Shaving is an example of how consumer products extract more money
johnwhiles.com
johnwhiles.com
Convenient consumer products tend to sell better than less convenient ones, even if the product is worse. That's the entire story. People have finite time, so when they receive more income they will tend to spend it to reduce the time they spend doing things that they don't care about.
I for one hate spending time doing all the things that the products in the article make more convenient, and happily pay more so I can spend my time on other things.
* I don't like shaving, so I optimize for razors that get the job done faster (more blades, easier to swap a new blade)
* I don't like cleaning pans, so I buy pans I can clean faster and don't have to "season"
* I don't like filling bags with tea, so I buy tea bags that are pre-filled
* (nespresso) I actually enjoy the ritual of making espresso, so I use a real espresso machine
* I bike every day to and from work, so I take it a step further and buy an E-bike with no shifter
* I don't want to fiddle with chromecast or fire stick, so I just use my TV's built in smart features
* (inner city shops don't sell individual pieces of fruit) I live in SF, it's very easy to find individual fruits here
* I don't like going to grocery stores, so I pay to have groceries delivered to me
No lol that's the whole point
> without the carcinogens.
I'll take that trade, I'm not going to spend my 30s sitting around waiting for pans to heat up because there's some very small probability a pan will harm me.
"The raw material in Ultra Light Original is exactly the same as for our traditional cast iron. The difference is that with the new technique, the pans are less porous. This explains why the pans responds much quicker to changes in the stove’s power effect, and why they heat up and cool down faster than traditional cast iron cookware."
https://ronnebybruk.us/blogs/cookware/ultralight-original
It isn't near-feather-light like some pans I've picked up in the store for sure. It's just light enough to be a noticeable difference from other cast iron pans I've tried, like being much more comfortable to hold one-handed.
De Buyers are more expensive than your regular cast iron, but they’ll last a lifetime.
Cast iron pans are actually not great at heat transfer, which is why you see pans like all clad where there's aluminum or copper clad in steel. They are really good at holding heat though, so when you put something cool into them they don't immediately get cold.
Most people really don't care about this though. If you're a foodie, you're probably not going to be satisfied with the $5 wal mart nonstick pan, because it's a thing you care about. For everyone else who doesn't care, they either have a completely different definition of what 'good performance' is (and buy accordingly) or they don't cook anyway.
Mise en place helps immensely!
I just want to eat and I want to get that out of the way as quickly as possible. For a nice meal, I'll go to a restaurant. I'm not interested in learning how to prepare my own food better, and all of these comments and the OP seems to forget that.
In any high-dimensional space, most samples are far from the median on at least one axis. You have cooking, I have coffee, programming, and looking at birds.
My cast iron usage most days isn't anything fancy, it's just cooking breakfast for the family. The "other cooking related tasks" means:
* Crack the eggs into the bowl
* Season and beat them
* Start the oatmeal water boiling
* Set the table
By then the cast iron is ready for the eggs. You don't have to be making a fancy meal to have other things you can be doing while the pan heats up, and it doesn't take that long even on our slow glasstop stove.
> You have cooking, I have coffee, programming, and looking at birds.
I used to be like this, eat as quickly as I could and whatever was quick enough that filled the hole in my stomach. You will likely pay for this later, and will have discussions with your dr about food freshness, processed foods and how horrible the food at even “heath food” restaurants is for you. Unless you want to live your life with gastrointestinal issues, change your attitude about cooking.
I use cast iron pan because everything I cook comes out 10 times better on a cast iron pan. You can properly sear meat on them. Things don't get cooked on the outside and stay raw on the inside.
I thought I was shit at cooking before getting a cast iron pan - I just had the wrong tools. I'm definitely not a chef and I don't cook for pleasure, I just throw chicken, steaks, eggs on the pan and eat when it's safe to do so.
Most chefs on youtube are using cast iron pans, you won't get the same results following instructions made for another pan.
In regards to heating up, I never noticed the pan taking too long to heat up.
Maintenance takes more time, but it's nothing more than rubbing oil on it and throwing it in the oven. You can also get away with not doing it for a long time (you can wait until food starts sticking to it)
Pots yes. Pans not so sure.
This strikes me as particularly ironic in the current context. How much time have you spent so far today arguing about pans on HN? How many times could you have heated up a cast iron skillet during that time?
Aluminum has much better thermal conductivity, but is a terrible surface to cook on (soft, oxidizes, imparts flavors to acidic foods). The best compromise is a clad pan with aluminum sandwitched between layers of stainless. I switched from cooking on cast iron to cooking on clad and it makes a huge difference.
This guy took a bunch of IR camera shots demonstrating the effect: https://www.centurylife.org/is-all-clad-worth-it-is-it-still...
> it's a nonstick pan without the carcinogens.
Strictly speaking, this is false. The seasoning on a cast iron pan is burnt oil. It is without question mildly carcinogenic. Not so much that I've thrown away my cast iron - I still use it occasionally - but I wouldn't tout it as having health benefits (except maybe a tiny increase in iron consumption).
FWIW the newer ceramic nonstick pans are incredible and nearly indestructible. Clad is still my go-to, but I use the henckles granitium pans from costco for anything with egg in it. Two years later they still work like new.
Woks are great, but you wouldn't pan-fry a steak in a wok.
If you're talking about pure stainless pans, I've never seen one. I've seen pure stainless steel stock pots (though even then, most have a clad base). The thing about stock pots is that they're full of liquid, which convects and makes thermal conductivity of the hardware pretty much irrelevant. Never buy expensive stock pots.
Isn’t it completely opposite? Teflon is incredibly inert and nobody knows what really happens in cast seasoning other than - it’s burned food!?
I choose to focus my time and energy minimizing environmental impact more effectively. For example, instead of using a DE razor, I use that time to commute by bike instead of car, This results in overall much less waste and a lifestyle that I prefer.
Can you please explain to me how a landfill doesn't cause environmental harm?
It's no different than the sand that's already below ground. It essentially just sits there.
The production and transportation of the cartridge could harm the environment though, but that's a more complicated story.
Likewise they capture or flare the methane.
* Overly frequent shaving. If I shave every day, I will get nicks and ingrown hairs, regardless of technique. After I shave, the skin slightly closes up around the follicle. Not enough to be fully ingrown, but enough that there's a bump of skin from about 12 hours post-shave to 72 hours post-shave. If I shave again during that time period, the razor will catch on those bumps and cause nicks. If I wait 3-4 days, the hair pushes out, and can be cut cleanly.
* Clogged razors. This is partly due to the coarse hair, and partly needing to remove 3-4 days of growth at a time. The blades of a cartridge razor are placed far too close to each other, and need to be rinsed out several times over the course of a shave. Sometimes multiple times over a single stroke. If this isn't noticed, I need to go over the same area again, increasing razor burn. While safety razors clog as well, it takes longer for them to do so, and it is easier to rinse out the accumulated hair.
* Over-use of cartridge razors. An 8-pack of cartridge razors is $25, where a 100-pack of safety razor blades is $10. I get about 2-3 smooth shaves from each razor, and it's an easy habit to replace a ten-cent blade every week or so. Even if I accept that cartridge's last longer, I can't believe that they would last the 35 shaves estimated by the marketing's 5-week estimation. Between the higher cost and the claimed lifetime, I would use cartridge razors well past the point of being dull.
So at this point, I have a reasonable routine: Replacing the blade of a safety razor every 7-10 days, shave every 3-4 days. But figuring out that routine requires going against the advertising, choosing an older style of razor, and avoiding the cultural expectation of daily shaving.
Some people do, and they’re welcome to spend their own time, energy, and money pursuing that feeling.
I would add accumulation of crap between the blades being the rest of the story.
A small blast of air gets that crap out and leaves the shavings path clear for next time.
Uh, that's not how loose leaf tea is used...
Usually one would use a strainer or a gaiwan. Your point still stands, tea bags are less hassle, you just won't get to drink fine oolong or puerh. I don't mind cleaning the gaiwan - taking out the leaves takes a couple seconds.
After steeping, you need to dump the used leaves (assuming you aren't planning to re-steep) with more potential for spillage than when disposing a tea bag, then take the strainer to the sink, add a tiny drop of dish soap, rinse the strainer, and find a place to dry it (e.g. over an empty jar).
It's not difficult, and the extra steps are personally worth it as loose leaf tea generally tastes better. However, for people who aren't concerned about the taste difference, it's nice to have one less task (where spillage is a concern) to pay attention to.
> You need to take a spoon (extra tool), scoop out the loose leaf tea from the container
I tilt the container and use the Earth's gravity to get them leaves out. I'm not afraid to use my fingers when no one's watching! With puerh it's more of a fight, I'm not afraid to use whatever's at my disposal to pry the leaves out the cake.
> you need to dump the used leaves [...] with more potential for spillage than when disposing a tea bag
Yes but it's more ecological - the leaves can be composted while the tea bag can't.
> (assuming you aren't planning to re-steep)
I definitely am planning to re-steep. With puerh, I'm even going as far as disposing of the first two steeps. I'm too fancy to drink them!
> then take the strainer to the sink, add a tiny drop of dish soap, rinse the strainer, and find a place to dry it
The gaiwan goes inside the dishwasher like everything else.
That depends on the tea bag. Some can't, some can:
https://teahow.com/can-tea-bags-be-composted/
The store-brand tea bags I buy for iced tea recently got redesigned to remove their staple. I assume that was to make them compostable, although I should double check.
Filling a paper tea filter is pretty easy though, just grab one, and shovel in a bit of leaves with a spoon. It's faster to fill a tea bag than it is to boil water for a cup.
I prefer tea bags because it's still easier to clean up, even though taking a dripping wet bag out of the cup is a messier process and is trash. A gaiwan or even teapot is rarely compatible with my normal in-the-moment tea drinking style. I aspire for it to be some day.
Using a gaiwan is just so joyful: stuff it with leaves, keep an eye on the temperature and steeping time, and you can resteep good leaves many times and get so much more out of them. Each of the steeps is different, you can see how the leaves open, how the taste develops. I have some Chinese greens that go on forever, start with around 75°C and 10 seconds, and gradually increase both over perhaps twenty steeps, ending with boiling water and brewing for however long I forget about it. Thinking about it, I'm off to make some tea :)
Not to be snarky, but considering you're leaving comments here then I doubt it
So you see loneliness makes us waste this part of our time probably in an futile attempt to deal with loneliness, forge a connection, having some kind of reassurance that we have a voice and maybe we matter even though we so don’t.
So this comment isn’t waste of OP’s time if OP likes to do this or wants to do this and gets gratification from it (even if doesn’t last beyond hitting the submit button). OP even mentioned that coffee thing in the similar vein.
So I think you were being snarky. Maybe inadvertently? Or just another knee-jerk comment like most of HN? :)
People would look strange on me if i started shaving while commuting on the train. Here i have ample of time to read.
One could also simply prefer watch junk on the telly to wind down after a long day of work, rather than seasoning my pan again. (Personally, i do have a seasoned skillet, it's a amazing)
Take this thinking too far and one should even give up washing machines and go back to hand laundry?
However, there were times I had to skip coffee making to start a commute on time. The tipping point was when I was slightly late for a couple of low-stakes meetings because shaving with a safety razor took so long (lather, three passes, rinse), so I had to take an alternative commuting route after missing a train. There were other times when I chose to skip shaving and buy coffee outside to make a meeting on time (taking extra time to walk to the coffee shop, line up, and buy coffee).
I remembered never having these issues of having to skip shaving when using an electric razor. I've now returned to using one for most days, and also usually use a brew machine. It's nicer to have less stress in the morning.
You could say that I could manage my time better in the morning by waking up an extra half hour earlier, but I've found it very nice to make my life a bit easier while other parts of my days are more stressful.
Saving time from shaving doesn’t necessarily mean the saved time will be used in something like saving the world. It just means less time was spent on shaving than it would have taken if OP did shaving your so called “hard” way.
Also your 20m shaved annually seems very weird. There are approximately 365 days in a year and one “easy” way shave, imho, definitely saves more than approx 0.055m compared to a hard way shave if one shaves daily without a miss :-P
What this article isn't telling you is that DE razors can be almost as fast, but there's a learning curve. They don't flex, bend, or rotate to the right angle, so you must hold them at the right angle, even when you're going around curves. There's just one blade, so it's easy to apply too much pressure and give yourself razor burn, so you must learn to use minimal pressure. It takes time to learn these skills.
Is learning how to shave with a DE correctly and quickly worth saving money? If money is no concern for you, then no. However, there are other benefits. One pass of a five bladed razor is, you guessed it, five blades being dragged across your face, and likely with more pressure than is necessary given how much pressure is required just to make the flexing, rotating razor engage with your face. If skin irritation, ingrown hairs, etc. are a problem for you, then learning how to properly shave with a DE razor can dramatically reduce those problems. However, things may be worse at first while you're learning technique. This is all even more true if you're the sort who suffers from irritation and reuses cartridges too long to save a little money. Dull blades make skin irritation worse.
Another thing this article isn't mentioning is shaving soap. Most of us are used to chemical gel's or foams. To be blunt, they all smell awful and feel gross. Again, it takes slightly more time and a little technique must be learned, but traditional shave soap with a badger hair brush, lathered on the face, is something everyone should at least try. There are some awesome smelling soaps out there, and lathering on your face with a good badger brush feels amazing. If you hate shaving, this is a switch that might change your mind.
If you hate something, you can spend less time on it, or you can look for ways to make it more enjoyable.
Much better than these and shaving soap / brush, is Somerset's Shaving Oil[1]. King of Shaves do a shaving oil too, but it's nowhere near as good. Not affiliated, I just love the stuff.
You can use it with shaving soap too, but I just use it on its own.
At one point I was worried the company might go under so I bought a big box of it just in case. It's not a great business model as one little bottle lasts months. You only use 3 drops per shave.
[1] https://www.somersets.com/(X(1)S(hrhdq4w0o12w1qjoh0myxyml))/...
ALSO: That order page is a breath of fresh air. As soon as I added one item to my "cart", I was presented with their full list of SKUs, enough info to know which is which, and a quantity box next to each. So simple. I wish more ecommerce sites did stuff like this.
The blades seem to be immortal, and they commonly last 5-10 years until the batteries fail. There are no regular consumables; the blades are never replaced.
I had used Norelco foil razors previous to this, and the foils would break after wear and slash my face, easily drawing blood. Neither of my Panasonic razors has ever done this.
I normally shave right after waking up, no shaving cream, lotion or sundry lubricant. If someone with extremely sensitive skin cannot do this, the shaver is waterproof.
This one looks close to my current model.
https://www.amazon.com/Panasonic-Electric-ES8103S-Nanotech-F...
I shave thrice a week (head and face) and the Proraso brand has been a lifesaver.
Have never managed to learn to use the DE razors :/
If your body is falling apart without constant cosmetics, you probably have an issue that needs addressing. Maybe something in your diet or something in your soap or I don't know what, but spontaneous skin issues are not normal at all.
Your skin naturally flakes as it replenishes itself (I think it's called the skin cycle), it was getting caught in my beard, I'm lazy I can't be bothered with that. Plus when it gets long you have to cut it straight, right pain in the arse. A lot less hassle shaving.
I rarely use anything. And to be frank, when I do it is a small drop of hair conditioner.
I mean, no one is telling you to stop, but I wouldn’t chalk up your recommendations to anything more just preferences.
It’s just another hobby. Some people love scotch, others coffee and some people getting the best shave experience.
If I loved scotch and someone said “yuck, I don’t like it” I wouldn’t somehow assume they were living their life incorrectly or missing out, they just don’t like it.
That’s the obvious market story but not even the entire story in the post. The lack of available alternatives is a real thing.
Several of the examples in the article feel like real losses to me. Another example: last I looked, I can’t even buy a mouse with the form factor and features I want unless I give up and charge batteries. The thing I want to buy existed under many model names over the last 20 years, apparently now I need to start looking second hand. This is true for lots of wired devices, it’s almost impossible to find many of them or a spiritual successor now. I don’t want all of my secondary devices to be battery powered. I’m clearly a minority in the market, or at least untargeted as one.
I don’t begrudge anyone their preferences or conveniences, but I definitely miss some of the things I used to be able to find which are now just relics.
I do not always like wires, but wireless is kind of a mess. Pairing, charging, quality of info transfer problems...
So, I bought a bunch of wired, high quality earbuds, am going to to get some mice too. Those things just work and the quality/consistency of input / output is something I value way more than not having a wire.
On the other extreme, (and due to my personal interest in practicing knife sharpening), I ended up using a pocket knife and a couple quality sharpening stones as my “razor”. Too lazy to calculate whether the long term cost is worth it, but the setup will probably last me a lifetime. If avoiding waste is really the highest priority (over convenience) then I would argue that sharpening your own razor blade is the only rational way to shave.
Razors like G. Mach3 or similar are neither really much faster nor better in any way (I compare them against my $25 "classical" metal razor "Timor Solingen 1322"). The fact that so many people think otherwise is a proof that marketing departments of G. or Edgewell (Wilkinson) did a very good job.
If you are to compare stuff, stuff like modern razor cartridges and double-edged razors, you ought to mention the convenience side of the things. I hate being the devil's advocate, but shaving with 4-blade cartridge designed for easy shaving is still 'miles' ahead compared to shaving with double-edged razor. Miiiles ahead. And I use a double-edged razor 9 out of 10 times, so I would know a thing or two about it.
And that's not to say that are overly pricey. They are. Plus, if you account for different prices in different regions, the price difference is even more concerning.
The same is also true for some other appliances/services mentioned - tea bags and coffee machines are not just 'superficially convenient' they are wildly more convenient.
EDIT: As one person said in the comments down below, "What this article completely misses, is that there are more than two options.". That was my whole point, and I'm sorry if it came out the wrong way. Shaving is a personal preference, and you are free to do it however you like; but saying 'Shaving is too expensive and is a demonstrative example of how most consumer products are designed to extract more money from you rather than to improve your life, or the world, or to be in any way remotely good.' is just incorrect and insane.
For me shaving with DE razor is miles ahead in comfort over cartridge
I have sensitive skin and a fresh DE blade cuts better with just water than a cartridge razor because it's sharper.
But before I got a DE razor, as an outsider, I also assumed you needed to take shaving seriously and be an accessories guy to use one, and thankfully it's just not true.
Yes, and, as I probably haven't said, I've been doin' it for 'years', and I do have a favorite soap/razor brand/razor handle... you name it... And I rarely ever (1/10 prob) get cuts, and the end result _is_ better, purely quality wise (double-edged razor is just sharper and can access spots, like under your nose, that 4-blade razor, let's say it's 4-blade, just can not).
My point is that after a while, you realize that you can get 80/90% of the quality with less than 20% of time invested. (Un)fortunately enough, the calculation is not that simple. You need to include the money factor, the frequency of shaving factor, the energy/focus factor (you can't just shave using a double-edged razor at 6am with your eyes still half way closed, and also expect no to cut yourself; you just can't, no matter how experienced you are - it is still 'razor' sharp :), with next to no safeguards, depending on your razor handle)... And I get that in many cases, the money factor is more (or the most) important, but you still can't just ignore all other factors.
That said, I strongly believe that modern 4-blade cartridges can/should be less expensive.
Also, I have next to no experience with electric razors, so take that into consideration. (Also, if anyone knows some electric razor model/brand that is well worth the money, I will really appreciate the suggestion)
https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-electric-raz...
This is what I fretted over to no end before I actually tried shaving with a double-edged razor.
Turns out I needn't have worried, as shaving with a double-edged razor turned out to be exactly the same as shaving with a cartridge razor.
No special techniques needed.
"Look at the reddit groups with everyone having some favorite brush or soap lather."
All that stuff is completely unnecessary.
I just lather up some ordinary soap with my hands and smear it on my face before shaving with my double-edged razor and it works great. No need for any fancy equipment, creams, brushes, pre/after-shave, etc.
Better yet, don’t look. Just because dweebs want to spend their time fluffing their feathers in front of other shaving dweebs doesn’t mean that any of that is required. (And if shaving accessories is your schtick, go with my blessing as I tend to my own dweebery.)
And the first few times I shaved with a DE safety razor, it went fine. It’s a safety razor, not a straight razor, what are people expecting to happen?
This is interesting too, because it worked for me on the first / second try. Didn't have any learning curve at all. And I didn't use any fancy foam or anything. Just a regular cheap ~$2 foam / gel from the supermarket
However, the real trick is to get the eos brand sensitive shaving cream with shea butter and colloidal oatmeal. It might be marketed for ladies, but it's way better than anything you could waste your life whipping up with a brush.
I simply apply ordinary soap to my face with my hands when I shave with my double-edged razor.
It works just fine.
Soap is, indeed, “good enough”. But for a minimal investment you can buy the shaving soap cakes, cup, and a shaving brush. Way cheaper than the stuff in a can, a little more luxurious than hand soap.
For 4-5 months of the year (summer) I shave my head 2x or 3x a week, and I don't understand this comment. How are cartridge razors more convenient than safety razors?
Safety razors are just hands down better, IMO. It's a more comfortable shave (depending on the blade), the blades can be bought in bulk for $0.05 cents each, they take less than 30 seconds to change out, they last longer than cartridges, and there's no plastic waste.
Also, I fully agree with the price factor - they are less expensive, and as a bonus there is no plastic waste (at least in most cases, depending on the packaging of your razor blades). But that was not my point.
That said, I don't work for Gillette (or any related company), and don't get commission for saying any of this (this is all just 'IMO' type of comment), and apart from anecdotal evidence (I've had multiple conversations with people with 20+ years of shaving experience, using both 4-blade razors and double-edged razors, and they all, more or less, share my opinion) I can't really provide any data (maybe I could try to find some, but I don't care about this topic 'that' much).
I hope that this clarifies my previous comment.
1. Don't shave. Grow a wild and wooly beard.
2. Electric clippers. For that permanent five o'clock shadow look.
3. Electric shaver. Easy.
4. Cartridge + foam. Smooth.
5. Double edge safety razor. Very smooth. Requires some skill.
6. Straight edge razor. Super smooth? No idea personally.
7. Laser. Also no idea personally.
What this article completely misses, is that there are more than two options.
I personally switch it up depending on what I am doing that day.
There is no right way to shave.
Ha, it is for permanent hair removal. Might be good for the upper cheeks, not sure.
Also, as you get older, your ears.
The most convenient thing was a Gillette Styler that would last for I can't count how many months, but was ultimately disposable. I later found a MINISO brand that was less than half the cost that was rechargeable with only minimal paper packaging. Not as close but good enough. Ultimately it's disposable too but I'm still on my first one.
I'm in the electric clippers camp personally. A good model can easily last you 10+ years and keeps my dry skill happier. I'm lucky they are still easy to find. Good luck finding a straight razor in your local shops if that's what you're into though.
But sure, they do last forever.
I'd say it gets very very close to a manual razor in terms of smoothness.
These were the inexpensive mail-order discount razors and the special shave butter they advertised, I forget the name of the company but it was the first one I was aware of that bypassed the Gilette racket by doing everything via mail. (edit- DollarShaveClub?)
Smooth or not, I'm sticking with my electric razor.
I got a cheap one sub 20 and it lasted 3 months.
I tried getting a wired one hoping it will last a bit longer.
It may just be me, my hair is really hard.
I’ve never replaced any heads on my shavers either. I lose them before that.
Depends on where you go. The various DE/SE subreddits it absolutely is.
Also protects others from my bad breath, or recycles the chocolate smell. :-D
While I don't think they require as much skill as people think, they are a bit harsh IMO. Some people probably can shave daily with them, but when I tried it was pretty rough on my skin.
Edit: Well I got the Merkur 34C after 23 minutes of research.
>but shaving with 4-blade cartridge designed for easy shaving is still 'miles' ahead compared to shaving with double-edged razor
I actually tried switching to a straight razor. Found it requires a lot more skill than I'm willing to put in to learning. But it appeals to me as the ultimate in reusability.
The double edge safety razor is so much easier to clean out.
For me, and many many others who have tried both, eg in the subreddit for DE shaving, DE is much better for a) your skin and b) getting a close shave.
Your hair doesn’t need 4 blades running across it. It just needs one sharp blade over it.
Fair it may take one or two shaves to “get used” to the new way of shaving but that is only because most people start on 4-blade.
Perhaps my hair is just soft, and I suspect it is, but I started out taking 10-15 minutes and now I can do a quick shave in 5.
It lasts longer, it’s cheaper, and easier on my skin — I break out less often.
>Cooking equipment: essentially indestructible Cast Iron skillets transition into teflon pans. The newer pans perform worse, and must be replaced on a shockingly regular basis. They also seem to be poisonous.
They have their uses. I wouldn't try frying eggs in a cast iron, for instance (technically you can, but it requires an absurd amount of oil). Also, claiming that they "seem to be poisonous" without any qualifiers is a little misleading. To my knowledge they're only poisonous during manufacturing (ie. the precursor chemicals) and when they get too hot.
>Nespresso machines, and other coffee pod brands, replace many styles of coffee brewing. Provide much worse coffee, at a higher price but are superficially convenient.
Why are they only superficially convenient? They seem pretty convenient to me.
>Televisions moving from being screens which accept input, to self contained 'smart' devices that require software updates and thus have a shortened useful lifespan.
I thought it was the other way around? ie. smart TVs are cheaper than dumb TVs because they're subsidized by ad revenue. Also, the claim itself doesn't really make any sense. Even if you stop getting software updates, that doesn't prevent you from using it as a dumb display.
FWIW it's pretty easy to fry eggs in a cast iron. You do have to oil the pan, but I wouldn't call it absurd. Just a dollop of oil in the pan. And the end result has a crispy, yummy texture that's hard to achieve with Teflon. It just takes a little practice and an open mind.
If you have a good seasoning then less oil while cooking is needed. If you have a new pan with a rougher surface then using a steel spatula will smooth out the surface texture and improve performance (without making it too smooth where seasoning won't stick).
There's a lot of varying advice on cast iron, but the prevailing wisdom seems to be that if you keep using it then the pan will improve.
Cast iron doesn’t seem to work as well on electric stoves: Temperature control is problematic. Perhaps induction heating would be more effective?
[1] https://www.seriouseats.com/thmb/3KEyHXkLBbmzhHgp5P81odFcIR0...
[2] https://www.seriouseats.com/classic-over-easy-fried-eggs-rec...
I also make scrambled eggs, but tend to use a tbsp (15ml) butter, but that is more for flavor and texture than to keep from sticking
Of course it's crispy, you are deep-frying your eggs in oil, like McDonalds-style fries. It may feel delicious, like almost anything overcooked with high temperature, but it is not quite healthy.
Just because you have drowning eggs in oil does not mean everyone does it that way.
Fried eggs are just aldehyde cancer hell. There's so much out there you can cook without any oil and it's handy to know for sure. Try cooking stuff in sauces instead for example.
Which means you need to do a better job at seasoning. Cast iron is used almost exclusively at my place and I use less than 1/2 TSp oil for eggs. Granted my newest skillets are made is 1930s.
What issue are we even talking about?
Because the older techniques weren't close to usable after the casting, the cleanup process made for a smoother pan. Because the newer techniques were much closer to usable after the mold, less cleanup was put into them, resulting in a rougher pan.
A cheap angle grinder is good enough for the relatively soft iron alloy used in cast iron pans. Grind the surface down smooth (don't forget to wear a face mask!), then finish up with increasing grades of sandpaper until you get a nearly mirror surface on the pan. Season the pan a couple of times and you'll be left with one of the most durable, non-stick surfaces for cooking that you can possibly have.
You grind the bottom of the pan smooth. Isn't that obvious? I guess not, apparently. But it seems like it should be.
Seems like overkill though. You could probably just hand sand it to be honest.
Tools exist to make jobs easy. There is no virtue in doing hard work for hard works sake. Plus, orbital sanders tend to inflame my carpal tunnel.
If i had a cast iron pan I had to flatten, I’d dog it down on my CNC router, set up a 1/4” endmill, whip up some code for 33% overlapping passes in Fusion 360, and take off .005” layers until it was flat.
Something like this: https://www.bunnings.com.au/bosch-blue-250w-random-orbital-s...
Or for a US version: https://www.milwaukeetool.com.au/power-tools/carpentry/sande...
Or you can try carbon steel which is more forgiving than cast iron. Blanc Creatives makes a great carbon steel pan/skillet.
Flea markets often have them for even cheaper. Thrift stores have them but you might pay $50--which is still cheaper than a decent angle grinder.
Do it in a well ventilated area, preferable outside. The fillings get everywhere, include into any vents of any other equipment you might have nearby. My glasses weren't enough to keep the filings out of my eyes. They are fine enough that they won't scratch or cut your eyes, but you will feel like you are having the worst bout of seasonal allergies you've ever had.
I was sneezing rusty boogers for 3 days.
I bought the majority of my cast iron 20 years ago for about $25 and it'll likely outlast me.
You just need to let the pan heat up, drop a teaspoon of oil or butter, let if soak in a second then blast it and drop your egg.
More butter more better but that's flavour at that point.
For figuring out if your plans at the right heat, a spalsg of water should bead and float around.
Going that hot with Teflon will give you the Teflon flu.
Only thing I use nonstick for is scrabled eggs and pancakes where a low heat is beneficial.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4284091/
I kind of suspect the bizarre health correlation for olive oil relates to its poor temperature range.
For fried eggs you just need to make sure it's hot enough with oil it should bubble and fry without sticking.
FWIW I shrug and use my cast iron.
That's because many cast iron pans you can get these days have unpolished bottoms unlike antique ones. If you get a polished one (or polish it yourself - there's plenty of youtube videos on that) it'll be incredible non-stick. You can also just get a carbon steel pan which doesn't need polishing.
Someone then claimed my pan was manganese deficient due to some war in Gabon pre-WWII. It will always be something with these people.
Sounds pretty inconvenient to me, which directly opposes author's thesis.
And even that comparison is unfair, as with that you're getting fresh ground coffee which is much better. Pod coffees are preground minimum months before you're brewing with them.
Here's a review: https://coffeeblog.co.uk/delonghi-magnifica-s/
https://www.idealo.de/preisvergleich/OffersOfProduct/2416409...
It comes with a pressurised filter so you can throw whatever ground coffee you buy in the supermarket and it will make a decent espresso.
If you want to take it to the next level you should buy a non pressurised filter, good fresh coffee in beans and an extra 300 for a good electric grinder.
That's pretty much the cheapest setup I can think of to make a good espresso.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/28/well/eat/filtered-coffee-...
Cleanup is fair but it’s on the order of putting your hands in the grounds and throwing them in the trash. I suspect people think machines are easier because they don’t mind mold or scale building in their unclean tank.
Nonstick pans contain hormone disrupting chemicals. Just google it and there are numerous resources. Nonstick chemicals are also released into our rivers and waterways and basically impossible to remove (lots of resources for this as well).
>From nonstick pans to food packaging to make-up, hundreds of everyday products are made with PFAS chemicals that have been linked to adverse health effects, including cancer, weakened immunity and low birth weight.
>They are also a persistent pollutant in the environment, with high levels found in many public water systems.
https://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/national-international/to...
If you don't like cast iron then carbon steel is a similar but easier to maintain alternative. If those don't work, then enameled cast iron (i.e. Le Creuset) works.
Again, is this during manufacture or in the finished product? In my comment I specifically said it was poisonous during manufacture.
>Just google it and there are numerous resources
I checked on wikipedia and I found no mentions of that in the finished product.
It's both/ Read the article I linked above "most people in the U.S. have PFAS in their bloodstream" so these chemicals are toxic in the finished product (which they then digest when using) and during manufacture.
>While contamination of drinking water around military bases and factories gets most of the attention, the EPA says 80 percent of human exposure comes from consumer products in the home.
The "product" in this case being "non-stick pans", or various other consumer products? The wikipedia article seems to suggest the latter.
>they are still produced internationally and are imported into the United States in consumer goods such as carpet, leather and apparel, textiles, paper and packaging, coatings, rubber and plastics
>In 2020, manufacturers and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced an agreement to phase out some types of PFAS which are used in food packaging by 2024
>PFAS are also used by major companies of the cosmetics industry in a wide range of cosmetics, including lipstick, eye liner, mascara, foundation, concealer, lip balm, blush, nail polish and other such products
Based on that, I'm inclined to believe that there's a bunch of ways for PFAS to get into people's bloodstreams, but cookware isn't one of them (I did a quick search and they're not mentioned in the article, aside from a reference to a california legislation requiring them to be labeled). That's perfectly consistent with my prior claim that "finished non-stick pans are safe" and your claim that "most people in the U.S. have PFAS in their bloodstream".
You have the burden of proof to prove your claim/belief. I already provided a source that says "80 percent of human exposure comes from consumer products in the home." which you're making the illogical leap that that must not include pans coated in these chemicals that we use to cook on... That seems illogical. Yes there are other sources of PFAs, but you're trying to exclude one of the most obvious sources.
>That's perfectly consistent with my prior claim that "finished non-stick pans are safe"
You have literally cited zero evidence for your claim--so no it's not consistent. You're pulling this out of your ass.
I strongly suggest you do a bit more reading on the subject: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2022/03/07/pfas-guide-ch...
Regardless, I'll keep using my cast iron, carbon steel, and enameled cast iron pans--you can keep eating weird chemicals.
If you really want to talk about "burden of proof" and whether something "seems illogical", I'm going to take the easy way out and point out that PFAS is a set of substances which include PTFE ("teflon") as well as PFOA (used in the manufacture of PTFE). We have been conflating the two, which means many of the sources you provided for PFAS are actually invalid, at least in the context of discussing whether non-stick pans are "poisonous".
Technically the original discussion was about PTFE (ie. the stuff used on pans), not PFAS (which is what your sources reference since your first reply). If anything, you're the one who moved it my subtly moving the discussion to be about PFAS. I suppose it's "moving the goalposts" to bring the discussion back to PTFEs, so I do apologize if you think that me replying to your comments constitutes acceptance of moving the discussion to be about PFAS.
>don't provide any evidence again
Here's my "evidence"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polytetrafluoroethylene#Safety
>PTFE is stable and nontoxic at lower temperatures
You need to learn how to season and care for cast iron. It doesn't take an absurd amount of oil, and the egg should slide out with ease.
So they need more work and skill than other pans. In other words: they are in fact less convenient.
Cast iron also has multiple issues when used with induction ranges, which are by far the most efficient/environmental cookers.
Cleaning cast iron is easier than cleaning teflon or stainless. However, you'll want something to scrape it with, and a stanless steel pot scrubber.
We use cast iron on our induction range with no problems. The only issues I've heard of involve scratching. The new models don't seem to have that issue (and cast is no scratchier than stainless, etc).
Cast iron is best if it's the workhorse. Not using it regularly degrades the seasoning.
I treat mine no differently than any other pan and do all of the things that I do to any other frying pan. I wash it with soap and the scratchy side of the sponge, I store it with no oil, I cook acidic sauces, I let it soak in the sink, etc...
The seasoning is fine, once I accidentally left it on the burner and it burnt off the seasoning (something that would have destroyed any teflon pan). I just used a little extra oil the next few times.
I haven't used it extensively with an induction burner, but I don't have any complaints....
This is the first I’m hearing of this. My understanding is that pans only need to be magnetic to work with induction, in which case cast iron are prime candidates for induction.
Though my cast iron wok heats properly, for almost the same reason!
Watch this documentary, "The Devil We Know" (About the history and toxicity of teflon.
tl;dw - its a cancer causing birth defect, testosterone/endocrine system atomic bmb and there isnt a single person alive today who can be found (according to the doc) who does not have measurable amounts of teflon in their blood.
Sorry, but I'm not going to watch a 95 minute documentary on a whim. Based on the wikipedia summary, it doesn't seem to contradict what I said, specifically
>regarding allegations of health hazards from perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA, also known as C8), a key ingredient used in manufacturing Teflon
I specifically mentioned in my last comment that they were "poisonous during manufacturing ".
Plastic is made from oil. Do you think there's literally oil in your plastic water bottle?
[1] https://www.healthvermont.gov/sites/default/files/documents/...
[1] https://emergingcontaminants.eu/application/files/9514/5260/...
I mean, if Teflon is so toxic, and there isn't a single person alive today who doesn't have Teflon in their blood, then why aren't there tons of documented cases of Teflon poisoning?
Teflon pans kill birds unfortunately. Once you live with a bird, you can’t have any hot teflon in the house because it releases toxic fumes. Fine for a human because we’re large animals, smol birds reach lethal levels within minutes.
There’s stories of people turning on an air fryer and their pet bird dropping dead in another room.
Source?
They list "coated food contact materials" as a source of PFOS and PFOA in the abstract.
It leaches estrogen analogues (sometimes called xenoestrogens), and ~ 100% of people alive today have biologically active levels of those compounds in their blood.
In particular, Teflon brand nonstick coating contains PTFE and PFOAs. This has been settled science for at least 20 years.
Neither are fine for humans. The dosage is still high enough to cause long term health issues. (Mostly cancer and hormone issues.)
Until a software update on your media player means you need a display with a different DRM. No matter what display you use, the media transfer method to that display (DVD/VGA/HDMI/Wifi etc) will probably be obsolete before the display itself goes dark.
Well, alright then.
> and when they get too hot
Oh… I dunno, but this seems to be a fairly likely failure mode for a pan.
"too hot" in this context means "higher than smoke points of most oils". Like I said, they have their uses. If you're frying an egg you're likely not heating your pan to the point of smoking, and I'm certainly not going to be searing meats on a non-stick.
After spending a few weeks trying, I’ve had multiple people tell me they got theirs ‘seasoned’ after three or four months.
Don’t let yourself be sucked in.
But people who say you can easily cook eggs in it or everything else "after its seasoned" are just not to be listened to. Use a nonstick.
EDIT: Or carbon steel I guess. Even then, meh. Remember that the vast majority of professional chefs use nonstick skillets specifically for eggs both at home and in their workplace.
That said, one thing I have come to realize over the past couple of decades of cooking with cast iron is that seasoning is less some mystical ritual that is performed one time, and more a result of proper use and care of the pan over time.
But yes, there is lots of ritualized BS (“Don’t wash it”, “Never use dish soap”, “Only season it using flax oil in the oven at 200 degrees for four hours”, etc etc etc).
-In the very beginning, bake it in an oven with a very thin layer of crisco two times
-Only use it for eggs for a while, letting the butter turn into seasoning with higher heat as it cools. Find the right preheating ranges by experiment.
Now it's maintenance-free and nonstick.
Eww... You can and should wash your cast iron pans. Dish soap is no longer made with lye or other harsh chemicals, just use a bit of Dawn and a blue scrub pad (same you'd use on nonstick) and properly clean it, make sure it's very dry afterwards and put a very thin layer of oil. Also don't use paper towels on cast iron unless it's a smooth bottom pan, the modern style cast iron will cause shreds of paper to get embedded in the pan which will burn and get nasty (also paper towels are bleached and that's nasty).
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasoning_(cookware)
[2] https://sherylcanter.com/wordpress/2010/01/a-science-based-t...
There is a /lot/ of bullshit myths around cast iron, like that you cannot use soap for instance, or shouldn't scrub it, both of which are totally fine, but the idea of seasoning and what occurs when it's done properly are entirely true. Most people just want to otherthink it. All you need to do with cast iron is use it and care for it properly, the longer and more often you use it, the better it gets.
Use the right tool for the job and cast iron is definitely not the right choice a lot of the time. Unless you exclusively cook meals where heat control is never needed, I don’t see why you’d only use cast iron.
I'm hell-bent on getting something with zero smart function- just ports. TVs like that will become gold in the future, when smart tvs will have ad banners that you can't turn off. The cost of media has come full circle. My prediction is: 1. All TVs have smart functions and no input ports 2. TV manufactures will be cutting deals with advertisers to display banner ads. Maybe you'll be lucky enough to pay for ad free. 3. Aggregate streaming services will provide access to multiple services for a flat fee. Welcome back to cable! 4. Total cost of consuming TV media will be eat average income budgets away
https://www.displayninja.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/best...
Even the best TVs had atrocious latency compared to cheap monitors. I don’t really know why this is, but it likely has something to expensive transformations to the video signal to “improve” quality. I have very pricy 1080p Samsung TV from 2013. Even in “Game Mode” I has latency of over 100ms. This enough to be noticeable in just moving a mouse around, let alone gaming.
That has been mostly rectified nowadays. I have an LG C1 (42”) and use it for gaming and work. It has <1ms average latency and just enough pixel density for computer use. It does need a good desk though.
The biggest remaining differences would be:
- TVs tend to have a “smart interface”. This can generally be avoided if you are just switching between inputs. - TVs tend not to support DisplayPort input. - TVs tend require large desk stands and are not VESA compatible. You need a large desk to use one as a monitor. - Very few TVs with high quality panels are available in smaller more pixel dense sizes. I’m imagining this will become less of a problem with a move to 8k. - TVs tend to have almost unusable colour calibration out of the box. Rtings reviews tends to note how close the displays get to a standard colour profile after calibration. Many can be calibrated to a reasonable level though. - OLED panels are much more common in TVs.
I have found this issue of latency to be a real challenge when connecting to a TV via HDMI so I'm curious if it gets better with larger TVs
Apparently this is enforced by the regulators. If it has a tuner it will say "television" on the box. Otherwise it says something like "monitor" or "display".
As far as I know, Apple TV doesn’t do this, and Kodi + Raspberry Pi seems clear of it too.
Maybe I should have gone with Kodi.
My last two tvs had smart crap built in; I never set any of ot up, not even as far as connecting to wifi.
It's definitely worth considering but there are pros and cons to consider, it's not an acceptable replacement in all situations.
Not even that, I suspect that projectors would be defeated by mid-range VA-LED TVs, especially when you factor in that TVs have nifty tricks like FALD
And you can't even make the picture on the wall smaller if you want, it always dominates completely.
When my mother is visiting we just want to half watch some game show and chit chat, we don't want to have a movie night, and we don't want to focus entirely on each other/conversation for a whole evening either, it's kind of exhausting.
It seems up on the latest hdmi standards and it turns on and off with the appletv plugged in.
Look for a used signage panel. No commercial smart functions and quality that's barely available in consumer TVs but sometime can be had really cheap if you find the right place, look on govdeals, if your patient.
The real issue is the lack of security in these devices. Updates are rare enough but for something that bridges your home network with the internet this is an agregious failing.
This doesn't even touch on the repairability issues inherent in modern TV design.
This sounds like a non-issue, in a "broken escalators become stairs" kind of way. If your smart TV doesn't work because it hasn't received software updates for years, and the youtube/netflix app no longer works anymore, can't you just... use it as a dumb TV?
>This doesn't even touch on the repairability issues inherent in modern TV design.
What "repairability issues"? TVs hasn't been repariable for decades now.
No.
Like most things in this life, you get what you pay for.
If you cheap out on "newer pans" then sure, they won't last you because the manufacturer will use cheap manufacturing processes in order to achieve your stingy price point.
If you buy decent pans from reputable manufacturers, they will last you a lot longer.
1. The manufacturing process results in those precursor chemicals entering urban water supplies where they are nearly impossible to filter out (only RO is effective and it's not even 100% effective), and once in the bloodstream of people are powerful endrocrine disruptors which circulate and are filtered slowly by the kidneys... and when peed out go right back into the water supply due to not being able to be removed during treatment. These "forever chemicals" are some of the most health damaging pollutants in the West.
2. Teflon is extremely hazardous when consumed and it flakes off of the pans over time (which is why they must be replaced often) or when incorrect utensils are used (common among unsophisticated users).
3. Teflon can overheat on a standard consumer stove using standard cooking techniques. You actually need different techniques to prevent overheating a Teflon pan.
4. Cast Iron is effectively non-stick after enough use, and you can absolutely fry an egg in it without sticking if you have a smooth-bottom pan (either a vintage cast iron, new vintage-style, or a new style that you've sanded down and seasoned yourself).
That's why I said it was "a little misleading" rather that outright false. "poisonous" sort of implies that the object itself is poisonous or is bad for you. I'm sure manufacturing a smartphone causes a bunch of environmental damage, but you wouldn't call it poisonous (outside of putting in in your mouth).
>2. Teflon is extremely hazardous when consumed and it flakes off of the pans over time (which is why they must be replaced often) or when incorrect utensils are used (common among unsophisticated users).
source? This is contradicted by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polytetrafluoroethylene#Safety
>3. Teflon can overheat on a standard consumer stove using standard cooking techniques. You actually need different techniques to prevent overheating a Teflon pan.
Like I said in my initial comment, teflon has its uses. I'm not saying it's the best tool for every job. Given that, I highly doubt this applies if I'm just cooking my eggs.
>4. Cast Iron is effectively non-stick after enough use, and you can absolutely fry an egg in it without sticking if you have a smooth-bottom pan (either a vintage cast iron, new vintage-style, or a new style that you've sanded down and seasoned yourself).
Sounds like a lot of work to me. In other words, the teflon pan is actually more convenient.
It’s actually zero work, despite the recent uptick in people who think you need to coddle a cast iron pan. Most of the tips people give for dealing with cast iron are pointless extra work or actively make it perform worse.
I wash mine with soap and water and it takes about a minute, or about as long as washing a Teflon pan. Frequently I don’t even bother with this, and just wipe it out with a paper towel.
There was no need to jump through hoops to specially season the thing. Just use it, and its non-stick properties increase over time. It’s zero maintenance and I’ve had the damn thing for over a decade now.
I can also sympathize with anyone who is of below average strength (children, injured or disabled, advanced age) not choosing cast iron, they are heavy compared to a Teflon pan.
It's just not as common as people think when they hear about it.
The real solution isn’t to reseason. It’s to just wash the damn thing. Soap, water, and whatever scrub brush does the job. Nothing you do short of steel wool is going to make a dent in the seasoning.
Not washing with soap is one of those widespread myths that actively makes your cast iron perform worse. I struggled with this problem constantly until I stopped babying my cast iron and I’ve never had a problem since.
What totally changed my perspective was trying to get the black stuff off an aluminum sheet pan. It’s a slightly different bond than the seasoning on a cast iron pan but functionally they’re both the same thing. Getting that off a sheet pan required meticulously scrubbing with steel wool and a lot of elbow grease. It clicked for me that if it’s that hard to get it off a sheet pan, it’s not coming off my cast iron because I used a little Dawn.
I'm probably being a little nitpicky/contrarian when I say this, but for my cooking style, teflon is actually more.
I cook with large amounts of fat (generally beef fat - tallow and/or suet) every meal, which on Teflon causes a nightmare of a mess to clean. With my cast iron pan, I just wipe off a bit of the excess and let the rest say in the pan, forming a non-stick coating. I've not cooked any eggs in a while, but I reckon (granted, possibly falsely, since I've not tested this) that I would fry one without any special precautions due the amount of grease I cook with in normal times.
So for some people, the cast iron cooking style is actually easier because there is less cleaning.
Sticking is often a matter of temperature control. Once you get used to it, there’s very little difference to a teflon pan.
I know that teflon would be slightly more convenient but the health tradeoff doesn’t seem worth it.
I personally dont like cooking, and I avoid anything requiring more than 3 items - my steel pans remove the annoying factors (equipment handling, maintenance & care) make me dread cooking a little less. Had the pans for 4-5 years now and they are an absolute joy to use
I replied to the GP, but I fry eggs in a bog-standard Lodge which is neither vintage nor sanded down. It still has a distinct ”pebbly” appearance to it, though perhaps less than when I first got it.
Works like a charm, and a shake of the pan is usually all that’s needed to release eggs.
It's very common to use incorrect utensils (metal) because the correct ones (wood, plastic) are are harder to clean and don't last as long, and few people would choose to use such utensils if all else were equal.
https://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/is-teflon-coating-safe#:~....
This is not to go against your other points, but stop spreading FUD please.
Fried eggs were a thing long before before teflon. I dont know what you consider absurd about of oil, some oil is needed, but I would qualify it as "normal"
It’s so easy to just say “oh that’s to extract money from you” when you don’t know…
It requires proper seasoning. Once you got that, egg away!
>Also, claiming that they "seem to be poisonous" without any qualifiers is a little misleading. To my knowledge they're only poisonous during manufacturing (ie. the precursor chemicals) and when they get too hot.
Agreed - they're not poisonous to use, but the manufacturing chemicals used to produce them are, and those chemicals are often dumped into the environment - they're also known as, "forever chemicals", which reek some havoc on well: us.
https://www.ewg.org/what-are-pfas-chemicals
>Why are they only superficially convenient? They seem pretty convenient to me.
The plastic waste they produce still have the inconvenient problem of what to do with them. Like many conveniences, the problem is just offloaded to someone else.
https://money.cnn.com/2015/03/04/news/k-cups-keurig-inventor...
Some feel microplastics in our blood stream is a worthy compromise to easy-to-make coffee.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/mar/24/micropla...
I dunno much about TVs (I've never owned one), but sounds like subscription over ownership which, grumbles over Adobe
>https://money.cnn.com/2015/03/04/news/k-cups-keurig-inventor...
>Some feel microplastics in our blood stream is a worthy compromise to easy-to-make coffee.
If you're in a first world country with proper garbage disposal, those k-cups most certainly aren't contributing to the problem of microplastics. Where I live they basically get landfilled. Kind of hard for that to end up in my veins when they're buried underground.
When do we all stop saying, "not my problem" when it comes to single-use, disposable items like this?
"20 years ago was the best time, second best time is now", kind of scenarios.
What if you count having to view ads, and having the tv spy on you as a cost? RN,for many TVs you can just not connect to wifi, but how long until the TV won't work unless it is connected?
> Also, the claim itself doesn't really make any sense. Even if you stop getting software updates, that doesn't prevent you from using it as a dumb display.
Perhaps a better argument is that a bad software can brick the TV, or the components of the smart functionality break in a way that prevents you from using it as a dumb tv (i.e. it has more "moving parts"), and if you don't use the smart functionality, then it is a waste of the materials to make those components, and probably electricity running through the circuits. And it isn't too hard to imagine a future where the tv just stops working if it can't phone home.
I don't connect it to wifi, problem solved.
>for many TVs you can just not connect to wifi, but how long until the TV won't work unless it is connected?
Is there reason to believe that it won't work? The "smart" TV I have hasn't been connected to wifi for years and still works.
>Perhaps a better argument is that a bad software can brick the TV, or the components of the smart functionality break in a way that prevents you from using it as a dumb tv (i.e. it has more "moving parts")
I don't get it, are you trying to have your cake (smart functionality) and eat it too (smart functionality randomly breaking stuff)? If you use it as a dumb TV from day 1 I can't imagine why it would randomly break later.
>and if you don't use the smart functionality, then it is a waste of the materials to make those components, and probably electricity running through the circuits
The nvidia shield TV uses 6W while streaming. Presumably the smart TV component probably uses something similar or less than that. In the grand scheme of things it's nothing.
>And it isn't too hard to imagine a future where the tv just stops working if it can't phone home.
That's seems to be more of a theoretical concern than something that's actually happening right now.
I've heard of some tvs that work that way, rn it is the exception rather than the rule, but there is an incentive for tv makers to move in that direction.
> If you use it as a dumb TV from day 1 I can't imagine why it would randomly break later.
Smart tvs have inherently more complicated electronics, and that means more things to break. If you don't use the smart features it might be less likely for those components to break, but unless the designers were careful to sufficiently isolate the smart components, it still increases the chances of breakage.
> That's seems to be more of a theoretical concern than something that's actually happening right now.
For TVs maybe, but it is already the case for other "smart" devices like thermostats.
We fry our eggs every morning on a cast iron skillet with a tiny amount of oil (<1 teaspoon for 6 eggs). The only time I have problems with stuff sticking is if I get impatient and don't wait for the pan to preheat.
This is one of the biggest contributors to teflon's mythology: you can't preheat a teflon pan safely (it ruins the coating), so people learn to not preheat. They then get frustrated when using other pans that things stick that wouldn't have on their teflon.
(Edit: the skillet is a cheap, unaltered Lodge, nothing antique or sanded.)
how can anything that produces a worse quality of a productivity enhancing stimulant than you would have using another method ever be truly convenient in comparison to that other method?
basically in any situation when you decrease the quality of anything to such an extent that you use it less and thus get less of the benefits that it gives you it would follow that it would be more convenient that the quality was higher.
For example - condoms, condoms that don't work very well would be inconvenient.
But also coffee, when coffee is of such poor quality that people do not drink it that is inconvenient if you are employed turning coffee into code as the funny t-shirts have it. Hence my humorous reference to productivity enhancing stimulants.
I can put a tiny amount of oil in my cast iron and fry eggs without sticking.
Over time, cooking oils polymerize from heat and form a smooth seal in the microsurfaces of the cast iron, resulting in a natural non stick surface which is resilient and replenish-able.
80% of my stovetop cooking is in a 70 year old cast iron skillet, the rest happens in stainless steel or enameled cast iron.
You’d be surprised. I have a Lodge cast iron pan I fry eggs in regularly. A tablespoon of butter is enough for three eggs, and only occasionally is there a spot or two that sticks.
The trick is heat. High heat causes them to unstick fairly quickly, to the point where I can typically just shake the pan to release them in their entirety.
That said I haven’t tried to scramble eggs in cast iron. I suspect this would not work nearly as well.
No one should be surprised that people will pay more for the exact same thing over time. People want to get as much as they can as quick as they can. If you spend $100 for a cast iron pan now instead of $30 for a Teflon pan, then you have $70 less money to spend on other stuff. The average person doesn't care that over the long run they could spend $1000 on pans instead of a $100 pan that lasts a lifetime.
I did sand it a bit with a palm sander because the Internet told me to, but I'm pretty sure it would have been fine anyway.
It's been years, and I've deliberately seasoned it only once, and I don't think I actually really needed to. Sometimes when it's been used for tomatoes and looks thirsty, I'll put a wipe of oil in and heat it up for a bit.
I don't miss the very expensive Le Creuset wedding present non stick pan that turned out to be as bad as all the rest.
However, also in T[KJ] Maxx are 10 times more truly terrible Teflon pans.
Because they're a PITA to clean compared to a regular coffee maker.
A seasoned pan is fine for eggs. I just use a little butter.
I switched to aluminum/copper core from Teflon and eggs are easy with a little butter, or oil, or spray. And cleaning is easier with some steel wool.
An all-clad pan was $100 but is going strong 15 years later and should last a few hundred more. My non-stick pans were $20 and lasted a year or two.
If you add the eggs with the pan too cool and then heat them up, they will stick.
It’s a bit difficult to exactly measure the effects of PFAS and how much of it makes it poisonous—when a study sought a control group of people without any in their blood for a study, they were not able to find a single living person on this planet that fits the definition anymore—but even with what we know the author is likely significantly understating that particular point[0].
Even if we ignore the poison released into the environment during manufacturing, I am yet to see a used Teflon pan that has no scratches (and that’s just the ones visible with naked eye). Combine with the fact that non-Teflon pans are becoming nearly impossible to find in many retail stores, and it becomes somewhat concerning.
Because it is absurdly easy to make a pot of coffee, if you want a single cup just adjust the amount of water and coffee.
There is also instant coffee. Which can be better than Keurig.
It's not to say that there is 0 convenience its just barely so and not really worth the added cost and waste. Also if you happen to be the one that has to refill the water or wait on it to heat it's no more convenient than any other option.
Also the coffee sucks.
Check out the Misen ones, their marketing video is literally all about an egg slipping around it like water.
You have to season it, but it's easy to do. Number one mistake most people make is seasoning with too much oil.
I use nothing but cast iron,s on a wood-burning stove. Frying eggs is no problem at all and it does not take "an absurd amount of oil", just a light coat of butter or margarine will do the trick assuming the pan is well-seasoned. I make pancakes for 4 people about once a week, also no problem, using a silicone brush to coat the pan in a light coat of molten butter/oil (I often mix these two) and they slide right out. Just clean the hot pan with water and wipe it clean/dry after use, it will work even better the next time you use it.
PTFE-covered pans are only a thing because people have been told fat is bad. The truth is fat is not bad, just like other foods are not bad per definition. What is bad is too much fat, just like too much carbohydrates or too much salt or... etcetera. Knowing that fat is actually a good ingredient there is no reason to use those flimsy disposable aluminium pans covered in PTFE.
This really bugs me. We have a product, designed to be used over heat, which leaks literal poison into your food when it gets "too hot"... WTF is that? What does "too hot" mean and how can you expect anyone to know which of their burner settings (which often have no guidance at all as to temperature beyond gradients between "low", "medium", and "high") will be hot enough to leak poison into the food they feed themselves and their families. Non-stick coating seem like the kind of thing which should be banned at this point until it's proven to be safe under typical conditions. None of the chemicals which have replaced teflon have been proved safe. They just haven't been shown to be dangerous yet, which isn't saying much considering the decades it took to prove the dangers of teflon and the efforts the manufacturers went to hide those dangers from the public they poisoned.
> smart TVs are cheaper than dumb TVs because they're subsidized by ad revenue.
I've never seen that proved anywhere. Costs have gone down over the years, and the amount of ads and data collection have increased but I haven't seen any evidence at all that there's a 1:1 connection between the two. Companies seem to be perfectly happy to charge you the most they can get away with while still collecting your data and pushing ads in your face. By limiting the availability of dumb TVs you don't even get to vote with your wallet on this one. Currently I'm recommending people replace their TVs with computer monitors, but "smart" computer monitors are the new thing and will push out the dumb models too.
You may want to avoid vegetables that lose a lot of water as that will wear your non-stickiness faster.
Nothing than rubbing some oil and putting in the oven won't solve.
His point on single use plastics is spot on. I know a lot of people that love to lecture me about my moralistic views, the types of people who believe in overpopulation and are sad about the plastic in the ocean, not a single one of them pays any mind to the packaging of anything they buy. I do, and I'm not even one of those people. My "footprint" is probably less than 10% of most peoples, and I don't even care the way they do.
People consume too much disposable crap. People act like they have to buy what's on offer. People are convinced they're helpless in the face of corporations. Start refusing to buy things and stop making excuses and until then you should feel ashamed to lecture anyone about anything.
The other issue is that focusing on something like this megamansion (as grotesque as it is anyway - seriously a lot of these rich people are just tasteless losers) leads down to a never ending condition where you just never do enough to satisfy people who have no interest in changing their habits anyway.
If Gore sold his megamansion they'd say "hey you are still flying", if he stopped flying they'd say "hey you're still driving a car", if he stopped driving a car they say "hey you're not growing your own vegetables", if he started growing his own vegetables they'd say "hey the tools you use come from a carbon emitting supply chain" and if he stopped using tools and made his own they'd just keep on and on and on forever until we get global warming anyway and so many people are screwed. There's no genuine interest in solving the problem, they just want to distract you.
it's not about distraction, it's about showing you're sincere. If you're like "save the planet" out of one side and on the other planning your 5th airflight you don't "actually" care.
it's like asking poor countries to bare all the burden of climate change and rich countries doing little. "I've got mine and sorry you don't but too bad, you're not allowed to have it" is not going to convince anyone except to follow your actions, not your words
Its not about the complete abolition of everything its about the hypocrisy of being one of the biggest polluters in a country let alone the world while suggesting others on substantially less consumption drastically change their lives when they are least financially able to do so.
Who Visits OilPrice.com?
OilPrice.com's rapidly expanding and influential audience consists of investors, fund managers, resource bankers, traders, energy market professionals and high net worth individuals from all around the world but mainly North America, Canada, UK and Australia.
Oil and gas industry executives from large multi-nationals to smaller independents
Renewable energy company executives, investors and analysts involved in the oil and gas industry
Investors and analysts involved in mining and resource sectors
Investors, analysts and news enthusiasts in various renewable energy sectors
Exploration and production companies
Geopolitical news enthusiasts
High level politicians and political advisors
Editors of various news, financial, resource and energy sites
High net worth individuals primarily from U.S., Canada and Europe
Simply flying would have been 10x better. Let alone joining via Zoom.
This is not true at all. People aren't stupid. They know the difference between Mega mansions/private jets and driving a car. Sure, there might be a few trolls online that will still say "But you don't grow your own vegetables". But it would definitely not become a nation wide focus in a way that living as hypocritically as Al Gore does.
You're comment comes off as really dismissive. Almost like you're saying "the people calling him out for his mega mansion are just as bad as people who would call him out for not growing his own vegetables".
> People aren't stupid.
Then why are they getting hung up on his mansion instead of demanding that their government do something? Him having a mansion doesn’t change basic scientific facts even if he’s the one stating them.
Al Gore was right about, well, basically everything he said on major policy issues.
BTW, that supposed "megamansion"? It's a 5-bedroom home, really quite modest by the standards of today's billionaires. It's basically what you'd assume a former Senator and Vice President might have. Efforts to paint this as somehow offensive are obviously in bad faith.
The attacks on him for his house were just to distract from his message. He also paid extra cash to his utility company to get blocks of "green power" produced using renewable sources to help offset the extra power his home consumed each year.
I'd take it a step further and say -- just do what you feel is best, what matches your morals, etc, and skip the lecture in any case. 99% of what is wrong with social media has to do with people lecturing the world as if their own personal opinion deserves special consideration. Focus on doing, not talking about it.
This individualistic refrain doesn’t make sense in the context of a critique of the overall system. Maybe as advice on how to be a self-flagelating low-eco-impact consumer or how to better master your personal finances. But ultimately it’s just an excuse for corporations to do the usual thing because the buck stops with the consumer (and corporations can just claim that they are just fulfilling a need that someone else would fill in their stead; they only sell the proverbial guns, they don’t pull the trigger).
Laws, propaganda, tradition, abusing human weaknesses like addictions.
Our power is diffuse and slow.
They're Javelin anti tank weapons pinpoint targeting our weakest points.
The fight is not fair and they're winning.
And the way to stop it is to stop buying that stuff. Stores get pressured to stock things, and they can only justify it if it gets bought. If a store doesn't stock the things you want, don't buy things from that store except the things it does have that you do want. They will make the alternatives equally accessible when we demonstrate that we can go without what they have on offer. We always have a choice, always.
I want a cell phone that respects my privacy, but none exist on the market today so I have no choice. I still need a cell phone though since my work requires one. We also don't all have the same amount of choices. Those with fewer resources have fewer choices. People should do the best they can given their circumstances, but its worth trying to remove the artificial barriers which limit our choices where we can. Especially when those barriers are put in place to funnel profit into the hands of a small number of people at our expense.
"If I don't participate in this economy I'll be homeless, so I have to by Gillette mach 20 disposable plastic razor cartridges." Do what you can where you can. Can you stop buying disposable razor cartridges made of plastic and still not be homeless? Then do so.
More like: "I want to get a job, the employer requires me to not look homeless so I have to shave my face, which means I have to buy a razor, but I've never heard of double bladed razors, or seen them being offered for sale and every store I can access that sells razors only sells plastic razors with disposable plastic razor cartridge so that's what I'll buy"
If you're lucky enough to have heard of a better alternative, and you have the means to get it, you should, but unless nearly everyone has the means, opportunity, and then does that thing, it will never force stores to change how they stock shelves.
> I've never heard of double bladed razors...
now you're jumping through flaming hoops to rationalize your excuses. I challenge you to find a man with hair on his face anywhere in the world who has never heard of single blade razors, straight razors, double blade razors, electrical razors, or trimming a beard with scissors.
" The double edged razor has become a product that you can only buy on the internet, and which you will only buy if you know that it exists."
How did you learn of this product? Have you ever seen ads for one? I only knew of them because I've seen it discussed online (in the context of "shaving club websites") but you'd be kidding yourself to think that that's something everyone would stumble on.
Electric razors are an alternative, and I've seen them in shops although they were expensive enough that it might be hard for some. I'm sure they can picked up at low prices elsewhere, but again, that will vary by location. Straight razors I've heard of (thanks to Sweeney Todd and old cartoons), but I've never once seen them for sale anywhere. I guess growing a beard with scissors is an option for workplaces that allow beards, but I wouldn't trust myself to do it well enough for a job interview. Another option might be an old fashioned barber shop too, but while I'm sure they still exist I've never seen or been to one that offered shaves.
It really all just depends so much on where you are and what you've been exposed to. When you're counting on the masses to have identical access, experience, knowledge and behavior to drive changes on store shelves I don't think you'll find much success and I don't think we have to depend on speculation there since we can see from the state of store shelves now that things have not been working out to our benefit.
Each company has their own marketing department. Public Relations is the science of manipulating desire, developed for over one-hundred years now. And they just have to focus on selling their coffee machines or whatever.
Take just one commodity as an example. A soda. They sometimes put just a little bit of salt in it to (1) mask the sweet flavor, and (2) to make you more thirsty. But you of course don’t notice any salty taste or the fact that it is unreasonably sugary because the salt and the sugar (to a point) cancel each other out. But a reasonably conscientious consumer could read the what’s-in-this-shit label, go on a message board and convince a lot of others (hundreds? thousands?s) to do a boycot campaign until all major producers start to issue “no salty business” labels on their products, so that the somewhat less conscientious consumers can pick the no-salt options without reading the what’s-in-this-crap label.
Now you just repeat the above step for all of the hundreds of items that you have to buy.
Who has time to do that on a big enough scale? No, not just on the scale of getting the bragging right of “I consume X times less than the average person”;[1] we’re talking about actually pressuring companies (with our awesome wallet power[1]) to stop producing whole lines of products.
Each company just has to sell their coffee machines or whatever else. And you just have to do wade through and make sense of the the propaganda given out by dozens/hundreds of companies, for hundreds to thousands of product lines.
[1]: Some fringe “anti-consumption” lifestyle groups does not threaten the bottom-line of any company.
[2]: Speaking of which: one can of course vote with one’s wallet. That is a form of power. But here the issue of how relative that power is painfully obvious: some (most) people have wallets (including savings) consisting of hundreds to thousands of dollars, while some people (and entities) have wallets with hundres of millions of dollars. This is not a one-person-one-vote kind of power!
I'm going online right now, telling people how I live, maybe 10 see it and say "he's right, I have to live by what I claim to believe" and make an effort to change what they do. Maybe 10000 do, maybe none. But I did this because I wanted to.
I don't care what companies do, if they don't have what I want they don't get my money. It's really that simple. We talk about marketing and propaganda, how much marketing has gone into muddying the water and poisoning the discussion just to get people to forget this one fact? If everyone just lived by their own stated rules they wouldn't be able to get away with any of this. They get away with it because we let them get away with it, by making excuses for ourselves. They want you to make these excuses you're making, convince yourself why you need their junk, convince yourself that it is insurmountable because you can control only your own behavior. You're demoralized into wanting "the collective" to change your life for you. You focus on your peers instead of yourself, and this is precisely how they can get away with what they do, because of the choices you make, because of your focus on things out of your control.
My goal isn't to save the world, my only goal is to be honest with myself and live the way I want to. And that's all it takes, everything else is excuses.
1. We can “save the planet” (whatever that means to us) by forcing companies to change: ultimately it is we who have to change because the change flows from us
2. None of this matters: it’s just about personal integrity
Because these two can be combined: if everyone just had sufficient integrity/character then we could “save the planet”. We wouldn’t be trying to do that, as individuals, but that would be the emergent result.
What I’ve been complaining about all along is just the apparent idea that we can help the environment by voting with our wallets. But if this is all about (2) then I don’t give a shit at all: I don’t care about the personal finance aspect, the frugality aspect, or the “living your values” aspect; I simply think the idea that we as consumers have more power than companies is wrong. And specifically when it comes to “saving the planet”.
But if “saving the planet” is not a concern then we are just talking past each other.
And all of that crap about “excuses” is just you projecting your living-your-values mission onto others; I don’t care, for even one second, about that stuff. At least the way you present it.
It is, by the way, funny how you think that “companies” want us to think that we are powerless. Well sure, maybe they do. But they have indeed invested money in the idea of the all-powerful consumer. The now famous “carbon footprint” was an invention by British Petroleum: the idea that we should, as individuals—always as individuals—just turn off the bathroom light and maybe not drive on Sundays. The “carbon footprint” is of course the fault of individuals, not of entities like BP. British Petroleum and you would at least agree on that much.
Maybe the perfect consumer (as far as companies are concerned) does feel powerless. But she also has to feel a sort of paradoxical guilt for using about ten planets worth of resources (if extrapolated to the human race).
And yet another trick is to reduce people to consumers (as in only that). Hence your fallacious conclusion that my line of reasoning is that people should feel powerless. But that ignores the fact that people are also citizens, and they have more potential power as citizens (political animals) compared to your don’t-tread-on-me code of conduct.
This does not make sense to me. The single biggest consumption item is living in a detached single family house with yard space (due to knock on effects of everything you consume having to travel further, including the people in your house).
I know this, and I can advocate for change such that it people are incentivized to live more densely and consume less space (drastically higher fossil fuel taxes). But that does not mean I should give up my enjoyment of resources. If everyone else is going to consume, then so am I. But if the collective decides to sacrifice, then I am signaling I am willing to also. There is no reason for someone to not live it up if the collective is not going to also sacrifice.
Throwing out 500 lbs of unnecessary plastic packaging has nothing to do with single family houses.
There is no “sustainable” world and a lifestyle that allows 8 billion people to have their own cars, fly to island vacations, and live in suburbia, with current energy transformation technology. Doing all the other things is a rounding error.
At the end of the day, the physics is simple. Moving mass a certain distance takes a certain amount of energy. Our current method of harnessing that energy results in a lot of byproducts, and we have yet to find alternatives with sufficiently better properties. Either we find that breakthrough technology, or reduce the mass and/or distance it is being moved.
If everyone thought as you do saying "Until everyone agrees to sacrifice, I won't either" then no one would ever sacrifice. Leading by example on the other hand is a proven way to help inspire change and can help avoid adding to harms caused by people who choose to live selfishly as long as they can point to anyone else also being selfish.
Housing is a subject full of complications and increased population density causes problems for the environment as well. Personally, I don't care of you live in a McMansion or a shanty town. I don't care of you buy the plastic razor with 47 blades or whatever they are up to now or switch to double bladed razors, but don't blame your selfishness on "the collective". You have no power over what they do, and they have no power over what you do. You alone are responsible for deciding for yourself what you're willing to give up in order to help the environment.
As for myself, I absolutely blame society for having a house. I live in France where class warfare is still a thing, and living in a block with people of the other ethnicity is unthinkable (they raped my goddaughter, but that’s only one example of storied - they kill gays at the train station too, so I take my car). Give me love and I’ll turn over my lavish house and happily live in a small flat, if I’m not hated for being there.
No, they don't control you, but they can influence you, just as you can influence them and their choices.
Climate change isn't solved by individual decisions because the worst of it isn't the result of an individuals choice. Corporations are primarily responsible and as individuals we are largely powerless to change their practices. That doesn't mean we can't make personal choices that reduce the harms we cause, it's just not going to solve the problem.
I have yet to visit France, but I doubt everyone there would share your view that living with people of another ethnicity is unthinkable or would by necessity result in rape. That doesn't mean you shouldn't make sensible decisions to protect your safety. If your train stations are unsafe, don't feel bad about driving a car, but you should probably be pushing for improvements to the security of your public transportation. Make choices that are good for the environment where you can. Our circumstances may limit our choices, but if we're doing our best that's all anyone can ask.
Jesus, do you live in _Banlieue 13_ or something?
"They" ("the other ethnicity", as you put it) did nothing to your goddaughter. A criminal, on the other hand, did — and I hope they are paying a high price for it.
I live in France as well, and I share a block with many ethnicities. Without exception they've been warm, welcoming people.
Quite frankly, your comment exposes your racism. C'est une honte.
If it were a "white" person that had raped his god-daughter would he be clamoring to live in a different community. Without knowing this person, I can confidently say no based on the stereotypical racism in his outlook.
Racial categories are a societal invention. They are completely made up and arbitrary which is why we should be especially intolerant of racists. Not only is it a cruel viewpoint, it's a stupid one.
A knife is a knife is a knife. But the definition of what race someone belongs to is entirely up for debate depending on where in the world they are.
The guy wasn’t in jail. Think why.
> People should be called on their bullshit.
I’m calling you on your bullshit, but only because you present it that way: You are denying that there is a widespread rivalry between two ethnicities in France, and there are real victims. Real victims on one side (including rape, murder) and mostly paper victims on the other, and you are helping this situation to happen, mostly by putting pressure on the police to not jail the culprits. It’s like foxes in a hen enclosure, where you would blame the hens for speaking up.
The real issue is islamophobia and racism especially amongst the oldest who are sadly the majority of the population and the last to vote.
There is no widespread rivalry of any kind in France. You have to live an extremely sheltered life and watch to much TV to believe that.
If I were a white person that lived in a white community that had problems with women getting raped, I'd leave. There are communities like this, and plenty of people trying to find a way out of them. If I were a brown person that lived in a brown community with these problems, I'd leave, which is why I am sympathetic to immigrants leaving their countries and going to ones where women don't get raped all the time.
Also, after reading more of this thread, I don't think he's saying "this ethnicity rapes people" necessarily, I think it's more like "when someone from this ethnicity does rape someone, they don't get punished because the judges are afraid of being wrongly called racists, so if I move away from them, at least the rapists where I move will go to jail. It's not safer because they rape less necessarily, its safer because the rapists are in prison."
But that's all beside the point. You can't fault people for generalizing, we are pattern finding creatures by nature. It's a shortcut to bettering our lives. The pattern might only be correlation and not cause, but that doesn't change the improvement we get when we make decisions based off the recognized pattern, hence the evolutionary advantage to pattern recognition. The apparent pattern might not even exist, but behaving as if it does might not cause us any detriment at all, so there's no selective pressure against it. Berating people for this doesn't solve the problem, it in fact worsens it, and if you're indeed right, then over time people will meet nice people that fall into a negative stereotype in their mind and adjust their world view accordingly, no lecture required.
Ethnicity in french is the equivalent of race in english, when we speak about human beings.
I live in the center of Lyon. The problem has grown bigger than you imagine.
> Quite frankly, your comment exposes your racism.
The one who did my goddaughter at the age of 7, I invited him home because I wasn’t racist. I couldn’t imagine they systematically raped the white girls when given the opportunity. I also couldn’t imagine police knew it and left him free despite 7 previous condemnations. He was a nice guy, met at salsa lessons, invited several people for my birthday.
Police left him free. Police left him free because the judges free them. They wouldn’t free a white guy. It’s outrageous. Police left him free!!!
You have read too much conspiracy websites I'm afraid.
Why do you want to consume because everyone else is doing so? Is the only reason you're willing to consider doing otherwise to save the world? Is life worse without the disposable products? Why are the decisions you make in your life contingent on some insurmountable, unachievable goal such as "everyone else must do it first"?
I want to live a world with as close to zero carbon footprint as possible, however, short of sacrificing all my possessions and living like a hermit, I can't do that without collective change. I've taken many steps to minimize it but it feels like the next step I take will have almost no impact while also making the quality of my life significantly worse.
I use almost no disposable products. I think the disposable products I do use once, would be floss picks and fuel for the car. I even avoid buying trash bags and just reuse grocery bags. My carbon footprint is on the order of a village dweller from a third world country, and I don't even do it because of my carbon footprint, I do it because life is better when it is simpler. I'm not a hermit, I have an active social life and an active life in general. And my life is good, better than it was when I had a bunch of things and lived in an apartment.
I don't care about carbon emissions, the collective, any of that, and I am doing vastly more for those causes than 99% of the people that lecture me about them, and my only motivator is living by my standards, being honest with myself. That's all it takes, if you care about these things live like it, if you can't be bothered to live by what you say then quite frankly shut the fuck up about it.
I re-use grocery bags for trash and use no trash bags. I reuse any disposable plastic I can, at least once. That cut's my plastic output roughly in half compared to other people around me.
I've taken to using a water pick now, so a bag of those picks takes me maybe a year to use. That's miniscule.
I don't know if you've ever been to a third world country, but plastic bags even at small street shops are all the rage. I probably dispose of less plastic than they do. And to top that off, most developing nations don't have the infrastructure to handle it, and you see the bags clogging up waterways and blowing around, it's a big problem. So the direct pollution, even if I used more plastic, doesn't compare because most of the plastic I use goes to a landfill, not the local creek that's used as a sewer.
Nobody in their right mind agrees with the state of civilization, probably at all; this is the consequence of heteronomy. So even if you're affine to laissez-faire idealities, their realities with the concentration of wealth and the fundamental aspect necessitates someone ultimately is sacrificed to turn the wheel, typically the "third world". Or any of a huge battery (probably infinite) of other similar moral concerns.
We're all culpable for the continuity of this, myself included. We need exceptional individuals to live exceptional lives more than ever, though. We need to take it upon ourselves to begin dismantling these systems and their fundamental concepts.
Most of the resources used are in the supply chain anyway.
The most environmentally friendly thing I’ve done in my life is delay replacing my totaled car.
No packaging used up for all kinds of shaving soap or cream or other products, no packaging or plastic or metal used up to buy thousands of blades, etc.
The only reason I've had to replace them so far is that it becomes impossible to buy replacement blades and foil. So I have to buy a model that is only superficially different, instead of just replacing the expendables.
You can do what the article says and just buy a double bladed razor, more environmentally friendly because you don't get stuck in this trap, the disposable part is just steel, it's easily manufactured and not proprietary. Or, you can buy the disposable parts for your electric shaver with the shaver, keeping in mind the actual, working lifespan of the device. Or, you can use a straight razor and a strop, no disposable parts necessary.
In any case, whether you agree with me or not about this detail, it's vastly less use of throwaway plastics, less use of metal, less energy use from manufacturing and delivering all that stuff, and of course, way cheaper.
I go through Mach 3 cartridges pretty slowly, so price isn't a big concern. And I don't notice anything deficient about the quality of my shaves. But one thing I really like about safety razors is that there's zero risk of serious injury.
In total I would never go back to a Mach3. The safety razor is just the all around superior product at a fraction of the price once you use it correctly.
Isnt't Mach3 a safety razor?
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safety_razor
Of course if you want to go old school:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straight_razor
Slightly more convenient, but uses a similar technique:
* https://bespokeunit.com/shaving/shavette-vs-straight-razor/
Safety razors (single/double edge) are safe by comparison to 'cut throat' straight edges, not to cartridge razors.
(Because they came first. It's like 'New' College Oxford being something like the second oldest one.)
I tried the double edge safety razor. Got the brush, shaving cream, big pack of Astra blades. Watched a bunch of YouTube videos on technique.
Spent way more time shaving. Nicked myself an ungodly number of times. Somehow got a worse shave out of it. Ended up going back to the cartridge razor.
I really want to be a double edge razor guy, but I was not able to make it up the learning curve.
I really want it to work, but it's literally a blood bath.
Maybe it's the blades?
I started with Derby Extra blades[1], and without using any special technique I've nicked myself only maybe once a year with them.
The weight of the razor might also figure in to it -- I got a Parker 66R razor[2], which has a nice heft to it, which means I don't have to press in to my face with the razor -- the weight of the razor itself is enough.
If you had a plastic and/or light-weight razor maybe you had to press in to your face, which could account for the nicks.
Could be worth trying a different set of blades. The Astra Platinum were the Reddit hive mind recommend at the time, but this was ~8 years ago.
I’m also wondering if it might be a hair thing. My facial hair is thick/coarse, particularly on the upper lip, which is where I consistently nicked myself.
Short of a several pound handle I can’t imagine cutting it with the weight of the razor alone.
Also, before starting to shave you should wet your facial hair with hot/warm water for a few minutes to soften it up. I usually wet my face as soon as I get in to my shower and shave inside the shower a few minutes later.
A straight edged razor, by contrast, is just a knife, that you actually can kill yourself with by slicing deep enough into your neck to take out a major artery. You can't do that with a safety/multi-edge razor.
The straight razor incidents were pretty traumatizing, so much blood..
Stay safe <3
Edit: I double checked, it actually was with a safety razor. They don't have any buffer to avoid slicing you up compared to a mach3 or modern disposable razor. Please do be careful folks, they are super sharp and a single swipe can cut you up real good.
(Edit: to be clear I mean the spent metal blades? Not the plastic ones...)
If feasible, re-smelting them would be superior, as it'd skip the ore-to-iron high temperature chemistry process.
Don’t get mad at me, but what you need is a 5000, 8000 and maybe 12000 grit Naniwa (or comparable) superstone. Also, a good strop. Leather would be sufficient.
Send your razor off for establishing a good edge to Portland Razor Co. Once you get it back, you should be able to maintain that edge with minimal fuss.
Carbon steels can get sharper but you need to be really on top of it on maintenance. Stainless steel is more durable and tolerates some abuse but does not retain edge as well.
Lastly, don’t hurry while shaving, and don’t drop the damn razor please.
Source: Guilty as charged.
Also guilty: I did start growing a beard after dropping my favorite razor :/
Like 1200 before every shave? 800 once a week? Etc...? Do you ever need to go back to a coarser one?
Do you ever re-flatten your stones, or buy new ones? How often?
Remember that you keep a razor sharp by using the pasted strop and having a good maintenance routine. After a while the cutting edge becomes more convex, which is where the stone is needed to straighten out.
A coticule is flattened on every use, because you rub a smaller stone on it to create the milky suspension that will do the actual abrading. I've had the same stone for 20 years.
Quality of shave. If you maintain your straight razor, and mind it, it does require some maintenance, the quality of shave is of no comparison. My wife can instantly make out the difference when I shave in a hurry with Mach 3.
Shavettes have lower maintenance and are very similar to straights:
* https://bespokeunit.com/shaving/shavette-vs-straight-razor/
A safety razor is also a great investment and cheap. I bought a Wilkinson Sword handle $20 and a pack of five blades $5. It's an old name-brand sold practically everywhere. I can get more than a month out of one double-sided blade. Plus it shaves very close much better than multi-blade razors.
It's better than the two, three, four, five blade monstrosities that always get clogged in days. They also cost far too much literally 5x more than safety razor blades.
I've invested to a couple of stainless steel safety razors. An Edwin Jagger 3one6, and a Mühle R94. They're easy to maintain, have infinite life, and shave much better than top of the line cartridge razors from any manufacturer.
I also use a good but not expensive boar brush and shaving soap.
As a result, I either buy a new stick of shaving soap every six months, or a can of foam every year (for emergency morning shaves), and buying 100 blades every 2 years or so, for a much cleaner, comfortable and enjoyable shave for negligible money. Both razors have paid themselves as savings too.
Just want to warn that both razors are in the "efficient" category, which means they need some experience to use without any nicks, but they're not as wild as the open-combed, aggressive razors. If you want a milder, but equally long-living razor, go Mühle R89, Edwin Jagger EJ89, Merkur 34HD or Timor Gentle Butterfly.
I sharpen my own knife and woodworking tools. So learning to sharpen my razor is no big deal.
Now my only expense is occasionally buying some soap or aftershave once a year or so. And my time I suppose maintaining the razor which isn’t much at all.
Definitely not the case for me. As someone whose been recently exploring properly sharpening some high quality kitchen knives at home, there's a cost in time for sure to do things correclty both learning and executing. Once you learn, it's not too bad but there's a learning curve and time factor that's difficult to ignore. I need to set aside a good hour or 1.5 hours on a given weekend to sharpen my knives (find and soak my soap stone, gather my knives, get back my angles and motions down pat).
I'm still a novice for sure and an expert may be able to sharpen quickly but that's a big difference from just grabbing a new disposable product ready to use. With a straight razor a certain amount of care also needs to be taken when shaving to reduce cuts -- safety razors aren't a bad invention overall. I suspect if you do a lot of regular shaving (e.g. body hair that's not just your face), it might become time consuming.
I'm not saying reuse and repair are bad investments, I'm a huge fan of these ideals, but the time involved can't be entirely ignored for some consumer products. In many (perhaps most) cases, I agree with the thesis of the article that modern business practices are becoming increasingly misaligned from consumers and societies interests and becoming nothing but wealth extraction optimization factories in various forms. But, I think not all products are so clear cut and some legitimate progresses are not reasonable tradeoffs for everyone, like a safety razor (maybe not cartridge based but similar to the one described in this article). Now a safety razor for a cartridge is a pretty close set of advantages/disadvantages with clear cost savings.
I only have to sharpen my straight razor maybe twice a year at most.
Kitchen knives depends on use but a typical sharpening is 15 minutes maybe? I might do this 3 - 4 times a year.
I do woodworking with hand tools which need to be sharpened far more often and that is fairly time consuming... but so is making wood projects from hand tools. I consider it part of the process.
If we get to fully economic decision making the case can be made to prefer convenience over all else because of paperclip maximization. Instead of buying organic clothes made by hand and spending the time to maintain and repair them we prefer fast-fashion. It's cheaper in time and money to simply buy a brand new shirt. Along with the many other benefits it entails.
But that has a cost too, doesn't it? Landfills chock full of disposed-of clothes, beaches covered in cables of clothes that have washed up on shore, and they're mostly made of oil-based products and will take centuries to degrade. People with families and children literally starving and wrecking their bodies in sweat shops to produce these throw-away, convenient, cheap clothes.
Some times taking time to do things the slow, inconvenient way has a lot of benefits too that are not immediately obvious until we take a step back and stop trying to be in such a rush.
The only bad thing about it is that it makes flying with just a carry-on impossible.
I still spend a not insignificant ~$250/yr on blades and shaving cream to shave face and head daily.
I admittedly don't shave every day, but I've been using a safety razor since 2013. I went back and tallied up all of the purchases for materials, including my razor, and I believe I've spent a little over $200 for that entire period, so maybe $25/year.
I have coarse hair, so that dulls the blade faster. And shaving a whole head probably counts as like three face shaves (in terms of both blades and shaving soap.)
For soap I use Proraso (which is cheap) or Taylor of Old Bond Street (unscented - they call it "organic" - which is not cheap.)
In the past I stretched blades and spent far less, but the experience was not as enjoyable.
I spent $15 on 200 double-edged safety razor blades a couple of years ago, and have used maybe 50 of them from shaving every-other-day.
At this rate that $15 in blades should last me 4 years.
Which is why it might as well be the pro-Gillette marketing zeitgeist. Too easy to turn away from something under the assumption you'll just get sucked into it and waste a lot of money. Another good example of this is the fountain pen community. As a total outsider, I was actually under the impression that a fountain pen cost well over $100 and was difficult to maintain and write with. I happened to randomly look into it one day only to discover that some very well regarded pens are only $30 or so, write well on almost everything, and will last for years of high quality writing.
If some people want to turn it into a hobby where they obsess over badger hair brushes and so on, that's also fine. Nobody is ever forced to buy that sort of stuff.
All marketing tries to mislead people to spend money on "unnecessary" stuff. That's what people mostly spend their disposable income on. And Americans have tons and tons of disposable income, so they are good targets for marketing. I don't see the same thing in Germany for example as people are generally more careful with their money and don't have ginormous amounts of it like Americans (look up the disposable incomes). For example, you're (assuming you're American) also getting screwed by the mattress industry.
Lay it on us, jrootabega. Whence comes these?
I fell for this marketing thinking non-stick was the best out of everything always and kept having to buy new pans and trays when the teflon would eventually flake off thinking it was my fault. Stainless steel is fine: works without a lot of food sticking for most things, comes out clean from the dishwasher, doesn't require much care, and there's no easily damaged coating so should last decades.
Related but more because of recipes writers repeating tips without considering waste, but I find there's almost zero need for tinfoil, wax paper or plastic wrap either. A reusable silicone mat works if you need a non-stick surface or to cover a dish or bowl, and you can reuse food plastic containers to store things in the fridge. Most e.g. bread recipes insist on putting plastic wrap over the bowl of dough when proving when you can just use a plate, silicone mat or dish towel.
Like fine, feel free to use less plastic, but it really isn't a big portion of most people's resource consumption.
So, I can do my best on areas which I have most control, and do whatever I can on the areas with less control, and if you ask me, it's better than nothing.
Once you've done this you should also avoid detergent, dishwasher and acid (tomato sauce). Again - just like a cast iron skillet. Which is a shame because it's easy to believe one of the benefits with a steel pan is that it is convenient to pop into the dishwasher.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilkinson_Sword#Stainless_stee...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gillette#Super_Blue_and_the_Wi...
But there are Problems.
1. You can’t find powder anywhere. Not a single grocery store near me sells it. Gel, sure. Pods, sure. Powder, not even Wal-mart had it, and they have everything. I finally found a faded and dented box at an Ace Hardware, where I wasn’t even looking for it.
2. The pour spout is a pain in the butt to open. I don’t have long nails (due to a very bad habit), and it takes me dozens of seconds every time to open.
3. A single clump makes it even more annoying. Now you have to figure out how to break the clump (because it’s blocking the spout), or you have to shake the box for a long time.
4. Speaking of shaking. If you get too much powder in the cracks around the dispenser, it won’t close anymore! Now you have to figure out how to get the powder out of the cracks before you can close and run the machine.
I’m sure it’s cleaning my dishes a little better, but I am not going to buy another box of powder. The marginal convenience of the pods is much higher than Alec claims. I’m going back to the product that I can actually buy in enormous bulk at Costco.
Some dishwashers don't even work well with non-powders.
1. Easily available at every grocery store for half the price of pods
2. I just leave the spout open and it's fine
3. It doesn't clump
4. Occasionally the door does fail to close but I quickly brush it off
The dishes are perfectly clean after a normal program, whereas the pods required me to use a three hour power wash program for the same result.
https://www.walmart.com/ip/Great-Value-Automatic-Dishwasher-...
https://www.target.com/p/lemon-scented-dish-detergent-powder...
Maybe you were looking during peak shortages?
In particular, it's critical to ensure the washing arms can rotate freely, something my flatmates (some of whom are engineers) will never understand no matter how many times I try to explain it to them! Otherwise the dishes will come out looking clean-ish but actually smelly and not properly clean.
All dishwashers seem to have a reservoir for salt but of course people only tend to use it in regions where it's needed.
It's been estimated that Elon Musk's time, for example, is worth around $22,000 per minute. So if he's wasting 7 seconds messing around with his dishwasher, that's a lost opportunity cost of $2566.
When the strip wears off the shaves get a bit uncomfortable while that stuff peels off but then they start to feel better again after that. A friend of mine actually hates the strip so much that she scrapes it off brand new razor cartridges before using them for the first time! I think the discomfort caused by the worn out lubricating strip is a subtle push by Gillette to get people to toss the cartridge and start a new one before the blades have even begun to dull.
On the other hand I experienced blades that were unusable or even oxidized after 2-3 uses.
That said for as often as I shave, a couple times a week, I switched to a safety razor and got a sampler of double sided blades years ago. I am just about out of blades now and you can get 100 for like 10$.
More info here: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/is-mineral-oil-bad...
Relevant excerpt:
> When highly refined, mineral oils do not cause any adverse effects. However, if the petroleum is not highly refined, it may include polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), which are carcinogenic. This means it may increase the risk of cancer.
> A 2019 article notes that in Europe, companies are only allowed to use mineral oils in cosmetics if they comply with specific purity regulations regarding PAHs. These regulations and safety requirements ensure that the mineral oils go through the refining process to remove any substances that may cause cancer and reduce the presence of PAHs.
> However, according to the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, the mineral oils used in the United States are not as refined as they are in Europe.
> As a result, people should avoid buying products that contain mineral oil unless the label states that it is fully refined as white petrolatum or white mineral oil. White mineral oil is highly purified and meets specifications to ensure that it is safe to use in over-the-counter products.
I really wish you could purchase them without the lubricating strip. I have no proof but strongly suspect they encourage microbial growth and contribute to skin irritation.
So water hardness can make a big difference in how long they last.
I expect it would be difficult to consistently replicate the factory edge.
I get that they have some downsides, but if we’re talking about the expense/waste of straight razors, then it would make sense to consider electric razors.
I’ve seen so many ads about companies trying to “invent” the most effective, lowest cost straight razor and it still confuses me, given we already have electric razors that will last literally years before needing to be replaced.
I’ve been using my current electric razor for probably close to 10 years, and while the blades could probably use to be replaced (still on the original), they get the job done about 98%, which is completely fine given the expense, waste, and mess of straight razors.
Edit: the article itself doesn’t even mention electric razors (as a solution to the expense/waste of straight razors), almost as if they don’t even exist. And before I posted this (after 3 hours of comments), maybe only one or two other buried comments referenced electric razors. So genuinely curious why so many don’t even give them a second thought?
Unless you are concerned with getting the closest shave possible, electric seems the obvious choice.
There are some really fantastic electric razors that are cheap and get close enough that it makes no visual difference, except they don't cut the hairs under the skin so I haven't had an ingrown hair in years and years.
Blades cost $0.25 each and I use about 10 a year.
Much better than $15/mo I was spending for cartridge razors. I’ll never go back.
But I've also had it several years and the technology I'm sure constantly improves.
I switched to electric years ago and will never go back.
You don't actually need shaving cream to shave with a non-electric razor. You could just use soap -- which is hopefully available wherever you travel.
You also don't need electricity.
Now I recently purchased a very expensive version (comparatively) and it does the same job.
Technique will eliminate ingrown hairs/cuts etc,
The exfoliation provided by using a razor (disposable, safety, or straight) is something some people find desirable (see also microblading) YMMV
Time and effort is more interesting to me. For me the time spent shaving (and on other parts of self care) is part of the value of shaving in the first place. This isn't a process that I choose to speed up
As for travelling, I use a soap puck rather than shaving foam or cream, so TSA doesn't care about that, blades are more of a crap shoot.
[1] https://leafshave.com — I use one of these for armpits and back hair, and then a traditional style merker for face
> (expense, waste, time/effort, mess, cuts/removing skin, ingrown hairs).
Eh, shaving isn't that hard. I know we've gotten lazy but holy crap. A DE shave never results in any of that for me. Shower, lather, apply, shave. 5 minutes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdyU9qItBMA
It could be done faster too, because he does a lot of stuff that is unnecessary.
I have a DE razor and am using it for the weekend or other special occasions only because the fast way is too fast for my skin and beard (beard is like steel...). I need it properly prepared and that takes more time than I want to spend in the morning on normal days. I use an electric one than.
And I mean, why not? I quite enjoy to take some time if I don't have to wake up early for it. I listen to my audiobook and do it properly.
Actually these came with a trimmer on each side of the foil which you need when taking down a full bush, but I remove these and just use the foil.
It takes a lot of passes but I have plenty of time while traveling.
Brush & blow it out completely every time.
I tried reversing the procedure and shaving before I left for work, but the cast-iron skillet proved about as useful as tits on a bull while commuting.
Fortunately, the lady who gave me the shaver and the skillet decided not to use them while commuting herself, so here I am the lucky one.
I've tried using electric, even expensive ones few times in my life but had always ended up with skin irritation starting to develop. No soup for me ;(
Both Philips, only got rid of the first one as it got broken by being knocked off a high shelf.
The idea of shaving being expensive, just seems ... odd.
So the idea that "shaving is getting expensive" strikes me as silly; I'm sure you could spend thousands if you wanted to, but that's a choice.
[1] I tried a Braun "wet or dry" shaver, but one drop in the shower was the end of that "upscale purchase".
The only thing that works well are multi blade cartridges or two passes with a double edged razor (never tried a straight razor).
I shave my head as well as my face, and I’ve only gone through two razors in 15 years. I’m only a couple years into using the second one.
The first one I actually broke down, cleaned, and partially repaired several times. I replaced wiring that had corroded and had to replace small parts. I suppose I might be on my third by now if I couldn’t repair stuff.
They do the job quickly and make it so a regular razor is easier to use if you want that close of a shave. I rarely care that much because the electric gets almost indiscernibly close by my standards
You can also use it to give yourself a buzz cut, if you're so inclined, and save even more money.
But the marginal gain in closeness I get from a wet shave versus the method mentioned above, when paired with cost, razor burn / irritation / breakouts, and cuts, doesn't seem worth it to me.
The post doesn’t even mention straight razors [1].
Also, I’m not sure electric razors are the less wasteful solution. Any electric appliance is likely to be much more environmentally costly to manufacture than a simple gadget. It certainly can’t compare with safety razors (or double-edged razors, as called in the article).
I won’t comment on the convenience of electric razors. My very limited experience with them (and not only mine) is that they don’t work on all beards, or if you don’t shave every day.
I've been using a safety razor for years and figured I was getting a pretty good deal out of it. Then a few months ago I reached into my travel bag without looking and sliced my finger open badly; the resulting stitches and tetanus shot came out to about $200, probably wiping out whatever money I'd saved by using them.
I still think it's a good deal.. if you're careful.
I also switched away from a DE when I shave in the shower. I'm too afraid of dropping a heavier handle with a sharp blade attached.
I still much prefer DE/safety over cartridge.
I'm not sure how I'll pack my razor next time (the time I cut myself was the last time I traveled) but I'll have to change how I do things going forward. Maybe I'll put the whole thing into one of those plastic clamshell soap containers, although that would be a bit bulky.
One subtle problem I've noticed with shaving in the shower is whisker splinters. Twice (both times during the pandemic, after not shaving for two or three weeks) I've gotten a whisker embedded into the bottom of my foot and didn't figure out what the strange pain was until a few hours later when it worked itself in deep enough that I couldn't ignore it anymore. I think this only happens if I've let my hair grow too long, so now I avoid this.
https://getrockwell.com/products/rockwell-genuine-leather-sh...
I use a straight razor now. The initial cost was high and there's a learning curve, but comfort is great ongoing costs are minimal: shaving soap (much cheaper than anything that comes in a can, even for premium options) and cubic boron nitride paste for my strop (this is not conventional).
This blog post is about industry shoving wasteful and overpriced new trends down our throats, not about the best way to shave.
It definitely gets a close shave, and it's my go to for traveling, but I just can't stomach paying like $22 CAD for a tiny blade.
I'm hoping for a quality cheap alterative from AliExpress soon.
I do it once a week. I have a full 5 o’clock shadow on the first day and a pretty short beard on the last, but I don’t like how much of a waste of time shaving or trimming is so I deal with it.
But IMO, as with many of the other things mentioned in the blog post, the "additional hassle" to stay out of such closed ecosystems is often worth it. It's a nice experience and I can absolutely recommend the DE / safety razor. Also try different blades from different manufacturers, there are real differences between them :D
(In German it's called "Sicherheitsrasierer", literally security razor, mixed that up)
Plus, nothing wakes you up in morning like potentially cutting yourself
The big win was using an alum block - disinfects and seals nicks quickly, and styptic pencils (same thing but stronger).
It is maybe a little less foolproof than a Mach 3, but it's pretty close. Looks shiny too.
This was true -- in about 2010. My local CVS has three or four DE razor models available plus packs of blades, and has for several years now; it's been interesting to watch the market switch.
I stopped razor-shaving a while ago, and just use a corded trimmer without a guard to set neck and cheeklines when i trim the rest of my beard.
edit:
In fact, a lot of examples listed in this piece have a similar pushback story. This is encouraging!
- cast iron pans are ridiculously available, cheap, and heavily marketed.
- shaving soap pucks (and bar shampoo, upscale bar soap, etc.) over body wash are pretty hyped at the moment.
- 2.5 kilo bags of loose-leaf brand teas are available widely (taylor's of harrowgate, etc) as well as from more specialty shops.
- everyone i know shits on pod coffee machines (though they are widely used, alas; some shifts towards compostable pods have been made)
- retrogrouch cycling, which never left, has been boosted with "party pace" cycling advocates. eTAP is certainly here to stay, but quality mechanical components are and will remain widely available.
smart TVs, food deserts, and bullshit food subscription services are harder to rebut :/
Definitely not "you can only buy on the internet".
[1] https://www.walmart.com/ip/van-der-Hagen-Stainless-Steel-Dou...
The problem would arise if the more convenient choice also externalized in some way: if it hurt other people, or the planet, and so on. There is some vague idea that throwing away a cartridge "produces more waste" than throwing away a razor blade alone, which may be true, but the difference between them seems like a trivial amount, as does for that matter the total share of waste from all shaving cartridges put together.
In other words, I don't see the harm; shave however you want.
Trying to do approximate math for this is difficult and the difference seems small but greater than trivial. The larger point raised by the author is that the more packaging, dyes, adverts, etc. that a product has associated with it, the more likely a consumer is to buy it(??), and each step of the marketing-to-consumer pipeline costs more environmentally and energetically.
This is not a condemnation of advertising or marketing. In order to sell an environmentally-conscious product, you still need to sell the product.
It might seem impossible but there probably are long-term solutions to much of consumer waste. We aren't even really trying that hard overall to cut down on this and amazon et al are world leaders in packaging and return waste. There might not be easy answers but even partially solving the consumer packaging problem would cut down on landfill/recycling use.
It's a good thought exercise to imagine how you would sell razor blades without any packaging.
Cartridge and (quality) safety razors don't last the same amount of time. The additional plastic on a cartridge doesn't seem like much, but when you look at the millions of cartridges disposed in a year, it certainly adds up. Compare the packaging and space of 100 safety razors to 100 cartridges and you'll see an enormous difference. This all stacks up to a bigger impact in packing, shipping, etc.
Not to mention the disposable whole-stick razors that some people use (those are terrible).
You also don't provide any data to back up your claim that the total share of waste from all cartridges is trivial. You can't just hand wave this away so easily.
Once people have forgot about the less-convenient alternatives, they can't accurately price convenience anymore and will just pay whatever is the market rate for the convenience product (be it coffee pods or razor cartridges).
At some point I decided to do some research and settled on double edge disposable blades.
I've never been happier, and feel much better about my skin too. These are the products I use:
* A wooden synthetic shaving brush (I felt bad about the beavers)
* Taylor of Old Bond St shaving cream. It lasts forever.
* A ceramic lathering bowl
* Floris after shave. Also lasts forever
* Jagen David B40 (make sure to get a butterfly version, they're much more convenient)
* Derby blades (I bought a bulk of 500 blades for like £30 quid, and I'm only halfway through using them after many years).
Now I probably spend less than £40 per year replacing shaving cream and after shave, having had to spend that amount monthly on disposable blades, and that terrible canned cream, and I hardly ever get any cuts anymore. And my shave is much closer.
Besides these products look great in the bathroom.
I ended up coming across the idea to try this on Art of Manliness about a decade ago and probably never would have thought to try it otherwise. https://www.artofmanliness.com/style/shaving/how-to-shave-wi...
The brush my father gave me aged 16 had an alum block built into the handle. I don't see brushes like that any more. I bought an alum block 2" x 1" from a barbershop for about £10; it never seems to get any smaller. In the east you can buy lumps of alum in souks and bazaars for almost nothing.
As well as being a styptic, alum doubles as an antiperspirant.
I still use electric. But the trick is to buy a beard trimmer. Trim beard with that, gets you to pretty short stubble, then you use electric shaver to go clean shaven if you want. I actually have found stubble to short beard to be ideal spot for me.
Beaver fur is for hats; good shaving brushes are badger (I'm sure that's what you meant).
And an electric shaver for the days I'm too lazy. With both methods, it's fast and convenient.
I can't understand why anybody would waste so much money and then complain.
The Internet claims this type of shaving is best, not just in terms of cost and enviromental impact, but that it reduces irritation and produces a closer shave.
After using a double edge razor for over five tears now, let me dubunk these claims. They are 100% grade bullshit. They don't produce a closer shave, not even close, and they are way, way, harsher on my skin than Gillette disposables. Maybe my skill in using them just sucks, and for other people these claims are true, but here's the thing, the Gillette cartridges are foolproof. They are more convenient in every way, you can actually fly with them, and you can use cheap shaving foams instead of hard to get shaving soap. And of course, they are much, much quicker to use. I can shave with disposables in less than five minutes, but using my double edge razor takes me around 20 minutes.
I still use my double edge razor because I like the feeling of accomplishement I get after I manage to get a decent shave with such a primitive technology, but anyone who claims double edge razors are "better" is simply insane.
To be honest, this is a negative point, because it takes time to experiment with blades, and it's extremely unlikely you will be able to find your favorite blades when you travel somewhere.
Practice undoubtedly helps, how much more more can I practice. I shave every other day. In fact, when I used disposables I shaved every day, and I wish I could still do that, but double edge blades are too harsh on my skin to be able to do that. After I shave, I need a day to heal. And this is with special creams and balms and alum blocks. With disposables I didn't even need to use any kind of after shave treatment at all.
I also prefer Feather blades the most but they are expensive compared to rest. When i was looking for alternative funnily enough the next sharpest (and a lot cheaper) was... Gillette blades. They have few different lines and some of them come close to Feather. Now i am torn when buying blades if i cheap out and buy Gillette or go for Feather... (95% of time i support the Japanese :))
Then there is the actual using of the thing. Go ahead and shave with one of those box cutter razors. The first couple of times your sink will look like bloody murder and even after that you need to be careful. I don't want to think about technique. I barely heed grain. With a cartrige I can even use just hot water in a pinch and mash the thing against my face and get an OK shave in not very long. I'm paying extra sure, a dozen dollars a year I guess, but I get the convenience of speed and being able to have the sloppiest shaving technique imaginable and not walk out with a dozen globs of tp fused to my bleeding face.
Nonetheless, I often go a week between shaves nowadays and this seems to be much more socially acceptable than used to be the case.
As a bonus, mineral oil is a decent shave gel on its own, though it can be difficult to wash out the whiskers and gunk from multi blade razors.
As an aside, I'm pretty sure they are incrementally tweaking the chemistry of the blade-front indicator to break down more rapidly, which destroys the uniformity of the leading edge. IMHO older cartridges actually last longer. If you find a stash in the developing world or some other slow-moving place, buy them.
However, reading your comment, I wonder if my Mach III blades (purchased in India) are different in the metal composition from what I would purchase now in the USA.
Just wished that more people saw, understood, and voted with their wallets - the world would be a less costly place (both to ourselves, and the planet).
I make a decent living now, and I use Harry's razors. Could I use and change the cheaper disposable ones more often? Sure. Is Harry's quality worth paying for so that I nick my face less? Very much so. I don't really need to be told they're "out to get me". I'm a big boy who can do simple price math.
- glass smartphones - the iPhone X and Pixel 3 are all in a unibody of glass that is very fragile despite all gorilla glass marketing bullshit. The result is that we have to use plastic bumpers. We could have just stayed with plastic/aluminum frames that allowed to open the back and replace the battery. Glass unibody smartphones are made to last less and be less repairable. I'm sick of this and next phone I'll get a Fairphone https://www.fairphone.com/ and I purchased a Nokia 105 for 25$ whose battery last 35 DAYS on standby as backup.
The trick on the latter is that I discovered I can keep a single one of Target's store brand Mach3-compatible cartridges going for 3-ish months. This was due to a combination of tricks I had already been using to keep Mach3 blades going for a while (dry after use, store in a dry place, strop before use), plus the more recent discovery that Target's generic blades are higher quality and greater durability, at a fraction of the price.
With double edge blades, on the other hand, I can get two shaves out of one, tops, before it starts to give me nicks. I've tried stropping these blades, too, but without much success.
So that works out to me being able to get about 2 years' worth of shaves for about US$7 with the cartridge razor. I'm not sure what the exchange rate is right now, but I think that works out to about 1/3 of the £10/yr that the author calculated for safety razor blades.
(On the other hand, I can definitely get a better shave out of the DE razor.)
E.g. some here are saying "multi-blade cartridges are easier and faster" ... which is true. Users of old-fashioned safety razors often have a little learning curve when they adopt, and have to be a bit more careful even after they've on-boarded. But that ease of use doesn't come from the cartridge per se -- it's from the multiple blades and pivoting head. Recognizing this allows for the possibility of low-waste multi-blade pivoting-head safety razors (e.g. leafshave.com but I think they're not alone).
Lower cost-per-use and lower waste doesn't have to get rolled up with some nostalgic return to products as they existed decades ago. But I think both consumers and systemic corrections (e.g. we should tax externalities associated with waste streams, and with carbon) need to nudge companies away from making disposable or short-lived products.
I was using a standard safety razor for a while, but I started shaving my head and quickly abandoned the safety razor for obvious reasons.
This looks like a great product that's both eco-friendly and affordable.
"Well understood mechanical bike shifting transitions to electronic shifting which requires you to pay more and charge your pedal bike (Not sure about this example, as in theory a bike derailleur needs not be a repeated purchased)"
One of my bikes has a Shimano electronic shifter. The others are a mix between mechanical SRAM and Shimano components. The electronic shifter has two advantages that mean something to me. First, you never have to deal with "cable stretch" whereby the alignment gradually shifts off-center and you have to use the micro-adjustment knob to re-align. It starts out perfect, and it stays perfect. Second, "oops" shifting (i.e., failing to shift before you've hit a hill and have to shift at low a RPM while applying force to stay moving) is much smoother. Those are both real advantages to me.
The problem I've run into, at least with the Shimano electronic shifter, is durability. Both the front and rear derailleurs have failed on me mid-ride for different reasons. The front because there's a part that pushes against a plate when up-shifting, and that fatigued to the point of snapping off completely after a couple of years of use. The rear because of a minor slide-out. Some sensitive part broke in the mechanism, and the entire thing had to be replaced. I've slammed plenty of mechanical rear derailleurs into the pavement or a tree stump or whatever, and they've all survived just fine, so long as the hangar was intact. I've even subjected a mechanical rear derailleur to the dreaded "get caught in the rear wheel spokes" abuse, and it came through just fine after replacing the hanger.
I've never forgotten to charge the battery, but I've heard of people on longer group rides (think 70+ miles) losing the ability to shift when they're 40 miles out into the countryside because their battery died.
The electronic shifter just seems much more fragile to me. But it's a really nice shifting experience while it works!
All that said, my N+1 bike I just picked up last weekend has mechanical shifters. I'll adjust the knob when the cable stretches and deal with the occasional "oops" when I hit hills in the wrong gear because I value durability and robustness more.
What era Di2 did you have that failed?
Whatever Trek was shipping on their Domane line in 2017.
I just flip the bike and dial in the adjustment by eye and spinning the crank. Assuming the derailleur isn't bent, this is usually just about perfect.
I get what you're saying about power being a variable in adjustment, I just haven't found that it's a concern for me. Maybe MTB drivetrains have less flex/are less succeptible to that, or I'm just too unsophisticated to realize :)
Who knows? I cannot possibly be the only male here who disputes this math. I have a Gillet razor, one with a fancy 5-blade rotating head. It also has a silly vibrator that I am too afraid to use. The blades last forever. Not 15 shaves. More like 150 or more. I have to shave literally every morning, often in a hurry and without shaving cream (military). But I never have any issues. I think that the last time I switched out the blade might have been September of last year when. I had dropped it on concrete and damaged the plastic head. The blades were still fine. The metallurgy behind these things is frankly astonishing.
Might need a new set of blades after a couple decades.
The cord annoys me though, but cordless will definitely not last as long.
[1] https://i.etsystatic.com/21375310/r/il/668221/3688482515/il_...
maybe, but many men have decided not to shave anymore anyway
> about gillette and co
I have used both the "disposable" blades (that barely last a week) and the more robust ones that last a month (proper razor blades), and the thing is, the shaving experience is completely difference. The proper razor blades are very sharp and can result in cuts if you are not careful, whereas it's fairly difficult to cut yourself with a Gilette or Schick for that matter. They work in very different dimensions. It's almost not the same product.
I might just be clumsy, but even after using a safety razor for about a year, I still occasionally cut myself, and due to the nature of the blade, the nicks tended to be much deeper.
The "cartridge razors are a scam, safety razors are better in every way" line has always been a little silly. Like you said, they are really different products with different pros and cons. Being able to take my razor onto a plane is a big plus for longer trips. Safety razors are much cheaper, more efficient, and better for the environment, but you're losing out on convenience and idiot-proofness.
is a solid product that I've been using over 15 years
As for the rest of the article:
> Cooking equipment: essentially indestructible Cast Iron skillets transition into teflon pans. The newer pans perform worse, and must be replaced on a shockingly regular basis. They also seem to be poisonous.
No, no, and no. Teflon pans perform wonderfully, are replaced maybe every 10-20 years depending on workmanship if you don't scratch them up with metal utensils, and are not poisonous unless you're eating the flakes from your scratched up pans.
> Nespresso machines, and other coffee pod brands, replace many styles of coffee brewing. Provide much worse coffee, at a higher price but are superficially convenient.
They produce good coffee in many styles that would normally require a lot of work, and are MASSIVELY convenient. Press a button and a couple of minutes later, your cup of coffee is ready to drink.
> Televisions moving from being screens which accept input, to self contained 'smart' devices that require software updates and thus have a shortened useful lifespan.
Their lifespan is unchanged. You can continue to use them as "dumb" screens using HDMI input and plug in an external device. You can also buy a smart TV and never connect it to the internet.
> In many inner city shops it is now hard to buy an individual piece of fruit.
For some fruit maybe, but if the point is saving money, why are you buying individually?
> Subscription services like Hello Fresh, where you can pay well over the odds to have some vegetables delivered to you.
So buy them from the market like we've been doing forever. If you're lazy and rich, use these delivery services. You have choice.
> For some fruit maybe, but if the point is saving money, why are you buying individually?
Because fruit rots.
Plenty of produce doesn’t last a week from when you buy it and this varies based on where and when you buy it.
As an example, a few apples might last for over a week. A package of raspberries might last 4 days. An avocado that is ripe may last 2 days.
If you do happen to scratch the pan, surely the resulting flake is very likely to go into the food, and you’re then very likely to eat it?
But then again I use wooden and silicone utensils.
The safety problem with Teflon is when it is overheated. Don't heat a pan without anything in them, because then the Teflon will decompose into some really toxic chemicals. Good news is that water boils at 100C, an even the highest smoke-point oils decompose at 250C. Teflon only begins to deteriorate at 260C, and only full-on decomposes at 350C.
No, even aside from the smart thing, modern panels don't last nearly as long as CRTs.
They are so much better in every other way, though.
The newer panels are nicer but since this is a 19" and they don't make nice 19" panels anymore I can't upgrade them. (I also have a 27" Dell Ultrasharp--it's superior, but it doesn't come in 19" and 19" has the largest pixels--nice for older eyes.)
That does not mean that the smart features will not work tirelessly against your attempt to use the device as a dumb display. Menus you don’t want, EULA prompts that cover almost the entire UI, and weird spottiness in the CEC support that one can only assume is designed to fuck with you. And it’s buggy! It’s really buggy. On one of my TVs, I have to hold the power button down to entirely reboot it frequently for it to see the HDMI signal on one of my outputs. Otherwise.. it just sits on a gray screen. Sometimes I also get a loading spinner (!?) or, despite it having been set up for about a year, a “detecting device, please wait” message. I have manually set the type of device to PC on both of the TWO HDMI ports (yes, two, hope you have your own HDMI switch.)
Of course, there’s no convenient way to hook up speakers to these modern marvels of technology. At least not the speakers you already own. If you want to stick to what the manufacturer wants, you need an HDMI ARC port and a soundbar: a worse speaker that sounds like shit and costs more and sometimes might only fully work with some TVs. It eats an entire HDMI port, though some of them provide it back to you less conveniently.
I see your optimism, and I raise my burning inferno of rage towards smart TVs.
Take the time to test your devices, and return them if they don't meet your needs. I've also had CRTs in the past that disappointed and I had to return. Fortunately, these modern TVs are light enough for one person to move.
Now of course I can return my Samsung TVs, but I do test my devices somewhat, and Samsung seems to have the best overall TVs, looking at aspects like value, panel quality, latency in game mode, etc. Other models I’ve tried (Vizeo, whatever the hell Best Buy sells generically) have been very disappointing. Sony screens are probably much better, but cost an absolute FORTUNE.
You get what you pay for.
My only real option is to have a monitor and use that as a TV. But aside from a lot of other downsides, like no TV remote and a UX not designed to handle TV use cases, and builtin speakers that are just embarrassing, large monitors are also horridly expensive and the most likely to have extremely bad problems (like the horrible backlight bleed on some of the larger screen options from ViewSonic.)
This is all getting very silly though. We went from a market where you got what you paid for to well,… this. You can get what you paid for… kind of, if you don’t care about certain things and do fairly thorough research. And sure. I can try to dilligently pick an option that works best for me. The average consumer is getting completely fucked, however, and they are the ones driving all of the demand.
JVC and Panasonic produced garbage CRTs and VCRs and DVD players and stereo equipment for years, but they sold like hotcakes because they were cheap. You had to choose carefully what to buy, and make sure the place had a decent return policy just in case. There were some brands with good reputations, others that were hit-or-miss, and some just plain garbage. Now is no different.
FWIW I bought the Samsung and the Sharp online through Amazon (because they have a good return policy). I returned the Samsung and kept the Sharp.
Yes. That’s not the market today. If we were talking about truly cheap TVs, I’d be talking about Insignia and subsidized crap like FireTV. I’m talking about Samsung TVs with “quantum dot technology” and whatever other yahoo crap.
Back then, you could most definitely buy any decent Samsung CRT and be confident it wasn’t going to suck. Hell, the model of Samsung CRT TV I had as a kid is now often used for RGB modding because of its excellent picture quality and the fact that they’re mostly still around and working great. Was it expensive at the time? No. It wasn’t.
Certainly if you bought a Trinitron back in the day you knew you weren’t getting ripped off. Is it the same with Sony Bravia? I’m not willing to incinerate money at a high enough rate to find out, but the fact that it comes with Android TV stock makes me unhopeful. My car comes with Android 4.2 and that’s aged about as well as polio by this point.
The market today for consumer electronics is completely ass. Not only do the cheap options suck ridiculously badly, even the expensive options are hard to stomach.
The wet razor is much more convenient than the plastic waste. No to mention the enormous environmental cost of slight inconvenience
For you perhaps. I cannot handle the weight as easily, and there are a lot of extra steps to keep it clean which need handling (especially over a sink). Extrapolate to the whole population and you can see why there is a market for them.
They're light weight, inexpensive, very easy to maintain, and last forever. You do have to dry them before putting them away.
This looks awesome; never heard of it. Anyway to get something like this with a textured handle?
Anyway, I use similar razors such as his and tossed them when I realised they were too dull. A 10 pack could last me a year, but only if I pay attention. Otherwise, it's bound to be closer to 2 years. Note that I don't deliberately do this for costs reasons - I just prefer not to thrash something that is still decently usable.
Obviously, your mileage may vary. Nevertheless, for at least some people, shaving costs about one 10-pack per year.
Anyhow, as a bearded man, only trimming/shaving the edges with a razor, a pack of razor blades lasts me probably 3 months.
Also on the double edge vs cartridge, as another poster mentioned, cartridges are foolproof and give a good shave.
Just because it can theoretically be cheaper to go the double edge razor route, doesn't actually mean it will be.
First there are all those blades to try. Then soap brushes, then soaps (so many artisan soaps). Then you find yourself looking at aftershaves (so many of those too), and balms, you might even decide to try pre-shave products. Then you will find more soap, or cream, or shave sticks you want to try. Then more razors, slants, open comb, shavettes....
If you let it, you can find yourself spending way more on products after switching to a double edge razor per year than you were with cartridges.
Yes, you can bring some of these costs down by buying samples.
Unless you have a lot of hair you're trying to shave, in which case clippers can quickly get it down to make shaving easier.
Shaving can be very simple and cheap.
I never get irritation from a Braun S3 shaver, but if I use my Skull Shaver on my neck it can leave it slightly red and irritated unless I'm careful.
That works for the most part. The razor is for all the spots where you want no hair at all. I've got a beard and I can shave my neck down with a trimmer and get it really close, but if I want to actually have clean neck I've gotta reach for the razor.
Depends on your beard. I have coarse black hair that grows fast. People with fine blonde hair can get away with a trim. For me, it has to be a choice between a beard and a wet-shave.
The other part of the cost equation is gel/foam/soap. I stopped buying overpriced gel and foam quite a few years ago. Hair conditioner (with maybe a bit of shampoo or liquid soap to make it foamier) works pretty well for a tiny fraction of the price. Liquid hand soap or body wash works even better for slightly more. The same goat-milk soap I use for everything else (including hair) doesn't work quite as well when lathered by hand, but it's closer with the one-time purchase of a brush. While the direct cost isn't the greatest, the marginal cost is near zero since I wear the shower bars down to slivers at a sufficient rate to support shaving as well.
In short, it's pretty easy to save a couple of hundred bucks a year without really changing the experience. If you want to go further than that because you enjoy the challenge (or for any other reason) you certainly can and should, but the incremental savings at that point are a bit smaller.
https://gillette.com/en-us/shaving-tips/shaving-science/why-...
Which type of razor are you referring to? It’s hard to tell.
I went to old school safety razors because they caused so much less irritation than Gillette. But it did take finding a good quality DE blade.
https://www.amazon.com/Parker-99R-Heavyweight-Butterfly-Plat...
Other things I've done, all my pans are cast iron, all my storage is glassware, all my utensils are silicone or metal, I drink only drip or Moka pot coffee. I do have a ceramic coated dutch oven though, but the coating is said to be real ceramic and not ptfe (or any of the "safe" coatings that are claimed out there). All my cutting boards are wood or bamboo. I tried to get as much plastic out of my kitchen as humanly possible.
No electric razor has ever "cut the mustard" for me. If I can't have a wet shave then I'll stay with the beard, thanks.
A cutthroat of course has no replaceables; but you do need a strop and a stone. I have a belgian stone, which I pass the razors over every 6 months or so.
No pressurised cans of foam for me; I use a cream from The Body Shop, but I could just use a puck of soap like everyone else. Anyway, that means I need a brush: I use a silverpoint badger brush.
So two cutthroats: call it £100 each. One badger brush: about £50. Belgian stone: £120. Total: £370 one-off cost (brushes do wear out, but if you dry them properly they should last 20 years). The Mach III blades are good for about a dozen shaves each, and give a pretty good "baby's bottom" finish. I use a bay rum cologne as an aftershave lotion.
Truth is, I happen to like sharp blades. So I use the belgian stone on my carbon-steel chef's knife and my Buck pocket knife.
So... I did buy mine off amazon; but that was mostly due to living in the rural areas where there wasn't much for shopping choices to begin with. With that in mind, consider this.
I was still able to find double edged stuff at the local store now and then too, but it was generally a Christmas gift item, and stuff like that. Or tucked away in the top corner of the bathroom section, where only the old fella from the early 1900's might be interested in looking for some Dapper Dan or something like that.
I can even find them in some stores like... I think it was Shopper drug mart?
But all in all, just going on amazon and typing "Double edge razor" or "Single blade razor" is generally enough to find what you are looking for and have in on hand in 3 days or less usually.
For context, I am in Canada. So this might be more of a thing for us here in Canada what with being able to find this stuff without having to go to a specialty store for it, like those fancy beard barber shops.
Spotify/Apple Music is super convenient and relatively cheap, if you listen to music even at moderate levels. Yeah you don't own the albums, but you get all the value-added features like music discovery, playlist, sharing etc.
Netflix also the same: have access to many movies and series at a very low cost (if you watch even moderately), also comes with the same: you don't own the content (but how many times were you planning to watch the same movie/episode in average anyway when there are thousands to pick from? And even if you do, it's still cheaper if that episode is not literally the only thing you watch), and recommendations.
Tinder/Bumble also the same: you don't go out to places (which would cost MUCH more than the app subscription) and try to find a mate: you match and have sex. You might or might not have a partner in the end, but that's not the promise anyway.
Same for iPhone subscriptions in US (the one you pay a monthly cheap fee and always have the latest iPhone).
Pretty much sure there are many examples out there too.
They are all convenient, and are actually cheaper than the "old way", giving access on demand to whatever you like from a big catalog.
Pans i understand and probably don’t replace my non stick ones as often as i should, i consider cast iron but it seems like a huge hassle.
I do like teabags, actually particular cheap brands from my home country that i just really like the taste of. At work we have tons of fancy loose leaf tea, but i just really, really like my imported stuff.
I have a mocha pot at home, these are great. I always thought the nespresso machines were slightly less convenient. I have one coffee a day and those machines take up valuable kitchen real estate.
I walk to work or use public transport
I find the packaging of veg intensely annoying, if you’re single and want a handful of a particular veg for dinner it is hard to find. And i hate wasting all the excess i have to buy for one meal i want to cook. I have 2 supermarkets right by me, and they mostly offer loose veg, but on some they don’t (green beans seem to come only in hugely over sized bags) there’s some supermarkets (and markets) in the city that offer all loose veg, but i find i can only use them at the weekends. I find this ine particularly annoying as it discourages healthy eating.
My smart tv is disconnected from the internet and it works just fine with a combination of my playstation as media server, and a raspberry pi running a plex server
I live close to supermarkets, am a fussy eater and the idea of having unknown and unexpected food stuffs delivered to me frightens me
You can check weapons so no, I don't think a razor is going to be such a big deal.
Teflon skillets are much more convenient for cooking than cast iron, that I can tell from the experience. I once bought a super-expensive cast iron with non-sticking coating, and it became unusable after about a year, same as Teflon one. So the problem obviously a coating, not a skillet material.
All right, I am a selfish being who wants to just put the skillet into dishwasher machine and press "start", thus I have to buy a new skillet once a year instead of once a decade. But where are we heading to if we try to reverse this process? At Malta, where wood was in a scarcity, they developed a communal ovens, one for a village, where everybody was coming to prepare their food for the day. It even gave a birth to a very specifiс local cuisine. Do we want something like this in our cities?
Not really. DE doesn't jam as much as 2/3/5 blades, and is generally faster to get to a full shave with about a week's growth for me. Just that the setup and cleanup is a little longer. It also takes a bit more practice to get the DE razor working properly (angle/force etc.,) compared to the cartridge razors.
In general, I prefer DE at home and cartridges for travel, because it's generally easier to travel with cartridges in carryon.
Followed by advocating the lower quality options...
The old safety razors shave just as well as a new cartridge razor. The only advantage to the cartridge razor is that if you're a moron you have a lower risk of slicing a finger open when changing the blade.
Your idea of convenience from using a Teflon skillet is based in ignorance. Both of the maintenence involved and of the difference in food quality between the two types of pans.
Isn’t a main reason people go to cast iron is to avoid Teflon and get the natural non-stick of seasoned iron? If that isn’t needed, what’s the draw? Seems other pans would be more suitable.
Or a giant salt block for meat cooking
It was not a Teflon, some other patented non-stick coating.
As someone who fully shaves his head almost daily, closeness, speed, and minimal risk of injury are the most important factors for me. I’ve tried all the alternatives - electric shavers, old-school double edged blades with handles, etc. and found them either to not provide a close enough shave, or to be too high-maintenance or slow (too many passes required) to be worth the cost savings. Electric is out because I shave in the shower and they don’t cut close enough anyway. (Also, electric shaver blades dull over time, too.)
https://www.theonion.com/fuck-everything-were-doing-five-bla...
But it's so problematic. It does not shave nearly as well as a modern multi-razor disposable, it's prone to cutting me if I'm not careful, and takes more time. You can't bring the blades on airplanes. It's clear that you actually need disposables sometimes, and that they often shave better and for longer.
The best and cheapest shave is from a straight razor. You know how many people use that? About zero. ~$150 for a decent razor and you have it for life. But then it's a chore to maintain and not easy to shave with.
It's clear that we pay more for products that are more convenient. They are providing additional value, even if the cost is inflated.
Not being able to travel with safety razor on plane is the annoying part. Also I accidentally cut my finger on a blade once and had to get stitches. That might have made up for the cost of not buying disposable.
DE shaving is also better for your skin by a wide margin. It also gives a closer shave. I can’t recommend anything more highly.
However you may get sucked into the rabbit hole and DE shaving can become a hobby and suddenly you have a Muhle SS [1] that cost you £120 together with 100 different shaving soaps that cost £10-20 each and ultra fine ultra thick shave brushes that can cost £80
[1] https://www.executive-shaving.co.uk/muhle-r41gs-stainless-st...
1. Throwing away huge chunks of plastic makes me ill. And it's also terribly unnecessary.
2. The quality of new electric shavers is a sham. I had an ancient Braun, inherited from a friend's father. It lasted years, in heavily used condition, until I overcharged it. The foil was never replaced, yet always worked well. All new models require regular replacing of the foil, which I suspect, is due to cheap metals. The new designs are superior in concept, but not in frugality or endurance.
0. https://wetshavingclub.com/product/made-in-the-usa-safety-ra... made in USA by veterans, machined from 100 percent marine grade stainless steel.
The biggest advantage of the flimsy multi-blades is that groggy morning shavers are less likely to cut themselves (but at the cost of being less likely to get a complete shave). In this regard they are good for kids.
And what’s the deal with shaving cream? For my whole shaving life I have just used the same soap I use to wash the rest of myself.
Funny side note: webcams are almost all pretty terrible. I switched to using an iPhone as an external webcam (I use the camo app to make this work) and now it’s clear whether I have a good shave or not. Luckily most of the time I don’t care :-)
The advantage of the safety razor is that it's much, much cheaper, and it doesn't lift whiskers like a multiblade setup does, so it's not as close a shave, but it's gentler on your skin. Also, it's somewhat more enjoyable as a process to use a safety razor (once you get good at it).
Switched several years ago from cartridges to an injector blade system, and have never considered switching back.
I just replaced my clipper after maybe 8 years because spring in blade finally broke, it cost originally around 12€, I cut my hair, sons hair and shave myself occasionally. If I didn't mind waiting 1-2 months for replacement blade from China I could get it replaced for 3EUR (oh and I replaced broken pet cable for maybe 1EUR USB cable with special connector). Instead I splurged for new 20EUR clipper but can't say I'd be particularly happy, so probably will end up ordering replacement blade anyway, but at least no need to worry about backup.
"Everything used to be better, and hamburgers should cost a nickle!"
Look, as consumers, we make choices. You can still get a safety-razor on Amazon if you want.
The trouble is... man, if you don't know how to use them right, you can get some nasty cuts. For me... modern idiot-proof razors that this article rants against... well they're just bliss. I can't remember the last time I cut myself shaving.
My Dad said something like, "They sure don't make cars like they used to!" And I said, "No, they don't... they're much safer now, much better gas mileage..."
On the topic of razors, double edged blades also tend to be better at preventing ingrown hairs and irritation compared to the layered 3-4-blade system from what I've read and experienced. My experience is just with minor peach fuzz and not proper facial hair, but after years of trying different methods for this (eyebrow razors, chemical options, facial trimmers, regular razors), getting a cheap razor that takes double-edged blades is the thing that has worked the best so far.
Key phrase: more convenient.
We haven't been sold products as much as we've bought into convenience matters above all else. Marketers can market all they want. Some times they do well, others not so well. Evidently they've been most successful selling the idea that we as individuals aren't responsible and/or accountable for our (consumer) decisions.
Blame the razor manufacturers. Blame Walmart. Blame Amazon. For what exactly, meeting a need in the market? I'm certainly not in favor of these outfits, but they're not making our collective decisions either.
Not being able to buy an individual piece of fruit in many inner-city shops. This isn't about making it cost more, but about reducing waste.
When fruit is loose some people will simply grab what's in front of them, but some will be choosy taking the best specimens. The inferior ones get rejected--but they were handled to do so. They get picked up, looked at and put down again and again--and pretty soon they're not in shape to sell.
When you package fruit you considerably reduce people's ability to determine which are the best specimens and you considerably reduce the amount of inspection/rejection going on.
Thus more of the packaged fruit actually gets sold.
Though I totally agree about tea bags. Wildly bad tea, I cannot drink it. Did they boil tea for ten minutes to make it as bad as coffee? I think brits in any case boil their tea, so they probably do not know better. But what a waste of tea.
If you have skin sensitivity issues and/or ingrown hairs, then these razors should be at the very top of your wishlist. There is also quite a bit of joy in the art/routine of using one of these. And I've nicked myself far more often (and far more painfully) with cartridge razors.
Cartridge razors are definitely one area where the newer technology is worse than what it replaced.
The only thing to be careful of is safely disposing of the razors, remember that they can cut through your trash bag and hurt anyone involved with your garbage collection.
Just because Gillette claims you need to replace the blade after 15 shaves doesn't mean you need to. If you shave regularly, one of these five-blade heads will easily last you 50+ shaves. You may have to run it over your skin a couple more times with an old head - whereas with a new one just once would be enough.
If you let your hair get long then yes, it does get stuck in the razor sometimes and then may get plucked out - which is painful and can lead to infections as well.
Even an old Gillette Fusion is way safer than a double-edged blade or a straight razor, but if you really want to save costs one of those would be the way to go.
I don't have to worry about shaving almost every other day, replacing razors, shaving creams, aftershave lotions and on top of that I actually look better with a beard.
I'm good with what it's costing me now.
At least on the first few shaves, the three bladed ones have a lot of research behind them, and are technically superior to the single bladed ones; there's a lab in long island that pays men to test razors that has evaluated this.
Whether the increase in quality and reduced effort is worth it is a personal preference
I didnt buy a brush, but if it takes a huge ritual to prepare to shave even after a shower, i'd rather just pay Gillette
The one I like is sold as for shaving, but it needn't be, and isn't any more expensive than the same brand's handsoaps.
I found it quite anti-climactic when I started, though I was very cautious at first. I think maybe trying to follow videos is just an unhelpful distraction - focus on how it feels instead, touch the top (not blade) to your cheek and angle down until it just starts to engage and stroke; just adjust that angle according to how it feels, not what someone tells you in a video.
I'm amazed there is so much waste with these exposed blade shaving systems. Even if they could be sharpened and re-used a dozen times you'd cut the waste down to 1/10th....
I am using mine with just water and I always make sure that I clean/ shake off everything afterwards. My first proper blade lasted for 4 years. Then I changed just because I clicked on ad to receive free razor from Gillette. That one is already working for 2 years.
So I get that new blades are bit nicer to your skin, but as blade getting dull is gradual I never see the tipping point when I should get a new one. My skin is perfect by the way.
I would recommend investing in a decent safety razor - which will last forever if well cared for. ($40-80 range). Then your razors run about $0.20 each for good ones purchased in bulk.
edit: I now see that safety razors are the point of the article.. great minds?
I do use a double edged safety razor, but I run into the same problem. Blades have to be ordered online. Disposable razors was a convenience, that become the norm.
> Cooking equipment
I buy it the commercial grade, ugly looking ones from bulk/wholesale stores. They are not pretty, but they are functional, very sturdy, very inexpensive, and work both on the stove top and in the oven. Fancy pots & pans is a luxury in my opinion, that become the norm.
> Tea bags replace loose leaf tea.
Bagged tea is less expensive (Irish breakfast) where I travel than loose leaf.
> Nespresso machines, and other coffee pod brands
Agreed, this is purely paying for convenience, at an extreme premium. This is a luxury in my opinion, not the norm.
> Well understood mechanical bike shifting transitions to electronic shifting
Electrified bikes and bikes with electric shifting is not the majority. This is a luxury in my opinion, not the norm.
> Televisions moving from being screens which accept input, to self contained 'smart' devices
Agreed, this is a nightmare as it binds two different vendors together, increasing the chances of stuck with an obsolete system. This is a luxury in my opinion, that was forced upon us to be the norm.
> In many inner city shops it is now hard to buy an individual piece of fruit.
Not the places I have been (Asia, Central & Eastern Europe, all of the Americas). Walk into grocery store, and start picking the individual fruit.
> Subscription services like Hello Fresh, where you can pay well over the odds to have some vegetables delivered to you.
This is a luxury in my opinion, not the norm, that is forced on us. The recent forced isolation make it a necessity for some.
The power of marketing!
As far as consumables go, I pay about 10€/year in blades (I buy 100 Voskhod blades at a time), 15€/year in shaving soap, and 20€/year in miscelanea (aftershave etc.).
Shaving is quite cheap if you don't fall into the printer cartridge model.
I shave in the shower, and I use Aveeno Body wash for shaving. For years, I simply used conditioner in the shower - basically rub it all over my hair and face, then shave my face. I have never used a mirror to shave either. I just use my hand on my face to know exactly what has been shaved.
The thing makes an irregular squealing sound; you might think it's going to go kaput, without the insider knowledge that it's been doing it for probably well over 20 years.
Compared to a whole espresso setup, I’m not even sure they are expensive in the short to medium run.
Espresso pots are the only obviously cheap way to get espresso, but I often wonder if they aren’t really a different category.
Compared to drip coffee? Sure, but drip coffee isn’t espresso based coffee.
I don't get this at all. I use the cheapest disposable razors (a bag of Bics), and can get 200 shaves out of one. Maybe because I shave at the end of a hot shower when my stubble is soft?
I don't need a razor that looks like it is a Star Wars prop, either.
Nespresso virtuoline machines produce (arguably) better coffee than many cafes. In terms of consumer sentiment, they also perform amazingly compared to other at home brew methods.
Gillete Blades are one of the most loved goods to steal in big quantity, light small and expensive, it's even better than gold.
But the best part: You pay once 60-100 bucks and can keep using it for a few years (in my case 7 years as I just had to replace my old one).
It's perfect for my skin, and a super fast shave. Just enough stubble to look good.
Lapped the blades once, just put a new one in. Hard to beat the ROI on that!
What's funny about Stallman is that he looks exceedingly well-maintained, even indulgent, compared to the average Unix hacker. Razors are really a Roman military thing, aren't they? When you look at the Parthians, the Macedonians, the Cappadocians, the Phoenicians, the Gauls, the Germans--all bearded. All basically Unix hackers, of a sort. But we imitate the Roman legions for some reasons.
'the durapolist puzzle' https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=496175 is about 20th century history of durable goods marketing + how consumers prefer small up-front discount to long-term quality
'neo-luddite's lament' https://economics.mit.edu/files/883/ is about forced upgrades and oligopolies
there's a famous-ish law review paper called 'the durapolist's dilemma' about the 20th century history of durable goods marketing. conclusion is that consumers are not totally savvy about buying things that last
Now if one of you says you use one of those, you've got my undying respect.
(Never used it, though. I'm an electric razor guy myself.)
Between that, "razor burn", and the likelihood of nicks/cuts, it's obviously unhygienic vs. just a close no-guard clipping.
Actually spending money regularly on consumables to do this to yourself is utterly misguided IMO.
Take a cheap plastic razor, use and dry it after every use. Quite dry, e.g. with a towel and blowing on it. It will last from 3 to 6 months, depending how dry you keep it.
Meaning, the razor degrades primarily due to rust, not from shaving!
“Shaving is expensive”
to:
“Shaving is an example of how consumer products extract more money”
I appreciate the HN mods’ often thankless task, but there are times when title overrides feel overzealous and IMO this is one.
I find cartridge razors will clog up well before they lose sharpness. Double edge razors, on the other hand, are easily cleared.
Maybe where he is, but I was able to find a huge variety of DE razors both online and in a local store.
If the cost differences are negligible, people will go for convenience, marketing, and quality.
It is shocking how much of our economy is unnecessary products designed to extract money from us.
The only exception is I can still easily buy a single piece of fruit.
As in cooking, it's the blunt edge that cuts you: you slip or (have to) attack harder.
Tip: instead of shaving foam, use high fat substance, like coconut oil.
Men can just keep their beards clean, tidy and save boatloads of money.
laser hair removal. electrolysis. growing it out. waxing tweezing.
I like shaving because it removes dead skin cells or some thing like that.
Or a 100 pack of razor blades for $6.19
Loose-leaf tea can be reused? Doesn't it lose flavour?
Why do people even use cartridge razors??
Iron Skillet vs Teflon Pans -- Skillets weigh a lot more, meaning they take longer to heat up. Teflon also is way more hydrophobic. Honestly, they're two different tools for two different jobs. Skillets should be used for longer periods when temperature is key. Teflon Pans should be used for shorter, faster cooking stuff (really, morning eggs / omelets are best on a Teflon pan).
Tea -- Loose Tea saves on packaging and is far higher quality. You'll have to wash a Tea Infuser regularly (I like things like this: https://www.webstaurantstore.com/1-3-4-stainless-steel-sprin... . Available at almost any tea-store, but I guess you can also shop online).
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I guess I only agree on the tea-point and the safety razor / double-edged razor points. The other complaints seem to miss the point. Yes, Teflon pans only have a short lifespan and need constant replacement, but they also do cooking duties that are inconvenient on a cast-iron skillet pan. (It takes longer to heat up my cast-iron than to cook an egg on a Teflon pan).
A few of my friends are experimenting with steel-pans, which are lighter (heat up faster), but very similar characteristics to cast-iron... just heating up (and cooling down) faster.
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> Shaving foam: soap pucks transition to self foaming aerosol canisters
Self foaming aerosol canisters are only a couple of bucks? While razor costs are pretty high, I'm not seeing much price difference between soap-puck vs aerosol. I'm thinking this is more of a personal preference issue than cost-efficiency.
> Nespresso machines, and other coffee pod brands, replace many styles of coffee brewing. Provide much worse coffee, at a higher price but are superficially convenient.
If people want a more convenient coffee, I suggest brewing coffee ahead of time (possibly cold brew, but hot-brew works just fine) and storing it in the refrigerator. Microwave the coffee to heat it back up and you're good.
Noting beats the convenience of just taking coffee out of the fridge and drinking it (if you're fine with cold). I've found that cold-brew concentrate is very inconvenient to make, at least without special tools. I've stopped doing it because it just takes too long to filter out the grinds.
Hot-brew (and then refrigerate later) is perfectly fine / fast to filter even with crap blade-grinders and whatnot.
> In many inner city shops it is now hard to buy an individual piece of fruit.
So buy fruit at a grocery store? I guess I'm not seeing the issue...
It's white, optimized for showing dirt. It's closest to the ground, optimized for getting dirty. And (In the case of your typical sneaker) It's a special weird porous rubber that is difficult to get clean, optimized for quickly looking like crap.
And when your shoes look like crap it's time to buy new shoes.
Thus we have shoes optimized for short lifespan.
But this is dead obvious.
At that point, it doesn't make a difference whether it's white or black for the sole.
You could have made your point two replies earlier and it would be more clear what you consider the issue with white rubber to be.