Palantir and other tech companies are stocking offices with tobacco products

nancyminusone

What the fuck

still-learning

When is my corporate sponsored adderall IV drip coming in?

jdross

“While the pouches are considered a tobacco product, they don’t contain any tobacco, and are instead made from the plant fiber cellulose” It’s just Zyn, which doesn’t seem that dramatically different than coffee. But maybe that’s because I don’t drink coffee or use nicotine

SpicyLemonZest

From personal experience, this isn't even a top-down push. I know people who have defended in detail why it's a good idea for them to develop a nicotine addiction. Bizarre behavior.

cush

The opening line - “puff puff pass the spreadsheets” - was written by someone with absolutely no idea what that means

stackedinserter

Back in 2003: tech companies are stocking offices with coffee machines to boost employees productivity.

alfon

Not much different than a fully stocked fridge with alcoholic beverages. Consume responsibly, we're all adults.

flowerbreeze

I'll take one addiction and a possible oral cancer for the company, thank you so much. No, I understand it's not guaranteed, but I am seriously flabbergasted by the careless actions of some companies...

awakeasleep

Now there is a perk that is going to get expensive, and boy it is going to suck when theres a downturn or new facilities manager who decides to cut back and stop offering them.

aduffy

It's even funnier actually. Yes, Palantir does have free Zyn vending machines in every office, but the Zyn is only for visiting customers. Employees are explicitly prohibited from using the machines. Just vice signaling all the way down.

0x4e

This reads like an ad.

paxys

Soldiers have always been given cocaine and meth to stay awake and alert during battles. Guess their tech backup will have to do with nicotine.

poplarsol

They're "tobacco products" in the same sense that Diet Coke is a "cocaine product".

D-Machine

Seems a good time to link to Gwern's well-researched notes on why nicotine, when consumed in purer forms (e.g. patches, gum), may be pretty useful and not really as harmful nor as addictive as one might think. https://gwern.net/nicotine

dfxm12

The article specifically mentions Lucy & Sesh. A quick Google search confirmed some suspicions: Sesh (2025): Max Cunningham is the Founder & CEO of Sesh, a nicotine pouch startup. In September 2025, Sesh raised $40 million in funding from investors including 8VC, a firm co-founded by Peter Thiel. David Renteln is the ceo of Lucy. I couldn't find a direct link between Thiel and Lucy, but it looks like Thiel has been friends with Renteln for a while and invested in Renteln's Soylent.

cm2012

Nicotine is highly addictive but also relatively harmless. I would appreciate it provided by an employer though even though I wouldn't normally use it.

butterbomb

Funny. At least since Covid, I’ve noticed a number of employers, often at municipalities or other governments, but sometimes at private companies, are adding terms that employees cannot use any nicotine products whatsoever. What’s even stranger is the always go out of their way to explicitly note that non tobacco cessation aids are not allowed either. Seems like pure virtue signaling, though at least one person has suggested to me that the companies engaging in this are serious and go as far as blood testing.

OutOfHere

I strongly urge against consuming any tobacco or nicotine product. At the very least, it's very bad for your heart in pretty much every form, whether pure or impure, smoked or absorbed. Besides being directly bad for the heart, nicotine also metabolizes to carcinogens. If you need a boost beyond caffeine, consider a square of 95% or 100% dark chocolate. It works. It too stresses the heart mildly, and can aggravate reflux a lot, but overall it's significantly safer than any tobacco product. You can also eat more of it if as needed. The only sane time to take pure nicotine might be if someone is dying from Covid, their lungs are collapsing, and one desperately needs a daytime breathing boost.

api

I've been wondering how long it would take for tobacco to make a comeback given that we seem to be in a weird era where it's some kind of flex to embrace idiotic ideas. Nicotine (without tobacco e.g. Zyn or gum) does seem to have some nootropic-ish properties but it's vastly inferior to a lot of other things and has major addiction/tolerance problems. It's not a great performance enhancer for anything but very sporadic use.

m4ck_

If companies are going to start giving us free drugs to boost productivity, they should at least give out the good stuff. Give me a modafinil (/provigil) vending machine, forget nicotine.