5 Products that Will Be Exposed as B.S. in 2011 | Cracked.com

5 Products that Will Be Exposed as B.S. in 2011 | Cracked.com

Bottled water has been exposed as bullshit again and again. Penn and Teller did a brilliant expose several years ago. The product has endured notwithstanding. Whatever you think of the product, you have to admire the marketing genius behind it. The producers of bottled water have managed to get people in countries with safe water to pay exorbitant amounts for something which is not as good as what they already have for free. Moreover, they have persuaded consumers, even ones who purport to care for the environment, to make that decision despite the fact that the packaging is harmful to the ecosystem. (Yeah, I know the bottles can be recycled. So what's better: billions of plastic bottles, many of which do not get recycled, or no containers at all, which is what you need when you drink from your bathroom tap?)

Penn and Teller went a step further and showed that the supposed taste preference for bottled water was complete nonsense. They filled fancy bottles with water from a garden hose, then recorded pretentious asses praising it.

Some bottled water actually is tap water. Everest Water is the municipal water of Corpus Christi, Texas. The source of Glacier Clear Water is tap water from Greeneville, Tenn.

Even top sellers like Dasani and Aquafina are just reprocessed tap water from various American cities. One of Aquafina's sources is the romantically pure Detroit River!