What the different is the fact that the current Chinese government is much more powerfull in respect to it's people then the US or the typical European country was in the 18th and 19th century.
The US? A nation that still had legalized slavery and where women couldn't vote? Britain? Home of child labor, coal mines, the industrial revolution, and Dickens? France and Germany, nations with the most elaborate bureaucracies known to man, this side of China? I think you have a pretty naive view of 18th and 19th century America and Europe.
I sell them at a national department store, and roughly 80% of them sold come back defective...
I think you are making that up. Even if 100% of them were DOA, you wouldn't get 80% return rates--at those prices, half the people won't even bother driving back to the store.
I am using a Cyberhome player (cheapest I could find) and have been happy with it. It seems to use the same drives everybody else is using and it plays everything I put into it just fine.
Yes, working conditions in China probably can be poor, even hazardous. But if the fashion industry is any indication, many of the more expensive items are made under similarly bad conditions. With electronics, often, the high price and low price items are just minor variations on the same design anyway.
And what is the alternative? Do you think the Chinese that work in those shops are going to be any happier if you don't buy their products and they are out of a job? If they had an alternative, they'd probably take it.
Europe and the US went through periods of horrendous exploitation and abysmal working conditions before workers demanded, and got, improvements. China will probably follow the same path if given a chance.
and give the lunatic fringe of the environmental movement something to protest about, if it isn't really necessary?
That lunatic fringe might point out that the majority of Mars rovers to date have met with some unknown fate--disintegration is quite plausible. Do we really want to risk contaminating portions of Mars with radioactive materials? That might play havoc with future science missions.
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What the different is the fact that the current Chinese government is much more powerfull in respect to it's people then the US or the typical European country was in the 18th and 19th century.
The US? A nation that still had legalized slavery and where women couldn't vote? Britain? Home of child labor, coal mines, the industrial revolution, and Dickens? France and Germany, nations with the most elaborate bureaucracies known to man, this side of China? I think you have a pretty naive view of 18th and 19th century America and Europe.
I sell them at a national department store, and roughly 80% of them sold come back defective... I think you are making that up. Even if 100% of them were DOA, you wouldn't get 80% return rates--at those prices, half the people won't even bother driving back to the store. I am using a Cyberhome player (cheapest I could find) and have been happy with it. It seems to use the same drives everybody else is using and it plays everything I put into it just fine.
Yes, working conditions in China probably can be poor, even hazardous. But if the fashion industry is any indication, many of the more expensive items are made under similarly bad conditions. With electronics, often, the high price and low price items are just minor variations on the same design anyway.
And what is the alternative? Do you think the Chinese that work in those shops are going to be any happier if you don't buy their products and they are out of a job? If they had an alternative, they'd probably take it.
Europe and the US went through periods of horrendous exploitation and abysmal working conditions before workers demanded, and got, improvements. China will probably follow the same path if given a chance.
and give the lunatic fringe of the environmental movement something to protest about, if it isn't really necessary?
That lunatic fringe might point out that the majority of Mars rovers to date have met with some unknown fate--disintegration is quite plausible. Do we really want to risk contaminating portions of Mars with radioactive materials? That might play havoc with future science missions.