Hi. In today’s episode, we look at Planned Obsolescence, the resulting mountains of e-waste, and why companies don’t want you to be able to fix their crummy products.
If you expect Cody to be nice to Apple, you will be very disappointed.
Damn, did Technology Connections get everybody fired up? I just watched an Unlearning Economics video on the same topic.
What video did he do recently that would have gotten people fired up about this?
Tech Con: https://youtu.be/zb7Bs98KmnY
UnEcon: https://youtu.be/Fz68ILyuWtA
Might be more of a Baader-Meinhof phenomenon for me, because those two videos were just recommended to me back-to-back, and I’ve only watched the second one so far.
I really expected zero updoots here and maybe a reply saying I’m dumb cuz Tech Con barely said anything about obsolescence. I was just stream-of-consciousness’ing, but I guess others are feeling the same vibes? ¯\(ツ)/¯
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So. I’ve seen the some more news video as well as the Technology Connections one. I have not see the Unlearning Economics one (but it’s going on my docket for tomorrow).
Basically the Some more News video is just a simple overview on the concept of Planned Obsolescence i.e. the idea that some things are designed/engineered in a way so they will break easier/faster than they normally would or made in such a way that a repair is not economically viable so that instead of keeping/repairing a product a customer has to buy a new regularly.
One if the most famous and oldest examples is the lightbulb cartel where lightbulb manufacturer actually had a contract that limited how long a lightbulb would live to 1000h (including penalties if the manufacturers produced longer living bulbs). Iirc Cody mentioned that one in his video as well (I will watch all 3 vida back to back tomorrow just to straighten things out here).
Now this “Phoebus” cartel as it was called is exactly what the Technology Connections video is about. However Alecs point is a different one. He is basically saying that while it was true the cartel limited the Lifetime it also meant they were producing “better” bulbs. Namely ones that would burn brighter while using the same amount of power as ones that would last longer. His second point is that lightbulbs are more or less a “spare part” i.e. they are cheap and easy to replace (usually) so if one breaks you don’t have to throw away your nightlamp or whatever it is attached to you simply replace the bulb with a cheap replacement and you’re good.
So basically the Technology Connections Videos Thesis is the Phoebus Cartell wasn’t actually planned obsolescence but a move to a better lightbulb and a bit more runtime (2.5x in his example) isn’t worth the worse light output.
Baader-Meinhof??? I hardly know her Meinhof!
Apple in my opinion is one of the worst companies at sustainability. Like yes the product is fast and reliable until it doesn’t. Then you have to throw the whole thing away instead of being able to change the single piece that it’s not good anymore.
This take is hilarious. Apple, which has phones that are the longest lasting with the longest updates, is somehow the worst company? Have you ever worked on tech before? Dude, I cannot tell you how many shitty ass galaxy S3-4s I repaired that had “pillow pack” where the battery dies and inflates. Or how many LG phones got stuck in a boot loop, or how many HTC devices had broke ports that were soldered to the mobo so it was either charge to solder (yeah ok) a new one on or buy a new phone again.
When I was working on enterprise systems it was the same story too. MacBooks only ever had problems if someone dropped it and broke the screen, otherwise those things lasted upwards of 8 years and that was 10 years ago when laptops didn’t last for shit. We threw out thousands of Acer and Asus Chromebooks every 4 years back in the day because Google and the manufacturer would stop giving them security updates so they couldn’t test with them. Or god forbid it was one of those crap Samsung Chromebooks at which point the little DC pin connector just basically broke and it was again a port soldered to a mobo.
I get that Apple isn’t perfect. I can shit on them for their monopolistic behavior, their longstanding hatred to self repair, and their walled garden systems that make it impossible to administrate over as a sysadmin. However to say they’re the worst offender in an industry with peers like Samsung, LG, Acer, Asus and others is laughable. At least we can get 8 years out of a device. Hell the iPhone 6 received almost a full DECADE of security updates with 6 solid years of full system updates. Sustainability is beyond just repairability. It’s also how long a device can actively, and safely, be in service.
I am sorry but what about creating new charging standards so that you can sell your own charging cables, adapters, etc. Don’t tell me that Apple is good, no they are not. Why do you think even today, you cannot use their headphones with Android or MS devices? They are actively trying to create extra hurdles and they only adopted the USB-C because of the pressure the EU put on them. Aren’t all those incompatible parts not increasing the e-waste?
Oh and if I am not wrong they were the first to introduce the non replaceable battery, and eventually the rest of the pack followed suit.
Lightning was leaps and bounds better than anything else on the market. Fully reversible, sturdier connector, sturdier plug. The only drawback was the apple tax, and that is easily overcome with third party cables.
USB C was released a full 2 years after Lightning, and Apple was part of the group that helped develop it.
And by “headphones” are you talking about EarPods? Because those things are garbage and most people wouldn’t even notice that they don’t work with other devices. Or are you talking about their AirPods, which all work with virtually any device that realistically supports Bluetooth headsets.
I started this comment intending to play devils advocate, then realized you’re just an uninformed individual with a hard-on for a company you don’t like. At least try to know what you’re talking about next time?
This is a very jaded and warped take with some bias.
MacBooks only ever had problems if someone dropped it and broke the screen, otherwise those things lasted upwards of 8 years and that was 10 years ago when laptops didn’t last for shit.
I’ve used MacBooks for work for the last half decade, the entire generation of MacBooks manufacturered around 2016 until the M1 were released were entirely what you’re claiming some poorly manufactured phones were. My MacBook’s battery grew so much it busted the case open, and the touch bar constantly malfunctioned from the day I got it. So, it ain’t all roses as far as quality from Apple either like you’re saying.
Oh, and another thing is that while they might not be the worst quality, they are often by far the highest priced items in their category. So, yeah Acers probably break more frequently but they’re like $300 while (like the video states) you’ll be spending $700 for locking wheels for a fucking Apple.
For the price they charge, they ought to be the longest lasting, best electronics ever made. But they are definitely not.
I got torn apart a few days ago for pointing out that these phones are actually very easy to repair. Barring the VIN locking on recent models, they’re pretty modular devices and, at least in my experience, are on the easier end of devices to repair. Also, when the iPhone 11 was the latest model, the bulk of the phones I was repairing were the 7 and 8, so even with the locking, that I will agree is bullshit, the bulk of devices are not the absolute newest. This notion that iPhones have to be thrown away if they have so much as a hairline is kind of stupid. There’s plenty of reasons to hate Apple without stretching the truth.
Galaxy s3-4s batteries were user replaceable
Also those are phones from 13 years ago, despite not having removable batteries the new Samsung phones get updated and are built to last, much longer.
Are You fucking thick, or being paid by apple? They release the same phone every 2 years and force you to change by slowing down software. I’ve had a cheap Xiaomi phone for 5 now. Still works fine. My friend has a Samsung for 8 years. Either one of these cost less than a fifth of a price of an iPhone. Laptops? I’ve had an Acer for 7years. It cost less than a quarter of a price of an apple with lower specs. Now I’m using a Lenovo for 3 years, end when I needed more storage space, I dismounted the 1TB hard drive from my 7 year old laptop and installed it in my current pc. And the 7yo Acer? I gave it to my grandma, she still uses it, so it’s being used for a decade now. Do any of this shit with an overpriced apple product, I dear You. Not to mention their stupid design. I was working once in an office where they used apple. Only time ever when my hands hurt from using a keyboard. And the moronic wireless mouse which looked the same front and back so people regularly held it backwards. And the charging port was on the bottom, so you couldn’t use it while charging. Overpriced, overadvertised shit.
First off, they release the same phone every year thank you very much.
Second, just because you’re using those devices doesn’t mean they’re properly supported. Those phones haven’t received a single security update in years which means you’re vulnerable to various kinds of SMS attacks that have been patched on devices that have received security patches. That’s the other part of E-Waste. Devices getting actual software and security support. Just because you can upgrade the SSD in a laptop doesn’t make it less E-Waste. You have simply now added a new drive to the mound of trash if that drive failed. Back in 2014-16 HP laptops had these Intel SSDs in them. They failed like crazy. Usually about 10 per every 100 devices. We kept a supply of SSDs on hand for when those drives eventually shit themselves. Now, on a MacBook a failure rate of the SSDs/internal storage is incredibly low. I personally haven’t had a MacBook that’s had internal storage failure and I’ve managed probably close to 750 MacBooks. So of the probably 2000 hp laptops, with Intel drives that we swapped after 2 years because they were dying. We created a decent amount of e-waste. Just because we could repair the device easily doesn’t mean it isn’t still contributing.
We need higher quality materials used in fab with longevity, not just repairability. I can fix almost anything given enough time. I can’t fix thousands of broken things constantly assaulting me with work orders because of unreliable parts.
Maybe don’t write out messages when you’re hOrni.
The “h” is silent.
It’s probably just the only phone he has
Yeah and I wonder how much gets recycled. E-waste is a massive issue that’s been around now for decades
I wonder how much gets recycled
To put it simply.
It doesn’t.
It is still cheaper to dig new shit out of the ground (due to all the environmental costs being ignored) than it is to breakdown the many metals etc within a phone for reuse.
microelectronics will be inherently difficult to upgrade, reuse and recycle. their continued hyper-evolution prevents any real programs. it will happen, but there are plenty of more voluminous, low-hanging-fruit we could be working on immediately.
these are bigger items that are now made like garbage like all home appliances. these things should absolutely be user-upgrade able, 100% recyclable and designed to last decades. they could easily be designed in more modular fashion, and absolutely used to last decades.
We’ll eventually reach a point where we can just have electronics scavenge the defective electronics.
You will find no argument here about the problems that arise when corporations are not required to pay for the garbage they produce.
However.
Optimising incandescent lightbulb efficiency is actually not easy to do. It is easy to make a lightbulb that lasts literally forever, if you run it cooler. But if you do that, your power efficiency will be total shit. (And your light will be uncomfortably red, but let’s say that’s less important for now.) You will waste a lot of money on your electricity bill. There will come a point when you will be wasting more money on electricity than the lightbulb is worth. This breakeven point is difficult to determine. It is a calculation that the average consumer shouldn’t be burdened with.
