Friday

Planned obsolescence

Planned obsolescence is becoming more and more of a problem. We live to waste. One film that captures this and other elements of the manufacturing cycle and breaks it down into digestible pieces of information is The Story of Stuff. You can go to the site to watch the whole video. Here is a short teaser…

I understand the competitive advantages of planned obsolescence but what I would really love to see is the inclusion of the by product or end product re-enter the next stage of the product life cycle. So parts are created initially with the intent that they are able to be reimplemented to make a better version of the next product. I am not an engineer, but I would imagine, with more interchangeable parts, the entire unit doesn’t not need to be replaced when one element is dramatically improved.