How a Rogue Geologist Discovered Diamonds

prone2tech writes "Both NPR and Wired are running stories about how nearly two decades ago, a dogged, absentminded Canadian geologist named Charles Fipke who was practically down to his last nickel when he discovered diamonds in the Northwest Territories. Back then there was no such thing as a Canadian diamond, and today, Canada is the world's third-largest producer. The story behind the addition of Canada to the ranks of diamond-producing nations leads back to this one man. His discovery started the largest staking rush in North America since George Carmack found gold in the Klondike a century earlier."

Comments

Re:i don't get it

[tlhIngan]

why are diamonds still considered precious?

don't we have the technology to make them cheap?

sure, there's all the convoluted diamond market, debeers monopoly explanations, but that's like saying no one can buy marijuana because its illegal

if i want to get a diamond, why can't i pay $5 and go get one the size of my fist? its just carbon. that i can't do that right now, seems absurd to me, and even more absurd, that we should still be digging this stuff up and considering it valuable

Diamonds are precious because about 70+ years of marketing by DeBeers has made popular opinion think they are valuable. All those "Diamonds are forever" type of ads you see? Marketing. And not just any diamond, they had to be big, beautiful expensive diamonds, not the cheap ones people used to buy in the early 1900's. And not only that, but marketing to convince people they need to keep buying diamonds.

And yes, we can make them artificially - either vapor deposition, or large pressures and high temperatures, or probably a ton of other methods. Look up for industrial diamonds (they're quite useful in industry).

It's basically all DeBeers marketing - DeBeers basically bought up all the diamond mines and established a complex network of distributors that effectively took over all cosmetic diamond sales. These diamonds were then effectively rationed to make their price go up. When some shrewd business practice causes potential losses in the value of diamonds, DeBeers puts some control that effectively disrupts the practice. (DeBeers has tried hard to quash any sort of thing that might disrupt the price of diamonds and collapse its monopoly). The price of a diamond is artificially inflated, and kept that way. And marketing ensures that you can't get away with some low-quality diamond, you must buy a nice expensive one for your significant other.

In fact, the resale value of diamonds is quite poor, so as investments, you can do better elsewhere.

Here's an interesting read on how DeBeers turned a relatively cheap gem into something desirable, and managed to keep tight control over production in order to keep value up.

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/print/198202/diamond

Diamonds for Ten Dollars Per Carat

[WisdomGroup]

Fortunately, diamonds will sell for ten dollars per carat in the year 2015. All of us will benefit from inexpensive, flawless diamonds. Computers will become faster and less expensive. Advanced medical equipment will become available to more people. Photovoltaic cells made from diamonds will bring cheap power to the masses. What an exciting time to be alive!