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."
Actually, De Beers is terrified. Over the last decade, they have pushed "genuine diamonds". Cool. A good jeweler and a bit testing could determine the difference between natural and artificial. Note, that I do not call it real vs. fake. The reason is, that they are both real. The problem is that the new artificial are not only indistinguishable, but it appears that better larger ones may be available soon for less than the cheaper "real" ones. De Beers would LOVE to kill these folks. But it is way too late for that. All in all, an investment in a diamond mine or even in a diamond ring may be a very bad investment. OTH, a nice gold ring may be a good one. In particular, if it has some disappearing scribbling inside.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
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.
Interestingly enough, it IS possible to distinguish the new artifical diamonds from natural ones.
;)
The artificial ones have fewer impurities and inclusions
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.
A diamond ring has always been a bad investment, because the same marketing push that has been so successful at convincing everyone that diamonds are somehow rare and valuable have also convinced people that second-hand diamonds are nearly worthless. You will never get anywhere near what you paid for a diamond ring on the secondary market unless you happen to have a diamond with some historic significance.
The DeBeers story, and the history of the diamond as jewelry, is simply the story of the most successful marketing campaign in history. It is simply astonishing how the DeBeers cartel has managed to turn a fairly ordinary (but shiny) stone into one of the most expensive, sought after stones around. A stone that is so valuable that not only is it worth 2 MONTHS salary, but is so personal that it should never be purchased second hand.
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.
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.
Nonsense, unless you value buying over-priced tokenistic items from highly violent cartels that ruthlessly control the price. People that make fake diamonds need to have armed guards for their sites and bodyguards for their home. This is the "value" of diamonds. DeBeers allegedly has a 400 year supply sitting in warehouses.
Diamonds are completely and utterly worthless unless you want to drill through hard objects. You might "get what you pay for" with a diamond drill bit but I prefer the GTA interpretation: "Nothing says I love you more than a lump of rock mined by child wage slaves in Angola".
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.
They should care it wasn't pulled out of the earth.
At gunpoint.
From a mine where a war was waged to retain control of it.
And polished by child slave labor in India.
You shouldn't marry fucking retards who think a 'real diamond' is better. 'Real diamonds' and the DeBeer's cartel have caused hundreds of thousands of deaths over what, in reality, are just rocks.
Carefully explain that you can pay X, and have a completely flawless rock, or you can pay X*5 and have a slightly flawed rock with the blood mostly washed off of it.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?