De Beers admits defeat over man-made diamonds • Hacker News Board

Re: De Beers admits defeat over man-made diamonds

#221

Post by jjeaff » Wed, May 30, 2018, 5:18 AM UTC

ggg9990 wrote: post #65

fgonzag wrote: post #10

"Lightbox will transform the lab-grown diamond sector by offering consumers a lab-grown product they have told us they want but aren't getting: affordable fashion jewelry that may not be forever, but is perfect for right now" This is clearly a play to devalue the image of man made diamonds. "May not be forever" my ass, it's the exact same thing. Their goal is probably to try to quickly drive the price of man made dia…

What if even below Moissanite? If they are selling artificial diamonds for $1 each that might be the best way to protect the mined diamond price.

It would. But I think the real threat is that man-made diamonds will likely become impossible to distinguish from natural, even with the expensive, specialty equipment that debeers has created.

At that point, natural and man-made will reach a price parity... Far below the current cost of natural diamonds. Because there will be no way of knowing where your diamond comes from.

Re: De Beers admits defeat over man-made diamonds

#222

Post by icebraining » Wed, May 30, 2018, 5:21 AM UTC

barrkel wrote: post #192

driverdan wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Organic food is treated with pesticides and herbicides too. There's a limited list of allowed chemicals, some of which are much worse than glycophosphate.

To be sure we're all on the same page, there are differences in organic regulation in the US vs the EU. I don't know much about the US situation, but an outline of EU general regulations for organic plants is https://ec.europa.eu/agriculture/organic/eu-policy/eu-rules-... : > Basic substances allowed in organic agriculture comply with two criteria: i) they are of vegetable or animal origin ii) they are considered to…

That's not true, though, there are authorized exceptions, like copper. See Annex II, table 3: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/en/TXT/?uri=uriserv%...

Re: De Beers admits defeat over man-made diamonds

#223

Post by lopmotr » Wed, May 30, 2018, 5:22 AM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #156

BurningFrog wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not how disbelieving works. People disbelieve facts that would cost them to believe. If I believe in climate change, I have to make expensive life changes (sell the SUV, buy a Tesla, etc). Therefore I will not believe in it. This belief is 100% honest, BTW. This is key to understand! For diamonds, the incentives are reversed. If I believe that artificial diamonds are as good as the natural kind, I can get a we…

> If I believe in climate change, I have to make expensive life changes (sell the SUV, buy a Tesla, etc). In part this is true, but none of those are necessary, but what is neceaary for most deniers if they flip is “abandon my political tribe, whose leaders have defined the belief in climate change as outside the bounds of the tribe.” That's really very nearly the only factor that matters.

The tribalism goes both ways. Sadly, it's hard to be a pragmatic optimist and say "Yea it's probably going to change but there's also nothing we can do about it without killing millions of people through economic destruction and we'll likely adapt anyway (humans can adapt their civilizations in the time scales of climate change - see the rapid growth of Chinese cities), so let's not worry too much." Then everyone sees you as their political enemy.

Re: De Beers admits defeat over man-made diamonds

#224

Post by cf498 » Wed, May 30, 2018, 5:23 AM UTC

School-Cotton wrote: post #201

ersh wrote: post #151

All that jewelry industry looks fake to me. There is absolutely no value in man-made or nonmanmade jewels at all. I am wondering why people pay even a penny for that.

What's so hard to understand? Jewelry exists because it (1) makes people look more attractive, and (2) enables conspicuous consumption. Humans aren't Vulcans who make decisions rationally. We're apes with a facility for reason tacked on as an afterthought.

Diamonds are historically an extremely new phenomenon with the demand outside of industry created by De Beers massive advertisement campaign over almost a century.

Diamond Jewelry exists because advertisement works.

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/02/have-yo...

Re: De Beers admits defeat over man-made diamonds

#225

Post by jjeaff » Wed, May 30, 2018, 5:24 AM UTC

stuntkite wrote: post #216

cortesoft wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But diamonds aren’t a store of value at all; they have very little resale value.

That's a bit reductive. Retail diamonds are usually priced on their size and the maker of the jewelry that surrounds them. There are investment grade diamonds, but as the article "Diamonds are Bullshit" that is currently at the top of HN[1] illustrates, appraisers sometimes deviate by 100% on that estimate. However if you buy a $7000 ring from Tiffany and walk out the store to a buyer and can get $1000, it is still s…

Actually, I think it hold value pretty well. At least a Tiffany ring would. But you need to buy it on the secondary market.

Buy the MSRP $7k Tiffany ring for $1k on the secondary market and it will probably grow in value over time. Antique Tiffany has always been pretty sought after.

Re: De Beers admits defeat over man-made diamonds

#226

Post by lopmotr » Wed, May 30, 2018, 5:24 AM UTC

godzillabrennus wrote: post #15

fgonzag wrote: post #10

"Lightbox will transform the lab-grown diamond sector by offering consumers a lab-grown product they have told us they want but aren't getting: affordable fashion jewelry that may not be forever, but is perfect for right now" This is clearly a play to devalue the image of man made diamonds. "May not be forever" my ass, it's the exact same thing. Their goal is probably to try to quickly drive the price of man made dia…

Smart move. Throw enough marketing dollars at misinformation and you can convince hordes of people to doubt facts. Case in point. Despite overwhelming evidence there are people today who still debate climate change.

If you're going to bring politics into it, don't forget the left's denial of the well established race-IQ and gender-IQ relationships.

Re: De Beers admits defeat over man-made diamonds

#227

Post by whack » Wed, May 30, 2018, 5:28 AM UTC

stuntkite wrote: post #216

cortesoft wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But diamonds aren’t a store of value at all; they have very little resale value.

That's a bit reductive. Retail diamonds are usually priced on their size and the maker of the jewelry that surrounds them. There are investment grade diamonds, but as the article "Diamonds are Bullshit" that is currently at the top of HN[1] illustrates, appraisers sometimes deviate by 100% on that estimate. However if you buy a $7000 ring from Tiffany and walk out the store to a buyer and can get $1000, it is still s…

By that definition, just about anything is a store of value. "That Bic pen I just bought at the mall? Store of value" Usually when people refer to something as a store of value, it's understood that it's a good store of value.

Re: De Beers admits defeat over man-made diamonds

#228

Post by stuntkite » Wed, May 30, 2018, 5:28 AM UTC

jjeaff wrote: post #225

stuntkite wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a bit reductive. Retail diamonds are usually priced on their size and the maker of the jewelry that surrounds them. There are investment grade diamonds, but as the article "Diamonds are Bullshit" that is currently at the top of HN[1] illustrates, appraisers sometimes deviate by 100% on that estimate. However if you buy a $7000 ring from Tiffany and walk out the store to a buyer and can get $1000, it is still s…

Actually, I think it hold value pretty well. At least a Tiffany ring would. But you need to buy it on the secondary market. Buy the MSRP $7k Tiffany ring for $1k on the secondary market and it will probably grow in value over time. Antique Tiffany has always been pretty sought after.

Sure. Also once on craigslist a guy traded a paperclip all the way up to a house. This is a pretty big digression from my point. I'm not trying to give investment advice, I just think the concepts surrounding artificial diamonds are interesting and also love a chance to bust out some Star Trek trivia.

Re: De Beers admits defeat over man-made diamonds

#229

Post by stuntkite » Wed, May 30, 2018, 5:31 AM UTC

whack wrote: post #227

stuntkite wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a bit reductive. Retail diamonds are usually priced on their size and the maker of the jewelry that surrounds them. There are investment grade diamonds, but as the article "Diamonds are Bullshit" that is currently at the top of HN[1] illustrates, appraisers sometimes deviate by 100% on that estimate. However if you buy a $7000 ring from Tiffany and walk out the store to a buyer and can get $1000, it is still s…

By that definition, just about anything is a store of value. " That Bic pen I just bought at the mall? Store of value " Usually when people refer to something as a store of value, it's understood that it's a good store of value.

Yeah, that is in line with what I'm saying. This is a bit off the map from my original point about the value of a limited worth resource being held magically in the human suffering required to extract it naturally. My initial point was not that anyone should buy real diamonds at a retail store. Sorry if that wasn't clear.

If you would like to have an argument about something that really doesn't matter I would prefer if it was Star Trek related and not "Diamonds as an Investment" related.

Submitted for your approval.

How does warp drive compensate for the temporal complications of faster than light travel? Earth and the Enterprise all seem to keep the same clock. I'm not convinced they could do that effectively even with the proposed energy output of trilithium. It just doesn't add up. Warp isn't creating a wormhole to punch through subspace, which could account for it (maybe?). Faster than light as a warp bubble stretches space forward and around the ship slinging it to it's destination. After a fun trip to Risa, you would get home and your kids would be elderly. I'm no astrophysicist, but my armchair quarterback understanding says that's the case.

Would travelers aboard a starship essentially become gods compared to their planetary counterparts because of temporal perception? They wouldn't age (from the perspective of the planetary occupants) but they would have accumulated massive experience and useful insight while the planetary toil away in the moisture farms. Checking in from time to time, maybe getting 3 visits in the lifetime of their loved ones. Sorry, mixing universes. I think my point still stands.

What sort of societal constructs would even grow around something like that? How long before the interstellar separate completely as a different race? My bet is not very long, but I think they would still come back to the planetary frequently as it would be an invaluable information resource for their new Galaxy Class civilization.

To keep this debate on the rails, we should probably avoid abuse of concepts involving tachyons. Reverse or otherwise.

Re: De Beers admits defeat over man-made diamonds

#230

Post by donarb » Wed, May 30, 2018, 5:32 AM UTC

lowbloodsugar wrote: post #123

"The new synthetic diamonds will come in pink, blue and white, and the stones will contain a tiny Lightbox logo. De Beers said the logo won't be visible to the naked eye, but it will make the stones easily identifiable as lab-grown." So de beers will intentionally damage their synthetic diamonds. Sure I wanna buy synthetic diamonds from you guys.

There is no damage. Certain diamonds are laser-engraved with microscopic serial numbers, which can be linked back to certification. Nowadays people are even having their names and wedding dates put onto the diamond.