the problem is capitalism necessitates enshittification.
you aren't getting a contender as long as the regulations are abhorrently lax about both the workers and the sellers. along with consumer rights. there just is no economic incentive to improve but rather dig the moat.
(1) Expand network of friends/family. (2) Buy only when you get a recommendation from friends/family. (3) profit? :)
Asking the government to create regulations for product quality just means that the lobbyists who actually write those regulations are going to fuck you over yet again.
I would agree but [1] is likely one of the top 3 biggest exiatential issues facing mankind right now. We live in an age of increasingly weaker connections between people.
So while in paper these 3 items look easy, they're likely not.
I am not a person who would know what the biggest existential issues are, but I have always found it to be helpful to ask for product recommendations in the various group chats that I partake in. It also clamps down on consumerism, and I've found that I just buy less stuff. I am fully up to date on all of the latest tech news and new technologies, but my phone is 6 years old and I don't care.
Some people have this notion of only buying best-in-class products or the latest stuff which they have to rigorously find by going through tons of reviews and looking at various articles and what not. I have (almost) no FOMO, and I don't mind not having the best, it frees up my time to do more important stuff like spend time with my children or watch a movie with my partner.
In a democracy you have to make a case for it. I don't want the government spending tax dollars so they can recommend which sneakers or USB power adapter I can buy. Curation of a marketplace is not an essential service by any stretch of the imagination.
Until your house burn downs or it destroys your phone. Minimum enforced standards are a good thing because the vast majority of consumers are not capable of evaluating the safety and compatibility of devices.
You can't just trust the seller or people you know about a power supply (in this example) being safe.
Amazon does not enforce electrical standards, nor does any store anywhere in the world. Where do you guys come from making these extremist arguments? Just.... wow.
you actually want your electronics to interoperate.
everyone wants to not have to think about things.
really, you disagree with society and it's really impossible to look at modern society and think this happens just by random good nature and not well to poorly coordinated hierarchy.
you already benefit from existing regulations but they're so painless that you've intrinsicalyy assumed they're naturally constructed.
you live in bizzaro world claiming you don't want unleaded gasoline or clean drinking water, seat belts, crumple zones and the rest.
I've had this conversations with well meaning folks before.
The manufacturer of a product is liable for product defects, not the distributor. The seller/distributor is usually liable for accurate descriptions, etc. Caveat - I'm not a lawyer, and this is probably dependent on a bunch of other stuff and contracts, etc.
In any case, the reality is that safety incidents drive improvements in standards and enforcement and policy changes at the governmental level. Historically - car crashes, airplane crashes, water pollution, etc, etc.
Does this mean you need to wait for bad stuff to happen? - Not necessarily, but it does mean that you gotta have a lot more backing beyond "guys, trust me, this is a problem waiting to happen". If you can get enough people to agree with you, then you have some support to propose a change to policy at the governmental level, otherwise this is just venting on an online forum.
The usual followup is "people are barely making ends meet how are they ever going to have time to hit the streets over this" - Well, every change has required sacrifice and it would be nice if this wasn't the case - but that isn't how the world has worked so far.
you aren't getting a contender as long as the regulations are abhorrently lax about both the workers and the sellers. along with consumer rights. there just is no economic incentive to improve but rather dig the moat.