Workers make smartphones - they design, assemble, and sell them. Capitalism is the system under which all of the above occurs from start to finish.
Not to mention, for them to work they require a service network of towers and infrastructure, data centers, etc.
It’s not like Johann the Blacksmith can fire up the forge and hammer out an iPhone to feed his family for the winter.
I think the brand and model makes a big difference too. Many older iPhones and Pixels still work great.
And yet their cadence of pushing out new phones every year to replace old ones hasn’t changed.
I’m still using my pixel 3a, which I bought in 2019. It is the 64 GB variant (I think base was 32 GB) and cost me $340. It’s still doing its phone thing pretty well, but it can get a bit warm scrolling the modern bloated web without an ad-blocker running. I really don’t see a reason to upgrade right now.
My wife has a 6a and I recently had to open it up to replace it’s internal speaker that failed.
I was using a Pixel 3a up until recently too, it still works fine but I got a used 6 pro from a relative so I chucked GrapheneOS on it and started using that.
My partner’s iPhone is six years old. We’re going to replace it soon because it stopped receiving security updates. She’d keep using it until it completely bricked otherwise.
I appreciate they’re some of the best around for longevity but I wish they’d push further. I have a Fairphone and their firmware support is the same so it’s frustrating that there’s not really an alternative here.
I wish more devices would move in the Framework laptop direction, where hardware can be upgraded and old hardware can be repurposed.
The closest I’ve seen to that would be the pinephone or librem 5, but they have their own issues.
I know this is whataboutism but isn’t every developed nation currently a major electronics hub? Why is “US Capitalism” your crosshairs and not just planned obsolescence in general?
The US forces its style of capitalism on everyone who can’t resist them. In fact, the only 2 who can are even worse but we already know China and Russia are bad.
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Honestly, I’ve never really understood the cellphone as the the image of planned obsolescence. I’ve owned every cellphone I’ve had for at least 5 years, and it’s been totally fine.
How long are we expecting these things to last?
I ride my phones until they completely crap out or are destroyed. Then I get on eBay and get another for $150 or so.
I ve had 2 models of phone where it was the only type of phone I got until they stopped making them :(
I’m not convinced that capitalism could make phones better than the ones we have, for the reasons stated, and I’m not sure that not-capitalism could have made phones as good.
Which maybe wouldn’t be all bad when you consider all the slaves and stuff.
But this implied idea that we should have or are owed better phones is maybe worth some zooming out and some suspicion.
I think the idea isn’t about the quality of the phone, or any other product. It’s about the relationship between the company and the customers.
reminder phone parts could be made interoperable too, massively reducing wasted materials, money and time. AND eliminates this stupid need for a new phone every X years.
but that would cut into their profits so yeah.
“Frequent changes in design”
looks at all the black rectangles
I just upgraded my S9 to an Ulephone 27T pro. The S9 I fixed twice, and had for 6 years, but it’s battery no longer held a charge long enough, the charging port didn’t always work, and it regularly went into meltdown mode for some reason.
The Ulephone is more than 3 times the weight, and twice as thick as my S9. About the most rugged device available. It has more ram than my laptop. I’m hoping it will do me for another 6 years at least. I think that’s a reasonable amount of time for an everyday use device to last for.
