I'm guessing you didn't grow up in the age of landlines with corded handsets. They got used all to hell back when they were THE way of contacting people remotely. Kitchen phones in any home with a mother got used a lot, with the cables being dragged all over the room and sometimes into the next.

2. No. I have had several of these cables. All of them fell apart. I used electrical tape to hold them for a while but the problem kept spreading down the cable. The material they used is the problem.

Not necessarily.

I remember this very good charging cable from a premium phone I bought way back when. Truly felt premium in the hands with a matte finish and soft to the touch.

Lo and behold, after 6 months of regular use the cable started staining, and cleaning only made worse. Then after a year it frayed. 6 more months and I'm sure it would have looked like the one in the picture.

Moral of the story: there are good and bad products in all price categories and no, not every single product design is foolproof. No matter how universal and genericized the category it's in is, as innovation sometimes also breaks stuff.

Bad stuff's also on the market.

Only cheap cables end up this way, other you can easy reforce or fix with these and a lighter forever. Sets of these in every DIY shop/mall for a few bucks.