Planned obsolescence and Disposible Tech.

[oldSock]

Good day everyone,

 

The section below is about

 

Planned adolescence, normally is a technology with a known failure point placed into a device so that it will only last for a set amount of time. Disposable Technology is normally a device that that will not be repaired but will be replaced when broken, and is not to be confused with a "one time use" technology or "single use technology" 

 

Now I can start this post about the evolution of the mobile device and the tons of landfill it produces each year. I can copy and paste statistics and environmental study impacts and can even add in a few facts about some of the parts mobile phones have that is made from resources that cannot be renewed.

 

This post however is not about all that. It is not about someone's income or what they can and can't afford. This post is about a real problem the end user faces when buying a device. Firstly many devices simply is hard to repair or cannot be repaired outright. Many devices are expensive to obtain and the user expect a reasonable amount of use before having to replace the device.

 

So as a consumer we must now ask our Governments to really set-out mandatory rules for companies to follow. This is important to us for many reasons other then just the use of the device. It is important because our environment ends up being negatively effected. E-scrap is a industry on its own BUT it is also a HUGE problem for many countries and the fallout does effect the health and safety of the individual. This is already a problem. 

 

So this post suggest that we should ask our Governments to regulate technology by imposing laws and fines on them if they don't comply. 

 

These factors can include:

 

• how long the device must last, This must include software support. 
• its maximum cost "if it is considered to be disposable" So that manufactures are capped on profiting from poorly made devices.
• how recyclable the device is, 
• how many components is considered to have a "negative impact on the environment "both stand alone and accumulative effects as both are important"
• Repair-ability as well as responsible disposal.

 

Now this list must be a lot longer then what it is and should include many more situations.

 

It is no longer about the device and its function, it is about companies taking responsibility on all fronts. 

 

See if a company doesn't want me to replace a cracked screen or a dead battery then they should be held accountable and be limited on how much profit they get from the individual user.

 

For example if the phone cannot be repaired it must be considered as a disposable device. Thus their must be a limit on the maximum asking price and take FULL responsibility to recycle the device. Now it is true that companies can retaliate but at this point in time considering how massively profitable they are, we as consumers have no grounds for demanding anything. We simply must comply or go some place else. Well why should this be our only options? In the end of the day we are the consumer and we should have the ability to demand that companies take responsibility and be more reasonable and flexible towards the end user. Right now we if you look at the situation it is fair to say that we have almost no say in anything anymore.

 

 

So this post was not to provoke or demand. It was to make us think, is what companies are doing fair to us, how does it effect us, and what the consequences of those effects are.

 

I think a great many of us are concerned and is wondering why steps towards consumer protection hasn't been taken.

 

 

Thank you for reading and be safe.

 

   

 

 

 

 

 

 

[PlayStation 2]

I have but one thing to say when I see a thread about planned obsolescence:

THIS is disposable garbage. If something is explicitly designed to fail or not function after a certain amount of time, to me, it's disposable.

Miniaturizing electronics always turns things into complex and hard-to-repair things. Look at tape camcorders from the 1990s. Have fucking fun repairing them. But that doesn't mean, at least to me, that they're designed to be disposable. No, it's just a side effect of things getting smaller and smaller. How long a device is supported is a fair thing to note, but at the same time, how long a device can be rationally used is also something to note.

[thrasher_565]

it started with the light bulb. and spandex. if you make it last too long no one will buy anything els. back in the day appliances had to last 30 years.

 

my grandma has an 50 old dishwasher and microwave for that matter... i have my dads amp still waiting for the speakers thow... 

[thrasher_565]

3 minutes ago, comander said:

Those devices also usually cost far far more relative to income and sucked electricity like crazy. There were also cheaper variants that broke down quickly. It is a mixed bag though. There's a lot of nuance. 

 

https://www.quora.com/Why-are-home-appliances-of-yester-years-such-as-fridges-and-TVs-much-more-longer-lasting-than-those-of-todays-despite-the-advancement-of-technology

 

Cars, for example, last around 3x as many miles while requiring less maintenance. They are around 30% more expensive now though. 

 

 

 

electricity was cheap back then thow. my dad had this thing if your house had 3 different heat sources you got a discount...they booted him off of it thow.

 

people buy cars for the looks not how long it last thow.

[Rocketdog2112]

We now live in a disposable society polluted with disposable devices. Cell phones, flat screen tv's and even major appliances with electronic control boards that cost more than half the original price of the appliance to replace. That is even if you can source and purchase the parts to repair them. That coupled with the fact that people no longer strive to learn how to diagnose and fix these products. FB Marketplace is full of listing for refrigerators, stoves and dishwashers needing a MCB replacement. Most people don't know how or care to repair.

Another side to the story is with highly sensitive electronics infiltrating all of our consumer products, survivability of a power surge or lighting strike is a forgone conclusion.

[NineEyeRon]

With user end tech becoming more and more just access devices to cloud services this seems a sensible. 

 

Already local storage should only be for programs and quick access, everyone should have online backups of all important data. It’s crazy we still see people having issues that their thumb drive or external USB HDD died with their very important data (one I heard recently was a university professor losing academic data!!!).

 

I see these as the future but they just be supported by a viable and sustainable recycling system.

[thrasher_565]

6 hours ago, NineEyeRon said:

With user end tech becoming more and more just access devices to cloud services this seems a sensible. 

 

Already local storage should only be for programs and quick access, everyone should have online backups of all important data. It’s crazy we still see people having issues that their thumb drive or external USB HDD died with their very important data (one I heard recently was a university professor losing academic data!!!).

 

I see these as the future but they just be supported by a viable and sustainable recycling system.

ya there no recycling system in the west any more. for a bit the un valuable plastic could be sold and ship to china and they made a bit of profit but it was killing there people so that stopped.  we really need a law to stop these un wanted plastic being imported and ansetives to use aluminum, glass, and reusable plastic were ever posable.

 

WE DON'T NEED A NEW PHONE EVERY YEAR!

[PlayStation 2]

13 hours ago, thrasher_565 said:

people buy cars for the looks not how long it last thow.

I dunno about this. There's plenty of people who just want a rational, reliable car that'll last them a few years, at the very least. Back in the 1970s, there was no shot in hell in getting a car that wasn't tired by the 75k mark. Nowadays, most new cars can hit 100k like it's nothing, although probably with some maintenance necessary to get it in tip-top shape. 

People always forget that once upon a time, it wasn't a trivial thing that you could drive a car to 100,000 miles. My car's got 180k and while it's seen better days, it's still on the road to this day. 

[thrasher_565]

ya its a pain to find good reviews of a product vs paid reviews. my sister got some lg diswasher and loved it but she had to move and the house they got was not worth putting much in so they tried buying a cheaper lg diswasher and it was too loud and didn't clean the dishes so they had to go with what worked.

[Zodiark1593]

17 hours ago, thrasher_565 said:

it started with the light bulb. and spandex. if you make it last too long no one will buy anything els. back in the day appliances had to last 30 years.

 

my grandma has an 50 old dishwasher and microwave for that matter... i have my dads amp still waiting for the speakers thow... 

With incandescent lights, there tends to be a tradeoff between efficiency and longevity. Running a smaller filament at a hotter temperature provides improved brightness at the same power consumption, but wore down the filament faster. 
 

With engineering, longevity is just one tradeoff among many others during design. Batteries are another example. Life-Po4 cells drastically outlast Li-Po in longevity, but sacrifice a lot of capacity and size, so they’re seldom used in much of anything. 

[thrasher_565]

1 hour ago, Zodiark1593 said:

With incandescent lights, there tends to be a tradeoff between efficiency and longevity. Running a smaller filament at a hotter temperature provides improved brightness at the same power consumption, but wore down the filament faster. 
 

With engineering, longevity is just one tradeoff among many others during design. Batteries are another example. Life-Po4 cells drastically outlast Li-Po in longevity, but sacrifice a lot of capacity and size, so they’re seldom used in much of anything. 

your basing that off of other products out there...(stuff is built ten years in to the future) when they were making the light bulb they could have made it last way longer but that would reduce the sales. hense Planned obsolescence. ya there might be long lasting lightbulbes now but they also cost the same per time lasting so... all products have Planned obsolescence meaning there been dumed down from there testing. this also gives them a time line of making an new improved item every year.

 

simple a company gos bankrupt if there not selling products.

[thrasher_565]

 

Edited December 25, 2020 by thrasher_565

[NineEyeRon]

10 hours ago, thrasher_565 said:

.WE DON'T NEED A NEW PHONE EVERY YEAR!

No one does, I know with Apple devices it’s about 5 years, my iPhone 7 is just coming up to my planned replacement date. For most battery driven products 5 years is good. 
 

If you only plug it into the wall that’s different, should be 10 years plus. I try and make 10 the minimum depending on how often it gets used. Just replaced a 10 year old kettle that gets used multiple times a day and a once a day toaster is coming up on 11 years and will be replaced soon.

[oldSock]

a few days ago i went to look at a new laptop for a family member.

 

Every single laptop in the price range i had in mind was crap. It had virtually no functionality other then being a very basic word processor with web access. In short what was on offer was bad really bad. Then my mind wondered what happened to all those nice laptops of yesteryear? The devices that wasn't sold and returned. It is such a hole that i cannot find any information other  then "they get send back" send back to what, to whom? 

 

I mean i am more then willing to buy an old device if it works well enough. Most of the time laptop batteries isn't that hard to replace. Mind you it is not easy BUT i am willing to put in the time knowing that my family member is actually getting something they can actually use.

 

it is just scary all round and it shouldn't be...

[thrasher_565]

1 hour ago, oldSock said:

a few days ago i went to look at a new laptop for a family member.

 

Every single laptop in the price range i had in mind was crap. It had virtually no functionality other then being a very basic word processor with web access. In short what was on offer was bad really bad. Then my mind wondered what happened to all those nice laptops of yesteryear? The devices that wasn't sold and returned. It is such a hole that i cannot find any information other  then "they get send back" send back to what, to whom? 

 

I mean i am more then willing to buy an old device if it works well enough. Most of the time laptop batteries isn't that hard to replace. Mind you it is not easy BUT i am willing to put in the time knowing that my family member is actually getting something they can actually use.

 

it is just scary all round and it shouldn't be...

ya its dam hard to find good un paid revews or ones that give there opinio. a few years ago i wanted to buy an laptop and i wanted one with a big battery with a good gpu. the problem is they dont normly list what gpi is in there or what size the battery is so it was frustration. i finnly got one with 95w hours and an gtx 1060. get about 1 1/2 hour on battery gaming. also has an rgb keybord. sadly it dose thermal throttl. a few moths ago i wanted an blue tooth head set but i want one that felt nice and had  sound cancelling. after a few days it was narrowed down to  Bose QuietComfort 35 or  Sony WH1000x M3. i got some used Bose QuietComfort 35 for $200 off eaby and i like em allthow im having a problem with my bluetooth transmitter can do 1 wall fine but 2 walls and an fire place cant do it...

Edited December 26, 2020 by thrasher_565

[kaixax555]

10 hours ago, thrasher_565 said:

your basing that off of other products out there...(stuff is built ten years in to the future) when they were making the light bulb they could have made it last way longer but that would reduce the sales. hense Planned obsolescence. ya there might be long lasting lightbulbes now but they also cost the same per time lasting so... all products have Planned obsolescence meaning there been dumed down from there testing. this also gives them a time line of making an new improved item every year.

 

simple a company gos bankrupt if there not selling products.

It's a very simplistic assumption, and there is more to the story than the planned obsolescence of light bulbs

About the light bulb planned obsolescence story
1. The market is crowded and competitive because many companies (big factories and small family owned businesses) are making light bulbs. Business is extremely unstable even for large corporations, as sales can fall as much as 60% on a year to year basis
2. Licensing GE light bulb designs means they need to follow a production quota, even though the factories can easily produce double that

3. Engineering something to fail at 1000 hours is actually challenging, or even more challenging than engineering something to last longer

4. It kind of did backfire, as small family owned businesses in Japan are able to produce inferior quality lightbulbs that are far cheaper than what the cartel had made, and their sales did tank in the 1930s

Secondly, "engineered to fail" is a misconception. Most of the time, engineers don't "engineer to fail", rather they engineer to a price point. "Engineer to fail" is more often used when the product is supposed to fail at a certain limit to protect the user, such as fuses in electrical systems or shear pins in machines.

 

Most engineers engineer to a certain price point. Usually, the marketing department observes the other products currently in the market and determines what kind of features the product should have and the estimated price of the product in order to be competitive in the market. As design engineers, they have to work around the limitations set by the marketing department, balancing out features and cost to produce the final product. There is no "design to fail" on purpose, unless the part is supposed to fail during excessive loads, like keys on motor shafts. These are safety features, designed to protect both the machine from excessive damage, and the user from excessive forces hurting them. Often these parts are replaceable. Yes cheaper components will be used, but engineers won't purposely engineer your products to fail, as this will invariably damage the reputation of the company. In addition, engineering to fail entails more cost than just engineering to meet cost requirements.

 

That isn't to say planned obsolescence isn't a real thing, but rather that most engineers approach design with balancing function, cost and durability in mind. There are also other forms of obsolescence, like technological obsolescence, where new technology is so good that it renders old technologies obsolete (like flash storage making optical media obsolete), and perceived obsolescence, where your product "loses fashion" when a new product is released.

Perceived obsolescence is the bigger issue, and the one that people should look into instead of planned obsolescence. Many products today are designed with more focus on aesthetics (industrial design) than on the function aspect (mechanical/electrical design). There is this desire in people of wanting the "latest and greatest", often to show off. Having the "latest and greatest" is sort of a status symbol, and it often fuels our ego (even though we might deny it), even though we might not need it. For example, people are clamouring for RTX 3000 series GPUs and Ryzen 5000 CPUs, even when their RTX 2000 series GPUs and Ryzen 3000 series CPUs are perfectly functional. I do feel it is part of the human psyche, and companies are reacting to this portion of the human psyche. This "disposable technology" part in the end is partly driven by technological obsolescence, and also partly driven by the human mindset of "latest and greatest" to show off their wealth.

That said, I do agree that "right to repair" is a problem. While miniaturization does makes things harder to repair, people shouldn't be denied the right to repair when they want their stuff to function instead of buying a new product. Heavy lobbying is also a huge concern, especially in the United States.

[whm1974]

9 hours ago, kaixax555 said:

That said, I do agree that "right to repair" is a problem. While miniaturization does makes things harder to repair, people shouldn't be denied the right to repair when they want their stuff to function instead of buying a new product. Heavy lobbying is also a huge concern, especially in the United States.

The Right to Repair what One Owns should be Enshrined in Law. Considering How expensive some Equipment are. Such as Cars and Farming Vehicles.

[Lii]

Imo the problem is the economic system at it's core (and politics)

but in this forum is strictly prohibited to talk about that so..

 

anyway recently it broke (again, same piece, same spot) a piece of the washing machine, that works as a serrature, which is basically a piece of plastic with two really tiny metal cores, obviously online you cannot find anything like that, so you do need to contact their official support to get a substitute, and accept whatever they do say, because well, you cannot check by yourself, anyway the first time that tiny piece of plastic broke, they said that it was out of production, and that we needed to buy the whole door (that it was like x5 times pricey) to get also that piece; after some time, the same fucking piece broke, this time in another store/"official support centre" they had that piece, they said also that it was in production, but that tiny junk of plastic costed 50 euros

 

I could've printed that piece, but you know, you cannot deal with someone that does want things to be done straight away, like yeah I cannot get some time to do a quick drawing and let the printer print it

 

anyway I will print it anyways in solid metal, since it's likely to break again

[Commodus]

I do think we should fight some degree of disposability, although it's important to allow some freedom of design. I'd hate to lose clever concepts like Samsung's Galaxy Z Flip or LG's Wing.

 

It's also important to be careful about accusing companies of planned obsolescence when they don't always deserve it. Apple is the classic example — it's odd for people to claim the iPhone is designed to break down early when Apple offers much longer OS support for mobile devices than Android vendors (typically five years versus two or three). It even shifted its update strategy to optimize for phones on the tail end of the support cycle. Hell, people bash Apple for CPU throttling (not without some merit, to be clear), but it was doing that to extend the life of older phones, not to force early upgrades.

 

I'd argue that an Android OEM abandoning OS updates early (I've even seen phones that are stuck with their launch software) is a better example of planned obsolescence than a lack of removable batteries or DIY repairability. Pulling removable batteries can confer some kind of benefit (if just to free up space inside the phone), and few people are willing to replace their phone screen. But having to buy a brand new phone or resort to unofficial firmware to get a new Android revision when you haven't even finished paying off your device? That's just lousy, even with Google Play Services filling in some of the gaps.

[Rocketdog2112]

32 minutes ago, whm1974 said:

The Right to Repair what One Owns should be Enshrined in Law. Considering How expensive some Equipment are. Such as Cars and Farming Vehicles.

Isn't Apple one of the biggest offenders of Right to Repair? I remember a video Linus did about trying to replace an Apple AIO screen that was damaged during reassembly.

[whm1974]

59 minutes ago, Rocketdog2112 said:

Isn't Apple one of the biggest offenders of Right to Repair? I remember a video Linus did about trying to replace an Apple AIO screen that was damaged during reassembly.

I think I remember that when when I first watch some of his Videos. One of the many reasons I will refuse to buy one. However System76 is a well know Linux hardware vendor that used to offer a really nice one. It was upgradeable.

 

[thrasher_565]

all im saying is we need to rethink how things are made. how its going to be recycled. i get it making jobs were there arnt any is good but at a cost to the enviroment. there are some stuff that can last 5-10years plues but there no way of it being recycled.

 

i get that tec gets so fast that you wont want to use it it be like using windows 98 today you just wont wnat to unless you have too. its all good to make new stuff but make it cheaper easer to fix or make it more recyclable. then when no one wats to use it any more it can be recycled in to new things. yes the oil compalys are going to "say" that the cheap non recyclable plasic cost less to make vs the stuff that we can reuse.

 

 

Edited December 26, 2020 by thrasher_565

[unsorted]

On 12/24/2020 at 6:25 PM, oldSock said:

So as a consumer we must now ask our Governments to really set-out mandatory rules for companies to follow.

I strongly disagree.

 

The solution starts with the masses being educated and ends with the masses being educated. Being educated starts with being concerned about how long something will last and voting with your wallet.

 

If there are enough people that actually care about this stuff: enough to change their habits and enough to stop doing business with certain companies, then things will change.

 

Everything from the tax laws, depreciation, etc encourages maximum waste. We don't need more government intervention that just raises costs for every single company on the planet.

 

We need an educated customer. It starts there and ends there. We don't need yet more central control and intervention. We have too much of it and it leads nowhere.

 

We can go further into the crooked financial system encouraging mass exploitation, usury, etc. but I'll stop here.

 

[oldSock]

4 hours ago, unsorted said:

I strongly disagree.

 

The solution starts with the masses being educated and ends with the masses being educated. Being educated starts with being concerned about how long something will last and voting with your wallet.

 

If there are enough people that actually care about this stuff: enough to change their habits and enough to stop doing business with certain companies, then things will change.

 

Everything from the tax laws, depreciation, etc encourages maximum waste. We don't need more government intervention that just raises costs for every single company on the planet.

 

We need an educated customer. It starts there and ends there. We don't need yet more central control and intervention. We have too much of it and it leads nowhere.

 

We can go further into the crooked financial system encouraging mass exploitation, usury, etc. but I'll stop here.

 

Targeted advertising is a reality today, Billions are being spend to log our movements, analyze our behavior so that we get "targeted advertisement" meaning they know what we want, what we are looking for and they will push products that we are most lightly to buy. this is reality and has been the case for some time. See the individual assume that others will follow once the message is out in the wild. Truth is people in general really may care a little, but over all they just continue to do what they do.

 

Since the outbreak of the global pandemic there was thousands of videos made to educate the public and yet, how many video uploads are there with individuals refusing to protect themselves and others not to mention their families ? Now consider the seriousness of the situation against the one we are addressing and you may perhaps agree that we really cannot trust individuals to make the right choice because the facts are what they are. 

 

Thus as much as i dislike the idea for government to get involved, clearly we need their involvement. We need regulations, we need protection and we need the industry to comply so that the end user can benefit from a properly made device. The industry will not listen to the individual because they have more money then most governments. Thus they can afford to push on and take a hit or two. BUT with mandatory regulations they simply must comply or face harsh penalties or even being blocked from selling anything out right. The last part "being blocked from selling goods" will scare investors to act more responsibly and invest in businesses that do comply. 

 

See once the investors are spooked and they stand to lose, then and only then may we see an improvement. But time will tell if we will get poisoned by landfill or will we win this fight. Time will be the judge in the end.   

[unsorted]

On 12/26/2020 at 10:47 PM, oldSock said:

Since the outbreak of the global pandemic there was thousands of videos made to educate the public and yet, how many video uploads are there with individuals refusing to protect themselves and others not to mention their families ?

<redacted>

 

Regardless, I know where you are coming from, I just think it's the wrong approach to rely on the most wasteful entities on the planet (gov) to regulate. You know where that ends up? More power to them, more bribes paid, more everything...the same as it ever was. The same applies to food (corrupt), pharmaceuticals, fertilizers, and everything else they regulate. They just gain more power and nothing effective is really done.

 

To me it's easy to ignore 99.999% of modern technology because I don't believe much of it will last. I can pick laptops as an example. Less and less easily replaceable components. I can talk about the serialisation of parts, so a replacement part will not work and independent repair shops can die a slow death https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMtqao-JV8kb and so on.

 

We have reached peak waste, but it's up to the customer to actually care about this stuff and vote with their money. If they don't, nothing will change. I think that's the only real, lasting solution that can't be influenced by bribes being paid to gov. No central authority should control this stuff because we all know what happens then.

 

Edited December 28, 2020 by wkdpaul