The Register recommends adopting a new exemption covering diagnosis, maintenance, and repair of retail-level commercial food preparation equipment because proponents sufficiently showed, by a preponderance of the evidence, adverse effects on the proposed noninfringing uses of such equipment.
Proponents said that fixing the Taylor Company ice cream machines used at McDonald's required users to interpret "unintuitive" error codes. Some error codes are listed in the user manual, but these manuals were said to be "often outdated and incomplete" because error codes could change with each firmware update.
Difficulties in repair related to "technological protection measures," or TPMs, were described as follows: ... access codes can only be accessed by reading a service manual that is made available only to authorized technicians.
The exemption does not include commercial and industrial food preparation devices... proponents have not established a record of adverse effects with respect to industrial equipment, the Register wrote.
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