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We can't save the planet or ourselves because it's not profitable.



Selling brake pads that don't wear out would be immensely profitable. Things people want get bought.


I dunno mate. If I were a brake pad salesman I'd prefer they last less not more.


So? There would only be one "brake pad salesman" left, who would sell indestructible brake pads to car manufacturers, and all the others would go bust.


Right. It's not like they can form a cartel and collectively decide how long a brake pad should last, just like the incandescent light bulb cartel [1] of the early 20th century or the NAND flash memory cartel of the 21st century.

Mate you're far too naive to believe what you're saying.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoebus_cartel


A theoretical cartel can do precisely nothing, since it's a mere mental construct. It takes an actual cartel to fix prices (ignoring as a distraction the fact that the link you provide gives several good reasons to think that planned obsolescence was not the primary factor in the lifetime of incandescent bulbs).

There is no brake pad cartel. If there is, demonstrate it. If not, again, an imaginary cartel can only do imaginary things. It can't do real things.


I'm gonna let you reflect on what you just said.


Translation: you have no coherent response to what I said, and don't like that, so you figured a bit of snark might recover some dignity. It's better to simply not reply.


I gave you my argument in detail above with sources that companies routinely collude in anti-consumer ways, but you decided to strick your fingers in your ears and sing "lalala I don't believe you".

Therefore I have no more replies for you to protect my sanity. Feel free to believe whatever you want to believe, just leve me be, i have no duty to waste my time to change your opinion of something you're fixated on.


> with sources that companies routinely collude in anti-consumer ways

Was this your link that said "there was a cartel in an industry once"? That doesn't seem to demonstrate a general issue.


The link that says "although there is vigorous disagreement about whether 1000 days was a good technical standard or a case of planned obsolescence, a cartel did exist, and there are sources which say it was to use planned obsolescence to sell more bulbs". Inconveniently, longer-lasting bulbs emit less light, and more heat. If you remember the heat of a 100W incandescent bulb, perhaps you might see the fire hazard in encouraging bulb companies to compete on the basis of bulb life. But no matter.

This definitely demonstrates that there's a brake pad cartel, right now, doing the same thing. By implication, you see.


I think you replied to the wrong person.


Not precisely, but I was agreeing with you, although I see how that might have been unclear.


If you think incandescant lightbulbs could last forever, and no one would break ranks to cash in on this universally better product, that's fine of course. It just sounds unlikely.




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