Mastodawn

calcifer 🧯Aug 20, 2024

I swear people don’t understand planned obsolescence. PLANNED is the key

If I stop supporting a 6-year-old version of something because I have data suggesting hardly anyone uses it anymore, that’s just garden variety obsolescence

If I plan on day one to stop support after 6 years, THAT is planned obsolescence. Same if I just make design decisions such that most of them will break before then.

If I deliberately break old things, that’s not planned obsolescence, that’s FORCED obsolescence.

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FoolishOwl Aug 20, 2024

@calcifer I've thought that Moore's Law was really about the CEO of Intel making a public declaration about the rate of planned obsolescence throughout the computer industry. Since Intel had an effective monopoly on key components, it was in a position to impose that rule.

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calcifer 🧯

@foolishowl close. It was a genuine observation, but then Intel set it as an engineering target.

But that isn’t an example of planned obsolescence. The chips don’t stop working or stop being supported; Intel didn’t do anything to artificially make it harder to use old chips or anything like that. Simply releasing new things in the hopes people will upgrade is not planned obsolescence