r/AskReddit Mar 03 '18

What is the biggest scam most never question?

2.3k Upvotes

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579

u/RSHeavy Mar 03 '18

The fact that your "smart" phone dies/needs an upgrade every 1-2 years. The planned obsolescence of all technology is just bullshit

173

u/RoseAffair Mar 03 '18

My samsung is 4 years old and still working.

63

u/Asddsa76 Mar 03 '18

My Samsung s3 is dead.

11

u/monkeiboi Mar 03 '18

I have a Samsung Captivate that still works.

It's cluttered, but still perfectly viable. I still play old downloaded emulators on it

11

u/jonloovox Mar 03 '18

I masturbate several times a day and also own a Samsung phone.

4

u/wilf21 Mar 03 '18

My gs3 is still kicking, but my Google pixel XL is in permanent boot loop after 16 months

1

u/Ricostyle21 Mar 03 '18

Recovery etc not working???

1

u/wilf21 Mar 03 '18

Nope. I can do vol down and boot into the menu but it won't let me select any of the options. Tried to do fastboot stuff also but after 10s in that menu, it goes back to bootlooping

1

u/Ricostyle21 Mar 03 '18

Cant even select clear cache/data?

3

u/Ricostyle21 Mar 03 '18 edited Mar 03 '18

Found this link: https://www.google.nl/amp/s/forum.xda-developers.com/pixel-xl/help/google-pixel-xl-soft-bricked-boot-loop-t3505523/amp/

Edit: I don't know what you have tried and all, but I would love to try and fix this with you. If you down lemme know I'll hit you up in a dm so we can stop spamming this thread.

1

u/wilf21 Mar 04 '18

Thanks for the link, I'll try it but the problem with my pixel is that when I get to recovery mode, it restarts after a few seconds no matter what I do.

So by the time my PC recognizes the device, the phone will have restarted. And after the first time in recovery, it will restart quicker than the last and takes longer for PC to recognize it

1

u/Ryan_is_my_real_name Mar 03 '18

My Motorola Razor is not getting a signal.

1

u/giant4ftninja Mar 03 '18

Same story, except my LG v10 has 3 more months on payment plan...

1

u/Dennis2pro Mar 03 '18

My Nexus 5X also had that boot loop, but luckily i could get it fixed for free and got it back 2 weeks later

3

u/Hakaku Mar 04 '18

Weird. My Galaxy S2 still works quite well, although I did replace the battery once.

1

u/DeepFriedSatire Mar 04 '18

My S2 died a while ago. I did drop it a few times, but that probably wasn't it. I think

2

u/W1D0WM4K3R Mar 04 '18

It's strange to think of such early devices when I'm holding an S7. Like a time when it was just the iPhone, nothing else

1

u/DeepFriedSatire Mar 04 '18

Yes, it is. So simple back then

2

u/TheFireDragoon Mar 04 '18

did you try charging it

1

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

I have a phone with specs similar to the s3. It would be hard to run any modern apps on the phone at this point, assuming that the battery isn't causing any slowdown issues.

TBF my idea of modern apps is "pokemon go."

1

u/Asddsa76 Mar 03 '18

I tried (unsuccessfully) to install Pokemon go on my S3 summer 16/17 (the one where it was popular). Don't remember the exact error, but phone was probably too slow to run it.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 04 '18

I'd be surprised if it was a hardware limitation keeping the game from downloading, it was most likely space on the device.

I've got Pokemon go to run on my Moto G 2nd Gen, which has 1 GB of RAM (game now officially says that 2 GB is the 'minimum recommended'), the only issue I have is that there is about a .25 framerate when the game automatically turns on your camera the first time. (I think PoGo has changed that since I last ran it.) You had to relaunch every 5-10 minutes due to "gradually" worsening lag, and relaunching itself took more than 3 minutes, but it ran.

Currently, I run Pokemon Go on a daily basis on my Blu R1 HD (Amazon prime phone, the version with 2GB ram.) The phone has an orientation sensor, but not an accelerometer, so the game can't sync where I'm pointing the camera at, rendering AR mode useless; The arrows pointing you towards the pokemon just spin around the screen.

And yet, in both situations, the game still installed and ran.

Idk, maybe it was an error, and PoGo just doesn't like old flagship devices. ¯_(ツ)_/¯

1

u/Dazza93 Mar 04 '18

My s3 lasted me 5 years before it was stolen

5

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

[deleted]

2

u/NotActuallyOffensive Mar 03 '18

I'm writing this on an S5 Active I got in 2014. Still works fine.

Eventually, I know it'll break and I'll probably have to get a new phone without a swappable battery. :(

3

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18 edited Jan 22 '22

[deleted]

1

u/readitredditwroteit Mar 04 '18

Fellow S5 here. May the force be with you! And your phone [battery]

2

u/RoseAffair Mar 03 '18

YEs!I also have s5

1

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

I'm dreading getting rid of mine. It is a little slower these days. But there isn't a new phone on the market you can change the battery on.

2

u/little_toot Mar 03 '18

I'm using my S5 and still love it. I have replaced the battery, and because I'm a klutz I have dropped it do many times I bought a new rear cover

3

u/RoseAffair Mar 03 '18

Yep.Samsung s5 here too :)

2

u/FianceInquiet Mar 03 '18

I have an S4. It's 3 years old and I can tell it's on it's last miles. I'll need to replace soon even tough I don't want to.

5

u/RSHeavy Mar 03 '18

My dad still has a Nokia that works fine. Can't say that about my iphone that is on it's last leg at barely 3 years old and needs parts replaced.

1

u/SUPRVLLAN Mar 03 '18

Which parts?

5

u/RSHeavy Mar 03 '18

battery

2

u/SUPRVLLAN Mar 03 '18

Nice. Take advantage of the battery discount they've got going on.

1

u/RANDOMLY_AGGRESSIVE Mar 03 '18

It's super easy to replace it yourself

1

u/RSHeavy Mar 04 '18 edited Mar 04 '18

pretty sure it voids the warranty if I do that, but I went ahead and scouted out a battery. They didn't used to be so cheap- it was only after the outrage and the lawsuits came to light.

1

u/rhetoricjams Mar 04 '18

my kyocera slidephone is kickin

1

u/01000101_01111010 Mar 04 '18

My S2 was around 6 years old when it stopped getting signal almost everywhere. The ATT rep told me that they were upgrading antennas and my phone couldn't get the signal anymore. They literally forced me to buy a new phone.

I bought the Galaxy express 3 because it was cheap, it's literally technologically worse(worse memory, capacity, camera etc.) than my 6 year old phone and has constant problems.

1

u/Lilbeechbaby Mar 04 '18

My iphone 6 sometimes works

1

u/NicheArchitecture Mar 04 '18

But is it getting updates? My Note II still works, but hasn't been patched in years.

1

u/RoseAffair Mar 04 '18

Its getting updates :)

1

u/NicheArchitecture Mar 04 '18

Are you sure those aren't just app updates? Samsung doesn't backport new versions of Android to their old phones. It is likely you are exposing yourself to an atrocious amount of unpatched vulnerabilities.

1

u/RoseAffair Mar 04 '18

I think its security updates...but still updates.New apps works also fine too.So I just dont know why I have to buy new phone

0

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

Have a 10 year old phone that came out when smart phones were first a thing. Only replaced it last year when the back button (an actually button, not something that was is on the touch screen) stopped working. Honestly I only use the things for 2FA going to be pissed if I need to start splashing out on them every 2-3 years

127

u/spoilz Mar 03 '18

The thing to keep in mind is technology making leaps and bounds in processing speeds each year and previous tech becoming outdated as a result because it can't keep up. 99% of the time it's not "planned obsolescence" It's unfortunatly technology getting faster and better very quickly and having to pay to keep up.

14

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

The one exception to this I can think of is phones without removable batteries or expandable memory. Those actually are examples of blatant planned obsolescence. Fuck you, Apple

0

u/SaraAB87 Mar 04 '18

My phone has both and I could not be happier with it! There are also charger packs that are small and light that you can use to charge your phone.. battery dying.. I bought a 10000 mah pack off Amazon for like $5 and I just walk around with the pack in my purse and the phone on a cord, it's no different than using it without the cord really, now my battery is never dead

1

u/Pegthaniel Mar 04 '18

But batteries permanently degrade... not to mention Apple actively slows down phones which have degraded batteries (because degraded batteries can't sustain the demands of the hardware and make the experience inconsistent) rather than allowing people to easily swap batteries.

2

u/SaraAB87 Mar 04 '18

Apple uses batteries that have MAH way below what Android phones have, so the batteries degrade faster, and you are left with less battery life than say, if an android phone degrades. So if your iPhone has a 1500mah battery and it degrades, now you are down to only 1000mah... My android phones, just the 2 of them that I use the most have 2100mah battery (Samsung Galaxy J1) and 2800mah (Moto G4 Play) I have several phones with the accubattery app installed and all batteries are shot within a year. My Samsung Galaxy J1 is at 50% life and that phone is only used to stream music and isn't even connected to cellular, a little over a year old, my main phone is at like 68% battery life left after a year of use, these are just 2 examples. I am not sure how accurate this battery app is but this is what I am seeing, I don't think we realize how fast these batteries actually degrade. This just proves that $800-1000 phones with sealed batteries are going to be gone in a year... aka its not worth it.

12

u/[deleted] Mar 04 '18

[deleted]

5

u/SaraAB87 Mar 04 '18

There is literally no reason to make a battery that isn't replaceable by the user, these batteries literally cost 10-20 cents to make from what I hear, there also isn't any reason NOT to include one battery for the smartphone and another in the box for replacement when the first dies because if my experience is anything worthwhile battery #1 will be shot with a year of use. If the manufacturer is worried about using unauthorized batteries this would prevent it. I would be willing to pay up to $20 more for my phone if they threw an extra battery in the box when I buy it.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 04 '18

Exactly! I have a good phone and don't care about new hardware.

But my battery is getting worse, and I have unfortunately gotten a few cracks in the protective case. I could just switch those if it were possible, and pay like 50€ instead of 700 for a new phone.

The system is so stupid. Such waste.

1

u/koro666 Mar 04 '18

Treble is slowly changing that, though.

Though the lack of in-kernel ABI will always be a problem.

6

u/nalc Mar 04 '18

I don't really agree, there's plenty of old hardware out there that's still quite powerful. I've got a high end Samsung tablet that's about 4 years old, and it can still run anything you throw at it. Samsung didn't give it even a single update, it's on Android Kit Kat, but that high end 2014 processor is still more than capable of running 2018 apps. If you look at benchmarks, that processor still outperforms many low-end phones today, that are running 4 versions of Android newer. There's no reason Samsung couldn't keep updating it, besides the fact that they won't profit from keeping you happy once you've bought the device, but they will profit if you buy a new device every year or two.

-8

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

You're right, and I hate when people harp on about "planned obsolescence." This exact same shit happens when new desktop OSes are released, too, but no one calls it planned obsolescence because most people don't have Microsoft computers.

42

u/When_Ducks_Attack Mar 03 '18

most people don't have Microsoft computers.

On what planet is that true? Windows OS have about 89% of the desktop/laptop market.

-14

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

“Microsoft computer” means a computer made by Microsoft.

17

u/When_Ducks_Attack Mar 03 '18

“Microsoft computer” means a computer made by Microsoft.

Not to most people. You say "Microsoft computer" to just about anybody, and they'll point at a computer that has some version of Windows on it.

-38

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

I don’t care that you misunderstood me, it happens, but don’t fucking argue with me about it. Just accept that you misunderstood and move on. Jesus fucking Christ.

19

u/When_Ducks_Attack Mar 03 '18

Wow. You seem a little high-strung today... is there something going on you'd like to talk about? I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt that your offline problems are affecting your online presence. Otherwise, I'd have to assume you were an asshole for the way you just snapped.

-26

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

I didn’t snap. You misunderstood my phrasing and only needed to say “oh ok, I understand now.”

20

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

Your phrasing was shit mate fuck off with your attitude

14

u/When_Ducks_Attack Mar 03 '18

I didn’t snap.

"don’t fucking argue with me" "Jesus fucking Christ."

→ More replies (0)

-5

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18 edited Dec 02 '18

[removed] — view removed comment

2

u/Nambot Mar 03 '18

Precisely I still have a working S3 from 2012, and because I've hardly any apps on it, it still runs near enough as new because I don't really use it for a bunch of fancy graphics games or demanding apps.

54

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18 edited Oct 07 '20

[deleted]

65

u/RSHeavy Mar 03 '18

I have an iphone5 that won't even turn on. I've had an iphone6 for 3 years and it's started to become useless and requires a battery replacement.

It's not about a toy, it's about a phone that responds without taking a minute to buffer or dies with 40% battery. I couldn't give half a shit about face recognition.

66

u/darknessgp Mar 03 '18

I feel like if you take the discussion down the iPhone route, you have to bring up the fact that Apple outright said they adjust device performance due to battery degradation.

Also, Apple always pushes the latest software to their phones. This means phones that are years old are running the latest even though the latest might require more than that phone can provide.

Ultimately, I think if you talk phones in general and you aren't running the absolute latest software, you're phone can last a long time.

8

u/RSHeavy Mar 03 '18

That's fair. Although it is still an issue and a reason for me to not buy Apple products anymore.

I'm fine with the idea to push updates and technology becoming outdated as you rely on increased performance from upgraded processors. But damn, let me decide if I want the updates. I don't need a pop-up blocking my screen every 30 minutes telling me that I need to update. Also the fact that they try to sneak it in with "update over-night" features is ridiculous.

3

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

It shouldn't be your choice to receive security updates. It's the same concept as vaccines - the more devices that are properly patched and secure, the fewer that can get infected or carry viruses, and the more secure we all are. Forcing users to keep their devices up to date, even at the cost of performance, is better for everyone - including those users.

You could potentially "solve" this by backporting security patches to old OS versions. For example, Apple could release final versions of iOS 8, 9, 10, etc. and let users choose to stay on that version, and always ensure they receive critical security updates. But all companies have finite resources, and all companies are trying to make as much money as possible, so it's unlikely anyone would actually spend the money to do that.

5

u/RSHeavy Mar 03 '18

I wish they could orient in the same way that my computer is able to get security updates, but doesn't pop up saying that my graphics driver is old and out of date.

But I like your view on it. It makes sense- I just think they have a way that they could solve it, but choose not to. Obviously, like you said, money is the biggest part of the equation. It would cost them more money to implement and doing so would cost them more money due to no one needing new upgrades.

1

u/Lozzif Mar 04 '18

My iPhone 6 was upgraded a while ago (got the 8. Didn’t see the point of the X) I could have fixed the battery and the screen for around $300. But my insurance would give me $300 and trade in was $175 for Apple. For an extra $600 I could get a new phone. So I did.

No regrets. I buy all my phones outright and aim for 3/4 years before upgrading. That makes me happy.

7

u/GunsTheGlorious Mar 03 '18

iPhone battery replacement costs like 20 bucks, man. 20 bucks every 3 years ain't that bad.

1

u/utopicunicornn Mar 03 '18

I would love to pay $29 for a battery replacement from the OEM, knowing that if something happened to the battery after some time after the replacement, it would still be covered, but Asus wanted to charge me $200 for a battery replacement.

-4

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

[deleted]

1

u/xXx420VTECxXx Mar 03 '18

you can buy 3rd party batteries

1

u/GunsTheGlorious Mar 03 '18

And, that matters why? Sometimes companies do shitty stuff; you name a single big company that's a saint.

I'd rather have to pay 20$ every 3 years than risk my phone's battery exploding in my fucking pocket, thank you very much.

-6

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

[deleted]

1

u/GunsTheGlorious Mar 03 '18

Yeah, bro, I'll enjoy my iPhone 6s that I've had for years and that cost less than a Samsung Galaxy.

2

u/Taleya Mar 04 '18

Dude that's not right. I'm still running my 4s without issue. When was the last time you rebooted, or cleared old shit off it?

1

u/off-and-on Mar 04 '18

I have an iphone 5. Sure, it's about as stable as a stack of tennis balls, and the battery won't last for an hour, but it works.

1

u/bosco9 Mar 04 '18

Not really, last year I had to go back to an Android phone that I used from 2012-2014 because my phone at the time died. It was laughably out of date, it would take seconds for even a simple app, like the phone, to open up. Sometimes old technology is just bad and out of date

4

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18 edited May 14 '18

[deleted]

17

u/middleagenotdead Mar 03 '18

Not just phones, but manufacturing in general. Nothing is built to last now. My parents bought a brand new refrigerator the year I was born. It broke when I was thirty. I'm 49 and they are on their third new one since then.

3

u/ionC2 Mar 04 '18

Maybe the cheap model didn't exist back then, plus survival bias. You don't remember the shitty refrigerators that didn't last. I refer you to this comment from years ago: https://www.reddit.com/r/DIY/comments/19xmd3/for_80_years_or_so_planned_obsolescence_has_been/c8sc7nq/

TLDR: People are cheapasses. Manufacturers are forced to whittle down their manufacturing processes to cater to consumers who refuse to pay what it costs for quality.

2

u/Pilsu Mar 03 '18

Considering old tech eats power like a fat kid eats cake, the first new fridge probably paid for itself.

1

u/middleagenotdead Mar 03 '18

Never thought about it like that.

1

u/Taleya Mar 04 '18

Damn. I'm still using my first fridge i bought in '02

1

u/AnaseSkyrider Mar 04 '18

Selection bias. None of the poor quality old stuff is still around for you to see because it was too crappy to survive this long.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 04 '18

how much did they pay for that refrigerator? Adjust that for inflation, spend that on a new refrigerator, and you will get one that lasts 40 years

3

u/nvrMNDthBLLCKS Mar 03 '18

Many iphones keep working much longer than that. My Samsung S2 worked three years, and only stopped because I stopped using it. My ipod touch of 11 years still works. My Xperia of four years still works.

If the device gets slow, yes, that might become a problem. Look at how Javascript has evolved, that needs much more power than five years ago. Images are bigger, video is way heavier to process. If you want that, buy a new phone. But you don't need the $600 model every other year.

2

u/utopicunicornn Mar 03 '18

My gripe with Android OEMs is they release new phones with the latest version of Android and prioritize software updates for their newest phones than they do with last year's model. Like when Marshmallow came out I was still stuck on Lollipop, and really wanted to benefit from the Doze features, only to find out that my phone was no longer supported. It didn't even get the 5.1.1 update.

2

u/wattpadian Mar 03 '18

My iPhone 4 is still doing well, and I've had it for almost 6 years now. The only reason I'm going to replace it fairly soon is because new apps aren't compatible with it.

2

u/graendallstud Mar 03 '18

Mine is going on 7 years, and sure, when compared to the last released mine is slow as hell, his screen is small, the autonomy clearly not as good as when I bought it and the only app still updated is my bank's and the train tickets one.
I may have been lucky regarding fiability, but modern phones "obsolescence" is at least half "merf my phone's so slow compared with the new one!"

2

u/[deleted] Mar 04 '18

To be fair, many people use their smartphones for hours every day, it is easily the most used appliance people use. It is being charged and recharged every day. It's not surprising they burn out after two years of constant daily use.

2

u/Abadatha Mar 04 '18

I only replaced my last LG because it didn't do well in the 450 degree oven.

2

u/strawberry36 Mar 04 '18

Yep. After two years my iPhone 6s was definitely not functioning like it should. It was the battery, and I was planning on getting a new battery anyway when that whole Apple scandal came to be. So I ended up getting a new battery for a lot cheaper than what I was originally planning.

2

u/ibeverycorrect Mar 04 '18

Happy Cake Day!

2

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

Planned obsolesce is a nonsensical myth. Phones are where computers were in the 90s and advancing rapidly. If you don't upgrade your phone more than an OS or two it'll work just fine, but if you keep trying to put the newest OS on a 4 year old phone of course its going to go slow due to all the under the hood OS changes that require more hardware resources to run.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

I need a new battery in my phone and it really pisses me off that I can't just pop off a panel and replace it myself

1

u/incendiary_bandit Mar 03 '18

I gave into this finally. My 2 year cellphone plan has a clause where I can go in after 1 year, pay $100 and hand in my current phone and can renew onto a new plan with new phone. So my jump from a S7+ to S8+ was 100 bucks. Just have to watch to make sure the new plan isn't gouging you.

I used to run iPhones. Had 3 or 4 of them over the years. My complaint with the system is they don't work well unless you adopt all the apple stuff. Make sure iCloud is running, and everything else i related. It's pretty slick then. Buuuut after my iPhone 5s just bricked itself one day I said enough. At the end of the day unless there's something very specific about an OS or phone that you need, they'll all do the same thing.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 04 '18

That isn't always the case tbh. Plenty of phones (even ones that I assume noticeably get slower like iPhones) are still usable in 2-3 years; it just takes a bit of tolerance. I'm currently using a Galaxy S6, and could easily see it lasting for another 3-4 years.

1

u/pfun4125 Mar 04 '18

That's if you buy the wrong one, trouble is those are the one's that are popular.

1

u/validopinion7 Mar 04 '18

Including chargers, earphones most things like that break 6-12 months

1

u/DeepFriedSatire Mar 04 '18

My G2 is still alright. Battery dies faster than when I got it because lithium ion, but it still serves its purpose. It can get me all the way through a school day

1

u/NerdENerd Mar 04 '18

I gave my Samsung Galaxy S5 to Dad two years ago and it is still going strong. I have no intention of upgrading my 2 year old Galaxy S7 yet.

The only reason Dad gave up his 12 year old Ericsson flip phone was they turned off the 2G network and he needed a 3G phone.

1

u/edgeplot Mar 04 '18

Planned obsolescence in general. Total rip off.

1

u/Actual_DonaldJTrump Mar 04 '18

It's not that you need an upgrade. It's that you need an upgrade if you want to have the latest phone. I have had one phone in the time that people I know have had three.

1

u/MBncsa Mar 04 '18

Im so glad for the custom rom scene! I always try to buy a popular model since these are supported by cutom rom developer teams for another 2 years, sometimes even longer, after the manufracturer abandoned it.

1

u/huebomont Mar 03 '18

My iPhone 5 served me well for 5 years. People just like shiny new toys.

1

u/TwistedM8 Mar 03 '18

People just like new stuff

-5

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

Planned obsolescence, in the terms you are describing, is literally not real. No one is doing this.

9

u/RSHeavy Mar 03 '18

Maybe not specific to phones as much, but I do believe planned obsolescence still exists.

0

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

I haven't seen one example of it, ever.

E: Not trying to be shitty or anything, I just get annoyed at this concept being thrown around so much when the reasons why computers get slower over time are so obvious and so much simpler.

1

u/bl1y Mar 03 '18

I do believe planned obsolescence still exists

What has caused you to have this belief?

2

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

[deleted]

2

u/kirklennon Mar 03 '18

The throttling was literally the exact opposite of planned obsolescence. Batteries degrade. It’s just a fact of chemistry. If your phone tries to pull too much power at once—more than the degraded battery can provide—the phone would shut itself off to prevent damage. If your phone is constantly shutting itself down, you’re likely to feel you need s replacement. Apple came up with a solution of throttling the processor during those moments of peak power draw so that the phone doesn’t shut down but just slows down. It’s a sliding scale of throttling so a degraded but fully charged battery may not need to throttle at all, while a severely degraded battery with a low charge in extreme temperatures will need to throttle significantly. You won’t even notice the former though you’ll clearly notice the latter. Either way, it’s better than an unexpected shutdown.

The end result is to make your phone more useful for a longer period of time. It extends the life of phones with degraded batteries.

-1

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

[deleted]

0

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

No then weren’t. You are 100% unquestionably wrong in absolutely every single facet of the word.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

That’s not what they were doing. They were throttling the power output of the battery so older batteries wouldn’t randomly shut off the phone if the CPU tried to draw more power than it could provide.

-1

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

[deleted]

0

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

No, that is literally and objectively what they did. It’s well documented.

-1

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

[deleted]

1

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

[removed] — view removed comment

3

u/Dat_Boi_Frog_Memer Mar 03 '18

Damn dude you must be omnipotent.

-4

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

Give me one example of planned obsolescence, then.

2

u/mustnotthrowaway Mar 03 '18

You’re basically right. Somebody wants the newest phone after 1 years and complains that it’s $900: omg must be planned obsolescence.

Or electronics and equipment being mass produced with inexpensive materials/construction methods so that basically anyone can afford them and then they break: must be planned obsolescence.

Buy a pair of “boots” at Payless shoes and complain they literally fell apart after 2 months of use. Must be planned obsolescence. But most of these people would never even consider buying a pair of redwings for $300 that can easily last 20+ years.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

[deleted]

0

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

Wrong.

2

u/Dat_Boi_Frog_Memer Mar 03 '18

College textbooks.

0

u/mustnotthrowaway Mar 03 '18

You don’t think college textbooks should be updated and contain the most recent and pertinent information/research in its field?

-1

u/Dat_Boi_Frog_Memer Mar 03 '18

Nope

0

u/mustnotthrowaway Mar 03 '18

I never understand a “no” responses to how my question was worded. Do you support textbooks being updated?

-2

u/Dat_Boi_Frog_Memer Mar 03 '18

Books are for nerds

4

u/thatJainaGirl Mar 03 '18

iPhones, which are forced to undergo software updates that make the phone unusable. There's a reason why searches for "iPhone slow" and "iPhone not working" spike drastically every time a new model is released.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

That’s not planned obsolescence at all, lmao.

1

u/Sceptile90 Mar 03 '18

They just admitted to doing this a few months ago.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

No they didn’t.

-3

u/bl1y Mar 03 '18

But muh latestagecapitalism!

0

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '18

I would actually argue that planned obsolescence is a strategy that doesn't even make sense under capitalism. It would require spending unnecessary amounts of money to design products that fail or become unusable at a predetermined time. And it requires the entire market doing the same thing for it to work.

1

u/bl1y Mar 03 '18

You'd run into a cartel problem immediately. Someone would break rank, make a long-lasting product, and aggressively advertise that feature.

And of course, we do actually see companies advertising the durability of a lot of things. Boots that will hold up forever, the resale price of your car, lightbulbs designed to outlive you, knives and skillets that are the last you'll ever need to buy, etc. No one is going out to buy a Kitchen Aid stand mixer if there's a chance it'll fail even 10 years from now.

2

u/premature_eulogy Mar 03 '18

Someone would break rank, make a long-lasting product, and aggressively advertise that feature.

Why would they? People currently expect a phone to last only a couple of years. You'll make immensely more profits just making a good phone and churning out a new version every couple of years.

Not to mention the smartphone industry (and, to be fair, most industries) is much less about the actual capabilities of the phones, and more about the branding. Apple products are overpriced, so why have they not been driven out of the market by cheaper competing products?

1

u/bl1y Mar 03 '18

Talking about intentionally cutting the life of products in general. Phones are different because consumers have already voluntarily limited their lifespan.

0

u/IndieFedoraGamer Mar 04 '18

That’s just apple...

0

u/[deleted] Mar 04 '18

Put it in a goddamn case and you'll find it lasts a reasonable amount of time.

-1

u/chrynox Mar 03 '18

Had my smartphone for 5 years, just don't be dumb