7 ms·

Am reminded by this quote from Ferdinand Porsche: "The perfect racing car crosses the finish line first and subsequently falls into its component parts." Game

Am reminded by this quote from Ferdinand Porsche: "The perfect racing car crosses the finish line first and subsequently falls into its component parts." Games fit this philosophy, compared to many other pieces of software that are expected to be long-lived and receiving a lot of maintenance and changes and evolve.

WJW 1y ago
The Porsche quote reflects a wider design philosophy that says "Ideally, all components of a system lasts as long as the design life of the entire system and there should be no component that lives significantly longer. If there is such a component, it has been overengineered and thus the system will be more expensive to the end consumer than it needs to be.". It kinda skips over maintenance, but overall most people find it unobjectionable when stated like this. But plenty of people will find complaints when they try to drive their car beyond its design specs and more or less everything starts failing at once.
- doubled112 1y ago
  When the design spec seems to be a 3 year long lease I can see why people get bothered.
- signalToNose 1y ago
  Consumer protection laws prevents businesses following this to it’s extreme. For many businesses the ideal would be to just sell stuff that immediately breaks down as soon as it’s sold. It has the fulfilled its purpose from their point of view
  - delichon 1y ago
    I run sous vide cookers 24*7, and they uniformly break within 90 days or less. But they don't like to admit their smaller duty cycle, so they don't, and keep sending me warranty replacements instead. I keep buying different brands looking for one with a longer life. I'll bet most people do that when their gadgets die, and purposely making products that die as soon as sold isn't often a successful business model.
    - rlander 1y ago
      That’s not a small cycle count for a normal household. 90 × 24 = 2,160 total hours. I sous vide now and then, about twice a week for 6 hours each, so around 12 hours a week. That works out to roughly 15 years of usable machine time for the average person. Not bad at all.
      - account42 1y ago
        You think a measly 360 uses at your 6 hours typical operation is even remotely acceptable for a glorified heating element? And yes, 15 years is bad. I don't want to replace my entire household every 15 years FFS.
      - 47282847 1y ago
        Assuming linearity, which I doubt is the case.
      - josephg 1y ago
        Photography is the same way. Most SLR / DSLR / mirrorless cameras have a mechanical shutter which is expected to last around 200k-1m activations. I've had a camera for a bit over a year. I've used it quite heavily, and my shutter count is at about 13k photos. At this rate, the shutter will probably last for 20+ years - which seems fine. If I'm still using the camera by then, spending a few hundred dollars to replace the shutter mechanism sounds totally reasonable.
      - plywoodShadow 1y ago
        2160/12 is 180 weeks, or roughly 3.5 years, not 15 years
    - account42 1y ago
      Well from an evil business perspective their options are either - the product doesn't break and you don't buy a replacement from them because you still have a working product - the product breaks and there is a greater than 0% chance that you will buy a replacement product from them Of course in practice it's more complicated but I wouldn't be so quick to declare that the math doesn't work out.
- ortusdux 1y ago
  Anyone can build a bridge, but it takes an engineer to barely build a bridge.
  - mikepurvis 1y ago
    Alan Weisman's lovely book World Without Us speculates a bit about this, basically saying that more recently built structures would be the first to collapse because they've all be engineered so close to the line. Meanwhile stuff that already been standing for 100+ years like the Brooklyn Bridge will probably still be there in another 100 years even without any maintenance just on account of how overbuilt it all had to be in an era before finite element analysis.
    - ortusdux 1y ago
      There was an aluminum extrusion company that falsified test records for years. They got away with it because what's a few % when your customer's safety factor is 2. Once they got into weight sensitive aerospace applications, where sometimes the factor is 1.2, rockets starting blowing up on the launch pad. https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/aluminum-extrusion-manufacturer-agrees-pay-over-46-million-defrauding-customers-including https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/aluminum-extrusion-m...
      - aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA 1y ago
        Should have resulted in jail time. A monetary fine is no deterrent.
        Scramblejams 1y ago
        It did result in jail time. The linked document states that the testing lab supervisor was sentenced to 3 years. (Not sure how much of that time was actually served, apparently he was suffering from dementia.) More info: https://www.oregonlive.com/portland/2018/08/company_supervisor_who_falsifi.html https://www.oregonlive.com/portland/2018/08/company_supervis... Also a correction to GP: They were payload deployment failures, they didn't blow up on the pad. More here: https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/05/nasa-finally-concludes-investigation-of-two-failed-launches-a-decade-ago/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/05/nasa-finally-conclud...
- creaturemachine 1y ago
  Porsche was talking about racing, where the primary focus is reaching the finish line faster an anyone else, and over-engineering can easily get in the way of that goal. Back in the real world, no race team would agree that their cars should disintegrate after one race.
  - AzN1337c0d3r 1y ago
    > Back in the real world, no race team would agree that their cars should disintegrate after one race. Wasn't F1 teams basically doing this by replacing their engines and transmissions until the rules introduced penalties for component swaps in 2014?
    - creaturemachine 1y ago
      Yup, cigarette money enabled all kinds of shenanigans. Engine swaps for qualification, new engines every race, spare third cars, it goes on. 2004 was the first year that specified engines must last the entire race weekend and introduced penalties for swaps.
      - TylerE 1y ago
        F1 income is way way higher than the 80s.
      - lostlogin 1y ago
        > cigarette money enabled all kinds of shenanigans. It still does. New Zealand has a crop of tobacco funded politicians.
        lawlessone 1y ago
        >New Zealand has a crop of tobacco funded politicians. when they leave politics do they just rapidly age and dissolve like that guy in the Indiana Jones film?
    - jperras 1y ago
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
aleks224 1y ago
There's a quote in the bible that says something similar: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.” (John 12:24)

WJW 1y ago

The Porsche quote reflects a wider design philosophy that says "Ideally, all components of a system lasts as long as the design life of the entire system and there should be no component that lives significantly longer. If there is such a component, it has been overengineered and thus the system will be more expensive to the end consumer than it needs to be.". It kinda skips over maintenance, but overall most people find it unobjectionable when stated like this. But plenty of people will find complaints when they try to drive their car beyond its design specs and more or less everything starts failing at once.

doubled112 1y ago
When the design spec seems to be a 3 year long lease I can see why people get bothered.
signalToNose 1y ago
Consumer protection laws prevents businesses following this to it’s extreme. For many businesses the ideal would be to just sell stuff that immediately breaks down as soon as it’s sold. It has the fulfilled its purpose from their point of view
- delichon 1y ago
  I run sous vide cookers 24*7, and they uniformly break within 90 days or less. But they don't like to admit their smaller duty cycle, so they don't, and keep sending me warranty replacements instead. I keep buying different brands looking for one with a longer life. I'll bet most people do that when their gadgets die, and purposely making products that die as soon as sold isn't often a successful business model.
  - rlander 1y ago
    That’s not a small cycle count for a normal household. 90 × 24 = 2,160 total hours. I sous vide now and then, about twice a week for 6 hours each, so around 12 hours a week. That works out to roughly 15 years of usable machine time for the average person. Not bad at all.
    - account42 1y ago
      You think a measly 360 uses at your 6 hours typical operation is even remotely acceptable for a glorified heating element? And yes, 15 years is bad. I don't want to replace my entire household every 15 years FFS.
    - 47282847 1y ago
      Assuming linearity, which I doubt is the case.
    - josephg 1y ago
      Photography is the same way. Most SLR / DSLR / mirrorless cameras have a mechanical shutter which is expected to last around 200k-1m activations. I've had a camera for a bit over a year. I've used it quite heavily, and my shutter count is at about 13k photos. At this rate, the shutter will probably last for 20+ years - which seems fine. If I'm still using the camera by then, spending a few hundred dollars to replace the shutter mechanism sounds totally reasonable.
    - plywoodShadow 1y ago
      2160/12 is 180 weeks, or roughly 3.5 years, not 15 years
  - account42 1y ago
    Well from an evil business perspective their options are either - the product doesn't break and you don't buy a replacement from them because you still have a working product - the product breaks and there is a greater than 0% chance that you will buy a replacement product from them Of course in practice it's more complicated but I wouldn't be so quick to declare that the math doesn't work out.
ortusdux 1y ago
Anyone can build a bridge, but it takes an engineer to barely build a bridge.
- mikepurvis 1y ago
  Alan Weisman's lovely book World Without Us speculates a bit about this, basically saying that more recently built structures would be the first to collapse because they've all be engineered so close to the line. Meanwhile stuff that already been standing for 100+ years like the Brooklyn Bridge will probably still be there in another 100 years even without any maintenance just on account of how overbuilt it all had to be in an era before finite element analysis.
  - ortusdux 1y ago
    There was an aluminum extrusion company that falsified test records for years. They got away with it because what's a few % when your customer's safety factor is 2. Once they got into weight sensitive aerospace applications, where sometimes the factor is 1.2, rockets starting blowing up on the launch pad. https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/aluminum-extrusion-manufacturer-agrees-pay-over-46-million-defrauding-customers-including https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/aluminum-extrusion-m...
    - aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA 1y ago
      Should have resulted in jail time. A monetary fine is no deterrent.
      - Scramblejams 1y ago
        It did result in jail time. The linked document states that the testing lab supervisor was sentenced to 3 years. (Not sure how much of that time was actually served, apparently he was suffering from dementia.) More info: https://www.oregonlive.com/portland/2018/08/company_supervisor_who_falsifi.html https://www.oregonlive.com/portland/2018/08/company_supervis... Also a correction to GP: They were payload deployment failures, they didn't blow up on the pad. More here: https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/05/nasa-finally-concludes-investigation-of-two-failed-launches-a-decade-ago/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/05/nasa-finally-conclud...
creaturemachine 1y ago
Porsche was talking about racing, where the primary focus is reaching the finish line faster an anyone else, and over-engineering can easily get in the way of that goal. Back in the real world, no race team would agree that their cars should disintegrate after one race.
- AzN1337c0d3r 1y ago
  > Back in the real world, no race team would agree that their cars should disintegrate after one race. Wasn't F1 teams basically doing this by replacing their engines and transmissions until the rules introduced penalties for component swaps in 2014?
  - creaturemachine 1y ago
    Yup, cigarette money enabled all kinds of shenanigans. Engine swaps for qualification, new engines every race, spare third cars, it goes on. 2004 was the first year that specified engines must last the entire race weekend and introduced penalties for swaps.
    - TylerE 1y ago
      F1 income is way way higher than the 80s.
    - lostlogin 1y ago
      > cigarette money enabled all kinds of shenanigans. It still does. New Zealand has a crop of tobacco funded politicians.
      - lawlessone 1y ago
        >New Zealand has a crop of tobacco funded politicians. when they leave politics do they just rapidly age and dissolve like that guy in the Indiana Jones film?
  - jperras 1y ago
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]

aleks224 1y ago

There's a quote in the bible that says something similar: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.” (John 12:24)