Comment by whorleater | Hacker News Reader

Comment by whorleater | Hacker News Reader

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>2) But it's marketed as complete food replacement, not as a simple nutritional supplement. Though I don't fancy the supplement industry either.

I'm not sure where you got this idea, the Soylent guide they send you when you get your first shipment even tells you that it's not necessary to go 100% Soylent. And, as far as I can tell, the website never says that you should eat only Soylent.

>3) I think it's stupid to consider this time as waste instead of time well spent.

Is the 10 minutes of making breakfast sausages really time well spent every day? That 10 minutes where I'm still somewhat sleepy, somewhat groggy, and pretty grumpy? I'd much rather have a serving of Soylent for breakfast, takes me 30 seconds to pour out a cup and spend an extra 10 minutes running in the morning, reading a newspaper, etc.

>4) Standards for food production are higher, I can touch it, I can see it, I can ask where it's from. Not sure where you have been buying your food. A banana I eat is not the product of a badly regulated industry, where hobbyists create mixtures of their liking.

As for the health of Soylent, you can find every ingredient and amount [1] for every iteration of it. While there's definitely less regulation in this industry, Soylent themselves have done a decent job of publishing the nutrition facts [2] and ingredients, is this that far removed from another traditional food? Can you really verify what pesticides were used in the production of that banana that you're eating?

[1]: https://faq.soylent.com/hc/en-us/articles/211343763-1-6-Form...

[2]: https://faq.soylent.com/hc/en-us/articles/200789315-Nutritio...

I remember when the Soylent-Creator was on the Colbert Report, and he clearly marketed it as a 100% food replacement. Saying that you don't have to replace food with it completely is smart, it opens up additional customers, makes sense. Their Soylent promotional video however makes the claim that 1) it can replace any meal 2) while not having to replace every meal, it certainly insinuates it can (which is way different from other supplements).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPt1W9IAx0I

I also do remember the piece by motherboard on Soylent

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8NCigh54jg

Fair, they were a small operation back then, but even if it might not tell you how they work now, it certainly shows you how low the standards are. Their facilities don't even have to be inspected, ... at all.

So you are too tired to cook, but fit enough to run? And usually I have to get dressed, have to shower, pack up my things, work over my schedule, read some mails, activities where I can have something on the stove at the same time. If something needs 10 minutes to cook I am not staring into the pot for the duration.

The composition of the ingredients does not tell me how they know, where they buy, anything in beyond. I rather see food, touch it, smell it, know where it's from, I don't really bother about whether the fish I just bought has 1 gram fat more or less, that's not the "quality" in food I am looking for.

> 1) it can replace any meal 2) while not having to replace every meal, it certainly insinuates it can..

So...your beef with Soylent is that they insinuate that every meal can be replaced? You're free to enjoy food however you want, but you do realize just because they insinuate it, you don't have to follow that right?

> So you are to tired to cook, but fit enough to run? And usually I have to get dressed, have to shower, back up my things, work over my schedule, activities where I can have something on the stove at the same time. If something needs 10 minutes to cook I am not staring into the pot for the duration.

Not wanting to cook doesn't translate into an inability to cook. I'd much rather not spend the time in the morning if I don't need to, and Soylent allows more freedom in my schedule.

> your beef with Soylent is that they insinuate that every meal can be replaced

Their kick starter didn't insinuate this, it explicitly said you could use it as a 100% meal replacement.

Here's what happens in Soylent threads:

Someone says how great this new thing is, this new total meal replacement

Someone else says that liquid meal replacements are not new

Some people will say that they're not marketed as 100% liquid meal replacements (they are, to medical professionals)

Other people point out the problems of Soylent marketing ("puts everyone in perfect health"!!) and the problems with 100% liquid feeds (the risks are acceptable in ill people, but probably not in well people)

People then say that of course it's not a 100% meal replacement, and no-one would ever use it like that.

Soylent isn't new; the early marketing was amazingly irresponsible; and the early creation was irresponsible. They've pulled back from many of their earlier claims, and most people have stopped saying that it's a 100% meal replacement. So now we're left with a dull product that has no differentiation from all the other products on the market that have existed for many years.

Actually the reason we changed the language was because people thought it was an all or nothing proposition.

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