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23andMe lays off 100 people as DNA test sales decline

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Re: 23andMe lays off 100 people as DNA test sales decline

#161

Post by recursive »

bobthepanda wrote: post #82
jsgo wrote: post #79

> Wojcicki has theories Think the obvious one is that the results are shared and whether someone is a criminal or not (or will be one in the future), people are not particularly comfortable with sharing to parties they didn't initially trust it to for the purposes they trusted it for. Anecdotally, I bought a 23andme kit (just the genealogy one) but never submitted it because the labeling was to send it to the lab in…

Honestly, I would also say that a partial reason why these would've dropped is that everyone who can do it has done it. You only need these kinds of results once because your DNA doesn't change. I knew people who were giving or had gotten these as gifts, but those are one-off purchases. And if you've heard of people doing it then you'll do it too but that's also a one-off. I don't think I'd personally benefit because…

> Honestly, I would also say that a partial reason why these would've dropped is that everyone who can do it has done it.

In my immediate circle of acquaintances, that doesn't seem to be true. I haven't done it. I'm aware of it, but I've never looked into it, since I've never seen a reason to care.

Re: 23andMe lays off 100 people as DNA test sales decline

#163

Post by mplewis »

skissane wrote: post #134
dmix wrote: post #35

Maybe the industry as a whole should stop handing stuff over to law enforcement and governments. I was going to buy it for 2 different people for christmas but both declined over privacy concerns as they read in the news they are being used in sweeping investigations. Given the number of wrongful accusations that litter history and the general trend away from any regard for privacy among security agencies this is a v…

> Maybe the industry as a whole should stop handing stuff over to law enforcement and governments. They can try saying "No", then the government will just get a court order to force them to do it. They don't really have a choice in the end – the only choice they have is whether they make it easy for the government ("you want our data? here have it!") or slightly harder ("I'll need to see a warrant first..." "No probl…

Companies could stop retaining data that governments would be interested in. I'd love to get my genome sequenced, but I never want that data to be retained by anyone but me.

Re: 23andMe lays off 100 people as DNA test sales decline

#164

Post by jedberg »

0xCMP wrote: post #133
zyang wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did it 6/7 years ago because the novelty, and enthusiastically recommended it to family and friends. Now I regret doing it considering how Google and Facebook has abused consumer data. I definitely would not submit my kids to the same fate.

IIRC you can request the data to be deleted. You have no way of knowing if it's been done correctly, but at least it's something you could do to prevent your kid's DNA from effectively being there.

I seem to remember reading that even when they delete your data, they keep your sample. So really all it does is prevent you from getting it.

Re: 23andMe lays off 100 people as DNA test sales decline

#165

Post by perardi »

Ohn0 wrote: post #149
bobthepanda wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, I would also say that a partial reason why these would've dropped is that everyone who can do it has done it. You only need these kinds of results once because your DNA doesn't change. I knew people who were giving or had gotten these as gifts, but those are one-off purchases. And if you've heard of people doing it then you'll do it too but that's also a one-off. I don't think I'd personally benefit because…

They need a SaaS! Monthly/yearly subscription to updates of some sort

That might be workable.

Frankly, I think these mail-in DNA tests are like modern-day phrenology, but you could spin in that "pay us $x per year, and we will analyze your DNA every month once research becomes available".

Re: 23andMe lays off 100 people as DNA test sales decline

#166

Post by dekhn »

wahern wrote: post #132
dekhn wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It remains unclear that 23&Me's data will truly be transformative in drug development (this has been a criticism of the human genome project since it finished and most predictions for human health still haven't panned out). There's a lot of narrative and noise there, but not a lot of useful activity (yes, I know 23&Me is touting one drug at this point).

On the last big 23andMe thread at least one researcher commented that their data has been immensely useful. And I'm fairly certain I've read a few similar comments on HN before then. A researcher friend of mine made fun of me for signing up to 23andMe when they first offered their test. SNPs, he told me, didn't tell you much of substance. To which I replied, haven't the last 20 years (almost 30, now) of genetic resea…

Researchers talk a big game, but genomics has turned out to be a massive disappointment and really oversold.

SNP analysis is useful, but leaves out a lot of important variation. Also, it's taken the field a long time to understand that most interesting phenotypes are complex nonlinear functions of many different variations, which makes health discovery far more challenging.

Re: 23andMe lays off 100 people as DNA test sales decline

#167

Post by buckminster »

rrdharan wrote: post #140
bobthepanda wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gifting someone a thing that could be used as a paternity test at a baby shower would be more than a little rude. And presumably if both parents have already done it why would you need to test the baby?

Mutation is a thing.

"No, no, I wasn't questioning the paternity, you can use the test to check if your baby is a mutant."

Re: 23andMe lays off 100 people as DNA test sales decline

#168

Post by e_y_ »

nordsieck wrote: post #75
laurencerowe wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With 23 pairs of chromosomes we have 46 dominoes each (ignoring recombination.) This changes the odds of inheriting none of your mother's Scottish dominoes from 1 in a million (2^20) to 1 in 512 (2^9).

> This changes the odds of inheriting none of your mother's Scottish dominoes from 1 in a million (2^20) to 1 in 512 (2^9). That may be true for mom, but conservatively, there's between a 1-in-100 and 1-in-20 odds of inheriting none of your father's dominoes.

It's been a while since I've taken high school biology, but the odds should be the same as the mother. Scottish-ness is not something that's limited to the X or Y chromosome.

Mitochondrial DNA will only come from your mother, but I don't think we're talking about that here.

Re: 23andMe lays off 100 people as DNA test sales decline

#169

Post by joshfraser »

I did it and then regretted it. Possible outcomes:

You risk getting linked to a crime because your DNA was found at the scene of the crime. You might even be innocent, but just having your DNA in a database increases your risk of a false conviction. Worse, you put your relatives at risk too, regardless of whether they are guilty or not.

Maybe you unknowingly got someone pregnant and now owe child support. Depending on your situation, you may not welcome this discovery.

Best case, you find out that you have a genetic disease that you can't do much about.

Re: 23andMe lays off 100 people as DNA test sales decline

#170

Post by reaperducer »

Ohn0 wrote: post #154
throwaway1777 wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

New people are being born all the time. There are many industries based around one time purchases. Think appendix removal or weddings (that one may be more than once for some people)

Ah, the lucrative appendix removal industry.

Considering the types of cars that surgeons drive, I'd say yes, quite lucrative.
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