I have a toaster oven that is 15 years old, and it is still used regularly.  It is, by far, the most reliable electric appliance I have ever had, followed by the rice cooker&#x2F;steamer pot.  Even the slow-cookers have had broken oval-shaped lids that turned out to be practically irreplaceable.<p>You can get replacement lids for a <i>round</i> slow cooker very easily, but those ellipses are all built with slightly different sizes and eccentricities, and you can only get replacement crocks and lids that fit well directly from the original manufacturer, who will either gouge you on the price, or inform you that they recently discontinued that size, and they are no longer available at <i>any</i> price.  As a result, I tried to propose a &quot;no more oval slow cookers&quot; rule, but that was vetoed by the spouse.<p>The greatest obstacle to repairing seems to be the availability of replacement parts that fit.  Most of the time, getting just one critical repair part costs 50% or more of the cost of just replacing the entire thing.  We could make everything more repairable if only we have more accepted standards for COTS parts.<p>It is very much like the difference between the old Apple 30-pin connector and USB connectors.  Those 30-pin things break very often, and are relatively expensive to continually replace.  In contrast, I have never paid extra for a USB charger&#x2F;connector cable, and none of them have yet become non-functional.  So I have quite a few male-type-A to male-micro-B cables, and thanks to the standard, every non-Apple device in my home can share those cables.  The Apple devices are split between 30-pin and Lightning, which are always in short supply.  Again, I tried to propose a &quot;no crappy, expensive, everbreaking, proprietary connectors&quot; rule, but it was vetoed by the spouse.<p>If you want repairability, you&#x27;re going to at least need some standards for dimensions and form factors.  And you&#x27;ll probably also need some sort of patent licensing reform, such that the repair parts for a retail product protected by patents may be manufactured and sold using a standardized license.<p>So at some point, preferably sooner rather than later, we&#x27;re going to need to settle on some standardized monolithic smartphone dimensions, like large: 150x75x12mm, medium: 130x65x12mm, small: 110x55x15mm, and tiny: 90x45x18mm.  It doesn&#x27;t really help me, the consumer, to have 100 slightly different options for phone dimensions when I go looking for a 3rd party protective case, or for shirts with the right pocket size.  And it certainly doesn&#x27;t help when the only differences between two different replacement batteries are 0.2 mm of length, and the contacts shifted 0.1 mm to one side, and then both cost $5 more because of it.