Re: An electro-political rant
- From: b <reverend_rogers@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 24 Jul 2007 05:15:55 -0700
On Jul 24, 11:19 am, "Arfa Daily" <arfa.da...@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
<ZZac...@xxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1185238922.455723.37550@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I don't really know where to start.
I think I shall start with this - Since big business bought our
government, it seems like it is open season on the American consumer.
I mean that 100% and invite anyone to refute it.
These people are not stupid either. Take the example of the Protron 30
or 32" LCD. You can't get a power supply for it. The name Protron
appears nowhere on the power supply. It's made by yHI and has a
completely an independent model number.
Now, if I were in charge of yHI I would make a bunch of extras and
just stow them away. Unless the contract specifically prohibits me
from doing so I would do it. Then just wait several months. Those
power supplies that they jewed you down to $40 each on, people are
willing to pay $150 now because they got this $800 TV that doesn't
work. (no offense intended to Jews, that is a figure of speech)
Why wouldn't yHI make some spares and just sell them later ? I can
think of only one reason. They agreed not to.
Does this cross the line into conspiracy ?
How long will it be before nobody can repair anything ?
JURB
I don't think it crosses the line into conspiracy - I think it is just the
way it is now. Our government in the UK struggles to know even what industry
is any more, let alone control it - except by keeping it cowed under heavy
tax and legislation. As far as spares go, such is the way it has been for
years now here, so if it's only just starting to filter into your nation,
you have indeed had it lucky. There was the time - here at least - when
spares had to be kept for all products for a certain number of years. I've
no idea if this is still the case, and if it is, how the manufacturers /
importers get around it. Oh for the days when you could phone a
manufacturer, and get someone in service, who knew the product, and better
yet, sounded older than 18, and understood as much about electronics and
service, as you did yourself, or a stores person who knew what they were
talking about, and understood about spares.
But what really hacks me off in all of this, is the way that spares, when
available, are prohibitively priced. We keep getting told all manner of
hysterical eco-nonsense about pollution and global warming and whatever new
fad that they can come up with this week, and are also told that we've got
to become much less of a 'throw-away' society, and become a lot more aware
of recycling, and the damage done by dumping stuff in landfill.
Fair enough on some of that, but if it's the government-sponsored case that
we need to do this, why are they not addressing the problem of spares
availability, and pricing ? Quite 'reasonable' home cinema systems can, for
example, be had from the local supermarket, for a very sensible price. And
I'm not talking 'no-names' here. Often well known brand names, although what
you are getting is not, of course, actually manufactured by them. Now what
happens when its laser fails just out of warranty ? Well, first off, it's
probably not even available as a spare part. If it is, the cost of it is
nearly as much, if not more, than the player cost in the first place. Result
? An otherwise perfectly good player goes at worst to landfill, and at best,
to be recycled, which uses yet more energy.
It seems to me that if these items can be built cheap enough to sell at that
price in the first place, then the component cost of the laser must only be
a few pence / cents. So, if governments really want to make a difference,
then this kit should be forced to have a 5 year lifetime, by making
manufacturers supply spare parts for that period of time, and by making them
sell them out at cost plus handling, plus a sensible storage cost. Profit on
spares should be secondary, only if the final cost allows for it.
There. That's *my* electro-political rant .... !! d;~}
Arfa
I agree with what Arfa says. We urgently need a system of spares and
suppport to keep usable stuff from the landfill. I would even go
further and propose that with the annual multi-million pound budget
for implanting extensive recycling schemes, including the cost of
sorting, transporting, storing waste electronic materials and the
energy use all that entails, we could subsidise every repair shop in
the country and SAVE money and do far more for the environment!
And don't get me started on new TVs and their power consumption -
you'd have to go back to the early 70s colour sets to find one with
such a ridiculous power consumption. So you have a double whammy -
people chucking out working CRT sets which used less than 90w, into
the landfill AND replacing them with more-contaminating plasma and
LCDs using many hundreds more watts. And here's everyone going on
about F$%&ing light bulbs??!! The only explanation I can find for
this farcical situation is a) public ignorance and b) the businesses
in whose interests it is to keep things that way.
It's a sad part of living in a world where big business and
deregulated multinationals can do what they want, and are seemingly
untouchable, whilst the ordinary citizen is forced to pay for the
costs of this environmental folly and suffer endless recyling
campaigns, not to mention having often little choice but to throw
equipment away. It's a perverse form of socialism for the rich IMO.
Still, as long as people are stupid enough to keep BUYING instead of
thinking about the consequences, or just for a second questioning this
state of affairs, there'll be more of the same.
(drags soapbox away ;-))
-B.
.
- References:
- An electro-political rant
- From: ZZactly
- Re: An electro-political rant
- From: Arfa Daily
- An electro-political rant
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