this post was submitted on 27 Aug 2023
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Technology
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Sheesh, they're still not admitting fault for that. Why on Earth would a company send its only prototype to them as a "we don't need it back" item?
It's not that unusual. I work in the medical device industry and we need to do quite some testing with early prototypes for all sorts of stuff like biocompatibility, cytotoxicity, hemocompatibility as well as pressure tests, drop tests, leakage testing and whatnot. Each and every one of those prototypes is hand made and therefore the "only one".
Even if they pass one test with flying colors and no visible damages, we couldn't use them in another test because they need to be factory new to satisfy regulatory protocols.
Normally we don't ask for those back, we are more interested in the ones that failed a particular test.
Now we wouldn't want our prototypes to be auctioned off, naturally, so the test centers we work with have to ensure they'll be destroyed (we have contracts and NDAs in place). But not wanting a prototype back after a third party played around with it is way more common than you think.
Right, but the cases you’re used to are very different than a small, start up tech company making computer parts.
Indeed, medical devices are often intended to be single-use throw-away items. This was a water cooling block, which is completely reusable. It makes no sense to assume they didn't want it back, and I'm quite sure Billet Labs would have mentioned that they wanted it back.
LTT did something really stupid and they're still claiming "but they didn't tell us not to do something really stupid!" Even though they almost certainly did.
I'm sure they wanted it back, I'm just saying that disposing of prototypes is not as outlandish as it generally sounds.
You're good. You were providing an insight into a scenario most people wouldn't expect. Please keep posting information like that to help build this place up.
Will do, thanks for the encouragement :-)
The snipe in the video is bad form. Selling something borrowed, bullshit reasons why you didn't re-test it. Awful, Yadda Yadda.
A company sending a critical piece of equipment to a YouTube channel is just dumb.
They were done dirty, but if you really truly needed that prototype, you would never send it to the other side of the planet to a known butterfingers.