My local Montana landfill is full of the remains of short-lived coffee grinders, pens, peelers, laptops. After Christmas, I’ll need to reserve a bigger plot.
I'm late to the game here, but he Maytag washer and dryer I bought in 1976 are both still working fine--made with actual metal and capable of receiving replacement parts. But those parts, the repairman tells me, are soon going to run out!
So 47 years of use of two products, rather than buying replacements every 5-7 years--meaning buying 6-7 replacements, which would have had to be sourced, manufactured, and the old ones thrown out to the land fill. Then we have "shrinkflation."
Great article. There is a fascinating "Stuff You Should Know" podcast on planned obsolescence and surprisingly it goes back to the early twentieth century. So we were doing it to ourselves before trade opened internationally and then we were able to do it to ourselves for far cheaper. Ah Taiwan, what would we do without you. Thanks for a great article.
Grateful that my husband is an engineer. We are able to keep our young appliances longer because he discerned the motherboards in them are the things that sputter and die quickly. He replaced the computer component/or an entire control panel in each, and the otherwise hardy dishwasher, washing machine and microwave oven are living to perform a longer lifespan. He orders the components online. Can openers, timers, and other small inadequate tools are the sources of despair for me. I try to find the simplest tools with the least "features." I now use a simple can opener to pierce a can and pump up and down with muscle power until the can is open. Low-maintenance, high efficiency.
Our meager efforts will not stem the tide of planned obsolescence, but we live to fight another day.
I don't know about that. I have just had a computer tech fix my ten year old plus laptop, which had even lost it's keyboard usage. I was using an external keyboard and he managed to fix it. I have replaced it's battery several times, too. I replaced my old smartphone (probably over 5 years old) three years ago with a new one and hope to have it another five or six years. Some things CAN be repaired if you want to repair them and other things can be picked up at resale shops on the cheap, very often. But there will still be those out there who think that they have to have the latest and greatest. That will never change.
Things generally don’t go as well if people don’t have skin in the game. Parachutes get folded better if people have to take a jump once a week with a parachute they packed themselves.
In the software world we call using the program you work on “dogfooding”.
When we build our new house 17 years ago` we bought all new appliances. In a moment of overkill it was decided to put a new German made Miele in the kitchen and another in the pantry for entertainment overflow. As it turned out the one in the kitchen was used 5 or more times a week, while the one in the pantry was used perhaps five times a year. Two years ago the one in the pantry died. OK, no big loss but then, within a week, the one in the kitchen died. Same symptoms preceding death. Looked like planned obsolescence.
Product quality deterioration is so maddening...we have a saying in our house "everything is just a little bit shittier these days". To be specific (as Walter likes), why does every crappy dishwasher have to run for 2 hours+ to clean plates and glasses when 20 years ago you could complete a wash in 30 minutes? Because the EPA mandated electricity / water savings in every design and manufacturers are spending all their time/money on chips and electronics to save $0.05 of energy on every load rather than making a product that will run for 20 years (like a 1998 Toyota). If consumers had a "choice" (rather than buying a mandated product) they would almost always choose longevity for saving $0.05 / load. Great article!
Hear, hear. (Specific gripe: the new tumble dryer that won't work properly with an app, which doesn't work after downloading and harvesting my data.) The move from mechanical to digital is nearly always a change for the worse. Bah! Merry Christmas!
I think the article is true in so many depressing ways. But perhaps at least a partial antidote is included in the quote of William Morris. I think people are realizing more and more that living a digital life is not living at all. We need to get back to things that are tangible. To surround ourselves with things of quality and beauty and to have real actual human interactions. If you have a craft, make something with your hands and then put it in your house. If you’re all thumbs, find someone who has a craft, be it woodworking or pottery or basketweaving and buy something that appeals to you. In the process you’ll not only be supporting a creative person, but interacting with someone who can add dimension to your life. Last summer I made a point of shopping at a local farmers market. Buying produce from the woman who picked it that morning is just different, and better. After a few visits, she asked me what I was doing with all those tomatoes and she shared what she does with the bruised ones she can’t sell. Just human interaction. Wow. Try getting that experience in the self checkout line at Walmart.
Similar to the juicer, we have a clothes dryer we got for a wedding present in 1977. It has been repaired a couple of times for minor issues. The repair guy always says to hang on to it. And we do.
Relic like rtifacts or financially engineered products?
It really is a Hobson’s Choice isn’t it?
We can spend our treasure buying American made goods that cater to the past generation or gorge on the cheap goods our CEOs manufacture in China and elsewhere.
Aaah, the wonders of technology, or should I say the merger of plastics, microchips, marketing, and planned obsolescence. It's not even the fact that gadgets break, but also that we are a culture that wants the latest gadgets with the latest bells and whistles. How many times are we tempted by the constant ads to buy the latest model of some doodad that winds itself, needs no maintenance, and requires little effort on our parts to operate . . . until it doesn't. Oh, we bitch and moan about the makers, advertisers, and the legal beagles who write those undecipherable contracts and warranties, but as Pogo told us long ago, "We have met the enemy, and he is us." The fact is that we are addicted to conspicuous consumption and ease that was perfectly captured several years ago in the animated Pixar movie "Wall-E". Our Mount Trashmores testify to that.
my wife insists its my fault that we buy dozens of pens a year for a few wors and numbers in ink and never have any. its because they dont work after a use or two and fall apart.
I'm late to the game here, but he Maytag washer and dryer I bought in 1976 are both still working fine--made with actual metal and capable of receiving replacement parts. But those parts, the repairman tells me, are soon going to run out!
So 47 years of use of two products, rather than buying replacements every 5-7 years--meaning buying 6-7 replacements, which would have had to be sourced, manufactured, and the old ones thrown out to the land fill. Then we have "shrinkflation."
Great article. There is a fascinating "Stuff You Should Know" podcast on planned obsolescence and surprisingly it goes back to the early twentieth century. So we were doing it to ourselves before trade opened internationally and then we were able to do it to ourselves for far cheaper. Ah Taiwan, what would we do without you. Thanks for a great article.
Grateful that my husband is an engineer. We are able to keep our young appliances longer because he discerned the motherboards in them are the things that sputter and die quickly. He replaced the computer component/or an entire control panel in each, and the otherwise hardy dishwasher, washing machine and microwave oven are living to perform a longer lifespan. He orders the components online. Can openers, timers, and other small inadequate tools are the sources of despair for me. I try to find the simplest tools with the least "features." I now use a simple can opener to pierce a can and pump up and down with muscle power until the can is open. Low-maintenance, high efficiency.
Our meager efforts will not stem the tide of planned obsolescence, but we live to fight another day.
I don't know about that. I have just had a computer tech fix my ten year old plus laptop, which had even lost it's keyboard usage. I was using an external keyboard and he managed to fix it. I have replaced it's battery several times, too. I replaced my old smartphone (probably over 5 years old) three years ago with a new one and hope to have it another five or six years. Some things CAN be repaired if you want to repair them and other things can be picked up at resale shops on the cheap, very often. But there will still be those out there who think that they have to have the latest and greatest. That will never change.
Things generally don’t go as well if people don’t have skin in the game. Parachutes get folded better if people have to take a jump once a week with a parachute they packed themselves.
In the software world we call using the program you work on “dogfooding”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eating_your_own_dog_food
What a funny (but serious) essay. Thank you for this wonderful work, Walter. It won't fall apart or become useless anytime soon.
When we build our new house 17 years ago` we bought all new appliances. In a moment of overkill it was decided to put a new German made Miele in the kitchen and another in the pantry for entertainment overflow. As it turned out the one in the kitchen was used 5 or more times a week, while the one in the pantry was used perhaps five times a year. Two years ago the one in the pantry died. OK, no big loss but then, within a week, the one in the kitchen died. Same symptoms preceding death. Looked like planned obsolescence.
Great read
Lulz
Product quality deterioration is so maddening...we have a saying in our house "everything is just a little bit shittier these days". To be specific (as Walter likes), why does every crappy dishwasher have to run for 2 hours+ to clean plates and glasses when 20 years ago you could complete a wash in 30 minutes? Because the EPA mandated electricity / water savings in every design and manufacturers are spending all their time/money on chips and electronics to save $0.05 of energy on every load rather than making a product that will run for 20 years (like a 1998 Toyota). If consumers had a "choice" (rather than buying a mandated product) they would almost always choose longevity for saving $0.05 / load. Great article!
Hear, hear. (Specific gripe: the new tumble dryer that won't work properly with an app, which doesn't work after downloading and harvesting my data.) The move from mechanical to digital is nearly always a change for the worse. Bah! Merry Christmas!
"*without* an app", not "with an app"! Doh.
I think the article is true in so many depressing ways. But perhaps at least a partial antidote is included in the quote of William Morris. I think people are realizing more and more that living a digital life is not living at all. We need to get back to things that are tangible. To surround ourselves with things of quality and beauty and to have real actual human interactions. If you have a craft, make something with your hands and then put it in your house. If you’re all thumbs, find someone who has a craft, be it woodworking or pottery or basketweaving and buy something that appeals to you. In the process you’ll not only be supporting a creative person, but interacting with someone who can add dimension to your life. Last summer I made a point of shopping at a local farmers market. Buying produce from the woman who picked it that morning is just different, and better. After a few visits, she asked me what I was doing with all those tomatoes and she shared what she does with the bruised ones she can’t sell. Just human interaction. Wow. Try getting that experience in the self checkout line at Walmart.
Similar to the juicer, we have a clothes dryer we got for a wedding present in 1977. It has been repaired a couple of times for minor issues. The repair guy always says to hang on to it. And we do.
Relic like rtifacts or financially engineered products?
It really is a Hobson’s Choice isn’t it?
We can spend our treasure buying American made goods that cater to the past generation or gorge on the cheap goods our CEOs manufacture in China and elsewhere.
Aaah, the wonders of technology, or should I say the merger of plastics, microchips, marketing, and planned obsolescence. It's not even the fact that gadgets break, but also that we are a culture that wants the latest gadgets with the latest bells and whistles. How many times are we tempted by the constant ads to buy the latest model of some doodad that winds itself, needs no maintenance, and requires little effort on our parts to operate . . . until it doesn't. Oh, we bitch and moan about the makers, advertisers, and the legal beagles who write those undecipherable contracts and warranties, but as Pogo told us long ago, "We have met the enemy, and he is us." The fact is that we are addicted to conspicuous consumption and ease that was perfectly captured several years ago in the animated Pixar movie "Wall-E". Our Mount Trashmores testify to that.
my wife insists its my fault that we buy dozens of pens a year for a few wors and numbers in ink and never have any. its because they dont work after a use or two and fall apart.