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Comment by hayksaakian | Hacker News Reader

It seems like this author misses the point too. At first it seems like he was trying to reshape the original posts' message into a sort of 'live the best way possible' message, but instead he turns his focus back onto material goods.

"This isn’t materialism, it’s a deep consideration for the non-materialistic things that depend on the material. A lamp for reading or helping. A flatware set for eating. A backpack for hiking. A towel for traveling. These are all intellectual and spiritual pursuits that are also important."

Eating is not about flatware, neither is hiking about backpacks, nor traveling about towels. Obsessing over the best backpack takes away time you could be spending actually hiking.

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You need a backpack to hike. You could hike without one but that would involve carrying everything in your hands. Backpacks are the evolution of ergonomic design to make carrying items on long journeys comfortable.

You need a towel if you travel. You could drip dry after each shower or decide not to at all but that introduces another set of hygenic and time-wasting problems.

You need utensils to eat. You could use your hands, again not paying attention to hygiene, or you could be civilized and use a knife and fork.

Researching and buying the best ensures you should only buy once. It's appreciating that someone, or group of people, have spent months, even years paying attention to every detail in designing something that serves an important purpose.

All of these things potentially improve your experience. Despite not using the best designed tools for any particular job, I personally remember experiences for who I was with or what we did, not with with which brand of x or type of y.

But that's what Dustin is saying. If you're using the right tool or the right equipment, you won't focus on it. You won't worry about something breaking. You'll get to enjoy the experience. These quality 'things' don't improve the experience, they prevent other factors (such as a poor quality backpack breaking) ruining the experience.

Part of the problem I have with Dustin's article are the examples. I think some are ridiculous.

I spent about 10 minutes picking out flatware at the store 10 years ago and haven't thought about it since. The stuff looks the same as it did back then, still weighs the same, and still produces the same functionality.

If my alternative was to spend days researching designs, purchasing 20 different sets so I can test them at home, and finally picking one for the sake of "having something my whole life", I would have felt like I wasted time and money that could have been spent on much better things than flatware. I see no reason why my current flatware would become less usable than the kind Dustin is advocating, and if it does, it would take me all of 2 minutes to buy a new set on Amazon. I guess I'm just not seeing the reward for the resources exhausted.

I disagree. There is a good reason to want 'the best' within limits (cost, availability etc.). For example, hiking with low quality shoes that give you blisters decreases your enjoyment of hiking. Hiking with shoes that fit perfectly and give comfort makes hiking much more enjoyable.

But that's an argument for "good enough", not for "the best".

At some point there's very little difference between products that are good enough. And after that point? You're into the territory of people like Best Made Company.

$250 for an ax? (http://www.bestmadeco.com/products/american-felling-axe-cour...)

vs $160 (http://www.traditionalwoodworker.com/4-lb-Splitting-Axe-with...)

vs $35 (http://www.ebay.com/itm/Seymour-AX-3-3-5-Lb-36-Single-Bit-Mi...)

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