YHK - yet another hacker news clone

I mean, it doesn't actually look like natural stone, though. At least not the mid-to-high-end stones. (Or sell for as much as it.) The floor can be similar if you're looking at some of the cheaper natural stone options, but the ceiling is extremely different. And the really unique depth and transparency of natural stone pushes much more toward the ceiling. Engineered quartz looks like a composite with some tells. I did some extensive shopping for countertops last year, it very much has a specific look. It just looks *different enough& from entry-level countertop options people are most familiar with that it doesn't (yet) read "cost-cutting" to less-familiar renters or buyers. And it presents a lot of attractive durability aspects to people concerned with that re: natural stone. Eventually I have no doubt that it'll be prevalant enough—if not regulated away—that it'll be pattern-recognitioned as "2020s basic" kinda like a modern formica.

Porcelain is also not widely seen yet, which presents the same benefit (especially because many of the "basic"-grade/inoffensive options that flippers or apartment builders want have practically no depth to them even if they're true natural stone!).

But: Natural stone has nowhere near the same magnitude of damage from the same level of exposure. And often it's not on-site (or outdoors) and the people working in those facilities are getting far more damage than the ones working on natural stone.

When Reading Becomes Consumerism:

Book Hoarding & Hauls: Buying massive stacks of physical books faster than you can realistically read them (often driven by social media trends like BookTok or Instagram).

Aesthetic Collecting: Treating books as interior decor, buying multiple special editions of the same title, or prioritizing how a bookshelf looks on camera rather than the text inside.

Surface Level Consumption: Reading purely for status, volume goals (like churning through 100 books a year for a tracking app), or keeping up with hype rather than deep engagement.

Why Reading Itself Is Not Consumerism:

The Act Is Immersive: Engaging with a story, learning a concept, or exploring ideas requires time, mental effort, and imagination. the exact opposite of passive commercial consumption.

Low Cost or Free Access: You do not have to buy anything to read. Public libraries, used bookstores, digital swaps, and public domain archives make reading widely accessible outside of retail markets.

Long Term Relationship: Unlike fast fashion or single-use goods, a well-loved book is often kept, reread, annotated, or passed down for decades.

So as you can see modern publishing relies on consumerism to drive profits and exist in an economic sense but it is not remotely the same as a pure act of experiencing literature detached from collectible drive or acquisition.

In similar vein you can experience a sunset by consuming a product - a travel agency trip. The act of watching the sunset is not consumerism. Yet the purchase of the holiday trip is consumption.

Buying a brand new, special edition hardback from a massive retail chain is the equivalent of buying the holiday trip. Actually sitting quietly, turning the pages, and letting your mind build a story is the equivalent of watching the sun go down.

However I am not claiming that capitalism or consumerism is inherently bad. No one managed to ever establish the connection in a rigorous scientific way that capitalism is morally bad and eg. Communism is morally good despite countless attempts to prove so. (When Cohen realized that a pure exploitation framework could actually justify inequality (like a naturally gifted person earning millions and keeping it all, à la Robert Nozick's Wilt Chamberlain argument), he had a "Road to Damascus" moment. He realized he didn't actually care about arcane Marxist economic formulas; he cared about human beings having enough to live a dignified life.)

Too much of consumerism is definitely unhealthy and so it is important to know what is consumerism and what isn’t to apply the antidote once in a while while keeping the economy we all profit from in a good shape.

Frankly, pertaining online religions, I am more into anti church, gnostic feminist type of Christianity focused on the way Jesus lived and what he teached as opposed to later perversions of his teachings than either of the nowadays fashionable ideologies or the horror of what Catholic Church has become or always was.

Not that I manage to live such life as Jesus but I consider it significant.

Check out prince rupert drops for another example of this.