On 10 Feb 2020 at 15:48, Peri Hartman via EV wrote: > Ultimately we may need legal clarification of what it means to own, or > at least indefinitely own the right to use. Similar to the > right-to-repair issues fomenting right now.
You'll see more of this in coming years. It's a growing trend for business to push their customers away from ownership and toward a rental relationship. Some other well known examples: software as a service instead of software purchased and installed and used for years; streamed music and movies instead of CDs and DVDs; books on an electronic gadget instead of physical books on your bookshelf. The goal is to lock in a long term continuous revenue stream for the business. Essentially, it's like being forced to forever rent your house or car instead of being able to buy it. You pay, but not for the item; you pay for the right to USE the item. The "seller" still owns it. They can revoke your right to use the item at any time, based on arcane terms of a user agreement that you may have accepted without even reading. It's insidous. The push to move as many consumers and products/services as possible to a rental model means that you'll own less and less in coming years. What you don't physically own will be subject to confiscation any time, for any reason. And not just if your financial situation changes and you can't maintain the rent. Sometimes things you think you own are taken away through no fault of your own. In an infamous case a few years ago, Amazon removed a paid-for book from users' Kindles because the rights on it had changed. There are also several cases where people "bought" downloaded music or video files that they now can't play because playing them requires that the playback hardware or software contact a net server for permission -- and the company that "sold" the files is out of business, or has just decided not to support them any more. Remember "Plays for Sure"? Imagine someone coming to your door and announcing, "Sorry, you're not allowed to read that book you bought 2 years ago any more. Give it to me," or "Hey, we're going to re-release that movie, and we want you to go see it, so hand over your Blue-Ray." You'd never stand for it, which is why business loves this new model. Things they want to take back just quietly vanish. Tesla's model extends this to vehicles. NOT just a leased Tesla, which might be understandable, but one you bought and think you own! It's outright theft of an item that this buyer paid for, and that he expected to be able to use in the future. It's comparable to Tesla sending its goons to break into his garage and rip the self-driving hardware out of the car. It's just plain wrong. And if Tesla can do it to this buyer, they can do it to you. Peri speaks truth: this should be illegal. What's more, we shouldn't stand for it. David Roden - Akron, Ohio, USA EVDL Administrator = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = EVDL Information: http://www.evdl.org/help/ = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = Note: mail sent to "evpost" and "etpost" addresses will not reach me. To send a private message, please obtain my email address from the webpage http://www.evdl.org/help/ . = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = _______________________________________________ UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub ARCHIVE: http://www.evdl.org/archive/index.html INFO: http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org Please discuss EV drag racing at NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA)
