Planned obsolescence is very much an actively employed, functional, business strategy.

I think you're only considering one aspect of planned obsolescence -- where the product is designed to have a short lifetime. I don't know why you would believe that that isn't part of "business as usual", but there's more than one way to make a product obsolete. The typical case is when a company releases yearly model refreshes for a product with an operational life far in excess of 12 months. This stategy is most common in markets with a monopoly or oligopoly, in saturated product segments.

Have you ever heard the phrase "last year's model"?

Not sure I like the tone. Yes, I have heard the phrase "last year's model".

Say you buy a smartphone, and you want it to last for 7 years. If you buy the model from 2025, the manufacturer commits to supporting it until 2032 (it already exists). Now if you buy the 2025 model in 2029, it will still last until 2032, so in 2029 it actually makes sense to not buy the model from 2025. But I would say that it's pretty great that the manufacturer commits to supporting the devices for 7 years.

Planned obsolescence suggests that the company has been actively investing resources into it. "This lightbulb lasts for 4 years, have our engineers find a way to make it die after 1 year" is the typical example of that.

Now of course, as a customer, you can buy the 2025 model, and throw it away in 2026 to buy the new model.

For what it's worth, I see now how that would read as condescending and I'm sorry about that. I mentioned the "last year's model" thing because, to me, it's a phrase most associated with automobile makers and advertising c. 1950 -- with that business in particular often being cited as the originator (or at least, codifier) of the "yearly refresh" planned obsolescence strategy.

> I would say that it's pretty great that the manufacturer commits to supporting the devices for 7 years.

Sure. Your scenario is describing planned obsolescence, though. As I understand it, you're saying that the device will be practically unusable when the support period ends in 2032. It doesn't matter if it's 7 years or 7 months, that's something that came about because of a decision made by the company -- it was planned. Further, the company releases a new version of the product in 2026. The older model still works, but it has nevertheless been rendered obsolete, by an (arbitrary) action of the company that produced it.

I do understand how my "premature obsolescence" may sound exactly like "planned obsolescence".

It's just that in my mind, there is a difference between "I put efforts into making sure that it won't last longer than what I plan" and "I don't put efforts into making it last longer than what I plan".

- Actively making the product worse is an arsehole move. The way to prevent that is to make it illegal to do it.

- Not actively keeping it alive is actually rational if it is less profitable. We do agree that it is premature for a smartphone to be unusable after 2 weeks. We probably do agree that it is not reasonable to expect a smartphone to last for 10 000 years. So we need regulations that enforces something reasonable upon company. Then it becomes rational for the company to apply it, because if they don't they will get fines and it will be more costly.

I see the first one as "planned obsolescence". The second as "premature obsolescence". For the former, I think we should be extremely severe with companies (the CEO who clearly asks for that should go to prison, if it's at the scale of smarphones). But the latter comes from a lack of regulations.

Lowest cost possible is often fun optimization problem engineers enjoy. Save a fraction of cent here and there and there too. And in some ways it is good for consumer getting cheaper products.

On the other end you have something like Juicero. Massively and wastefully overengineered piece of crap. To do not that useful task. While being extremely expensive. And probably not actually last that long.

Maybe one day if far future we end up with some mature balance between two. But I doubt it...

I don't think that engineers think "okay, so if I use this chip, the product will last 4 years, so I can use this other chip that will last only 2 years because it's a few cents cheaper".

If you want it to last longer, it's a lot of work: you have to somehow test the components you buy (or get those who produce them to do it) and then you have to test whatever you build with them. So you have to invest in it, it's not just a design decision.

Same for waterproofness: it's not that you actively drill holes in your device to make sure that it won't be waterproof. It's just that if you actually want it waterproof, you have to design for it, then you have to test, and iterate a few times. If your consumers still buy your device if it's not waterproof, then there is no need to invest in waterproofness. But it's not "planned un-waterproofness".