
No Evidence of Aloe Vera Found in the Aloe Vera at Wal-Mart, CVS - abakker
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-11-22/no-evidence-of-aloe-vera-found-in-the-aloe-vera-at-wal-mart-cvs
======
dfar1
“You have to be very careful when you select and use aloe products,” said Tod
Cooperman, president of White Plains, New York-based ConsumerLab.com, which
has done aloe testing.

\-- And how am supposed to be careful? Should I run my own lab to test every
product I use?

~~~
macintux
One of the failings of the libertarian ideal. There's no way for even an
informed consumer to have any idea what most of their purchases contain, what
safety issues they have, how effective they really are, etc.

~~~
cgriswald
Your comment is odd considering this flaw is occurring in a system that is not
'the' libertarian ideal and the solution is close to the libertarian ideal and
is working.

Consumers are being informed right now. A scandal can kill a company or a
private inspector in a way that it can't kill a corporate oligarchy or bad
regulation. Private inspectors have to compete for consumer dollars.
Government regulators, at best, have to compete for less than half the votes
of registered voters; or they are simply appointed.

In the system we have now, there will be lawsuits, but they will be capped and
won't mean the death of these corporations, so will largely be meaningless and
likely the entire thing will still be overall profitable to these companies.
Any attempt to regulate will be met with lobbying efforts to make that
regulation competition-restricting and corporation-protecting while giving lip
service to protecting consumers.

~~~
glenstein
I think the real lesson of the story isn't that the system is "working", it's
that we've (society) been purchasing tons and tons of a product for who knows
how long that has been inauthentic, without any idea that it was the case. How
long has this been happening? For how many other products is this the case?

It's certainly better that we know and (hopefully) some corrective action is
taken, but overall I'd read it as a signal of dysfunction. And I don' think
macintux is suggesting that we're presently within the libertarian ideal,
rather we're in the universe where it's considered a responsibility of the
state to prevent these kinds of things from happening, yet they are still
happening. So look what happened here, and imagine what would happen with even
fewer failsafes...

~~~
semi-extrinsic
> we've (society) been purchasing tons and tons of a product for who knows how
> long that has been inauthentic, without any idea that it was the case

Also, whenever this happens, one should stop and consider:

"Why are we buying aloe vera products in the first place, when millions of
people using the product for years are unable to detect that it's fake?"

If this happened with something tangible, say replacing all regular coke with
diet coke without changing the labels, it would be noticed immediately.

Whenever people buy something which they are completely unable to
differentiate from a fake, are they really being defrauded when someone sells
them the fake?

~~~
klagermkii
> Whenever people buy something which they are completely unable to
> differentiate from a fake, are they really being defrauded when someone
> sells them the fake?

Yes.

~~~
mzw_mzw
I think the point was that the real thing is just as much (or as little) of a
fraud as the fake is.

------
adt2bt
Whenever I see an article like this, I lose another bit of faith in all of the
products in these supermarkets, fair or not. I get the sense that all of our
modern 'health products' are nothing more than shams that induce the placebo
effect in people. Unless a doctor prescribes it, [edit] or it's an OTC drug
[/edit], I tend to think it's bologna.

Does anyone else feel that way or am I being unreasonable?

~~~
stillsut
Supermarket aloe vera is a product that changed my life. Seriously.

With my cheap Irish skin, I'm sure to get a severe sunburn once a year. I've
had one so bad it started to bleed; that one almost stopped me from going to
highschool prom.

I had tried Noxzema moisturizing gel, cold shower, hot tub, and several other
anecdotal remedies for sunburns, but nothing worked - for about five days
following a sunburn I was basically handicapped.

A year or two after the big one I tried the [fake] aloe vera and it finally
seemed like something worked. Ever since then, I'll use roughly a bottle a day
of the stuff following an intense burn. This has reduced the discomfort to the
level that the average Joe expresses as in "Ahh, extra sensitive right now"
not "Can't put on clothes right now"

~~~
pavel_lishin
Did it have any actual Aloe Vera in it?

~~~
jmcdiesel
Does it matter if it works? (i mean, legally, of course... and morally... )
... but as a solution, if it works, it works, right?

~~~
mtrpcic
Uhh, if I bought a bottle of Aloe and was smearing it all over myself, and
then I was told "That's not actually aloe", I'd want to know what I was
applying to my skin before I applied any more. Sure, it works, but maybe it's
carcinogenic, or has a side effect that I don't want to risk, or I have an
allergy to whatever mock-aloe-substitute they used.

~~~
jmcdiesel
Im in agreement... im saying if someone has been using it for years... and it
works for them, they might not care whats in it...

------
1_2__3
Combine this with an increasing trend in grocery and drug stores to only stock
1 "name brand" and everything else is house-branded and we're in for a rough
time. For now you can still use brand loyalty, but what happens when the whole
world is Wal-martified (we're on our way) and Safeway only sells Safeway
brand, Costco only sells Kirkland, CVS only sells CVS products, etc.? You can
say "go somewhere else" but selecting a different store isn't even a realistic
option for many people in the US - there are no alternatives.

We rely on retail establishments to provide choice as part of their value add.
Now that that's disappearing in favor of the retailer controlling everything,
what happens next? I honestly don't know.

~~~
chrsstrm
I can say this as someone who knows for certain, most of the products on the
shelves are the same, regardless of the label. They came off the same line
from the same factory. Want to know how they are different? The line operator
stopped for 10 minutes to change out the packaging. The amount of variety you
see is an illusion. The generics are exactly the same as the expensive name
brands. Walk into any store and compare the manufacturing codes on similar
products. And before you get too pedantic, I'm not saying they are _all_
exactly the same. I'm saying a choice of 10 "brands" likely all come from 3 or
less factories of origin.

~~~
unreal37
20 years ago I worked for a major gasoline refiner in Canada, who supplied the
gasoline for all of the gas stations in Toronto. Esso, Shell, BP, Petro-
Canada, Sunoco - all bought their gas from the same refinery. The whole WORLD
is branding.

~~~
chillacy
I think this finally hit me when I saw on display a tiny bottle of high-end
"high performance surfer sunscreen" for $35, complete with beautiful packaging
and a poster with attractive models.

------
yarper
So as it turns out regulation is good for us, and free market forces don't
solve all problems.

~~~
nostromo
Regulation is one way to try and solve this problem, but the courts are
another.

As mentioned in the article, the retailers of this product are already being
sued based on the findings.

~~~
british_india
The average consumer does not have money for attorneys: hence, the need for
government regulation. That's why all of us pay taxes.

~~~
pfranz
It's also that the fraud is incredibly diluted. Is the solution a class-action
lawsuit? If so, is it even worth it to me to fill out the postcard for a tube
of bogus aloe I bought 2 years ago? Let's say someone actually told me it was
fake. Was it the "Wal-Mart Premium Aloe" or the "Wal-Mart Organic Aloe"? I
would happily pay $0.20 more for real aloe over fake, but I'm not going to
spend 20min on my phone then pay $0.20 more for each item I put in my cart.

Which brand of olive oil isn't the fake one, again?

~~~
nickik
Legal scholars have actually found many elegant solutions to this sort of
stuff.

The simplest one is that if you find out that you were the victim of small
scale fraud. You should be able to sell your claim to a third person. This
third person can then gather many small claim and do the lawsuit for profit.
Your claim might only be worth 10$ in this case (since this is just wrong
labeling and not anything worse) but its still free money.

This system would also give consumer groups for example a better financial
situation. Currently, fines usually go to the government if some group detects
that some law was abused. In the system im talking about a consumer group
could ask for the data of all the people, should the find something they
inform everybody of this and ask them to sell their claims. Then they sue the
producer and make a profit. Such system could essentially be automated.
Selling a claim should not be harder then making online bank payments (in
Switzerland we have E-Bills, pops up, 1-click, done). If you trust the
consumer group you could just automate it completely (in Switzerland you can
actually give access to your bank accounts companies you trust).

This is also not some new idea, there are historical systems that worked
exactly like this. Those system were found to perform quite well.

------
glup
My first thought upon seeing the headline was well duh, there are 500+ species
in that genus
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aloe#Species](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aloe#Species))
But then in the article, "Aloe's three chemical markers—acemannan, malic acid,
and glucose—were absent in the tests[...]."

Yikes.

~~~
VLM
There was some humorous homeopathic reasoning in the article where a weasel
claimed that the extensive processing cosmetic products require might remove
the components that make aloe, aloe, but its still an aloe product, which is
kind of like claiming I'm still drinking orange juice if I extensively process
it to remove everything but the H2O molecules. Sure chemically speaking its
distilled pure water now, but once upon a time it was orange juice.

~~~
eric_h
Reminds me of the "what's the color of your bits" article that came up again
when the Illegal Primes wikipedia article made the front page.

"What's the color of your molecules?".

~~~
dbdr
[http://ansuz.sooke.bc.ca/entry/23](http://ansuz.sooke.bc.ca/entry/23)

------
mrfusion
We've seen this same issue with supplements like St. John's wort, and products
like honey. And then who knows what's going on with Amazon lately.

I see a pattern. I think we're seeing a breakdown of the concept of brands.
Every few generations society forgets important lessons it learned in the past
and has to relearn them. I think the importance of brands is one of these
concepts.

If a company can build a rock solid brand that people really trust I believe
they're going to be extremely sucessful. That's one reason Apple has done so
well. You completely trust that Apple would never sell you garbage. (although
they're also starting to forget this lesson.)

I'm going to start looking for strong, loved brands as part of my investment
strategy going forward. Unfortunately I'm having trouble thinking of any at
the moment.

~~~
delecti
> That's one reason Apple has done so well. You completely trust that Apple
> would never sell you garbage. (although they're also starting to forget this
> lesson.)

Also word-for-word true about Amazon.

~~~
nommm-nommm
... but Amazon is full of garbage, fakes, and counterfeit goods.

~~~
delecti
Yeah, _now_.

They spent the first 10-15 years building a pretty fantastic reputation for
customer trust, and then the floodgates of junk opened.

------
carsongross
Yet more corporate erosion of the trust that makes society work.

This is why restricting trade isn't as crazy as it sounds: when the aloe vera
cream is made down the street, you can go beat the guy up if he defrauds you.
And he knows that.

~~~
typetypetype
No, this is an example of why government regulation is important.

~~~
british_india
Exactly. Regulation does not come out of thin air--but in response to abuses.
Complaining about regulation in the abstract is akin to bank robbers
complaining about the laws against bank robbery.

~~~
givinguflac
"Complaining about regulation in the abstract is akin to bank robbers
complaining about the laws against bank robbery."

Amazing analogy, and unfortunately all too close to reality for many companies
fighting reasonable regulations.

Disclaimer: Not all companies fighting certain regulations are crooks.

~~~
delecti
And in cases where the company fighting against regulation aren't crooks, the
people fighting for them likely are.

------
Johnny555
_" Acemannan has been misinterpreted," Meadows said. "The cosmetics industry
requires highly processed aloe. How that affects acemannan is anybody’s
guess."_

Even the cosmetics industry admits that they don't have a clue (not even a
guess) about what happens to Aloe after it's been processed for inclusion into
their products, so it may not have any of the original properties. (acemannan
makes up about 15% of aloe)

~~~
Nition
And if it doesn't contain any after it's processed then it's not an Aloe
product anymore.

------
roflchoppa
Go outside, find an aloe plant, take a cutting of it (make sure to ask the
owner.....) and transplant it into a pot of soil.

Water, and keep your friend alive.

Succulents make good desk plants :)

~~~
maxerickson
Go outside, no aloe to be found.

It's still easy enough to get a plant or cutting though.

~~~
roflchoppa
If you come over I can give you some <:p, I've had the same plant for almost
10 years, Once my mother and I were deep frying some fish and she kicked the
oil over into her shoe, that aloe plant was used to help sooth the burns...
interestingly no scars on her feet from that incident.

------
mast
This article reminded me of the story about snake oil. At one time it was
considered a traditional medicine. In the early 1900's products were sold
claiming to contain snake oil but didn't. This lead to the modern usage of the
term.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake_oil](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake_oil)

~~~
wmeredith
The term "blowing smoke" has a similar origin. There is an outdated and
defunct medicinal practice of blowing smoke up one's rectum as a sort of
cleanse. The of course turned to be of, uh, dubious effectiveness for curing
ailments. Hence the modern term, blowing smoke, which means someone is
bullshitting you.

~~~
nommm-nommm
In modern times smoke is replaced with coffee. And it can be deadly.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffee_enema](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffee_enema)

------
jrumbut
So these products are made of Aloe Falsum then?

~~~
diyseguy
Possibly Aloe Verum

~~~
Florin_Andrei
verum is singular

vera is plural

~~~
jrumbut
I was feeling pretty pleased with myself about this joke but now the grammar
mistake has ruined it for me.

------
ekux44
I wonder if the products were always lacking Aloe Vera, or if this is an
example of "quality fade"?

([https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poorly_Made_in_China](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poorly_Made_in_China))

~~~
abakker
As he discusses in the book, I suspect that this is a combination of quality
fade, and willful ignorance (also known as poor/no testing). Testing costs
money, and budget products mandate cost cutting.

------
narrator
They don't do aloe vera products, but
[http://www.labdoor.com](http://www.labdoor.com) is a great site that does
chemical analysis of supplements and determines if their labels are actually
accurate and if they contain any harmful impurities.

------
edgarlove
False advertising should be punished severely. The consequences are always
bad.

~~~
nommm-nommm
Unless your fraud involves dietary supplements, then there's almost always no
consequences.

------
dbl9
In Germany and many places if not all of west and central Europe products get
detailed labeling of ingredients. For instance if you buy what's supposedly a
brand name syrup of plums and therefore should be 100% the result of cooking
plums and nothing else except maybe conservatives, what you actually get
according to the label is 99% various forms of industrialized sugar and then a
little bit of plum flavor. This is great because I've also found such syrup
which was what you'd expect and pretty much the same thing you get when you do
at home, but it wasn't from the most famous brand in Germany, which is
disturbing given the price you have to pay for the brand. Same with stuff
that's supposed to be honey or all those fancy teas which have no trace of
what the label says if you look into the ingredients list. Most people do not
bother to read it, and I don't blame them, but if you do, you start to put
many products on a personal blacklist of fakes.

That said, do US products not carry detailed ingredient lists or is this
product discussed in the article part of a group of products that are exempt?

~~~
laretluval
> The products all listed aloe barbadensis leaf juice — another name for aloe
> vera — as either the No. 1 ingredient or No. 2 after water.

~~~
dbl9
In that case it's clear fraud and will be dealt with, I assume. Given the
comments here about a liberal market, I assumed labeling requirements are less
strict over there.

------
pritianka
I always suspected this! The products felt so different from when you break
off an aloe leaf and use the goo. Feeling so vindicated right now :p

~~~
ceejayoz
I don't know that that's a great test. Bread feels pretty different from wheat
plants, but it's still the same thing.

~~~
zentiggr
Not a proper comparison... The beneficial chemicals in the aloe have no need
to be processed at all, cracking a leaf and squeezing out the gel is
sufficient.

Crack wheat, sure the kernels are edible and quite healthy - but that's a far
cry from bread.

~~~
pfranz
Often things need to be processed or treated to make better and more
consistent products. Consumers are also fickle about appearance. You can make
powdered sugar by grinding up confectioner's sugar, but the stuff you buy in
the store has cornstarch added to prevent clumping. Shredded mozzarella has a
powder coating to prevent it from sticking together.

Fresh aloe from the plant doesn't need to worry about mold or spoilage.
Something shoved into a bottle, shipped on a truck, and expected to
consistently squeezed out of a tube (without drying out or getting gunky)
probably needs additives or treatments that change it in order to be safe.

~~~
oasisbob
Truth. The American consumer is very sensitive, especially to consistency. If
your product changes color, or settles out weird or does anything to shatter
the belief that one bottle is exactly like the next one, you've got a big
problem.

~~~
jmcdiesel
Case in point - I had a friend who was recently trying to be all organic and
stuff (like, crazily) ...

He got mad because he came home with a jar of peanut butter that was organic..
and natural... (and delicious) but he was actually upset because the oil
separated... like, actually upset, and wanted to take it back, and did not
want to eat it... he thought it was gross...

Yeah... natural is gross and processed is good... 'Murica

~~~
pfranz
Yup. I remember reading about a smoothie like product that had some additive,
a known inflammatory, that did nothing but keep it from settling out. It's
only purpose was to save the consumer from shaking it before opening the
bottle and had some obvious downsides (it also made it look prettier on the
shelf). After a/b testing it the consensus was to leave it in.

------
finid
_We’ve been in the business a long time and we know where the raw ingredients
come from,’’ John Dondrea, Fruit of the Earth’s general counsel, said in a
telephone interview. “We stand behind our products._

Did I hear somebody say that regulating companies is bad for business? And the
incoming administration have said that cutting regulation is a top priority.

------
tripzilch
This would be so illegal in the EU it's not even funny.

Also, Aleo Vera is a plant. So "no Aloe Vera in the Aloe Vera" doesn't even
make sense. Is it hand cream? Shampoo?

------
JustSomeNobody
> Tim Meadows, president of Concentrated Aloe Corp., said that nuclear
> magnetic resonance isn’t reliable for cosmetics because the presence of
> multiple ingredients can cause interference and there’s no way to test for
> aloe in finished products.

This type of science is out of my scope of knowledge, but the skeptic in me
thinks, "how convenient."

------
ilaksh
Maybe there could be a data format/protocol for reporting ingredients in
products electronically so they could be easily analyzed. And make that open
for the public (or companies) to view.

This gets at the issue of externalities and the general inadequacy of trying
to track everything with one number ($).

~~~
joosters
There already is a basic data format & protocol: the ingredients are listed,
in order. The problem here is that the ingredients were lies. Being more
precise isn't going stop the lies.

~~~
ilaksh
There is no electronic format that is easily accessible.

~~~
joosters
An electronic format won't make the lies go away, why the fixation on it?

------
known
You can buy original aloe products from Tribals in India
[http://onlineshop.apgirijan.com/product/aloevera-
soap/](http://onlineshop.apgirijan.com/product/aloevera-soap/)

------
perseusprime11
I buy the Aloe Vera leaf for $1 from my local grocery store and use it
whenever I want. Don't rely on off the shelf products unless you know the
founder is very passionate about the product and it's benefits.

------
colordrops
Is there a third party that tests products for their legitimacy? Consumer
Reports? The government? Seems like a market need.

------
ilaksh
Try the jars of "pesto sauce" they sell at Walmart. Its literally pickled
basil stems with garlic.

------
jdavis703
Aloe Vera is very easy to grow at home. There's literally no reason to buy
this at a store.

~~~
fma
Say...you go on vacation to the beach and fall asleep to the soothing sounds
of waves. You get sun burned. Then what.

~~~
kazinator
Go to a beach vacation to a place where aloe plants grow all over the place;
pick some tentacles and keep in your hotel room fridge.

------
5ilv3r
Some things don't work at scale. I guess squeezing leaves into bottles is one
of them.

------
toodlebunions
I wonder how many other products are completely fake.

~~~
nommm-nommm
Blueberries are often fake! [http://www.npr.org/sections/health-
shots/2011/01/20/13308914...](http://www.npr.org/sections/health-
shots/2011/01/20/133089144/fake-blueberries-often-masquerade-as-real-fruit)

------
silveira
Contains post-truth Aloe Vera.

------
joesmo
"That means suppliers are on an honor system"

In other words, abuses will be rampant as having an honor system for
corporations is like asking your cat not to eat that delicious fish or bird
they just caught. Only idiots would think that could possibly work. That's why
it's a dominant theory of economics in the US.

------
rasz_pl
so its like Chocolate then? I guess all that evil EU regulatory burden serves
some purpose after all

[http://www.thefoodieentourage.com/2011/10/should-bad-
chocola...](http://www.thefoodieentourage.com/2011/10/should-bad-chocolate-be-
illegal.html)

------
dschiptsov
Where on Google Maps are these vast aloe vera plantations which are required
to produce these millions of liters of products? There must be hectares and
hectares, visible from the outer space.

~~~
jpalomaki
Not sure about the locations, but you'll find images about quite big
plantations if you do Google image search for: aloe vera plantations

------
bertiewhykovich
It's terrible that the FDA is interfering with free association between these
gigantic conglomerates and consumers. It's a sin.

------
dschiptsov
They should also try to find evidence of grapes is crappy wines to which a
cork is too expensive.

~~~
mrob
Crappy wine is made from crappy grapes, or good grapes handled poorly, not
fake grapes. There is no reason to use fake grapes because there is so much
supply of real grapes (see "wine lake"). And most wine is not meant to be aged
for a long time so there is no reason to use a cork and risk cork taint.

------
derefr
I don't much care whether it's aloe. The real question, I think, is whether
the substitute product (maltodextrin) _works the way aloe works, to solve the
same problem aloe solves_. If it does, and it's cheaper to stick in a bottle,
then I'm all for it. If it doesn't, then it's a problem.

When you buy "aloe extract" in the cosmetics aisle, you're not buying it for
its particular organochemical structure (unless you're planning to spread it
on toast); you're buying it for the effect it has. You're looking for a
chemical that supports aloe's API contract for its interaction with your own
biophysiology. You're looking for, essentially, an "IAloe".

This is the problem with a lot of organic->synthetic transitions: people know
the _effect_ by the name of the organic substance that produces it, and thus,
to get any mind-share, you have to market the synthetic by making it appear
similar to the organic. Pure synthetic capsaicin is still marketed as "Ghost
Chili oil" or similar, because people don't know or expect "capsaicin" to be
spicy, but they do expect chili peppers to be.

Really, it's a miracle (of a mega-conglomerate marketing machine) that aspirin
isn't just called "willow bark extract."

\---

ETA: okay, apparently people are really very upset by the idea that a company
"lying" about a product could be okay.

Every company that produces a product that isn't under government mandate to
be a certain way, lies about _everything_ they can get away with! That is the
world we live in. 90% of products on the market are this way. You should not
believe a single ingredients list if a product isn't in the FDA-regulated
classes of "food" or "drugs." Most products outside of these categories don't
even bother to _have_ ingredients lists; this should tell you everything you
need to know about the incentives that caused the products that _do_ to put
one on there anyway.

When I say "I'm okay with this", I mean that "I can deal with this, because I
was _already_ dealing with this in every purchasing decision I make, and this
doesn't change anything." Everything on a drug-store shelf other than the
actual FDA-regulated "drugs" are unadulterated bullshit that you have to comb
through yourself to verify claims.

Guess what? That's the optimum! Empowering the FDA to fact-check the labelling
claims of every single product would cost _insane_ amounts of money, slow the
whole economy down to the glacial FDA-approval pace of the pharmaceutical
industry.

I'm okay with the world being this way, because all alternative worlds
(reachable via anything less than a complete restructuring of government and
maybe the human psyche) are worse.

~~~
phkahler
>> This is the problem with a lot of organic->synthetic transitions: people
know the effect by the name of the organic substance that produces it, and
thus, to get any mind-share, you have to market the synthetic by making it
appear similar to the organic.

You mean lie and say that it IS the organic - in this case. So in the world of
computer products, you'd be happy with a knockoff laptop marketed with an
Apple logo then? That's trademark infringement and it's illegal precisely
because someone could otherwise market crap under another companies good name.

~~~
derefr
Trademark is a whole separate issue; product classes are not trademarks.
(Except in the cases of "protected cultivars" of things like fruit and wine.)

But to try to use your example to make my own opinion here clear: yes, I
_would_ be happy with to receive a "knock-off" laptop with an Apple logo on
it... provided it _looked and functioned identically to an Apple laptop,
including Apple 's willingness to take it in for warranty repairs_. (Tangent:
such things exist! They're called "ghost shift" products, produced by the same
factory-workers that produce the real ones, when nobody's looking.)

And that's what we're talking about here: chemical analogues that _have the
same effect on the body_.

Note that this is all contingent on the idea that maltodextrin _is_ a chemical
analogue to aloe vera extract. If it isn't, then my argument here is moot.

------
pcunite
_There’s no watchdog assuring that aloe products are what they say they are._

Start teaching honesty in universities along with "how to make money".

~~~
freehunter
They do. I had to take an ethics class in college. And every business class I
took had a section on ethics as well. But you learn what you want out of
everything that's taught to you. I know people who got an A in biology but
still reject evolution and people who have majored in environmental science
but don't believe in climate change.

~~~
finid
It's very rare that whatever you learn in school changes your consciousness.
Very rare.

~~~
Hydraulix989
You mean "conscience"

------
finid
This is just for Aloe. What's in that coconut water that you're drinking?

After taking a sip of one brand of 100% coconut water a couple of years ago,
my body complained bitterly, which is how my body tells me that what I just
ate/drank contains an artificial ingredient.

So now if I want to drink coconut water, I go buy the real thing itself.

~~~
tehwebguy
> which is how my body tells me that what I just ate/drank contains an
> artificial ingredient

This guy is the solution to all our product testing problems!

~~~
finid
Nope!

That guy, _moi_ , is his own solution to product testing.

~~~
fuzzfactor
Between two identical experimenters, each having the same harmless test
material, the one participating as a willing guinea pig is much more likely to
realize subtle effects compared to the one that does not.

A carefully selected variety of Aloe is my only current gardening effort. The
fresh gel of the living plant has benefits to the skin not possessed by lesser
forms. Commercial formulations are (at the least) thousands of years less
advanced than the natural plant.

