Deere Draws Fire for Copyright Argument

John Deere drew criticism last week when it submitted an argument to the Copyright Office that suggested farmers who buy its tractors do not own them but rather have an implied license to drive them. The claim seeks to retain the tractors’ software as the property of John Deere.

Kyle Wiens, co-founder and CEO of iFixit, an online repair community and parts retailer, responded to the argument in an editorial at wired.com.

“In a particularly spectacular display of corporate delusion,” he wrote, “John Deere – the world’s largest agricultural machinery maker – told the Copyright Office that farmers don’t own their tractors. Because computer code snakes through the DNA of modern tractors, farmers receive an ‘implied license for the life of the vehicle to operate the vehicle.’”

In a response to the editorial, a John Deere spokesman said it was an inaccurate characterization of the company’s position on intellectual property rights of software code.

The Copyright Office will consider the argument as part of its review of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, a 1998 law that criminalizes production and distribution of technology or devices intended to circumvent measures that control access to copyrighted works.

Wiens describes the Digital Millennium Act as governing “the blurry line between software and hardware.” In the case of farm equipment, he explains, problems arise if a farmer does not have access to diagnostic software to repair a machine.

John Deere is not alone. General Motors has filed a similar argument with the Copyright Office, which is expected to decide in July which devices are protected and which can be modified or repaired.  S