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Soylent on the latest Vice piece

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Re: Soylent on the latest Vice piece

#41

Post by Yver »

contextual wrote: post #10

Soylent will likely become a billion dollar global enterprise, and even "disrupt" the food industry. It will also ultimately be a failure and frowned upon in modern society. Why? Because a Soylent-saturated world would rob families and loved ones of the ritual and benefits of eating together. Eating together civilizes people. It's emotionally and socially edifying. Studies show that families that dine together stay t…

Your comment reads like you're living in the 60s. I don't think that modern families have the kind of "ritualistic" meals you're describing.

Re: Soylent on the latest Vice piece

#42

Post by toomuchtodo »

nether wrote: post #22
contextual wrote: post #10

Soylent will likely become a billion dollar global enterprise, and even "disrupt" the food industry. It will also ultimately be a failure and frowned upon in modern society. Why? Because a Soylent-saturated world would rob families and loved ones of the ritual and benefits of eating together. Eating together civilizes people. It's emotionally and socially edifying. Studies show that families that dine together stay t…

Except liquid meal replacements already exist (Ensure etc.), and the entire world isn't Valley geeks. You could eat cheap fast calories everyday but gourmet restaurants still thrive. Not everyone is obsessed with food practicality.

Where would you rather eat on the go? Mcdonalds? Or a Soylent vending machine?

I've had enough Mcdonalds for this lifetime. Bring on the Soylent vending machines!

Re: Soylent on the latest Vice piece

#43

Post by berberous »

contextual wrote: post #10

Soylent will likely become a billion dollar global enterprise, and even "disrupt" the food industry. It will also ultimately be a failure and frowned upon in modern society. Why? Because a Soylent-saturated world would rob families and loved ones of the ritual and benefits of eating together. Eating together civilizes people. It's emotionally and socially edifying. Studies show that families that dine together stay t…

Is every single meal a social event for you?

I eat out at least a few times a week with friends. But if I'm stuck at the office working late or home alone one night, I don't cook. I order off seamless, and a lot of it is garbage. Sure, I should learn to like cooking, but I've failed to do that and that's unlikely to change.

So in my mind, replacing the shitty delivery meals with something optimally nutritious would be great. And then on the weekends or when I have time, I'd still of course eat out with friends and family.

Soylent is not aiming to replace every meal. But as a replacement for grabbing a slice of pizza on the way home from work by yourself, what's the problem?

Re: Soylent on the latest Vice piece

#44

Post by DanBC »

meritt wrote: post #26
OoTheNigerian wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has practically disappeared and the submitted link was substituted[1]. I think this is a first. I doubt that PG is aware of this type of orchestrated manipulation going on. It is quite dangerous for the credibility of HN. Soylent seems interesting and potentially disruptive. However, it is FOOD and deserves to be put under the microscope. Anyone conniving to make them dodge scrutiny (especially via underhand moves…

YC owns a portion of Soylent. It is not in the best financial interest of YC to portray them in a negative light. You can't reasonably expect impartial and unbiased information to come from this site, can you? They have a vested interest in seeing the success of their children.

> YC owns a portion of Soylent.

No they don't. Unless you can point to something that shows they do?

Re: Soylent on the latest Vice piece

#45

Post by nchuhoai »

DanBC wrote: post #44
meritt wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

YC owns a portion of Soylent. It is not in the best financial interest of YC to portray them in a negative light. You can't reasonably expect impartial and unbiased information to come from this site, can you? They have a vested interest in seeing the success of their children.

> YC owns a portion of Soylent. No they don't. Unless you can point to something that shows they do?

Um, yes they do

http://blog.soylent.me/post/64789154918/soylent-funding-anno...

Re: Soylent on the latest Vice piece

#46

Post by jonnathanson »

jw_ wrote: post #34
jonnathanson wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally speaking, I think the B2B market makes a lot of sense for Soylent. Especially sales to the military, space agencies, and maybe even white labeling for big food companies. In the consumer space, sure, you have some "Valley geeks" who see food as more of a burden to be solved than a source of enjoyment or socialization. But you've also got folks like athletes, both professional and amateur (a much bigger con…

Military organizations already spend a lot of time and money on food, given its overwhelming importance in things like fighting wars. I suspect "Valley nerdchow-paste" is not going to do a lot to raise morale.

"Military organizations already spend a lot of time and money on food, given its overwhelming importance in things like fighting wars"

Correct, which is why military branches are deep-pocketed potential buyers.

"I suspect "Valley nerdchow-paste" is not going to do a lot to raise morale."

In a military context it's not a meal replacement, per se. More of an emergency MRE or HDR replacement, provided it's more shelf stable and can compete on nutritional factors. (Big ifs, of course.) I don't disagree that morale is a concern, though. MREs are nasty, but they're at least attempting to be palatable within the confines of their purpose.

Re: Soylent on the latest Vice piece

#48

Post by berberous »

smspence wrote: post #30
contextual wrote: post #10

Soylent will likely become a billion dollar global enterprise, and even "disrupt" the food industry. It will also ultimately be a failure and frowned upon in modern society. Why? Because a Soylent-saturated world would rob families and loved ones of the ritual and benefits of eating together. Eating together civilizes people. It's emotionally and socially edifying. Studies show that families that dine together stay t…

Haven't similar products existed for a while now? I wonder how Soylent compares to a product like Ensure, or other meal-replacement powders / shakes that have been on the market for years already. Is Soylent significantly cheaper, and/or is it better nutritionally? I think for Soylent to really explode in sales, they should find a way to market it as a cheap weight loss solution or something similar. The mass market…

I've read on the Soylent message board and various related sub-reddits that Ensure and similar products are indeed not as nutritionally optimal. Specifically, many of them are loaded with sugar so that they taste good. Which may be okay for 1 meal, but bad if you are using it regularly. Also, they probably are more expensive.

That said, Ensure is usually the product I hear has too much sugar. I'd be curious if anyone with more knowledge has looked into this issue more, or compared the nutritional components of the major players in that market.

Re: Soylent on the latest Vice piece

#49

Post by nostromo »

thinkalone wrote: post #25
tptacek wrote: post #2

Wow. Exactly the right response. I would never have paid any attention to Soylent's agreement with a large HACCP-certified manufacturer before, but Vice's story actually made that relevant to me. They might actually pick up customers from this shitstorm. Argh! But, well played.

What shitstorm? The Motherboard piece was overall positive, and didn't have the tongue-in-cheek holier-than-thou tone that most articles about Soylent have had.

The nascent shitstorm was the story PandoDaily wrote that cherry-picked the mold and rat incidents from the Vice piece to make the content more salacious than it otherwise was.

Re: Soylent on the latest Vice piece

#50

Post by markeganfuller »

smspence wrote: post #32
XorNot wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People keeping bringing this up. What is so difficult about the concept that not everyone wants to, or even can, cook meals that are nutritionally suitable, healthy or even intended to be consumed collectively - all the time?

Because on the internet, and especially in internet comments, the world only exists in black and white. Something is either 100% true for everyone everywhere at all times without exception, or it is 100% false. There is no middle ground, and no shades of gray. Ever.

And definitely not 50 of them.
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