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Pricing niche products

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Re: Pricing niche products

#181

Post by SuperPaintMan »

criley2 wrote: post #169
SuperPaintMan wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very much signalling, you want something that sets you apart from other users and if that means custom CNC'd cases, with harvested switches that have been lubed using the finest tears mounted on a custom plate. So you have something to ogle and show off to the others. And that's before we get into the scarcity territory that sees secondhand TGR Alices going for over 5K. It's weird, a good chunk of people buy my Georg…

It's funny how on hacker news apparently buying a fancy keyboard for your home where no one can see it is "signalling", but if you point out that wearing Apple watch, holding iPhone, and displaying those ear buds is also signalling/branding/status symboling, I am generally very aggressively downvoted. I'd say buying a mechanical keyboard with RGB lights and nice switches is probably 100X less signalling (several orde…

Sorry I wasn't clear! What I'm getting at is when you're flexing in Discord/GeekHack/Reddit using a Alice is a very strong signal.

Just using it as your personal keyboard in normal day-to-day settings isn't nearly the same. Because you're not actively showing it off.

Re: Pricing niche products

#182

Post by dsabanin »

criley2 wrote: post #169
SuperPaintMan wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very much signalling, you want something that sets you apart from other users and if that means custom CNC'd cases, with harvested switches that have been lubed using the finest tears mounted on a custom plate. So you have something to ogle and show off to the others. And that's before we get into the scarcity territory that sees secondhand TGR Alices going for over 5K. It's weird, a good chunk of people buy my Georg…

It's funny how on hacker news apparently buying a fancy keyboard for your home where no one can see it is "signalling", but if you point out that wearing Apple watch, holding iPhone, and displaying those ear buds is also signalling/branding/status symboling, I am generally very aggressively downvoted. I'd say buying a mechanical keyboard with RGB lights and nice switches is probably 100X less signalling (several orde…

Did it ever occur to you that people buy Apple stuff because it’s just good/better?

Re: Pricing niche products

#183

Post by Klathmon »

ccp22 wrote: post #163
phaus wrote: post #2

I have a $600+ keyboard so I'm a part of this hobby. However, only a part of this can be explained by the expense of manufacturing at a small scale. The hobby fully embraces the drawbacks of the small scale and intentionally does nothing to try to improve it because the exclusivity drives prices up to an insane point. A typical group buy for a popular case sells out in minutes or days time after time. Clearly some of…

> to see if my wrists would feel better Does it work? On a side note, I wish I could buy a split keyboard for $30. Are they much harder to produce?

I use split keyboards, and for me I can't go back.

I'm able to reposition them so that I sit up straight and no longer have my wrists cocked at a weird angle. The ability to move them throughout the day means I can change where each half is and how angled they are depending on how i'm sitting (leaning back i'll move them more parallel, sitting forward i'll angle them more "outward", etc...) I also "tent" my split keyboards, so they are at like a 15 degree angle with the inside being the "tallest".

That alone have stopped the carpel tunnel pain I was starting to get while using "traditional keyboards".

But aside from that, the crazier "custom built" keyboards tend to run firmware that allows pretty insane customization to the keyboards which I genuinely can't see myself ever going back. Things like being able to make a dedicated key to commit my work in my editor, what I call "physical bookmarks" which are keybindings that will open websites or apps on my PC, and being able to move around the keys and add layers for various things (my left-alt key acts as left-alt when held down, but presses escape when tapped).

It does come with it's drawbacks though. I have a hard time transitioning back to a normal qwerty keyboard now, and that means I take my split keyboard with me when I travel if I'm expecting to use the laptop significantly. It's not that I can't, but that my muscle memory is really ingrained now and I end up making a lot of mistakes.

$30 is going to be really hard to find a split keyboard for, but if you are willing to get your hands dirty and do some soldering and flashing of components, you can pickup the parts for a "DIY" keyboard kit for probably around $100 if you do your homework. Something like [1] is about $20 for the PCBs and diodes, $20 for the mounting plates, and then you'd need to find some cheap-er switches and keycaps as well as 2 ~$9 controller chips. It's not off-the-shelf for that cheap, but it's doable.

[1] https://keeb.io/products/iris-keyboard-split-ergonomic-keybo...

Re: Pricing niche products

#184

Post by lynaghk »

d7gibo wrote: post #78
leksak wrote: post #52

Not related to the content but kudos on the site styling. Haven't opened it on anything that is not a mobile device (yet) but it was very pleasant to read.

Agreed - I'd like to use the theme if it's available.

Author here --- you're welcome to copy whatever you want from the unminifed CSS: https://kevinlynagh.com/stylesheets/style.css

Re: Pricing niche products

#185

Post by cmroanirgo »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #155
tonyedgecombe wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d say it’s more about status signalling, even if it’s kept within that small group of keyboard aficionados.

"More"? I understood CommieBobDole to be saying it was entirely about status signaling: > the purpose of the hobby has transitioned from primarily "making/using the thing" to "obtaining and displaying ever more extreme versions of the thing to impress other people who know about the thing" What do you think the difference is between "status signaling" and "impressing other people"?

Erm. Not having used (nor heard) the term "status signaling" before, I'd suggest that "status signaling" is a status signal that you (and now me) is trying to impress someone. ;-)

Re: Pricing niche products

#187

Post by radus »

phaus wrote: post #2

I have a $600+ keyboard so I'm a part of this hobby. However, only a part of this can be explained by the expense of manufacturing at a small scale. The hobby fully embraces the drawbacks of the small scale and intentionally does nothing to try to improve it because the exclusivity drives prices up to an insane point. A typical group buy for a popular case sells out in minutes or days time after time. Clearly some of…

Details on the 20 minutes of easy mods?

Re: Pricing niche products

#188

Post by knolax »

Filligree wrote: post #81
kragen wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People break keyboards all the time. Reinforcing them with carbon fiber seems reasonable to me. You seem to be confusing carbon fiber, which is a mild irritant like fiberglass, with carbon nanotubes. It's goofy that the keyboard enthusiasts got taken in by the marketroid term “forged carbon”, though.

I have never once broken a keyboard. I can't imagine how I would -- sit on it? It's fixed on my desk. If I did need a stronger keyboard, I'd rather have it reinforced with steel. That would have the extra benefit of keeping it in place.

I used to travel with my mechanical keyboard a lot and the keyboard breaking while in a heavily stuffed backpack was definitely a big concern of mine.

Re: Pricing niche products

#189

Post by criley2 »

SuperPaintMan wrote: post #181
criley2 wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny how on hacker news apparently buying a fancy keyboard for your home where no one can see it is "signalling", but if you point out that wearing Apple watch, holding iPhone, and displaying those ear buds is also signalling/branding/status symboling, I am generally very aggressively downvoted. I'd say buying a mechanical keyboard with RGB lights and nice switches is probably 100X less signalling (several orde…

Sorry I wasn't clear! What I'm getting at is when you're flexing in Discord/GeekHack/Reddit using a Alice is a very strong signal. Just using it as your personal keyboard in normal day-to-day settings isn't nearly the same. Because you're not actively showing it off.

I would disagree strongly, and I would go so far as to claim that signalling isn't done for the in-group, it's done for the out group.

Apple users don't wear white ear buds to signal to one another, they do it exclusively to signal to people who don't have it that the apple user can afford product and symbol greatly in excess of the person.

Same with mechanical keyboards. The signal there is to people using shitty 20$ dell membrane boards, and who see those beautiful machined aluminum boards and custom caps and feel jealous. The signal is about demonstrating you have more than someone else.

When two people who have similar things are showing it off, that's not signalling, that's talking shop.

Re: Pricing niche products

#190

Post by criley2 »

dsabanin wrote: post #182
criley2 wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny how on hacker news apparently buying a fancy keyboard for your home where no one can see it is "signalling", but if you point out that wearing Apple watch, holding iPhone, and displaying those ear buds is also signalling/branding/status symboling, I am generally very aggressively downvoted. I'd say buying a mechanical keyboard with RGB lights and nice switches is probably 100X less signalling (several orde…

Did it ever occur to you that people buy Apple stuff because it’s just good/better?

Did it ever occur to you that people buy mechanical keyboards because it's just good/better?

(And P.S. subjective ideas of good/better are what they are, but no fair objective analysis of price and value would agree with you. A thousand dollar phone is a pure status symbol and owning it has nothing to do with a rational attempt to achieve value per dollar)

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