FTC and DOJ Think McDonald's Ice Cream Machines Should Be Legal To Fix

The Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice have urged the US Copyright Office to broaden exemptions to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's Section 1201. Specifically, the two agencies are advocating for the extension of the right to repair to include 'commercial and industrial equipment,' which includes McDonald's ice cream machines that are notorious for breaking down. The Verge reports: Exemptions to DMCA Section 1201 are issued every three years, as per the Register of Copyrights' recommendation. Prior exemptions have been issued for jailbreaking cellphones and repairing certain parts of video game consoles. The FTC and DOJ are asking the Copyright Office to go a step further, extending the right to repair to 'commercial and industrial equipment.' The comment (PDF) singles out four distinct categories that would benefit from DMCA exemptions: commercial soft serve machines; proprietary diagnostic kits; programmable logic controllers; and enterprise IT. 'In the Agencies' view, renewing and expanding repair-related exemptions would promote competition in markets for replacement parts, repair, and maintenance services, as well as facilitate competition in markets for repairable products,' the comment reads.

The inability to do third-party repairs on these products not only limits competition, the agencies say, but also makes repairs more costly and can lead to hundreds or thousands of dollars in lost sales. Certain logic controllers have to be discarded and replaced if they break or if the passwords for them get lost. The average estimated cost of 'unplanned manufacturing downtime' was $260,000 per hour, the comment notes, citing research from Public Knowledge and iFixit. As for soft serve machines, breakdowns can lead to $625 in lost sales each day. Business owners can't legally fix them on their own or hire an independent technician to do so, meaning they have to wait around for an authorized technician -- which, the comment says, usually takes around 90 days.

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