Please don't take this comment as "there is nothing wrong" and don't take it as "there's nothing to talk about here". Clearly this is a problem that needs to be discussed and brought to people's attention. This is a response to people taking this article and interpreting it as though there is some injustice being done to farmers and that we need some sort of government intervention:
How is it a monopoly? There are like 8 or 9 different major tractor brands to choose from. The word is out on the street (or fields?), and I've seen articles like this for well over 5 years now.
There's a simple solution for farmers that don't want the costs (and benefits presumably) of these restrictive deals: don't buy a tractor that has these restrictive terms of service.
I agree that what we are seeing is not really a monopoly. The issue is better defined as "industry realities prevent effective use of voting with their wallets".
> There's a simple solution for farmers that don't want the costs (and benefits presumably) of these restrictive deals: don't buy a tractor that has these restrictive terms of service.
...and lose compatibility with a large number of add on equipment and related software. Much like the AAA games industry moving towards micro-transactions, your ability to avoid suppliers that require that is limited and you are the one that ends up losing out.
How do we solve these issues? No idea. But expecting farmers (in this case) to take the hit themselves in the hopes that enough of their peers do the same to create a big enough financial incentive for vendors to change their ways is unlikely to succeed.
I appreciate your points, I just really dislike paternalism, especially when it means treating farmers who are probably pretty savvy and creative like they are helpless.
I'm fairly certain that building compatible equipment is totally legally protected in the US. It would seem like a huge opportunity for some people living in farm/manufacturing country to start building adapters or other compatibility mechanisms to use add on equipment across tractor brands if the tractor manufacturers aren't interested in doing it. If Henry Ford could build a car in his garage, I'm sure there are plenty of people out there that could make a combine work with a tractor that doesn't have the right logo on the side.
> I'm fairly certain that building compatible equipment is totally legally protected in the US
Once software is involved, this isn't true. And software is rapidly involved in every device.
Sure, you could go back 100 years and use equipment from then - but yields are increased since then for a reason, and variable-rate-seeders, planters that adjust depth based on soil type (from data), charting your harvester yields and planting density, a crap ton of interactions with fertilizer application/herbicide/fungicide, etc, are a part of that reason. Farmers are perfectly savvy enough to know this, but their options are (1) get the new equipment with the restrictive terms, (2) not get any of that new tech, or (3) change into a new field and try to build what they would want, taking on the big giants that are perfectly willing to Embrace/Extend/Extinguish, etc. Of those options, the savvy person will do #1.
Your listed proposal of adaptors isn't legal if software and EULAs are involved, which is where the whole right-to-repair movement gets involved.
The meaning of monopoly here is that JD has a monopoly on the repair of JD tractors. That is, there cannot be competitors if they require you to use official repair places. It doesn't mean that JD repair centers have a monopoly on the repair of all tractors, or that JD has a monopoly on the market for tractors themselves. It's not meant to imply that it would legally be considered a monopoly.
How is it a monopoly? There are like 8 or 9 different major tractor brands to choose from. The word is out on the street (or fields?), and I've seen articles like this for well over 5 years now.
There's a simple solution for farmers that don't want the costs (and benefits presumably) of these restrictive deals: don't buy a tractor that has these restrictive terms of service.