What is to prevent a manufacturer from programming a piece of hardware to deactivate after so many hours of usage?
I took the back off our dead television just to see if there was some obvious sign of the failure mode. Most likely the power supply, I'd guess. For the last few years, it had been making weird lines on the screen, just for a while, while warming up. So we were prepared when it died.
I looked at all the circuit boards - power supply, IR interface, WiFi card, and main processor, and nothing looked amiss. We will take it to the electronic recycling center later today (it won't fit in the garbage can).
But looking at all of this, I got to thinking, what if you could program the main processor to just stop working after, say, 10,000 hours of use? It would force the user to upgrade. And why not do this with other products like cell phones? How do we know this isn't happening already?
Apple is famous for pushing "updates" to iOS onto older phones that essentially bricks them. Windows gets slower and slower with each "update" and putting Windows 10 or 11 on an older machine running 7, will slow it to a crawl. Sadly, Microsoft set Windows to auto-install Windows 10 automatically, unless you specifically disabled it. A friend of mine has an older HP (!!) laptop that ran Windows 7 just fine, but is slower than paint drying with the "update" to Windows 10. Well, that and McAfee slowed it down. Have you ever tried to remove all of McAfee from a computer? It just seems to keep coming back!
So maybe we are already at this point - planned obsolescence can be programmed into a product, rather than merely designed into it. A car manufacturer could guarantee its car for 100,000 miles, at which point, it would shut down or drive itself back to the dealer for scrapping. With the way leasing is going, it isn't that far-fetched a fantasy.
And maybe, like with HP printers, we would just rent everything. You'd pay so many dollars a month for a television, and if you stopped paying, it would stop working. There would be advantages to this, of course, in that if the television broke, they would replace it with a new one - provided you kept paying.
This is, in a way, how smart phones work for many people who have "plans" in place. If they pay (through the nose) a monthly fee, they get "unlimited" data (up to the limit, then it slows down) and a "free" phone upgrade every few years. The telcos sell the old phones to resellers and I buy them on eBay. My Galaxy 7 Active is getting long in the tooth, as it will no longer run some newer apps. But I spent less on that phone than some people pay for a month of cell service!
But the point is, people are already conditioned to trading in their electronics every few years. And for a long time, it made sense, as advances in technology meant that a computer from even a few years ago was woefully obsolete. As time progresses, well, these improvements in technology become less and less. In fact, some generations of cell phones haven't sold well simply because people were happy with their old phones and the new ones simply weren't much better to warrant an upgrade.
So why not make them shut off after so many hours of use?
Like I said, it is an evil thought. But I suspect it is a thought that has occurred to some marketers and even Engineers and certainly CEOs of certain companies. We seem to be moving to a business model where people don't own anything but instead "subscribe" to products and pay monthly fees. It is a flawed model, from the consumer's point of view, as when you actually own something, it is possible to take care of it and make it last longer, or simply decide to forego "upgrades" if last years' model is working OK for you.
With so many products having embedded electronics, even the simplest of appliances can be made to quit after so many uses. Other than for things like a hammer or an anvil, makers could program everything from light bulbs to lawn mowers to simply quit after so many hours of use. The mechanics of it (or should I say, electronics) are trivial.
Of course, there could be push-back from this type of marketing and there already is. People who know and understand what is going on, would never buy (lease? rent? borrow?) an HP printer as the CEO of that company has flat-out said they want to move to a pay-to-print subscription model. Screw that. Sad, too, as it will hasten the demise of the printed page, which is already dying on the vine.
But others, particularly those that are techno-phobic, may prefer such a model. They always have the newest and latest equipment, and never have to worry about repairs or breakdowns. Just call the nice man at the company and they send you a new one! Be sure to update your payment options!
In a way, it would be like Japan, which for years had a stringent three-year inspection protocol for automobiles that was nearly impossible to pass. This was by design. As a result, no one kept a car more than three years and the domestic auto industry flourished. It did make the cities look modern and neat - you never saw broken-down, rusted, oil-burning "junkers" on the road there. And used cars could be exported to nearby right-hand-drive countries. (My understanding is, that since then, they have lengthened the time between inspections somewhat).
Of course, the ultimate option is to consume less and that sometimes means consuming nothing. We tend to think we "need" things like smart phones or televisions or computers, but fail to recall a time when these things did not exist. Sadly, our society is making it harder and harder not to engage with technology. Some employers demand to know your cell phone number (and require you own one, as a term of employment) and your social media accounts (and "none" is not deemed an honest answer, hence I am unemployed). You literally cannot work or shop these days, in some instances, without some technology.
Well, let's just hope it doesn't come to having "kill switches" in our technology (if they are not there already). And maybe I should keep my evil thoughts to myself, lest the powers-that-be get any ideas!
