Diamonds Suck (2006) • Hacker News Board

Re: Diamonds Suck (2006)

#121

Post by chrisseaton » Wed, May 30, 2018, 12:30 PM UTC

baud147258 wrote: post #59

chrisseaton wrote: post #10

People who are against diamonds seem extremely aggressive about making sure other people agree with them and validate their opinions. I can't imagine making a website about any of my jewellery preferences (short of ethical, which isn't mentioned prominently here).

Well it's like vegans. Except here instead of animal suffering, it's human suffering; which can give a greater sense of importance to the cause. And in turn, it would make people against diamonds feels justified to be more aggressive.

The human suffering part is pretty far down this person's list of complaints against diamonds.

Their principle problems are price and marketing.

Re: Diamonds Suck (2006)

#122

Post by nialv7 » Wed, May 30, 2018, 12:41 PM UTC

Oras wrote: post #98

I know I will get a hell of downvotes for this, but "Brainwashed" term can also be applied to people trading Bitcoins? Some people agreed that it is valuable and gave some tokens a huge value and its a market now.

Well, I guess it could be true that some people are "brainwashed" to trade bitcoin. But I think there are some differences between the two.

First, diamond is not in itself useful. While it some industrial uses, that is not where its value comes from. The value of diamond is the result of misinfomation about its rarity and an extensive marketing campaign. On the other hand, BitCoin (or rather, blockchain) promised to be a distributed exchange, and more or less acheieves that. And although it is debateable whether its current valuation is reasonable, at least that grows organically from its use.

The value BitCoin and diamond are both influenced by their limited availability. Diamond supply is tightly controlled by a corperation, but there is no guarantee that corperation will continue to have this controll indefinitely. On the other hand the limit on the number of bitcoins is more rigid and will only break if someone took controll of at least half of the network.

Re: Diamonds Suck (2006)

#123

Post by dgacmu » Wed, May 30, 2018, 12:41 PM UTC

skywhopper wrote: post #69

tzaman wrote: post #14

Out of curiosity, what's all the fuss with engagement rings in the first place? When me and my wife got engaged, I gave her nothing (nor did she expect anything), just asked her to marry me and she agreed, we kissed and that was it. We did, however, made wedding rings, which together were about $1300, but that's because they were made out of gold. Why overcomplicate things? :)

That's cool. It's also cool to give a token (such as an engagement ring) or exchange gifts as part of the engagement as well. Why criticize the way other people choose to celebrate their engagement?

There's an important difference between criticizing a tradition, and criticizing individuals. The tradition, in this case, was greatly magnified by the parties who have a vested interest in people spending a lot of money on rings. That aspect of it conveys little benefit to the people who partake in it, or, as others have already noted, is even negative by encouraging people to spend too much of their income at a time in their life when they really ought to be focused on saving and making efficient use of their funds.

Rituals are good. A gift exchange can be great. A visible symbol is important to some people (I wear a wedding band and I like it). But the current tradition encourages something financially foolish for most modern couples.

Re: Diamonds Suck (2006)

#124

Post by stevehawk » Wed, May 30, 2018, 12:47 PM UTC

mjhagen wrote: post #63

Freak_NL wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "it's the most important day of my life" Implying that its all downhill from there. I find this such a depressing way of looking at life.

I can't believe I'm about to defend a marketing slogan. "Most important" doesn't imply "best", in my opinion, I think it implies that this day has the most impact on your life, so make it a good one. Maybe future days will be better because of what happened on this day.

I will say that at 37 years of age i believe my wedding was the most important party i have thrown in my life. With people giving up an entire weekend to fly in to a central location for my wife and I it seemed only fair to make sure everyone had a great time.

It's pretty easy for a wedding and reception to be boring for your guests.

Re: Diamonds Suck (2006)

#125

Post by dingo_bat » Wed, May 30, 2018, 12:50 PM UTC

LeonM wrote: post #101

Freak_NL wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "it's the most important day of my life" Implying that its all downhill from there. I find this such a depressing way of looking at life.

It's the same as someone who says: "But you only turn 18 once!" Which is true for every birthday.

When people say that, they mean this is the only time you will officially transform into an adult. Still ridiculous, but 18th birthdays are different from other birthdays.

Re: Diamonds Suck (2006)

#126

Post by collyw » Wed, May 30, 2018, 12:50 PM UTC

Freak_NL wrote: post #46

retSava wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, it's upsetting. As soon as merchandise X is prefixed with "wedding", the cost is doubled. Wedding cake? Boom. Wedding napkins? Check. Etc. It's astonishing how easy it is to fall into the trap of "it's just a one-time event", "it's the most important day of my life", etc.

> "it's the most important day of my life" Implying that its all downhill from there. I find this such a depressing way of looking at life.

From peep show, one of the funniest comedies around in my opinion.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4QRf-HKJ8E&t=8m20s

Re: Diamonds Suck (2006)

#127

Post by fapjacks » Wed, May 30, 2018, 12:59 PM UTC

isostatic wrote: post #4

> If I can prevent a single reader from needlessly dropping $6,000-10,000+ on a diamond engagement ring, this site will be a success. Financial worries are the #1 cause of stress in a married relationship - there is absolutely NO excuse to start your married life by taking on that level of debt. Average U.S. wedding cost $30k in 2014, while the average engagement ring was $5600, or 19% of the cost [0] https://www.val…

Well, Mister Wonderful put it nicely: "I love weddings. They're one of the only times in a person's life when they're completely irrational about price."

Re: Diamonds Suck (2006)

#128

Post by dionidium » Wed, May 30, 2018, 1:01 PM UTC

arkh wrote: post #106

isostatic wrote: post #4

> If I can prevent a single reader from needlessly dropping $6,000-10,000+ on a diamond engagement ring, this site will be a success. Financial worries are the #1 cause of stress in a married relationship - there is absolutely NO excuse to start your married life by taking on that level of debt. Average U.S. wedding cost $30k in 2014, while the average engagement ring was $5600, or 19% of the cost [0] https://www.val…

> Average U.S. wedding cost $30k in 2014 Averages are mostly useless for this kind of things where some people can go crazy on prices. What is the median? Are other deciles available to check? But I think the most important would be with the cost of a wedding / current capital owned and cost of wedding / revenues ratios.

>"In 2012, when the average wedding cost was $27,427, the median was $18,086. In 2011, when the average was $27,021, the median was $16,886. In Manhattan, where the widely reported average is $76,687, the median is $55,104. And in Alaska, where the average is $15,504, the median is a mere $8,440."

http://www.slate.com/articles/life/weddings/2013/06/average_...

I grew up exclusively attending weddings from the (bottom of the) bottom half of that median and I now routinely interact with people who (seemingly) have only been to weddings from the top half; the disconnect is enormous.

Re: Diamonds Suck (2006)

#129

Post by NikolaNovak » Wed, May 30, 2018, 1:03 PM UTC

Anybody know anything about this "Moissanite" thing?

I find it interesting that in the 100+ comments here, there's no mention of the item the linked website so heavily promotes, yet I personally never heard of until now. One of the reasons I love HN is that usually relevant knowledge and experience will come out of woodworks and share their wisdom - so, anybody ever heard of "Moissanite"? :)

Re: Diamonds Suck (2006)

#130

Post by Ntrails » Wed, May 30, 2018, 1:08 PM UTC

hrktb wrote: post #83

mjhagen wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't believe I'm about to defend a marketing slogan. "Most important" doesn't imply "best", in my opinion, I think it implies that this day has the most impact on your life, so make it a good one. Maybe future days will be better because of what happened on this day.

That’s still usually not the most important. For instance even if your partner is the best thing that ever happens to your life, the most important moment will be the proposal or whatever moment you recognize and mutually accept you need each other in your life. The wedding is the inking of the deal, the most important moment is when you agree to the deal in the first place (and I hope that’s way far before the weddi…

Saying that you will do a thing and doing a thing do not have equal merit. If I say I'm going to climb everest, you can be sure that the moment which is remembered is the one where I made it to the top (or failed to).

Similarly the birth of a child, not the agreement to try and conceive, is the bit that matters. (Although I'll accept the getting pregnant somewhat)

The act of marriage, of declaring in front of witnesses (friends/family) before the law that you bind yourself to another person in perpetuity is obviously the occasion that is important. Not when you decided to ask. Not when your partner said yes. When you do it.

(The party afterwards is sheer madness etc etc)