Imagine, government of the people, by the people, and for the people - that’s crazy SoCiAlIsM talk!
Longer means more forever chemicals
Right, so if they break down faster the forever chemicals disappear faster. Is that what you mean?
Do you even know what forever chemicals are or do you think they’re a magic thing that are added to machines to make them last longer?
Companies literally add pfas to everything to make things last longer
Ahhh, so you are the type of dumb that heard the name and assumed the wrong interpretation and ran with it. The so-called “forever chemicals” are called that because they themselves don’t really break down, but they don’t give that property to other things. These “forever chemicals” are stuff like teflon, they’re stuff that doesn’t react with other things and that makes them nonstick, something that can be useful in a bunch of different things besides just nonstick pans, but because they’re so nonstick, it’s difficult to make them stay in the pan or whatever industrial machine they’re a part of, so they can flake off and be in the end product, in our food, water, soil and much more, and since like I said before they’re not reactive, they can just stay there as their molecules, forever. Using them in a machine doesn’t give the machine more durability or extends it’s work life, it just helps it not stick to stuff
I’d love to hear how you came to that conclusion.
Not necessarily, you can use more steel, stronger parts. And if forever chemicals become a problem, you can regulate them just like with everything else. Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water.
Not really, it means mechanically working longer not forever.
Back to the good old days when products were of higher quality. What a concept.
And to a world where repairing is both possible and feasible.
I’ve heard this from service techs who have worked on my refrigerator and dishwasher - major appliances in America last a third as long as they did 10 or 15 years ago.
I can tell you from firsthand experience it’s even worse than that. I had a washer that lasted me damn near 20 years that was made in the 90s. Finally decided to get a new set from Samsung. Made it just past warranty, or basically 1 year. The repair would have cost as much as the washer was new. Similar experience with an LG fridge. Bought it and the ice machine broke in it, TWICE, within the first year. Fuck these brands and their established hold on the market.
they are truly junk. the only goal of American industry, it seems, is to make more money than ever.
Always has been.
And that’s nothing. You know how they’re pushing for washing machines, dishwashers, etc. to be internet connected? Currently they’re forcing this for data mining purposes. But I have no doubt their real goal is to eventually make these devices like printers, with expensive consumables locked in by internet-connected DRM. They’ve already gotten people used to using dish and clothes detergent pods. How long until they’re putting everything in plastic cartridges, locking things down with DRM, and charging like printer companies do?
Money burns the world to the ground
My washing machine is around 25 years old. Not giving it up till its absolutely done haha. But since parts are relatively available, it might just be a few more years.
The washer, dryer, dishwasher and fridge my wife had when we got married were already old and all lasted 20 years more. The fridge was the first to go, and in the 12 years since then they have all been replaced twice.
We have a Bosch washing machine we bought second hand 15 years ago for £50. It’s basic, not digital, but has all the functions we need. We’ve never had a problem with it. It will break one day but I’m hoping it lasts a lot longer still.
Bosch makes good appliances.
A welcome mandate, especially for electronics. However people are already throwing away so much perfectly fine furniture that I don‘t think it will help much in that regard. A lot of people want something new, not something that just works.
Where are you living? Here people give away (emmaus for example) or sell it online, for cheap equals you don’t even need to throw it away, someone comes and picks it up for you.
Those appliances are so simple too, making them durable is very low cost. Good move EU.
Where I live you can easily give your stuff away or donate it to a charity shop, but it’s a tiny bit less effort to chuck it in the trash so there are people who do that. Not all of them, thank god, but you can come across decent stuff every one in a while. Do have to say people are more likely to dump cheap stuff than reliable stuff from known brands.
Yeah they buy new because the advertisements give you idea that new is cool, brainwashing one into consuming. We should ban ads
Disposable culture is a blight on society…
This is absolutely true and sad, though I get a lot of free electronics to dismantle by rummaging through trash. People have no appreciation of the value of “used” items that either work perfectly fine or have a minor issue that prevents them from working but is easily fixable, e.g. a broken cable (I have many working devices that were thrown away because the cable is severed, which I could easily fix). I think only proper education in this regard will improve things long term.
People have been conditioned to throw away perfectly good shit, now we are surprised they throw away shit. This policy is obviously not gonna fix the issue on its own, but as you said, it’s welcome.
I specifically want new because I already know even the new won’t last long don’t even mind something someone has used for a few years already
Well, for furniture, I totally agree with you and honestly: I don’t think there is eomething wrong with redesigning your living room every 10 years, especially when you move around.
I mainly want to be able to buy old washing machines, dish washers, TVs, because I don’t care about their appearance.
If it’s quality furniture you can sell or donate it. If it’s recent Ikea or other cheap stuff, it won’t survive being disassembled, moved and reassembled. Ikea’s surfaces scratch so easily, even on desks. It’s ridiculous. That kind of fast furniture is terribly unsustainable. But I wouldn’t be bothered if you bought a new sofa every ten years and make someone else happy with a used sofa that will last another ten years in it’s new home.
If the produced stuff last longer it wouldn’t mean there would be less competition on innovation, people would still have a reason to sell you their old appliances because they want certain new function. This law is against making stuff that can’t be repaired or breaks easily. Don’t think you’d buy a 2 year old tv if it doesn’t work, right.
And work without apps.
You can buy LED lightbulbs that all have their own apps. It’s getting ridiculous
To be fair most do work without the app. The app is for remote control and other features like colors usually.
They should just force them to open the API, this would be sufficient in most cases.
Oh look! So much progress is being made since USA embargoed itself!
I know this is a joke, but it is important to point out for others that such policies get years to be designed, discussed and published in the EU.
And this law came into effect last July
Now, this is the trading standards that we all ask for; not “be more racist” or repeal the protection on lgbt. Christ, American fascism is the weirdest i have seen. Fascism in the past didn’t even try to dictate the laws and regulations of other countries.
“We will stop our tariffs if you accept our diseased, chlorinated chicken”
I don’t even understand what fascism means in each case on lemmy and whether it is a fixed term or some adaptive catch it all
I usually go by Umberto Eco’s points but some scholars added their own. By and large, most agree that aspects such as militarism, demonization of out-groups, belief in a strongman authority figure, and lack recognition of civil rights and liberties are key characteristics of fascism. Trump 2.0 has most if not all the characteristics of fascism. Even now, Trump refuses to comply with court orders, has police harass and grab people without lawful warrant, demonizes out-groups and threatening military action.
I think it is rather controversial to use it in this way
There are scholarly consensus already. It is not controversial. Unless you are trying to muddy the water.
Scholarly consensus that some president is fascist?
Fascism is a precise term for a specific political movement. not some “I don’t like this” adjective
Trump is the president who happens to be the leading figure of MAGA movement and Project 2025, which are unquestionably fascist movements, and seeing as how his administration deliberately ignore court rulings and thereby undermining civil liberties, which is the key characteristic of fascism.
key characteristic of fascism
That’s not true and even a glance at first encyclopaedia you can get your hands on can disprove this. This is a very broad characteristic of many ideologies such as Bolshevism
Yes, because then you have to recognize a lot of communists as fascist. Dessalines won’t like that.
“Red fascist” is a term used pejoratively, you know?
What exactly is there to dispute with a government that is trying to carve a unitary executive out of a 3 branch system, admires Nazis, has ties to actual neo-Nazis and leaders who have literally seig heiled, and is currently turning an agency into the gestapo and deporting anyone he wants to concentration camps?
The definition I find useful is, Fascism is when an imperial power begins applying colonial policies to citizens in its core.
So, for a practical example, the United States has used extra-judicial black sites to disappear and torture people the CIA/pentagon deem enemies for decades. Locking up people in El Salvador without (constitutionally mandatory) trial or legal council is just that policy brought home.
We really need to stop with this “build to break” mentality for products. Our wastes, as humanity, would significantly lower and reduce wastes…. But hey, we also have to think of the investor’s, right?
The spirit is willing, but the machine is spongy and bruised.
Bullshit. My aunt has a washing machine with all knobs and switches that’s probably 30+ years old and it still works fine.
They need to stop putting all these digital components into washing machines or make the boards standardized so they can be easily swapped out. These aren’t laptops that you toss after 3-5 years. Appliances should last 10-20 years.
Laptops should last longer than 3-5 years too. It should go without saying, but this is the internet.
Agreed but in most larger businesses swap out the laptops around 3-5 years.
Consumers use laptop 5-10+ until they die.
Samsung: god damnit, now we have to use the $0.30 washer instead of the $0.29 washer and itll last at least 10 years longer!
That’s 10s of millions in extra sales lost!
This is a good first step. The next would be to lower the ridiculous amount of electronics in them and remove wifi and telemetry functionality. A dish washer should never have to connect to a server to do its job.
I would like it to come with an open source firmware that I could connect to my locally hosted servers.
I would enjoy mapping out load weights, water and electricity consumption, and cross reference that with a lot of other stuff. Plus some remote controls, and a better interface to choosing washing programs and scheduling start/end…
I just don’t want any of that data to leave my house, ever.
Electronics in general should last longer, just like back in the day.
Plenty of short-lived stuff back then, too. Survivorship bias means that all the stuff that happened to survive to today is not necessarily representative of the typical thing that was manufactured back then.
Well yes it’s ridiculous we have (in EU) a mandatory warranty of only 2 years on anything electronic.
Phones should be 5 years. Appliances should be 10 and cars 15 or 200k kilometers. How have we normalized the fact that it’s okay for a car to break down after two years and the manufacturer is not on the hook ?
Hell yeah. This is the good shit.
When buying future appliances, I have to be sure to get them from the EU. Standards in the US are going to be below the floor.
I’m liking the sound of “Made in EU = high quality”
Prepare to pay out the ass for that though. Between tariffs and a weakening dollar.
Why? We don’t buy products like this from the US. If its imported its coming from China.
Quick edit: I clearly misread the comment you replied to
The three biggest things that kill a tyre are;
- shitty roads
- aggressive driving
- heavy vehicles (like EVs and oversized SUVs)
That said, cheaper tyres are typically made of cheaper compounds that age poorly.
That last point sticks with me.
I always used to get the cheapest, shittest tyres just because cost, but since I became a driving instructor a few years back I got into the mentality of thinking “I need decent tyres because I don’t want my learners to lose control of the car”
Normally I’d buy tyres once every 6-8 months after squeezing out every morsel of life from them, but my current Bridgestone tyres have been on for nearly a year now - doing driving instructor mileage on top of my usual - and they’re not showing any signs of needing replacing yet.
The fact is I’m actually saving money doing it this way, because whilst the tyres are more expensive, I’m replacing them much less often.
I’m going to try out Pirelli next because it sounds like they’ve started lining the inside of some of their tyres with that puncture repair stuff and padding them out with foam to significantly reduce road noise.
Obligatory Pratchett:
The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money.
Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.
But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that’d still be keeping his feet dry in ten years’ time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.
This was the Captain Samuel Vimes ‘Boots’ theory of socioeconomic unfairness.
I’ve carried that with me for years. I always try to buy long-lasting quality items for this very reason.
Not to mention that, due to inflation, those ten dollar boots themselves will cost 20 to 30 dollars before long.
That’s weird. I’m changing tires every 2 to 3 years and so is the norm in Europe.
They did mention being a driving instructor. Driving (and teaching students to drive) all day every day is going to put a lot more wear on the tires than a typical driver.
They also mentioned getting good tires after they started doing that, not before
Yeah I put 30k+ miles on the car just doing instructing, then I often also drive when I go on holiday, putting at least a good 500-600 miles on the car if I go away on the weekend (which is often).
I’ve had dedicated works vehicles which I’ve put fewer miles on the clock 😂
Under inflation is terrible for longevity, handling, and safety. You should maintain proper tire pressure.
So is over-inflation. Always inflate to the correct pressure as per the placard. If you are driving in unusual conditions,
My little Jimny weighs bugger-all but needs Light Truck tyres. On-road pressure is a very light 26 PSI. If I am driving through Sand, Mud or Snow I will deflate to an appropriate pressure and drive slowly. If I am driving over rocky terrain, I will also deflate to an appropriate pressure for better adhesion.
As soon as I hit the Tarmac again, I will reinflate back to 26. If I am carrying more weight or towing, I will inflate the rear tyres to 29.
EVs are getting their own lines of tyres (supposedly) designed to handle the weight, torque and address range concerns.
shitty roads
Cars (as you said, some more, some less) themselves destroy roads
It’s a good thing they think about this. With that said, the tires can wait. Let’s start with the low hanging fruit. It’s a crime that critical components in home appliances break so easily and are so hard to fix.
Or impossible to buy spares for, or when you can get the spare part it’s often so expensive with shipping that it’s almost worth buying a new appliance on offer with the warranty that comes with it.
Tiny plastic part that holds the handle to my fridge broke. Need a new 50 cent plastic part.
GE wants $200 to replace all 3 metal handle assemblies. Can’t just get the plastic part, it comes in a bundle with all 3 metal handles. Which would immediately go in the garbage.
If we can’t get them on the “intentionally gouging customers” angle, we can surely get them on the “creating excess waste” angle.
Find someone with a 3D printer?
Exactly this. I recently had my clothes washer break. Spent days researching the problem, taking the thing apart, figuring out the cause was the spindle on the back of the drum having a crack and eventually breaking. I eventually found a replacement part which had a slightly different part number but research showed it should be compatible. $400 for the part. $130 shipping, plus tax came out to just shy of $600. 2 week lead time to get the part, and no certainty I’d be able to put it all back together. Professional appliance repair wouldn’t have made financial sense either, I called around.
I ended up ordering a new one for $800 all in, saving many headaches. Had it two days later and was able to catch up on laundry.
Fundamentally, you’re never going to be able to compete with the economies of scale of an assembly line with the same people putting together all the parts that were shipped to the same place. If the repairman has to keep an inventory of hundreds of parts for dozens of models, and drive around to where he only has time to diagnose and fix 2 appliances per day, while the factory worker can install a part for 100 appliances per day, there will always be a gap between the price of replacement versus the price of repair.
Some stuff are just ridiculously tedious to service due to their design.
Asus laptops are notorious for this. I remember having to take apart everything including the mainboard just to replace the RAM module.
On a similar note, in car context, I’ve read about instances where one needed to take out the whole engine just to replace the spark plug. I think it was Mercedes A series, as well as some Wuling.
Spark plugs hit home. The back 3 in my Lexus are a real pain in the arse to get to. they’re iridium so they dont have to be done as regularly but when they do it’s a good few hours work even for a professional
To be honest anything on a modern engine is impossible, I had headlights that needed part of the bumper and wheel arch removing, just to change a bulb
