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I'm a bit surprised to see how much snark there is in the comment sections of this video. The requests for "let's see an independent chef use this knife to do r

• razzmatazmania 1y ago
  I'm surprised there isn't moralizing about the price point. I don't see why the US is so far behind in manufacturing efficiency. Everything seem to be 10-100x the cost of comparable Chinese goods, and US labor isn't paid anywhere close to 100x more.
  • Eisenstein 1y ago
    This episode of the Search Engine podcast goes into detail about that: * https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-puzzle-of-the-all-american-bbq-scrubber/id1614253637?i=1000699197820 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-puzzle-of-the-all-...
    • j_bum 1y ago
      Did you mean the Search Engine podcast..?
      • Eisenstein 1y ago
        I did. Thanks for the correction.
  • gpm 1y ago
    Eh, it's pretty clear this price point isn't driven by manufacturing. It's driven by being a bespoke item with tons of R&D costs that need to be recouped. If this turns into a significant market, I'm sure the cost will plummet.
  • ajmurmann 1y ago
    Is it that they cannot sell it for cheaper or that this price will maximize profits?
  • komali2 1y ago
    Why would manufacturing cost come into play? Isn't it a given that a company will charge as much as they can get away with charging? Cost of labor and material I understood to only matter at the absolute bottom of a highly commoditized market e.g., bolts or capacitors or whatever. This is the only consumer ultrasonic knife (as far as I know) so they can charge whatever.
• rowanG077 1y ago
  This is also make takeaway. I have noticed this more and more on this site. Everything is criticized to an insane degree. If someone hasn't solved world hunger, while at the same time making money and curing their grandma of Alzheimer it will not be received well.
  • rkomorn 1y ago
    Oh good for them if they cure grandma of Alzheimer's. That's REALLY gonna help those of us whose grandmas are already dead.
• jszymborski 1y ago
  > ...you are never going to make meaningful progress by telling consumers to feel bad for buying fun things. I think it's a worthwhile message to tell folks that we, collectively, should be mindful about the resources we consume and the waste we produce. For such razor-thin (lol) gains in QoL, I think it's worth reminding people to consider whether it is worth the huge increase in waste. Knives are metal and wood/plastic... awfully efficient tools for the work they get done. EDIT: And to balance the negativity, I _love_ the Seattle Ultrasonics logo.
  • mlrtime 1y ago
    You're not entirely wrong but the selective outrage (on e-waste) here is 100% off balance.
• tgsovlerkhgsel 1y ago
  Most importantly, buying useful things, that will likely be used for a long time and contain about as much e-waste as a single-use vape.
• mensetmanusman 1y ago
  E-waste can be solved without reducing the number of items. Just requires basic investments in recycling.
  • 9dev 1y ago
    Recycling is a sham. There is mostly no efficient recycling of sufficiently advanced components, the industry just spent decades on making you think you can buy lots of cheap things and all that trash isn’t your problem. Well it is.
    • mensetmanusman 1y ago
      With enough energy we can separate anything into its elemental constituents. “Recycling” as mentioned by the US press is a scam because we had humans walking over our trash in India manually recycling in such a dangerous way they banned our recycling. Anything can be ground into dust and sent through a series of physiochemical processes to reconstitute.
      • 9dev 1y ago
        Well. The "recycling" we’re talking about in this thread is a greenwashing lie to make consumers feel better about their irresponsible consumption. The recycling you’re talking about is a science fiction trope, and utterly irrelevant here, because we don’t have a way of expending that much energy, let alone generate economically (or ecologically).
• DannyBee 1y ago
  Overall agree it seems cool, and maybe interesting. "People spend hundreds of dollars and many hours sharpening kitchen knives," The former, totally agree - i've seen people buy a tormek to do basic knife sharpening (not grinding), which is like swatting a fly with an $800 hammer. The latter, do you mean overall, or in a sitting or what? I've certainly seen people on various forums go nuts, and then you have hertzmann staring at knife edges with an SEM, but even if i did it completely by hand with shaptons, it takes like 15 minutes, max, to sharpen 10 knives, through an entire insane grit progression (which i do for plane blades when i need to cleanly slice end grain without going to a super high-angle plane or something. For knives, i was just trying to get a comparison point, i use electric sharpeners in practice). Or approximately 2 minutes with an electric knife sharpener. While sure, there is a difference when i put them under my digital inspection microscope, either can slice paper towel cleanly and easily (slicing paper is easy, slicing paper towel ends to be hard because any burr catches really easily) Are there really even semi-normal people out there spending hours to sharpen knives? If so, like, why? (Obviously, again, if they need to be reground because you knicked it really badly, sure that takes a bit, but beyond that) None of these steels are tough enough to require all that many strokes (it's pretty easy to test it with a marker and see when you remove the marking), and if you are using super custom steels (RIP Crucible :(), carbide, or ceramics, you need CBN or diamond anyway, but the same is still true - given the correct abrasive material, sharpening knives is just not that slow. I actually travel with an electric knife sharpener if we are going to be staying in an airbnb somewhere for >1 week and are cooking most nights. It's the most consistent thing about airbnb - no matter what level of luxury, etc, they always have many knives, and all of them are dangerously dull. It still doesn't take more than a few minutes to sharpen them all.
  • john_minsk 1y ago
    I admire you. You are a minority, you know that, right? I don't have time in my schedule at the moment, which says "sharpen the knifes". So for me - it would be amazing if someone solved this problem in a radical way. Sporadically I would sharpen the knives and since I don't have it in my "skills" section of the brain, I always have to "figure out" sharpening process.
• dlcarrier 1y ago
  >People spend hundreds of dollars and many hours sharpening kitchen knives... What amazes me is how many people spend absolutely zero time sharpening knives, using decades-old knives that have never been sharpened and can't even cut through cucumbers.
  • john_minsk 1y ago
    I don't use knives in my kitchen. My romantic partner does. Yesterday I decided to cut some tomatoes only to find out that all knives are dull. She never said anything, I didn't know it. Why? Because she is just "used" to it and to her these knives were just fine. So she never thought about sharpening knives in the first place. I will take those knives to a pro and he will sharpen them for me, as in a rental I stay in, I don't have the tools to do that and as I said in another comment - I don't have a pain free process to do that as I don't do it often.
    • chneu 1y ago
      You don't really need "tools" to sharpen knives. You just need a harder surface and some experience. It's one of those things that once you learn you can accomplish with a variety of "tools" because you're just trying to achieve an end goal. There's zero reason you can't sharpen a knife in a rental, lol. You don't need a belt grinder or anything. People get way too caught up in buying into systems and being told how to do things because it alleviates some anxiety of trying something new. Sharpening knives hasn't really changed much in the last few centuries. Watch a few guides and learn to do it. There's no substitute for experience here. It's also a very transferable skill so it's one that used to be taught in schools but no longer is.
      • JohnMakin 1y ago
        when I was poor I used to make pricy shaving blades last for months longer than they should have by rubbing them on some old jeans. I don’t remember where I learned it but my roommates thought I was crazy til they tried it.
• poink 1y ago
  > People spend hundreds of dollars and many hours sharpening kitchen knives With a mass market electric sharpener and a reasonable knife I spend maybe 15 minutes/yr on sharpening and the knife + sharpener costs less than half this product The marketing video seems to try to head people like me off, but it also seems to wildly overstate the level of commitment required to have sharp knives (I do think the tech is cool tho. I just wouldn’t pay $400 for an 8 inch chef’s knife no matter how good it is)
  • stickfigure 1y ago
    To embrace a stereotype, there are two types of people in the kitchen: Tool enthusiasts and food enthusiasts. The tool enthusiast has beautiful Japanese steel knives treated as family heirlooms; the knives are sent out for professional sharpening once or twice a year. The food enthusiast has a pile of fibrox knives and a chef's choice electric sharpener. The knives go through the sharpener once a month and the dishwasher daily; the knives get replaced every decade or two. The tool enthusiast's knives are pretty, but the food enthusiast's knives always pass the paper test. Nobody has ever complemented me "wow, this meal was prepared with such pretty knives!"
    • quotemstr 1y ago
      Your kitchen example also functions as allegory for software development
    • YeGoblynQueenne 1y ago
      Most people I know never sharpen their knives. My grandmothers (both of whom cooked for all branches of the family every day when I was a kid) never did. I think if a knife got too dull they simply chucked it out and got a new one. And probably cut themselves a few times until it got dulled enough. Anyway that's three kinds of people: two kinds of foodies, and everyone else.
      • slow_typist 1y ago
        How can you know your grandmothers never sharpened it? In my experience grandmothers tend to have a steel lying in a drawer and use it at least before cutting through expensive meat. And they use professional sharpening services once in a year. You wouldn’t actually notice as a child.
• lqet 1y ago
  > People spend hundreds of dollars and many hours sharpening kitchen knives I am ashamed to admit it, but I have been happily using this 5,99 EUR IKEA knife sharpener for nearly 10 years know: https://www.ikea.com/de/en/p/aspekt-knife-sharpener-black-57145296/ https://www.ikea.com/de/en/p/aspekt-knife-sharpener-black-57... I use it 1-2 times a month for 30 seconds on the 2 knives I use in the kitchen. They pass the paper test. Previously, I used the bottom of a coffee mug. That being said, thinks like [0] do exist and people seem to buy them. [0] https://www.horl.com/us/en/sharpeners/ https://www.horl.com/us/en/sharpeners/
  • thiht 1y ago
    No need to be ashamed, if it works it works. Whetstones look cooler but they do the same job. I actually bought the same device at a local knife store for my parents and the clerk said it was perfect if you just want to get sharp knives and be done with it. Whetstones or professional sharpening is more useful for pros or knife hobbyists/enthusiasts.
    • cowjan 1y ago
      > they do the same job The quality of the job is vastly different, though. This video shows great examples: https://youtu.be/0uy5NrLEZ4g?si=mxAUrFxAFX_xHrFv https://youtu.be/0uy5NrLEZ4g?si=mxAUrFxAFX_xHrFv
      • spyckie2 1y ago
        In the comments it reveals this guy is using the sharpener wrong by doing way too many pulls with too much pressure. The cheap ikea one is fine, it will not wear out your blade. 2-3 pulls at very light pressure, no need to learn how to use a whetstone properly, perfect UX for those who don’t typically sharpen knives.
• avereveard 1y ago
  The video provides no test of the unsharpened sonic knife performances, so any claim made are instintively fishy marketing, however cool the product may be, it was fresh out of packaging, what happens once the blade is dull? If we have to sharpen it it instantly loses all it's value. also, no test on power armor, I don't think they have identified their core market.
• deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
• emmelaich 1y ago
  Pro tip, often the early comments on HN are negative. Give it some time.
• omnicognate 1y ago
  Concerns about safety aren't moralising, and this isn't just a "sharper kitchen knife". First, on sharpness, it takes me about 15 minutes once a week to sharpen my cleaver, two chef's knives, paring knife and breadknife. I could spend another half an hour or so and get them to razor sharpness, but I don't because I don't need or want that level of sharpness for kitchen work. Therefore, while something that eliminates that 15 minute task could be of value to me (though personally I rather enjoy the process), something that provides a sharper edge is not. Secondly, even if I were to use razor-sharp knives, there's a limit to the damage they will do to my hands in a typical accident. In particular, even a razor sharp knife will usually stop at the bone. I don't know if this knife will because this advert didn't address safety at all, but given ultrasonic knives are used for cleanly cutting through bones in surgery [1] it's reasonable to suspect it might not. Adding to my chef's knives the ability to smoothly pass all the way through my finger would not be an upgrade in my view [2]. Lastly, to raise questions about a product's safety is not "moralising". If I were to say that you shouldn't use this knife because of safety concerns, that could be viewed as a moral position, but I don't care about that at all. You can use chainsaws and flamethrowers in your kitchen for all I care. When I say I would be unlikely to buy this thing without some information on what it will do to my hand in the event of a kitchen accident, that's just a choice I am free to make as a consumer. [1] https://www.cheersonic.com/portfolio-items/ultrasonic-bone-cutter/ https://www.cheersonic.com/portfolio-items/ultrasonic-bone-c... [2] As it is, I have what seems to be permanent scarring and some loss of sensation on my left thumb from cutting it to the bone with my breadknife a year ago, and my mind replays the trauma every time I pick that knife up. (No, the knife was not blunt. It was brand new at the time, and I've since maintained it to the same level of sharpness it had then, using a ceramic sharpening rod and a whetstone for the tip. The accident was due to me being distracted and positioning my hand incorrectly. And yes, better technique would have prevented it, but I'm not and never will be a trained chef. Had I used this ultrasonic knife I expect I would have taken the end of my thumb off.)
• raverbashing 1y ago
  If anyone doubts the efficiency of ultrasonic cutters may I recommend this Old (Tony) video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFeek0a8s7Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFeek0a8s7Q
• lwhi 1y ago
  I have a knife sharpener in my drawer that I use to sharpen my Wursthof knives .. and end up with sharp knives as a result. How would this make my life much better?
• TulliusCicero 1y ago
  > I'm a bit surprised to see how much snark there is in the comment sections of this video. It's "slashdot talks about the iPod announcement" all over again. Unfortunately, communities tend to devolve other time into empty cynicism and negativity, and it's hard to stop, since obviously you don't want to ban 100% of cynical or negative comments.
  • rkomorn 1y ago
    > since obviously you don't want to ban 100% of cynical or negative comments. Probably would be a net positive if we did.
    • brulard 1y ago
      How would we find out the real sentiment if negative comments were all filtered out?
      • rkomorn 1y ago
        I guess it depends on how you define negative. "I don't think this is something I would use." or "I think the price point is too high for what you get." aren't particularly negative to me. "Nobody should buy this, it's dumb." or "Who even needs something like this, just learn to sharpen knives!" are.
• TacticalCoder 1y ago
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