Built to Break, a world constructed on unregulated capitalism.

Joe Rogan was saying this in the podcast last night... When they make laptops 50$ cheaper, they have cheaper parts which are faster to assemble, so in turn people are laid off and go hungry, end up with depression, family suffers.

Why can't we keep things as they are and keeping paying 300$ for a laptop, instead of 250$, if it will save families.

reply to post by Hopechest


There is an actual business plan modeled around planned obsolescence. It's a well known fact by those who actually care.

reply to post by Hopechest


No, they don't. Actually the big name companies, high end stuff is where the planed obsolescence is more prevalent. One of many examples. Bought a 500$ DVD player 2 years ago. It broke. It would of cost me around 150$ to repair including shipping. I just recycled it and bought an other one for 75$ and it's still going strong. More options too.

reply to post by Hopechest


It has nothing to do with technology, it has to do with an inherent flaw in capitalism.
That flaw is the double edged sword that also makes capitalism work = greed.

There is no reason that companies should make their products to break or make tools and that work with nothing else when they could all just use common standards, other than greed.
But the companies are not to blame here, we are for letting this system remain in place, because companies by design are only out to seek profit - they do not care how it is done, just how it looks and will effect their profit if caught doing something wrong.

If we are to truely advance as a species we have to find a new system that can cater to our greed, but at the same time provide the basics of life to everyone whilst rewarding companies and workers for quality over quantity, man over machine/computer and common standards/transparency over patents and secrets.

Originally posted by Hopechest
It would be called technology.

If you would prefer to drive the horse and buggy that you can fix by finding sticks on the side of the road I'm sure the Amish would welcome you with open arms.

The rest of us however like to progress.

Planned obsolescence does not have to come at the price of greed nor should all things technical require a professional to replace. Technology is being designed to last a certain amount of time and require a specialist by design not necessity.

Real progress would be finding ways to increase technology without overfilling the land fills while gouging the consumer for the last dime to get the latest greatest thing. Eventually you will reach a saturation point and people will not want the latest and greatest...so solution make it break...

Originally posted by CranialSponge
reply to post by Hopechest

 

I'm glad you recognize my point and I humbly accept your apology.

Its great to see that you have an open mind.

Nice try.

But fail... massive fail.

I freaking can't believe that just happened It's the sparkly fairy though and by now I should know it's coming

Originally posted by byteshertz
reply to post by Hopechest

 

It has nothing to do with technology, it has to do with an inherent flaw in capitalism.
That flaw is the double edged sword that also makes capitalism work = greed.

Greed is definitely a huge driving force behind all this, and planned obsolescence is definitely a real thing (I also recommend everyone here watch The Lightbulb Conspiracy, as well as The Story of Stuff) - but it's not the only element at play.

Other factors include laziness, apathy, vanity, superficiality, ignorance, and extreme gullibility.

^^^These are all things that drive the mindset of your average consumer.^^^


In theory the system should work, because if you build a better product that lasts longer it should perform better on the free market.

But we live in a world where people don't care about that - everyone just wants instant gratification instead.

So they flock to Walmart to buy cheap crap because it's easy. They consume those cheap goods exactly because they're cheap, not in spite of it. This fosters a culture where companies are actually more in competition with each other to produce the cheapest crap possible, rather than the best.

Meanwhile even with pricier items people are often more interested in how the logo on the product makes them look cool rather than what it says about its quality.

So that's not to say greedy corporations are off the hook here, either - they are still very much the beast. But the problem is we keep feeding it.



Until that changes, nothing else will. Corporations aren't just going to suddenly all have a change of heart and say "hey we're sorry we've been exploiting all your mindless stupidity folks, we'll stop raking in the dough now because it's the 'honest' thing to do".


All in all however yeah - it just adds up to show how fundamentally broken capitalism is, and how much it fails in reality versus how it's supposed to work in the ideal (much like all the "isms" really).

Also want to say great topic OP. ATS needs more discussions like this. There are even members on this thread who I normally completely disagree with that I'm starring their posts because we're totally on the same page here.

If more of our conversations came from critical thinking and common sense talking points like this, instead of all the crazy right vs. left rhetoric all the time - we'd probably have a lot more constructive dialogue around here.

(Despite the best efforts of the trolls trying to derail it - yaaaaay planned obsolescence, yaaaay government lobbyists...lol seriously?)

Originally posted by mc_squared

Originally posted by byteshertz
reply to post by Hopechest

 

It has nothing to do with technology, it has to do with an inherent flaw in capitalism.
That flaw is the double edged sword that also makes capitalism work = greed.

Greed is definitely a huge driving force behind all this, and planned obsolescence is definitely a real thing (I also recommend everyone here watch The Lightbulb Conspiracy, as well as The Story of Stuff) - but it's not the only element at play.

Other factors include laziness, apathy, vanity, superficiality, ignorance, and extreme gullibility.

^^^These are all things that drive the mindset of your average consumer.^^^


In theory the system should work, because if you build a better product that lasts longer it should perform better on the free market.

But we live in a world where people don't care about that - everyone just wants instant gratification instead.

So they flock to Walmart to buy cheap crap because it's easy. They consume those cheap goods exactly because they're cheap, not in spite of it. This fosters a culture where companies are actually more in competition with each other to produce the cheapest crap possible, rather than the best.

Meanwhile even with pricier items people are often more interested in how the logo on the product makes them look cool rather than what it says about its quality.

So that's not to say greedy corporations are off the hook here, either - they are still very much the beast. But the problem is we keep feeding it.

Until that changes, nothing else will. Corporations aren't just going to suddenly all have a change of heart and say "hey we're sorry we've been exploiting all your mindless stupidity folks, we'll stop raking in the dough now because it's the 'honest' thing to do".


All in all however yeah - it just adds up to show how fundamentally broken capitalism is, and how much it fails in reality versus how it's supposed to work in the ideal (much like all the "isms" really).

I agree with a lot of what you are saying except when it comes to lower class families. There are a lot of families out there who have no choice but to consume cheap. Unfortunately something like healthy eating has become a fade for those with the means. Its not always about choice. Sometimes its about survival. kinda off topic. Sorry

It all depends what we are talking about though. Component level electronics is the thing of the past because it is far cheaper to produce a multi-layered circuit board than have someone troubleshoot it (in which, many of technicians couldn't anyway). Many of these types of components have replaced the standard resistor, capacitor or transistor of old that many could find and replace.

So when we open up a coffee maker, and see a printed circuit board that is controlling the functions of it, compared to a coffee maker of yore; where simple electronics controlled it, it is more cost efficient to just replace the whole assembly and not just the portion that has failed.

Originally posted by Hopechest
It would be called technology.

If you would prefer to drive the horse and buggy that you can fix by finding sticks on the side of the road I'm sure the Amish would welcome you with open arms.

The rest of us however like to progress.

Would they really?

On topic: i agree with you and the best example is any new windows version. (Dont buy windows 8)

If you're looking for something to blame on why things break, there are a few reasons...

The first and most important is shareholders. It's because once a company goes public, they are beholden to shareholders. The ONLY thing that the majority of shareholders care about is money. So when you own a company that is private and makes good products, and then all of a sudden they get crappy, check to see if the company has recently gone public. The more money the shareholders make, the more investment capital a business has to work with, so the only logical way to do that is to make profit. How do you make profit? If you have a single line of business, you cut costs. How do most businesses cut costs? They buy cheaper parts, cheaper distribution channels, etc. In most cases (not all), cheaper tends to mean something of lower quality.

Another reason for the cheaper quality products is China. Yes, labor is cheaper in China. But there are also little to no regulations there. Most US companies will build their products in China, bypassing the quality and safety regulations here in the US, or change their quality inspection process to only check the fully assembled products after they come from China, rather than quality inspecting every part before and after assembly, which is usually how things are done elsewhere. Contracts and safety mean little to Chinese businesses, and the government for that matter, and this is reflected in the manufacturing of their products.

After market warranties. An entire market segment has been created solely on selling and servicing warranties. This acts like a safety net for the cheaper products so that consumer aren't too jaded by so many broken products. This also has a revenue stream independent of the products themselves. That's why you'll always get offered the extended warranty, because it's just profit on top of profit and they don't want to deal with returns (which are expensive), so they off-set the expense to the warranty shops, who make a killing because they are basically selling mini insurance policies. This leads into the next reason, which is something most people don't know...

Electrical Component Ratings / Specifications / Datasheets. The important thing to know about these ratings is that every single piece of circuitry that is in every device you buy will have a rating that goes with it. The rating is an indicator of approximately how many hours of operating time under optimal conditions a specific part is guaranteed. When a risk assessment is done for a product for structuring a warranty, an analysis is done to figure out what is the first part that could die the earliest. That is when the warranty is set for. After that, all bets are off. In the past, most parts were of much higher quality, but again, with the cost of rare earth minerals increasing exponentially, and China having virtually the entire industry locked down, the lack of quality in China, you get electronic parts that are lower quality and therefore, shorter warranty periods. After that, it's a numbers game and that's where the 3rd party warranty companies take your money.

Last but not least, is planned obsolescence. Microsoft already has technology right now, that can look over your data, and predict with 90% accuracy where you'll be located days and in some cases, weeks from now. They also have everything in between that and the technology available commercially today. Anyone with common sense can see that if you're trying to keep shareholders happy, you're going to play your cards close to your vest. Anyone who has gone to college for business and understands boom and bust cycles knows that you don't put everything on the table all at once. Why do you think Taco Bell, Burger King, McDonalds, etc. all have a "special" or "new" product every few months? They pump up their value with these "new" things until it plateaus, ride it for as long as they can, and then do it again. They have already created the next 100 "new" sandwiches and meal combos to last the next 5 years, so why offer them all now? Because you make more money by doing it as a slow release over time. This makes shareholders happy and increases the "value" on paper that a company is worth, so that when they ask a bank for more investment money, they look better and more "profitable".

The only ways to fix it is for companies to want to build products for the betterment of mankind, and to increase the overall wealth of a person's life. As humans, we should be compelled to create a better existence for all other humans and to eventually get off of this planet, because it doesn't take much to figure out that there is a breaking point to our population and resources. It will take centuries to do it right, so we should start now instead of worrying about which words to drop from a 140 character tweet to make it fit.

Thanks for letting me get on my soapbox. This struck a personal nerve.

~Namaste

Originally posted by buster2010
Stockings used to be strong enough you could tow a car with them good luck trying that now.

Or use them in a pinch as a belt on your engine.

It's called engineered failure. During college studying product and industrial design, I met many designers who would purposefully find ways of making the product fail after a set amount of time based on what the company's given time frame for the product would be set at, this is nothing new, and as you said, is for the purpose of making a bigger profit. That's just one of the negative aspects of basing a whole system around greed. However not all companies are like this. Take the AA battery for instance. The rechargeable energizer, and duracell batteries always performed like garbage, and would fail relatively quickly, this in turn kept the normal alkaline battery sales up, and kept people buying loads of batteries. Then steps in sanyo who built a rechargeable eneloop AA which could hold a charge for years compared to the typical AA rechargeable battery which would fail in a few months. Even their charger is better, as it doesn't blast the battery with brute force. People instantly recognized that this battery was 10 times better than the garbage energizer and duracell was spitting out. I'm sure these companies are losing money, so they have been forced to put out a better rechargeable cell, ie "duralock"

This has always bothered me, so before I buy any product I will research it to death and only buy quality items based on real reviews, because in the end you end up spending more money on the cheap garbage having to buy it over and over again.

It all comes down to the fact that companies don't build products for the benefit of the consumer, they build products to make as much money as they can get away with, without the consumer losing faith in that company.

reply to post by Hopechest


It's called controlled fallacy, and yes it's a real practice. Products that last a long time are no good to producers for rather obvious reasons. Things are built to break so you keep on buying. Can you please do a smidgeon of research on a topic before you reply to it?

reply to post by Hopechest


Garden seeds, Monsanto is buying them all up!

Sometimes I like to believe that the whole system we're living in right now has been designed to be a cataclysm towards a new world order. Just a very well thought, long term plan, for the best way to go at it. The economy proves my point. There's no future to it, it's not a viable economy, it's a crisis economy driven by debt. Massive and painful changes are required to fix the root problems. Problem Reaction Solution. The problem will be the system. Reaction will be global outrage. The solution is already written.

reply to post by Tranceopticalinclined


It almost seems like the whole system was built to break at some point.

Obviously, in a society where you get respected merely by the amounts of money you have is a false and twisted society, like Jacque Fresco said: 'Our society will go down in history as the lowest development in man"

For goodness sake, I doubt if there's yet a term for that but we obviously have planned obsolescence for our bodies and health too, otherwise why going into a supermarket only to find huge amounts of junk packed with stimulating boxes and pictures?

100 years ago, we barely had nations and borders. Seems like this nationalism idea wasn't to make us all feel safe, but rather it seemed like it was planned obsolescence to strip us away from simple rights and get us trapped into this false idea we call a nation. Which is a complete bullocks.

Our entire society was planned obsolescence, build a world to break the # out of it. In every single thing I observe in our society, I can see how nothing really works as it should, the world is completely upside down and there must be a reason behind it. Even religion seems planned obsolescence, making you believe you found truth and salvation and yet you are manipulated and have your vision and truth distorted.

I don't know how we've got to this situation, but yes OP I fully agree with you although I believe it is on a much greater scale. I honestly wish it was only for products made in China but it's all around us, and unfortunately I don't see how the future can change that as it's only getting worse by the time.

Originally posted by Tranceopticalinclined
You can make more screwing your consumer over selling it one time to them, and having it break from cheap parts, blame it on the
" factory " ( but you told them to use the parts ), they aren't under any form of anything from USA consumer protection orgs and they just made 25.99 times 500,000 on a bad week. This is why our country is failing yet our stock market is rising.

Uhm, no, that's not why our country is falling apart.

It's because people like you have not allowed capitalism to flourish, which would mean that failing corporations, and most importantly the too big to fail BANKS, would have gone bankrupt and disappeared when they failed. Instead, you have allowed them to capture, bribe and co-opt the government. And now they have a means by which they can steal every last penny from the American people and the world.

That is not capitalism. In fact that is pure socialism, from each according to his ability, to each according to his need. The banks were in need, and the American taxpayers had the ability to bail them out.

Congratulations, keep voting for Republicans and Democrats, you're getting just what you wanted.

reply to post by Tranceopticalinclined

I could not agree more with your view on this issue (specialized tools ) etc. & recycling parts as it is a hobby of mine to recycle old technology while attempting to integrate it with some of the new technology where applicable the planet we reside upon is more than a wasteland of discarded ideas & wasted technology!