My Treadwater Desk

http://doublestealth.blogspot.com/2014/07/my-treadwater-desk.html

by jgrahamc • 12 years ago

168 55 12 years ago

doublestealth.blogspot.com

tmikaeld• 12 years ago

I'd love to see a picture of this, or even better - a video! :-D

insin• 12 years ago

Here's a Treadwater Interview which might give a flavour of how those Skype sessions go:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGDkcLT8IqM

radiorental2• 12 years ago

Looking forward to the co-location treehouse hanging desk, because you know... we all came down from the trees (o;

Hilarious post, I wish there was more on the blog.

mkopinsky3• 12 years ago

I assume that this treehouse will be complete with a "No gurlz allowed" sign?

mijoharas• 12 years ago

I can't tell whether this is a childish joke or a scathing indictment of silicon valley "boys club" culture. (inclined to assume the latter given that it's posted on HN). :)

radiorental2• 12 years ago

And Tinder rebrands to Timber (o;

[I'll let myself out, thanks]

JonnieCache• 12 years ago

LOL, double stealth. That gets me every time. Is this blog actually written by jgc, or just inspired by his original post on here? I see he submitted this item, so presumably he wrote it.

EDIT: here's the original: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4166183

jgrahamc3• 12 years ago

It's written by me.

I wrote if for a while and then stopped. I figured that there were plenty of things in the 'startup culture' worth lampooning so I brought him back. I can't promise to write as "Brad Bradstone" often because it requires inspiration, but I suddenly had the silly idea of a 'treadwater' desk last night and figured I'd run with it.

cscurmudgeon4• 12 years ago

More please! Have you thought of going freemium?

troels• 12 years ago

Brilliant:

Currently we're in double stealth mode (the public doesn't know what we're building and neither do we).

henrik_w• 12 years ago

In the same vein: "More Office Workers Switching To Fetal Position Desks" http://www.theonion.com/video/more-office-workers-switching-...

scoj• 12 years ago

That was hilarious! Good ol' Onion.

furyg3• 12 years ago

Obligatory xkcd: http://xkcd.com/1329/

agarcia-deniz• 12 years ago

You mean this is a parody? but I have an identical set up and my productivity some days is infinitely higher when I use it.

OK, I may only use it on Mondays, my body needs the whole week to recuperate, and I don't work on Sundays but still, can you claim infinite gains in productivity by using a different desk? thought not.

sgarrity• 12 years ago

I created an artists rendition of this last year: http://www.actsofvolition.com/archive/2013/september/swimmin...

fasteo2• 12 years ago

Reality Surpasses Fiction and this was close enough.

Inside the Paleo movement there is a "cold therapy" trend. Its main contributor is Ray Cronise. You can watch a TED talk [1] and visit his web site [2]. His latest contribution is a scientific paper, co-authored with David Sinclair (yes, the resveratrol guy). It is titled "Metabolic Winter Hypothesis" [3] and it is quite interesting.

In simple terms, the rationale is the same as for the food leg of the paleo movement: Food availability is hurting us badly; warm "availability" is doing the same, so we better get some time in a colder environment.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrQ_ldCwKUQ [2] http://hypothermics.com/home/ [3] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24918620

jgrahamc3• 12 years ago

Ha. I didn't know about that. Interesting.

Part of the problem of parodying some of this stuff is that it's self-parodying. I keep thinking about what would happen if "Brad Bradstone" tries Soylent.

maxerickson• 12 years ago

He seems like the kind of guy that would have a farm-to-table-to-farm system set up for the whole company.

(Stolen from https://medium.com/message/new-york-city-after-global-warmin... )

lfuller2• 12 years ago

I actually start every day with an ice cold shower and find that it helps to wake me up and put me in the right frame of mind for the day. I don't claim it's anything more than psychological, but it's been a big help for me.

swah2• 12 years ago

What is the temperature where you live?

rschmitty• 12 years ago

I enjoy cold showers from time to time. But as someone who just moved in to a new home and forgot to schedule gas turn on in advance leaving us without hot water, a true "ice cold" shower leaves you literally breathless.

I've never felt my body react in such a way.

saraid216• 12 years ago

FWIW, a friend of mine suggested doing that and threw a study at me when I made disbelieving noises: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17993252

meritt• 12 years ago

It's called shivering. Your body does it in response to early hypothermia. It requires energy to shiver, which burns fat.

This guy is a nut. Just exercise more.

MadMoogle• 12 years ago

Read the site. He suggests water temperatures that aren't cold enough to make you shiver. In fact, if you're shivering, you're way past the 80/20 point. This isn't woo woo crazy shit, he's done his research.

shanev• 12 years ago

It's called cold thermogensis [1]. Fat burning could be one benefit, but apparently it can help your body get more adapted to changes in temperature. Some people who do cold plunges or cold showers feel that they can handle temperature fluctuations better, although most of that evidence is anecdotal. I personally switch to a cold shower after a hot shower and it makes me feel amazing afterwards. People have experimented with hot and cold temperature variations for years, like the Finnish with their saunas, and native Americans with sweat lodges.

[1] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=%22cold+thermogenes...

happyscrappy• 12 years ago

Double Stealth - No one knows what we're up to and we are not to sure either.

wil421• 12 years ago

Don't forget to enjoy your water paleo diet while treading. Since humans evolved from the sea it's only natural for our bodies to eat a sea plants like kelp and sea weed. A strict diet of sea plants is the only natural diet.

/sarcasm

spyder• 12 years ago

Not exactly as described but close :) :

http://imgur.com/6jxS7aU

needs a bigger monitor instead of the small display :)

Also it would be good for a "walking on the beach" simulator with Oculus Rift (filling up the water as you walk in the ocean :D )

taspeotis• 12 years ago

At Yellow Yellow we like to blaze our own trail and in NoSitting we're no exception

I read this in Cave Johnson's voice.

Gracana• 12 years ago

I ignored the heading that points out this is parody, and while i found it bizarre, it seemed believable. I guess I've encountered enough wacky stuff that this didn't strike me as too "out there."

lessnonymous• 12 years ago

Yesterday on Reddit someone posted their pet sweet potato. Today I'll believe anything.

jenius• 12 years ago

Hah! Same - I got to the end of it and was like this has to be a joke, but honestly maybe it isn't... then scrolled back up top and saw that it was. But I definitely could have been convinced that it was serious.

cscurmudgeon4• 12 years ago

Makes sense. We are 70% water like the earth's surface. So we should lead an organic lifestyle spending 70% of each day in water (17 hrs) and the rest on land sleeping in a fetal position.

You see, this is another reason why the waterfall development method failed. (No actual water used!)

shabble• 12 years ago

"We reduced downtime by 37% by wiring our CI build status direct to the building sprinkler system above the dev team"

cscurmudgeon4• 12 years ago

True waterfall mode.

vegancap• 12 years ago

I'm actually going to switch to a Ski jumping desk.

chiph• 12 years ago

We have introduced our own line of these desks, branded as the Koi Desk.

Not only are you more productive because your body isn't contorted into a sitting or standing position, you get the calmness and tranquility that watching Koi fish bring to your day as they swim around your legs.

aspirant• 12 years ago

Makes me wonder what a sense deprivation tank workstation would be like. Insane productivity? Or just insanity?

PMan74• 12 years ago

Sure, they don't see much of me because I'm building Yellow Yellow, but I want to be there when we can all enjoy the fruits of my labors.

Parody it may be but this is the way a lot of start up types seem to think

bitwize• 12 years ago

Coming up next on HN: Parkour desks! Work while wallrunning!

baddox• 12 years ago

And all the evidence points to sitting being a disaster health-wise.

What's the status of this? I've seen claims that standing at a desk is worse than sitting, and vice versa, and both groups like to point to scientific consensus. At the minimum, it seems to be like there would at least be some tradeoffs.

My Treadwater Desk

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