You're all missing the point here.
Sure it's a rip-off.
Which is why it is also an opportunity for some enterprising soul. Namely setting up a "Convert your AA 2500mAh battery to a D 2500mAh battery with this handy shell for a simply amazing price of $1.99 a pair". Any Chinese manufacturing shop should be able to turn out 1000's of those blanks for $0.05c a pop. The rest is all moolah for you.
Any takers - and I want 5%.
Then you'd see how fast the price would come down!
If you dance barefoot on the broken glass of undefined behaviour, you've got to expect the occasional cut.
If at first you don't succeed, try writing your phone number on the exam paper.
You just lost IQ points with me on that one. We are talking about an Energizer battery here that has nothing to do with any of that. And just b/c former leaders have been pro-business or pro-this or that does not mean that current leaders with the same viewpoints are exactly the same as the leaders you are referring to. That is faulty logic.That is not a "police state". A "police state" is one in which we round up all the Jews and Communists to serve in forced labour for big business.
Wow the fact that you can take a benign conversation and spin it into a web of deceit and lies with black helicopters hovering overhead is just a bit scary. It's a battery and guess what...you don't have to buy it but you can't stop them from selling it as is if they did not break the law. As Salem points out true Capitalism is self-regulating via market forces. Whenever one company fails or screws up there is always one out there willing to try to make a buck off of it or improve what they have and make a better product.
Last edited by VirtualAce; 08-28-2009 at 04:28 PM.
Well we must not be living in true capitalism then, because there is significant evidence that that is not the way it works for large corporations. They tend not to compete too aggressively with one another. Particularly because the entry barriers to new competition are so high that theres noone to keep them honest.Originally Posted by Bubba
Go try to start a new battery company and see how far you get.
This is unfortunately true. But regulating on the entry-level is going to make things even harder for small companies to get their foot on the door. And that is precisely what we have been witnessing a little all over Europe; regulations that put barriers on the so-called "product quality" (whatever that means) which have been a godsend to the big players since they have been removing the competition from the small companies who can't find the money to upgrade their production.
It's no secret that is legislation the primary reason for loss of business.
Originally Posted by brewbuck:
Reimplementing a large system in another language to get a 25% performance boost is nonsense. It would be cheaper to just get a computer which is 25% faster.
And yet, those laws are currently in place to make sure we don't get half-assed quality products.
So, out of curiousness, do you think these laws are good or bad?
Certainly there are regulations and then there are regulations. I'm not saying business should be entirely unregulated. But that we have been experiencing a surge of highly debatable laws, we have.
When a few years ago wooden spoons were prohibited in all restaurants in Portugal, I wondered. Necessarily this has little to no effect on the industry (except that you no longer have a market for wooden spoons). But the motivation behind such a regulation -- which spewed from the enlightened minds in Europe -- is questionable. Food safety was the reason given. But where is food safety concerned exactly?
And the fact that such regulations are actually made laws and are enforced by an economical police that goes by the name of ASAE (here in Portugal. You may have your own with another name) with powers to close down and even arrest individuals makes me no less comfortable about how far our governments are willing to go.
This is the makings of a police state. We aren't going to get there of course. But there is no question in my mind that our governments are over regulating, even destroying old traditions. Like the Portuguese street chestnut vendors who no longer can sell their chestnuts on newspaper cones after having done so for the past 200 years, or the oldest and most respected sweet factory in Portugal (more than 300 years old) that had to close down because their factory location demanded an impossible investment in order to obey the new laws concerning food safety.
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Going back to the batteries, a regulation that tried to put limits in capacity and resistance of batteries according to their sizes would be such an example of over regulation. Regulations that are completely unnecessary, hamper business and limit the ability of emerging markets (like those of China, India or Brazil) or small businesses to provide their alternative products in the global market. (Curious concept, no? Or did you really think that these regulations are meant to protect you as a consumer?)
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It's obvious that the discussion is turning political. This is really all about whether we want or not an intervening state. You get what's my opinion.
Last edited by Mario F.; 08-29-2009 at 08:19 AM.
Originally Posted by brewbuck:
Reimplementing a large system in another language to get a 25% performance boost is nonsense. It would be cheaper to just get a computer which is 25% faster.
Government cannot even run itself all that well much less a business. How did we get here when we started with the Energizer bunny?
I'm looking at the actual article and the battery clearly states the capacity in mAh on the packaging. To me this sounds like complaining about the horsepower of a particular car and saying that "From the outside, this car looks like it should be a lot more powerful than it actually is. Obviously some kind of crime or fraud has been committed here."
Code://try //{ if (a) do { f( b); } while(1); else do { f(!b); } while(1); //}
Ya know what the beauty of all this is.....you don't have to buy the battery. Guess what you have something called 'choice' which is b/c of capitalism. So instead of throwing a fit and getting lawyers involved in a complete waste of time....just don't buy the stupid batteries. If you really think boycotting Energizer is going to hurt their bottom line then go for it while they laugh all the way to the bank.
They were upfront and honest about the battery, its capacity, and its usages. I see no issue here other than ignorant consumers.
Hehe. That is a very good analogy. I bet I could use that, however, to haggle down the price of the car.To me this sounds like complaining about the horsepower of a particular car and saying that "From the outside, this car looks like it should be a lot more powerful than it actually is.
Last edited by VirtualAce; 08-29-2009 at 11:39 AM.
And that's the driving force being a market. Consumer awareness is important and can be obtained from education or consumer rights organizations (assuming they don't start asking for unnecessary government regulation like some like to do). But in the end the power is really ours when we choose to buy or not a certain product.
Originally Posted by brewbuck:
Reimplementing a large system in another language to get a 25% performance boost is nonsense. It would be cheaper to just get a computer which is 25% faster.
