Why did old items last longer than the modern items?

You might have noticed that your old items like LCD TV, old clocks, etc. lasted longer when compared to the new age items. Did this happen to you. It might. So why does that happen? Why are things made in this century are not long-lasting? You are going to know about it in this little blog.

What's making modern items ephemeral?

Our civilization started with the purpose of living, and then in the way, a lot changed. Like the way of living, the way the people think, and the way the people pursuit for happiness. Not only this, but the financials of people also impacted the short-living of things. Companies learned the public interests and the way the people spend on something. So what did they observe?

Let's understand this with the concept of the evolution of technology. The Technology and the knowledge one acquires increased exponentially. Consider the example of a Telephone. The telephone was invented in 1876. This was the first stage of Technology in the Telephone segment. At first, Telephone Technology grew at a slow pace. As time passed by, the rate of Technology transformation is increased. We can see that most of the mobile phone technology happened in recent years.

As the new technology arrives, people tend to buy the items made with that Technology. But what makes them hard is that the old device is still working. Many people opt not to buy a new thing even if it is made with new technology because their old device is still working. To capture sales from this section of people, companies make products so that they don't last long.

What do companies do to make products lifetime less?

Companies induce a mechanism of failing the product in a short time. They do this intentionally. Nowadays, no company in the world makes products or components intending to make them long-lasting.

They also make maintenance capability only to their own service centers. For example, if a TV of some XYZ company failed to work, that repair can be possible only with the servicemen of that XYZ company. No other local service member can repair the TV. So that the company earns even if the TV gets repaired. The companies also make sure that the components, in our case TV, fail only after it completes its warranty period. So the customer receives the TV repaired from XYZ service center or buys a new TV with upgraded technology.

Companies make parts of the component unique so that no other company has spare parts of it. They manufacture unique parts, especially for the parts that are intended to fail.

What are the consequences of this approach of businesses?

The approach of making things with a definite failure mechanism is followed primarily in electronic products like Mobile phones, Televisions, Laptops, etc. This results in more consumption of products by the consumers. Which in order results in the accumulation of large e-waste. You might ask that the products that failed are being recycled and reused by those companies. But in reality, no company has revealed pertinent details of their recycle balance sheet. Even if a company opts to recycle the failed components of products, it is not entirely possible to recycle the parts, and it definitely produces the remains, which is called e-waste. This is creating much environmental damage.

What can we do to stop this?

As ordinary people, we individually cannot do anything to stop this. But we can do a small thing as a contribution to nature. So what's that? 

If your electronic device gets failed in a very short time, then don't go for buying the new appliance; try as much as you can to get it repaired. If the repair is not possible after all your efforts, only then go buy a new device.

To stop this, governments need to proceed to take a hard step towards those companies. Governments need to make laws applicable to those companies to manufacture standardized parts so that the company's servicemen and everyone can repair the device. The rules should be made so that companies do not manufacture the products with an intentional failure.

This Government's step towards companies reduces the sales of the companies. It also results in the decrease of tax collections by the governments. So most governments do not show interest in stopping this type of approach in manufacturing electronic products.

Not only electronic devices, but this approach of business is followed in the Textile industry also. You can observe that the clothes we wear now fade out and are torn out easily than the clothes that we wore during our childhood.

What are the other businesses that follow this approach of making products with intentional failure? Comment them below.