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A laptop stand made from a single sheet of recycled paper

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Re: A laptop stand made from a single sheet of recycled paper

#81

Post by toast0 »

cle wrote: post #42
nozzlegear wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the carbon cost behind buying and shipping the book, or cutting down the tree to make the book?

Use whatever's lying around. Some more ideas: - A shoebox - An old binder - A food container - Some coasters - Egg carton - Jenga blocks - Cereal box - Legos - Picture frame - Tennis ball (cut it in half) - Door stoppers - Cake pan - A screwdriver box - A few junk mailer magazines - Crumple up a couple newspaper pages Or better yet, order one of these and make 3 more with the shipping box it came in. That'll help onc…

Not sure how many cereal boxes can hold a laptop... unless you're stacking them flattened, and then you need to eat a lot of cereal, but you can adjust height very precisely. :)

Re: A laptop stand made from a single sheet of recycled paper

#82

Post by wy35 »

calmbonsai wrote: post #78

I'm reminded of similarly useless "sustainable cardboard furniture" that came out about a decade ago. On the positive side, kudos to whomever in marketing/pr at the design firm got this useless product so much press. This is just the sort of "win" that a design consulting shop loves to have for actual briefs that lead to real moving-the-needle revenue. One example would be SmartDesign's modular slip-on "S-Grips" that…

Didn't know about the SmartDesign/OXO vegetable peeler, very interesting rabbit hole to go down.

https://www.fastcompany.com/90239156/the-untold-story-of-the...

Re: A laptop stand made from a single sheet of recycled paper

#83

Post by bko »

latexr wrote: post #47

The article is seemingly outdated. The cheapest one I could find in the store was 29 USD. In Euros, it’s 36.37. And of course, you still have to pay for shipping. From Korea. This seems quite absurd. Whatever good you do the planet by using something out of recycled paper (thumbs up on the idea) will surely be offset by all the logistics of the shipping. This should have been a tutorial, not a product.

I often see "recycled" or similar as a signal for more expensive.

My favorite was when I saw a jam that touted "upcycled" strawberries. When I looked into it, it basically meant that it was made from beat up ugly strawberries that would have been used for animal feed. Surely there would be cost savings in using reject fruit, right? No, an 8oz jar retails for over $8 compared to about half that to an organic no sugar added alternative (I think its cheaper since I last looked though)

They even get certified that they use the most undesirable fruit that they can find!

https://mleverything.substack.com/p/what-are-upcycled-strawb...

Re: A laptop stand made from a single sheet of recycled paper

#87

Post by radlad »

calmbonsai wrote: post #78

I'm reminded of similarly useless "sustainable cardboard furniture" that came out about a decade ago. On the positive side, kudos to whomever in marketing/pr at the design firm got this useless product so much press. This is just the sort of "win" that a design consulting shop loves to have for actual briefs that lead to real moving-the-needle revenue. One example would be SmartDesign's modular slip-on "S-Grips" that…

This is a bit of a random place to mention it, but while I very much like OXO goods, IKEA makes the best (in my opinion) potato peeler for $5 - cheaper than anything OXO makes: https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/ikea-365-vaerdefull-potato-peel...

Re: A laptop stand made from a single sheet of recycled paper

#88

Post by iLemming »

Suppafly wrote: post #71
nosioptar wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to dumpster dive for old compsci books at the end of semesters. It's how I learned java, c, perl, vim, and SQL.

>I used to dumpster dive for old compsci books at the end of semesters. It's how I learned java, c, perl, vim, and SQL. I'd always grab old books from school and work, but honestly they are horrible to learn from because things like java and c# have changed so much, you end up teaching yourself outdated stuff and then needing to relearn all of the new ways to do stuff. You're probably safe learning C from an older bo…

There are some languages with books that remain relevant over decades, notably books for any Lisp - Common Lisp, Scheme, Clojure, also:

- C (post-ANSI) - fundamentals largely unchanged since 1989

- SQL and Erlang - basic concepts stable since 1980s

- Prolog and Forth - core concepts stable since 1970s

Although modern books might cover some improved practices or new tooling, older texts on core concepts remain valuable.

Re: A laptop stand made from a single sheet of recycled paper

#89

Post by 0xffff2 »

recursive wrote: post #39
nozzlegear wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the carbon cost behind buying and shipping the book, or cutting down the tree to make the book?

Assuming you don't have a book in your possession?

I'm old enough to have owned a lot of paper books at one point, but as a Kindle owner and person who moves every few years, I no longer own any physical books. For fiction and non-fiction prose, I find an e-reader to be strictly superior to the paper version. I've even embraced e-cookbooks. The UX is markedly inferior while cooking, but the convenience of not having to move boxes and boxes of paper around with me is worth it.

Re: A laptop stand made from a single sheet of recycled paper

#90

Post by yoavm »

bko wrote: post #83
latexr wrote: post #47

The article is seemingly outdated. The cheapest one I could find in the store was 29 USD. In Euros, it’s 36.37. And of course, you still have to pay for shipping. From Korea. This seems quite absurd. Whatever good you do the planet by using something out of recycled paper (thumbs up on the idea) will surely be offset by all the logistics of the shipping. This should have been a tutorial, not a product.

I often see "recycled" or similar as a signal for more expensive. My favorite was when I saw a jam that touted "upcycled" strawberries. When I looked into it, it basically meant that it was made from beat up ugly strawberries that would have been used for animal feed. Surely there would be cost savings in using reject fruit, right? No, an 8oz jar retails for over $8 compared to about half that to an organic no sugar…

Sometimes it's a marketing stunt, but often recycling is more expensive. I mean, recycling a plastic bag is probably more expensive than making one. The unfortunate reality of our financial system is that it often rewards people for doing the wrong thing.
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