4 ms·

Not sure where you’re going with the can’t buy crappy stuff anymore argument, from another perspective, most things built today are crappy Chinese junk compare

Not sure where you’re going with the can’t buy crappy stuff anymore argument, from another perspective, most things built today are crappy Chinese junk compared to things built 70 years ago, if they existed 70 years ago. Mending and the art of repair has been forgotten by most - if your TV has an issue, you’re more likely to buy a new one than fix it, even if it’s possibly repairable for less than a couple hundred bucks by someone who knows there way around electronics. Same goes for clothing, small appliances like blenders or table fans, and a lot of other things. OTOH, something like a fridge today is much more efficient than it was 50 years ago, but it may not be as easily repairable or simple - look at cars nowadays versus the cars before 90/00s - no computers easy to fix. Now you buy a Tesla that is put together like an iPhone.

sokoloff 7y ago
When you can buy a 50" LED 4K TV for under $300, why would you attempt a repair of any older tech TV that is "probably repairable" for a couple hundred bucks? Take it off the wall; find a repair place; make an appointment; schlep it over there; wait for the results; pick it up; put it back on the wall vs drive to BestBuy and buy a newer, better TV and put the old one on the curb and be done with certainty tomorrow. Any commodity TV is immediately beyond-economic-repair, IMO. 1 - https://www.bestbuy.com/site/samsung-50-class-led-nu6900-series-2160p-smart-4k-uhd-tv-with-hdr/6268403.p?skuId=6268403 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/samsung-50-class-led-nu6900-ser... (literally the first search result I found)
- ryandrake 7y ago
  It makes sense if you can repair it with a few $0.15 capacitors and an hour of your time. I repair my electronics when they fail, and it saves me a lot of money. Somehow, it's become cool just to throw perfectly serviceable stuff in a landfill rather than watch a YouTube video and learn a little soldering.
  - sokoloff 7y ago
    Yes, I'm also personally very likely to tear it apart and see if I can replace any failed electrolytics, but that's only applicable to 0.5% of the population or less. I'm doing that as the least hassle way to get a working TV again (less research, less driving, no changing the TV mount, etc). 99.5+% of people are better off economically and time-wise to throw away any out-of-warranty TV undiagnosed and buy new.
- toiletfuneral 7y ago
  That’s a cool philosophy...btw how’s that Texas sized gyre of plastic in the pacific doing? Really excited for the hidden hand to fix it
eru 7y ago
> [...] built today are crappy Chinese junk compared to things built 70 years ago, if they existed 70 years ago [...] Ignoring the big 'if': most goods today are better than what we had in 1950. Especially if you compare the quality of goods that required the median worker to work the same amount of hours. The 'junk' you talk about takes minutes of work to earn enough to buy. And most of the time, that's good enough. The stuff that you spend a few hours of pay on, is mostly so much better. Another commenter already pointed out that the example of repairability don't really hold up. It's mostly because wages have increased that repairing those things doesn't make much sense any more. Just think how much time even well-to-do middle class women used to spent on darning socks and mending clothing. Basic clothing is too cheap to measure these days. Cars need much less maintenance these days. It's easy to view the past with rose tinted lenses. But most things were really crappy. See https://www.gwern.net/Improvements https://www.gwern.net/Improvements for more on this perspective: > clothing has become almost “too cheap to meter”; the idea of, say, darning socks is completely alien3, clothing companies routinely burn millions of pounds of clothes because it’s cheaper than the cost of selling them, and Africa is flooded by discards. > materials science has produced constant visible-yet-invisible improvements in textiles yielding, among other things, far better insulated (and cheaper) winter jackets: instead of choosing between winter coats which make you look like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man or freezing (and if you get wet, freezing anyway) or exotic ultra-expensive garments aimed at mountain climbers, you can now buy ordinary (and much cheaper) winter coats which are amazingly thin and work even better to keep you warm—so much so that you have to be careful to not buy too well-insulated a coat, lest you swelter at the slightest exertion and be placed between the Scylla of overheating & the Charybdis of opening your coat to the freezing air to cool. I submitted Gwern's piece at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22441865 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22441865
- ghaff 7y ago
  I mostly agree. >cars need much less maintenance these days. And, especially if you lived somewhere with snow and salt on the roads, they mostly lasted about 50K miles before they rusted out. Growing up, it was an unusual car that made it to 100K. That said, minor repairs of otherwise functional gear can make sense. I'm generally in agreement on electronics. But I fairly commonly repair or have repaired hiking or camping gear for example that just needs some stitching to get back in working condition.

sokoloff 7y ago

When you can buy a 50" LED 4K TV for under $300, why would you attempt a repair of any older tech TV that is "probably repairable" for a couple hundred bucks? Take it off the wall; find a repair place; make an appointment; schlep it over there; wait for the results; pick it up; put it back on the wall vs drive to BestBuy and buy a newer, better TV and put the old one on the curb and be done with certainty tomorrow. Any commodity TV is immediately beyond-economic-repair, IMO. 1 - https://www.bestbuy.com/site/samsung-50-class-led-nu6900-series-2160p-smart-4k-uhd-tv-with-hdr/6268403.p?skuId=6268403 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/samsung-50-class-led-nu6900-ser... (literally the first search result I found)

ryandrake 7y ago
It makes sense if you can repair it with a few $0.15 capacitors and an hour of your time. I repair my electronics when they fail, and it saves me a lot of money. Somehow, it's become cool just to throw perfectly serviceable stuff in a landfill rather than watch a YouTube video and learn a little soldering.
- sokoloff 7y ago
  Yes, I'm also personally very likely to tear it apart and see if I can replace any failed electrolytics, but that's only applicable to 0.5% of the population or less. I'm doing that as the least hassle way to get a working TV again (less research, less driving, no changing the TV mount, etc). 99.5+% of people are better off economically and time-wise to throw away any out-of-warranty TV undiagnosed and buy new.
toiletfuneral 7y ago
That’s a cool philosophy...btw how’s that Texas sized gyre of plastic in the pacific doing? Really excited for the hidden hand to fix it

eru 7y ago

> [...] built today are crappy Chinese junk compared to things built 70 years ago, if they existed 70 years ago [...] Ignoring the big 'if': most goods today are better than what we had in 1950. Especially if you compare the quality of goods that required the median worker to work the same amount of hours. The 'junk' you talk about takes minutes of work to earn enough to buy. And most of the time, that's good enough. The stuff that you spend a few hours of pay on, is mostly so much better. Another commenter already pointed out that the example of repairability don't really hold up. It's mostly because wages have increased that repairing those things doesn't make much sense any more. Just think how much time even well-to-do middle class women used to spent on darning socks and mending clothing. Basic clothing is too cheap to measure these days. Cars need much less maintenance these days. It's easy to view the past with rose tinted lenses. But most things were really crappy. See https://www.gwern.net/Improvements https://www.gwern.net/Improvements for more on this perspective: > clothing has become almost “too cheap to meter”; the idea of, say, darning socks is completely alien3, clothing companies routinely burn millions of pounds of clothes because it’s cheaper than the cost of selling them, and Africa is flooded by discards. > materials science has produced constant visible-yet-invisible improvements in textiles yielding, among other things, far better insulated (and cheaper) winter jackets: instead of choosing between winter coats which make you look like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man or freezing (and if you get wet, freezing anyway) or exotic ultra-expensive garments aimed at mountain climbers, you can now buy ordinary (and much cheaper) winter coats which are amazingly thin and work even better to keep you warm—so much so that you have to be careful to not buy too well-insulated a coat, lest you swelter at the slightest exertion and be placed between the Scylla of overheating & the Charybdis of opening your coat to the freezing air to cool. I submitted Gwern's piece at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22441865 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22441865

ghaff 7y ago
I mostly agree. >cars need much less maintenance these days. And, especially if you lived somewhere with snow and salt on the roads, they mostly lasted about 50K miles before they rusted out. Growing up, it was an unusual car that made it to 100K. That said, minor repairs of otherwise functional gear can make sense. I'm generally in agreement on electronics. But I fairly commonly repair or have repaired hiking or camping gear for example that just needs some stitching to get back in working condition.