Historically, the intentional reduction of the lifetime of light bulbs from 2.500 to 1.000 hours by the big manufacturers (Philips, GE, OSRAM) in 1940 is probab

Historically, the intentional reduction of the lifetime of light bulbs from 2.500 to 1.000 hours by the big manufacturers (Philips, GE, OSRAM) in 1940 is probably one the first large-scale examples of this, unfortunately today ubiquitous, practice. In my own experience I had two cases where this effect was very visible: I still own a HP Laserjet 4 that I bought for 50 $ on Ebay in 2001. By that time it already had printed more than 60.000 pages (judging by the test page output), and until today it still keeps churning out more and more pages at 600 DPI and less than 1 cent per page (a refurbished toner costs around 40 $ and lasts for around 7.000 pages). The printer itself is probably the sturdiest piece of equipment I've ever seen, weighing in at more than 10 kg and containing lots of metal parts. Comparing this with the current HP model, which consists mostly of plastic parts, still effectively prints only at 600 DPI and for which a 2.000 page toner can easily cost in excess of 80 $ kind of makes you wonder where all the R&D spending in the printer industry went to. Concerning the washing machine example from the article: I still own on an old Miele Lavamat which has been in service since 1989 (!) and still works flawlessly to this day. New machines are more energy-efficient of course (saving about 50 % of electricity and water compared to the 1989 model) but seem to have a much shorter lifespan as well. BTW, a while ago Arte (a French/German TV channel) showed a really interesting documentary on this "planned obolescence" ("Kaufen für die Müllhalde" - "Buying for the Junkyard"; unfortunately only in German and French https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVFZ4Ocz4VA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVFZ4Ocz4VA).