GE Is Saying Goodbye To Its 129-Year-Old Light Bulb Business (cnn.com) 150
schwit1 shares a report from CNN: General Electric is saying goodbye to the light bulb. The conglomerate is shedding a struggling business founded by Thomas Edison more than a century ago. After years of failing to find a buyer, GE announced Wednesday it will sell its 129-year-old lighting division to smart home company Savant Systems. The deal marks the latest step in dismantling the GE empire, which is saddled with too much debt and poor-performing businesses. GE has previously unloaded units that make microwaves, locomotives and washing machines as well as NBC Universal and much of its troubled financial arm. Worth noting: You will still see GE-branded light bulbs on store shelves for the foreseeable future. The lighting transaction includes a long-term licensing agreement that allows Savant to use the storied GE brand.
What a dumb move (Score:5, Funny)
They should simply renamed GE Light Bulbs into GE Space Heaters. Voila: at the stroke of a pen, they go from selling shitty light sources to selling really compact heating elements that, conveniently, also happen to produce light!
Re:What a dumb move (Score:5, Interesting)
The lighting division also includes LED bulbs as well, which GE pioneered.
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The only mention you'll hear of GE in the history of LED lighting is the invention of the first red LED in the 1960s, so it's a good stretch to say they "pioneered" LED lighting. To me that's sort of like saying that ancient Chinese fireworks makers were pioneers of human spaceflight...
It wasn't until Philips came out with the phosphor based LED bulbs in 2010 that they became performance-competitive with tungsten and CFL bulbs, and it would be several more years before they became cost-competitive.
=Smidge=
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> Wrong. LED was more performant than tungsten back in 2005, hitting 20% luminous efficiency (versus tungsten 2%)
But you weren't going to get a singular LED lamp as bright as a tungsten lamp, the size of a tungsten lamp, in a form factor that was compatible with existing lamps, that cast light unidirectionally like a tungsten lamp. "Performance" is a lot more than just raw efficiency.
> And they were already cost-competitive then.
In 2010 a 60-watt equivalent LED bulb cost about US$40. A 100-watt incand
Re:What a dumb move (Score:4, Insightful)
Talk about penny wise and pound foolish.
You neglected the *thousands* of dollars of electricity you would need to run the $40 worth of incandescent bulbs for 200K hours.
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Yeah but so does everyone.
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Seriously.
Flip it around, say your LED bulb is rated for 25k hours.
25k hours for a 60w bulb is $150 at $0.1/kwh, not including the purchase cost of 25 incandescent bulbs: $150
25k hours for a 60w eq LED bulb drawing 10w for the same: $25.
Even in the early days, they made sense over incandescent. The real competition was CFLs. Worse light quality, warm up times, often visible flickering, but far cheaper than LED in 2010.
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They should simply renamed GE Light Bulbs into GE Space Heaters. Voila: at the stroke of a pen, they go from selling shitty light sources to selling really compact heating elements that, conveniently, also happen to produce light!
I have one of those Lizard Heat Lamps on a big 1.5m pedastal, that I use while sitting on the couch it's feels much nicer than having a full room heater going and is more efficient as it is heating less space.
Completing the circle of history (Score:2)
Should GE have kept their vacuum tube business going too?
Well, it could have been merged into the Space Heaters Division with the light bulbs . . . which would have completed the circle historically, as the first vacuum tubes (valves) were manufactured by light bulb manufacturers.
Re:(((Kohlberg Kravis Roberts))) (Score:5, Interesting)
For those who do not know what the scare-brackets are, they are a symbol that neonazis put around names of Jewish people.
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mosel-saar-ruwer just outed themselves as an anti-Semite. Well, some of us had already noticed... But what's more worrying is that they thought they could get away with it on Slashdot and no-one would call them out for it.
Just how many fellow neo-nazis are there around here?
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Enough that he's currently modded positive. Hopefully people with actual humanity also have mod points.
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I'd tell you to keep your neo nazi crap to stormfront, but it was shut down ages ago. Either way, quit being a racist asshole
too much debt (Score:3)
The deal marks the latest step in dismantling the GE empire, which is saddled with too much debt and poor-performing businesses.
Sounds like a business run by MBAs.
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The deal marks the latest step in dismantling the GE empire, which is saddled with too much debt and poor-performing businesses.
Sounds like a business run by MBAs.
It's probably a situation where the company can't sell its product at high enough mark-up *and* pay its workers low enough to still provide over-inflated salaries to management and dividends to shareholders. Management and shareholders will get money from the sale of the company and its assets, while the workers will either get laid off, with little severance 'cause of the sale, or have to accept reduced pay to stay on. The product will probably suffer too over the long run as the new company squeezes ever
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Light bulbs are the original designed-to-fail commodity and LED lighting has ruined that approach.
Re:too much debt (Score:4, Insightful)
The LED will probably run for ever, the electronics in them seem to last about the same length of time as an old incandescent bulb lasted.
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The LED will probably run for ever, the electronics in them seem to last about the same length of time as an old incandescent bulb lasted.
Sadly, this is a completely accurate reflection of reality. I have some incandescent bulbs that are over 14 years old and still going strong. None of my LED bulbs have lasted more than 2 years.
Re:too much debt (Score:5, Interesting)
???
I've never had an LED light burn out, I currently have dozens, and I've used LED bulbs for 5 or more years. Maybe the electricity at your house is "dirty," and incandescent bulbs are more forgiving the LED lights?
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I have had plenty burn out. But they have mostly been Philips bulbs, bought at a sale in the supermarket and they have all been in the E14 socket form factor. They have all been in open air so they should have been able to be cooled.
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I replaced my entire house with E14 philips bulbs when I bought it in 2012. All are still going. All of them are encapsulated in closed fittings and none get any air cooling. They are a mix of 70-100w equivalents. They probably aren't as bright as they once were, but man you must have some shitty power to burn those out.
Re: too much debt (Score:2)
Mine are mostly Feit bulbs. They are cheap but unreliable. They typically donâ(TM)t fail completely. Theyâ(TM)ll flicker or run at 25% brightness. I have 11 in my kitchen. 4 are flickering occasionally. Two went low output.
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I have LED bulbs die, usually they start flickering first. Some were cheap, some not.
The issue is that the power supplies fail, usually the capacitors. The cheap ones use both cheap caps and inefficient switching regulators that get quite hot, combined with inefficient LEDs that also get hot, and the caps fail.
Part of the problem is that lighting in the UK is generally done via one or two high power bulbs in a room, meaning you need 800lm+ in the socket. If you have better lighting you can use a bunch of 40
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???
I've never had an LED light burn out, I currently have dozens, and I've used LED bulbs for 5 or more years. Maybe the electricity at your house is "dirty," and incandescent bulbs are more forgiving the LED lights?
"Burn out" probably isn't the correct term. I replaced all of the lights in my house with LEDs about 5 years ago - probably around 75-100 bulbs. I've had 3 or 4 quit working in that time.
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Touché. I would guess that they're being undercut by Chinese bulbs.
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Well, GE makes LED bulbs too.
But yes, incandescent bulbs were intentionally made bad. Back in the early 20th century, they were achieving 2000+ hour bulbs quite easily, but then the entire industry got together and decided that this race to longer and longer life bulbs was bad for business. They basically colluded to ensure 1000 hour bulbs would be standard.
The only advantage they hold is perfect color renditio
Re: too much debt (Score:2)
I have yet to replace it because it's still so damn bright.
Every LED I have ever seen, whether it's in a lightbulb, flashlight, case fan, or backlighting a display, have lost 75% of their brightness within the first year. Where are all of you people getting these magical LEDs that aren't shit?
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Just buy any old product expecting to put it in your bedroom and get some sleep. Murphy's Law guarantes that it will have at least one 2.3 billion candela green or blue LED (determined at random).
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Well I've been using some 100-watt equivalent, 90+ CRI LED flood lamps as desk/worktable lighting for over a year and these things are still as bright as the fucking sun. (They actually measure BRIGHTER than a 100W tungsten with my cheap lux meter, mostly because they shine the light directionally so it's more focused; something to consider as well)
It's worth noting that a 75% reduction in brightness is very difficult for the human eye to register, eyes being nonlinear. This is why lamp service life uses a
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But yes, incandescent bulbs were intentionally made bad. Back in the early 20th century, they were achieving 2000+ hour bulbs quite easily, but then the entire industry got together and decided that this race to longer and longer life bulbs was bad for business. They basically colluded to ensure 1000 hour bulbs would be standard.
Can you provide some references or documentation for that? I'm generally skeptical of stories of shady backroom deals, especially when there's a dynamic market. I find it far more plausible that all the players figured out that cheaper, shorter lifespan bulbs sold better than expensive, long life ones. So, yeah, they might all move that direction but not because of any collusion.
But I'm willing to be proven wrong. Surely there's some documentation of such a deal.
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See here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] as a starter.
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Well, GE makes LED bulbs too.
But yes, incandescent bulbs were intentionally made bad. Back in the early 20th century, they were achieving 2000+ hour bulbs quite easily, but then the entire industry got together and decided that this race to longer and longer life bulbs was bad for business. They basically colluded to ensure 1000 hour bulbs would be standard.
No, that didn't happen ;) Stop with the weird conspiracies.
The bulbs were made more efficient by using narrower and narrower filaments. That meant they burned out faster but used less electricity. You can still buy long lasting incandescent bulbs today, just note you need about twice the watt for the same light output.
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No. The approach was ruined back in the 1930s by WW2.
http://economicstudents.com/2012/09/planned-obsolescence-the-light-bulb-conspiracy/ [economicstudents.com]
Google "Phoebus Cartel" and enlighten yourself. GE was a founding member.
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God damn those evil capitalist investors who put their own money into the business and expected to actually make money on their investment. How dare they?
Repeat after me, "investment is evil".
Ya, I never said or implied that, but should management and investors receive a much (often much, much) larger share than the workers who *actually* build the things the company sells? All three groups are (usually) needed to have a successful enterprise. Perhaps management/investors believe workers are interchangeable, disposable cogs, but finding and training successful workers isn't (necessarily) as easy as snapping a finger, but much of what management does, especially upper management isn't rocket s
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It is entirely possible that there are companies in Capitalist economies that choose to forego an extra penny in profit in trade for better long term health, either by not taking on debt or taking steps to retain a good workforce, There might even be investors who look for that sort of management style and choose it over others.
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...When I used to be an apartment dweller, did I saw GE in the kitchen or laundry I took that as a sign the landlord/owners were cheap ass and probably cutting other corners, too.
Dunno about your experience but we've had GE appliances which work just fine 20 years down the road. Sure, they're not Wolf or Viking but they're not bad either.
Re:too much debt (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe, but the business was set up for failure by Jack Welch. He built something ungovernable and inspired no loyalty among its employees. I don't know if he had an MBA but he certainly acted like he did.
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Re: too much debt (Score:2)
I have a circa 19
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So, you're saying GE is dying because the employees are disloyal? Are you claiming the employees sabotaged the company? That's a pretty serious charge.
Don't know about that, but if a company doesn't care about its employees, why should the employees care about the company or product? Loyalty is a two-way street. Not caring doesn't imply sabotage, just not caring. Things can fail from simple neglect.
Re: too much debt (Score:4, Insightful)
That's the effective policy of most companies here in the west from the 80's to the early 2010's by 'selling off' people instead of investing in them. Doesn't help that there's an entire generation of vulture capitalist and vulture MBA's out there that buy up companies, and crash them into the ground while selling off everything that made them valuable.
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LED bulbs last longer, so sales are down. The old bulbs routinely failed and could be counted upon for steady income. But either way, these aren't growth products and so investors are possibly soured on it, and the "smart" light bulb market doesn't seem to be going anywhere beyond the early adopters. Also GE had a lot of debt and needs a way to get rid of it, which means selling off the stuff it can.
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Hmm, i haven't had one burn out. I have had incandescents burn out quickly and regularly. Maybe you got some early model LED lights.
Re: too much debt (Score:2)
These bulbs were purchased within the last 2-4 years. Not very early.
What does GE still do? (Score:2)
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Major player in aircraft engines and industrial turbo engines.. which is a bad business space to be in right now.
Re:What does GE still do? (Score:4, Insightful)
They make military electronics, which I suspect they'll hold on to because of the ability to soak the taxpayers.
Conglomerate (Score:2)
They build and sell parts for large scale power generators - coal, steam, nuclear, solar and wind. They have a large aerospace division. They have an analytics division they have leveraged into their power and medical divisions. They also have a venture capital arm they are funding by selling off their financial services division.
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Maybe (Score:2)
They also sell replacement engines to the military, which is a huge contract. That alone might be worth keeping the aerospace division.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
"In 2018, General Electric power plants produced one-third of the world's electricity."
GE Ohio (Score:2)
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"They took her job!" - Goobacks
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Wow, good timing for her. Did she move into a new field like switch board operator?
Maybe Buggy-whip designer -- those things probably sell well now on sites like Adam & Eve. :-)
Incandescents Better? (Score:3, Interesting)
1) I have multiple incandescents that have been in their socket for 30 years and they still work.
2) Did you know bulbs can last a looong time [centennialbulb.org]?
3) Did you know they're finding that LED lighting is bad for one's retinas [nih.gov] (blue is used to make white)?
4) Incandescents are made of simple compounds (no semiconductor manufacturing poisons here): metal and glass.
5) Incandescents are easily recycled as compared to anything that's considered e-waste.
6) Why can't the consumer decide which lighting is best for his situation? People who don't need them have 2 computer monitors. Millions of cars SIT in traffic every day. L.A. pumps it water from HUNDREDS of mile away. But I'm not allowed a 100 Watt bulb? Think of the children... (I figured I'd throw that in there.)
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"Am I the only one who can't stand most LED bulbs?"
Yes.
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Am I the only one who can't stand most LED bulbs?
Yes
Literally everything else that you said.........
At least how it comes off. [imgur.com] I mean, I'm by no means any kind of spring chicken here, but gosh. I'll take the hit in being called troll, but I really do hope you have enough introspection to realize how you sound.
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Don't tease him, he's hyper-sensitive to the toxic metals in LEDs.
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Am I the only one who can't stand most LED bulbs?
I have a friend with a lot of them in his house and I find the light they generate a bit harsh or sharp -- vs. CFLs or incandescent. Perhaps it's the brand or type of bulb he's using, but I'm not completely sold on LEDs at this point.
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so the heat is not wasted
Yes it is, look into a heat pump, which uses 1/3 the energy for the same amount of heat. If you are in an area that needs any AC during summer, when it is time to replace that AC switch to a heat pump that can also assist in heating the house in winter.
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[so the heat is not wasted] Yes it is, look into a heat pump, which uses 1/3 the energy for the same amount of heat. If you are in an area that needs any AC during summer, when it is time to replace that AC switch to a heat pump that can also assist in heating the house in winter.
I came here to post that. But then realized that it's technically true that the *heat* isn't being wasted, but the *energy* is.
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Depends on the temperatures outside. Heat pumps turn to resistance heaters below freezing. Sure, some may do better, the point stands that heat pumps become overly complex space heaters when it's cold.
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so the heat is not wasted
Yes it is, look into a heat pump, which uses 1/3 the energy for the same amount of heat. If you are in an area that needs any AC during summer, when it is time to replace that AC switch to a heat pump that can also assist in heating the house in winter.
All ACs are heat pumps that is how they work... They pump heat out of the house. You can use them in reverse as well, but that is only efficient if you have a source of heat somewhere nearby.
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Can you not still buy normal bulbs?
We have LED, I don't hate the light from it, but there is a buzzing with cheap led's and dimmers which I had to sort out.
I don't hate the cost of operating the lights at all.
Everyone should have 2 monitors. Computers shouldn't exist without two monitors.
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I can buy incandescents in New Hampshire; perhaps the law prohibiting them has expired. They don't seem to be selling very well. It looks like most consumers have wised up.
I think LED lamps are displacing fluorescents. LEDs are sturdier, last longer, and are more efficient. The biggest disadvantage is they can't tolerate high temperatures.
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I think LED lamps are displacing fluorescents. LEDs are sturdier, last longer, and are more efficient. The biggest disadvantage is they can't tolerate high temperatures.
I don't think they last longer at all. My experience with the 25+ I have says otherwise. They are definitely more efficient, is is great. I like that you can dim them and they don't turn insanely red. The high temperature thing is a problem. I have a lot of recessed or enclosed lights. LEDs last about 2 years in recessed lights (and this is bulbs made for recessed lights.) I gave up on the enclosed lights and LEDs after seeing failures after a few months. I could replace the figures, but paying an electrici
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interesting story. Please develop.
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I find the light from led bulbs a lot nicer. I have some where you can charge the colour temperature or I select a slightly cooler than incandescent shade for better readability. Cuts down on eye strain I find.
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In the future, no one will use LED because they will be far less efficient than incandescent light.
You must have been out sick when they did that overview of thermodynamics in your high school physics class.
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In the future, no one will use LED because they will be far less efficient than incandescent light.
You must have been out sick when they did that overview of thermodynamics in your high school physics class.
You must not get much news from your mother's basement.
Incandescent light doesn't need to be low efficient, and the sky is the limit on improving incandescent efficiency, and this far beyond LED and other artificial light sources. LED has massive disadvantages beyond the fact that LED has reached the theoretical limit of it's possible efficiency. LED is dead as dead. Incandescent is coming back [mit.edu] in a big way
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No, I don't want to spend 5 minutes in the hardware store aisle choosing a "warmth" or color
WTF are you talking about? You literally don't want to spend 5 minutes ignoring a product you don't want the one time in your life you need to buy the things. What is wrong with you that this is even a complaint about LEDs. Are you under the delusion that you don't also have to spend 5 minutes selecting an incandescent? Back reflector, wattage, size, thread, clear vs cloudy, OMG A CHOICE WHAT WILL I DO! AHHHHH!
As to your numbered points:
1) Congratulation on wasting power for 30 years.
2) Yeah because one bul
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1) Congratulation on wasting power for 30 years.
How much energy does it take to MAKE a complex LED bulb? (I ask as an electronics designer.) You could probably run your car for less than an hour and use as much energy as my bulbs have over the 30 years.
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How much energy does it take to MAKE a complex LED bulb?
The fact that you even need to ask this shows some severe brain dysfunction.
You could probably run your car for less than an hour and use as much energy as my bulbs have over the 30 years.
I love the comparison. Why not compare a light source that wastes the vast majority of its energy content with a mode of transport that wastes the vast majority of its energy content. But sure. If you just buy lightbulbs and don't use them you can probably get away with that statement. If on the other hand you realise driving a car an hour on the highway consumes 50MJ of energy and you realise that your can run your 30x 100w lightbu
Stop buying"bulbs (Score:2)
Stop complaining, and have a look at High-CRI led lights
Also, stop buying"bulbs", those are the absolute wong form factor for LEDs.
The person who had this idea... (Score:2)
So Sad (Score:2)
GE's computer business (Score:4, Informative)
I entered the industry in the era of "IBM and the Seven Dwarfs". I was still working for one of the expiring dwarfs when GE exited. Street talk went "Just because GE knows how to manage producing light bulbs doesn't mean they know how to manage producing computers." We hired one of their former managers. He used to wax longingly about the view of the mountains from his former office.
At the dawn of timesharing, the GE-645 was one of the pioneers of virtual memory, and beloved by techies everywhere. However, its (and all the other vendors') o/s were incompatible with the IBM360, and buyers just weren't interested. It wasn't until IBM TSS/360 that virtual memory penetrated the marketplace. GE's wasn't the only attempt.
Fake. Fake. Fake. (Score:5, Insightful)
"Worth noting: You will still see GE-branded light bulbs on store shelves for the foreseeable future. The lighting transaction includes a long-term licensing agreement that allows Savant to use the storied GE brand."
Just like RCA. We've reached a point where brands don't really matter anymore. They're just a logo that's sold or licensed to third parties to entice consumers to think they're buying something of more value than it really is. This transaction is essentially fraudulent. When you buy a GE washer or dryer, you think you're getting something made by GE, a company with a long history. You're just buying a dryer with GE's logo on it.
Carmakers had done this shit for years. Chrysler was notorious for it, importing Mitsubishi products and slapping a Dodge logo on the front. The whole point of a brand is supposed to be pride and trust: you're buying something from a company you know and whose products you trust. When you simply slap that companies logo on shoddy crap made in Thailand, then that's as fraudulent in its own way as selling fake Gucci bags on some New York street corner.
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We've reached a point where brands don't really matter anymore. They're just a logo that's sold or licensed to third parties to entice consumers to think they're buying something of more value than it really is.
No, RCA is a badge for junk, most people know to stay away. Same with Westinghouse, Zenith, Polaroid, Sylvania electronics, etc. etc. Such a shame, Licensed names in name only should have some sort of logo identifier requirement, like a broken spring or something.
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Re: Fake. Fake. Fake. (Score:3)
If consumers lose trust, the value of a brand name suffers. Then don't lose their trust? This doesn't strike at the core concept of "brands", that's just how they work. Duh.
Unless you're buying artisanal microwaves and lightbulbs, it does not make a gnat's dick of difference who makes a damned thing.
If I invent some new gadget and produce it with contract manufacturing, it is not "Fake".
If I design software and hire a team to develop it, it is not "Fake".
If I publish some software or thing that someone e
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Yech, GE (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm tickled to see TFS make reference to GE's "troubled financial arm." There was a time when that was the best-performing segment of GE's business, to the extent that you could fairly describe GE as a financial services company. Now, I could understand if its manufacturing divisions suffered because it neglected them while it was riding the finance rocket to the moon ... but to screw up financial services, too, takes real talent.
In a related note... (Score:2)
Between Toronto and Hamilton right near the shore of Lake Ontario on the south side of the Queen Elizabeth Way is a very distinctive art-deco building in yellow brick. It used to be in the middle of nowhere, but as Toronto continued to expand in all directions, now its pretty much in the light-industrial spawl.
I recently saw it was fenced off, so I spent time in Google Earth until I spotted it. Sure enough, it was a major GE lighting factory. And so they knocked it down. Luckily they designated the offices
Having screwed people over with CFLs... (Score:2)
They spent a fortune developing and mass-producing CFL bulbs only to see that their lunch money was about to be stolen by LED bulbs so they bought off Congress to get incandescents banned in an effort to recoup their inevitable losses.
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Don't the phosphors dampen out the flicker? Or is that the price you pay for instant-on lamps?