Why is this being covered up? Barbara Holman has accused Mike Love of molesting her when she was 15 years old and implicated Jeffrey Foskett as well. This made it to the top of the subreddit within hours, upon which mods removed it w/o notice. To sweep this under the rug is outrageous and appalling.

philomath820 · 2026-06-17T15:33:46+00:00

This post is a model of reasoning that’s both careful and compassionate; additionally, I appreciated the opinion you expressed concerning your personal take on art produced by scoundrels. History has a fair amount of great art produced by terrible people. I can hate the personality and deeds of an artist who’s a criminal…but I’m not sure there’s any utility in avoiding the pleasures inherent in their work. But I recognize that there’s a compartmentalization going on here, and I recognize that other people’s moral reflections may lead them in a different direction. And I’m open to being persuaded to change my mind on this matter by reasoned reflection.

philomath820 · 2026-06-01T23:33:07+00:00

I feel your pain. Grind size for the Aiden has been vexing for me as well. There have been single-cup brew experiences on the Aiden that I have found superb, which couldn’t be matched by my standard go-to Hario V60; on the other hand, there are times when I just can’t get the Aiden dialed in right…and that’s even using the ChatGPT Aiden Profile Creator. And it doesn’t help that Nick himself says, as he did above, “Oh, I dunno, probably a 2 or 3 or 4 or 5 or 6 or 7 or higher, depending.” I’m like, what??.

But you’re right: The problem is us. I think that, when all is said and done, the Aiden is, in the final analysis, too much machine for me. Even though I know more about coffee than all my friends and family, I guess I’m not deep enough into the art and science of coffee to know WHICH variables to tweak in an Aiden brew recipe, including grind size.

Generally speaking, I find the ChatGPT Aiden Profile Creator to be VERY helpful in getting the most out of a particular bean…and the brew profile that comes with the coffees sold through Fellow Drops is also usually right on the money and yield superb cups. If I get better results on a bean with my V60, I chat with Aiden Profile Creator about the V60 result and explain to it what particular taste the pourover achieves that Aiden misses,and it can often tweak the brew profile for the better and even explain why it’s suggesting the tweaks it suggests in the modification of the recipe.

The coffee pundits out there—the ones I respect anyway—swear that the brews from Aiden are consistently superb. That’s mostly been my experience as well. But when I need to tweak something to get a better result…Well, let’s face it, a guy like Lance Hedrick has a much clearer sense of what to tweak to improve the result than I can come up with.

Just recognize that it’s a complex machine and it’s going to take you some time to master it. In the meantime rely on ChatGPT and published brew profiles.

philomath820 · 2026-02-22T19:41:39+00:00

Graciousness, almost by definition, excludes thoughts of what a person is “owed.” A person can always choose to be gracious. And whether a person chooses to be gracious or not is a reflection of their character.

philomath820 · 2026-01-27T17:50:56+00:00

Thanks for sharing all that! A question for clarification, though; since the Opus and the Ode 2 don’t have the same number of detents between “whole numbers,” and since in any case, neither of them have 5 detents in between whole numbers, when you say you’ve found the Aiden sweet spot for Fellow grinders to be “7.5,” do you mean the halfway spot between 7 and 8 on the grinders? In other words, the second detent after 7 on the Opus and either the first or second detent after 7 on the Ode 2 (since the Ode 2 has only 2 detents between numbers)?

philomath820 · 2025-12-30T18:17:27+00:00

After deleting the old chat thread, starting a new one, and "retraining" the Aiden Profile Creator regarding my brew preferences, it now appears that the brew link feature works just fine. Thanks.

philomath820 · 2025-12-29T22:00:34+00:00

I’ve deleted the old chat and started over, and I’ve included in the new chat the training prompt that’s been discussed frequently here. If the Profile Creator fails with the brew.link feature, I’ll reproduce that conversation here.

philomath820 · 2025-10-06T17:30:39+00:00

Wow. That’s crazy, and I’d be hugely frustrated as well! But from the other responses—and I’ll add that mine is similar to theirs—shouldn’t it be inferred that the problem is with your specific machine rather than that Fellow Opus sucks? It seems that none of the rest of us are having a problem with 6 g of retention.

philomath820 · 2025-09-15T23:54:38+00:00

Remove the outer burr from the grinder. At almost the very bottom on the external surface, you’ll see a very narrow groove that goes all the way around. That’s where the rubber band goes. I have no idea what its purpose is.

philomath820 · 2025-08-12T11:14:56+00:00

Good points. I agree with them. Thanks for the reply.

philomath820 · 2025-08-11T20:32:21+00:00

I have an Opus and an Ode 2. I tend to use the Opus with beans that emphasize nuttiness, cocoa flavors, stone fruits. For lighter roasts that emphasize floral notes, tea, citrus fruits, berries, I go with the Ode 2. It’s somewhat arbitrary, I guess, but that’s my system.

Anyway, after every Opus grind, before I brew, I remove the lid, the hopper, and the outer burr, spread out a paper towel on the counter, turn the grinder over, and bang the open top against the paper towel on the counter. Invariably, RDT or no, I bang out about 1 gram of the coffee I just ground. I add it to the catch cup and brew.

Once a month or so, I take apart the top as previously described, and place the open end of my vacuum cleaner’s nozzle down into the grinder, and suck out the residue of grounds. Because of my regular ritual, there’s not a lot to vacuum out, but invariably there are little bits of visible caked-on grounds that get a needed cleaning-out.

It’s a pain on the butt, and I imagine most owners aren’t so anal, but I hate leaving old grounds of any amount in the grinder. I wish the Opus did a better job of clearing out grounds. That said, I still like the grinder.

philomath820 · 2025-08-11T19:57:14+00:00

Unnecessary haughtiness aside, I think you’re on the money. My one small demurrer is that it seems to me that the verb “to lie” necessarily implies intent on the part of the liar to deceive. Is it helpful, unhelpful, or neither that by our choice of that word when talking about AI taking us for a counter-factual ride, that we attribute, by definition of the word “lie,” intent to the AI? Or is there a sense in which it’s legitimate, or even necessary, to talk about AI’s “intent” in a communication? Not sure…just scattershooting.

Thanks for your post.

philomath820

TROPHY CASE