Fixing Your Car Yourself Maybe a Violation of Contractual Rights in the Future

If it were up to General Motors, it may soon be illegal for you to tinker with your own car.  That’s because the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (“DMCA”), an Act that started as anti-piracy legislation about a decade ago, now also protects coding and software in a range of products more broadly.  Your car is one such product if it, as many cars do nowadays, it has an onboard computer.  Vehicle makers promotes two arguments in their favor: first, that it could be dangerous and even malicious to alter a car’s software programming.  Second, per the tractor maker John Deere, that “letting people modify car computer systems will result in them pirating music through the on-board entertainment system.”  “Will”?!  As the Yahoo article mentioning this story smartly pointed out, “[t]hat’s right— pirating music. Through a tractor.” 

Isn’t that an example of a company getting a little too excited over its own products?  Or am I just an incurable city girl (although one that occasionally likes country music)?  Judging from the lyrics to a recent Kenny Chesney hit (“She Thinks My Tractor’s Sexy“), I see that opinions differ in this respect.  To each her own.

Hat tip to Professor Daniel D. Barnhizer of the AALS listserve for sharing this story.