It wasn’t easy being a lightbulb maker in the early 20th century. Today, with many countries phasing out incandescent lighting in favor of more-efficient and pricier LEDs, it’s worth revisiting this history-not simply as a quirky anecdote from the annals of technology but as a cautionary tale about the strange and unexpected pitfalls that can arise when a new technology vanquishes an old one. In carefully crafting a lightbulb with a relatively short life span, the cartel thus hatched the industrial strategy now known as planned obsolescence. Indeed, all evidence points to the cartel’s being motivated by profits and increased sales, not by what was best for the consumer. Cartel members rationalized this approach as a trade-off: Their lightbulbs were of a higher quality, more efficient, and brighter burning than other bulbs. By early 1925, this became codified at 1,000 hours for a pear-shaped household bulb, a marked reduction from the 1,500 to 2,000 hours that had previously been common. Its far more enduring legacy was to engineer a shorter life span for the incandescent lightbulb. The cartel’s grip on the lightbulb market lasted only into the 1930s. General Electric Sociedad Anonyma ( Brazil) company General electric was itself not a member but was represented through its overseas subsidiaries. Circling the Globe The Phoebus cartel enjoyed a truly global reach.
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