JRPGfan said:
There are *supposedly* research studies that prove it isnt (and no, i havnt bother to read them). |
It depends on what you call planned obsolescence then. Yeah, I agree that companies do not support their products for a lifetime. That's expected. But here in France, when I hear talks about it (even with the politics), it's always about "50 years ago a car lasted 20 years and now it lasts 5 years and fails after the warranty is over, that's planned obsolescence". No, it's not.
And when I read the french wikipedia page about planned obsolescence, it does specify that it should be about pushing people to buy a new product even when yours still works, but that this term is in fact used to talk about defects. This use is wrong and closer to the conspiracy theory, that's my point. And it was what was used in the OP ("90' TVs lasted longer than now").
About nanarchy's comment, I agree. That part is not my specialty, but I'm pretty sure there are also other reasons for this. You can't really produce spare parts for a product that you no longer sell for example, you would lose money for almost nothing. We could say that the PS4 and the Xbox One are expected to be replaced by new consoles in a few years, but is it really "planned obsolescence"? Or is it just a normal innovation, production and market cycle? I still play my PS3 sometimes even with my PS4 and my new PC in the room, it's not obsolete whatsoever and still does exactly what it's supposed to...
