Slashdot Mirror
Lab Created Diamonds Come to Market
E writes "Technology is putting some new sparkle in the world of diamonds. Until recently, naturally occurring, mined diamonds were unchallenged in their quality and desirability. But now laboratory-created diamonds, which possess the same properties as naturals, are poised to give them a run for their money. A new company, Adia Diamonds, has quite the variety in their inventory. They have the same chemical and physical properties as a mined diamond and come in white, blue and yellow. Both GIA and EGL grading labs are offering certifications for lab created diamonds. Seems like a good, high-tech alternative to the DeBeers diamond cartel."
The article hints more at the new synthetic process' value for jewelry, but I'm not so certain that most jewelers will appreciate it -- especially the jewelers that cater to the most extravagent tastes. Diamonds have always been an oddity for me -- I understand the diamond's purpose in industrial applications (drill bits, saw blades, abrasives, and even in semiconductors) but the De Beers Group situation is not one I've ever understood -- even when trying to "think like a lady."
I'm guessing the De Beers Group isn't worried about these synthetic diamonds, either -- they have such a great relationship with most jewelers because the De Beers Group spends a LOT of money in how they market the diamonds: marketing that provides diamonds for the bling-bling rappers, the royal families, the Hollywood stars and whoever else needs something sparkling to wear in public. That's what the jewelers want: they don't care if it's cheap, they get a great marketing campaign and still make huge profit margins.
From Adia's website, we see only one retailer that resells their diamonds. Here's a company that has been around a few years, and they don't have a lot of support.
For industrial applications, though, is the De Beers Group really a powerhouse? I'd always heard that a lot of flawed diamonds end up in the industrial applications, and the flawed ones are significantly cheaper than the "perfect" clarity versions used in jewelry.
As a sidenote, my lady doesn't wear diamonds unless they're family heirlooms -- I've gotten her to move to 22K and 24K gold jewelry. It is shiny, sparkles like crazy if cut right, and when it wears down, I have it swapped for a new piece of jewelry in any Indian neighborhood (or in India) for a relatively competitive price. Diamonds are sort of boring for her now -- she sees how little they store value over time versus gold, and they're not very useful in a financial emergency (versus gold or platinum). Plus the fact that she can "trade-up" her softened jewelry for something else really captivates her -- the last ring she wore we "exchanged" for a set of earrings that was traded for bangles a few years later. With the diamond, she's mostly stuck.
My Real Doll will never know the difference
Lab manufactured diamonds is an interesting concept, but if DeBeers gets its metaphorical finger in machine, it will ensure these diamonds either never get manufactured, or if they are manufactured never hit the marketplace with the name "diamond". The DeBeers monopoly is too dear and too powerful for disruption like this.
You can argue the "blood diamond" political aspects of the diamond mining industry, but even tossing that aside DeBeers' behavior and domination and control of the diamond industry transcends any other monopoly. There's a reason DeBeers isn't a U.S. company (among many others...), DeBeers' monopolistic practices and domination and heavy handed control of the diamond market would not likely pass legal muster in the U.S.
If you ever get a chance (/. "girlfriend" jokes aside), buy the lab diamonds, or buy your to-be a genuinely rare gem such as a Ruby (diamonds are not rare).
The sooner the myth that is diamonds is de-mythed, the better. Read more about diamond myths here.
Wired had a great article on the subject of synthetic diamonds a few years ago. An excerpt:
These technological wonders are rare and unique, they need to ramp production to even come close.
:)
from the website:
Only a handful of Adia diamonds are produced each month. To the contrary, natural diamonds have annual production rates of over 150,000,000 carats. Would you believe that they are rare?
I'm just reading a fascinating site packed with diamond color info.
Fascinating to see the histories of the famous natural diamonds, if they can get production close for clear ones it will be good.
As a geek I cannot wait for a diamond processor.
Is this the startings of the diamond age
liqbase
I remember seeing and looking at lab created diamonds in 1995. It hasn't been wether or not the can be created in the lab to be sold as jewelry or for industrial applications. It has always been unprofitable and will continue to be unless they found a really, really cheap way to do it.
Also remember that Debeers, among very few others, have already realized the possibility of alternatives coming to market (as jewelry). Hence the continued branding of Diamonds (The real kind, not the fake kind) into the mind of America.
TFA : "Adia diamonds are physically, chemically and optically identical to mined diamonds"
That said, is there no way to tell them apart?
-- Brought to you by Carl's JR
-challenges one of the most egregious monopolies in the world: debeers
-undermines the economic incentive for blood diamonds
-removes the financial drive behind a classist symbol, the diamond ring
-unlocks thousands of new technological and scientific advances, due to diamond's unique properties of hardness and optics, that were previously economically unfeasible
a diamond is just carbon. a very common element. it's just arranged in particularly difficult to achieve crystal. not anymore
on so many levels, in so many ways, when something that was previously scarce is now plentiful, the world has become a better place, progress has been achieved
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Over 3 years ago, Slashdot ran an article on these lab created diamonds; it was a great story on Wired.com. The difference there was that it was an independent piece, a solid read, and offered a glimpse into the future of computing (i.e. using diamonds as semiconductors).
This current story, however, is just a link to a damn press release, with no mention What was the point of it, aside from giving free press to this company?
didn't general electric do this about 20 or so years ago?
i recall debeers begging them not to enter the market with artificials due to the indistinguishability.
look, i know there are be other kinds / colors.. but at least 99% of all the diamonds i've seen in my life have been the white / transparent kind -- if they want to impress people with how exactly the same their synthetic diamonds are, maybe they should have some in their galleries that actually look even remotely like the diamonds we're used to.
I check lots of gallery images (which don't have previews and reload the damn page for each image) and didn't see one that looked like a diamond. WTF, those are way off the diamond grading scale for clarity. It's like you got them out of a cracker jack box.
Seems like a good, high-tech alternative to the DeBeers diamond cartel.
Not really. They're missing an element; a human element. I expect bloodshed and slavery with my diamonds. They make the diamonds more special.
Push Button, Receive Bacon
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
Wired did a much more in depth article on this subject a couple years ago.
One thing to keep in mind is that saying the lab-created diamonds possess the same qualities as natural diamonds is a little misleading. They are certainly diamonds, in that they are the same type of crystal form of carbon, but they *are* distinguishable from natural diamonds.
What I find very interesting is just how expensive and advanced equipment needs to be to tell the difference, and how much Debeers is shelling out to ensure that the biggest diamond testing labs have that equipment. Check out the linked article for more on that.
If you want to do something about challenging the DeBeers cartel and their questionable business practices, check out Canadian Diamonds, also here and here.
"He's more machine now than man, twisted and evil."
So whose ass are they sticking the lumps of coal in?
Bullshit! "Imitations" as you call them are more pure then the naturally occurring ones. They are chemically perfect and there is absolutely no way you would be able to tell with the naked eye.
It's FUD like yours that keeps DeBeers in business. The complexity you speak of is the diamonds imperfections.
I think its great. A diamond as stone does not have much value in comparison to Gold and other precious minerals. The diamond cartel has created a false monopoly and people are getting swindled everyday! Its about time people realize this.
It's not really love unless a 12 year old lost a finger cutting it out of the wall of a mine.
(Kudos to whomever I'm paraphrasing/ripping off in saying that -- I know it's not my own.)
Sweet informative mod.
He also told me how to tell an artificial pearl from a real one -- the real one, he said, will dissolve in vinegar. Strange sense of humor he had.
Do not mock my vision of impractical footwear
Others have made these points but they have not put them together into a logical whole:
People pay a premium -- a VERY big premium -- for "flawless" diamonds. The fewer flaws, the higher the premium. So much so that there are at least three separate quality categories that are commonly called "flawless". As you can imagine, the top category is expensive indeed.
Given this truth, there is no such thing as je ne sais quoi when it comes to diamonds. Flaws are flaws, and they are undesirable. That is how the entire market is based!
Therefore, a near-perfect lab diamond is "worth" much more than almost any other natural stone, according to the EXISTING diamond market.
You can't have it both ways.
I love how DeBeers turned "diamonds we got by killing Africans and anyone else in our way, funding local wars, and ripping you off on something that is so common everyone could have 10 and we'd still have warehouses full" into ... "conflict-free".
Until these guys ramp up to massive capacity, buying a diamond still involves killing people.
- Adam L. Beberg - The Cosm Project - http://www.mithral.com/
She did not need persuasion or even a second to think about it. She's adamant (pardon the pun) that any future diamond we own will be a symbol of the highest human skill and ingenuity and will not be something a slave dug up in an armed camp. For the symbolism, for the historical connections, for the emotional resonance, we both prefer diamonds that humans created.
Debeers is already losing market influence, dropping from 80% of the market leader (still less than Internet Explorer) to 60%.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
I'm no expert on diamond pricing, so maybe these are a good deal compared to the 'real' things, but check out their online inventory, and you'll see that their target market is definitely not cheapskates like me. Makes sense, though, or they would forever be labelled as the 'cheap' diamond, overshadowing the other qualities like being a unique conversation piece, being conflict-free, etc.
Give them about 10 years, and *maybe* we'll start seeing them on sale at Wal-mar.
A post a day keeps productivity at bay.
They must market it as ethical diamonds, Something like "No African died so that you can wear this diamond"
The purpose of the diamond ritual is to require the male (or whoever) to put his money where his mouth is, to prove that he is sincere about the relationship. And what's the old saying? "Money has a truthfulness. If a man speaks of his honor, make him pay in cash."
The diamond is idea for this purpose because it has almost no resale value. It's a way for the male to make a demonstratively extravagant purchase, one which the female (or whoever) is not able to whip back around for a cash refund.
Of course, it didn't have to be diamonds. Were it not for the DeBeers' marketing savvy, any arbitrary rare object could've sufficed. If technology had evolved differently, women might now be wearing tiny LCD displays on their fingers which play a video loop of their husbands throwing a bundle of cash into the ocean.
FATMOUSE + YOU = FATMOUSE
Supporting what the parent poster is saying, diamonds are the only gemstones I know of that are artificially scarce. Thus, in my mind, they are a poor investment.
They are made scarce by the fact that the overwhelming majority of productive diamond mines are controlled by one company, which jealously guards that scarcity (literally, the "extra" diamonds are guarded in huge warehouses). In my mind diamonds are only a few productive non-DeBeers mines away from being made much less valuable.
If you really need to get gemstones to invest in, I would recommend rubies or sapphires (I know, they're the same stone). Star sapphires are especially prized. Otherwise stick to precious metals.
"He's more machine now than man, twisted and evil."
...run, not walk, away from your woman.
Especially if you have explained to her what a scam DeBeers has perpetuated
upon the world, and it has not changed her mind.
Sure, you can offer her a non-blood diamond. But you have to ask yourself
if a person like that is someone you want to spent time with.
Of course, I carry a cellphone with tantalum capacitors in them. The world's a fucked up place.
Come on... the "article" is a f*cking press release!!!
Oh shiny! Give it to me!
What? This is the wrong article?
Demented But Determined.
Yes, the post certainly conveys upper-class, Ivy League snobbery. Furthermore, the author, I would contend, is less a scientist and more a literary scholar of classic schools of thought. That is to say, a culture of scholars who consistently misktake eloquence for sound argument, who consistently believe that truth can be discovered by coupling logic with fuzzy verbal terminologies such as utility, happiness, common good, etc. In a word: Philosophy. Can't solve a damn thing, but they feel better about themselves by having an expanded vocabulary (jargon) in an effort to appear sophisticated.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
"Gold-Pressed Latinum, anyone?"
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
They had a Belgian diamond expert examine one of them, and he was fooled. The industry had to create new types of testing just so that experts can pick these out. There's no uncanny valley here. They're real diamonds, just mass-produced.
Warning: Apple/Nintendo fangirl. Likes her electronics cute & cuddly. May be rabid.
For many years De Beers has been marketing diamonds and saying that the _very_best_ diamonds are flawless.
Here is a quote : "_Flawless_ is the very highest grade of gem stone, where no internal inclusions or surface imperfections are visible."
They are going to have a tough time convincing people that lab made diamonds are "too flawless".
If YOU'RE wearing them or if SHE'S wearing them.
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
Ya know there is talk of using diamonds to create the next generation of CPU's. Take a look at this 81 GHz!!! Diamonds may become a geek's best friend soon. :)
Looking at their white diamonds, the only one they list is really not cheaper than the natural diamond. In that case, the only advantage is the social conscious one - which is great if that's important to you.
B E138
,SI2 (meaning less imperfections) for $1,665
Caveat - they only had one white diamond. I do not know if their gigantic 3 carat stone would be significantly cheaper than the natural alternative.
http://www.adiadiamonds.com/diamond.php?diamond=A
Price: $1,505 ($2,640 per Carat)
SKU: ABE138
Shape: Round
Weight: 0.57 carat
Color: E
Clarity: SI3
vs Shane Company
0.58 carat E color
$150 more but better quality and slightly bigger
or
0.59 carat E color, I1 (more imprefections) for $1,280
More inclusions but lower price... eh
So everyone knows about blood diamonds? Can anyone here shed light about other gems? A lot of sapphires come from war-torn Sri Lanka, for example, so they could be "blood sapphires," right? I mean, other gems are worth a lot, too. Why couldn't they be used to finance wars? Do any other countries have other gemstone mines (emerald, ruby, jade, sapphire, onyx, amethyst, peridot, etc...) filled with slaves and slave corpses?
you said what i was thinking better than i could have said it
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
It doesn't matter which is technically proven to be better. Even if you can sit the average gal down and give her a 2 hour lecture on the details of crystaline flaws in natural and synthetic diamonds, it will always be "real" versus "man-made/fake" in her head. And when the gal is your wife, you don't want that to happen for a large number of good reasons.
For slashdotters the synthetic one may actually be more desirable, but the sad (or perhaps natural?) state of human psychology will always put the market in favor of the naturally formed diamond. This is good for industry however, and I wonder how much it would cost to make PC cases out of them.
Joking, joking..
It's not clear from the Adia diamonds whether these are grown like semiconductor wafers or made in high-pressure presses. Gemesys has a Florida plant making gemstones in high-pressure presses. They finally caved in to deBeers and laser-engraves their stones with some ID information. The FTC caved in to the diamond industry and insists they be called "cultured diamonds". They're distinguishable from natural diamonds by their absorbtion spectrum, and deBeers has a tester for this
Grown synthetics were still experimental when Wired wrote their article, but that's the more promising process. Those, in theory, can be indistinguishable from natural ones.
The diamond industry had painted itself into a corner with the concept that the most valuable diamonds are "flawless". You do not want to be in that marketing position when going up against the technology that makes semiconductor wafers. Look for PR about how real diamonds have "natural flaws".
Tied to this is the "Kimberly Process", the agreement supposedly intended to restrict the flow of conflict diamonds. This requires source documentation to travel along with diamonds as they pass through the distribution chain. Previously, diamonds were generic; nobody cared where they came from. The Kimberly Process has the effect of making it much harder to insert large quantities of synthetic diamonds into the distribution system.
Incidentally, most industrial diamonds have been synthetic for years. Annual synthetic production is around 600 metric tons, most of it in the form of abrasive grits for cutting wheels and such. When you need to cut a slot in concrete pavement, you use a diamond cutting wheel.
Bullshit! Complexity is everywhere, even in our chemical factories. Chaotic non-linear systems abound. Again, Bullshit.
If we truly valued the 'complexity of naturally occurring systems' in our jewelry, then we'd wear glass spheres of soil. http://soils.usda.gov/sqi/concepts/soil_biology/fw _soilhealth.html
Is that dirt on you jacket, sir?
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
I recently got my fiancée a man made diamond from Apollo, and she loves everything about it, including the fact that it didn't come through the DeBeers cartel. Not to mention that it's just cool, in the geeky way. The quality and size of the ring are indistinguishable from a mined diamond.
arghh..you...arghhh your...
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
Well, Clark Kent is almost human and he has no problems making diamonds with his bare hands. [grin]
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Now, is there any hope of production of gold through fission or in particle accelerators (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmutation) becoming economically feasible in the near future?
Or is it probably safe to assume the energy cost will remain so high that by the time we might conceivably advance to the point where we have such an amount of energy at our disposal that this process becomes trivial, we will have moved beyond our fascination with shiny yellow metal?
The commoditization of gold... that woud be something to see indeed, considering its economic, political, and cultural significance.
Perhaps first we would see access to planets or moons where it is abundant at the surface. Although that might just mean exploiting our impoverished and oppressed peoples by sending them to the harsh moon mining colonies instead of exploiting them on good ole' Earth.
The lack of flaws comments keep being bandied around, but if you actually read the website and look at their diamonds, most of them are not "flawless."
B E138 : SI3 (Small Inclusions)B B03 : SI2 (Small Inclusions)B B0142 : VS2 (Very Small Inclusions)
http://www.adiadiamonds.com/diamond.php?diamond=A
http://www.adiadiamonds.com/diamond.php?diamond=A
http://www.adiadiamonds.com/diamond.php?diamond=A
etc.
If they were "flawless" or "too perfect" they would not have these ratings.
Integrate Keynote and LaTeX
The DeBeers company sold its stake in Anglo-American years ago. The careful "11 Harrow House" style control over the market has more or less collapsed with Namibia, Angola, Russia, the Congo and similar wildcatting their stones.
The man who never alters his opinion is like the stagnant water and breeds Reptiles of the Mind -- William Blake
YOU ARE FUCKING IGNORANT YOU PIECE OF SHIT...a.fdsjafkdajsfds.afjs.dkjf.ksdjfk.sadjf.ksd ajf.kasdjfks.adfjasdfeialj
I just don't know if I can enjoy my diamonds without knowing that some poor bastard in a third world country suffered greatly to produce it. They call this progress?
first of all, jewelers don't make a "huge profit margin" on diamonds, in fact they generally make very little, unless you walk in there waving a huge wad of cash. there is a very well known document called the "rap sheet" (aka rappaport sheet) which is published weekly and lists the wholesale prices for various grades and types of diamonds. if you know even a little, you can get a jeweler to give you 5% over rap, which is hardly a huge margin compared to media/software/drug companies.
secondly, diamonds are definitely an item for which you get what you pay for. can you overpay? absolutely. but a $5000 diamond from a good retailer (like whiteflash or blue nile) is going to be twice as good as a $2500 diamond when it comes to the all-important flashyness factor (amount of light returned through the top of the stone) also, any good retailer will buy your diamond back for what you paid for it originally if you want to trade up (like the gold guy)
third, I never understood what all the fuss was about diamonds, until I bought my fiancee (now wife) one. I'm a pretty miserly guy in general but I have to say splashing out for a 1ct SI1 with excellent cut and symmetry was an amazingly good decision (for me) in retrospect. she gets complements on it every day (years later), and, sad to say EVERYONE JUDGES OUR RELATIONSHIP BASED ON THE FRICKING ROCK. I can't tell you how many times she's heard "oh he must really love you" -- gak -- sad but true.
finally, to get a bit of historical perspective, the fall of DeBeers has been predicted for quite some time now.. I recommend Ed Epstein's fantastic article from The Atlantic.. if you don't look at the date you might think it was just published: http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/198202/diamond and for those who want a fantastic and unbiased source for diamond info, I highly recommend http://www.pricescope.com/
Step 1: sell short on diamond stocks.
Step 2: drop a boatload of artificial diamonds over the *natural* diamond mines in Namibia. Document your "salting" of the diamond mines, but keep it secret.
Step 3: wait until you're sure the new artificial diamonds are in the system (i.e. sold as natural diamonds).
Step 4: reveal the documented evidence that there are artificial diamonds being sold as natural ones.
Step 5: profit!
This idea was originally proposed by A.M., a friend of mine. Pure genius!
Expected time to finish is 1 hour and 60 minutes.
If the diamond flaws are really important enough for people to have, then the diamond developers will find processes to introduce them into the manufactured diamonds.
As a female, I never understood the appeal of diamonds specifically or why a lot of women prefer natural gems to lab grown gems. Wouldn't a flawless lab grown gem be a better symbol of love than something flawed?
Of course everyone is talking about the technological aspect of it and forgetting the social. The entire reason people like diamonds is because they're costly and rare. Same as gold (a somewhat ugly color that is often unflattering to the human skin). They are a social signal for status. Note even before these new 'pure lab diamonds' there were plenty of fakes like cubic zirconia that essentially appear to be the same. Without a chart from a professional jeweler you cannot evaluate a 'diamond's' authenticity. Yet diamonds still exist. They are a delicacy. Obviously this baffles the slashdot 'logician'.
It is now official. Netcraft confirms: DeBeer'S Di(amonds) is dying
One more crippling bombshell hit the already beleaguered DeBeer's Di community when IDC confirmed that DeBeer's Di market share has dropped yet again, now down to less than a fraction of 1 percent of all diamonds. Coming on the heels of a recent Netcraft survey which plainly states that DeBeer's Di has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. DeBeer's Di is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by failing dead last in the recent South African comprehensive marketing test.
misktake eloquence for sound argument
coupling logic with fuzzy verbal terminologies
in an effort to appear sophisticated.
Yep. If we go back to the root of the word sophisticated - ie sophist, that's what sophistry is all about. How to bullshit your fellow man because the meaning of the message is not important- in order to convince people it's the delivery that matters. A real favorite among religious types and politicians... and the idiots who follow them.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
You can also tell real pearls from fake ones by rubbing them against your teeth. The real ones feel grainy (like sand) and the fake ones are smooth. I'm a big fan of pearls, and the thought of them dissolving in vinegar makes my skin crawl.
Yeah, except that man-made diamonds also have fewer civil rights issues associated with them, and are much cheaper for large, "fancy-colored" stones. Unfortunately, the're actually more expensive than mined for small-to-medium clear stones, which annoys me because I'll be buying an engagenment ring soon, and I would really have preferred not to support DeBeers' monopoly...
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Natural vs Synthetic ... bah ... who cares when Supernatural Gemstones are falling from heaven in Idaho.
If the atomic structure was different and there was fluoerescence then this would imply a different structure than tetrahedrical diamond (here and now some double bond for example, or even different type of atoms in the crystaline structure).
:), but then again we made them in form of lens, not in form of jewelry diamond , so there was not "facet" to reflect light and make them atractive. The method used (an inefficient one) was to seed some diamond on a silicon waffer (microdiamond) then put that in a plasma of 95% H2 and 5% CH4 (more or less a big microwave oven of 10K-20K power) for 24 hours. Afterward we had a nice 1-1.5 inch (2.5-3 cm) radius lens with a thickness of 1/8 inch (3 mm). They were far away from "perfect" for jewelry usage, but I put it under 10 years to get them to the point where the only way to distinguish them from natural one would be to MARK the natural one which goes out of the mine. Turn out I was wrong, it took 15 years :).
The funny things is I did indeed fabricate diamond : I was in a french labor during the early 90's which studied such stuff. They looked more like glass or plastic than diamond
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
The Diamond Story
You realize that we can fabricate ruby in BIG quantites since way way back ? If I recall correctly the first laser were done with a long bar of ruby (artificially made) during the 60's. Just put the ruby in a light path and make a population inversion. And houpla ! You get a red laser. Heck, even if my memory fail me and ruby was artificially created later, I recall using some big bar of ruby as practice work to fabricate a laser in my physic 101 university year. So Ruby might be rare, but you can fabricate it cheap ass. EVen cheaper than diamond. If you really want something interresting, then hunt for a precious stone which is not yet fabricated in industrial quantities :).
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
For my everyday working life and activities, I wear a plain 6mm tungsten carbide ring my girlfriend gave to me. I love it, I never have to take it off no matter what I'm doing, have worn it for more than a year now with no scratches or any sort of defect other than needing a quick soaping up and polish with a cloth to get it back to mirror finish. I do have a diamond ring that used to belong to my grandfather but I only wear it on very special occasions or if I'm going out somewhere nice occasionally. I liked the Tungsten carbide specifically because it was durable, look great, and lasted many years without having maintenance really
"The boy is dangerous, they all sense it, why can't you?"
DeBeers is getting closer and closer to truth in advertising. At first, it was "Diamonds are forever." Then it became "Diamonds, take her breath away." Next? "Diamonds... that'll shut her up!" ;-)
Be relentless!
I've posted on this topic before here in this article. They can be used as a semiconductor material and achieve speeds of 81GHz. And don't forget the older Wired article about The New Diamond Age either. :) Cheers.
Restore America: Dr. Ron Paul for President!
I don't know about you suckers, but I finally found a girl who likes the joke about getting her a charcoal ring for the truly long-term investment. :P
Is there any way to buy stock in DeBeers hitmen? I suspect an upswing in business ;-)
Table-ized A.I.
that is, High Pressure, High Temperature synthesis, not CVD (Chemical Vapor Deposition) process. If you check their FAQ, it says they have very small metallic inclusions, which is diagnostic of diamonds grown in molten metal systems at typically 100+KBar pressure.
other companies are doing this, apollo diamond and gemesis. de beers is having a shit fit
Actually, real philosophers (at least at Stanford) are damn smart, and talk in normal language. You're thinking of Soc. majors.
I used to be baffled by how giddy girls would get when words like "diamonds", "gold", or "platinum" were mentioned. While they're getting all dreamy-eyed, the only thing I can think about is how over-priced and easily-lost it all is.
Then I realized that I'm the same way; I just respond to different words.
For me, (as a mild audiophile and auto-geek) it's words like, "oxygen-free braided copper", "CNC machined billet titanium", and "cast magnesium". I feel a little happier thinking about such things, but the girls just don't seem to get it.
"Operating systems suck: you're better off using only the BIOS" --trainsaw.com
I will buy some with my lab created money.
Technically, murder-suicide does not violate the golden rule.
Couldn't agree with you more. I feel DeBeers is a truly evil organization, yet the sham they've been able to pull is nothing short of a marketing masterstroke.
Take the "two-months-salary" thing. Convincing the consumer that this is a legitimate scenario is the holy grail of product pricing. Imagine asking a jeweler "hey, how much does that ring cost?", and blindly pulling out your wallet when the jeweler says "well... how much ya got?". Yeah, I'm oversimplifying... but considering prices are so inflated, the consumer is really paying in proportion to his/her income rather than in proportion to the diamond's size.
Somehow DeBeers got it in people's heads that two-months salary is somehow indicative of the your love and ultimately the strength of the marriage. The irony here is that that financial woes are the leading cause of divorce -- if anything this silly notion is probably setting up young couples to fail.
There is plenty of posts summing up the situation properly but lets develop. For industrial purpose, those are great but so are other less perfect imitations of the naturally occurring gems. For jewels on the other hand, those are completely missing the point. Anyone who is into gems worshiping is obviously lacking rational thinking. When it became evident that diamonds were not rare, diamond producers united under the name "De Beers" to cut the supply in order to jack up the price. That wasn't too successful until the major add campain "diamonds are forever".
Now all the people who are stupid enough to worship gems think that there is something special with the particular gem called "diamond". No matter what you sell and how good it is at imitating diamonds, it won't have this "something special" and it can't have it because that "something special" is purely fictional.
You can't apply a technological solution to a social problem.
The way to solve the problem with De Beers is to quite this stupid worshiping of gems, if you acknowledge that gems mean something by offering one, either a diamond or some other. you do nothing to solve the problem. Others point that offering your SO something that cost a bundle is a way to prove that you are dedicated to the relation. Personally I would recommend that you find a SO that is not lacking rational thinking but maybe you are that desperate and you really want to continue with your current one. In that case you are probably better of offering stocks, gold bullions (not jewels), collectable paintings or anything that has real value, that is tradeable and that isn't purely emotional.
But maybe I fail to understand the gems worshipers. Why do they want gems?
Dirty Tleilaxu and their synthetic spice
Diamonds are vastly overpriced. It's common knowledge that diamonds are not as rare as the price they command would indicate. The former USSR was known to have vaults of diamonds to back up their currency the way that the US has gold. All it would have taken was for them to start selling their diamond reserves in exchange for US dollars and diamonds would be as valuable as scrap iron.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
If they really wanted to clobber DeBeers, they're going about it the wrong way.
Instead of producing clones of small sparkly rocks, market "Genuine Diamond" in multi-kilo or multi-ton chunks. Construct rock gardens out of it. Bricks. Walls. Houses. Watchbands. Spectacles. Make it a commodity material. Do media interviews where there are battered buckets of 'classic-shape' diamonds lying around randomly, and encourage them to grab handfuls and fill their pockets. Emphasize that 'diamonds are diamonds'. Have people walk around diamond trade shows leaving piles and trails of little shinies. Heck, rain them down from the roof and see how long it takes the dealers to sort one from the other.
Start a series of rumors that all the diamonds used in jewelery since, oh, 2001 have been simply mass-produced because they're cheaper and not even experts can tell the difference. Start another one that the diamond mines are laying off all their 'workers'. Have celebrities attend media events dressed in clothing made *completely* out of diamonds. Coat prominent buildings completely in diamonds and leave piles of them unsecured around the construction site, replenishing as needed. Get famous people to throw 'diamond parties', where people are given gifts of buckets of diamonds, giant-size novelty diamonds, cute little diamond sculptures etc. Have some of the buffets on a slab of diamond held up by giant-size 'gem-cut' diamonds.
Make it a personal trademark of the guys in charge of the production to hand out diamonds or diamond products as freebies to anyone who interviews them, just as the interview begins, as a 'talking point and memento'. Have entire interview rooms or offices made largely out of diamond slabs, bowls of diamonds on the desks and benches, and glittering piles out the front of the building. Offer low-class diamond products like enormous bling, spinning hubcaps etc.
Very rapidly, the media and celebrity perception of diamonds will become 'just another cheap material like wood or gravel'. DeBeers will be stuck with stockpiles of the equivalent of glass beads, because anyone will be able to buy raw diamond stock and tools cheap.
In those labs, do they employ scores of black underpaid, mistreated men just to feel like they are really competing with DeBeers?
I know a very smart philosopher at UCLA.. I'm talking about the schools of thought before the 1950's..
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
Screw the market, bunch of bastards. The sooner diamonds become nearly-worthless, the sooner we can start making cell-phone microchips and eye-gougers out of them.
... a culture of scholars who consistently misktake eloquence for sound argument, who consistently believe that truth can be discovered by coupling logic with fuzzy verbal terminologies such as utility, happiness, common good, etc. In a word: Philosophy.
On the contrary. Philosophy specifically teaches how to create sound and valid arguments using clear and concise language, and 'fuzzy verbal terminologies' are attacked equally by philosophers if they are not well enough defined.
Well if ya don't want to support the De Beers monopoly and all the harm it causes then don't. "Here, babe, I got you this nice ring, I paid an arm and a leg for it... AND SO DID SOME KID IN AFRICA!... err, marry me?"
Or would you just let your concerns be bowled over by corporate propaganda telling you that you can buy her love? I don't actually know that much about the behavior of the diamond miners, but I do know that jewlery ads on TV make me sick and I change the channel every time they come on. And comments and links from this article's discussion have certainly taught me something. Grow a pair and stand up against those manipulative fuckers.
Why, yes it is!
It's a fine blend of California dirt and Wyoming dust.
Thanks for noticing!
While diamonds, rubies, sapphires are shiny and sparkly opals are far more interesting and beautiful gem stones.
Deleted
Not many people know it but only 120 years ago aluminium (or aluminum for you Americans) was more precious than gold. European monarchs had dinnerware made out of it. Then in 1886 a new industrial technology collapsed the price permanently, and now it's a disposable wrapper for fast food.
So, fast forward to the "Diamond Age", and the courtship rituals which involve diamonds will just have to migrate to another hardware platform: clothes, cars, vacations, or whatever.
It's in their interest (at the moment) to produce a low number of high value stones. There are only 3 man made diamond manufacturers at the moment and they all have a substantial investment in machines and technology, they have to cover those costs and make a profit, they are also benefiting from DeBeers restriction on the natural stones.
Don't expect diamonds to be cheap for a decade or so as production slowly increases and the supply follows. In the meantime, spread the word about the artificially high price of natural diamonds.
Deleted
Gemesis: http://www.gemesis.com/
Apollo: http://www.apollodiamond.com/
and now
Adia: http://www.adiadiamonds.com/
Gemesis were the first using Russian technology.
Did you know that the huge thermal conductivity, is why they are called ice, they always feel cold.
Deleted
If you want to mention it, allude to it by saying what you have and/or will give up to pay for it.
As soon as you put a price on it, women will think you're buying them.
If that idea doesn't put them off, you'd be better off buying directly and at least then you're honest with each other.
I'll be buying an engagement ring soon, and I would really have preferred not to support DeBeers' monopoly...
Do what I did and ask your future wife without a ring and then go shopping for a ring together. That's what I did, and ended up "only" paying 1000€ for the ring. (Which still is quite expensive, but at least it's not the double of my salary.) She ended up preferring a ring with a pearl, so screw DeBeers....
Contrary to popular belief, the engagement ring is just a symbol and an intelligent woman will understand that. If you get a girl that doesn't understand that, you probably don't want to marry her in the first place. Then, of course, it could be also that European women don't flip on diamonds as much as US women. ;-)
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
I can't say that I'm upset about free PR for a viable alternative to the current cartel methods of diamond production.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
Wow, I've read many comments in this thread, and I have to say, I'm a little dumbfounded.
/. comment. Just tell me:
Is it really that bad with US women and diamonds?
I really don't want to be inflammatory or condescending, but I've never known women here in Germany (or other European countries I've been to) being so obsessed with getting a diamond ring for their engagement. I myself have a girlfriend who doesn't wear jewelry at all, but also just about everybody I know who is engaged or married has a rather simple silver or gold ring. And yes, I guess many of them could afford a diamond ring if they really wanted to.
We also have DeBeers' "Diamonds are forever" TV ads over here, but it seems they aren't as succesful with their campaign as they appear to be in the US.
Again, I really don't want this to be yout typical "Europe is better than US"
Is it really that bad with US women as you might think after reading this thread? Or did I just miss the other side because they weren't modded up or didn't voice their opinion?
"Oh, a lesson in not changing history from Mr I'm-my-own-Grandpa." - Dr Hubert Farnsworth
Symbolise the lifelong commitment you are making to your fiance with an ethical diamond.
They manufacturing real diamonds, and this technology represents an advancement in the capabilities of mankind. Society should not allow this to be curbed in any way by an industry with blood on its hands.
${YEAR+1} is going to be the year of Linux on the desktop!
"the mined diamond suppliers have a very tight grip on the supply channel and synthetic diamonds are not available in large enough quantities for any large gem buyer to risk losing his place as a De Beers sightholder"
I expect that the simple answer to this is to start selling the diamonds online. People could either buy the diamonds and take them to a local jeweler to have them prepared, or alternatively have the online store do the complete preparation. I would imagine that this type of thing could get large pretty quickly. At that point they would be able to give De Beers a run for their money.
Adventure City Tours
I only recently bought my wife an artificial diamond. She's a mathematician, and wouldn't dream of spending tens of thousands on a real one, but we recently had our anniversary and she deserved one (she lets me play Eve-Online to my heart's content).
The artificial diamond wasn't cheap, but it wasn't anywhere near the price of a real one of the same size. It's beautiful and kicks light like crazy. I love to play with my laser pointer and that ring. Her friends all think I'm a stud for buying her the rock. (By the way, I bought the stone loose and had a jeweler set it into a beautiful ring. He was extremely impressed by the stone and gave me a dollar-quote that was a few hundred times what I paid. Of course, didn't put it through lab tests, though).
Screw DeBeers and the pain they've caused in Africa. I say let those bastards go broke and feel pain on the way.
You are welcome on my lawn.
The fact of the matter is all of these semi-rare stones are just different crystal formations that can be replicated in the lab.
The only reason you see such a push for it in diamons is because diamonds have lots of industrial applications, so even if the jewlery market crashes they stil have a market. But if there was a huge switch in jewlery from diamons to rubies/sappires because of their percieved "rarity", you can bet those would start being made artifically as well.
Gold and Silver are *not* artificially rare, they are elements and we aren't going to be economically creating those in a lab anytime soon.
So now that diamonds are easily manufacturable, people are looking for other types of gems. Sapphires and rubies were suggested, but it seems they are easily manufactured too. Is there any gemstone that is not easily synthetically made?
This is why I will get an engagement ring through Www.justmetal.com They are made of titanium (if you really want gold you can get it ) and are really good looking but cost a lot cheaper then a normall engagement ring. Why pay for a diamond if you can get something better looking for much cheaper.
Michael Moore should do a documentary about the DeBeers cartel. Although, I'm not sure how he'd tie THAT back into Flint, Michigan. You don't think a sweaty doughy white-guy would stand out at all hanging out around an African diamond mine, do you?
Why are they still ridiculously expensive? More that $12,000 for a ring!
What if DeBeers started a company that claimed to sell man-made diamonds, but actually just sold DeBeers excess stock?
Facts that might support this plan:
- New diamond manufacturing processes create flaws and imperfection, making new-style manufactured diamonds indistinguishable from found diamonds. This also makes found diamonds indistinguishable from manufactured diamonds.
- According to conventional wisdom, DeBeers has a huge stockpile of diamonds. This helps keep the price up by imposing scarcity, but it is also excess, inventory--non-revenue-producing inventory.
- As manufacturing processes become widespread, it seems very likely that the diamond market could collapse, making DeBeer's excess, non-revenue-producing inventory not worth very much.
- DeBeers has a proud history of destroying competition by using its monopoly to offer the same product for less.
- A quick comparison of pricess at http://www.adiadiamonds.com/ and http://www.canadadiamonds.com/ shows similar pricing. For the moment, at least, the market will support high prices for manufactured diamonds.
- This strategy doesn't make sense in the long-term, but if there IS no long term, then selling off excess inventory through another market is a good idea.
- As many commenters have noted, there is a lot of perceived value in not having a "Blood Diamond". If DeBeers can convince these commenters that its diamonds are not blood diamonds, then it can sell to them. One way to do this is to pretend that the diamond is man-made, even though it is not.
The weak link in this chain is the diamond's flaws. If you buy a flawless diamond, it must be man-made.
I don't really know if this is true--it seems pretty far-fetched, but I don't really know anything about Adia (or any of the other diamond manufacturing companies) either. It's an interesting bit of scepticism, that's all.
They don't do any business at all in the US. They require diamond buyers to fly to London to get their shipments, then these buyers may resell elsewhere in the US. In fact, if the DeBeers people ever set foot in the US, it is my understanding that they are immediately subject to arrest.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
So when are they going to grow one so large after it's cut it will be the size of a basketball?
from the article "at a fraction of the price"
I guess they mean they are correct in the same sense that 99/100 is still a fraction of 100.
I expected the prices to be much lower than they were.
Gush, gush, gush...
Watch this Heartland Institute video
Rich b00bs will fall for the line. They fall for Nigerian generals smuggling 10.3 million dollars out of Ivory Coast. They fall for forged cheque cashing schemes. They even fall for "I am a rich heir, stuck in a Mexican prison, please get me out" telegrams.
Ofcourse, I dont care conpeople con richpeople. But eventually this will be one more thing that the DeBeers cant control.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
You know what this means...
WE COULD FINALLY HAVE DIAMOND HEAT SINKS!!!!! WOOHOOOO!!!!!
(In case you don't get this, Diamonds are (supposedly) one of the best thermal conductors available. You'd probably have to paint them black so they radiate better 'tho now that I think about it...)
The more publicity they have, the greater the chance of DeBeers getting caught if they pull a black op against them. They've been trying.
In a couple of weeks, Adia and all of their employees are going to mysteriously disappear, after DeBeers cronies receive secret orders. There will be no evidence left to tell us who really caused their disappearances.
You know, there have been options other than 'conflict diamonds' for years that most of you seem to be overlooking. Russian diamonds have been on the market for some time and it isn't exactly difficult to find them. Additionally, the aren't marketed through DeBeers (who've been trying to keep the Russians from flooding the market with their diamonds for years).
So there you go... not mined in Africa by a poor 12 year old who's arm was cut off and not contributing to the DeBeers cartel.
And, generally speaking, they're a bit less expensive (you get more for your money) and usually appear to be more brilliant than African diamonds since the Russians cut theirs slightly differently, usually with more facets.
I bought my fiancee a Russian diamond and she loved it. I felt better for dodging DeBeers and conflict diamonds and I saved some money too. Was it still more expensive than a man-made diamond, yeah, but honestly, I didn't spend an unreasonable amount, I did my research and my price shopping, I haggled and I got a nice ring for a great price.
To this day she gets compliments on it every single day (she's a hair dresser, so she see's a lot of different people all the time).
It's not a good article and it's not something that just happened.
See this for a good article (and it's from 2003).
You can even buy them here or here, or just read the wired article and check up on the companies mentioned in it.
Question everything
I did a search of their inventory. The cheapest white round diamond I found was $1500 for .57ct. I bought a .6ct diamond last year for $999 from Jared.
I just got it at a local jewelers. Many many jewelers carry tungsten rings but there are somethings to look out for. Number one, make sure the ring is actual tungsten carbide and not tungsten with a cobalt alloy. Cobalt is cheaper so some ring makers put it in there but it takes some of the quality and strength out of the ring. Secondly, make sure that the company you buy it from has a lifetime warranty on damage or scratching. Tungsten carbide bands from good shops usually will offer a guarantee on scratching or bending out of round. Finally, yes it is a mirror finish but the metal looks similar to stainless steel so it's not a briliant type of shine as with silver. Still very nice looking though. They use diamonds to polish it and so the finish stays on quite well. Other than that if they meet those qualifications buy it and enjoy never having to take it off :)
"The boy is dangerous, they all sense it, why can't you?"
I concur wholeheartedly - my wife's engagement ring was purchased *after* I proposed to her from Wal-Mart for $8 (one of those little plastic thingies) - in fact, it wore down after a couple months, so I bought her an identical one later on. For our wedding rings, we had them made by a local silversmith for $300 total (which included both our rather ornate rings as well as two plain 'working' rings.) Unfortunately, we then found that my wife's skin oxidizes pure silver rather quickly, so we shopped around online and found a beautiful sterling silver ring for $40 which she still wears to this day (and shows no oxidation - a friend gave her a sterling silver ring several years ago that she constantly wears, so we know sterling silver's alright with her.) And what's best of all is that she loved all of them. She even keeps the Wal-Mart rings in a little plastic bag to tell our kids about someday. Of course, it may be due to the fact that my mother-in-law's engagement ring was a twist-tie.
It's not so much that a diamond is supposed to cost two months' salary; it's that an engagement ring is supposed to cost that much. The story I'm told is that they were given in Victorian times as a deposit on the prospective bride's virginity. If the man, after devaluing the woman, declined to go through with the marriage, the two months's salary was forfeit.
The whole marriage pageantry is about a transfer of property from one man (the father) to another (the groom). It's amazing that anyone still goes through with it, knowing what it used to mean.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
My mother is getting her deceased fiance (who was cremated) turned into a diamond for a ring. He was a big, burly, man's man guy, too. She hasn't decided on a color or carat size yet--I'm pulling for a girly color, just so I can giggle every time I see it.
Gotta love it.
My wife's engagement ring was a little $8 plastic one purchased at Wal-Mart (see my other post for my ring history.) My mother-in-law's engagment ring was a twist-tie. I agree wholeheartedly.
Just asking...
Feel free to purchase a diamond and place it in an self-cleaning oven, which may be just hot enough to make it evaporate into a small puff of carbon dioxide, if you think the source is inaccurate. Or purchase a diamond and hit it with a hammer.
Oh, wait, you're just trash-talking wikipedia because someone fact-checked you.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
The whole thing is a DeBeers invention. Before DeBeers, no one would even think that surprising a woman with a big sparkly rock that cost two whole months salary was a good way to get her to say yes. Their market research showed that most women would rather have the man save the money for a downpayment on a house. So they came up with the whole "Surprise her with a diamond" idea. Don't tell her ahead of time or ask her father or any traditional shit like that so that she has a chance of talking you out of doing something stupid, surprise her!
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Oh, we're definitely both aware of that... I suppose the reason I feel I ought to get her a diamond is so that other people (who care about such things) will recognize it. Maybe I ought to just skip the whole thing and get her a nicer wedding band instead...
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
About a year ago or so an article came up somewhere about LifeGem, one of the companies in the "cultured diamond" business. (Yes, "cultured" is just a dumb marketing term; not the point, here.) For those who haven't heard of them before, LifeGem's twist is they make diamonds as a memorial to "the dear departed", using carbon harvested before cremation. (Insert old "that's not grandma's ring, that is grandma on the ring" jokes here.)
Since I regularly donate blood, I wondered if one's own donated blood could be used as a suitible carbon source, thus allowing for an engagement ring that truly comes "from the heart". While it would tend to be pricier than a boring white stone, they usually make very nice colored stones, and the only human exploited would be the willing donor. After looking at their website to see how much carbon was required, and making some rough calculations, it looked possible, although IIR about three pints would be needed (and thus, a minimum of 16 weeks prep time) for a ring-worthy gem. So, being curious, I called Lifegem and asked about the idea.
Since it's a small company, I talked with one of the founders. He seemed to think I was a weirdo (true), and that it wasn't their usual fare, but said that "if you supply the carbon, we can make the diamond". He also said that he wasn't sure what the (hypothetical) girl would think of the idea of a "cultured" stone. He said he has access to some of the largest and finest synthetics ever made, but when proposal time came, his financee would settle for nothing but a "real" rock.
Still, not all women are that way. My sister (a mechanical engineer) got a little tipsy at the family reunion this summer, and admitted that the huge 2.5 carat rock on her finger for the last decade is actually a cubic zirconia. The pricetag for the real ring was put as a downpayment for a house; the wedding reception was held in the huge backyard. Mom still doesn't know. =)
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
This article from The Atlantic, published over 20 years ago, that does a great job of telling the story of how diamonds became expensive. It's fascinating, and it makes you really wonder what DeBeers has done all these years to prop up their cartel.
The short version is this: diamonds are not precious stones, and they are not rare. Their main value is their emotional value of the person who received the stone; it's not based on any market value whatsoever. And diamonds became "required" for engagement rings through one of the best marketing campaigns in history that leveraged the power of Hollywood in the 1940's.
I don't think I'm going to be buying any natural diamonds any time soon. Artificial? Maybe... but I'd probably prefer a real precious stone.
When looking for an engagement ring for me, hubby did a lot of research on different types of stones. I didn't really want a big ring, and didn't see the point (and find it ridiculous) to spend "two months salary" on a ring. He found black diamonds! Perfect for me, since that's my favorite color, I wear it more than any other, including as my wedding dress. (We got married on Halloween.) Since they aren't highly sought after, he got a 1/2 carat stone in white gold for about half the price that a white diamond would go for. Plus it's very unique.
If anyone needs me, I'll be in the Angry Dome.
External Validity: How does philosophy ever show evidence for external validity? Or does modern philosophy generally ignore issues of real world application? That is a question.
Lastly, I suppose I misspoke when I implied that philosophers used fuzzy terminology. Indeed they use an expansive field specific vocabulary which the discipline has been refining over the centuries. Yes philosophers know how to attack loose language. Ive experienced this first hand with a good philosopher friend from UCLA. And yet it reminds me of the dark days of introspection in psychology; the days before it strived to be a science: An advanced and complicated vocabulary developed to record and understand the human mind.. ANd yet, it subjective! Philosophy doesn't have fuzzy terminology, they have fuzzy concepts that they've sliced up as best they can.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
Lastly, what I meant to include: I am mostly speaking to old school philosophy, and literature majors.. To those who pride themselves on have reading the classics, can give quotes at will, and who did try to base their terminology on shaky concepts.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
Hey!! I'm an Ivy League scholar, you insensitive clod!!
Anyway, "philosophers" really can be obnoxious, but the real deep end of the bullshit pool is literary criticism.
Really old news. Wired magazine did a great article about this back in September 2003 titled, "The New Diamond Age." Linky here: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.09/diamond.h tml
I think it's more akin to the gestapo shooting one of their own to make it look like they are really on your side. I'd say mission accomplished. Despite the fact that value was lost, more could potentially be lost if nobody wants to buy a manufactured diamond as opposed to one that looks natural.
Incidentally, I've talked to many girls about the manufactured vs natural and they've almost all said the same thing; they'd rather have a natural diamond, even if it cost twice as much as the manufactured one. If introducing imperfections makes manufactured and natural diamonds indistinguishable maybe we can do away with that madness and the manufacturers can make as much money as the slave drivers.
Years ago, I worked with a jewler, and got a colored stones certificate from the Gemological Institute of America (GIA). Since diamonds are artifically scarce (DeBeers has warehouses full of them), they make a lousy investment, and I think they're grossly over-hyped. High-quality colored stones are honestly rare, and thus (hypothetically at least) valuable. And here's where the whole natural vs. synthetic thing gets messy. The synthetics are getting progressively harder to tell from the natural stones. Even a good gemologist will be hard-pressed to tell the difference between a truely exceptional natural emerald and a synthetic. Of course, the natural stone may appraise at 20k, while the synthetic is work a couple of bucks. For folks that have invested large sums in stones, this is frightening. The jewler I worked for quit purchasing high ticket beryl-based stones when the fakes got good enough he couldn't reliably spot them.
The perverse illogic of the situation is mind-boggling. If I, as a trained gemologist, can't tell you which of two stones is real, why do you care which one I use to make your jewelry? Especially if one of them is virtually free, and other costs more than your car? Yet, almost every time, the clients insist that they want natural stones. My wife wears a colored stone in her wedding ring -- perversely, it's a (quite spendy) natural stone. We're all insane!
My understanding is that a (simple) explanation of the diamond creating process involves carbon, and lots of pressure and/or other forces. Naturally, this can take quite a long time. In a lab, it can be accelerated and controlled for a better product.
Now, since humans are carbon based life forms, and we can be incinerated to ashes, etc. Would it be possible to be cremated and then made into a diamond (would there be enough to make a diamond). It might be weird to some, but being turned into a beautiful stone that your loved ones can have with them far into the future sounds like a nicer way to spend your end than in a ceramic jar or in the ground with the worms.
I wonder if this would be possible and, if so, how popuplar "diamond funerals" might be?
I remember when the local wholesale outlet (I'm pretty sure it was a BJ's) had a big heap of synthetic ruby and sapphire pendants. (There were three kinds, and I don't remember what the third was. Probably another color of sapphire.) They were pretty sizable gemstones, about as big as a pea (though it was a while ago, and I might be off by a bit), and they were cheap; thirty bucks each.
I was interested not only because they were pretty and inexpensive, but because it was just plain cool that someone managed to synthesize these things. I mean, anyone can dig a rock out of the ground (or more specifically, enslave children to dig rocks out of the ground); this must have taken engineering.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
The sentiment of the replies indicates that lab grown diamonds are without flaw, but a quick look at the inventory of ADIA (the diamond seller in the article) reveals that the clarity of their diamonds ranges from VS1 to SI3. The measure of flawlessness in a diamond is represented by a scale that ranges from FL (flawless) and IF (internally flawless) on the pricy end to I (imperfect) with varying degrees of inclusions in between. A SI3 level diamond, which happens to be the level of clarity offered in ABIA's lone white diamond, is hardly flawless. Indeed a SI3 diamond contains flaws that are visible to the naked eye, and in the mined diamond market would be offered for sale at a tremendous discount to less included diamonds. While ABIA offers diamonds up to the VS1 (Very slightly included)level, this is hardly flawless, instead it is a level of clarity that is common at any diamond store. Yes lab grown diamonds are arguably a great alternative to mined diamonds, but they are not necessarily less included than mined diamonds.
Everyone bellyaches about Microsoft, the oil companies having a monopoly. Geez! The diamond cartel has had a lock on the diamond market for longer than MS or the oil companies. It's about time someone came up with a good alternative to them. I'm sure if this catches on, Debeers will be dumping diamonds on the market to drop the price to cheaper than what the man made ones cost to produce to run them out of business. It's been known for YEARS that Debeers has been hording diamonds to keep the price up. With a vast stockpile of diamonds, they can afford to dump them on the market to undercut the price of man made diamonds. I'm sure with the advance in technology though, hopefully the man made diamond price will continue to drop, just like electronics. When first released, look what a LCD screen cost. Now look at the price....
Please explain your use of the words "worthless", "crap", "garbage" and "fraud". Also, please explain how DeBeers' cartelization of the diamond market to drive up prices is not an expression of greed.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Ahh yes that the one I was looking for, thank you. I also have a friend who is into literary criticism. Nice guy, but I try to keep my disdain for his work under wraps.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
They should put more energy at synthesizing other minerals like copper, gold, platinum, Aluminum.
Copper prices has risen dramatically in the last year and those cost directly affects consumer. Diamonds??? yeah maybe it will change the way diamonds mines are operated since the market can be flooded with flawless diamonds now.
This is sadly a true dilemma in the enforcement of intellectual property laws, to be effective, you sometimes have to invent definitions for word that marketing departments makes up.
Even if the word diamond isn't trademarkable, how do you make sure it is what the customer expected (especially when you can't tell them apart)? This is the same problem as "organic" carrots, or "fair-trade" coffee, or "bgh-free" milk, or "natural" vitamins, or "champagne", or "monterrey" jack cheese. Sometimes the producer has more information than the consumer and only regulations can force enough differentiation so that consumers can make a (possibly misinformed) choice.
The asymmetric information problem is really tough one to solve. Sometimes there are enough technological solutions to police it, and companies just generally comply (any one remember the yellow color packets that came with oleomargarine? or what they used to call "cheese-food"). But what happens in the case where the technological means to measure expectations don't exist? Or if the new products are actually superior to their incumbent competitors?
Are these so called "counterfeit" products (which are generally made by newer/smaller companies or larger companies entering new markets) really detrimental to society as a whole? Of course the incumbent businesses strive to make the description of emerging competitive products highly unattractive relative to theirs to defend their position in the market, but if the new descriptions are too repulsive, then there is the risk of damaging the emerging market and new companies. On the other hand, since the newer companies have no reputation, they want to make their descriptions as close as possible to the incumbents to smooth their entrance into the market. And since the new companies don't have anything to lose, they have less of an incentive for quality controls (although some companies start making their mark by theoretically providing higher quality). There is also the problem of distributors who usually don't have any financial incentive to police any distinctions (other than maximizing their profit by providing the cheapest product at the highest prices), there can be mixing of products (anyone remember the exploding capacitor problem a few years back?)
This isn't an easy problem for government to solve, so at least I'll cut them a break on this one for not knowing exactly what the right thing to do is, I'm not so sure I know either. Even the open source community has had to resort to a referee organization to "certify" open source licenses vs "open-sounding" source licenses. There aren't any easy answers...
not as jewelry but as conductive material for the next round of semiconductors...and therefore powering future generations of high
speed processors and electronics. The properties of diamonds lend themselves better in many respects than silicon in dealing with
high temperatures and harsh environments. Fascinating! Here are a couple links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_diamond#App lications
and
http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2003Aug/gee20030 827021485.htm
Obviously, I'm baffled. Costly and rare? Costly? At times, yes. Rare? If I can go to any shopping mall in America and find three different stores with two hundred of a thing on hand, it's not rare. A delicacy? Fugu is a delicacy.
I think many people like diamonds because they're pretty when the light hits them just right.
Perhaps you're a part of the "my crap will smell better if I pay more for my toilet" crowd. Actually, your comment strikes me as coming from a person in sales. Are you a shill? It's okay, you don't have to admit it.
Spelling, grammar, punctuation? We need something that checks logic.
"You see a tortoise lying on its back"
That tantalum in the capacitors your cell phone and computer may have been come from the ore called coltan which is mined in the Congo. Some believe that coltan mining is financing the war there.
I think there will still be a large demand for mined diamonds until lab diamonds become cheap enough that every high schooler is wearing one and two carat stones. Financially successful will do everything to avoid looking like a kid and having to explain that they are wearing an "expensive" diamond.
Apparently $100 bills have aphrodisiac properties. Can anybody confirm or deny this, since although I've seen bathtubs full of $100 bills do the business, it could be explained as placebo.
My amazing wife - Artist, Author, Philosopher - Laurie M
Do what I did and ask your future wife without a ring and then go shopping for a ring together. That's what I did, and ended up "only" paying 1000 for the ring.
I like my approach better. I asked her first, without a ring, went shopping for a ring together and let her buy the ring. She bought mine, too!
IOW, marry a woman with more money than you have :-)
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
I didn't buy my wife a diamond. I work my butt off trying to do everything else right but I didn't get a rock. Conflict diamonds aside, Debeers and all the slick emotional manipulation nauseates me. Screw 'em. I did other things with my money.
The synthetic diamond business is interesting but they have a long way to go... they could potentially be selling for hundreds of dollars a kilo or less. As time goes by it seems like more players are entering the market.
Just like Windows 'genuine advantage', the natural diamond producers will now have to rely on 'genuine diamond' stickers to justify their price fixing.
I would much rather have the manufactured diamond that doesn't come from some country with a dubious human rights record myself, and I believe that that is how the producers of synthetic diamonds should market them.
I find it hard to believe that " moissanite" aka silicon carbide, has a higher thermal conductivity then diamond - do you have a reference for this
PS: isotopically pure diamond has a higher thermal conductivity then diamonds with natural isotope distribution
Good point... I did marry a woman with more money that I have tough ;-)
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
From Diamond Nexus's website:
Mined diamonds are carbon (C), and Diamond Nexus gemstones are principally polycrystalline.
Yeah, you should! Our wedding bands together (and we've got really nice ones) were less expensive than the engagement ring. (Not by much tough, getting married is expensive.)
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
In case you haven't figured it out... ALL sex is paid for, in one way or another.
:-(
Depressed? How about this one:
Women control half of the money in the world, and all of the sex.
Damn life sucks doesn't it? I think I'm going to go kill myself now
Libertas in infinitum
...when they're actually affordable. $1500 for a 0.5 carat SI3 white isn't any better than what you'd pay for a mined diamond.
A similar story appeared in Wired three years ago: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.09/diamond.h tml
and here's some background on De Beers and engagement rings: http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/198202/diamond
No kidding -- that's the only reason why I haven't done it yet! I have a friend who got married, and he's working his ass off to support himself and his wife while she goes to college and he goes to grad school. He's told me he actually sees her less now than he did before he married her. For me that's just not worth it, so I wait.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Exchange artificial diamonds to Real Genuine ones for 50% of their price*
* - with reporting the place and proof of the purchase
Some conservative numbers:
Two month's pay: Let's say that's 6,000
Annual interest: 8%
Years until retirement: 40
So that ring is going to reduce your retirement wealth by $130,347.
If you retire in 45 years: 191,523
Another enormous mistake is buying a fancy car. If you simply avoid throwing money away on a car and a ring, and instead put that money in a long-term investment, and do nothing else you'll still magically be in pretty good shape when it comes to retirement and you need the money most. And your old self will thank your young self every day for not being an idiot.
I'm not disagreeing about diamond jewelry having zero investment value, but just a reminder to be very careful when you cite your sources. There is a big difference between a random economist who works for a left-wing organization and The Economist, which has articles written all over the political spectrum.
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
....that people in third world countries aren't used as slave labor to mine them. Arrested and sometimes killed if caught stealing from the mines. DeBeers trades in human flesh.
flood the market with these