwdriver through the battery of an iPhone, starting a lithium fire that required special chemicals to stop. In another incident, those same chemicals were used in the repair room when someone punctured a MacBook Air battery.

Points well taken. Assuming these anecdotes are documented, I hope they are presented at that March 9th hearing in Lincoln.

The Dog Factory: inside the sickening world of puppy mills

Written by

I hope there’s a special place in hell for people who abuse animals and another for those who willingly buy animals from such places. I’ve had several dogs and cats in my life (I got my latest one a few weeks ago, a 5-year-old cat named Wallace who is “The World’s Clumsiest Cat”) and every one of them has come from the local version of the SPCA. WARNING: The story includes some disturbing and heartbreaking images of abused animals.

The definitive map of the world’s extraordinary sights

Written by

Next time you go traveling, check out this map to see what is in the area you’ll be visiting. Next year, I’m (hopefully) heading to Portugal and Southeast Asia to teach beginning photography workshops and I’ve already picked out some of these extraordinary places to visit.

Apple’s employee number one

Written by

Craig Cannon, interviewing Apples’ first employee (beyond Steve Jobs and Woz), Bill Fernandez:

Craig: So at what point do Woz and Jobs come together and decide that they want to start working on Apple?

Bill: Okay, well during this Hewlett-Packard period when Woz and I were both there, Woz in the after hours designed his own Pong game. Pong was the first really popular, you know, video game that bars and pizza shops and restaurants could buy and put it in stores and people would come and put quarters in and play. So he built his own circuitry and used it with a small black and white TV set as the display.

Then a couple of things happened. He started working on building his own computer and he started attending the Homebrew Computer Club that was happening at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, SLAC.

So all of those things happened at the same time and then as his computer came together he would take it and show it off after the meetings. At some point there was enough interest shown that Jobs became aware of this. I don’t know if he went to the Homebrew Computer Club or just when he and Woz were together Woz was talking about it. Basically Jobs said, “You know, we could make printed circuit boards and just sell the computer already assembled so people wouldn’t even have to buy all the parts on the open market and figure out how to wire them together. We could just do it for them.” And so that was the beginning of Apple Computer.

Jobs got a printed circuit board made and he figured out where to get all the parts. They decided what to name the company and then, this is funny, Jobs got a front office front. There was a company at 770 Welch Road. If you look at the old literature that was their address, Apple’s mailing address. So there was this company on the second floor that had people who would answer the phone and depending upon what number was called would say, “Hello, this is Apple Computer, how can I help you?” And would receive packages mailed to Apple Computer and would mail things from Apple Computer. Jobs was working in his father’s garage and in his bedroom, you know, and this was like our front to make it look legit.

This is a nice, long interview, with lots of edge-on views of the stuff of legend, the birth of Apple.

The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

Written by

All about tech companies and the movement to have a right to repair your broken phones, computers, tablets and other complex products. This is an important issue.

Shoe retailer Clarks rolls out iPad foot measuring, data gathering system

Written by

Clarks is no small operation. They’ve got more than 1,000 stores throughout the world and they also manufacture their own shoes which they sell in their own shops, as well as via third party retailers.

This new system gives them accurate foot measurement, but that’s not the goal behind this system.

A template for an excellent idea

Written by

Matt Gemmell noticed that his local Apple Store did not have any in-store seminars teaching blind or visually impaired people how to use Apple devices. Here’s what he did about it.

Apple Pay: A new frontier for scammers

Written by

The Guardian:

Criminals in the US are using the new Apple Pay mobile payment system to buy high-value goods – often from Apple Stores – with stolen identities and credit card details.

This is a short term issue, a weakness with bank verifications, not an issue with Apple Pay.

Thoughts On iPad Sales

Written by

I’ve been asked by analysts, industry insiders, and Apple users over the last several financial quarters if I’m worried about Apple’s iPad sales. The simple answer to that question is: no, I’m not. […]

Jony Ive speaks about the tragedy of design education

Written by

Sir Jony Ive gave a talk at London’s Design Museum, focusing on what he considers a tragic direction taken by UK design schools.

Speaking at London’s Design Museum last night, Ive attacked design schools for failing to teach students how to make physical products and relying too heavily on “cheap” computers.

A terrific read, all the way through.

How Times Square works

Written by

Gizmodo:

Times Square is one big, busy machine. Powered by American ingenuity and more than a few megawatts of electricity, these six square blocks stay bright 24 hours a day, seven days a week. You’ve seen Times Square in movies and on TV a million times.

A lot of you have probably seen it in real life, teeming with chaos and glowing with capitalism. But how exactly does all that work? The shops and restaurants are one thing, but what exactly makes Times Square such a functional, perpetual spectacle?

The amount of technology, both digital and analog, involved in putting on the “show” that is Times Square is mind boggling. Even more so in Tokyo’s Ginza District.