“We wouldn’t have had an Apple had I not grown up in a very open technology world,” says Wozniak, “it’s time to recognise the right to repair more fully.”
The movement is pushing for laws guaranteeing that manufacturers will provide information and parts to repair their own devices and the Biden administration is said to be sympathetic.
“This one has really gotten to me,” says Wozniak, “when starting Apple, I could never afford a teletype for input or output. They cost as much as two cars.” Wozniak’s response was to modify TV.
“I didn’t have to afford something I could never afford,” he says, “I wasn’t restricted from anything that kept me from building that computer and showing the world that the future of personal computers is going to be a keyboard and a TV. That all came from being able to repair things, and modify them, and tap into them yourself.”
“You could repair a lot of things at low cost – but it’s even more precious to know that you did it yourself,” says Wozniak, saying that it helped people “to prove to themselves they’ve got a little special skill in the world”, and adding it was “very motivating for creative minds, believe me – that’s how I grew up”.