
I’m coming to this one late, but some wits at The Economist recently plotted out some interesting trends in razor-blade design. They charted out the dates in which single, double, treble, qadruple and quintuple-bladed razors emerged, and noticed that the rate of increase in the number of blades per razor-head has been accelerating. It took 80 years for the industry to add a second blade, about another 15 to add the third, then only two or three years between the four-bladed Schick Quattro and the five-bladed Gillette Fusion. The story is here, and Avram Grumer wrote a funny post pointing out where this is all headed:
Now, that power-law curve predicts 14-bladed razors by the year 2100, but that’s not the interesting curve. The interesting curve is the hyperbolic one, for two reasons: One, it matches the real-world data. And two, it goes to infinity in 2015. And how are you going to get an asymptotically-accelerating number of blades onto a razor? Why, you’d need godlike super-technology to do that.
Friends, it’s clear what’s upon us: The Gillette Singularity — the moment at which the act of shaving becomes so radically unlike any shaving before it that history no longer provides us a guide to what lies before us.
Personally, the whole four- and five-blade thing kinda baffles me. If I try shaving with anything more than two blades, the bathroom turns into a total slaughterhouse — blood and guts on the ceiling. I have yet to find a razor that shaves as well as the original, simple Gillette Sensor. Yet the sad fact is that as the razor industry jetpacks its way into the eschatalogical glory of infinitely-bladed heads, the companies have scaled back production of their creaky two-bladed models. Locating an actual package of Sensor razors in New York here is like trying to find a rotary pay phone.
(Thanks to Majikthise for this one!)
I'm Clive Thompson, a writer on science, technology, and culture. This blog collects bits of offbeat research I'm running into, and musings thereon.
Currently, I'm a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine and a columnist for Wired magazine. I also write for Fast Company and Wired magazine's web site, among other places. Email or AOL IM me (pomeranian99) to say hi or send in something strange!
The “Milky Way Transit Authority” map
Should automobile software be open-sourced?
My Bookforum review of Jaron Lanier’s “You Are Not A Gadget”
Molecular secrets of the “iron-plated snail”
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January 31, 2010 » 07:29 PM
V. A. To me death seems to be an evil.
M. What, to those who are already dead? or to those who must die?
A. To both.
M. It is a misery, then, because an evil?
A. Certainly.
M. Then those who have already died, and those who have still got to die, are both miserable?
A. So it appears to me.
M. Then all are miserable?
A. Every one.
January 24, 2010 » 03:22 PM
One of the more interesting trends is family, which came in at number five. Specifically, discussion about family, moms, dads, daughters, etc. jumped during 2009. With Facebook users getting older, this isn’t a big surprise. However, the fact that the mention of “kids” jumped by a factor of five this year is rather dramatic. It’s tough to know what this means, though. (via Facebook Unveils Most-Mentioned Topics of 2009
)
January 15, 2010 » 01:36 PM
BEYOND AWESOME. They are announcing a recall of the Plush Uterus “due to a potential choking hazard for children”. To apply for it, “Please send an email to the address below with the subject line, ‘UTERUS OPT OUT’”.
January 14, 2010 » 10:04 PM
“To order, please TYPE “YES” IN CHECKBOX BELOW TO AGREE YOU UNDERSTAND THIS PLUSH MUST BE KEPT AWAY FROM KIDS (it is a sex organ, after all). If it is not checked, WE WILL NOT SEND THE UTERUS.” (via @ibogost)
January 11, 2010 » 01:45 PM
I watched Space: 1999 back in the day, but I swear to god I do not remember this scene.
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