Worse on Purpose
ledger.worseonpurpose.com
ledger.worseonpurpose.com
Wonder how much money "Worse on Purpose" has been offered so far.
Myself, I am of the "buy the cheapest tool" first and see if I use it... If I use it and it works, great - if it breaks or wears out - or I use it regularly and it is "sub-par", then I will replace with something I do more research on.
Except - the breakdown of that argument, is sometimes the cheap tool wastes your time and it's "poor quality" actually prevents you from developing the skill and experience of performing that task correctly.
An electric drill from Harbor Freight costs as much as breakfast from Dennys.
You going to pass it on to your kids? No. But maybe you don’t need to.
But trading off a former reputation for premium quality whilst hollowing out the brand / actual goods ... is a pretty bright flag of red hue.
Looking through the list, I'm finding that the classifications and narratives for the cases I'm familiar with largely match my own experience, about 50 of the listed brands.
Principle exceptions are Keen and Merrell, both shoemakers. I've watched their products disintegrate before my eyes. Both had had good reputations. Keen, ironically, being my substitute for Teva when that brand went bad in the early aughts.
If anything, the rankings are generous. Though I don't see any marked "Approved" I'd disagree with.
True, simple MBAs often reach the same conclusions.
Then I see how much a zip-up hoodie costs: $168.
I guess I'm not in the mainstream anymore, yikes.
It's been a long time since we've had a sense for how expensive clothing used to cost, and a "good" pair of boots (just as example) would be an enormous sticker shock to most people.
This might be more tolerable if you only owned a single hoodie (why would you need more than one?) and crucially if it lasted for many years.
Esp that example it's kinda triggering me a little, because someone I know can't shut up about it.
From my perspective, what they consider "a good pair of shoes" is what I'd consider a "durable pair of shoes", which is - to them - criteria which makes them good
While that's an acceptable view, it's subjective - not objective. And I wouldn't trade my running shoes for them, even if I have to buy them new every 2-3 years... And consider the running shoes better, because they do provide a more comfortable wearing experience - at the cost of longevity.
I eventually repaired the zipper (and have done the same for the other since). They are high quality and have respectable service. I think they're worth the price. These are probably 7-8 years old now, so things could have changed since then.
I ended up buying another one recently, from RL directly, I think it was around $150. Considering how well it held up to near daily wear for 6 years, it felt worth it. People still asked me if it was new. Other than the zipper falling a bit, there was only some minor wear on the cuff, that only the person wearing it would notice.
I’m assuming there is also some way I can just replace the zipper on my old one, but I didn’t look into it.
Assuming you wear it, and it holds up like my RL one did, the per wear price can actually end up being pretty low, maybe even less than a cheaper alternative that only lasts a season or two.
As to why it exists: when generation of content costs next to nothing, I think that question is harder to pin. The basic answer is "clicks".
The two companies I looked up were accurately described, according to my own experience with them.
In fact, the one industry where enshittification is widely embraced is our own, so I guess maybe it's projection?... Most other goods and services are not deliberately designed to get worse over time. We're the masters of giving people something cool for free and then progressively worsening their experience until they're forced to pay.
Things like appliances don't get worse on purpose. They sometimes get worse as a combination of market pressures and regulations. Take fridges: you can buy a full-sized kitchen fridge for less than $600, that's kinda crazy? And yes, it probably won't last a lifetime, and they won't make it serviceable because it's not worth servicing given today's labor costs - if your bonded-and-certified repairman quotes you $500, you're going to toss it out either way.
> within days of closing a Cornell partner on the new board emailed the CEO to ask, "Is there fraud going on???"
(Italicised part is the link) linking to [1].
When I search that page, I cannot find the word 'fraud' let alone anything like that quote.
It's highly suspicious when a linked claim does not support the claim.
[0]: https://www.worseonpurpose.com/p/your-cookware-got-worse-on-...
[1]: https://fortune.com/2024/11/19/crock-pot-explosion-cornell-c...
Could be a copy/paste error, or could be an LLM trying to cite its own work by just looking at a list of sources used and guessing which one the claim came from.
Keyana Sapp is the writer behind it: https://www.worseonpurpose.com/authors/keyana-sapp
What struck most of all is the deep disconnect between author and authority. The tools one (tools are better than they've even been) stood out as a great example of this. People like to say things got worse, but it read like somebody asked a LLM to show how they got worse, ignoring all the ways in which they got better. A human who'd ever used tools would recognise the omission.
The result of this is high prices and waitlists for many of their products, which is the exact opposite of what private equity and conglomerates want.
Another interesting example from the UK is Howies. They were bought by Timberland, which then in succession got bought by VF, a big US conglomerate. The Howies brand was small and insignificant globally so the management of Howies were allowed to buy the company back and it continues as a niche
Private equity companies exist in a range of sizes, some buying big multinational brands and others buying small local brands. It's a omnivorous predator and it's down to the owners of companies to resist the temptation of money.
I've actually found AI a great resource for finding brands that offer great value for money by buying from obscure factories/brands with the same quality attributes as major brands, but without all the marketing spend and brand margin to subsidize.
I said something like:
"Identify [category]-making cluster regions in Europe (where I am), research the manufacturers/companies you find and see if they have online stores."
Once I had that list and found stuff I liked, I sent what I liked back to the AI and asked it to find me items of comparable build quality from better-known brands."
I did this latest step so that I could have a benchmark and to see if I was actually getting a better deal or if I could just buy from the big brand.
The trick was to specify the exact process I'd like to have run, but wouldn't take the time to do.
I ended up buying stuff directly from an obscure manufacturer's Shopify store for 1/3 the price I would've paid at a big brand. I think this could work in any product category where quality markers are somewhat objective and standardized.
An example that comes to mind is Speed Queen for laundry machines. People in the know now look for *used* Speed Queen machines, but casual searches will still turn up the old reputation.
I should have figured when I noticed my local appliance store starting selling them. That was my plan for when the Samsung garbage that came with my house breaks. What's the quality machine now?
Sounds like the opposite of what buyers want.
The get rich not quick as quick (and perhaps not quite as rich) it make a good quality product with consistent margins as you earn a reputation.
What sucks about brands is the marketing that drowns out the signals from other brands making them impossible to find or discover. Come to think of it, that’s sort of like everything else these days. (The Corruptor in Chief being a skilled practitioner). It’s why ChatAi is so effective over google search. The latter pushes the most discussed or linked or read (whatever the Google ranking algorithm is doing these days to put crap content at the top).
If you want to bring back quality goods and services, end wealth inequality. Tax the rich.
* rich people spending money==great investment into the economy and we need to give them more so they make the economy even better
* poor people spending money==mindless consumption, it's a bad idea to give them money because they are wasting it anyways
Sure, government spending can be wasteful. But it's also generally going into the economy. It's buying stuff from companies who use the revenue to pay their employees and supply chains. It's paying government employees who spend their pay on places to live, food to eat, entertainment, etc. Some folks act like that money disappears. Waste or not, governments aren't generally hoarding cash, they're spending it.
I wonder if this could be achieved by changing the tax code.
Worse on Purpose discussion 4 days ago:
Proto >> Snap-On IMHO. Both in raw quality and in value.
And while Craftsman may have changed significantly even before Sears' demise, there are still some excellent tool lines within the brand.
Not really sure how to solve this particular dilemma. I think Apple brushes up against it with the quality of their products too. I know of people who still use iPhones with a single digit in the model name. I am still on my M1 MBP.
It's possible the company would have failed on its own, but we'll never know, and it wouldn't be because their product was too good. If that were the case then all the recommended alternatives in the Worse on Purpose article would also be out of business. This company looks pretty comparable, and has been making basically one thing very well for 100 years: https://www.allamerican1930.com/pages/about. How often do people need to buy a new high quality pressure canner? They seem to be making it work despite durable products in a relatively niche market.
I don't understand how "their first product was too good, so they had to start making worse ones" isn't "worse on purpose". It seems like a paradigm case of "worse on purpose" to me. What am I missing?
wow
EDIT: wait this guy is non-tech. It actually tracks a lot more now. Not as a knock against non-tech people using AI, just that I would have been very disappointed in Palantir if they had a top AI engineer create something like this after leaving. You would assume they are more judicious about the markers they look for in hiring, but for a more salesy, soft skills role, a product like this makes perfect sense and isn't unimpressive.
Though, to be fair, the author works at Palantir - so probably does have relevant experience with making things worse on purpose!
That isn't reason enough for me to avoid, maybe to watch for things, but not avoid. Wake me when a product is worse on purpose, like the title claims.
And it's just ai slopped text too. This is the reason ThermoWorks is "Approved"
> Independent and honest; manufacturing is English rather than American, which matters for framing but not for stewardship
What does that even mean? That says absolutely nothing.
Same with the reason lodge is approved:
> Family-owned, US-made, priced honestly. The anchor of the entire counter-list.
Says nothing besides the AI wrote everything, and likely claude.