The Old Dog Discusses: Planned Obsolescence Exposes The Dark Side of Product Design!
Did you know that there is a lot of wickedness inherent in the design of many products and appliances?
What is Planned Obsolescence?
- Purposely designing products that wear out or become obsolete after limited use
- This is done to induce the consumer to purchase a new model of the product or to buy replacement parts
What does this light bulb have to do with you? Plenty! You'll find out here! Image credit
My Introduction to This Insidious Practice
Step One of The Dirty Tricks:
Several years ago I purchased a new Samsung printer for my business for about $200 and after a short period of time a message came out saying that the waste toner tank was filled and I needed to change it or the printer would stop working.
The waste toner tank is completely sealed making it impossible to empty but I drilled some holes in it, flushed it out and cleaned it myself. Afterwards I just covered the wholes with clear tape. The manufacturer could have provided a removable plug! This message and cleaning procedure was followed about every 6 months!
This is a screen shot from a Samsung video showing how to CHANGE the waste toner tank! What a farce!
Step Two of The Great Conspiracy:
After about a year a new message appeared saying that I had to change the image drum before the printer would work again! After some research I learned that the drum had a chip on it which only allowed the printing of a pre-determined number of copies! What thieves!
I found someone who sent me a chip that I taped on top of the old one and it worked for about another year. I then changed the chip again about a year later and in total I got many years of service out of that printer. No thanks to Samsung!
Here is a video from the the guy that I bought the chip from. Shocking!
What Was The Start of This Trickery?
There is a lightbulb in Livermore Califronia that has been burning for over 100 years. In fact when bulb inventors such as Edison and Adolphe Chaillet were designing the first bulbs their goal was longevity.
Then came the Phoebus cartel where major manufacturers such as Philips, General Electric and Osram decided to collude together! Not only did they get involved in price fixing but they purposely lowered the life-span of bulbs from the 1924 standard of 2,500 hours to 1,000 hours in 1940. Strict logs were kept and if necessary, fines were given in order to make sure that the low standards were kept! Can you say evil and wasteful?
All of this proved that putting the reins on innovation and quality was a proven way of sustaining continued consumption and profits!
Learn More About Planned Obsolescence
If you would like to learn more about this subject I highly recommend the documentary "The Lightbulb Conspiracy- Planned Obsolescence".
Beware! This film will shock you!
I always try to fix any broken products that I own and in a future article I'll discuss some more about this.
What Has Your Experience Been?
- Had you already heard about planned obsolescence?
- What examples can you share?
- How does this knowledge make you feel?
I hope that you enjoyed this article on "Planned Obsolescence Exposes The Dark Side of Product Design!"
Until next time,
@kus-knee (The Old Dog)
Remember, if you upvote my post and leave a comment I will do my best to upvote it with some of my 41,000 plus Steem Power!
@kus-knee, planned obsolescence has been one of my pet peeves for most of my adult life! My dad was a bit of an inventor as well as a "quality freak" and he originally taught me some about products that were created more to be "sold" than actually to be used.
"Cheap" printers are a particularly nasty piece of trickery... designed mostly to make you spend lots of money on expensive toner and parts that supposedly "wear out," as per your experience. I have a laser printer that I have been using "remanufactured" toner cartridges in for years... even though the printer manual insists that using such "3rd party"cartridges can permanently damage the printer.
Not only do I save money on the locally re-made printer cartridges, they actually last longer than the OEM cartridges they'd have me buy! A scam, indeed!
I much admire the example of your dad. Remember : "The misery of poor quality remains much longer than the joy of a cheap price."
Poor quality is one thing but designing a product to fail at a pre-determined time, while understandable from a business point of view, is criminal!
Thanks so much @denmarkguy for taking the time to make an insightful comment!
The cynic in me says it's just part of our inevitable cycle that revolves around consuming and spending. I'm sure apologists for capitalism will argue that's how things are meant to work... but I take issue with that. I am a willing buyer for a better product that will last me a lifetime, but nobody seems to make one for me to buy!
Yes, I prefer video games consoles using games in cartridges like Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis because they last longer than CD-ROM based game consoles of today.
Very interesting! Thank so much for the visit @darthvana. You're an inspiration to many!
It's my pleasure. Your posts are always interesting!
@kus-knee Isn’t it funny when you come across a product your parents or grandparents are using that you’ve never seen before because it’s so old? Like a vacuum cleaner that belongs in a glass case somewhere, or a television fit for a museum (not in their closet or living room.)
As someone who is on her third Apple iPod (and no, the other two haven’t died on me yet), the idea of a product lasting for years to come without dying or becoming obsolete is news to me. I can only imagine what it’ll be like for my kids someday.
If you’ve ever been frustrated by the idea of a company coming out with the latest and greatest thing every six months, then you aren’t alone. The idea of planned obsolescence isn’t a new one, but has been around for generations. You’ve probably even come across this practice in your everyday life!
Well thanks for sharing with us these things.
Upvoted+Resteem!!
On the iPods, all devices that use software eventually end up "updating" your device to the point it won't work. So you have to stop updating at some point, then you become "vulnerable". Maybe all the "hacker villians" aren't just some adult kid in a basement or gangs in Russia. Maybe they're on payrolls...
"Maybe all the "hacker villians" aren't just some adult kid in a basement or gangs in Russia. Maybe they're on payrolls..."
A very telling comment!
Gotta wonder
Agreed with your motto.
What a great comment! as they say: "They sure don't make em like they used to!"
Dear friend, when I studied economy at University (just few exams ^^), one of our teacher talked to us about the changement happened when, many years ago, the industries decided to make less expensive products (and also less long-lived) instead more expensive and long-lived products. This decision changed the society and the consumerism started. There are many economists who are studied the effects along the time, some of them have specific strategy to contrast the effect of consumerism in the society.
About me, I can give you my experience with a simple things: dresses! I love vintage dresses, not only because they are really nice, but also because the fabrics used for them are really long-lived! ^^
Thanks so much for your super comment. The fact that you express yourself so well in English is fabulous.
I am sure that you look bene and forte in those vintage dresses. For sure Paolo is a happy man!!!!
lol it's true! The vintage dresses are bene and forti, like me and Paolo :P
Hi Kus, can you Imagine that I had the same issues with my Samsung laser printer?? It was a cheap model but it worked so fine and when the message of the image drum came out I just bought new toners some days before! And the drum costed more than the printer value, no way!! So I found a step by step (in my case you had to add an extra resistance to the chip) to reset the count and now it works perfectly. What a sadness, waste of time and materials and pollution made by manufacturers, that they makes billions of profits (do they really NEED to do that?). Before this model I had an HP that had the scanner integrated, and when the ink was over I couldn't use the whole device!! Just to say that it's not a Samsung problem.
Anyway you did your job against this crazyness, well done!!
So, you're not just a painter but also a fixer! Nice! Yes all of the printing manufacturers seem to do it. Very dirty business practices!
Planned obsolescence is disgusting!!!!..I get very angry....think of all the consumeristic waste produced because of it...Grrrrr.... :-(
Yes you're right!
This is pure brilliance.
@kus-knee,
Actually I didn't go through the videos! Coz my data connection sucks :/ But I could get it!
"Planned Obsolescence" this is purposely done! In my organization some products are planned obsolescence! Coz if we make it for a long run, it might take long time to get a new customer!
I think that's the main purpose of "planned obsolescence"! But sometimes it might be happened with high demand! Then businesses try to get more advantage through high demand products and do "planned obsolescence"!
As a customer, we hate it! As a business sometimes we love it! But what I believe is, planned obsolescence means we cheat our customers and final outcome should be drop of the production and rivals will enter to the market!
Thank you very much for sharing such great post with us! Really appreciate your effort!
Cheers~
You make some very good points in your comment.
"As a customer, we hate it! As a business sometimes we love it!"
This is so true but it also shows that the entire system is wrong. This is what we call a canundrum!
Canundrum: "a confusing and difficult problem or question.
"one of the most difficult conundrums for the experts"
synonyms: problem, difficult question, difficulty, quandary, dilemma; informalposer"
Thanks for always adding so much to the discussions here!
OMFG!
This is one of the diabolical aspects of the world that pisses me off the most.
Humanity has literally been indoctrinated into an unsustainable consumer slavery!
The global elite have monopolized the world and are taking advantage at humanity and natures expense.
Thanks for shedding light on this very important topic!
Thanks so much for having a look. You get it!
Yes I totally get it!
I prefer to be in the know even when its not pretty but it sure aint pretty!
Of course I have heard about Planned Obsolescence. This is wickedness, because the corporations damage Mother Earth this way as well. I saw a film about planned obsolence some years ago - The light bulb conspiration. What you did with your printer, is great! You outsmarted them, hahaha :))) It is worth to follow.
Other examples?
Now, what can I do? I'm looking for old things that can be repaired, whether in furniture, clothing or anything else.
P.S:
I did not tell you that I was learning design (Hungarian Academy of Applied Arts), and there was a task, where an object had to be made of cardboard, which could carry 50 kilograms but had to be broken at 51. Needless to say, my object haven't broke at 51, just 60. I missed the exam :))) Thought provoking...
I love your examples they are all so true! When it comes to the stockings my wife tells me that often they rip while putting them on for the FIRST time!
I like your example from design school. I also studied industrial design and our project was to build a chair that would hold our own weight and not a kilo more!
Very cool comment. Thanks!
Thanks so much! Are you working as a designer in industry? I got a degree in glass design, and then worked in a glassfactory. But glass industry has ceased over the years, and I had to find a new job. Some artists are doing it as an entrepreneur, but starving as well! There is no market of art glass here! No more glass, this is so expensive to maintain a glass melting furnace. And my father, who was a builder of many glass furnaces, died in 2013.
By the way, glass! Breaks easily, but this is not planned obsolescence, but due to natural property of glass.
I worked in the field in Toronto for many years mostly designing custom furniture and store interiors. When I moved to a small town in Switzerland 22 years ago there was no work for me and I started my property maintenance/facility services business (that's a fancy way of saying cleaning business). This has given me a lot of freedom and I still love design!
That's great! Cleaning? Sometimes I go cleaning renovated and new houses and apartments. Not too much money but fun. And a great training to get slimmer (Lol)
Excellent information! My friends and I had been discussing this very thing recently. I had the same type experience with my printer which wasn't very old.
I started having problems with some major appliances and a friend who is in the appliance business told me on the QT that most appliances were designed to work at their best performance for only about 4 years.
"most appliances were designed to work at their best performance for only about 4 years"
I find this interesting, shocking and disgusting. I understand their reason for doing this but surely there must be a better way!
Thanks so much for the great insight!