“Designing For The Scrap Heap”
2025
This is a 10,000 word paper exploring the ethical implications of planned obsolescence and consumer expectations regarding smartphones - it takes a comprehensive approach to understanding the impact that both consumers and corporations have on dictating the lifespan of our mobile phones, and therefore dictating their obsolescence. The essay investigates this through a case study comparison between the modus operandi of both Apple and Fairphone, a Dutch smartphone manufacturer who pride themselves on sustainability. Unfortunately, the conclusion is that, regardless of corporate intention being good or bad, the weight of consumer expactation and cultural decadence is too much to overcome in defying the convention of planned obsolescence, requiring a paradigm shift form both consumer and corporation to see sustainable smartphone consumption.
Below you can find a PDF copy, as well as a visual outcome synthesising the research.