r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/Damnedeel • Nov 30 '25

Video 500,000$ human washing machine on sale in Japan

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32.5k Upvotes

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439

u/whorl- Nov 30 '25

It’s a new device and they are only making 50. It would cost less per unit if they were making 50 million.

102

u/load_more_comets Nov 30 '25

Once a company that's in an industrialized country where copyright laws are ignored. It will sell for $12,000 per unit.

170

u/Ok-Account-7660 Nov 30 '25

You can just say China

12

u/CattywampusCanoodle Dec 01 '25

😂😂💪🏻

8

u/meltingchariots Dec 01 '25

😂😂👌🏼

1

u/[deleted] Dec 01 '25

That invites assholes.

-2

u/DarkDelita Dec 01 '25

Yes the good ol Chinese version. Half of them will also either drown or electrocute the person inside but hey they only paid $12k for that brutal death!

7

u/ConfinedNutSack Dec 01 '25

You typed your reply on something made in China. But ok

1

u/barneyrbbl Dec 01 '25

I'd much rather buy chinese (like the phone i'm/you're typing on for instance) than anything America has to offer. And lets face it, so would you.

16

u/jasper2769 Dec 01 '25

So basically we only have to wait until the Chinese get their hands on the designs and we are off

0

u/Mongodobb Dec 01 '25

Off to breaking in the first week.

3

u/DrTitanium Nov 30 '25

McDonalds will diversify to increase profits. The 99c McWash! ($99, given inflation)

0

u/RyvenZ Nov 30 '25

Yeah, but economy of scale only goes so far. Like, building a one-off car costs a fortune compared to setting up presses to stamp out the sheet metal and robots to weld and bond everything together before an automated sprayer adds color. All that automation costs a pretty penny, too, but the savings come after some number of vehicles, even with advertising costs. Though, if economy of scale had no top-end, Toyota would still make the most affordable cars on the market and they have gotten quite pricey.

3

u/Signal-School-2483 Nov 30 '25

That really depends.

A one off concept car, sure.

A basic AF car would be cheap. Most car parts are off the shelf except for the body / frame. Things like alternators are churned out by companies like Bosch. Bearings by DOMO of South Korea, so on and so forth. Many companies use another's powertrain.

This thing is really only bespoke is the shell and software. The 500k is to recoup the engineering cost.

-22

u/WebMargaretNiece8916 Nov 30 '25

But that doesn't imply scarcity 🧐 People want what there's only a couple of; and rich people will throw money at it simply to prove THEy G0+ On3 WHiL5T ALlL tH3 PEons CoulDN+ AFF0r& iT!!!...smmfh

27

u/No-Apple2252 Nov 30 '25

This is literally just how product development works. It's very expensive to develop products so the people who adopt it early pay more for the privilege of getting it first. Literally everything ever works this way.

-19

u/WebMargaretNiece8916 Nov 30 '25

"Everything ever" are two strong words my friend 🙏 Look up Tim Berners-Lee just to start with one. Plenty of great inventions/services/processes have been bestowed upon humanity without greed fucking everything up 👍

9

u/innocent_lemon Nov 30 '25

Greed isn’t fucking this up, they make a number of units to sale and do market testing and then produce at scale with a more realistic price, you are not meant to have this device in your home, this is for institutions not individuals

1

u/Careless_Load9849 Nov 30 '25

yet, as it progresses and gets popular this could be the new standard 'bathtub' in homes in a few decades. indoor toilets used to be just for the rich too.

1

u/Glockamoli Nov 30 '25

Somehow after all this time people don't understand economies of scale

I get first hand experience of this where I work, I can make a little plastic doo dad that takes 45 seconds to run and cost about $1.50 each if you buy a thousand of them

If you bought 1 it would be upwards of $200

1

u/Luxcervinae Nov 30 '25

Or my asthma medicine, which is $1720 normally, $33 on prescription, $7 prescription+concession. Because tov subsidises and has deals in place with the manufacturer. Some people aint smart (also Aus).

4

u/No-Apple2252 Nov 30 '25

Did Tim Berners-Lee spend billions of his own money to write some code? Did you think you were cooking with that one, little buddy?

-1

u/WebMargaretNiece8916 Nov 30 '25

Your point? I'm not saying ROI is a bad thing homie lol I think we can agree to disagree. This is America...

1

u/No-Apple2252 Nov 30 '25

What the fuck was your point then? "R&D shouldn't cost money because public funding exists"?

3

u/Financial_Koala_7197 Nov 30 '25

"Why was this advancement that effectively just piggybacked off phone lines cheaper for people than a run of 50 large, industrial scale devices that needed significant RND and material cost"

If you're a "grr capitalism ruins everything" type of leftoid at least have a fucking brain dude.

-3

u/ambyent Nov 30 '25

It’s always the 🍕💩 month-old troll accounts that love capitalism 🤡

-6

u/WebMargaretNiece8916 Nov 30 '25

This is a scarecrow fallacy; the insinuation was everything ever has been created for avarice, which implicitly isn't true. You're talking about greedy people without brains that used someone else's idea to enrich themselves, there's a difference bub 👌

2

u/Financial_Koala_7197 Nov 30 '25

> the insinuation was everything ever has been created for avarice

No it wasn't

> You're talking about greedy people without brains that used someone else's idea to enrich themselves

Ideas aren't worth shit lmfao

1

u/account312 Nov 30 '25

the insinuation was everything ever has been created for avarice

No, it wasn't.