How in the world did we get here? These things used to last for 30 years or more.
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I had a SEARS refrigerator that I bought in 1980. It just died in 2022 and actually the only thing that didn’t work was the icemaker. I bought a new Whirlpool and it has a bunch of digital readouts on it. It makes a lot more noise when it is running and I don’t really like it near as much.
A refrigerator doesn’t need to be connected to the internet. I also recently bought a scale which I have subsequently returned because it wanted access to my wifi and wanted me to upload my health information to their website. What a crock. I just wanted to be able to weight myself.
Planned obsolescence and manufacturers reducing the quality of components to increase their profits are my guess. Some industries like smartphones are notorious for this. Unless you have custom ROM support like on google and oneplus (not sure about their current phones), good luck getting more than a few years of use on your phone, even if it’s perfectly functional.
And as Dan mentioned, analytics are quite valuable. So everything is becoming smart even if it doesn’t need to be (Why do I need a smart toothbrush?).
My current refrigerator cycles between 30°F and 43°F about twice a day. “Nothing wrong with it,” says the repairman after monkey-pushing some buttons on it, “it’s just what it does”.
I’ll keep my 19 YO 500$ Roper side by side until it must be replaced.
HVAC industry has gone from a designed life span of 30 years to 15 in about the past 15 years. Most will cite the technology advances as for that design standard. On air cooled equipment, condenser coils are typically the issue with life expectancy, it is even worse now since the adoption of micro channel condenser coils. While on paper they are superior to the traditional tube & fin, once you get them dirty, they go to hell in a hand basket.
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I hate micro channel. Give me something I can braze back together if it leaks, and clean over replace any day.
The other problem is the control electronics aren’t rated for anything timewise. As we get smaller people are paying close attention to electron migration etc and they’re only planning for 5 to 10 years because that’s just how long electronics last. Good luck with a FET/IGBT/SSR/Triac making it 30 years, and when it doesn’t make it have fun salvaging the rest of the control circuitry after it fails short.
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Some recent articles from slashdot. -
Thermal management is where a lot of manufacturers cut corners. Why not put that electrolytic cap next to that heat generating part. After all - all it has to do is make through the short warranty period right? Subscriber srvc idea - That’ll be $10 /mnth to activate that extra fan that will keep things cool enough to make it through the extended warranty period you paid extra for.
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Ours is 29 years old…i fear the day when we have to replace it 
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Got 15 years so far out of a unit I bought off-the-cuff that is probably nearing end of life. Kind of wish they still made the old semi-standard top freezer design with inbuilt icemaker but that formfactor has largely been relegated to the absolute cheapest barebones models out there - usually minuscule “apartment” sized.