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The Rise of the $8 Ice Cube

priceonomics.com

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Re: The Rise of the $8 Ice Cube

#121

Post by bcbrown »

DanBC wrote: post #68
danohuiginn wrote: post #15

This is, of course, ridiculous. Still, there's logic to it: find some mass-market component that is used in a luxury service, and provide a high-end alternative. The kind of idio^H^H^H^Hcustomers who want luxury certainly don't want it contaminiated by something from Walmart, regardless of the actual quality. It's the same reason as for those gold-plated cables for audiophiles.

But the high end drink chiller exists, and it is called "whisky stones" or similar.

Those are bunk.

The cooling power of ice comes from the phase change from solid to liquid, which absorbs a ton of heat. The temperature change from 25 to 32 degrees Fahrenheit is minor in comparison.

Whiskey stones do not change phase, and so they have a much smaller amount of heat they can absorb, and I haven't found them to be very effective for chilling a drink to 32 degrees and keeping it there. There's no dilution, but that doesn't matter to me as much as the temperature.

Re: The Rise of the $8 Ice Cube

#122

Post by morley »

tptacek wrote: post #107
_Adam wrote: post #48

As stupid as this sounds, there is actually a difference between these ice cubes and the standard variety. And that's the appearance. Just look: http://www.glaceice.net/uploads/3/9/6/9/3969825/3969289_orig... Because there's no air bubbles, the ice is perfectly clear. That's not a trivial fact. Humans innately like clear stuff! Just think how unappealing cloudy water is in comparison to clear water. The only exceptio…

Can't you get the same thing out of a Kold-Draft machine? Isn't that what high-end bars already do? What reputable high-end cocktail bar --- Pegu, Booker & Dax, PDT, Aviary, &c --- uses this stuff?

The article indicates that this is an end-consumer product. If I were an amateur craft cocktail maker, I might consider buying a small amount versus a commercial machine.

Re: The Rise of the $8 Ice Cube

#123

Post by 9999 »

One supposed virtue of this ice is that it's clear, if you want to make perfectly clear ice yourself, this instructable has instructions on how you can build an insulated ice maker that will do that for a few bucks (in addition to the instructions on making a good iceball maker):

http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-make-an-ice-ball-make...

Re: The Rise of the $8 Ice Cube

#124

Post by tptacek »

morley wrote: post #122
tptacek wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't you get the same thing out of a Kold-Draft machine? Isn't that what high-end bars already do? What reputable high-end cocktail bar --- Pegu, Booker & Dax, PDT, Aviary, &c --- uses this stuff?

The article indicates that this is an end-consumer product. If I were an amateur craft cocktail maker, I might consider buying a small amount versus a commercial machine.

So then couldn't any local ice company buy a Kold-Draft machine and undercut this?

Re: The Rise of the $8 Ice Cube

#125

Post by tcas »

jrockway wrote: post #71
Alupis wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you sure? Gold is one of the most soft/malleable metals used to plate connectors? (I know it's one the best best conductors). And we all know, there's no difference between the $150 hdmi cable and the $5 hdmi cable except cosmetics and perhaps some better shielding. They're all digital connections, so the signal/bits are either there or are not.

> They're all digital connections, so the signal/bits are either there or are not. Absolutely not true. There is quite a lot of engineering behind making an HDMI or Ethernet cable work: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmission_line And, there are plenty of ways to mess it up and make a cable that only sort of works. TMDS, the signaling mechanism that HDMI uses, does not have error correction codes. It does do some e…

The 8b10b encoding mostly helps with clock recovery and preventing a DC bias (+/- charge) build up in the cable, which helps with error detection (I think it can detect only single bit) and recovery from, but can't correct.

Re: The Rise of the $8 Ice Cube

#126

Post by erbo »

dbrian wrote: post #35
habosa wrote: post #18

The joke is that for very nice liquor (whiskey especially) you should definitely not be adding ice, no matter how "deserving" the ice is. If you want the drink cold, chill the liquor itself or even the glass. In hindsight, fuck it. There is no point in dissecting this, it is what it is. It's ice for people who want to spend money just to spend it.

Adding a bit of water brings out flavors you don't experience neat. It's a personal preference. http://youtu.be/ajqd62fE73E?t=6m23s

I'm told that, ideally, you should use the same water that the whisky was made from in the first place. But that may be apocryphal.

Re: The Rise of the $8 Ice Cube

#127

Post by erbo »

imkevinxu wrote: post #22

Reminded me of the Priceonomics article on diamonds, some business guy literally created a market for something found in nature

"Okay, okay, you figured us out. I'll give you a free bag of diamonds if you'll go away and keep quiet."

"Great...now I'm a party to this ugly little secret."

http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/1992-07-12/

Re: The Rise of the $8 Ice Cube

#128

Post by ianstallings »

At what point do we reach maximum decadence? How far can we go I wonder? But you won't ever see me complaining about this. It's not my place to question other's choices that don't hurt me. But it sure is funny to sit back and watch sometimes.

Re: The Rise of the $8 Ice Cube

#129

Post by [deleted] »

morley wrote: post #122
tptacek wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't you get the same thing out of a Kold-Draft machine? Isn't that what high-end bars already do? What reputable high-end cocktail bar --- Pegu, Booker & Dax, PDT, Aviary, &c --- uses this stuff?

The article indicates that this is an end-consumer product. If I were an amateur craft cocktail maker, I might consider buying a small amount versus a commercial machine.

[deleted]

Re: The Rise of the $8 Ice Cube

#130

Post by rosser »

monknomo wrote: post #114
nathan_long wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Someone could come in and sell a perfect ice maker for $200 and crush the pre-made high end ice market completely. Doubtful. What customers are buying is a feeling, not a specification. Such people would not buy an Acme watch just because it looks as good as and keeps better time than a Rolex, because the brand and its image is the product. Surely nothing makes that more apparent than luxury ice .

A $200 ice machine isn't going after the people who would buy an $800 ice machine so much as the people that want to be people who can buy an $800 ice machine. It's the reason Seikos and Omega exist in the watch market. You get some of the reflected glory, but can say "I'm more financially prudent than the guy with the Rolex" or "I'm beating the hell out of the guy with the Timex"

...people that want to be people who can buy an $800 ice machine.

And that's a vastly bigger market than people who can buy an $800 ice machine.

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