Parmigiano-Reggiano makers are putting edible microchips the size of a grain of sand into their 90-pound cheese wheels to combat counterfeiters::Italian Parmigiano-Reggiano makers are using microchips to verify the authenticity of their products and thwart scammers.

  • Terr@lemmy.ml
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    11 months ago

    I got to admit, Italians inventing Cheese DRM, wasn’t on my 2023 Bingo card.

  • Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de
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    11 months ago

    For fucks sake… This is literally about an RFID sticker that is put on the outside of whole cheese wheels.

    So unless you buy whole 40kg wheel and then eat it with the rind… you are not eating any.

    And also fuck that article for even mentioning that.

    • N1NJ4W4RR10R_@aussie.zone
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      11 months ago

      That makes it sound like the “edible” aspect of this is just an anti idiot feature. *Or just “printed” on it.

      Either way, pointless article.

    • pimento64@sopuli.xyz
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      11 months ago

      unless you buy whole 40kg wheel and then eat it with the rind

      Haha no of course not…

      • June@lemm.ee
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        11 months ago

        lol right? I would never lol, that would be like, too much? Would it be too much? Honestly we may never know

          • Terrasque
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            11 months ago

            You severely underestimate my cheese eating ability

            • silly goose meekah@lemmy.world
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              11 months ago

              I seriously love parmesan. I always buy it fresh and grate it myself. I know pretty well how much cheese is reasonable to eat in a sitting. 100g is insanely much for one serving, but you could distribute it over the whole day. If you eat 100g of parmesan each day, 1kg will be gone after 10 days. That means eating 40kg takes 400 days, or a bit longer than a year.

              Being a bit more realistic easily allows you to stretch that wheel of parmesan over the span of a decade, even if you seriously love the stuff.

              I’m perfectly aware that you’re not being entirely serious but I just can’t let it stand like that.

              • Terrasque
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                11 months ago

                shifty eyes Yes, 100 grams is quite a lot. Yes. Indeed. Quite right.

                • silly goose meekah@lemmy.world
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                  11 months ago

                  When I was a kid we’d grate 200g for 4 people. I take a bit less nowadays than what I would get as a kid but some people still look at me funny. I think 20-30g is a regular serving.

        • grue@lemmy.world
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          11 months ago

          https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=parmesan+rind+uses&ia=web

          From the top result (Treehugger):

          1. Throw them into tomato sauce when cooking. They’ll impart some flavor. Pull them out and discard when the sauce is done cooking.
          2. Place them in a jar, pour olive oil over them (perhaps add some garlic cloves, too – but if you add garlic, make sure to keep the oil refrigerated) and make parmesan-infused olive oil. Great for dipping bread into.
          3. Throw them into bean soups or minestrone. Discard the rinds before serving.
          4. Throw them into the pot when you’re making stock.
          5. Add to stew. Remove rinds before serving.
          6. Use them to flavor steamed artichokes. Add some chicken broth, onion and lemon juice and a cheese rind or two, and it’s a delicious broth!
          7. Put a rind in the pot when you’re cooking risotto or other rice. Remove the rind before serving.
          8. Make a parmesan broth for cheese-filled pastas like ravioli. You can try the Bitchincamero’s recipe for ricotta & pea ravioli in parmesan broth or just use the recipe for inspiration for your own pasta in Parmesan broth.
          9. Try The Novice Chef’s Panera-inspired recipe for tomato, cheese and bread Soup.
          10. If the rind is pure cheese (with no waxy coating), you can grill the rind until it becomes soft and chewy, put it on a piece of crusty bread, and eat.
  • dhork@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    The chips use blockchain technology and trace the wheel of cheese back to where the milk that was used came from.

    Cryptobros, Unite! We finally found a way for blockchain tech to be relevant for more than just ransomware! We authenticate cheese!

    Someone’s gonna make a ton of money on CheeseCoin

    • Edgelord_Of_Tomorrow@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      Blockchain is also good for solving the Ship of Theseus problem. You can encode the entire history of the object into the object.

      Blockchain has many cool uses and none of them are currency.

    • June@lemm.ee
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      11 months ago

      Blockchain =/= crypto

      Crypto uses blockchain, but blockchain is just a different type of database that generally tracks data through a decentralized network. It has a lot of real uses beyond crypto like identity verification, transcript/records management management, and iot data sharing. It’s nothing that can’t be done in a centralized manner, it’s just a different way of going about it that, in some cases, is much more secure and/or much more easily accessible.

      • Helluin@lemm.ee
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        11 months ago

        It’s nothing that can’t be done in a centralized manner,

        and thats the main problem with basically all blockchain related solutions, theres pretty much always a centralized alternative thats more efficient

        • utopianrevolt@lemmy.world
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          11 months ago

          and much more… centralized? But let’s also just ignore the part where it’s described as generally more secure as well.

          • turmacar@lemmy.world
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            11 months ago

            The cheese makers are not concerned about decentralization. Presumably they trust themselves, because they are the only ones trusted to write to the database. If they are the only ones allowed to put something on the chain, it’s a central database, regardless of how many computers/places they run it on.

            Blockchain is not magically more secure than any other equivalent cryptographic solution.

          • FooBarrington@lemmy.world
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            11 months ago

            Most commercial non-crypto blockchains I’ve seen only have a couple of nodes connected, usually held by a single entity. In these cases it’s no less centralised than any alternative write-only DB.

          • Helluin@lemm.ee
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            11 months ago

            and much more… centralized?

            it being centralized dosent mean its bad. theres also the fact that many processes are centralized by the nature of how they work.

            it’s described as generally more secure as well.

            why would that be?

          • Natanael@slrpnk.net
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            11 months ago

            What corporation which validates their supply chain for authenticity is not already centralized? It literally makes no sense when the official manufacturer and logistics partners are all known, at that point you may at best want “transparency logs” but not blockchains. They’re not even intended to stay authenticated on a second hand market, so there’s no need to be able to keep tracking their movements after first sale

    • dodslaser@feddit.nu
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      11 months ago

      I don’t know, can you make a JPEG of the cheese wheel and then put the hyperlink on the blockchain? Maybe make it so I can import the cheese in a shitty MMO that nobody actually wants to play?

  • Gork@lemm.ee
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    11 months ago

    If I run low on health and have to eat several dozen cheese wheels, will the authentic DRM ones provide a greater HP boost compared to the generic cheese wheels?

    • Curious Canid@lemmy.ca
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      11 months ago

      Actually an “HP boost” refers to using fake Hewlett-Packard ink cartridges that circumvent their ink-jet printer DRM. 😁

  • Fishy@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    Maybe I’m a picker eater, but I think I’d rather have an inauthentic product than eating a microchip.

    • Rescuer6394@feddit.nl
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      11 months ago

      as other people pointed out, is a sticker on the outside, on the hard part.

      unless you are very hungry and have good teeth, you will not eat it.

      yet, since is applied on edible product, it needs to be edible.

      • Fishy@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        I know. There’s an answer above where I say that. Writing a jokey comment doesn’t mean you haven’t read it.

        • happyhippo@feddit.it
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          11 months ago

          Well then the right thing to do would be to edit your misinformation-spreading comment in this thread, don’t you think?

          I’m not reading ALL of your comments

          • Fishy@lemmy.world
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            11 months ago

            Haha no. Cause I read the article before I posted my comment. I’m not spreading misinformation.

            The misinformation is in the title of the article. Report the article instead of going after someone who read it, and is obviously not talking about the article seriously.

            It’s funny though when someone says read the article doesn’t read the one of the top tree of comments they are replying to where I explicitly say it’s a non issue 10 hours before your comment.

            Maybe you want to edit your comment.

            • happyhippo@feddit.it
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              11 months ago

              We are definitely not sorting comments by the same criterion, then.

              Your other comment was nowhere to be seen 😉

  • Thann@lemmy.ml
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    11 months ago

    its funny that some ppl are paranoid that bill gates is trying to microchip them with a vaccine when they probably already have been by the fucking itailians

    • Otter@lemmy.ca
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      11 months ago

      That’s because makers of Parmigiano-Reggiano are implanting microchips into the casings of their 90-pound cheese wheels as the latest move to ward off counterfeiters, The Wall Street Journal reported.

      If it’s just going in the casings, then it wouldn’t be eaten I guess?

  • Obinice@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    Not really putting them “into” their cheese, just the labels that bind with their outer casing of the cheese wheel. Still neat.

    They are being placed on the casein label, a food-safe label commonly used in cheese production, which is placed on the cheese wheel.

    • over_clox@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      Okay…

      That still begs the question, why are they considered edible? Are people eating the labels? 🤔

    • HiddenLayer5@lemmy.ml
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      10 months ago

      Except it is very common to boil cheese rind for broth. And prolonged exposure high temperatures tend to break down pollutants into even more reactive forms as well as draw them out into solution. Worse if it’s in like a commercial steam oven or pressure cooker that can get much higher than 100 C, you know, like many professional restaurants make a point of using.

      I doubt it will be that easy to identify and scrape off, because that would defeat the point, probably hidden deep within the layers. It says it can’t be read remotely so very unlikely it’s just an off the shelf RFID sticker you can easily see and peel off. I also doubt a lot of people will know it’s there and that it needs to be removed in the first place, or they’ll take their word for it that it’s edible even though they are absolutely in no position to make that claim and have definitely not done the rigorous medical research/testing to actually justify a claim like that.

  • Draconic NEO@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    I guess in that case I should probably seek out the counterfeit versions of it since they’re now apparently better than the originals.

  • AfricanExpansionist@lemmy.ml
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    11 months ago

    If I can make cheese good enough to pretend that it’s another brand, I’m gonna just slap my own label on it

  • NigelFrobisher@aussie.zone
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    11 months ago

    Why are they not using those nanotech microchip trackers that are small enough to fit in a vaccine, and that can communicate with a satellite without any need for a radio or battery?