On Thu, 03 Dec 2009 19:03:07 +0000, Harry Bloomfield wrote:

It happens that Jules formulated :
Would it still work today? I mean, I like stuff like that - but lots of
folk these days seem to expect everything to be instant, and any little
thing that takes up their time actually has a negative effect. I'm not
sure they'd comprehend that going home to find they had a dud bulb would
be far worse than the extra couple of seconds it would take to check it in
the shop...

No - in those days they were packed in an open ended corrugated pack,
with the contacts exposed. The modern box would mean your opening it to
test it and re-packing it.

I didn't think the boxes were sealed - maybe they are. I'd forgotten about
those corrugated sleeves, though!

Besides which they are so very cheap in
comparison these days and so rare to find a dud. Who cares if one in a
pack of ten happens to be a dud?

Yeah, there is that. But I was also thinking more generally, and whether
most people would find someone wanting to test an item before handing it
over a good thing or not. I suspect it'd just **** a lot of people off :-(