Extreme Ironing

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extreme_ironing

by kulesh • 5 years ago

411 172 5 years ago

en.wikipedia.org

sneak• 5 years ago

Funny that the 1st Extreme Ironing World Championships were held in a country (Germany) where the native language has no word for the concept of “silly”. :D

zufallsheld• 5 years ago

Albern, Dumm, Lächerlich? German has words for silly and the concept of silly.

b112• 5 years ago

No, parent is right. There is no word for silly in german.

Instead, all german words pertaining to silly, also have an untranslatable connotation, a flavour to them, such as "silly, but with a deep undertone of contemplative thought as to how I ended up in this predicament", and so forth.

Crono• 5 years ago

Doch! Of course we have a - or actually some - words for that. The above-mentioned, but what could also fit is "absurd". Most of the time we have even multiple words with slightly different meanings - it's why I like our language :D

usrusr• 5 years ago

But bügeln is less ironic which kind of ruins much of the appeal.

anemic• 5 years ago

Extreme ironing used to be fun sport but when Rowenta started sponsoring the UK team in the championships it's now only "commercial sponsorship and exploitation"

http://www.ntk.net/2002/09/13/?l=92#l

drjasonharrison• 5 years ago

No single German word is equivalent to all of the English language uses of the word "silly". There are however individual German words for the English contextual equivalents.

https://german.stackexchange.com/questions/1227/how-to-expre...

toxodont• 5 years ago

How do they power their irons?

DaiPlusPlus• 5 years ago

Good question, but at least they don't need to refill the steamer's reservoir.

tyingq2• 5 years ago

I found this:

"We took our own iron. It's not battery powered so it doesn't iron that well, but the quality of the ironing is not the point - it's where you do it."[1]

So it sounds like they just run a not-plugged-in regular iron over some fabric and call it ironing?

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/apr/25/everest.nepal

elliekelly• 5 years ago

I mean if this is true it really just calls the validity of the whole sport into question. You obviously can’t iron without heat.

bserge2• 5 years ago

Pfft, not even a coal fired iron? Extreme my arse

devoutsalsa• 5 years ago

That's not ironing. It's a fabric massage.

eCa2• 5 years ago

A portable power station (eg [1]) should be an expected part of a working ironing setup..

[1] https://www.bluetti.com/products/bluetti-ac50s-500wh-300w-po...

layer8• 5 years ago

Irons used to be heated up by a fire, so that’d be an option.

luguenth• 5 years ago

From the German Wiki (roughly translated):

Commercially available irons are used for ironing. In places where no electrical power supply is available or cannot be used due to humidity, the heating plate is heated by auxiliary constructions (mostly gas cookers). For the World Cup, for example, a process was developed in which the iron is heated inside by an exothermic reaction, generated by mixing a hygroscopic chemical pressed into granules with water.

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extremb%C3%BCgeln

tromp• 5 years ago

Finally, an application for the conductive bungee cord...

rovr1384• 5 years ago

Get an old coal one.

nicbou• 5 years ago

From the See also section: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wok_racing

dangerbird23• 5 years ago

Don't forget wife carrying: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wife-carrying

zkms• 5 years ago

and belt-sander racing! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belt-sander_racing

rnd420_69• 5 years ago

For some reason I read it as extreme ignoring and now wonder what that sport would look like

smoyer2• 5 years ago

I vehemently refuse to read your comment!

Applejinx• 5 years ago

NO. You don't wonder that, and I don't either!

megamix• 5 years ago

That's not a sport - it's called programming

dangerbird23• 5 years ago

  try:
    ...
  except BaseException:
    return "yolo"

JohnWhigham• 5 years ago

Ask my wife

SuoDuanDao2• 5 years ago

I feel like that's just normal social behaviour for most felines.

cbozeman• 5 years ago

wonder what that sport would look like

Your love life.

(just kidding!)

semi-extrinsic• 5 years ago

Oh, this takes me back. One of the first wonderfully weird things I discovered on Youtube almost 15 years ago. The VHS quality, the ubiquitous Rocky or Top Gun soundtrack, oh my...

angrygoat• 5 years ago

A fairly good example, from the RAF in the Falkland Islands https://youtu.be/xyA9hpfBsB4?t=149

arethuza2• 5 years ago

Presumably that's the Special Ironing Service (SIS) at work?

cryptonector• 5 years ago

Perfect timestamp for this.

Matheo05• 5 years ago

That just made my day!

petercooper• 5 years ago

Extreme coding, anyone?

bserge2• 5 years ago

Coding while homeless. Actually exists but people don't like it for some reason.

nickthemagicman• 5 years ago

Currently evacuating from Ida and coding while homeless in a hotel on the beach.

Not too bad!

tiborsaas2• 5 years ago

Ask a digital nomad :)

mirekrusin2• 5 years ago

We already have Extreme Programming (XP).

dangerbird23• 5 years ago

Alas, extreme programming is not nearly as fun as it sounds

hutzlibu• 5 years ago

Oh yeah, I actually do that. Coding while sitting on a high tree or on a steep rock, only reachable by climbing.

Why I do this?

Well, certainly not because of attention seeking, rather the opposite.

No one bothers my flow state there and the elements bring inspiration.

amai• 5 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/996_working_hour_system

system2• 5 years ago

Another valid proof of people do anything to get attention.

michaelhoffman• 5 years ago

People will also do all sorts of things for fun.

slingnow• 5 years ago

What percentage of these people do you think do this and then DON'T post an image / video of it somewhere to get views? I would guess it rounds down to 0%.

It's pure attention seeking. And it also might be fun.

SamBam3• 5 years ago

Boo. Pretty sad way to view people having fun.

eCa2• 5 years ago

For gamers, this[1] is probably the best extreme gaming equivalent. Playing horror games alone in the woods at night.

[1] https://youtu.be/UCvnrkN9Jjw

Ancapistani• 5 years ago

This is the best thing I’ve seen in quite a while.

bmmayer1• 5 years ago

It's clear that people are just doing this...ironically.

admax88qqq• 5 years ago

Go home

louthy• 5 years ago

Irony, a bit like silvery and bronzy?

belter2• 5 years ago

Is this like the ...iron man competition?

Lio• 5 years ago

Go on, keep the jokes coming. I'm interested to see how far you can go before you, wait for it ...run out of steam! :P

smoyer2• 5 years ago

Perhaps we should turn to more pressing matters?

drittich2• 5 years ago

I'm getting board of this, I have more pressing concerns. Like collaring some criminals to de-crease the number wrinkles in our society.

loftyal• 5 years ago

I can't think of a witty response. I fold.

TedDoesntTalk• 5 years ago

How is the iron powered when there are no electrical outlets at these places?

tiborsaas2• 5 years ago

We are in the middle of a battery revolution so... batteries.

arethuza2• 5 years ago

Maybe use an RTG - just for maximum extremeness?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_ge...

Edit: You could just cut out the generator bit and have a nuclear iron.

moron4hire2• 5 years ago

Smart contracts on the Blockchain

eric__cartman• 5 years ago

And a smart clothes iron with built in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth to control the temperature and steam setting with an Amazon Echo that hopefully you remembered to bring with you.

SamBam3• 5 years ago

If the smart contract says the iron gets hot, it must get hot. Smart contracts are bound by the iron laws of cryptography.

fspoettel• 5 years ago

a use case, finally!

danlugo92• 5 years ago

No.

cryptica• 5 years ago

I invented a new sport a few months ago; extreme rock balancing. It's like regular rock balancing except I did it at the bottom of the sea at least 10 meters deep without scuba. I stacked 4 rocks.

It's a combination of freediving and rock balancing.

allears• 5 years ago

As my wife said just now, "Any time I iron it's an extreme sport."

ethbr0• 5 years ago

For those unfamiliar, irons were devices used to smooth clothes in historical times, when men's business casual at minimum required a dress shirt and collar.

ghostbrainalpha• 5 years ago

Were Irons replaced when Dry Cleaners were invented?

SuoDuanDao2• 5 years ago

This takes me way back. When I was in high school, one of my classmates had a job in a call center, and one of the surveys he was contracted to do was for a website dedicated to extreme ironing. Unlike most surveys he had to punch in phone numbers himself, so he called a friend who was in on the joke just to get some interesting responses.

"How much time do you spend ironing?" "one or two hours a day, I try not to overindulge"

"What's the strangest place you've ever ironed?" "A bass boat"

I don't remember any of the other responses, but everyone who heard that story got a good chuckle out of it. Interesting to hear that it's stayed around so long!

duckmysick• 5 years ago

Mildly related: I'm curious what are the latest advances in consumer irons and ironing boards. Something that improved them in the last 10-15 years, even incrementally.

For example SSDs became much more common and affordable over the past 15 years and their parameters also improved. Are there similar improvements in household appliances like irons? Where would one look for an industry overview?

derefr5• 5 years ago

I don’t think consumer cleaning technology products like this keep up with the rate of change of underlying technologies. People get used to doing certain things (e.g. ironing) and want to keep doing it the same way their parents taught them.

I’d instead look more at commercial cleaners (e.g. how shirts are cleaned/pressed for shipment to stores) if you want to see the bleeding edge of cleaning technology.

(It’s sort of like home consoles vs. arcade machines in the 80s/90s. Home consoles had to optimize for affordability, while arcade machines could essentially be expensive operationalized prototypes as long as they paid for themselves.)

rovr1384• 5 years ago

People get used to doing certain things (e.g. ironing) and want to keep doing it the same way their parents taught them.

tongue in cheek, but WHYY

On the other hand, my mom has sent me things like machines that fold and do other stuff whenever she finds something… or refinds something. So I doubt she likes doing it and maybe passed that down to me.

bewaretheirs• 5 years ago

There's a market niche for "steam generator" irons specifically for use when sewing (where you need the iron sporadically while assembling a garment from pieces). This is sort of a "pro-sumer" space.

These typically have an offboard water tank and boiler that doubles as a stand for the hot iron. This also lets the iron itself be lighter in weight.

A key feature for this market is the absence of the automatic shutoff that's commonly found in consumer irons.

thetis• 5 years ago

same answer from my perspective, i did not iron a lot during the last year because of lockdows but i see nice machines using steam. The sound is the same as a nespresso machine so i believe that it is based on the same steam generation technology, opposed to the brass tank steam generation process used in quality espresso machines & professional irons.

hughrr• 5 years ago

I have discovered the joy of having no clothes you need to iron.

That’s real progress!

codazoda• 5 years ago

I buy a lot of black 100% polyester t-shirts for this reason. They don't need to be ironed and I don't have to decide what I'm wearing for the day.

zo1• 5 years ago

Also realizing that a lot of times you don't need to iron something at all. Fold it nicely, or hang it up to dry without creases and you'd be amazed at how good it looks without ironing. Short of formal work clothes, I don't have anything that needs ironing.

dheera• 5 years ago

Also, how do people get power for their irons? Do they backpack an inverter and huge lithium battery? Or are there chemically powered irons that they use?

rovr1384• 5 years ago

Throw some coal in them and away they go.

They weren’t always electric.

cpcallen2• 5 years ago

They don't generally power their irons. It's more about the absurd photos than the pressed shirts.

elorant• 5 years ago

Steam generating irons. I bought one a few years back and makes ironing so much easier, especially for shirts and trousers.

47• 5 years ago

https://helloeffie.com/

Never used it myself but i have been curious if it actually works.

pronik• 5 years ago

More like "is it released after all those years". I've been very interested in the concept, but that's the last I've heard from them in the last 3-4 years.

nose• 5 years ago

A hot shower can achieve similar results: https://www.reddit.com/r/ShowerScience/comments/302aqp/showe...

cpcallen2• 5 years ago

You can now get 'cordless' (electric) irons. Like an electric kettle, they heat up while sitting in the (decidedly non-cordless) base, but you don't have to contend with the cord while actually doing the pressing. I am a bit doubtful about whether they are much of an improvement over the usual corded kind, but the one person I know who has one insists that she greatly prefers it.

zwayhowder• 5 years ago

I used on in Japan years ago and had to wait about 5 years before they showed up in Australia at a reasonable price. Not worth replacing a perfectly good iron with, but if you accidently melt the cord to your current iron it's worth considering.

It is definitely easier not having to worry about the cord tangling or pulling at your clothes.

bluGill• 5 years ago

My grandma used them for years. Hers weren't electric though, she had to put them on the wood stove to heat. The wood stove was next to her sewing machine, while the electric iron was in a different room, so it was a lot faster for her to pick up the iron than use the electric one. They didn't have automatic steam, but otherwise worked just as well.

dragontamer2• 5 years ago

Are there similar improvements in household appliances like irons?

I bought a new washer/dryer recently. A bunch of bells and whistles, but... the "autosense the water level" feature is awesome, and likely saves water in the long run.

It seems like washers use so much less water these days, its not like the old agitator models from 2000s which filled up a tank. Instead, modern washers thoroughly wet the clothes, add a bit of extra water at the bottom, and then mix vigorously (be it a front-load or top load, the HE washers all do this technique).

This leads to lower water usage. I also ended up using much less soap per load (the first few times, I noticed the soap wasn't fully getting rinsed out, but the significantly less water usage means I also should use significantly less soap).

Where would one look for an industry overview?

At least for generic household appliances, Consumer Reports is a non-profit survey / reviewer group. I dunno if they have much on irons themselves, but I haven't seen anything wrong with their reviews yet.

I think there's a problem when the price goes too low. For something like $20, $50, or even $200 or $1000 appliances even... its not really worthwhile to review. Instead, you often have to just buy the thing and hope for the best.

Maybe there's a specific professional group who is thinking about these tools and how to use them (chefs and cooking tools, or woodworkers + woodworking tools). But for things like irons or washers, or other household appliances... I don't think any such group exists outside of things like Consumer Reports.

Still, I get my reviews on "Tide vs Persil", and other household items. I think "Wirecutter" is a competitor and some people say they've got good reviews too.

In any case, Consumer Report's page on steam irons is here: https://www.consumerreports.org/products/steam-irons-28981/s...

Qworg2• 5 years ago

As an extension to the soap, there are single squeeze detergent bottles now that precisely meter on a one handed squeeze. So simple, yet phenomenally useful.

sydd• 5 years ago

Are there similar improvements in household appliances like irons?

Some examples that I know of:

- modern robot vacuums, that can mop, use LIDAR etc. We have a pretty decent one, it works OK, but we still have to vacuum by ourselves every 2 weeks or so.

- battery operated vacuums, irons, hair dryers etc.

- smart homes -- automaticcally setting heat, window blinds

- tons of gimmicky stuff like smart fridges, or water taps with touch screens.

But I'd consider these just some quality of life improvements, not major time savers like washing things by hand vs a washing machine. IMO the next big thing will be household 3D printers when someone finds out how to make them safe and reliable for everyday use by non-technical people.

inasio• 5 years ago

My favourite advance from the last ten years has been around precision cooking. Sous vide is perhaps the most well known, but you can now get sensors to automatically control a bbq, steam and temperature controlled ovens are becoming more common/affordable (still waiting for a home-use Rational), etc. I love being able to cook with consistent quality and easily repeatable results.

dunham• 5 years ago

Yeah, Anova has something that claims to be a temperature controlled (+-0.5F) steam oven at the $600 price point. It's tempting, but I'm not sure I want to give up the counter space.

If anyone here has one, I'm curious how well it works.

modzu• 5 years ago

the main advancement is planned obsolescence.

well that, and the electric toothbrush

xarope• 5 years ago

back in the days when I used to have to wear a suit and tie, my wife bought me a laurastar. The hook was that they had a fan built into the board, that could suck (it could also blow and hence billow the material instead) the shirt to the board, so that ironing was easier.

__MatrixMan__• 5 years ago

I'm pretty sure that if we managed to get extreme ironing into the olympics, we'd see increased innovation in this sector.

maguay• 5 years ago

A quick Amazon search doesn't seem to show them being popular in the States, but in Asia at least irons with separate water tanks where the iron itself doesn't get hot enough to burn clothes have become the new standard over the past few years.

u801e• 5 years ago

I don't know about the last 10 to 15 years, but 30 years ago, a lot of clothing brands had wrinkle free/resistant products which significantly reduced the need for ironing.

systemBuilder• 5 years ago

This article reminds me of the fake cities that Rand McNally puts on maps to see if someone else is copying their work. I feel like this is probably a fake article put into Wikipedia to see if somebody else is copying their work....

raman1623• 5 years ago

extreme ironing is "the latest danger sport that combines the thrills of an extreme outdoor activity with the satisfaction of a well-pressed shirt."

This was some of the humor that I didn't know I needed today. Had me laughing out loud.

raman1623• 5 years ago

Someone needs to host a legit tournament called the "Extreme Ironman". Although confusing, I bet some tri-athletes will appreciate the humor and actually sign up.

jeffrallen• 5 years ago

Been there, done that, got the t-shirt. https://photos.app.goo.gl/p6B6oeEs6dpzziaP7

raman1623• 5 years ago

Ha, good to see that someone has already done that.

vernie• 5 years ago

I wonder if these people scoffed at or participating in planking and owling.

andrewmcwatters• 5 years ago

I was watching this on ESPN 8 recently. Thrilling stuff.

dang• 5 years ago

One small past thread:

Extreme ironing - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6594989 - Oct 2013 (2 comments)

bla3• 5 years ago

In the French, German, Japanese, and Portuguese versions this was invented by Phillip Shaw in 1997 in Leicester, UK.

In the English and Spanish versions, it was invented by Tony Hiam in 1980 in Seattle.

rovr1384• 5 years ago

So many people have never thought what they used to iron before electricity became popular and accessible.

There used to be coal irons. You open them, put some pieces of charcoal on them and use them.

kzrdude• 5 years ago

From my grandmother's generation I've also seen hunk-of-metal-irons.. (look like modern irons, just more massive, without the steam holes) you just put them on top of the stove (wood or electricity-fired) to heat them

hardwaregeek• 5 years ago

There's a really great section in The Path to Power about how women in the Hill Country used to iron before electricity. They'd heat these massive irons (that they called sad irons) in the stove. The process was extremely finicky between the ash, the inevitable burns, and the unforgiving heat of the fire. Really goes to show how much washing machines and electric irons have done for quality of life.

kyle-rb2• 5 years ago

Interesting, but something about this article is weird. Overall it doesn't feel like it's in the Wikipedia style and some parts are very editorialized, e.g.

As extreme ironing has branched off, the conditions can gain in extreme activity. For example, a branch of ironing has been developed that includes both bungee jumping and well-pressed clothing. Bungee ironing is what some would call the ultimate in the thrill of extreme ironing.[8]

That citation leads to https://averyj12.weebly.com/extreme-ironing.html, which was clearly copied wholesale from Wikipedia (all its links and citations go directly back to Wikipedia).

Looking at the history, there have been a lot of edits since that text was added in 2007, so it's surprising that someone hasn't rewritten it since then.

sedatk• 5 years ago

That citation leads to https://averyj12.weebly.com/extreme-ironing.html, which was clearly copied wholesale from Wikipedia

Welcome to Wikipedia where the line between FUD and knowledge disappears.

thewakalix• 5 years ago

Citogenesis in the wild? [0]

[0] https://xkcd.com/978/

mikevin• 5 years ago

Slightly related question:

Does anyone know what to do when finding a Wikipedia page that's just an ad in disguise?

I've found a few and Wikipedia has a lot of pages about vandalism/verifiability which often recommends just changing the parts that don't fit or placing a warning on the user's page but what if the whole page is about a made up term that exists to link to the authors blog/company?

I can't outright delete a whole page right? I'm also pretty new to contributing Wikipedia and even though they specifically recommend just trying and learning when some action wasn't appropriate I'd still feel more comfortable if I could contact someone with a bit more experience/reputation to discuss such an instance.

kyle-rb2• 5 years ago

I don't have a ton of experience, but you can add a "may not meet notability guidelines" banner, or a "proposed deletion".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability#Articles_...

nwallin• 5 years ago

Don't delete it. Deleting an article has the lowest effort:effect ratio, so lots of automatic policies are in place to speedily allow an author to restore a page that's been deleted.

If the article itself shouldn't exist, mark it with {{qd|spam}} . `qd` is quick deletion.

If the article should still exist but has substantial content that's advertising, mark it {{npov}}

In both cases someone else will come along and fix it. If the author who put the ads up in the first place removes your template, just put it back up.

Clewza313• 5 years ago

Joke articles (and let's face it, this is a joke sport) tend to attract joke edits.

thorin• 5 years ago

The original extreme ironing site must be very old. I'm pretty sure I remember browsing it in mosaic on a sun workstation in the mid 90s.

Extreme ironing forever.

dijit27• 5 years ago

Hot Take: This is less extreme sport and more performance art.

Animats• 5 years ago

Some group used to have a drill team of serious-looking people who folded and unfolded lawn chairs in synchrony.

But that's not extreme ironing. This is extreme ironing.[1] (From the leading company in a boring but profitable business.)

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bd900ehE9M

eyelidlessness• 5 years ago

I misread the title as “extreme ignoring” and was mildly disappointed.

thread_id• 5 years ago

Seriously?

mixmastamyk2• 5 years ago

I haven't ironed anything in a decade or two. After trying one of those steamer irons, which promptly broke.

It had been working, and I wondered how much the heat was a factor. So I replaced it with a $1.99 fine spray bottle from Ikea, and it worked just fine! Saves a ton of electricity and time.

WhompingWindows• 5 years ago

You're saying you just wet the shirt and use a room temperature iron on it?

mixmastamyk2• 5 years ago

No, I spray a mist on any wrinkles to slightly dampen them. Can be while hanging or even wearing the clothes, as you walk out the door.

The wrinkles fall out quickly due to gravity and the water dries in two minutes or so.

pym4n• 5 years ago

Ok, now I'm surprised... "extreme ironing". O-M-G

Wildgoose• 5 years ago

Had to have been started by an Englishman. English eccentricity is still alive and well!

Extreme Ironing

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