Sony To Begin Plastic Packaging Phase-out Next Year (techxplore.com) 35
Sony will start phasing out plastic packaging for small electronic gadgets such as smartphones, cameras and audio accessories from next year, a company spokeswoman said Tuesday. From a report: From April, plastic packaging will not be used for some new products weighing one kilogram (2.2 pounds) or less. The Japanese conglomerate wants to eliminate the material from all containers for newly designed smaller goods by 2025, the spokeswoman told AFP. "Instead of plastics, we will mainly use paper, and a so-called 'original blend material' made from bamboo, used paper and squeezed sugarcane fibre," she said. Sony eventually wants to eliminate plastic packaging for larger products like televisions, but no specific time frame has been decided yet, she said.
Plastic Packaging (Score:3)
Even disregarding the environmental impact of plastic packaging, using plastic to wrap merchandise sucks. Whoever uses it to hermetically seal goods needs to be taken to a secluded forest and shot.
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A secluded forest precludes having a large audience. This is an event you could sell tickets to. I would propose a sport stadium instead.
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> Whoever uses it to hermetically seal goods needs to be taken to a secluded forest and shot.
I'm not sure I follow? If you seal electronics in a plastic bag with a desiccant pack it will survive everything except being submerged? That includes humidity, being rained on, etc.
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Why not ask the UPS, USPS, FedEx and Amazon delivery drivers why they do the things they do.
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Products have to survive the shipping process. That means things like changing humidity levels and temperatures. And changing humidity and temperature leads to condensation, which isn't really great for many products, especially electronics.
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Because Earth isn't flat and oceans cover most of the planet's surface. That and transporting things over water is well over ten times more energy efficient than the next best option we have that is rail.
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I don't think you understand the whole "second law of thermodynamics" thing.
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There are plastic containers that are snap-sealable to provide all the benefits you describe, but that don't require a satanic sacrifice of fingers to open.
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Seriously. Every damn time I've got to tear, cut, or jackhammer apart that packaging all I can think is: They wanted to sell it to me, but they sure as hell didn't want me to use it!
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The worst of it seems to have fallen out of favour in the UK, probably because with distance selling regulations (i.e. buying stuff online) people have the option to return. Not only that, but the law says they only need to return the product and not the packaging. It's like that because often you can't get into the packaging without destroying it.
So there is an incentive to make packaging easy to use, so returned items come back in it and can be resold.
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The best is when they package special tools to open these types of packages in these types of packages.
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I dunno, I don't see the harm in wrapping the product in a plastic bag. There are various reasons for it including well, protection of the product against something that might destroy the outer package but still leave the insides to be able to be used. Or an outer shrinkwrap that does the same as the sole piece of
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It's not so much the shrink wrap that annoys me. Just work from a corner to get started, and it's not too difficult to deal with. It's those damnable blister packs that piss me the hell off. Never mind being shot. Whoever invented those abominable things needs to be shipped to Fargo, ND and fed into the woodchopper. Only... modify the woodchopper's blades to be red hot so as to cauterize the wounds as he's lowered in. That way it will hurt more.
That's another thing Amazon got oh-so-right. Their "frus
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I'm a little surprised it's taken Sony this long to even start ditching plastic packaging. Many of their competitors use cardboard. The Japanese ones produce indicate origami folded boxes, and the Western ones have figured out how to mould paper like plastic.
I wonder if no plastic means no foam too. For heavy or delicate stuff, replacing styrofoam and the like with paper may be a challenge, but not impossible.
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Dell has managed to replace foam with origami-style cardboard for the vast majority of their products. It works very well for their large flat panel displays.
Which is easier to clean? (Score:2)
Presumably they're doing this for the environmental impact (indirectly -- pushing from consumers because of environmental impact). Same as the plastic bags at the grocery store.
In the case of plastic bags, more energy - and transportation energy - goes into the replacement (paper bags) than the thing being replaced. I assume here, too, there's more energy spent producing the paper, recycled paper, pressed sugarcane, and transporting it (even as part of the product) than the plastic that is being replaced.
I
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And it is a damn good thing they last for thousands of uses. You have to reuse a canvas bag 7100 times before it becomes more environmentally friendly than using single-use plastic bags. And if you go for 'organic' cotton, that number goes up to around 25000 times. Of course, nobody actually reuses a bad that many times.
CD/DVD/Bluray/PS* cases? (Score:2)
How long until they come up with a solution for these plastic cases for the media (which is, itself, plastic)? While reused for years (although sometimes not that long), they're still a decent chunk of plastic.
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People still buy these? Why?
Permanency. Streaming for convenience, physical for permanence.
If the laughably-called "content owner" wants to eradicate all online copies of say, Who Frame Roger Rabbit, they can do that and the average joe on the street can't do a damn thing about it. Bleat bleat bleat, ya, I know the "average slasdot reader" 10 years ago would've able to torrent / rip / whatever, but i'm talking about the regular joe on the street, not the seasoned nerd Cap't Eyepatch.
But they can't eradicate every DVD / BD disc they s
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People still buy these? Why?
In addition to TigerPlish's response, resale. I can resell my copy of Cyberpunk 2077 for PS4 anytime I want (bought it for $10 and, now that most of the bugs are fixed, it's quite fun and playable).
Good Start - Make Packaging Smaller Too (Score:2)
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The reason why things like memory cards, USB sticks and other small tech items come in such large packaging is to make it harder to steal.
Re:Good Start - Make Packaging Smaller Too (Score:5, Insightful)
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It's not just stealing. It's also display, marketing, and the ability to handle something without losing it.