Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/11/26/score-over-75-off-these-japan.html
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DAMASUKASU MY NEMESIS RETURNS.
Sigh, I suppose BoingBoing’s gotta pay the bills somehow.
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Yes, yes it is all too easy to fake craftsmanship. At this point, the BoingBoing Store/Stack Social ad copy is just outright projecting. These knives are an exemplar of fake craftsmanship based on looks.
As best as I can make out these are Chinese made fakes, being neither made in Japan nor made of Damascus steel. The knives’ “subtle alternating pattern” is the ad copy trying to imply Damascus steel patterns without saying it because the pattern is a laser etched faux “Damascus” pattern in ordinary steel. And the laser pattern is identical from knife to knife rather than unique from actual pattern welded steel.
And as in previous BB/SS ads for these knives, the ad copy is trying to imply the knives are made of high carbon steel by saying “carbon-rich steel” but also claiming the knives to be stainless, “corrosion and rust-resistant,” which high carbon steel knives very much are not.
These knives probably cut just fine for many applications and may be a good deal for people looking for an inexpensive take on Japanese style knives, but marketing them as the alternative to “fake craftsmanship” is pretty outrageous.
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What took you so long? 
Timezones.
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Not a big deal (or any size of deal) for me. Having BB around is good.
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Honestly appreciate the background.
Things I look for in a knife:
Good for juggling, or just flipping while cooking.
When I inevitably drop them, are they sturdy enough that if they land point first, will they just stick into the linoleum and quiver? or snap off the tip?
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The Amazon sellers claim
We directly import verified Japanese Damascus steel from Japan to China, where the knives are made by hand.
To give BB some credit, other stacksocial sites are claiming that these knives are marked down from as high as $500, so the BB shop ad is less hyperbolic than most.
But we could save over $400 dollars instead of just a measly $130 by buying them from the other sites.
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Hard to give BB credit on that account when a recent BB/SS offer to “get” over a million stock vector images was billed as 99% off of the full $5,000 price, from a company who’s web domain was registered just three weeks prior. :-/
Googling that quote gives me this knife on Amazon. I can’t tell if it is related to these kinves or not - different Chinese factories often produce similar products of varying quality. Nor am I sure whether the BB/SS set is laser etched or possibly mass produced pattern weld. The ad copy doesn’t mention key words one would expect from a true pattern welded product, such as the number of layers (a different website’s Stack Social ad claims 67 layers), so I’m inclined to believe these are laser etched.
It’s hard to do a quick Google of BB/SS products because the Stack Social affiliate store system is really good at SEO spamming, pushing everything other than Stack Social ads off the first page results.
What the BB/SS ad does say for sure is “Japanese” and only “Japanese”. The word China doesn’t appear anywhere in the BB post or the linked BB/SS sales page. But I think it is a pretty safe bet these are Chinese made. If they were made in Japan I’d expect BB/SS to be all over that in the copy.
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Fair enough; I’m not sure the casual chain of steps I took from the BB ad to the Amazon listing would pass an evidentiary chain-of-custody audit.
it is a pretty safe bet these are Chinese made
Even the one on Amazon appears to be made in China, and while the steel was processed in Japan it might well have come originally from China as well.
The SS products, a strange mix of overstocks, remainders, and loss-leaders, occasionally contain some actual bargains. For example, among the seemingly thousands of VPNs they hawk there are one or two that are pretty highly regarded in security forums, and recently they were selling the interesting Wilfa coffeemakers.
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75% off?? What am I goong to do with a 2.12 inch slicing knife?!
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The key word being “among”. BB/SS does occasionally sell some perfectly valid stuff at fair prices, but it is indiscriminately mixed in with sketchy crap.
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