5 ms·

I had clients who were going to bargain for less than a penny

• spookthesunset 5y ago
  For ten million units, a penny is $100,000. You could give an engineer an entire quarter to come up with a software debounce for less than that. That shit adds up. BOM costs are everything for consumer goods.
  • bserge 5y ago
  • tmzt 5y ago
    I've always wondered why the same logic doesn't apply to using a commercial BIOS. Doesn't the per-unit cost for someone like Compal add up to more than the value in using a customized Phoenix firmware? Even with UEFI the branded option is generally used.
  • alar44 5y ago
    And if you make $10 on each of those that's .1%. Or even if it's only $1 that's 1%. So be it! I don't want to encourage shitty design for pennies at any level. Stop making shitty shit.
    • avianlyric 5y ago
      There aren’t that many 1% in 100% or even that many 0.1% in 100%. Saving a penny on the keyboard will be one of hundreds of places where a penny was saved. Good engineering and product design is about trade offs and compromise, not taking absolute positions about what’s shitty or not.
      • spookthesunset 5y ago
        Exactly. Opportunity cost. Maybe saving a penny on this portion of the keyboard let’s them spend a penny on some other part of the design that might have even more positive customer impact.