Turkey Hacked the Hair Transplant Industry

(wired.com)

47 points | by joozio 2 days ago

7 comments

  • olalonde 14 minutes ago
    I did it a few years ago when I was living in Istanbul. One evening, a friend of mine wouldn't shut up about the procedure. I ended up booking it almost on a whim, mostly just to prove him wrong. I did the transplant the next day. In the end, I was very happy with the results. I think it cost around 1500$.

    https://raw.githubusercontent.com/olalonde/olalonde.github.c...

    • Teknomadix 9 minutes ago
      This is just like, my opinion man. You looked better bald.
      • john_strinlai 7 minutes ago
        this is one of those "if you have nothing nice to say" moments. there's really no reason for your comment.
      • olalonde 0 minutes ago
        Thanks, I guess I could still shave :) But it's definitely not a common opinion.
      • syspec 1 minute ago
        Dude, you're crazy! You look great now, prob one of the best procedures of it I've seen.

        Also I notice my wife and female friends NEVER seem to notice when someone has plugs.

        When I occasionally point it out, they're always surprised.

        I haven't done it as I don't need it, but I would say anyone on the fence, just do it.

        From what I know it's easier to keep what you have that get a transplant so fire up that HIMs subscription

    • koolba 10 minutes ago
      How did it hold up over the past few years?
  • laszlojamf 4 minutes ago
    The title just goes to show that

    1. the turkish government had reasons for trying to get people to use "Türkiye" instead.

    2. It's still not working.

    I 100% thought this was about birds until clicking

  • patates 1 hour ago
    My grandmother used to say, "the Americans are going to space while we're just growing butt-hair". She was so close!
    • rvnx 30 minutes ago
      Butt hair is not that bad if you compare to European promoted tech leaders:

      There is Microsoft, we have Qwant.

      There is Claude and DeepSeek, we have Mistral (originally a copy-paste of LLaMA stolen by employees, now a fork of DeepSeek, with a few changes).

      Then there is ASML and Airbus, alone on their island of innovation.

      We have LIDL too, so not everything is bad.

      If it wouldn’t be that bad why European companies prefer the US.

  • Ringz 51 minutes ago
  • kilroy123 1 hour ago
    So I spent time living in Istanbul a few years ago. It really was wild. In the touristy areas (near where I lived), you really would see loads and loads of bald guys walking around with stitches on their heads.

    If I were bald, I would totally go there and do the same.

    • brightball 37 minutes ago
      It's interesting to read about.

      I visited one of those Bosley places in the US. The pitch came across as very...predatory? It did not inspire confidence. They would only consider scheduling you for the surgery if you could demonstrate that you'd use other measures for a year, meaning finasteride, one of those laser hat things, etc. They did talk about how few surgeons there were that do this stuff well though. Also talked about scalp injections I think?

      It's been several years. I just decided to let it go naturally and deal with it.

      • simiones 31 minutes ago
        > The pitch came across as very...predatory? It did not inspire confidence. They would only consider scheduling you for the surgery if you could demonstrate that you'd use other measures for a year, meaning finasteride, one of those laser hat things, etc.

        I don't want to defend the esthetic surgery industry in general, which I do think tends to be quite predatory, but doesn't this sound like the opposite of that? If they really wanted to fleece you, wouldn't they offer surgery instead of the safer and cheaper treatments?

        • JackFr 23 minutes ago
          > If they really wanted to fleece you

          Tip: Bald people the worst to fleece.

  • tokai 1 hour ago
    Words are truly losing their meaning if its a hack to develop a business.
    • embedding-shape 1 hour ago
      I can't read the article myself, but the blurbs I can read:

      > Turkey’s billion-dollar hair-transplant industry is the result of a constant process of innovation. [...] it’s also a tale of “hacked” medical equipment and algorithmic craftsmanship

      Seems there was some actual "hacking" involved, if they had to patch medical equipment, but who knows how much of the article is actually about that, I can't actually see any text.

      • graemep 16 minutes ago
        > I can't actually see any text.

        Turn off JS

    • patates 1 hour ago
      Yeah they totally isomorphed that industry!
    • wil421 52 minutes ago
      Hack is being used to get more clicks.
    • m000 36 minutes ago
      If you're not white enough, it's a hack. You can get around this problem by attracting some VC funding and building your HQ in Silicon Valley. /s
    • asibahi 1 hour ago
      It’s hacking when it’s someone you don’t like.
      • antonvs 39 minutes ago
        In this context it's being used in much the same way as in "growth hacking", which is an actual position people hire for.
  • cactusplant7374 1 hour ago
    Has there been any progress on cloning hair follicles? I don’t want to move the hair around. I simply want more hair.
    • giarc 59 minutes ago
      I saw a headline about this the other day. I couldn't find it but did come across this article. https://www.zmescience.com/medicine/genetic/lab-grown-hair-f...

      No idea if ZME science is reputable at all.

    • embedding-shape 1 hour ago
      Could I donate mine to you? Been shaving my head for the last 20 years and I cannot wait for it to stop growing eventually... Seemingly it grows faster every year, as I need to continuously increase how often I trim it, I simply want less hair.

      Edit: I love that someone downvoted me for offering my hair follicles to a random stranger, downvotes truly happen randomly here :)

      • PyWoody 18 minutes ago
        Buddy, I hope you have a glove on because you're about to catch these fists!
      • ratg13 37 minutes ago
        You can't donate hair follicles .. it has to come from your own body
    • Traubenfuchs 1 hour ago
      Yes, yes it's coming. In 10 years.
      • Maken 1 hour ago
        Just in time for fusion energy?
        • postsantum 59 minutes ago
          Yes, imagine endless energy and endless hair. It's like nuclear and hippy again, but stronger and ai-government-mandated
        • boringg 56 minutes ago
          No no fusion energy company is going public shortly so the technology must be closer than that :)