If you put numbers on a package, the consumer will choose the bigger numbers. Taking some statistic out of context like "the typical consumer does not take reasonable account of product longevity" doesn't make sense when the only two things a lightbulb can do better are 'be brighter' and 'last longer', and both are prominently displayed on the package. The typical consumer does not pick coffee makers based on longevity because the coffee makers don't put longevity on the package, they put the number of feature buttons, and then the consumer chooses based on that instead of inferring or researching a longevity, and the actual takeaway is that consumers are bad at inference. And on this you call the article's extensive description of how lightbulbs work and how lifespan trades off with efficacy 'complete and utter nonsense'?

The video game system analysis is junk too. No, Sony and Microsoft are not in a cartel, you can tell by how they're in vicious competition with each other and Sony's winning. Assuming similar moves made at similar times is obvious proof of collusion is assuming that one party's move was just picked out of a hat, rather than market incentives prompting this move and applying equally to both companies causing both to come to the same conclusions for the same reasons. The actual reason the level of subsidization dropped, which you can find by googling for five seconds, is because they switched from bespoke hardware stacks to standard PC components, which were cheaper. No, you do not make the stupid financial move of making your hardware stack even more expensive just because your competitor made theirs more efficient.

The level of subsidization has nothing to do with hardware customization. You can have subsidized retail hardware or customized hardware sold at cost. They both went from high end heavily subsidized hardware to mid-range minimally subsidized hardware at the exact same time. Colluding in this way means they both dramatically increase their profit margins, and obviously does not preclude competition in other aspects.

Though they are also overtly colluding in other areas. For instance console exclusives used to be a major selling point, but they greatly empower studios to the consoles manufacturers detriment. The PS1 and PS2 had around 500 exclusive titles each. By the PS3 we're down to 174, 49 for the PS4 and now we're down to 26 in the PS5 era. Microsoft trends similarly and it was a strategic decision, to the point that they made a big announcement recently about returning to exclusives. As if the idea of having a competitive edge is some novel or revolutionary concept.