Snake oil did not vanish in the 19th or early 20th centuries: super expensive cables

[steve2470]

I would name the ones I'm thinking of but I'm thinking the company would sue me and/or Skinner. If you know anything about audio cables, computer cables or, hell, electronics, you KNOW these particular cables are extraordinarily over-priced.

Got any other examples of snake oil still out there ?

[Coventina]

1. Those "healing stickers" sold by goop.

[Eko]

2. There are plenty that are way overpriced.

Ive seen hdmi cables for over $100, crazy.

[steve2470]

3. Yep so insane nt

[Nac Mac Feegle]

4. The "Health Food" industry abounds with them

"Organic:" I knew it was batsqueeze when I saw Organic Margarine in a Trader Joe's

"Natural:" Cobra venom and Botulism toxin are natural

"Gluten Free:" You wouldn't believe the stuff I've seen labeled Gluten Free: Potato chips, tomatoes, meat, assorted vegetables that have never been anywhere near a wheat plant ...

"Non-GMO:" Pretty much everything is genetically modified: desirable traits have been selected for over time so that most food plants bear little if any resemblance to their forebears. And some things that have been gene-spliced are given unholy reputations that are completely undeserved. Look at Golden Rice, for example; a strain of rice has had a gene spliced in (carrot, IIRC), that provides vitamin A, giving it a distinctive color and providing a notoriously scarce nutrient. The lack of which causes all sorts of health problems, from pregnancy, infancy, childhood, and on.

The best comment on the whole set of fads was a sign on a welding supply store that I saw a photo of:
We sell Free Range, Organic, Non GMO, Gluten Free metal. They only missed "Vegan", maybe they ran out of letters or room.

[Cirque du So-What]

5. Absolutely...

Monstrous.

[steve2470]

6. LOL nt

[SwissTony]

7. I remember reading about such cables a couple of years ago.

A couple of hundred bucks per FOOT!!

Then a skeptics group wanted to run a blind test comparing the expensive cables with cables from your mainstreet HiFi shop. There was a sudden case of very cold feet.