[marknutter]

The founders of Uber were not experts in the public transportation space when they started their company. The founders of AirBnB were not experts in the hospitality industry wen they started their company. The founders of Hipmonk were not experts in travel planning when they started their company. The founders of Warby-Parker were not eyewear or vision experts when they started their company. The founder of Oculus Rift wasn't an expert in VR and head-mounted displays when he started his company. And so on..

[ksherlock]

Where is the disruption? My supermarket has half an aisle full of meal replacement powders, drinks, and bars. HN (and soylent) seem to be unaware of such a thing. Does Soylent bring anything new to the table other than guerrilla marketing and willful ignorance of FDA regulations ("These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.")

[pedalpete]

The disruption I think is in the marketing and could be in the product itself. The other 'meal replacements' aren't pitched as actually replacing a meal, or at least I don't think we view them that way. They're viewed as 'good enough if you can't get a meal', or 'helps me get to the next meal'. A true meal replacement is a completely different marketing approach, and the product 'could' be significantly different. I don't know, but I'll do what I can to support them so WE can all find out.

[jacquesm]

None of those start-ups have anywhere near the potential negative health impact that soylent has.

[buro9]

Makes me wonder how long they hold on to the sales pitch:

"Soylent is a simple and affordable nutritional drink that has everything the healthy body needs"

"Everything the healthy body needs"?

If I use it exclusively for a decade, will Soylent be liable for health issues arising from any potential nutritional issues?

I find the experiment interesting and don't wish to rain on the parade as I'd love to see some solution to nutrition in general (understand and communicating, figuring out a plan given height, age, sex, activity levels, dietary preferences, etc).

But I really hope the experiment stays out of the third/developing world until it's proven... if you're going to risk someone's health then at least let that be someone who has access to health care, clean water, other food, etc.

The worst thing they could do is to use the potential third world market as a sales pitch, experiment there, and then screw it up and leave people with a whole new set of problems and no recourse. Though, I guess that other industries do exactly that and treat it as an externalisation of the cost (oil industry practices, etc).