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I'm Wirecutter's water-quality expert. I don't filter my water

nytimes.com

211–220 of 222 posts

Re: I'm Wirecutter's water-quality expert. I don't filter my water

#211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

San Jose water is absolute trash. There may not be (much) lead, but there are a host of other minerals and contaminants. It’s also a roll of the dice whether you’ll find Legionnaires' disease in your pipes. I have a whole-house soft-water filter for general use, and for drinking/cooking get 5-gallon bottles filled with RO purified water from The Water Spring on Homestead in Santa Clara. The municipal source for RO wa…

https://www.eldoradosprings.com/out-of-state-shipping-of-eld... Cheers

Hard to beat $0.25/gal at Water Spring.

Re: I'm Wirecutter's water-quality expert. I don't filter my water

#212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.eldoradosprings.com/out-of-state-shipping-of-eld... Cheers

Hard to beat $0.25/gal at Water Spring.

Dunno. Have been unaware of them so far. Am not that often in SJ anyway, but when I am the tap is taboo for me. That stuff can only be spat out.

I know the Eldorado Springs from when I'm in Aspen, Austin, Altadena, and while I don't get the hype surrounding the stuff, it's more than acceptable (for water).

Taste matters. Be it for coffee, tea, cooking, making desserts, even baking, or making your own pizza dough.

Re: I'm Wirecutter's water-quality expert. I don't filter my water

#213
post #80

Wirecutter was bad before the NYT acquisition and now it's lot any/all remaining credibility. Much like CNBC, it's completely "turned the corner" for me and I take their editorial as a negative signal. In other words, definitely filter your water.

> Wirecutter was bad before the NYT acquisition How so?

They would consistently recommend products based on affiliate revenue over value or performance.

Re: I'm Wirecutter's water-quality expert. I don't filter my water

#214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what review site would you go to if you're shopping for a hand mixer, or is there no such animal?

I follow advice I learned from a friend who moved to the US from Germany. She said the German philosophy when researching is "Preis-Leistungs-Verhältnis" (PLV) PLV isn't just the sticker price - it's the total cost of ownership when considered against the utility and convenience it provides. I no longer set a goal to find the very best #1 thing in every category by reading reviews when I'm buying something. Reviews c…

Playing devils advocate for a min, your comment just a long way of saying "Don't get the very best thing - get the very best thing for you."

What tangible thing do you do differently from the advice this friend gave you? Or rather how did you shop before is your didn't look to see what utility it gave you in comparison to the cost?"

Let's say I'm in a situation where I need a bicycle for two months. I'm not going to buy the must expensive bike or there, I'm going to look around and buy a cheap bike that will be fair enough for two months. Are you saying before this advice you would research and buy the best bike out there?

Re: I'm Wirecutter's water-quality expert. I don't filter my water

#215
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Wirecutter was bad before the NYT acquisition How so?

They would consistently recommend products based on affiliate revenue over value or performance.

Can you share the evidence of this? Did you or someone have access to their affiliate revenue?

How do you know it shaped their decisions between products?

Re: I'm Wirecutter's water-quality expert. I don't filter my water

#216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They would consistently recommend products based on affiliate revenue over value or performance.

Can you share the evidence of this? Did you or someone have access to their affiliate revenue? How do you know it shaped their decisions between products?

If you'd like, use Wayback https://archive.org/ to show reviews from the pre-aquisiton days. Notably, they would consistently recommend electronics and even things like dishware that would be sourced exclusively from Amazon over superior products sold directly through the manufacturer or other private-brand retail sites. I have zero issues with affiliate marketing, but I have huge issues when those affiliations consistently skew reviews.

Re: I'm Wirecutter's water-quality expert. I don't filter my water

#217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I follow advice I learned from a friend who moved to the US from Germany. She said the German philosophy when researching is "Preis-Leistungs-Verhältnis" (PLV) PLV isn't just the sticker price - it's the total cost of ownership when considered against the utility and convenience it provides. I no longer set a goal to find the very best #1 thing in every category by reading reviews when I'm buying something. Reviews c…

Playing devils advocate for a min, your comment just a long way of saying "Don't get the very best thing - get the very best thing for you." What tangible thing do you do differently from the advice this friend gave you? Or rather how did you shop before is your didn't look to see what utility it gave you in comparison to the cost?" Let's say I'm in a situation where I need a bicycle for two months. I'm not going to…

I think it's tempting to overvalue our own needs. As if the Huffy $99 bike wouldn't work fine for two months. It absolutely would.

Life is too short to spent 5 hours agonizing over reports about what object to buy for 2 months. Agonize about the things you'll care about in 10 years, like a house, your career path, your health... that's where the value and utility/convenience comes in.

If photography was my passion, I'd spend that time willingly finding the best camera for me that would bring me joy and the function I wanted. I went to NYC years ago and wanted a camera with a selfie screen for the trip... went to target, bought one that worked in store. It was great on the trip and I had no issue just giving it away when I got back. Not worth researching --- but some otherwise very thoughtful people will spend 2 hours researching which printer paper to buy when they really don't care and it really doesn't matter.

Buy the car you want, not the one CR says to get. Buy an appliance from a brand you can get serviced in your area, and try to make purchases locally when you can. All of this matters much more than finding what 10 reviewers agree is the best bike or whatever is so temporary in life.

Re: I'm Wirecutter's water-quality expert. I don't filter my water

#218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wirecutter is just a worse version of Consumer Reports where they don't guarantee they aren't running ads and accepting money from the retailers whose products are featured in the media

It's even worse than that - they have the same anti-tech political bent as the rest of the legacy tech press. Thankfully we have better options now.

> anti-tech political bent as the rest of the legacy tech press

Idk why, this string of text is very weird to me... Feels like you expect effusive praise of the tech industry's political goals in the press? That's not what press is for...

Re: I'm Wirecutter's water-quality expert. I don't filter my water

#219
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wirecutter is just a worse version of Consumer Reports where they don't guarantee they aren't running ads and accepting money from the retailers whose products are featured in the media

If I need something I usually just buy what Wirecutters recommends and I'm rarely disappointed.

Wirecutter recommendations are always expensive compared to the same class of products. Consumer Reports will give their rankings and testing methodology and show prices and which are good budget buys and let you make up your mind.

Wirecutter recs are paid for and so that is part of the expense (but also expensive products tend to be better quality).

I've been buying CR recommendations for a decade now and no problems, albeit I haven't bought a car yet from their recs

Re: I'm Wirecutter's water-quality expert. I don't filter my water

#220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what review site would you go to if you're shopping for a hand mixer, or is there no such animal?

Hell if I know. These days I drop the query into deep research ChatGPT with explicit instructions about what I want and to only present price as data, not a deciding factor.

You are going to be the first pig suckled dry when they start inserting ads into these chatbots
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