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xkcd #3186: Truly Universal Outlet
(imgs.xkcd.com)
xkcd #3186: Truly Universal Outlet
Title text:
Building Inspectors HATE This One Weird Trick
Transcript:
Transcript will show once it’s been added to explainxkcd.com
Source: https://xkcd.com/3186/
We can't agree which one is best. When Tom Scott proclaimed his home plug to be the best I scoffed. I thought my own home plug is better. But in reality I think they all suck in their own way, every single one of them.
I think a new more research driven approach like the USB-C design would be better, something that protects your fingers, is easier to locate when behind furniture or in the dark, works in more than a single position, is not going to stab you if you leave it on the floor, does not get stuck in the socket, I think it might even be possible to add a fuse without making it larger than a typical phone charger, but to be honest, the smaller the better. One can only dream.
Randall himself already solved this problem
For up to 480W of fun!
That's generally the thing with decisions that don't matter much. If one option is much better, there is no discussion.
But if the benefits of either option are marginal at best, you get tons of discussion and no decision.
For example, the EU decided almost a decade ago that they would get rid of daylight saving time, and everyone quickly agreed that DST sucks, mostly because changing the clocks sucks.
Since then, the whole EU has been arguing about whether to keep summer time or winter time, even though that matters so little that we have been using both of them for decades. A week after switching DST, nobody even notices the time shift.
That's why at work if a discussion goes on for too long I usually point out that that's the case because all options are almost equally as good and thus we should just pick a random one instead of continuing to waste time discussing in circles.
Now there are fifteen standards...
The UK G type is the only one which is insulated, fused, grounded and polarized by default:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AC_power_plugs_and_sockets#Comparison_of_standard_types
This is great for electrical safety, though it's a very bulky plug.
Why the hell would I want the plugs to be polarized? Brits really stockholmed themselves into thinking that being unable to turn the plug around is a good feature. This is fine and dandy by Brits' standards.
Same country that convinced itself that you should have one hot and one cold tap, and if you want to get proper temperatured water just fill the basin.. instead of just combining them like the rest of the civilized world.
Mixer taps exist in the UK and are widely used.
Quite a lot of plugs are polarized, as you would see if you followed the link in my post. This includes plugs in the USA, Canada, Japan, China, Argentina, Switzerland, Denmark.
Don't know where all that research driven approach led us... USB-A worked perfectly, nobody ever had a problem with it; except having to turn it around a couple times to figure out how to plug it (which could be solved with a coloured dot on plug and cable). USB-C had the advantage of being a little bit smaller, but it sucks in any other aspect. While I might have broken a couple USB-A cables and plugs in my life, I do not expect an USB-C cable to last much longer than one year.
Usb-c has already proven itself to be reliable, it was designed to be reversible, it is easy to insert and remove with good tactile feedback and is compact while having lots of versatility. All traits I would love to see in an universal power plug.
To me USB-A was what schuko is today. It works and is mostly fine but I'm sure we could do better if we put our minds to it. The problem with todays plugs and sockets is they all work just about, enough that no one with any authority is going to bother with the topic. Any improvement needs to be by an unrealistically huge margin to be worth the investment required.