Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product

simonberens.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 427 posts

Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product

#111

Post by MichaelZuo »

landryraccoon wrote: post #101
MichaelZuo wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well wasnt that a good thing? After the extermination of Melos they could credibly say they were less responsible for the actions of the polis. And had a higher chance of deflecting the inevitable revenge on to the non idiotes Athenians.

If one civilization is taking revenge on another I don’t think they would show that much nuance. For one thing, wouldn’t everyone claim they were against their old polis? How would the invaders have any idea who was an idiote? I just don’t believe it’s at all easy to avoid the fate of your nation , and I especially doubt that the politically ignorant have a better chance of avoiding that fate than the well informed.

I did say higher chance, not guaranteed to avoid it.

The counter extermination was only 5% of Athens total population, or so historians say, so it seems like a lot of nuance was shown.

Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product

#112

Post by jjcm »

mmh0000 wrote: post #58

This is super interesting, and I'd actually be quite interested in buying a 60K-Lumen lamp... but not at $1200. Years ago, there was an HN article "You Need More Lumens"[1], which in turn led me down a rabbit hole. I ended up purchasing: 4 standard table lamps from Target, 28 2000-lumen Cree LEDs bulbs[2] and, 4 7-way splitters[3]. The end result is somewhere around 56,000 lumens. And I LOVE it. Makes me much happier…

I did something similar, but a slightly different approach. I installed grow lights in my ceiling conches: amazon.com/dp/B07BRKT56T?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_conn_dt_b_fed_asin_title_1

In my office I have 6 of these, for a total of around 13,000 lumens. It effectively 6x'd my light output for around $150. Worked wonders, especially in the PNW winter.

Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product

#113

Post by sberens »

necovek wrote: post #100
sberens wrote: post #2

Author here, happy to answer any questions about the journey!

Being 6'5" myself, I am worried I'd be blinded by the lamp when I stand up: to avoid adding a base under (an already bulky) base, is there a way to separate the lamp itself and have it wall/ceiling mounted (still pointing upwards)?

Because the lamp is 6'3" it's only below eye level for people who are 6'7-8.

We had another 6'5" customer who was worried about the height but they said it was totally fine even with shoes on.

Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product

#114

Post by seizethecheese »

ohyoutravel wrote: post #102
seizethecheese wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Classic hindsight bias. In fact, you could be paying a lot of attention to politics and still think tariffs were not going to go so high. Here's [1] a betting market that regularly was below 5% chance of tariffs above 40% on Chinese imports in first 100 days of Trump's second term. https://polymarket.com/event/trump-imposes-40-blanket-tariff...

Polymarket isn’t a source for this, lol. Maybe google trends, since there’s no reason to manipulate it. There were also reasons to anticipate the amount of the tariffs, and the absolute stupidity of the tariffs (still reeling from the Heard and McDonald islands tariffs lmao).

This is a strange position to take. Sure, Polymarket has warts, but that doesn't mean it's not a very good source for consensus opinions about the future from the past. Do you think this market was manipulated?

Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product

#116

Post by jjcm »

eek2121 wrote: post #81
mmh0000 wrote: post #58

This is super interesting, and I'd actually be quite interested in buying a 60K-Lumen lamp... but not at $1200. Years ago, there was an HN article "You Need More Lumens"[1], which in turn led me down a rabbit hole. I ended up purchasing: 4 standard table lamps from Target, 28 2000-lumen Cree LEDs bulbs[2] and, 4 7-way splitters[3]. The end result is somewhere around 56,000 lumens. And I LOVE it. Makes me much happier…

Just a fun random fact from me: We do need more lumens. Not for normal (non-production) indoor lighting in most situations, however, I always want a bright light for my outside lights, and I find that most 100w-equivalent (1500 lumens) are just not quite enough. 2,000 lumens is almost there, however, 2,500 lumens would be beneficial. Both 2,000 and 2,500 lumen bulbs either don't last in temperature extremes, or are s…

Relinking what I've already linked in a sibling comment, but I've just started having these die after 4 years of continuous use ~12hrs/day: amazon.com/dp/B07BRKT56T

Interestingly, 4 of the 6 that I had running all died in the same ~3mo period, but still I was pretty happy for 4 years of use for $25/ea.

Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product

#118

Post by ohyoutravel »

renewiltord wrote: post #65
cwal37 wrote: post #52

> As someone who generally stays out of politics, I didn’t know much about the incoming administration’s stance towards tariffs, though I don’t think anyone could have predicted such drastic hikes. I have an appreciation for very bright lamps, and the project is neat, but that stuck out to me. I'm always fascinated by people who both feel comfortable ignoring maybe the single most impactful society-determining appara…

Realistically, everyone always seems to think everything was predictable but I have maybe a handful of friends who sold the Russell 2000 futures short and then rebounded long who made millions off the various tariff trades. Ironically, Ukrainian and Russian. Ex-HFT but just doing very normal click trading. So I don't get it. Why isn't everyone who can predict the future so accurately a (deca-)millionaire?

Plenty of things are predictable in the sense that one can bucket them. Tariffs were very predictable because we know the pedo has that unilateral lever and talks about wielding it. But who would have predicted that out of all the stupid tariff things that might happen, it would be things like tariffing allies, tariffing uninhabited islands, TACO tariffs, or a giant board with “reciprocal tariffs”? It requires not only predicting specific stupidity, but taking an aggressive position.

Whoever was holding aggressive poly market positions on “POTUS poops pants at presser” is a millionaire now. We all know he wears diapers and has massive flatulence, but who would have predicted that specific thing?

Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product

#119

Post by polishdude20 »

cwal37 wrote: post #52

> As someone who generally stays out of politics, I didn’t know much about the incoming administration’s stance towards tariffs, though I don’t think anyone could have predicted such drastic hikes. I have an appreciation for very bright lamps, and the project is neat, but that stuck out to me. I'm always fascinated by people who both feel comfortable ignoring maybe the single most impactful society-determining appara…

You could also say politics is downstream of other forces that are less global and more local. Some people choose to stay aware of their more local forces rather than the grand ones.
Post reply on HN