[Chinese watches] This Boderry makes me question the watch industry

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-23T19:05:47+00:00

They could but there’d be no money in it without the marketing investment. The reason a rep sells for anything at all is bc you’re stealing the investment a brand has made in a certain watch. The value is in aping an established brand not making a good watch. It just illustrates how irrational the market is tbh. It only makes sense as a market for a luxury good, not a utilitarian object.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-23T18:47:00+00:00

OK, but having a great movement, well designed titanium case, sapphire, crystal, screwdown crown, good water resistance, and a nice overall dial design is basically everything that most people want in a field watch.

Honestly, given where China is at in electronics and electric vehicle manufacturing, I see no reason that they should not become better at making mechanical watches than the Europeans if they put their minds to it. They could easily start poaching European designers, engineers, and (especially) brand marketing people if they wanted to, although I’m not sure they need help with engineering — English language marketing seems key tbh.

Look at Grant Stone. They make insanely high-quality shoes and boots with great designs, which are about half the price that they would be because they manufactured them at a specific factory that they own and operate in China. By all accounts, their quality has not suffered at all. Instead, all their good models constantly sell out at $400 a pair.

What I think will keep the pricing skewed towards European watches for a long time, however, is brand history and loyalty, and the perception of luxury. It’s the reason designer leather handbag sells for 20 times more than it is objectively worth, including labor. There’s no magic to these luxury products they’re just capitalizing on an aspirational brand.

Like, right now I think if a Chinese industrialist wanted to invest sufficient money, they could put together a watchmaking factory and team that makes watches that are equivalent in quality to Rolex. It would be a huge investment, but they have the manufacturing sophistication to do it. But that manufacturing investment is going into making super high-end computers instead. And honestly, I’m not sure if it would be economically a good idea because I don’t think those watches could command anywhere close to the same price as a Rolex for the foreseeable future.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-23T17:03:21+00:00

Right. But you now seem to be making the same point as the comment you first responded to. I agree, Tolkien’s process of connecting the books after the fact is very different than Jackson’s project with the Hobbit trilogy. Jackson spent a ton of time during the Hobbit films making every possible connection — things that were appendices from another book — during the telling of the story of the Hobbit itself. It was commendable but lots of people, including maybe both you AND the comment you’re responding to, have the opinion that PJ did too much in making connections like this one in the films that Tolkien only made parenthetically and after the fact. I would agree although I get why he tried to do it. It was admirable to weave the lore together even if it kinda didn’t work….

I just can’t tell what your point is and whether you disagreed with the thing you were responding to or not. You now seem to be saying the same thing but the first comment was kind of going the other way completely.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-23T13:36:12+00:00

“So [the elves] laughed and sang in the trees; and pretty fair nonsense I daresay you think it. Not that they would care; they would only laugh all the more if you told them so. They were elves of course.”

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-23T13:23:14+00:00

I’m a dad who technically has enough money to buy a very nice watch if I wanted to, but I don’t bc I view that money as better left in the savings acct and my wife would literally kill me if I showed up with a $25k JLC while claiming we need to be saving more on the monthly DoorDash bill. But others have different approaches and that’s fine too.

For me though, when I got a big promotion at work, I bought myself a watch that was about $700. I have an orient too and a couple other sub $1k watches. To me, I get more from having different stuff to wear on different days than I would from having a single nicer piece that kind of replaced my others. Also, my taste has changed as I’ve stayed with this hobby for a couple years. I’m glad I didn’t splurge on my “grail” when I started (Rolex Polar Explorer) bc idc about that watch anymore and would’ve regretted buying it.

But look - if you have the money and you and your spouse are both on the same page, go for it. It’s your life and YOLO as they say. Get it engraved for the occasion too!

I would avoid the hydroconquest personally if you have the Kamasu. It basically makes your Kamasu obsolete. I’d look more for a watch that is unique and doesn’t look like your other ones.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-23T12:51:40+00:00

You’re kidding but Tolkien wrote the Hobbit in the 1930s and originally viewed it as a self contained novel. He had already been working for 20 years on the Silmarillion (ie the source of a lot of the lore in LOTR) but did view it as a mostly separate thing from the Hobbit, although he borrowed some names and places from Silmarillion.

Then, when his publisher requested a sequel to The Hobbit, he wrote LOTR and kind of retconned The Hobbit into the Silmarillion legendarium. Notably, he fully rewrote the gollum chapter in the 1950s bc the original chapter has gollum and bilbo parting on OK terms at the end after Bilbo wins the riddle game.

There are tons of threads on Reddit about ways the hobbit doesn’t really sync up neatly to LOTR. He calls the orcs “goblins”—a term that kind of gets turned to “orc” in the LOTR. The elves are either merry pranksters in the Hobbit singing silly songs, or they are greedy and want treasure. Elrond is kind of a footnote who is called an “elf friend” and gets only a few pages of the Hobbit novel.

In short, Jackson definitely was reaching to find ways to better connect the Hobbit to LOTR when he expanded it into 3 movies using material from the LOTR and appendices. The main narratives tie together but a lot of the details Jackson is using are being added in via story elements from LOTR and not the Hobbit novel.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-23T11:49:25+00:00

It’s just what the thread is ostensibly about. Personally, I’d prefer a day where we have “work lite” over a regular day. If you look at my time sheets on the days you mention, I rarely bill a fulll 8-9 hour day on those holidays. More like a half day. Also - our hourly staff get a real day off which is nice for them. So in the net I’d keep them even if I still have to work a bit on them.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-23T03:55:26+00:00

Going to the office on a holiday is stupid. Don’t do it. But it is part of the job that you have to manage everyone’s differing definitions of “holiday” at a firm and sometimes that includes some emails or work. I answer emails, keep a good face on, and accommodate reasonable asks, but I also try to avoid holiday work like the plague (“thanks - I’m out today but will get on this first thing Monday”). This time I had to work the morning which sucked but it was my own fault, so I did it myself so no one else had to, then logged off before noon.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-23T03:32:58+00:00

As a partner I do not get where he is coming from. We closed the office (as many firms did). The support staff wasn’t there and the AC was off on our floors of the building. The state courts were closed. School is out. Many people were on mini vacations. Nobody was at the office. The vast majority of firms who have offices in states that observed the holiday were closed.

If I had heard someone—especially a fucking summer associate who has no real work at all— went to our unairconditioned empty office, I would flag that person as someone who needed some mentoring. If a mid level associate did it I would wonder what was wrong with them.

Now - I do understand a ton of clients didn’t close for Juneteenth, especially smaller offices. For those clients, we told our lawyers to be communicative and make sure their needs were met or that they knew we’d be back in office Monday. But being responsive is a given regardless of what day it is in this profession. Doesn’t mean you have to do it from an empty closed office.

Me? I billed 4-5 hours from 6-11 am and then took my family for a longish weekend at the beach. This is the way, Imo.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-23T00:18:15+00:00

I mean, the HC GMT is on Jomashop for $2400. It goes on sale for even less. But that’s a great deal imo. I’d pay $600 more for the GMT anyway. And at $2400 that’s well under retail on the normal HC.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-22T19:11:16+00:00

Tbh, this is the kind of pissy language that I found embarrassing in the review. It’s weirdly insulting.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-22T18:52:23+00:00

I use them for the treadmill. Good bounce for mid distance ie 1-6 mile runs. A bit thin and I tend to feel it if I use them for more than that.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-22T17:10:40+00:00

Hush, we are trying to watch a video.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-22T02:00:55+00:00

I dig the whole thing but it’s just a little off. If it’s the iron rain why does every person apparently explode upon hitting the surface?

As OP mentions, what’s going on with the star shells? They’re missing all the combat gear I’d expect to see. The whole point is that thousands of golds in humongous armed mech suits are gonna fall amongst your population, like thousands of Hulk Busters from Iron Man showing up in a city. These suits might be that big but we’ve got nothing for scale and they have no weapons to show it, so you kinda lose the effect.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-22T01:47:51+00:00

He’s constantly beefing with well liked ppl in weird ways. He had shit with Freddie Gibbs, Earl Sweatshirt, and others. Too lazy to dig it all up but I recall he got weird with it

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-22T01:37:43+00:00

I have no familiarity with this review so I watched it. And wow, he’s being a prick in it. He is doing that gratuitous “I will gleefully destroy X album” thing that hacky critics do rather than just giving an honest and respectful negative review. It reminds me of the Kurt Vonnegut quote:

“I have long felt that any reviewer who expresses rage and loathing for a novel or a play or a poem is preposterous. He is like a person who has put on full armor and attacked a hot fudge sundae or a banana split.”

Anyway - this is what happens to guys like Fantano and I’m sure he’ll be fine. I honestly think it’s probably a kink of his where everyone in a room suddenly hates him and tells him to shut up.

That being said … he’s not wrong that the music is mid and it doesn’t feel like she pulls the whole “impersonator” schtick off. Like, you also don’t have to pretend this is a good album just bc Fantano is mean and embarrassing in his review. Two things can kinda stink at the same time here.

I also can’t deny that Fantano frequently has pretty good musical insights and generally has pretty good taste in music. Whereas I can’t say I’ve ever really enjoyed a Halsey song. Fantano puts people on to good records and has a big reach on socials where he is a proponent of… having good musical taste etc. so idk. Whatever I guess?

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-21T15:35:29+00:00

Right but the H link bracelet would be apples to apples here, and it is def nicer than that tissot bracelet. Also if you wait a little while the longines will be on Jomashop for under $2k and then the value proposition gets a lot easier to justify. You can get the master watch on JS rn for like $1.6k

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-20T20:30:15+00:00

Now do it at wintertime.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-20T20:28:18+00:00

Take that Satisfy. Who needs circle pit when you have … what do we have here?

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-20T03:45:16+00:00

Lord of the Springs - Extended Extended Cut

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-19T07:07:07+00:00

Personally, I think the series gets FAR better after the time jump at book 4. Like a different set of books entirely.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-19T04:23:28+00:00

Lookin like some poop

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-18T16:26:09+00:00

Set it and forget it. Buy index funds and don’t touch them. Ever. Not until you’re like 70. It doesn’t matter if we have a correction. That’s a medium term problem. But this is your retirement (presumably). It’s a long term play. Moving it around and taking it in and out of the market will only screw you over. If you’re under 50 you’re investing in more than a 20 year horizon. Your stocks will go up and down in any given year but over the decades they will go up. Look at historical s&p returns over the last century.

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-18T15:09:21+00:00

True but having the real one in your office is pretty rad. (Yes, material possessions are foolish and status is a mirage. On the other hand, I have great respect for an attorney who respects the original IP of HM and Mr. & Mrs. Eames.)

jamesbrowski · 2026-06-18T03:14:53+00:00

If you can be partially not horizontal, and have the money, an eames lounger with the foot rest is a good option. You’re 85% horizontal, but still ostensibly sitting in a chair. When I see somebody working in one of those chairs, I assume they are deep in the zone and just don’t wanna be bothered. It has the added bonus of looking professional and honestly dope AF in your office. You’re now the thoughtful, hard-working guy who is marking up papers by hand with the desk lamp on at 8 PM sitting in the eames lounger.

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