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'Plugspreading' is an Abomination (cnet.com)

Posted by msmash on from the somebody-had-to-say-it dept.

Mark Serrels, writing for CNET: A man [on a train], a human man as he lives and breathes, has put his bag, his stupid goddamn bag on the seat. He thinks his bag is more important than your buttcheeks. Than your tired legs. He is undermining your right to rest those legs, to plank those weary buttcheeks on a seat. This train is busy. He is a bad person. He doesn't care. This is a metaphor. In this metaphor the terrible man-person is a tech company. The bag is their terrible plug. A plug that is not content with taking up one slot on your powerboard, but needs two. Not for power, oh no. It just wants the space to... christ, I don't know. Mess with your day? Piss you off? Make your life worse? Stop you from plugging an extra device into your powerboard for no goddamn reason. Jesus wept. I call this phenomenon "plugspreading" and it's an abomination. [...] This is bad behaviour. This is a problem. That second socket was innocent man, it was collateral damage. He did nothing to deserve this. You ruined its life, starved that socket of its purpose, its reason for existing. Plugspreading is everywhere. It's a disease.

27 of 362 comments (clear)

  1. Plug-Spreading? by gerald.edward.butler · · Score: 5, Informative

    I'd really be afraid to Google that without "Safe-Search" turned on. That being said, I agree with your premise. How come if I have a power-strip with 8 sockets I can only ever plug-in 3 damn things? Crap Design! As usual. I don't know where all the "Designers" came from, but, be toasters, coffee-pots, vacuum cleaners, plugs, or software interfaces, they are ALL universally worthlessly incompetent and should be beaten with the "You have failed at your job Stick" until they leave the profession.

    1. Re:Plug-Spreading? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The purpose is to avoid you cramming in too many things without a chance of airflow for cooling. Hot electronics fail. It's also why many electronic devices have cases with curves or "unnecessary" protrusions: So you don't put things on top or right next to them.

    2. Re:Plug-Spreading? by Hognoxious · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The purpose is to avoid you cramming in too many things without a chance of airflow for cooling.

      I'd always wondered why the size of the plug was proportional to the power it draws.

      Oh wait, I haven't. Because it isn't.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    3. Re:Plug-Spreading? by barc0001 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      > How come if I have a power-strip with 8 sockets I can only ever plug-in 3 damn things?

      I have 11 things to plug in for all my living room multimedia... stuff. Most of them have the damn spreading wall-warts, and I have only a single standard pair outlet behind the entertainment unit for it all so it led to an octopus abomination of power bars, until I had salvation and tidiness visit me in the form factor of a 3 foot long shop power strip that I attached to the back of the entertainment unit. At last all is clean, tidy and off the floor. But NONE of that would have been necessary if I could have plugged 11 things into the standard 12 plug powerbar I had. Seriously, people shouldn't need to buy a shop power strip with 4 inches of separation between each outlet to be able to use them all.

    4. Re:Plug-Spreading? by batkiwi · · Score: 5, Interesting

      In Australia, where this article was written, almost every home power outlet is side by side, so he didn't go to ANY trouble to find a power outlet which was side by side.

      Also your standard "buy it at the shops" power board has that same spacing since it's a standard. You have to buy a special hugely spaced power board. Notice this one has only one specially spaced one: https://www.target.com.au/p/us...

      This one has none: https://www.officeworks.com.au...

      This one has actual spacing markers to show you where they will fithttps://www.officeworks.com.au/shop/officeworks/p/hpm-5-outlet-power-surge-protector-hpd1055

    5. Re:Plug-Spreading? by another_twilight · · Score: 5, Informative

      Apple?
      You mean the power supply where you can remove the mains connector to reveal that it connects via a IEC 60320 C7/'figure 8' socket, allowing a short cable to be installed moving the 'wart' to the middle of the length like you want? It's been a while since I checked and may be recalling incorrectly, but I thought that while Apple sold a cable with a moulded connector that fit in the socket and merged with the 'wart', that the socket itself was standard and you could use any suitable cable.

      Frankly, these are some of the best designs I've seen. Most of the bulk is away from the mains connection, so it doesn't interfere with other plugs and you can switch between wall-wart and cable-wart.

    6. Re:Plug-Spreading? by Plus1Entropy · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The reason companies use wall warts is because of certification. If you are going to sell a device that takes AC from the mains directly into itself, whether it converts it to DC internally or not, it has to pass a far higher bar than one that takes in DC directly.

      So instead of trying to pass those regulations, it's much cheaper to simply buy an AC/DC power supply which has already been certified and ship it with the product you design. The alternative is what a lot of laptops have, the power brick style, which is AC to a little box (certified) and then DC to the laptop. The manufacturer designs one supply to certify and sells it with multiple laptop models.

      For example, any device which takes in AC from the mains will have to pass a HiPot test, which is where you apply 2x(device rating) + 1000V DC* between the input terminals and the ground for one minute, during which the device cannot pass any current to ground (i.e., short). So a laptop which would be powered by 120V directly would have to withstand 1240V for one minute.

      *These are Canadian Standards Association numbers, but I know that CE and NEC requirements are similar.

      --
      Only crack the nuts that crack. You don't put the ones that don't crack in the sack.
    7. Re:Plug-Spreading? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Here's the solution: Outlet Extender/Outlet Saver/Power Extension Cable - 10 Pack

      Plug one of these into an outlet or power strip, and then plug the wall wart into the other end.

      I keep one in my backpack, a few in my desk at work, and several spares at home.

  2. What the fuck are you talking about? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Are you on drugs?

    1. Re:What the fuck are you talking about? by Travelsonic · · Score: 5, Insightful

      He is talking about, I think, plugs whose designs are such where if you needed to plug it in to a power strip, you needed to fit it in on one end, or else you're covering up one or more other outlets in the strip (and as a result unable to use said plugs).

      Seriously, why couldn't they design the plug to take up vertical space, and not horizontal space?

      --
      If you believe in privacy, and believe you have "nothing to hide" at the same time, you're a goddammed idiot
    2. Re:What the fuck are you talking about? by war4peace · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Seriously, why couldn't they design the plug to take up vertical space, and not horizontal space?

      They have. And it's equally bad. There's even an animation in TFA depincting that very situation.
      What needs to happen is to have a regular, small footprint plug continued with a wire which goes into the AC/DC converter itself. problem solved. Everyone's happy.

      --
      ...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
  3. I love 2018 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    When you can't tell anymore whether articles like this are satire or not you know why "millenial" has become an insult.

  4. The solution: short extension cords by PhotoJim · · Score: 4, Informative

    https://www.amazon.com/Etekcit... Like these ones, as a simple example.

    These things (or other similar ones by other companies) are a godsend, even if they are somewhat overpriced. I must have 30 or 40 of them in my house.

    You can also get long power bars with as many as ten outlets that are well spaced - enough to permit use of most wall wart-type plugs without needing these cords.

    1. Re:The solution: short extension cords by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 5, Funny

      Goddamnit, Jim - if you engage in topical responses they will post more of this shite.

      Complaints, only, man.

      --
      My God, it's Full of Source!
      OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
  5. Extension Cord? by jellomizer · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Actually the real problem is most homes are not wired for DC power. The plugs in the wall are designed for high powered appliances like Vacuum cleaners, Air Conditioners, Fans, Mixers, and Incandescent light bulbs.
    Most of the devices we plug in today are DC power. So we need a rather large brick to convert the AC current to DC at the correct levels, and safety.

    If homes and offices were wired for DC plugs (Say the High Power USB Standard) then we wouldn't need such bricks, and wouldn't need to carry around these devices that are heaver then the devices we are actually wanting to use. I expect if homes has a Single AC to DC converter then we would probably on the average save a lot of energy as well.

    However in the mean time, either get an Extension cord to give some space for the brick and room for an other plug, or deal with it.

    --
    If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    1. Re:Extension Cord? by Miamicanes · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You'll "never" see "whole-house" 12v (or less) DC converters, because the cost of the thick wire you'd need to supply potentially dozens of amperes to every outlet in the house would cost a small fortune. 48v might be do-able... but at that point, you almost might as well just leave it as 110-240v ac, because either way, you'd need voltage conversion at the device itself.

      Embedding the DC adapters into the outlet itself is somewhat viable (witness the popularity of power outlets with embedded USB power ports). The problem THERE is, every goddamn time we get what appears to be a viable standard, it ends up becoming obsolete within 2-3 years ANYWAY.

      So far, I've personally been through four rounds of outlet-replacement:

      Round 1: put outlets with a pair of built-in 500mA USB ports in 3 places.

      Round 2: replaced the 500mA outlets with new ones that could supply 1A to one port, and 3.1A to the other, and moved the 500mA outlets to 3 new locations.

      Round 3: replaced the3.1+1.0 outlets with new ones capable of Qualcomm Quickcharge, replaced the 500mA outlets with the 3.1+1.0 outlets, and threw away the 500mA outlets because they were only usable with single-gang configurations, and all of the remaining outlets in my house where I wanted to put them were double-gang.

      Round 4: replaced the 3 quickcharge outlets with new ones that had one quickcharge 2.0 outlet that could also supply 3.1A to an iPad, and one USB-C outlet.

      There isn't going to be a Round 5. When the day comes that I get my first device that genuinely needs 12v+ via USB power delivery, I'm screwing a 2-to-6 outlet adapter into the existing outlets, buying a half-dozen 99c power adapters from China, and just leaving an appropriate assortment of them permanently plugged into the lower 3 outlets. I've had it with endlessly replacing power outlets every 1-2 years.

  6. Blocking the outlet? by fahrbot-bot · · Score: 3, Insightful

    OMG! Too bad there's *no* way to solve this problem.

    [ Sigh... (a) Why is this a story and (b) Why is this a story on /. ? ]

    --
    It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
    1. Re:Blocking the outlet? by gerald.edward.butler · · Score: 5, Insightful

      That's not a solution. That's a work-around to design that does not bother to take even the slightest consideration of actual usage. Of course you can fix it. I can take the damn power supplies apart and internally connect longer wires and re-encase the transformers if I wanted to. I don't want to. I want to buy a power connector that takes these things into proper consideration. I shouldn't have to work around it. Somewhere, there was somebody actually "PAID" to "DESIGN" this crap. Don't you think they should be held accountable for their incompetence?

    2. Re:Blocking the outlet? by fahrbot-bot · · Score: 4, Funny

      That's not a solution. That's a work-around to design that does not bother to take even the slightest consideration of actual usage. Of course you can fix it. I can take the damn power supplies apart and internally connect longer wires and re-encase the transformers if I wanted to. I don't want to. I want to buy a power connector that takes these things into proper consideration. I shouldn't have to work around it. Somewhere, there was somebody actually "PAID" to "DESIGN" this crap. Don't you think they should be held accountable for their incompetence?

      Whoa. No more coffee for you today.

      --
      It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
    3. Re:Blocking the outlet? by Trailer+Trash · · Score: 3, Funny

      [ Sigh... (a) Why is this a story and (b) Why is this a story on /. ? ]

      *cough*msmash*cough*

      --
      Do you have ESP?
  7. Re:WTH? by king+neckbeard · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Newly invented term to describe a "wall-wart" to millennials.

    --
    This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
  8. So spread the plugs by HalAtWork · · Score: 3, Informative

    Look up "octopus power strip", these should be everywhere. As for the man, politely ask him to move his bag.

    --
    Twinstiq, game news
  9. Deranged rant is deranged by gweihir · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Seriously. And the thing about the bag? Are you unable to open your mouth and ask? Is it an imposition to you to be asked to communicate with another human being?

    --
    Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
  10. Re:So are autoplaying videos! by DontBeAMoran · · Score: 4, Funny

    I call it "videospreading". Useless auto-playing videos that nobody cares about, wasting bandwidth that could have been used by something worthwhile.

    --
    #DeleteFacebook
  11. Re:WTH? by DontBeAMoran · · Score: 3, Informative

    I think the technical term is "huge ass wall-wart".

    --
    #DeleteFacebook
  12. Is this supposed to be funny? by Rick+Schumann · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Whose Line Is It Anyway is funny; this article is not funny.

  13. It's Economics. by rhadc · · Score: 3, Funny

    The problem comes down to economics. You're buying a device that requires DC power, and the manufacturer is not going to decide the converter; it is going to choose an existing DC converter and supply it with the device. They might put a sticker on it. The socket-friendly option would cost a dollar or two more, which, when included in the Amazon price, just might give the competing device the edge. You and the other buyers didn't research the socket friendliness of the device, and there would be little opportunity for the manufacturer to convey this advantage in the first place.

    What incentive does the manufacturer have to improving products this way? Not enough to add $1 to the price. So there you have it.

    BTW, the article was incoherent. Let me coin the term "blogspreading" to refer to an article that takes up space and makes you spend more time than necessary to figure out what it's talking about.