• The Philosophy of Volatility

    A super super interesting thought on my mind is the quote from Michael Saylor, volatility is vitality. What does that mean, why does it matter etc.?

    First, typically when we think of volatility, it is in the financial realm. We think of volatility in the context of something going up and down, almost unpredictably, chaotically, crazily.

    For example in the markets, we tend to think of volatility like a bad thing. Because most people cannot stomach the up and downs.

    I am an interesting case because obviously I’m affected by it too. Yet now, whenever I see volatility, I’m more annoyed than anything, like the days that bitcoins down, or the days that microstrategy stock is a little bit down, it is almost more like having an annoying mosquito bite, Maybe even a tiny splinter than anything. The good thing with mosquito bites is as time goes on, we know that it will fade, although it is very annoying. Also, with the tiny splinter… Super super annoying to pick it out, but you can!


    Nuclear power

    So besides Chernobyl and Fukushima, I actually think that nuclear power is a super smart idea. Certainly nobody wants nuclear fallout, but come on… It is year 2024. For a while, me and Seneca were playing with SimCity: cities of the future on the Mac, and also, we watched the cities of the future film on IMAX and also 3-D, at the California science center. It is still kind of bizarre to me… Once again, the year 2024, if I think about the film Elysium, produced by Bill Block, and starring Matt Damon, shouldn’t we kind of be living in this futuristic, cyberpunk, or massively green and beautiful bright future? Not kind of this ugly, slumlord vibes we get from watching a film like Snowpiercer?

    Even often the truth is a distraction 

    Anyways, about two or three days ago I was curious why bitcoin spiked so high, breaking the mythical $70,000 mark, after about 2 to 4 years of languishing. So I searched it on ChatGPT, and randomly saw that because Elon Musk tweeted it? And then I was curious, and then I kind of went down a rabbit hole, checking Elon Musk Twitter, Seeing now how he endorses Donald Trump, and then seeing the tweed video the retweeted video of the Joe Rogan podcast with Donald Trump.

    Anyways, I was watching the interview, I watched about half of it, very fun and interesting and entertaining! One of the interesting things is how Joe Rogan was asking Trump about nuclear.

    So to me nuclear is interesting because it is insanely high volatility like it has a lot of power. But if done right, if handled quickly, it is essential you produce practically free energy for everybody! Apparently they do it well in France I think, they just create a bunch of these mini nuclear power plants, And the French citizens benefit?

    A good reason to be anti stoic 

    I think about 99% stoicism is good, come on, I named my firstborn son after Seneca the younger, the great stoic sage!

    Yet where stoicism fails, I call this “the life after stoicism”, is that Stoicism is too focused on hardening yourself into like a porcupine, and then eventually, it makes you unemotional or unfeeling etc. Yet what if you want to embrace this interesting strategy; put on the stoic armor, in which you don’t really suffer any downsides from life, but you could harness the volatility of life, and channel harness and reap the benefits of the upside?

    Stoicism is not volatile enough. Certainly we want Stoicism to clip and hedge the downsides of life, but, you want at least 200X upside in life!

    The wisdom of kids

    So kind of an interesting thing I learned from Seneca, kids in general etc.; Seneca is about 3 1/2, and when he is angry or upset about something, he’ll get angry, he’ll throw stuff, stop his feet, put out a lot of high energy, start screaming and yelling, and shouting, but when we just let him get it out of his system, like for 30 seconds or a minute or so, he’ll kind of forget about it, and then start smiling again, and then being happy and proceeding like usual. Because Seneca is like happy and joyful and silly and playful and curious Like 99.999% of the time.

    Adults should also mirror children 

    Anyways, I almost wonder if this is a better strategy for adults as well.

    I think where adults fail is that we try to be good proper and prim, I don’t know if this is like Victorian Quaker Christian ethics, we try to restrain our anger, we don’t raise our voices we don’t yell we don’t scream, we don’t throw stuff, we are told to become modest, go on a walk etc.

    But I almost wonder if it was a good idea that adults we also would just let our our anger and fury as well like kids — for example if we’re angry, to just yell shot scream, stump our feet, go outside, throw around the sandbag, go to the park and take some big heavy rocks and throw them into the distance etc. Also as a funny sidenote, go on YouTube or Google and search ERIC KIM rock toss challenge, in which during Covid when all the gyms were shut down I would just go to the nearby park, find the biggest rock or Boulder I could, and just practice throwing it around etc. It might be the best workout of all time!

    Don’t hold in your anger 

    Anyways, the issue with adults is that when we’re angry or upset about something, we’re holding our emotions, yet we harbor this anger and resentment, this Poison, for weeks days months years decades? Even one of my uncles, considering that my grandfather had an illegitimate wife and about five or six kids all illegitimate kids on the other side, essentially ditching my mom‘s mom, and the 4 to 5 legitimate kids, anyways, apparently one of my uncles is still super super upset about this, even many years after the passing of my grandfather, my uncle saying that after getting drunk “I have no father”, referring to my already deceased grandpa.

    I get it, but I almost feel like it doesn’t really matter anymore. Don’t people gotta move on?

    Yeah yeah yeah, life is tough, life is sad whatever, but, I once read that resentment and anger is like drinking poison, hoping that the other person dies.

    No not only is this kind of not a good strategy, it is ineffective but also foolish.

    Think Achilles

    For example, imagine like you’re a warrior, like you’re Achilles, or Hector, and you’re about to do the final battle. You got your spear and shield, your battle armor on. Obviously the goal is to throw your spear and kill the other guy, not to take your spear and stab yourself in spite of your enemy, hoping that somehow spearing yourself will damage the other person?

    Really sick stuff

    Even a more sick thing, a parent, who is frustrated with their child, not sure what to do, starts to literally beat themselves, like hitting themselves or self flagellating themselves, causing themselves some sort of self-made pain, to make the younger child feel bad? To me this is almost the most sick evil thing to do of all time because when your kid and your parent beats you, at least you could feel bad and think that your parent is a bad guy. But if your parent beats themself to spite you… You have no one else to but by yourself? 

    Never spite nobody!


    Where it is wise to not trust Christianity 

    The early Christian fathers, a lot of them kind of unwell people, we kind of do a similar thing, self flagellate themselves for their sins whatever, as a form of repentance or something?

    But the reason why this is so sick and weird, is that once again, by hurting or damaging or poisoning yourself, you ain’t doing nothing useful.

    Like for example, let us say that you did something bad or whatever, and then boom now your parents are dead or somebody you care about is dead or whatever, and then you get super depressed and you start to drink alcohol, smoke a bunch of weed, do a bunch of drugs, simply to alleviate your pain your distress your suffering. Or you start to self yourself, you start to physically beat yourself.

    Now once again, this is not productive at all.

    Channel volatility

    So just watching the recent microstrategy earnings call, go Michael! I also like Andrew Kang and Phong Le (both I presume our Korean and Vietnamese, just like me, Seneca, and Cindy!) 

    Anyways, what do you notice what super interesting was that what is so fascinating about microstrategy, it is like literally the best performing company in stock in the known human universe, is that it is also the most volatile. Whereas a typical asset might have a volatility of five, The volatility of micro strategy often exceeds 50.

    Volatility is vitality, the motto of Michael Saylor.

    So then I guess the tricky thing, the philosophy behind things: “Would you prefer to have higher volatility for greater yield and performance?” Or would you rather have low or no volatility, and just take boring steady gains, but far inferior gains and yields?

    For me, I think 100% obvious strategy is to have higher performance, with even greater and higher volatility.

    Because at the end of the day, it is probably more interesting to drive a high volatility performance vehicle, like a Lamborghini, which has more power powers and “flexiness” rather than a boring and reliable Toyota Camry?

    Yet what a lot of fools do is they just park their money in some sort of blended S&P 500 derivative, because they don’t know what else to do?

    Taking control of your financial destiny

    Michael Saylor said his personal imperative with bitcoin, is that he believes that at least 50% of the world‘s problems and issues can be solved by fixing the money. He likens traditional money and capital as being toxic; would you give your healthy four year-old child contaminated sewer water to drink, or would you give them clean water? Or, would you take the temperature of your home, which is a cozy 73°, and turn down the thermostat by 1°, every single day, for 10 years? Obviously not, you will literally kill and freeze your family to death.  

    Think scientific history & physics

    I think the genius of a Michael Saylor is that he studied history of science at MIT, and also aeronautics and aerospace engineering.

    So I was curious about the word volatility, and apparently it just is derived from Latin to fly, initially from the Proto into European to throw.

    So certainly flying is good. I would not want to go to Seoul South Korea on a boat. Also, thinking about French colonialism, I have no idea how the French would be able to stand the boat ride from Paris all the way over to Saigon; or even worse, Thinking about Australia, the original penal colony, how in the hell did you take a boat from London all the way to Australia?

    Flying is literally volatile (volaris, to fly)

    Anyways, the volatility of flying, certainly flying can be dangerous, you hear the reports about the new Boeing jets, exploding or whatever. Yet nobody gives up flying.

    Or let us say the dangers of driving an automobile car. Certainly there are lots of dangers associated with driving, like fatalities from car related accidents, now texting while driving, it is literally a life or that situation. You are 1 trillion times more likely to die from a car accident rather than any sort of accident resulting from a terrorist attack, or a gun related fatality.

    If in fact, everyone is talking about why guns are bad and so evil and how we should ban guns or whatever. Yet nobody is talking about how we should be texting while driving, or even ban the use of a cell phone while you are in an automobile car.

    If anything, if Apple really wanted to say millions of lives, I have a simple thought: by default if you buy a new phone or whatever, a new Apple ID or whatever, there should be a workflow which if it detects that you’re driving really really fast in the car, it automatically locks you out of your phone, into the do not disturb driving mode, and that if you want to access the normal mode, assuming you’re a passenger in an Uber or Tesla Robo taxi, then you could voice dictate or type I am not driving. Or “I am a passenger”.

    Anyways, volatility is good. I almost wonder if volatility, voltage is the same thing? You step up and you step down there’s transformers for electricity. And this is what allows high-powered electricity to travel from phone wires, silently into your home, powering your washer and dryer your heater and air conditioning whatever. Yet nobody is trying to ban electricity.


    Channeling volatility

    Bitcoin is up 507% percent over 4 years since 2020, MSTR is up 1989% since then — 5x, 19x (20x) gain since 2020

    So also, a curious thing… Why is it that I have never met a female day trader? Or a female bitcoin investor?

    I’ve met lots of day traders, all male, some guys at the gym at the local park whatever. It is pretty common to meet day traders who drive Uber on the side or whatever. I haven’t really met any bitcoin investors in the flesh yet, besides myself. And certainly I have never met any women who are interested in bitcoin. It is too volatile for them.

    It is also too volatile for most men. Yet a simple filter, I think that for the general part, women hate volatility, most men also hate volatility but some men like myself, love volatility.

    Question; are there any women who love volatility? I guess the ideas that you have sex with the rockstar, and you have the boring accountant husband at home, paying the mortgage or whatever, but it seems that most women, would not want to be in a serious financial relationship with a Starbucks barista playing music on the side.

    Anyways, maybe what life is then, is the love of volatility. 


    Harnessing the upside of volatility without the downside?

    So this is where things get super interesting; how can we reap the benefits of the upside, like gain 150% upside in life, while clipping the downside?

    So for example, the microstrategy strategy is super super fascinating;: capturing 150% the performance of bitcoin and the upside, without the downside?

    Bitcoin Treasury Company (BTC)

    So how do they do this? Simply put they have access to permanent bitcoin capital. Funny enough they are dubbing themselves BTC, bitcoin treasury company, I like to just think of micro strategy as their first bitcoin bank (BB), because it is easier for mere mortals like myself to remember, but anyways, what is super fascinating about microstrategy, is because they have been in business for over 30 years, they are a real company, that first started off selling business intelligence software, and now transitioning into becoming the world‘s first 100% bitcoin company, which is effectively unstoppable at this point; even if Apple somehow bought $1 trillion worth of bitcoin, because the operating structure of Apple computer is still revolving around future projections of selling more future iPhones, Apple can never really really ever become 100% bitcoin, even if I wanted to.

    December 2024: Will Microsoft purchase bitcoin? 

    Oh and also as a random sidenote, I think in December, there might be discussions that Microsoft might actually start to add bitcoin to her balance sheet. This is worth noting, especially because starting January 2025, the new FASB (fasb.org) financial accounting standards board, GAAP generally accepted accounting principles — essentially companies institutions like Harvard and Yale and Brown can now add bitcoin to their balance sheet, as a treasury reserve asset. The reason why this is a big deal is for so long, bitcoin was considered fake money, and that a company could not add it to her balance sheet, proving proof of funds and reserves in the traditional sense. Now, all of these nerds who become accounting will have to learn all of these new rules, figuring out how to integrate bitcoin and other cryptocurrency assets to accounting principles.


    If Larry Fink and Blackrock think that bitcoin is real capital, it is.

    The reason why this is such a big deal is that once again, people still think that bitcoin is fake money! Yet look at the Janet Yellen talk on Satoshi, and even look at Larry Fink, CEO of blackrock who owns over $10 trillion worth of assets, Larry Fink even now says that bitcoin is legitimate asset class, and I think that black rock has actually recently invested and bought a bunch more micro strategy stock. Watch the CNBC interview with Larry Fink on Bitcoin.

    Study it yourself

    Oh and also, a pro tip; definitely get the $20 a month ChatGPT pro, it is now the ultimate financial investment research tool; when you want to search any financials or anything, this is an insanely big deal.

    Anyways, once Harvard Yale and Ivy League schools start to purchase bitcoin, or maybe even there investors, the ones that handle the endowment start to purchase microstrategy, which is essentially a conduit for purchasing bitcoin, with indirect exposure to the asset class of bitcoin, this will be a big deal.

    If UCLA were smart, she would purchase BTC and Bitcoin and or microstrategy, not real estate.

    How to harness the upsides of volatility without the downsides?

    So this is a very big idea. Obviously the goal in life is to win, even Michael Saylor said at the end of October 30 micro strategy earnings call, that essentially, under a bitcoin strategy, everybody wins, there are no losers in the bitcoin strategy. Only varying degrees of success. 

    There are no losers in life!

    Philosophically, this is fantastic. Why? To me the idea that we could all win together, 100%, no losers, isn’t this the ultimate thing?

    For example, I still think that the number 1 foolish way that most individuals live is that they think of life like zero sum; they think that your success means my failure, that your big dick means my small dick.

    But this makes no sense because money is fake, money ain’t real, it is just a man-made construct. So if somehow you have $1 million in the bank, that doesn’t make my balance any smaller or bigger.

    21M is a hard cap.

    I suppose the thing that is a little bit tricky under the bitcoin standard is that because there is a hard cap of 21 million bitcoins, the ultimate strategy is indeed to own the most bitcoin at the end of the day. And this is still where I think the strategy, is to use microstrategy as a cash yield generation machine, periodically selling microstrategy stock when it is up to purchase more bitcoin, is still the best strategy.

    MSTR Microstrategy as the engine in order to accumulate more Bitcoin?

    MSTR -> BTC


    Building and making your own micro strategy?

    Introducing BLACK EAGLE CAPITAL: 

    Currently, my new direction in my life — obviously I’ll still be doing photography workshops etc., as it is still my number one supreme in life and passion. Yet I’m thinking about offering more workshops in the bitcoin sphere, I think I am well adjusted to this because I have Stoicism, and control on my side.

    Also, I am currently doing a soft launch of BLACK EAGLE CAPITAL, essentially my bitcoin hedge fund, the name behind it is inspired by the fact that I believe in the ethos of black, black canvas, all black aesthetics, and eagle, Because I was a Boy Scout eagle, also the symbol of America.

    If you’re interested in participating, shoot me an email at eric@erickim.com

    To be transparent, the strategy is to create an infinite money machine, you essentially leverage MSTR microstrategy stock, and then ultimately the goal is to accumulate more bitcoin. I encourage you to just open up your own Coinbase account, and start buying bitcoins. Just download Coinbase to your iPhone, from the App Store, connected with your JP Morgan Chase or Bank of America checking account, and start buying bitcoins, you could just buy 10 bucks, 25 bucks, $100, $500, $1000, 10,000, $100,000, if you like. The good thing on Coinbase is that they recently increased the limit i’m a $50,000 a day in instant limit, to now doubling that to $100,000! Thank god.

    When is the best time to buy Bitcoin?

    Buy it high buy it low buy it in the middle, because 30 years from now when bitcoin is worth $22 million a bitcoin, the price of what you paid right now won’t really matter. It won’t matter if you bought it at $100,000 a bitcoin, 200,000 a bitcoin, $75,000 bitcoin, or $50,000 a bitcoin.

    Essentially starting next year will be year one of institutional acceptance. I am almost close to 100% certain that Donald Trump will be elected president, even me, I am a liberal Democrat on the left, and even me… I don’t think I’ll be voting for Kamala Harris. Vote orange, vote bitcoin!. Even worth noting the Donald Trump talk at the bitcoin 2024 conference in Nashville Tennessee, also note that Donald Trump his two sons, Eric Trump and Baron Trump, I believe they’re actually really into bitcoin and crypto. Which is good for us, because if you have a president that loves bitcoin crypto and also the US dollar, this will be very very good news for us Americans. And also, good for any holders of bitcoin on the planet.

    Bitcoin is the solution for world peace?

    I also personally ethically believe that bitcoin can promote peace because it don’t matter what country you’re from, as long as you own bitcoin, we are all part of the same monetary network.

    I think bitcoin is a threat to the international monetary fund, Jerome Powell and the FED, which prints money like cotton candy. Even Donald Trump in his interview with Joe Rogan is talking about paying off the $35 trillion debt America has, and also Donald Trump says we will never sell our bitcoin.

    And also I would not be surprised if maybe, an interesting national strategy; a nation or a nation to purchase bitcoins, which backs their own fiat monetary supply?

    Like imagine if America owned 1 million bitcoins, or 2 million bitcoins whatever, and assuming that the US dollar was pegged to the bitcoin or back, then, the US dollar would actually be worth something. People talk that bitcoin is bad for the environment whatever, this is not true. Because bitcoin miners are incentivized to produce bitcoin, at a low financial rate, it will flow into high yield energy sources like nuclear power plants, or electricity which is stranded on the edges of the grid, for example it is it is cheaper to purchase electricity by building your bitcoin mining rig somewhere in the mountains with access to a hydroelectric dam, where electricity would not be used For example, if you could somehow capture the hydro power of hydroelectric power, which is essentially free because it is powered by gravity, then, assuming that electricity is practically free in America, certainly this will be very good for bitcoin mining and bitcoin network.

    And also besides cheap electricity, or free electricity, There is actually a strong entrepreneur incentive to create computers which are more efficient, because contrary to popular belief, bitcoin mining is less about electricity — it is more about computer efficiency.

    For example in the early days bitcoin, a lot of bitcoin mining was done on graphics cards, card by Nvidia, then a transition into ASICs, ASIC computers, which is not really even a computer in the traditional sense. It cannot do anything besides solve the mathematically intense cryptography puzzles, which is essentially the proof of work concept.

    Also, the reason why proof of work is the path, is that work, like things need to have a real world work in order for it to be worth anything.

    For example you do not want to live in your fake virtual reality metaverse, With your fake virtual reality Lamborghini, having sex with your virtual reality girlfriend, with access to your virtual reality money. For anyone who played Diablo II, you know very well that gold is not worth anything in the universe of Diablo; everyone wants the rare weapons.

    Before there were hacks, this would mean that you as a kid, you have you would have to spend hours upon hours of doing BAAL runs, Trying to wait and cross your fingers that BAAL would drop some sort of mythical item or weapon, for you to equip yourself. And as a kid, this required real work, which meant a lot of time sitting on your computer, clicking around, and investing countless hours of time which is work, to achieve this outcome.

    Bitcoin and crypto is the same thing; if there’s not real human labor or physical labor or analogue energy which goes into producing the digital asset, it is not worth it. This is why you should not purchase or invest in anything that is not bitcoin — nothing else is powered by proof of work and has a hard cap and supply. And derivatives, don’t forget Ethereum was essentially a bitcoin copycat.

    Ethereum is not worth anything, don’t buy it, sell your Ethereum and buy bitcoin.

    The best analogy is that Ethereum is Pepsi. Nobody likes Pepsi. The only reason anyone would drink Pepsi was because somebody gave it to them for free.

    Bitcoin is like Coca-Cola, it has always been the best and will always be the best or bitcoin is like the iPhone Pro, everyone wants the iPhone, nobody wants a Google pixel, nobody wants a Samsung. And certainly nobody wants a Huawei, if you’re a smart rich Chinese billionaire, come on… You have zero interest in buying a Huawei phone besides supporting the Chinese communist party.

    If you are any person with any sense, you would prefer to be wearing Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Balenciaga, wearing YEEZY sneakers, with the newest iPhone Pro, driving your Lamborghini Rolls-Royce whatever.

    You would not want to drive a Chinese car, a Chinese phone, or even send your kids to a Chinese university.

    You would rather want to send your kid to a Harvard Yale or Stanford, and even… No rich Chinese person actually wants to live in Beijing or Shanghai; they would prefer to live in and own property in Palo Alto, Los Angeles, Calabasas, Beverly Hills, Culver City, or maybe Vancouver.

    The Chinese yuan is actually pegged to the US dollar 

    The only thing that is stopping mainland Chinese is capital controls–  if you have $1 billion worth of Chinese yuan, you cannot take it out of the country even if you wanted to.

    Don’t forget that the Chinese yuan is essentially pegged to the US dollar, and I think time has shown that no no no, we are not going to be speaking in Mandarin. English is international protocol and the international business language.

    As long as the US, we have at least 1000 X military supremacy over China, we will be fine. And also, when Donald Trump becomes president, he is all about the tariffs, and he’s going to become antagonist towards China, which is good for us Americans because if you put a tariff on Chinese produced goods, money talks, words weep.

    What does that means is China will not do anything to promote war with America because the rich Chinese oligarchs are still dependent on manufacturing products in China, and selling it to the American market for a profit.

    Don’t be a dummy boy. Anyone who thinks that China is going to take over the planet is either anti-American, a communist, likes to give fellatio to Karl Marx, is a fakeass woke plant based hippie, spends too much time on Reddit, and pirateBay, spent too much time torrenting and streaming Maria Ozawa pornography (on Google incognito, brave browser incognito), maybe they have an apple Vision Pro and they watch virtual reality pornography on their $4000 Apple Vision Pro in private. They might be single, they might not be, maybe own a dog, they have no intention of having kids or girlfriends or a serious relationship.

    And also they don’t own bitcoin.

    ERIC


    Upcoming ERIC KIM workshops, bitcoin thoughts, crypto thoughts, and also when in doubt, start here >



  • The Philosophy of Volatility 

    The Philosophy of Volatility 

    A super super interesting thought on my mind is the quote from Michael Saylor, volatility is vitality. What does that mean, why does it matter etc.?

    First, typically when we think of volatility, it is in the financial realm. We think of volatility in the context of something going up and down, almost unpredictably, chaotically, crazily.

    For example in the markets, we tend to think of volatility like a bad thing. Because most people cannot stomach the up and downs.

    I am an interesting case because obviously I’m affected by it too. Yet now, whenever I see volatility, I’m more annoyed than anything, like the days that bitcoins down, or the days that micro strategy stock is a little bit down, it is almost more like having an annoying mosquito bite, Maybe even a tiny splinter than anything. The good thing with mosquito bites is as time goes on, we know that it will fade, although it is very annoying. Also, with the tiny splinter… Super super annoying to pick it out, but you can!

    Nuclear power

    So besides Chernobyl and Fukushima, I actually think that nuclear power is a super smart idea. Certainly nobody wants nuclear fallout, but come on… It is year 2024. For a while, me and Seneca were playing with SimCity: cities at the future on the Mac, and also, we watched the cities of the future film on IMAX and also 3-D, at the California science center. It is still kind of bizarre to me… Once again, the year 2024, if I think about the film Elysium, produced by Bill Block, and starring Matt Damon, shouldn’t we kind of be living in this futuristic, cyberpunk, or massively green and beautiful bright future? Not kind of this ugly, slumlord vibes we get from watching a film like Snow piercer?

    Anyways, about two or three days ago I was curious why bitcoin spite so high, breaking the mythical $70,000 mark, after about 2 to 4 years of languishing. So I searched it on ChatGPT, and randomly saw that because Elon Musk tweeted it? And then I was curious, and then I kind of went down a rabbit hole, checking Elon Musk Twitter, Seeing now how he endorses Donald Trump, and then seeing the tweed video the retweeted video of the Joe Rogan podcast with Donald Trump.

    Anyways, I was watching the interview, I watched about half of it, very fun and interesting and entertaining! One of the interesting things is how Joe Rogan was asking Trump about nuclear.

    So to me nuclear is interesting because it is insanely high volatility like it has a lot of power. But I’ve done right, if handled quickly, it is essential you producers practically free energy for everybody! Apparently they do it well in France I think, they just create a bunch of these mini nuclear power plants, And the French citizens benefit?

    A good reason to be anti-stoic 

    I think about 99% stoicism is good, come on, I named my firstborn son after Seneca the younger, the great stoic sage!

    Yet we’re stores and fails, I called this the life after stoicism, is that Stoicism is too focused on hardening yourself into like a porcupine, and then eventually, it makes you unemotional on feeling etc. Yet what if you want to embrace this interesting strategy; put on the stoic armor, in which you don’t really suffer any downsides from life, but you could harness the volatility of life, and channel harness and reap the benefits of the upside?

    The wisdom of kids

    So kind of an interesting thing I learned from Seneca, kids in general etc.; Seneca is about 3 1/2, and when he is angry or upset about something, he’ll get angry, he’ll throw stuff, stop his feet, put out a lot of high energy, start screaming and yelling, and shouting, But when we just let him get it out of his system, like for 30 seconds or a minute or so, he’ll kind of forget about it, and then start smiling again, and then being happy and proceeding like usual. Because Seneca is like happy and joyful and silly and playful and curious Like 99.999% of the time.

    Anyways, I almost wonder if this is a better strategy for adults as well. I think we’re adults fail is that we try to be good proper and prim, I don’t know if this is like Victorian Quaker Christian ethics, we tried to restrain our anger, we don’t raise our voices we don’t yell we don’t scream, we don’t throw stuff , we are told to become modest, go on a walk etc. But I almost wonder if it was a good idea that adults we also would just let our our anger and fury as well like kids — for example if we’re angry, to just yell shot scream, stump our feet, go outside, throw around the sandbag, go to the park and take some big heavy rocks and throw them into the distance etc. Also as a funny sidenote, go on YouTube or Google and search ERIC KIM rock toss challenge, in which during Covid when all the gyms were shut down I would just go to the nearby park, find the biggest rock or Boulder I could, and just practice throwing it around etc. It might be the best workout of all time!

    Anyways, the issue with adults is that when we’re angry or upset about something, we’re holding our emotions, yet we harbor this anger and resentment, this Poison, four weeks days months years decades? Even one of my uncles, considering that my grandfather had an illegitimate wife in about five or six kids all illegitimate kids on the other side, essentially ditching my mom‘s mom, and the 4 to 5 legitimate kids,  anyways, apparently one of my uncles is still super super upset about this, even many years after the passing of my grandfather, my uncle saying that after getting drunk “I have no father”, referring to my already deceased grandpa.

    I get it, but I almost feel like it doesn’t really matter anymore. Don’t people gotta move on?

    Yeah yeah yeah, life is tough, life is sad whatever, but, I once read that resentment an anger is like drinking Poison, hoping that the other person dies.

    No not only is this kind of not a good strategy, it is ineffective but also foolish.

    For example, imagine like you’re a warrior, like your Achilles, or Hector, and you’re about to do the final battle. You got your spear and shield, your battle armor on. Obviously the goal is to throw your spear and killed other guy, not to take your spear and stab yourself in spite of your enemy, hoping that somehow Spearing yourself will damage the other person?

    Really sick stuff

    Even a more sick thing, a parent, who is frustrated with their child, not sure what to do, starts to literally beat themselves, like hitting themselves or self flagellating themselves, causing themselves some sort of self-made pain, to make the younger child feel bad?

    The early Christian fathers, a lot of them kind of unwell people, we kind of do a similar thing, self flagellate themselves for their sins whatever, as a form of repentance or something?

    But the reason why this is so sick and weird, is that once again, by hurting or damaging or poisoning yourself, you ain’t doing nothing useful.

    Like for example, let us say that you did something bad or whatever, and then boom now your parents are dead or somebody you care about is dead or whatever, and then you get super depressed and you start to drink alcohol, smoke a bunch of weed, do a bunch of drugs, simply to alleviate your pain your distress your suffering. Or you start to self yourself, you start to physically beat yourself.

    Now once again, this is not productive at all.

    Channel volatility

    So just watching the recent micro strategy earnings call, call Michael! I also like Andrew Kang and Phong Le (both I presume our Korean and Vietnamese, just like me, Seneca, and Cindy!) 

    Anyways, what do you notice what super interesting was that what is so fascinating about micro strategy, it is like literally the best performing company in stock in the known human universe, is that it is also the most volatile. Whereas a typical asset might have a volatility of five, The volatility of micro strategy often exceeds 50.

    Volatility is vitality, the motto of Michael Saylor.

    So then I guess the tricky thing, the philosophy behind things: “would you prefer to have higher volatility for greater yield and performance? Or would you rather have low or no volatility, and just take boring steady gains, but far inferior gains and yields?

     for me, I think 100% obvious strategy is to have higher performance, would even greater and higher volatility.

    Because at the end of the day, it is probably more interesting to drive a high volatility performance vehicle, like a Lamborghini, which has more power powers and “flexiness” rather than a boring and reliable Toyota Camry?

    Yet what a lot of fools do is they just park their money in some sort of blended S&P 500 derivative, because they don’t know what else to do?

    Taking control of your financial destiny

    Michael Saylor said his personal imperative with bitcoin, is that he believes that at least 50% of the world‘s problems and issues can be solved by fixing the money. He likes traditional money in capital as being toxic; would you give your healthy four year-old child contaminated sewer water to drink, or would you give them clean water? or, would you take the temperature of your home, which is a cozy 73°, and turn down the thermostat by 1°, every single day, for 10 years? Obviously not, you will literally kill and freeze your family to death.  

    I think the genius of a Michael Saylor is that he studied history of science at MIT, and also aeronautics and aerospace engineering.

     so I was curious about the word volatility, and apparently it just is derived from Latin to fly, initially from the Proto into European to throw.

    So certainly flying is good. I would not want to go to Seoul South Korea on a boat. Also, thinking about French colonialism, I have no idea how the French would be able to stand the boat ride from Paris all the way over to Saigon; or even worse, Thinking about Australia, the original penal colony, how in the hell did you take a boat from London all the way to Australia?

    Anyways, the vitality flying, certainly flying can be dangerous, you hear the reports about the new Boeing jets, exploding or whatever. Yet nobody gives up flying.

    Or let us say the dangers of driving an automobile car. Certainly there are lots of dangers associated with driving, like fatalities from car related accidents, now texting while driving, it is literally a life for that situation. You are 1 trillion times more likely to die from a car accident rather than any sort of Accident resulting from a terrorist attack, or a gun related fatality. If in fact, everyone is talking about why guns are bad and so evil and how we should be in guns or whatever. Yet nobody is talking about how we should be texting while driving, or even ban The use of a cell phone while you are in an automobile car. If anything, if Apple really wanted to say millions of lives, I have a simple thought: by default if you buy a new phone or whatever, a new Apple ID or whatever, There should be a workflow which if it detects that you’re driving really really fast in the car, it automatically love you out of your phone, into the do not disturb driving mode, and that if you want to access the normal mode, assuming you’re a passenger in an Uber or Tesla Robo taxi, then you could voice dictate or type I am not driving. Or I am a passenger.

    Anyways, volatility is good. I almost wonder if volatility, voltage is the same thing? You step up and you step down there’s transformers for electricity. And this is what allows high-powered electricity to travel from phone wires, silently into your home, powering your washer and dryer your heater and air conditioning whatever. Yet nobody is trying to ban electricity.

    Channeling volatility

    So also, all those curious… Why is it that I have never met a female day trader? Or a female bitcoin investor?

    I’ve met lots of day traders, all mail, some guys at the gym at the local park whatever. It is pretty common to meet day traders, Who Dr., Uber on the side or whatever. I haven’t really met any bitcoin investors in the flesh yet, besides myself. And certainly I have never met any women who are interested in bitcoin. It is too volatile for them.

    It is also too volatile for most men. Yet a simple filter, I think that for the general part, women hate volatility, most men also hate volatility but some men like myself, love volatility.

    Question; are there any women who love volatility? I guess the ideas that you have sex with the rockstar, and you have the boring accountant husband at home, paying the mortgage or whatever, but it seems that most women, would not want to be in a serious financial relationship with a Starbucks barista playing music on the side.

    Anyways, maybe what life is then, is the love of volatility. 

    Harnessing the upside of volatility without the downside?

    So this is where things get super interesting; how can reap the benefits of the upside, like gain 150% upside in life, while clipping the downside?

    So for example, the micro strategy strategy is super super fascinating;: capturing 150% the performance of bitcoin and the upside, without the downside?

    So how do they do this? Simply put they have access to permanent bitcoin capital. Funny enough they are dubbing themselves BTC, bitcoin treasury company, I like to just think of micro strategy as their first bitcoin bank (BB), because it is easier for mere mortals like myself to remember, but anyways, what is super fascinating about micro strategy, is because they have been in business for over 30 years, they are a real company, that first started off selling business intelligence software, and now transitioning into becoming the world‘s first 100% bitcoin company, which is effectively unstoppable at this point; even if Apple somehow bought $1 trillion worth of bitcoin, because the operating structure of Apple computer is still revolving around future projections of selling more future iPhones, Apple can never really really ever become 100% bitcoin, even if I wanted to.

    Oh and also as a random sidenote, I think in December, our discussions that Microsoft might actually start to add bitcoin to her balance sheet. This is worth noting, especially because starting January 2025, the new FASB (fasb.org) financial accounting standards board, GAAP generally accepted accounting principles — essentially companies institutions like Harvard and Yale and Brown Kang now add bitcoin to their balance sheet, as a treasury reserve asset. The reason why this is a big deal is for so long, bitcoin was considered fake money, and that a company could not add it to her balance sheet, proving proof of funds and reserves in the traditional sense. Now, all of these nerds who become accounting will have to learn all of these new rules, figuring out how to integrate bitcoin and other cryptocurrency assets to accounting principles.

    The reason why this is such a big deal is that once again, people still think that bitcoin is fake money! Yet look at the Janet yell and talk, and even look at Larry Fink, CEO of black rock who owns over $10 trillion worth of assets, Larry Fink even now says that bitcoin is legitimate asset class, and I think that black rock has actually recently invested and bought a bunch more micro strategy stock. 

    Oh and also, a pro tip; definitely get the $20 a month ChatGPT pro, it is now the ultimate financial investment research tool; when you want to search any financials or anything, this is an insanely big deal.

     Anyways, once Harvard Yale and Ivy League schools start to purchase bitcoin, or maybe even there investors, the ones that handle the endowment start to purchase micro strategy, which is essentially a conduit for purchasing bitcoin, with indirect exposure to the asset class of bitcoin,  this will be a big deal.


  • The Ethics

    So something which is super interesting and important to me is ethics. And honestly it is something that is so elusive because there is no codified hard set rules of ethics which applied to everybody, for eternity.

    Also, I think is super interesting because I actually tired in ethics with certain moralistic imperative; I sent you when it comes down to it… Your personal ethics your ethos of things dictates almost everything.

    I’m almost starting to think instead… Rather than thinking about goals, veteran instead to think about ethics and ethos and your imperatives and philosophies behind things.

    The ethics of Bitcoin & money

    Is bitcoin actually the most virtuous money?

    So what is super interesting to me is that from a philosophical perspective, if you invoke the Austrian economics, like Karl Menger and the like .,, Property, what is property?

    Property is something that you own, that belongs to you, which legally that nobody could seize against your own will.

    So for example, I can own a watch, a camera, a car whatever… Legally nobody could just come up to me and steal it from me without any sort of negative repercussion.

    Taxes?

    Cindy’s mom and my brother-in-law Gabe both said it; when your own property, like real estate or whatever… Assuming there is a tax rate which is above 0%, that means that you don’t really “own “the property… You just borrowing it or renting it from the government.

    Because this issue is with taxes, in theory, that is money that you’ll never see touch or witness, and it is essentially like you’re bleeding capital.

    So for example, I was shocked, doing the math on even a $1.6 million home, I had a very low interest rate, you’re still bleeding around $1800 a month … close to $2000 a month, essentially money that is just going into thin air and vapor?

    Even if you’re a savvy investor like myself, my personal thought is I would prefer to take that $2000 a month and just buy bitcoin instead, which is gonna go to $13 million or $22 million a bitcoin. 

    Homes

    OK so currently… This is my thought:

    Single family home or nothing.

    I think the fragile position to be in is only a condo because the price of him might slightly go up, but… It might not even be able to keep in pace or up to pace with inflation. What that means is let us say you buy a condo for $1 million, and you sell it a deck for $1.2 million, you might’ve thought that you realized a $200,000 gain but you did not, because of inflation, you might’ve actually lost money?

    Another thing… Even owning a single-family home, property whatever, once again if you factor in property taxes and stuff, you’re not really making money.

    So I heard that is to own a single-family home is kind of more of like a trophy acid like bragging rights for owning a Ferrari or Lamborghini whatever.

    I suppose the nuance in difference is you could actually live in the thing, the single-family home. And you could brag to all your millennial friends that you own a single-family home.

    I think where the calculus gets a little bit confusing is assuming that you’re married you have a wife and kids or more kids on the way etc. So then the home becomes a symbolic thing. But for me still… My hard school of thought is that a home is not an investment, it is just somewhere where you live.

    And essentially, once again, just do the math, assuming that bitcoin is currently around $65,000 of bitcoin and is going up to 13 million, there is at least a 200X potential gain in front of you.

    So let us say that your down payment is $300,000 or whatever, that is $60M. So the question is… Are you willing to sacrifice $60 million for the potential upside of buying a certain house you like? For you and your family?

    Decisions

    I think your life, the wise thing to think about, is that decisions, nothing is ever forever, nor should anything before ever, and even from a Zen and Taoist principal, nothing ever remains the same even if you want it to.

    Also, your ethics change. Your ethical framework as a two-year-old versus 12-year-old versus high schooler versus college student versus 36 year old man with a kid is going to be different. Your ethics and morality as a degenerate single person is going to be different than your ethics and your morality once you have a kid. Or several.

    Or your ethics before getting married and after getting married.

    Where philosophers fail

    It really really big problem is a lot of these philosophers try to create some sort of ultimate at the cold framework which can never be changed or modified. They strive in vain for 30 years, seeking some sort of ultimate truth of everything, which could last 1000 years or whatever. If you think about it then, this is what religion is. The religion of Mohammad, Saint Paul, the religion of Judea – these religions have lasted for thousands of years. So I guess the founders did a good job.

    Endowments for private schools like Harvard or Yale; their endowments last forever. So it looks like they’re doing something right.


    The ethics of smoking

    So for this conversation I’m just going to talk about secondhand smoke.

    So some critical issues here; the ethics.

    First, I think smoking cigarettes in a public space which is not your house, in which your secondhand could fuck up the lungs of other people, especially for people like myself with sensitive lungs, is unethical.

    First, legally it might be allowed, but ethically, it is not.

    The first rule is first do no harm onto others. If you are on a sidewalk, and you have a certain walking path every single morning, and there’s always somebody smoking on that path, and they don’t know it, but there’s secondhand smoke goes down half a block, And it attacks your lungs, they are doing harm on you, whether you know it or not.

    So it is unethical.

    Ident suppose, what can and what should you do about it?

    For example I met a dude named Scott, who is always smoking this one spot in Culver City, wearing his red vest, he claims he works there but he looks homeless and dirty? Not sure I talked with him, and he seemed kind of normal, but slightly a little weird? Anyways, I asked him nicely to not smoke there on the main street because it gets into my lungs whatever, but then he told me to not walk on the sidewalk. Or to walk on the other side?

    Or he told me to keep walking?

    First, I think the major issue here is repeated exposure. Maybe if I was in Venice Beach or whatever, in which I’ll never see the person again this is different, but because I see him almost every single day or every other day, this is very annoying and upsetting to me.

    So obviously the first idea is to have a conversation with him. He had the audacity to tell me “If you don’t like it keep walking”. 

    So some several issues here.

    First, once again, no I will not keep walking. Because the issue is the regularity and the continued exposure. Once again if you’re in Santa Monica, and you see a homeless guy smoking a cigarette, or looking like he is cracked out, often in that situation the best strategy is don’t engage with crazy drugged out homeless people.

    However, if the person looks like an irrational human being, mentally there, then isn’t having an intelligent conversation with somebody worth it?

    Second I guess the big thing is I always saw it and I pointed out to him, that there’s literally a sign there that says no smoking. Like the big cigarette icon with the big red circle and the strike through it. I pointed out to him and he said that “oh, I never saw that.”

    I also suppose there’s a difference, if the person is homeless or a squatter versus they actually work there?

    Legality?

    Then at this point, let’s assume that is private property, but the property owner put a do not smoke sign out. Then according to the rules of the private property, you can and should enforce it. Is that what you do is you talk to Security, or you called the property manager etc. And you report them.

    But let us say that it is a more of a grey zone; like they are smoking a cigarette kind of close to a restaurant which is actually illegal in Los Angeles and most of California I believe. In this case, what do you do, call the cops on the person?

    Or… Let us say that you approach somebody and you try to talk to them rationally, and then they threaten you with some sort of physical violence, or they do physically assault you? Then I suppose what you could do is bust out your iPhone camera, Start recording them, and then you could get them arrested?

    I suppose the only thing you don’t want to get done to you is to get stabbed or shot with a gun, you don’t want to die.

    I mean I suppose for myself, I could take a hit or an injury, I just don’t want to die.

    So maybe, just be careful if you think they might have a gun?


    Not being a pushover

    So I think the problem with most people nowadays, especially people my age the millennial generation I was born in 1988, we are a very non-confrontational generation. And honestly most people are.

    The first thing is don’t let nobody push you around, don’t be a pushover. If there’s something you don’t like you had to speak up, and it is a good idea to make a fuss out of it even bit may seem trivial.

    So for me, the only thing I really hit on the planet is cigarette smoke, secondhand smoke. Especially having a father who was a heavy smoker, I hate the smell of secondhand cigarette more than the devil.

    And also, a big issue here is that I have a kid now, and me and Seneca often walk down that street and we smelled the secondhand smoke. So once again, you’re not just standing up for yourself but for your kid.

    I think the tricky thing with ethics is we should not invoke children because if you’re talking about kids you’re just kind of blaming them. Or you’re putting them in the crossfire. You should never make your kid apologize for nothing, it is your role as the guardian, The father to essentially have a spine and not be a pussy.

    What is a hero?

    I Also suppose the issue at hand is  things that upset you, versus things that could actually damage your harm others, whether it be your family, your kid, your kids etc.?

    I think the first practical thought is not to be a social justice warrior for all of society, this is too fake. First just protect your wife and your kid, the most difficult thing.

    Then after that your clan, your best friends, your squad.

    Treat others you would like to be treated?

    The golden rule, treating other people that way you would like to be treated, not perfect but still kind of a good rule. 



  • The Philosophy of Goals

    So, is a goal a good idea, or is it not?


    My personal thought right now is goals are not the path. Instead, I prefer the idea of principles, thoughts, patterns, or general values.

    So I’ve had random goals in my life and I’ve hit all of them, financial personal fame etc.

    And also… And weightlifting, lifting the mythical 1000 pounds.

    Now, my personal thought is trying to focus on more important things like for example, deeper thoughts, deeper philosophies etc.

    And also, trying to pioneer new ideas that are hugely practical and pragmatic, which could help other people. And obviously thinking through things to help myself. 

    So currently, a huge thought on my mind is financial, living, lifestyle etc.

    So for example, I think a lot of people, maybe around my age, I’m 36 years old, born in 1988; a lot of people are into trying to buy a house or something? Not sure?

    So I think and wonder, I think the big question about buying a house, buying your property, single-family home etc.


    Financial leverage?

    So the first critical thought to consider is financial leverage.

    So I think the number one critical thing is the interest rate. And also the philosophy of interest.

    So obviously everyone needs somewhere to live, but if you need to live somewhere you could just rent. So the question is what is the purpose of purchasing a home, especially if you need to buy it not all in cash?

    100% cash offer?

    So then the big question at hand is should you buy a house if you have to mortgage it or borrow money from the bank?

    So there are all these really really sophisticated financial instruments, remortgaging your house, refinancing it or whatever… And somehow being able to draw equity from it?

    I have no idea how this works, but still, my general gut feeling is that having to deal or mess with anything in the physical realm seems like a losing bet.

    Why? First, the critical issue here is that you’re playing with the laws of physics gravity and time. Which is a very very fragile position to be in because boom, your roof goes out, the foundation of your home is in disrepair, you could easily be out $100,000 or $200,000 without blinking.

    The idea?

    The difference between a man and a woman–

     I think women seek to buy a home and own a home as a conduit for safety security etc. A man might want to buy a house as a gesture of supporting and providing for the family, etc.

    And or, maybe if you want to be a man in the high castle, do you want to build yourself a fortress?

    But if you think of yourself like Achilles… And you think about the Greece versus Trojans, you don’t want to have a choice you essentially create a prison for yourself.

    I think actually what we want is power, domination.

    Is it that Achilles wanted? And what he cared for? Briesis his “rightful” prize, so, an unintended side consequence, getting revenge for his best friend Patroclus by avenging his death by killing Hector.

    My personal read is actually… Achilles, all he cared for is actually the lust for battle.  Seems this is when Achilles is at his finest; she is a warrior demigod, a mean green killing machine. 

    Maybe happiness is not the goal?

    Aristotle says all men to be happy, and it is one good that people seek for the sake in itself.

    I beg to differ, I think a little different; maybe what we really do desire instead, is the lust for battle, domination, and conquering?

    For example what is it that Alexander the great wanted to do? To essentially conquer the known modern world. What does America want? The same. 

    “Defense”

    Apparently there are all these laws that we have the legal right to self-defense, but nobody has the legal right of offense.

    And also where things get tricky is if let us say that you have a gun and somebody else might or might not have a gun, and you’re afraid of your life in danger or your kids life in danger whatever… And you shoot first, in preemptive self-defense, and then boom you found out that the other guy Was just trying to reach for a cigarette or whatever, then what?

    I think things are very very tricky if it has to deal with the life of your child, or as a conduit, your life as it means to protect your child?

    So for example, I have zero interest in performing fake bravado and getting shot by some skinny fat loser with a beard, and dying to try to act tough, because if this is the case Seneca will not have a father.

    So I think you’re very important thing to think about and consider is you’re not just thinking about your own life, but, also, the future life of your son, your daughter, your kids, or even potentially your future kids?

    so what is it here we really want?

    I think in America, there is a notion of security. Of settling down, stability etc.

    But is this a good goal?

    Once again, it all depends on who you are, your value ethics and morality etc.

    So for example, considering that I love powerlifting, one Max lifting, my notion of safety is different than the over generalized notion of safety for somebody else.

    For example, maybe somebody who is more of a boring person, might like to do things more of a bodybuilding style, like doing predictable repetitions, sets, using the loser cable machine etc. And their goal is more towards developing a look and physique, rather than building their courage, strength, power and dominance.

    And this is why, at the end of the day… The biggest dick in the room will always be the guy who could lift the most.

    So for example, if you’re at the gym, which is the modern day arena, if you could lift 1000 pounds, your dick is 1 trillion times bigger than the guy with the big chest, who could only bench press 325 pounds or something.

    I think once again, the truth of the matter is when you’re at the gym, everyone is trying to be the biggest dick in the room. And I think that is fine; everyone tries to seek it a different way. 

    For example some people end up being the weird calisthenics or weird mobility people because they think that it makes them feel dominant, others tried to do it with muscular size and steroids, other guys try to do it with increasing their one rep max number also taking steroids.

    So here… To compete with other random strangers in the gym or the world is a bad idea because if that is your ultimate goal, you’re probably sooner or later going to take steroids or something.

    Also this is where I trust zero professional sports, even the regulated ones in the Olympic; if you want to win and get the goal… You’re going to take steroids or other weird drugs, to give you an edge.

    Same goes with actors, actresses etc.… The whole industry is not good because it’s see extreme novelty and weirdness; women will end up doing strange plastic surgery and augmentation surgery, men will also be taking steroids other stuff to get the great on camera physique.

    Like let us consider… If there is a scene in the superhero movie in which you’re taking off your shirt, obviously you want to look like a superhero, like a god. That shot might only be like 10 seconds, but it is whatever everyone is going to be talking about in the next 10 years. So obviously from this perspective, the optimal strategy to take steroids, and promise that you won’t ever do it again later. 

    What does this happen? Obviously not. 

    Leg thoughts

    I have this simple idea of a never sitting lifestyle. You’re never sitting in a chair, on the couch, or in a car, doesn’t matter if you have a Rolls-Royce or whatever.

    So what is super interesting is that now, I have the 60 pound weight vest, which has totally changed my life. Every single morning without fail, I always put it on, and do my morning walks with it. Within a very very short period of time, it has improved my Physiology 1 trillion fold; my posture is superior, I stand up straighter, I’m just far stronger more handsome, more glorious!

    And, the biggest benefit is that what I’m sitting down, with it… I realize, how poor sitting is for you.

    People say that sitting is the new smoking, I think maybe instead… Sitting is the new Poison?

    Why sitting is toxic for you 

    First, there is actually no physiological reason why you need to sit, unless you’re crippled in a wheelchair.

    For example, there is no reason why you can’t use a standing desk, if you’re tired, your legs are tired whatever, instead of trying to self yourself to keep working and be productive, the easiest thing is to just lie down on your back and take a nap!

    And also… Even taking it a step further, there’s no real reason you need to even stand at a desk anymore, the idea is to just have an iPad Pro, and walk around while you’re doing your work! You could even have an iPhone or iPhone Pro, and ideally just do all of your walking outside while you take meetings or do work related things?

    Even if you have to send an email for a living, or take phone calls for a living, the ideal would just to just maybe have AirPods on, to just walk around nature and do your meetings on your phone? And do your emails just doing voice dictation, in nature or on a hike?

    ANTI OFFICE MINDSET

    It is the year 2024, I don’t understand it… Why are corporations and companies, especially the big tech ones, still forcing their employees to have to come into the office, even once a week or something?

    The only reasonable explanation is some sort of Panopticon monitoring Security thing; you’re fearful that your employees are getting lazy and unproductive, slacking off at home, therefore you force him to go into the office, to assert your domination and power over them.

    Ethical imperatives?


  • BRAVE NEW WORLD OF DIGITAL CAPITAL

    Capital, capitalism, assuming you own an iPhone, any smartphone, assume you have Wi-Fi at the house or a 4G or 5G connectivity thing, assuming that you have a car an automobile etc.; and also, assuming that you don’t grow your own vegetables and groceries etc., then what that then means is you are a part of society and capitalism.


    Don’t be a hippie 

    I think I figured it out… The notion of being a “hipster”, essentially it’s just a hyphenated form of saying hippies or hippy–

    Funny enough, studying a bit of the etymology of the word hippie, comes from the word hip, like same hip as in hip hip-hop. Although now, we think of that weirdos vegan cults flower worshiping and war hippies and the like, not the gangsta hip-hop rappers that we think of today.

    And actually what is very interesting, considering I was born in 1988, and grew up in the East Bay Alameda Oakland, Bay Area 510 rap hip-hop KEAK DA SNEAK, E40 hyphy movement ,,, my flavor of hip-hop and rap culture that I grew up was very different than the strange hip-hop culture today, and also a bit different from the mainstream 50 Cent gangsta idea that was popularized in the 2000s.

    Anyways, I think what is so fascinating to me about capital, digital capital, digital capitalism and the like is how insanely paradigm shift it is.

    Why?

    So the first question is… Why or why does this all matter?

    First, assuming you’re a photographer, digital photographer etc.; what that then means is you and all of us we are all implicated! And I think this is a good thing; digital is good, digital is better!

    For example, besides what all these virtue signaling hipsters say, I really do think that digital photography is 1 trillion times superior and now more virtuous than film. I think film was a good fling, but now in the year 2024… And now that the new Lumix S9 Camera is out with the phenomenal 26 mm F8 pancake lens, there’s almost 0 reasons to shoot film anymore. And zero reasons to shoot any loser Leica camera.

    Your opinion will change with technology and the times 

    Technology does matter; for example, in the past, it did make a difference. For example the original Leica M9 camera was a big deal at the time because full frame was simply too big, too bulky, not very accessible. At least in a small form factor. But now, in the year 2024 and beyond… Technology has changed and shifted.

    2024 — everything has changed!

    For example, for a long time, film photography did indeed look superior to digital photos. But now with new digital technologies, I would actually make the bold claim that digital photos with the right image processing filters, can actually look superior and more supreme to film photos. 

    For example, on the new Lumix S9 camera, we essentially have this “dynamic Leica monochrome” filter, with high contrast, grain added… the photos look phenomenal! Even deeper and richer contrast than my beloved Ricoh GR cameras?

    Even a random thing that I never really expected… there’s this new “LUT” concept — I think it’s from cinema or video or something, which I think is just a fancy word for color preset or film grading for cinema and media.

    Anyways, one of the built-in included LUT filters is like this really lovely cross processing color filter which shifts and brings out this really lovely orange cyan hue — the photos look beautiful! And also, when shooting 24 FPS video on it, it looks so beautiful and cinematic! I call the new Lumix S9 baby Godzilla!

    Digital is supreme

    Anyways, some reasons why I think this matters and why I care; the big one is I think we should lean really really hard into digital, the digital aesthetic the digital concept etc. I think there is too much pain misery and suffering in the world of photography and especially, digital photography. Everyone is having this weird small man complex, in which they and we never feel good enough in anything, until they somehow get some really really expensive mythical camera? And this is ridiculous because not only is it not sustainable, financially it is ridiculous.

    Let us consider that honestly at this point a Leica camera is just like a Panasonic LUMIX camera with a body kit. Kind of like how a Porsche 911 is just like a Volkswagen beetle on steroids! Or even, how a Lamborghini is essentially a Volkswagen Passat on steroids!

    Think different, become different, become superior?!


    Why driving is bad for your soul

    In America, the weird bias is somehow we have all been suckered into thinking that for some reason or another, it is desirable and good to desire own and drive, and experience forms of cars?

    For example, whether that be a Lamborghini with scissor doors or a Porsche 911 GT 3RS or whatever, why is it that we desire these things?

    The other day I actually had to drive to downtown late last night, to pick up Cindy, and it was probably one of the stupidest decisions that I made, me, thinking my machismo bravado was doing a good thing, in fact, was a really really dumb idea. Why? I have been driven at night for so long, but it was so tiring, so exhausting, and actually I forgot… Driving at night is actually really really hard on the eyes. You can’t see shit, in about after driving 40 minutes there, and a speedy 15 minutes back, leaving at 7 PM and coming back at 8 PM… I was destroyed and so exhausted.

    I think it was a good reminder to me, perhaps a nice wake up call because so much of American consumerist capitalist culture is centered around all of these ridiculous notions of sitting on your butt. Let us consider how much the ultimate desire is to somehow be sitting, sedentary? 

    For example, it doesn’t matter if you’re driving $1 million Bugatti car or whatever, as long as you’re in a position, you are in a fragile, undo dominant position. Doesn’t matter if you’re in a Lamborghini or Rolls-Royce Pagani etc.… It’s like you’re sitting on a big dick.

     I wonder if there are more studies on this, just how terrible and bad that your physiology and body becomes when you are forced to sit all day, or even, stand all day in a secondary position, indoors, under fluorescent or LED lights, without exposure to the real worlds, the direct UV suns of outside, etc.?

    Even a nice thing in Southeast Asia if they have a lot of these Eco resorts which you could just take a shower or a bath in a bathtub outside in the direct elements?

    A random aside; I met the neighborhood kids who got a chameleon as a pet. He discovered it somewhere. He told me that actually, the chameleon changes colors in the direct sun outside in the direct UV radiation of natural light, but it doesn’t work with fake lights.

    Even assuming that you had the world‘s best fake UV sunlight set up thing… It might only ever be 2% as good as the real sun.

    In fact one of the things I’m trying to fight against is how everyone has sun phobia or UV phobia now. Certainly if your genetic heritage is from northern Sweden, to be in the direct Vegas sun all day without any hats or long sleeve clothing or sunblock seems like a bad idea. Everyone is so afraid of some cancer skin cancer or whatever. But I’m wondering… How much of this is for marketing, to sell you overpriced “eco-friendly“ $30 sunblock or loser “UV protection” sunglasses– Luxor exotica essentially owns all of the sunglasses brands in America and beyond; they have a real monopoly overall the sunglasses, it doesn’t matter how cool you want to look, I’m sure they all get made in the same factory and mean in China for about $.50, and they market up to $300! Everyone wants to seem cool and look cool, all under the guys that they want to protect their eyeballs from the sun.

    I think we’re wearing a hat is natural, a wide brim hat, a sun hat, maybe even a sombrero. But not sunglasses, this is very unnatural. It is almost like having condoms for your eyeballs, not natural. Same thing with AirPods or noise canceling headphones, essentially condoms for your ears. And this is bad because I actually think that you have more wisdom and sensory perception in your ears Than your eyeballs, even though I am a photographer and a visual artist, in terms of joy, I think I might get 1000 X more joy from music than visual artwork. And I also think that there is 10,000 times more in intelligence and wisdom in your ears than your eyes.

    In terms of evolution, I think actually most organisms first develop years and hearing before eyes or visual senses?

    The digital transformation of capital and the economy

    I think this is what is so difficult for people to understand and grasp, even scientist who are supposed to think first principles. Rather than think about analogies, like how things were done in the past, and trying to iterate based on the past, much more interesting to Start with the clean slate, from scratch, thinking and trying to consider how things could and should be, rather than how things always have been.

    I think this is difficult for most basic people because once again, to think first principles is both gutsy, ballsy, unorthodox, unconventional, and also requires some sort of childlike mindset, in which you are not held back by the past.

    For example, the reason why you should trust no traditional thinkers, or why a lot of college dropouts are so successful, like Mark Zuckerberg is that they knew that the traditional path was not as interesting or meaningful; and that instead,  they would be able to change the course of the human race by not being stuck in some sort of academic hamster wheel.

    In fact, there is a story about Peter Thiel in which he was on track to become some sort of big shot judge or something somewhere, but eventually he didn’t make it, at first although he was dismayed, 20 years later when his law school buddy met him he said “with a grin, aren’t you happy you didn’t get that clerkship? Because otherwise he wouldn’t have started PayPal and wouldn’t be the billionaire today.

    everything happens as it should have happened

    I think this is also a difficult thing to consider; certainly there are lots of bad things that happen in our life, but with enough foresight in hindsight, plus or minus 30 years,  you discover that actually, everything precisely happened as it should have happened, precisely for the best reason possible.

    I don’t think of this like some sort of weird mystical woo hoo, I just think of it more like a practical thing; things happen, sometimes randomly, and the best way to live life is to take a stomach and optimistic approach;

    Is it possible that this “bad” thing that happened to me today, could have actually have been the best possible thing that ever befell me? 

    For example, there is this one Taoist story in which a man has a son, who was riding horse, fell off, and broke his legs or back or something. It was seen as very bad and unfortunate. But a week later, the province declares war on a different territory, and because the sun was injured, didn’t get drafted in the war, and as a consequence, doesn’t get killed in the combat. Then later, one of the village chief remarks, “aren’t you so happy that your son ended up injuring himself by falling off that horse, so he didn’t go to war and died?”

    No I think this is a hard thing, because nobody could think about the future, nobody knows.

    So whenever things happen, whether they’re good or bad, or even weather good; know that things happen, and the best way forward is to take everything in the positive!

    Even let us say that you won the lottery and became a billionaire or whatever, let us say as a consequence you get addicted to drugs meth cocaine heroin and prostitutes and strippers, and this destroys your life. Totally possible.

    Wealth could be some of the worst things that happens to your family 

    Not always but often I see a lot of kids for trust fund kids or aren’t you really wealthy families become degenerates, super lazy and unambitious.

    Maybe one of my biggest benefits of being born and raised poor was actually, this was the biggest benefit of all time; — he gave me the fire for entrepreneurship and self-reliance; I am sure if I was born to a well to do middle class or rich family, I would probably be some sort of generic something else. 



  • The 30 Year Body

    Think 30 Years Ahead

    The 30 Year Body

    My interesting funny idea:

    Think 30 years ahead

    Podcast


    So, how is this manifested?

    First, I think at least 30 years ahead; for example, Seneca is currently 3 1/2 years old, my mom is 70, I am 36; so 130 years, Seneca will be 33, I will be 66, my mom will be 100. Hopefully 30 years Seneca will have his own kid. 

    The reason I like 30 years that it cuts through a lot of nonsense, and the truth is… If you want to build anything really great, it takes a long time. You cannot build Rome overnight.

    Even Jeff Bezos his insanely genius concept; he’s been building up Amazon since the 90s, he had at least a 30 year plus vision.

    Why 30 years?

    So in terms of working out weight lifting etc.; Michael is to have a six pack even at the age of 66!

    Then what that means is you could take your time. You can miss the work out here and there, enjoy a few off days and bad days because in the midst of a 30 year horizon, you can lift more strategically, more intelligently.

    Also, a lot of these folks who take steroids and whatever… They are seeking success right now, or maybe in the 5 to 10 year span. But once you’re Ronnie Coleman, and essentially a cripple, none of it is worth it.

    Even a good thing about Arnold, he was able to get out of the game had a good time, so he did not become a cripple. I have a theory about Arnold Schwarzenegger, he probably knew that steroids and bodybuilding was not sustainable, so he got out of the game at his peak, knowing that taking steroids long-term was probably not a good idea.

    People talk about the good old golden days of bodybuilding… But everyone was on steroids! Even then.

    The reason why this matters is because I even hear stories of young guys, in their 20s, we have taken so many steroids that they are no longer able to beget children? The ultimate tragedy. It is almost like involuntary sterilization; even Nietzsche said that in the future, the most cruel thing one could do is force a certain population not to procreate. 

    Thou shalt not procreate! – The ultimate evil edict.


    Investing

    Everyone wants to make the quick gains, buy the loser Lamborghini whatever. Yet the real intelligence strategy is to think about building an empire for your kids kids kids. 

    “Generational wealth that’s the key, I started with shit so that shift started with me” — JAY Z

    This is where I think it is critical for any serious thinker philosopher entrepreneur innovator to have kids. Having kids, a wife, being married actually makes you a better investor because you no longer think for yourself, do you think for your family unit, the family business.

    Even Aristotle when he talks about economics (oecanomia)– essentially economics literally means management of household affairs; how you manage your slaves, your home finances labor accounting etc. Also funny thing back in the day… the slaves were the accountants. 

    Ultimately I’m a realist and a pragmatic person. I’m not interested in any sort of abstruse Macro economic theories; I’m interested in the now, the practical the day. Simple questions like how do I make money how do I retain how do I grow my capital, what is money etc.

    I also suppose what makes my approach unique is that I did not study economics in school, I studied sociology and later on self teaching myself philosophy, and currently self teaching myself economics through the Austrian economists like Karl Menger, and also practical economic thoughts from NASSIM TALEB (Antifragile), in my own personal crypto and bitcoin ideas, and also economic theories from Michael Saylor, the patron saint of bitcoin.

    Creating a legacy

    A legacy just means to build to me that will outlast you.

    An ancient Greek, kleos (forever glory, forever fame). The general idea is through a road act or deed, your name and your fame would last forever, kind of like King Leonidas and his valiant 300; we will remember them forever.

    I think the superficial thing that people try to do is they try to force a legacy by buying it; plus through your name on a urinal in the university of Southern California USC, urinal in the business school (true story) or putting your name on some sort of business school building.

    To me this is superficial at best; better to earn your name your legacy your KLEOS and immortal fame and glory through your heroic and valiant acts!

    For example, we will forever remember Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, and the like, we will forget Bill Gates, who only cares for money, and his physique that kills boners (Elon Musk tweet). I think also… For better or worse Donald Trump will be remembered, as well as Elon Musk, Jay-Z etc.

    Also Michael Saylor. 

    Can you force a legacy? 

    No. Just like trying to force kid to eat vegetables.

    I think maybe thinking about the 30 year body is an interesting idea because you essentially ideally want your physique your health in 30 years to be supreme! A thought and a theory; 

    Is it possible to have a superior physique at the age of 66, compared to the age of 36?

     Certainly I’m going to have more wrinkles in my face and whatever at the age of 66, but I actually wonder… Is it possible that I could train today and eat enough meat today, and get my testosterone up that in 30 years, I will actually be higher than now?

    I mean even at the age of 36, I’m 1 trillion times stronger and more handsome and I have a superior body and testosterone than I did when I was 26, and also compared to when I was 16. 

    20 years, I am superior at the age of 36 then I was at the age of 16… In terms of my muscles my body everything.

    Certainly at the age of 120, I’m probably not gonna be as good as I am today, but with enough foresight, I could start strategizing today!


    30 years or nothing!

    ERIC


  • FOCUS.

    The philosophy of focus:

    So, we are all photographers, thinkers entrepreneurs visionaries etc. To focus, I think at the end of the day, does seem to be a virtue.

    First, the ethics of focus, the first big idea is that things which distract us, or rob us of our focus, are third-party distractions, which often have some sort of advertising or marketing or product selling motive.

    For example, let us consider all of the ills of modern day life, which is modern media. Essentially anything which is supported by advertising is bad evil and should not be trusted.

    For example, anything on YouTube which has advertising or product placements or selling services are bad. Any podcast, Joe Rogan, anybody out there with subscribers, likes, comments, memberships, anyone who has some sort of monetary incentive behind things.

    Currently I am promoting bitcoin as a promise that it could solve at least 50% of the world’s problems; that is consider poverty injustice, high cost of living and rent… I actually do believe that these problems could be solved with bitcoin.

    For example, even poor spending habits, the issue with inflation is that even if I’m making $20 an hour working at McDonald’s, and the price of everything keeps going up… There is zero too little incentive to save. If my rent cost $3000 a month, and because of inflation in a few years it’ll be worth $4000 a month, incentive is to buy all the capitalistic consumer stuff while I could still afford it, Whether Nike or Jordan sneakers, certain cars, clothes etc.

    Also this is where Apple has been intelligent with iPhone; let us say that the iPhone Pro is $1000, or $999. This has been really relatively resistant to inflation; even though minimum wage keeps going up, essentially the price of the iPhone is not changing. Therefore if I am a typical working class poor person, and I’m being paid 16 or $20 an hour, incentive is to go out and purchase the iPhone Pro while I still can; because assuming the inflation keeps going up, in the near future I will no longer be able to afford that new iPhone Pro.

    Low prices?

    I think for the most part, a lot of the evils and ill society are issues with money, gambling, etc. At least this was the case in my family; my dad just sent you not having a job since I was two years old, gambling away the rent money etc. Assuming that my dad didn’t gamble away the rent money, like he was just a parasite but all he did was smoke cigarettes, watch television and movies, chill out the house… Assuming that were the case, at least he would be kind of a neutral party; but him having to threaten my mom with physical or mental or family violence, holding her at hostage or ransom, Forcing her to give him the rent money with physical force, saying that he was going to pay it himself, and then in the middle of the night driving off to Reno and gambling it away, which means my mom is already three months behind on rent… Certainly this is an evil that happened because of gambling and of course his own problems.

    the bad guy?

    Ultimately, one cannot point the finger at institution which is the casinos or whatever. Even now as a sober adult, haven’t gone to Vegas a few times, I find it to be very fun! I love going to wicked spoon, and having to all you can eat bone marrow, and all the great foods. But, I don’t have a gambling bone in my body; nor do I have a bone for smoking; essentially seeing all the bad stuff that my dad did, turned me off forever. This is where I have kind of a moralistic and ethical imperative against cigarettes, there’s nothing I hit more than cigarette smoke on the planet; The ultimate evil.

    What does focus mean?

    So focus, focusing… Assume you have a magnifying glass you could take the raise the sun, pinpointed to one point, and you could burn a hole through paper. Assuming you have a big enough magnifying glass, I wonder if you could even take the sun’s power and even make a hole through steel! Just think about all these James Bond’s movies.

    Anyways, I think maybe the focus in society in life should be similar; I am kind of OK fine mediocre and a lot of stuff, but assuming that life is finite, a hard cap of at least 122 years, then what that means is if I know with 100% precision that I will die before 122 years, Then the ethical imperative;

    How should I and how must I spend my life in a meaningful way?

    Assuming that practically almost all 8 billion of us on the planet have a phone, then what that means is everyone is a photographer because they make photos. Even my new friend Alexey show me an interesting street photo he shot in the hood, somebody who overdosed on fentanyl, ar a bus stop. Somewhere in South Central.

    And this is kind of a big deal because assuming that most of us live in cities, or assuming we all live in Los Angeles, anybody with an iPhone is a photographer, a street photographer.

    In fact, everything in the haptic shop is open source, free to download share remix four to your buddies or store on unlimited devices. For me this became an ethical imperative; because honestly, 99% of the roadblocks we face in photography has to do with some sort of penis envy for some sort of camera equipment; do you think the day that you could afford to buy the Leica, finally you will have a motivation to shoot or make great photos blah blah blah. Same goes with the iPhone Pro, which is actually, not that great.

    Also, objectively … Leica, Leica camera, is an inferior product and tool.  it is true that the craftsmanship is superior, but the overall product is inferior when you compare it to a Panasonic Lumix, or even a Fujifilm camera.

    I think what Germany has going for it is good marketing and brand. But everyone knows that any German car whether it be a BMW, Mercedes, Rolls-Royce, which is owned by BMW… maybach which is essentially a Mercedes with a body kit, is probably 1000 X inferior to any Japanese luxury car like Lexus or Toyota. In fact, a Lamborghini is just a Volkswagen Passat on steroids. A Lamborghini Urus SUV is just a Volkswagen touring on steroids. And a Porsche 911, 911 GT three RS is just like a Volkswagen beetle on steroids and a body kit.

    I’m currently using the full frame lumix S9 camera, been shooting some video on it… But actually a critical issue right now I’ve been discovering is the reason why micro 4/3, even maybe APSC sensors; or a smaller crop sensors might be superior is because you could focus far closer! Full frame cameras are very very difficult to focus especially up close and personal, and also the bigger issue is that the lenses become bigger heavier, more obtrusive, bulkier, harder to use.

    In fact, if you are a filmmaker, still… Getting some sort of micro 4/3 camera some sort of Panasonic lumix GH camera might be your best bet, because you can get the best lenses, with the best close focusing capabilities, the maximum aperture for the minimum amount of weight. And ultimately this is what matters the most; ultimately if you are a videographer photographer or cameraman, it comes down to weight and ease. In fact I think even most videographers especially aspiring filmmakers, maybe they should just get some sort of GoPro creator set up; just set it and forget it!

    Because 99.9% of the hurdle that creators face especially new ones is the technical hurdles, the technological issues. Even here may be an iPhone pro without any external accessories might be good for making films. Especially short ones. Anything that is not going to be a Hollywood blockbuster film. This is why I think Apple is trying to do all this marketing that you could shoot cinema on your iPhone Pro is kind of ridiculous; any real professional  Would use some sort of red dragon camera.

    I also feel bad perhaps the biggest issue here is everyone is trying to posture and look “pro”? But why?

    My thought is everyone has some sort of insecurity bias, a small man complex. Certainly everyone wants to feel big mighty and strong and successful whatever, but I also find this to be a little bit pointless because success, wealth and power, are not zero some; which means that assuming that capital is infinite, not a closed system, then that means that in theory, Anyone and everyone could become a billionaire, assuming that the global market multiplies by 1 trillion.

    And also,  because a lot of money is economic fictions, computer code, which means that any nerd with a computer could click a button and inject $1 trillion into the economy, what that then means is the upside for money is infinite!

    Certainly there are things which are scarce, like human time, labor, and bitcoin, but everything else… Has an infinite upside in theory?


    Why focus?

    I just think that it is an intelligent way to strategize life.

    I think the number one issue that a lot of people have, especially young folks that we don’t know what we should devote our lives to. As a consequence we just throw our interest at random in a bunch of Market Basket stuff, hoping that one will stick.

    But, to diversify our interest, is perhaps not a good idea. For example, if assuming you had a Mozart in your classroom, would you have your student waste his or her time learning Spanish or stuff that he or she would never really use? No! You would put them in one of those funny musical prodigy classes, have them devote 100% of their energy towards music, to become the next prodigy.

    I was also doing some research which is kind of funny that the whole idea of homeschooling was essentially invented because you had a lot of these young athletes students, getting ready for the Olympics, and they did not want to waste their time being stuck in the classroom. So the whole ethos was trying to devote most of the kids time and attention to maximize their sports performance, kind of what mainland China does, she is much more shameless than America. And also maybe be more successful.

    I think also that is why you see more record breaking Chinese Olympic weightlifters, because there is no stigma about taking steroids, performance enhancing drugs, and also, they don’t really have a egalitarian schooling system like we do in America.

    Anyways, I think to focus means to just value your life, your effort, your soul.

    Assuming that we believe in immortal soul, which means that once you die, your soul also dies… Why would you waste your life in anything superficial?



  • The virtues of changing your own oil

    About to change the oil on my 2010 Prius, I haven’t done this in a while since I was maybe 18… Or 16, maybe in the past it was because I didn’t have money to afford to pay somebody to do it for me, but now that I have the money, owrhaps the virtue of doing stuff yourself like changing your own oil is that first, a point of pride, second, demystifying the process which is very motivational and empowering, and third, annoyance and time?

    I think the annoyance and time thing is the biggest one; whenever you go to a place to get your oil change, you always have to wait in line, and you always feel stupid because you always feel like you overpaid? And the funny thing is it doesn’t really matter whether you’re rich or not, you’ll always feel ripped off?

    The feeling of getting a “good deal”?

    Sometimes and often times when the labor yourself could be a little bit foolish, but assume that you do it safely, don’t hurt yourself, and it just works out fine… Then maybe just doing stuff yourself is virtuous?

    And the feeling of pride; knowing that you use the top shelf oil, mobile one synthetic, in which you have this funny mental cactus that you feel like you’re getting superior performance and miles per gallon, even reality it might not make much of a difference ,,, but perhaps the thought and *perception* is what makes it all worth it!

    Pride

    Let it say you buy a new Ferrari or Lamborghini or whatever… Certainly if you drive it around you will feel a sense of pride?

    However, wouldn’t it be much more economical wise smart and more effective and efficient to instead, drive around your 2010 Prius, which you essentially got for free, and feel that same sense of pride, maybe even a superior sense of pride, without having to spend $500,000?

    Feeling *superior* pride?

    Once again, let me never forget… Then saying sense of pride and joy I had, buying my own car, my dream car… 1991 Nissan Sentra SE-R, two door coupe stick shift 5 speed manual, and having the pride that I paid for it myself, modified it myself, did all the labor myself, and also the insane pride that it wasn’t manual transmission not a automatic (auto-tragic haha)!

    It must have manual

    Even Seneca and I joke; whenever you see a race car or a sports car that has buttons or is automatic, which doesn’t have a manual transmission… It is a fake race car or a fake sports car! McLaren, Lamborghini most Porsche 911 GT3 RS’, Ferraris etc.

    Better to have a civic type R in stick shift, or even a GR Corolla, stick shift, instead of any of these other loser cars?


  • The Philosophy of Evolution

    Another big idea on my mind; the idea of evolution.

    So, the question is… Do you want to remain a Charmander, or level one forever, or do you want to become the Charizard, get the Firestone, and level up to 99, level 255 and beyond?

    The missing no hack

    So back in the days of Pokémon, the original red and blue, I never owned a game boy in my life but I had an emulator on my computer. I was able to play Pokémon red, 10 X speed, which is very useful in emulator because you could just run around a lot faster, save, and also advance through the levels much more quickly. 

    One big thing is in the game… There was some sort of glitch or a bug where you could jump on your whale, and there’s this one hidden island in which if you just kept going up and down it… You would meet a glitch in the game which was called the missing number (missing no), and if you fought it, with a certain Pokémon like a Snorlax… Essentially you could capture and level up a Snorlax, to be beyond the typical hard cap of 99.

    So in the world of Pokémon, essentially all Pokémon start off at level 1 or something, and you could advance it through training to level 99. But the hard cap was level 99. No matter how many more battles you did or experience points you gained, you could not go beyond level 99. 

    And this is where the missing no hack was so mind blowing at the time; through a simple glitch in the game, unbeknownst to its programmers, you could actually level up a Pokémon beyond level 99, when we all thought the hard cap was level 99, no, you could become a level 120, 200, maybe even 300?

    Does real life have hard caps?

    Another paradigm shift; do you remember when we were kids we were used to watch the who wants to be a millionaire, and the goal was to become a millionaire. But now if you’re a millionaire, you might be able to buy half of a decent condo somewhere in LA. Even nowadays, it is not uncommon to see single-family homes in Culver City sell for $3.2 million.

    And also I was shocked; I think Elon Musk is currently worth $270 billion? Even a decade ago, the idea that somebody could become a billionaire seems impossible, but now… A centi billionaire? I wouldn’t be shocked if in a decade he becomes a trillionaire. 

    Paradigm shift

    I recall when I was in Vietnam, around 2017… I started to first track bitcoin, windows around $300 a bitcoin. At the time, maybe the reason I didn’t buy it or invest in it because I didn’t really have a good reason to. I had already achieved my financial independence, And retired at the ripe age of 28 years old.

    In fact, she found that when I’m talking to people in LA, the greatest sign of success actually is just half jokingly tell people that I’ve been retired since I was 20 years old? And that I’m 36 years old right now and I’m still retired?

    I think typically, maybe the general idea of being retired is the point in which you no longer concern yourself with money, and that making money is an optional thing, maybe like a pastime game a hobby… But not an imperative; which means you don’t need to work in order to pay the rent or the bills or the mortgage. 

    Anyways, now that bitcoin is trading at around $66,000 a bitcoin, even when I first got into the game in around 2018 at around six to $7000 a bitcoin, I’ve already gone through them multiple roller coaster the emotional roller coaster many times over. And as a consequence, I’m not really concerned about prices anymore. Why? Because I’m playing the long game; 10 20, 30 years from now.

    Seeing my mom become a great grandmother?

    A new random life trajectory and goal; maybe wanting to have my mom live until my son Seneca gets married, and has a kid of his own?

    That would be wild, my mom is currently around 70, and assuming that even on the aggressive case, he might have a kid at the age of 33… My mom has to live at least another 30 years, ideally healthy and full of physical figure and mental consciousness.

    Than 30 years from now, I will be 66 years old… Still in my prime period and Seneca will be 33 years old.

    30 year cycles?

    Maybe this becomes interesting to me because a generation is 30 years. Cindy and I got married on paper when we were 24… And now that this upcoming December I guess we are celebrating our 10 year wedding anniversary! Pretty wild.

    Anyways, then thinking about your kid and their future becomes quite easy and straightforward. I think maybe a lot of the modern day malaise that people suffer is that they have nothing to live for; because they are not married, they don’t have kids, nor do they intend to have kids.

    I get it, some people never find the right partner, some people with good hearts end up going through bad marriages and getting divorced two or three times, some people might physiologically be too old to bear children. But assuming that you are a healthy able bodied person, I almost feel like there’s no reason to not have a kid.

    I think the big secret is raising a kid is actually honestly not that hard. Certainly in the early years, the first six months, is very physical psychologically painful, but then again, I would imagine that navy seal training might be 100 times harder.

    And for everyone who’s concerned that their kid is going to end up being screwed up or whatever… No. Why? Because you yourself are well adjusted, you yourself have good morals and ethics, which means that your kid will be fine.

    Also… Maybe something I need to rally against is this alarmism, like the world is going to melt or whatever. A decade ago they called this global warming, and now they call climate change or now they talk about the carbon footprint or something? The verbiage in the lingo always changes, but the general idea of the world going to overpopulate and exploit has been going on for millennia; The Malthus fallacy.

    I think what a lot of these fools and goody two shoers don’t understand is that technology, human ingenuity is not linear or scalar, which means, the planet is not zero sum.

    For example, people talk about the carbon footprint blah blah blah but they never actually critically give it any thought. Now that we have ChatGPT at our hands and we can search this information in real time, what I discovered is the concentration of carbon dioxide in the earth’s atmosphere is currently .0421%, in 30 years ago in 1993 it was approximately .0357%,,, which means that the percentage point increase of carbon dioxide levels in the last 30 year was was only .0064% percentage points? 

    The current concentration of carbon dioxide (CO₂) in Earth’s atmosphere is 0.0421%, and 30 years ago, in 1993, it was approximately 0.0357%. This represents a 0.0064 percentage point increase in CO₂ levels over the past 30 years

    Honestly, all of this hysteria about the carbon footprint, I think it is just another way for these vegan solar power plant corporations to make a quick buck.  or even worse, politicians to sign certain things to enrich in themselves and their buddies, behind back doors.

    In fact, if I could tell you with 100% certainty that 5000 years from now, the planet will be fine, it might be 20% worse than it is right now, 20% better, or about the same as it is in the year 2024… Would that change how you live your life?

    what is in our control, what is not in our control?

    I think the first thing to consider is things like climate change or plan change or whatever is certainly not really in our locus of control. Certainly things you could do  is like thinking about tailpipe mission; if you have ever smelled a car without a catalytic converter attached, you know how toxic it is. Or the secondhand cigarette smell smoke, also very toxic. Or secondhand marijuana smoke, which I also hate.

    Anyways, I think the big idea here is try to just focus on things which you could control, where you could actually make a meaningful impact, rather than trying to save the whole “planet“? Which seems to be kind of a ridiculous goal? 



  • The New Digital Slumlords

    Facebook, Amazon, Twitter Instagram Meta, TikTok YouTube etc.?

    Essentially any sort of digital hosting platform which is “free“, they are the new digital slumlords? 

    Everyone loves to hate and complaining about these slumlords, who rent us a really terrible apartment, at unreasonable prices, never fix anything, and are essentially bad and evil people. Yet nobody ever points the finger at the big tech companies? Why? Because they offer you “free” marketing platforms… I wonder, what are more freedom ways we could market ourselves which do not require us to use these toxic platforms to simply get our message across?

    The first most simple one is just your website, your blog. A website and a blog is essentially the same thing at this point. A digital domain, it’s almost like having a digital house or a digital business or a digital property in cyberspace? Like having your own address.

    No YouTube?

    A big one to disrupt his YouTube. I suppose TikTok and to some extent Instagram and Instagram stories, and now Twitter is doing the same, but still… YouTube is by far the dominant platform. Why? Having YouTube at this point is almost like having access to free flowing water or electricity; we cannot imagine the world without it.

    But, I guess now that I’m stupid rich, I don’t technically need to anymore. And also in terms of getting my message across, I suppose I’ve already done it really well?

    I think they’ll lure of YouTube in these platforms is that it will make getting our message across more effective, to maximize our impact?

    But I suppose the nuance is; if you have to use toxicity, to maximize our desired outcome, perhaps it is not worth it?

    For example, if in fact, using a toxic platform could leverage your impact by 10 X, would it be worth it? Maybe not. Even 1000 X or 10,000 X? Maybe not.

    So I wonder… If it is better, more profound to just make an insanely massive impact, on your own small audience, your own sport in 300, rather than try to convert the whole planet, all 8 billion of us to believe what you believe? # The New Digital Slumlords

    Facebook, Amazon, Twitter Instagram Meta, TikTok YouTube etc.?

    Essentially any sort of digital hosting platform which is “free“, they are the new digital slumlords? 

    Everyone loves to hate and complaining about these slumlords, who rent us a really terrible apartment, at unreasonable prices, never fix anything, and are essentially bad and evil people. Yet nobody ever points the finger at the big tech companies? Why? Because they offer you “free” marketing platforms… I wonder, what are more freedom ways we could market ourselves which do not require us to use these toxic platforms to simply get our message across?

    The first most simple one is just your website, your blog. A website and a blog is essentially the same thing at this point. A digital domain, it’s almost like having a digital house or a digital business or a digital property in cyberspace? Like having your own address.

    No YouTube?

    A big one to disrupt his YouTube. I suppose TikTok and to some extent Instagram and Instagram stories, and now Twitter is doing the same, but still… YouTube is by far the dominant platform. Why? Having YouTube at this point is almost like having access to free flowing water or electricity; we cannot imagine the world without it.

    But, I guess now that I’m stupid rich, I don’t technically need to anymore. And also in terms of getting my message across, I suppose I’ve already done it really well?

    I think they’ll lure of YouTube in these platforms is that it will make getting our message across more effective, to maximize our impact?

    But I suppose the nuance is; if you have to use toxicity, to maximize our desired outcome, perhaps it is not worth it?

    For example, if in fact, using a toxic platform could leverage your impact by 10 X, would it be worth it? Maybe not. Even 1000 X or 10,000 X? Maybe not.

    So I wonder… If it is better, more profound to just make an insanely massive impact, on your own small audience, your own Spartan 300, rather than try to convert the whole planet, all 8 billion of us to believe what you believe? 


  • The Philosophy of Art

    So just went to the Mr. brainwash art gallery in Beverly Hills, and I am blown away; it was the most fun, enjoyable, uplifting, playful, inspirational and motivational art exhibit of all time.

    why this matters 

    This is a big deal. Why this is a big deal.

    First,  life without art would be a mistake. Life without art is not a life worth living.

    For example, if you think about all of capitalism and consumerism, I think much of it is predicated on art.

    For example, what is clothing in fashion? It is essentially art fabric sculptures for your body, your human body!

    What is a car? Moving sculpture, a metal steel based thing which is secondly a piece of transportation.

    Has nobody figured out how insanely important cyber truck is; essentially it is the ultimate modernist expression of moving sculpture?

    I actually have a vision; gloss red cyber truck,  with yellow calipers, or yellow rims… Essentially imagine looking at like a fake Ferrari, but cyber truck.


    the best art

    A lot of people say art for art sake, but following in the footsteps of Nietzsche,  I think actually the purpose of art isn’t art for art say, rather, it is art for the sake of happiness joy, the great stimulus to life!

    In fact, I have a theory… When a lot of people become emo, sad dark and rose, is this issue here they are simply not having enough great art in their life?

    Even being at the Mr. brainwashing exhibition, they were just playing some great OG classical music on the speakers, and even hearing the great classical music put me in such good mood!

    Maybe I’ll start to listen to more classical music?

    The best

    Classicus,,, the ancient Romans, typically when we think about the word classic we tend to think about old school. But actually… In ancient Rome classicus, the elite class,,, “classicus” or “classic” simply meant “the best”.

    So then, what life then becomes about isn’t seeking the old school for the sake of the old school, but rather, seeking the best? 

    Why the best?

    Why not?

    Joy!

    I think nowadays, to be joyful unhappy in today’s world is a great act of courage? It is easy to be emailed depressed, sad, to opine about how the world is going to explode whatever. It takes much more courage to be joyful, happy and gleeful, to be the gay monster admits all of the emoness? 


    Choose Joy

    I prefer the word joy over happiness. Why? I think happiness is too much of a consumerist merchandised concept now. Troy is a lot simpler, like joy to the world!

    Music, what is music? Joy to our ears and to our soul.

    What is art, photography, paintings images and sculpture? Joy to our visual brain senses?

    Participatory art

    I think what is so amazing and what was so fun at the Mr. brainwash art exhibit was how almost all the exhibitions, you could interact with it! And also you are encouraged to photograph and video everything!

    A lot of modern art exhibitions and museums is that they are cold and sterile, and it feels like you’re not allowed to photograph or shoot stuff?

    In fact, I’m even thinking about doing a photograph workshop in Beverly Hills, maybe we could all go to the Mr. brainwash art museum together, have fun like a bunch of kids, and be inspired together?

    My vision of art: my vision is that art should be open to everybody, accessible to everybody, and also, fun for everybody! It should be no, not pretentious, not fake. Also, it should be free, open to the public, accessible to anybody, doesn’t matter if you’re 70 years old or three years old;

    I killed that art might be able to solve 50% of the world’s problems, maybe the other 50% can be bitcoin.

    Or even a more radical idea; if you combine bitcoin and art, 50% +50% is 100%. Then… Can bitcoin art be the solution to the maladies of the planet? 

    Maybe! Perhaps I’ll try and pioneer this!

    Bitcoin art is the way

    Great artist steal.

    Also, great artist “up cycle”, recycle, sample, remix, and parody the classics!

    This is where our source is so appealing to me; I hate restrictions, I hate copyright in laws; I prefer freedom.

    In fact in two days brave new digital world, I’ve ChatGPT and AI… The whole copyright model is broken.

    For example, certainly creators need to make money and a profit, but the big issue here is that all the craters are essentially slaves to corporations, and looks like a lot of these new digital slumlords, who control the “content“ of its creators… What they are essentially seeking is a mini of control, within a small mileau, trying to assert control and power in their very small domain?

    Nvidia is close to a $4T company??

    I was shocked, apparently now that the number two most world’s important company is Nvidia, right after Apple?

    In fact, I actually wonder if Nvidia is more valuable than Apple. The only reason why Apple is valuable is because they have the iPhone, but if and when Nvidia creates their own phone, that doesn’t require an iPhone, this will be a big deal?

    How to art

    There are so many ways you could art.

    So one funny idea I have is just taking famous artworks of the past, and copy pasting bitcoin icons on top of it. This is essentially the hilarious parody that Mr. brainwashed with a lot of these classical paintings, and also Banksky,  the art of uncovering BS?

    the problem about the art world

    I think the biggest problem about the art world is everyone is using irony sarcasm and fake big talk to try to inflate their fragile egos, and into control running their mini fiefdoms? 

    A writer and thinker that I’m kind of into right now is Saifedean — who wrote the bitcoin standard and the fiat standard. I first read his books because I was curious about bitcoin, but what I found very very fascinating was his critiques about art, the art world, and modernism and modern architecture? He’s kind of like NASSIM TALEB in that way (both Lebanese, Lebanese-American) — very outspoken, calls out BS. 

    If you have ever been to a modern art exhibit, and you see a piece of white paper with a hole in it, and it’s worth $1 million, and you’re scratching your head, I’m with you.

    Honestly, more or less all of modern day art is a scam, but that’s OK. You don’t have to participate if you don’t want to! Nobody is strong arming you to do so!

    The new art

    My personal vision is that I want to disrupt the art world. I certainly have done it for the world of street photography; essentially I killed all of these loser skinny fat anemic notions in street photography of what is considered good or bad, essentially the funny thing with photography is that while it should on paper be the most democratic open and egalitarian form of photography, as the streets are public and should be public and accessible to everybody… Once again, all of these ridiculous ivory towers?


    Now what?

    Maybe now I have some sort of moral or ethical imperative to make a difference?

    ERIC



  • The Philosophy of Art

    So just went to the Mr. brainwash art gallery in Beverly Hills, and I am blown away; it was the most fun, enjoyable, uplifting, playful, inspirational and motivational art exhibit of all time.

    why this matters 

    This is a big deal. Why this is a big deal.

    First,  life without art would be a mistake. Life without art is not a life worth living.

    For example, if you think about all of capitalism and consumerism, I think much of it is predicated on art.

    For example, what is clothing in fashion? It is essentially art fabric sculptures for your body, your human body!

    What is a car? Moving sculpture, a metal steel based thing which is secondly a piece of transportation.

    Has nobody figured out how insanely important cyber truck is; essentially it is the ultimate modernist expression of moving sculpture?

    I actually have a vision; gloss red cyber truck,  with yellow calipers, or yellow rims… Essentially imagine looking at like a fake Ferrari, but cyber truck.


    the best art

    A lot of people say art for art sake, but following in the footsteps of Nietzsche,  I think actually the purpose of art isn’t art for art say, rather, it is art for the sake of happiness joy, the great stimulus to life!

    In fact, I have a theory… When a lot of people become emo, sad dark and rose, is this issue here they are simply not having enough great art in their life?

    Even being at the Mr. brainwashing exhibition, they were just playing some great OG classical music on the speakers, and even hearing the great classical music put me in such good mood!

    Maybe I’ll start to listen to more classical music?

    The best

    Classicus,,, the ancient Romans, typically when we think about the word classic we tend to think about old school. But actually… In ancient Rome classicus, the elite class,,, “classicus” or “classic” simply meant “the best”.

    So then, what life then becomes about isn’t seeking the old school for the sake of the old school, but rather, seeking the best? 

    Why the best?

    Why not?

    Joy!

    I think nowadays, to be joyful unhappy in today’s world is a great act of courage? It is easy to be emailed depressed, sad, to opine about how the world is going to explode whatever. It takes much more courage to be joyful, happy and gleeful, to be the gay monster admits all of the emoness? 


    Choose Joy

    I prefer the word joy over happiness. Why? I think happiness is too much of a consumerist merchandised concept now. Troy is a lot simpler, like joy to the world!

    Music, what is music? Joy to our ears and to our soul.

    What is art, photography, paintings images and sculpture? Joy to our visual brain senses?

    Participatory art

    I think what is so amazing and what was so fun at the Mr. brainwash art exhibit was how almost all the exhibitions, you could interact with it! And also you are encouraged to photograph and video everything!

    A lot of modern art exhibitions and museums is that they are cold and sterile, and it feels like you’re not allowed to photograph or shoot stuff?

    In fact, I’m even thinking about doing a photograph workshop in Beverly Hills, maybe we could all go to the Mr. brainwash art museum together, have fun like a bunch of kids, and be inspired together?

    My vision of art: my vision is that art should be open to everybody, accessible to everybody, and also, fun for everybody! It should be no, not pretentious, not fake. Also, it should be free, open to the public, accessible to anybody, doesn’t matter if you’re 70 years old or three years old;

    I killed that art might be able to solve 50% of the world’s problems, maybe the other 50% can be bitcoin.

    Or even a more radical idea; if you combine bitcoin and art, 50% +50% is 100%. Then… Can bitcoin art be the solution to the maladies of the planet? 

    Maybe! Perhaps I’ll try and pioneer this!

    Bitcoin art is the way

    Great artist steal.

    Also, great artist “up cycle”, recycle, sample, remix, and parody the classics!

    This is where our source is so appealing to me; I hate restrictions, I hate copyright in laws; I prefer freedom.

    In fact in two days brave new digital world, I’ve ChatGPT and AI… The whole copyright model is broken.

    For example, certainly creators need to make money and a profit, but the big issue here is that all the craters are essentially slaves to corporations, and looks like a lot of these new digital slumlords, who control the “content“ of its creators… What they are essentially seeking is a mini of control, within a small mileau, trying to assert control and power in their very small domain?

    Nvidia is close to a $4T company??

    I was shocked, apparently now that the number two most world’s important company is Nvidia, right after Apple?

    In fact, I actually wonder if Nvidia is more valuable than Apple. The only reason why Apple is valuable is because they have the iPhone, but if and when Nvidia creates their own phone, that doesn’t require an iPhone, this will be a big deal?

    How to art

    There are so many ways you could art.

    So one funny idea I have is just taking famous artworks of the past, and copy pasting bitcoin icons on top of it. This is essentially the hilarious parody that Mr. brainwashed with a lot of these classical paintings, and also Banksky,  the art of uncovering BS?

    the problem about the art world

    I think the biggest problem about the art world is everyone is using irony sarcasm and fake big talk to try to inflate their fragile egos, and into control running their mini fiefdoms? 

    A writer and thinker that I’m kind of into right now is Saifedean — who wrote the bitcoin standard and the fiat standard. I first read his books because I was curious about bitcoin, but what I found very very fascinating was his critiques about art, the art world, and modernism and modern architecture? He’s kind of like NASSIM TALEB in that way (both Lebanese, Lebanese-American) — very outspoken, calls out BS. 

    If you have ever been to a modern art exhibit, and you see a piece of white paper with a hole in it, and it’s worth $1 million, and you’re scratching your head, I’m with you.

    Honestly, more or less all of modern day art is a scam, but that’s OK. You don’t have to participate if you don’t want to! Nobody is strong arming you to do so!

    The new art

    My personal vision is that I want to disrupt the art world. I certainly have done it for the world of street photography; essentially I killed all of these loser skinny fat anemic notions in street photography of what is considered good or bad, essentially the funny thing with photography is that while it should on paper be the most democratic open and egalitarian form of photography, at the streets are public and should be public and accessible to everybody… Once again, all of these ridiculous ivory towers?


  • MR. BRAINWASH IS A GENIUS!


  • The Philosophy of Investing

    Ultimately when people study Warren Buffett, Charlie Munger etc ,,, what all these guys are searching for is wisdom.

    I think this is good and important because principles wisdom, is resistant to time and technology, but at least for myself, I was born in 1988, searching for practical wisdom has always remained elusive for me.

    I think difficult thing is that my circumstances were unique. I was born in the states, yet grew up poor; my definition of poor is not being sure whether you would be homeless next month because your dad just gambled away the rent money again, going off to Reno in the middle of the night.

    The upside of poverty 

    I think on two fronts this was useful to me:

    First, it taught me self independence at a very young age. I knew that if I wanted anything, I had to work for it. This motivated me to pick up lots of part-time jobs when I was like 13, 14 or 15, tutoring English, through my honors program at school, working at the local community center, getting a $200 a month stipend etc. 

    In fact, my biggest personal pride and joy; essentially, purchasing my first car with my own money! At the age of 15, getting my drivers permit in California, $1000 or maybe $1200 1991 Sentra XE, 5 door sedan, 5 speed manual transmission car — it didn’t even have a tachometer! I learned how to shift gears simply by hearing and feeling the engine? This began my first love affair with manual transmission cars;

    In fact, another point of pride, every car I have purchased my own money has always been a used manual transmission car, never exceeding $2500 USD. In fact, the last car I purchased one in Providence Rhode Island before Seneca was born was a 2002 Subaru outback, five speed manual transmission, listed on craigslist for 1000 bucks, was able to negotiate down to $900, then $800 in cash! Lying out those eight $100 bills was the most obvious decision I’ve made in my life.

    Obvious decisions are obvious

    In terms of my decision-making philosophy, my unorthodox beliefs; obvious decisions are obvious. 

    What that means is before making any sort of decision life decision etc., you don’t need to think about it too much.

    Obvious decisions are staring you right at the face, and whenever you have to hesitate before making a certain decision, don’t do it. Why? Your brain is still working out the details, whether or not you should do the thing or not.

    Obvious trades, obvious financial decisions, obvious investments 

    For example, buying microstrategy stock, MSTR, to me is a 100% obvious decision. For the traditional markets, it’s literally the only asset worth purchasing.

    Why? Essentially they have discovered a free money hack or infinite money hack, which they could leverage their 30-year-old business, which is regulated, and mainstream… And leverage their position, borrowing money at less than one percent to buy bitcoin, which is accretive forever, and continuing the virtuous cycle.

    Now is your time to purchase a piece of cyber Manhattan

    Bitcoin is cyber manhattan: 256^3

    I think the idea of a cyber Manhattan, cyber real estate company is fascinating to me. And the difference between bitcoin, cyber real estate and Cyberman Manhattan is that it is actually backed by real electricity and power. For example, the problems with all these fake virtual worlds is that it is just powered by a computer code, one and zeros, Any nerd can click a button and create a skyscraper in Sim city.

    But what if, if you wanted to build a skyscraper in Sim city, you actually had to expand $1 billion of real capital in the real world, before transferring it and transporting it to cyberspace? This is the 1000% paradigm shift;

    The bridge between the physical, embodied reality,  physical world and realm, to the digital cyber realm… Which is still backed with physical electricity?

    It’s a bug, not a feature!

    Or it’s a feature, not a bug?

    I think what a lot of these goody two shoers don’t get or understand is about real life physics in the game, skin in the game, energy in the game. Everyone wants some sort of hidden upside without any real life downside?

    I’ll give you example, everyone wants to rid the world of suffering pain injustice and the like. However, a life without suffering pain injustice and overcoming is not a life worth living.

    You cannot have happiness without pain and suffering, nor can you have joy with without sorrow and misery. If we think about this from a Taoist perspective, I think about yin and Yang, you cannot have the good without the bad. You cannot have the virtuous without the evil.

    The upsides of downsides

    For example, obviously being in poor health sucks, and bad weather also sucks. But, when things get much better, you are 1000 times more joyful grateful and happy when things shift!

    This is why funny enough, I think people on the East Coast, New England, Providence Rhode Island are happier than people in LA because the weather shifts are more extreme.

    For example, when you’re suffering in the winter time for months on end, no sunshine whatever, and then boom, one day the sun comes out, everyone is overjoyed! It is still 55° and cold, but at least it is sunny; everyone runs out and gets their picnic blankets, And the joy of the sunlight is 1000 times more extreme than in Los Angeles where everyone is trying to hide from the sun, even though they love it?

    My simple analogy is everyone in LA is like a solid 7.2 out of 10, in terms of happiness, whereas in the East coast, your happiness goes from a -10 to a +500% when the weather is good! 

    So I suppose, the philosophical question them becomes, is it better or more favorable to have a steady mediocre thing forever, or more extreme highs and lows, which will be a benefit to your happiness?

    Then a simple thought, the reason why I love bitcoin is because of the extremes; I would prefer an extreme life to a steady and boring one. 

    In search of yield

    I think for me my number one principle in investing is yield. I think what a lot of people think is what they’re trying to do with their money is they are trying to securitize it, and make it safe, stored in really really safe assets like treasury bills, bonds, or “safe” investments like Apple Amazon Facebook Google and like.

    But, my personal thought is life should not be conservative; the point of life isn’t to just conserve your wealth, but rather, to grow it!

    Even the story of Jesus, you don’t just take your wealth and hide it and bury your talents, your gold talents in the ground because you’re afraid of losing it. No, the virtuous thing is to go out and multiply it!

    And I also think the same thing is with wealth; the virtuous calling is to multiply it to grow it, not to just bury it, with the fear that it might go down.

    How to gain more emotional armor for investing

    OK, a lot of these fools, they want quick gains in order to go out and buy the Lamborghini or whatever. But once you find out that only small dick losers drive Lamborghinis,  and also, that the useful lifetime value of a Lamborghini might only be three or four years, that is the point in which the maintenance costs and the insurance costs and fixing it up will destroy the price of it in just three or four years, then it becomes obvious; you wish the Lamborghini onto your worst enemy, you don’t desire one for yourself. 

    My simple thought is take a stoic spartan approach; essentially live like a super super poor person, the only thing you should ever spend money on is weights barbells and weightlifting equipment, and meet… Everything else should be essentially free.

    Tips to NOT go broke

    This means,

    1. Never eat out: nothing is worth it, not even all you can eat Korean barbecue! My current favorite joint is chubby cattle, but still… The 90 minute time sitting is a bit restrictive.
    2. No weed, no alcohol
    3. Don’t go out for coffee, just brew it and drink it at home. I actually have a new hack; I only drink a lot of coffee at the house first thing in the morning when I wake up, but after the morning, 100% abstinence for the rest of the day. I get the upside of getting a good caffeine buzz first thing in the morning to get me going, without the downside of having it affect my sleep.
    4. Never buy anything, and also… The only “computer“ or device I find worth it is an iPad Pro;
    5. Always buy the cheapest iPhone on the market; only poor people buy iPhone Pros
    6. For camera or digital camera, I recommend getting the most compact, capable Panasonic camera, and the cheapest, most compact pancake lens. Currently the Lumix S9 ($1500) and 26 mm F8 pancake lens ($200). Never buy a loser Leica which is essentially a Panasonic Lumix with a body kit. Especially the Panasonic Lumix Leica Q Cameras. If you want a digital rangefinder just buy a used Leica M9.
    7. Don’t shoot film: I think about a decade ago in 2014 2015, it was affordable, but now it is too expensive. Save your money and buy Bitcoin instead!
    8. Never buy a new car under any circumstances. This is immediately like taking a 30% haircut; the second you drive it off the lot, boom, you’ve already lost 30% of its value. And also, don’t buy electric vehicles, no matter how appealing. It is like purchasing a really really expensive iPhone Pro with wheels; it might be only good for 3 to 5 years, maybe seven years tops… Then after that, a slow degrading. Real rich people buy old used Priuses and drive them– 2010 Prius is the best rich person car.
    9. Stop buying clothes: you probably have enough clothes to last you two lifetimes already in your closet. My suggestion is if you want novelty, just take some scissors and turn your jeans into shorts, or cut off the sleeves off of your shirts to make them sleeve or if you’re cold, just layer up. Only poor people buy clothes.

    Essentially, the easiest way to become rich is not go broke.


    Einstein’s rule of money

    So essentially, I’ve literally I think watch every single Michael Saylor interview that he’s ever done everything that he posted to Twitter or YouTube etc. Maybe about 100 of them.

    Anyways, probably the most fascinating thing that I’ve learned about the value of an asset is the value of an asset is essentially the cost of something or the value is something divided by the maintenance cost.

    Now I think this is something that people don’t really think about — the maintenance cost.

    So for example, now that all of my millennial friends are growing up, I’m 36 now, in four years, I’m gonna be 40 years old, everyone’s trying to think about the future buying a single-family home or a condo or property or whatever. And what beguiles a lot of people or shocks people is when they buy a house, all the maintenance costs! Even talking to my friend Anton (congrats on your new kid!) he told me a story while we were in downtown LA about how he bought a house, but the water heater went out, and him having to fix it, and what a nightmare it was.

    Also simple things that we millennials never think about… You need a new roof and boom, that’s $50,000. That’s $50,000 I would rather put into bitcoin.

    There are so many things that exist on the planet, in real world, in embody reality which cost a premium in terms of insurance, maintenance, etc. Once again, almost nothing in the physical realm is ever worth it. 

    If you want a new car, just download some racing game to your iPad, or even PlayStation or whatever; better to spend 50 bucks on a virtual car then drop $50,000 or more on a new one! 

    Or, just buy an oculus quest, play some racing game, at least this way you want to kill yourself, or another family in a car with two kids or more.

    –> The worst thing in life isn’t dying or killing yourself, but it is accidentally killing another family, accidentally killing kids in the car seat of another car, and you having to live with the guilt for the rest of your life. 

    “But it isn’t real!”

    Bitcoin is not real, but, if it costs $800 billion to produce, it’s real!

    Let’s again, things must have a stake in the physical realm, if it doesn’t, it is just air coin, or the foundation is just built on cotton candy.

    I think we must avoid these fake environmentalists, a bunch of vegan losers. Essentially, if I psychoanalyze a lot of these fake environmentalists; essentially everyone is seeking a new religion, a new godhead which is the “environment“, but ultimately my critical thought is that once again it just comes down to money;

    Vegan and plant based stuff is insanely profitable

    For example, Al Gore, I wonder… How much money has he collected from doing his talks on an inconvenient truth, ultimately being funded by taxpayer money?

    And also, James Cameron, and also Arnold, how much money they have collected from the vegan pea protein powder plant factory, just follow the money.  Much more profitable to sell a $50 container of vegan protein powder, than a meat company to sell beef rib or beef liver. 

    Also a random aside; if you really wanted to be a real environmentalist, you would actually have a 100% organ meat diet, only beef heart beef liver beef kidneys and intestines, because these parts are typically thrown away.

    Rich vegans

    “Being naked is the ultimate sustainable option. We’re number two.” – Reformation marketing copy 

    The truth is environmentalism is very profitable. For example a lot of these clothing companies, I think also like the new one “Reformation“, a female clothing company, they talk about sustainability and blah blah blah, but once again, is it just another marketing tactic to sell their mediocre clothes.

    For example, people talk that leather in animal products are evil blah blah blah. Yet the truth is, you’re cheap vegan leather jacket which is made out of petroleum is probably 1 trillion times worse for the planet than a fashionable one made out of 100% real leather. A pleather vegan jacket might only last you a few years, a good leather jacket can you last you 50 or beyond.

    Because if you critically think about it, things which last, are better for the “environment”. And typically animal products last.

    I love leather!

    Also nowadays, people talk about Native Americans and stuff like that, don’t you know that historically the way that natives lived off the land was in harmony with animals, like can you imagine a Native American who didn’t use animal power, ride on horses, or eat meat and bison?

    Besides maybe virtue signaling America, there is no great civilization that has ever existed without animal products whether food labor etc. 

    I love risk

    Once again I think the biggest issue is in today’s world, nobody likes risk anymore. Risk is seen as something which is dangerous bad and to be avoided.

    For example anybody who buys a Mercedes car an Audi, a Porsche a Lamborghini whatever… It is ultimately a risk free option in the sense that no one’s gonna make fun of you for owning those type of cars. So in some ways it is a cowardly act;

    For example everyone thinks a Porsche 911 is cool, a Lamborghini is cool, a Mercedes or an Audi is cool. Yet  maybe I’m the only one with the big dick in the room, I brag that I drive a Toyota Prius? Everyone is always so shocked and impressed.

    Real investors and economists must and should drive a Prius!

    Real economics

    OK, whenever I discover anybody who’s a professor, who teaches in a business school, is an economist, academic or scholar or whatever… Yet just puts all of their money in a boring mutual fund… Or index fund… It is a signal that they are not a real economist, and they are actually not really connected to reality.

    Risk = Happiness

    We need some sort of risk exposure to the real world. For example, easy to be the typical fat American who is drinking beer or wine watching sports and American football, giving their opinion on sports teams and players yet they are not actually exposed to the risk of playing real tackle football?

    And once again… The more I think about it the more bizarre it is. To watch UFC or mixed martial arts, to watch any sport that you have not yourself played… It kind of like mental masturbation? To sports?

    Sports is masculine physical sports masturbation pornography?

    Just think about it the average person eats nachos french fries drink beer or alcohol smoke marijuana before watching the big game. But what a athlete who is actually participating in the sport down a beer really quick before putting on their armor and hitting the field? Obviously not!

    So why is it that alcohol food beverages is marketed to these individuals, for watching a sport?

    It is the new risk free premium hedonism; the joy of seeing people get murdered on a field, or in our arena without any real exposure.

    Don’t hate me because I’m so much more physically dominant than you!

    People are always so surprised that I played real football real American tackle football in high school, they are shocked to hear that I was linebacker, first outside linebacker then inside linebacker. 

    I think it is actually racism; you never expect an Asian guy to play linebacker because we are not seen as masculine or aggressive enough. But if I were African-American or black, even though I am on the more lean side — you probably would not be shocked, because in America, athletes are always seen as being African-American, never Asian. Even an Asian professional sports athlete is almost seen as a glitch in the system, not the real deal.

    Even when first deadlifted 465 pounds, sumo style off the floor, and everyone was so shocked, I was talking to my friend Jemal and I asked him — “If I was African-American or black, but people will be asshocked or surprised?” He laughed and said no!


    So what should we do about things

    So I think the first thing you have to think philosophically is what are you really searching for, and why?

    My very simple thought is think 300 years ahead, your kids kids kids.

    The New Hedonism

    The current lifestyle is like the Persian slave lifestyle?

    I think the issue we are facing today in today’s world is hedonism — the new hedonism. We seek companionship through humans or dogs, yet we don’t want to have children, we want to preserve our freedom travel the world go to Japan eat good sushi whatever.

    But, your dog cannot inherit your bitcoin. 

    I think maybe in the past life was actually easier and more straightforward people. You got married, you built up a family legacy and empire; this was actually a pretty good strategy in life. And I think people were actually much happier, productive, and joyful!

    Think about all the modern day melodies of depression anxiety whatever, they are all modern day sociological ills.

    In fact, the ancient Greeks, thinking about the Iliad; certainly things are natural like courage, cowardice, and fear… But depression anxiety was not.

    My sociological theory on why so many people are so depressed and anxious is because of YouTube, Spotify, podcast, TikTok Facebook Instagram, Twitter, news, fear porn. 

    The joy of growth or death & destruction?

    Have a theory; a lot of people are secretly waiting and twiddling their thumbs, they actually want to see the world burn to the floor, to be able to have the indignant feeling; “I told you… I was right all along!”

    For example, all these people, are during Covid and pre-Covid and post Covid whatever, thought that there was gonna be food riots and blah blah blah, none of it happened. Humans are 1 trillion times more resilient than we make them out to be.

    This is where also, philosophically I don’t really believe in short selling; even if you could cop a massive profit.

    For example there are certain things that I am certain which will go down to zero, like Ada Cardano and the like because it is fake. But rather than hoping that something is going to burn the floor, better to just bet on things that you think that will go to Mars! 

    For example, everyone hates Elon Musk, and they are secretly waiting and plotting for him to fail. Yet doesn’t it take more courage to wish and hope and desire to see people succeed?

    Even I remember the Tesla model 3; everyone thought it would be impossible, but now, it is certainly the new Ford model T; the coolest, most desirable, most futuristic and affordable car on the road. I personally plan on driving my Toyota Prius until it dies at 1,000,000 miles, but if for one reason or another I was forced to purchase a brand new car, it would definitely be a Tesla, maybe the robotaxi?


    Disruption

    The reason why I encourage everyone to watch the Robo taxi, Robo van announcement is that it is the ultimate disruptor.

    For example, the Robo van, the two door coupe, insanely awesome design, with the butterfly McLaren doors… I find like there is no more reason to ever even want to buy a loser Lamborghini, or McLaren or whatever. And I really really love that rose gold, MATTE Rose gold Color on the Robo taxi, and also the rims look awesome!

    Why doesn’t the future look like the future?

    Once again, assuming that you’re a futurist like myself, the trillion dollar questions “why doesn’t the future actually look like the future?“

    For example, if you really do believe in the digital transformation of things, like you care about Apple Tesla Amazon Facebook digital media whatever… Why would you ever buy analog property like a single-family home or whatever? Wouldn’t you prefer to buy digital property which is bitcoin?

    And also, issues with tax, property tax. Also assuming that you’re a libertarian, or some sort of anti-government person, bitcoin makes sense because it is like digital or cyber real estate that can’t be taxed!

    And I think the truth is that real rich people, know how to do tax deferment, or to avoid taxes, this is a real reason they become and stay rich.

    “My accountant so good I’m practically living tax-free!” – JAY Z

    Never buy property in California (you will get murdered from property taxes)

    For example, even if you live in the lowest tax jurisdiction place which is Florida, and nobody wants to live in Florida, still… Under a base case scenario you’re still playing at least 1.1% in taxes. And that means then, the life of your asset is only 70 years; within 70 years Assuming you buy a $1 million property, you’re gonna pay $1 million in taxes in 70 years.

    Then, if you own a single-family home or whatever, or property the coal is actually trying to rent out your property at a premium, but two people who have never really had experience with property property management… It is a fucking nightmare and headache. Finding good tenants and keeping them; the holy Grail. Too much counterparty risk with properties; people who fuck up your property, end up not paying rent in squatting your place, people who start to grow marijuana inside your property, people who turn your property into a brothel (true story), or just physical wear and tear and decay. Anything in the physical realm in my opinion has too much risk. 
    And this is where still… In my eyes, Tesla is too much of a risk. Why? Having to build all those cyber trucks, Robo taxis, is just in my opinion, too much of a gargantuan physical task. Even if you automate the whole thing with robots, still, extracting lithium from the Earth, making the cars, delivering the cars, my personal estimate is you won’t see Robo taxis on the road for at least another five or seven years? To me that is too long.

    Real world investing

    I think the best investment is something that you have a 100% certainty will go up in 30 years, and you just ignore the volatility and the noise on a day-to-day level.

    Can it keep going on up forever?

    Yes especially if it is digital!


    Think the classics

    Also the funny thing is; bitcoin was the classic the first only immaculate conception; technically Ethereum from Vitalik was just a bitcoin copycat.

    My very very basic suggestion is just download Coinbase to your phone, buy bitcoin from your traditional bank account, and once you’re done buying it, delete the Coinbase app from your phone, and never check prices. And what you doing instead it’s just go to michael.com, watch all the Michael sailor interviews, and read books on economic theory philosophy etc.

    I personally believe that the best wisdom is in the past; read Aristotle on economics, Fernandinho Galiani on money Della moneta, the principles of economic theory from Karl Menger etc. you should be able to find free PDFs of all these online, just read it on your iPad.

    ***

    Now what?

    1. Download Coinbase to your phone, start buying those bitcoins
    2. If you have a second car or some sort of asset that you’re not really doing anything with that you really don’t need, sell it, and use the proceeds to buy bitcoin
    3. If you’re stuck in the traditional markets, Ira or Roth IRA, retirement whatever… Very very simple just buy micro strategy stock, MSTR– I think it’s going to 10 X from here. My price target for Michael strategy is $2000 a share. Currently trading at around low $200s.
    4. Do an experiment that the next month, just cook all your food at home, buy meat at Costco whatever… Amazon prime or Amazon fresh food, anything that is cheap; quit alcohol and weed for a month, quit eating out and going out for a month, and just put 100% of that into bitcoin!

    so should I buy bitcoin or micro strategy? 

    You buy the bitcoin, and you never sell it, just keep buying it until you die, and the idea is just give it to your kids kids kids.

    And you’re a supreme happiness and joy is through weightlifting, one red maxing, and seeing the numbers go up! 

    My suggestion is never ever ever sell the bitcoin, for anything. If you need spare cash for living or whatever, better to borrow the money at 7% interest or lower, assuming that bitcoin is going to go up 21% year over a year, compounded rate forever.

     I would say only by microstrategy MSTR if you just cannot get access to capital to buy bitcoin directly.

    At the end of your life, he or she with the most bitcoin is going to be the winner. Or the corporate entity like micro strategy, who owns the most bitcoin.

    The goal is a Nakamoto, which is the mythical 1 million bitcoins. The same amount of bitcoins in Satoshi‘s wallet, which he hasn’t touched. This is currently $60 billion! 


    What else?

    honestly because I live like a poor person, for me, at this point investing is just a new passion, almost like a new hobby. Still for me my critical passion is photography, blogging and like.

    So the simple thought; know that investing in money is a means to an end not the in itself.

    ERIC

    ***

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  • The Philosophy of Investing

    Ultimately when people study Warren Buffett, Charlie Munger etc ,,, what all these guys are searching for is wisdom.

    I think this is good and important because principles wisdom, is resistant to time and technology, but at least for myself, I was born in 1988, searching for practical wisdom has always remained elusive for me.

    I think difficult thing is that my circumstances were unique. I was born in the states, yet group poor; my definition of poor is not being sure whether you would be homeless next month because your dad just gambled away the rent money again, going off to Reno in the middle of the night.

    I think on two fronts this was useful to me:

    First, it taught me self independence at a very young age. I knew that if I wanted anything, I had to work for it. This motivated me to pick up lots of part-time jobs when I was like 1314 or 15, tutoring English, through my honors program at school, working at the local community center, getting a $200 a month stipend etc. 

    In fact, my biggest personal pride and joy; essentially, purchasing my first car with my own money! At the age of 15, getting my drivers permit in California, $1000 or maybe $1200 1991 Sentra XE, 5 door sedan, 5 speed manual transmission car — it didn’t even have a tachometer! I learned how to shift gears simply by hearing and feeling the engine? This began my first love affair with manual transmission cars;

    In fact, another point of pride, every car I have purchased my own money has always been a used manual transmission car, never exceeding $2500 USD. In fact, the last car I purchased one in Providence Rhode Island before Seneca was born was a 2002 Subaru outback, five speed manual transmission, listed on craigslist for 1000 bucks, was able to negotiate down to $900, then $800 in cash! Lying out those eight $100 bills was the most obvious decision I’ve made in my life.

    Obvious decisions are obvious

     In terms of my decision-making philosophy, my unorthodox beliefs; obvious decisions are obvious. 

    What that means is before making any sort of decision life decision etc., you don’t need to think about it too much.

    Obvious decisions are staring you right at the face, and whenever you have to hesitate before making a certain decision, don’t do it. Why? Your brain is still working out the details, whether or not you should do the thing or not.

    For example, buying microstrategy stock, MSTR, to me is a 100% obvious decision. For the traditional markets, it’s literally the only asset worth purchasing.

    Why? Essentially they have discovered a free money hack or infinite money hack, which they could leverage their 30-year-old business, which is regulated, and mainstream… And leverage their physicians, borrowing money at less than one percent to buy bitcoin, which is accretive forever, and continuing the virtuous cycle.

    I think the idea of a cyber Manhattan, cyber real estate company is fascinating to me. And the difference between bitcoin, Sible real estate and Cyberman Manhattan is that it is actually packed by real electricity and power. For example, problems with all these fake virtual worlds is that it is just powered by a computer code, one and zeros, Any nerd can click a button and create a skyscraper in Sim city.

    But what if, if you wanted to build a skyscraper in Sim city, you actually had to expand $1 billion of real capital in the real world, before transferring it and transporting it to cyberspace? This is the 1000% paradigm shift;

    The Bridge between the physical, embodied reality,  physical world and realm, to the digital cyber realm… Which is still backed with physical electricity?

    it’s a bug, not a feature!

    Or it’s a feature, not a bug?

    I think what a lot of these goody two shoers don’t get or understand is about real life physics in the game, skin in the game, energy in the game. Everyone wants some sort of hidden upside without any real life downside?

    I’ll give you example, everyone wants to read the world of suffering pain injustice and the like. However, a life without suffering Paine injustice and overcoming is not a life worth living.

    You cannot have happiness without pain and suffering, nor can you have joy with without sorrow and misery. If we think about this from a Taoist perspective,  I think about Jin and Yang, you cannot have the good without the bad. You cannot have the virtuous without the evil.

    For example, obviously being in poor health sucks, and bad weather also sucks. But, when things get much better, you are 1000 times more joyful grateful and happy when things shift!

    This is why funny enough, I think people on the East Coast, New England, Providence Rhode Island are happier than people in LA because the weather shifts are more extreme.

    For example, when you’re suffering in the winter time for months on then, no sunshine whatever, and then boom, one day the sun comes out, everyone is overjoyed! It is still 55° and cold, but at least it is sunny; everyone runs out and gets their picnic blankets, And the joy of the sunlight is 1000 times more extreme than in Los Angeles where everyone is trying to hide from the sun, even though they love it?

    In search of yield

    I think for me my number one principle in investing is yield. I think what a lot of people think is what they’re trying to do with their money is they are trying to securitize it, and make it safe, stored in really really safe assets like treasury bills, bonds, or “safe” investments like Apple Amazon Facebook Google and like.

    But, my personal thought is life should not be conservative; the point of life isn’t to just conserve your wealth, but rather, to grow it!

    Even the story of Jesus, you don’t just take your wealth and hide it and bury your talents, your gold talents in the ground because you’re afraid of losing it. No, the virtual thing is to go out and multiply it!

    And I also think the same thing is with wealth; the virtual calling is to multiply it to grow it, not to just bury it, with the fear that it might go down.

    How to gain more emotional armor for investing

    OK, a lot of these fools, they want quick gains in order to go out and buy the Lamborghini or whatever. But once you find out that only small Dick Losers drive Lamborghinis,  and also, that the useful lifetime value of a Lamborghini might only be three or four years, that is the point in which the maintenance costs and the insurance costs and fixing it up will destroy the price of it in just three or four years, then it becomes obvious; you wish the Lamborghini onto your worst enemy, you don’t desire one for yourself. 

    Einstein’s rule of money

    So essentially, I’ve literally I think watch every single Michael sailor interview that he’s ever done everything that he posted to Twitter or YouTube etc. Maybe about 100 of them.

    Anyways, probably the most fascinating thing that I’ve learned about the value of an asset is the value of an asset is essentially the cost of something or the value is something divided by the maintenance cost.

    Now I think this is something that people don’t really think about —  the maintenance cost.

    So for example, now that all of my millennial friends are growing up, I’m 36 now, in four years, I’m gonna be 40 years old, everyone’s trying to think about the future buying a single-family home or a condo or property or whatever. And what beguiles a lot of people or shocks people is when they buy a house, all the maintenance costs! Even talking to my friend Anton (congrats on your new kid!) he told me a story while we were in downtown LA about how he bought a house, but the water heater went out, and him having to fix it, and what a nightmare it was.

    Also simple things that we millennials never think about… You need a new roof and boom, that’s $50,000. That’s $50,000 I would rather put into bitcoin.

    “But it isn’t real!”

    Bitcoin is not real, but, if it costs $800 billion to produce, it’s real!

    Let’s again, things must have a stake in the physical realm, if it doesn’t, it is just air coin, or the foundation is just built on cotton candy.

    I think we have to avoid from these fake environmentalist, a bunch of vegan losers. Essentially, if I psychoanalyze a lot of these fake environmentalists; essentially everyone is seeking a new religion, a new godhead which is the “environment“, but ultimately my critical thought is that once again it just comes down to money;

    For example, Al Gore, I wonder… How much money has he collected from doing his talks on an inconvenient truth, ultimately being funded by taxpayer money?

    And also, James Cameron, and also Arnold, how much money they have collected from the vegan pea protein powder plant factory, just follow the money. 

    The truth is environmentalism is very profitable. For example a lot of these clothing companies, I think also like the new one “reformation“, a female clothing, they talk about sustainability and blah blah blah, but once again, is it just another marketing tactic to sell more Mediocre clothes.

    For example, people talk that leather in animal products are evil blah blah blah. Yet the truth is, you’re cheap vegan leather jacket which is made out of petroleum is probably 1 trillion times worse for the planet than a fashionable one made out of 100% real leather.

    Because if you critically think about it, things which last, are better for the “environment”.

    Also nowadays, people talk about Native Americans and stuff like that, don’t you know that historically the way that natives lived off the land was in harmony with animals, like can you imagine a Native American who didn’t use animal power, ride on horses, or eat meat and bison?

    I love risk

    Once again I think the biggest issue is in today’s world, nobody likes risk anymore. Risk is seen as something which is dangerous bad and to be avoided.

    For example anybody who buys a Mercedes car an Audi, a Porsche a Lamborghini whatever… It is ultimately a risk free option in the sense that no one’s gonna make fun of you for owning those type of cars. So in some ways it is a cowardly act;

    For example everyone thinks a Porsche 911 is cool, a Lamborghini is cool, a Mercedes or an Audi is cool. Yet  maybe I’m the only one with the big dick in the room, I brag that I drive a Toyota Prius? Everyone is always so shocked and impressed.

    Real investors and economists must and should drive a Prius

    Real economics

    OK, whenever I discover anybody who’s a professor, who teaches in a business school, is an economist, academic or scholar or whatever… Yet just puts all of their money in a boring mutual fund… Or index month… It is a signal that they are not a real economist, and they are actually not really connected to reality.

    The biggest we hear is that you need some sort of risk exposure to the real world. For example, easy to be the typical fat American who is drinking beer or wine watching sports and American football, giving their opinion on sports teams and players yet they are not actually exposed to the risk of playing real tackle football?

    And once again… The more I think about it the more bizarre it is. To watch UFC or mixed martial arts, to watch any sport that you have not yourself played… It kind of like mental masturbation? To sports?

    Just think about it the average person eats nachos french fries drink beer or alcohol smoke marijuana before watching the big game. But what a athlete who is actually participating in the sport down a beer really quick before putting on their armor and hitting the field? Obviously not!

    So why is it that alcohol food beverages is marketed to these individuals, for watching a sport?

    It is the new risk free premium hedonism; the joy of seeing people get murdered on a field, or in our arena without any real exposure.

    People are always so surprised that I played real football real American tackle football in high school, they are shocked to hear that I was linebacker, first outside linebacker then inside linebacker. 

    I think it is actually racism; you never expect an Asian guy to play linebacker because we are not seen as masculine or aggressive enough. But if I were African-American or black, even though I am on the side you probably would not be shocked, because in America Athletes are always seen as being African-American, never Asian. Even an Asian professional sports athlete is almost seen as a glitch in the system, not the real deal.

    so what should we do about things

    So I think the first thing you have to think philosophically is what are you really searching for, and why?

    My very simple thought is think 300 years ahead, your kids kids kids.

    I think the issue we are facing today in today’s world is hedonism the new hedonism. We seek companionship through humans or dogs, yet we don’t want to have children, we want to preserve our freedom travel the world go to Japan eat good sushi whatever.

    But, your dog cannot inherit your bitcoin. 

    I think maybe in the past life was actually easier and more straightforward people. You got married, you built up a family legacy and empire; this was actually a pretty good strategy in life. And I think people were actually much happier, productive, and joyful!

    Think about all the modern day melodies of depression anxiety whatever, they are all modern day sociological ills.

    In fact, the ancient Greeks, thinking about the Iliad; certainly things are natural like courage, cowardice, and fear… But depression anxiety was not.

    My sociological theory on why so many people are so depressed and anxious is because of YouTube, Spotify, podcast, TikTok Facebook Instagram, Twitter, news, fear porn. 

    The joy of growth or death & destruction?

    Have a theory; a lot of people are secretly waiting and twiddling their thumbs, they actually want to see the world burn to the floor, to be able to have the indignant feeling; “I told you… I was right all along!”

    For example, all these people, are during Covid and pre-Covid and post Covid whatever, thought that there was gonna be food riots and blah blah blah, none of it happened. Humans are 1 trillion times more resilient than we make them out to be.

     this is where also, philosophical I don’t really believe in short selling; even if you could cop a massive profit.

    For example there are certain things that I am certain which will go down to zero, like Ada Cardano and the like because it is fake. But rather than hoping that something is going to burn the floor, better to just bet on things that you think that will go to Mars! 

    For example, everyone hates Elon Musk, and they are secretly waiting and plotting for him to fail. Yet doesn’t it take more courage to wish and hope and desire to see people succeed?

    Even I remember the Tesla model 3; everyone thought it would be impossible, but now, it is certainly the new Ford model T; the coolest, most desirable, most futuristic and affordable car on the road. I personally plan on driving my Toyota Prius until it dies at 1,000,000 miles, but if for one reason or another I was forced to purchase a brand new car, it would definitely be a Tesla, maybe the robotaxi?


    Disruption

    The reason why I encourage everyone to watch the Robo taxi, Robo van announcement is that it is the ultimate disruptor.

    For example, the Robo van, the two door coupe, insanely awesome design, with the butterfly McLaren doors… I find like there is no more reason to ever even want to buy a loser Lamborghini, or McLaren or whatever. And I really really love that rose gold, Matt Rose gold Color on the Robo taxi, and also the rims look awesome!

    Why doesn’t the future look like the future?

    Once again, assuming that you’re a futurist like myself, the trillion dollar questions “why doesn’t the future actually look like the future? “

    For example, if you really do believe in the digital transformation of things, like you care about Apple Tesla Amazon Facebook digital media whatever… Why would you ever buy analog property like a single-family home or whatever? Wouldn’t you prefer to buy digital property which is bitcoin?

    And also, issues with tax, property tax. Also assuming that you’re a libertarian, or some sort of anti-government person, bitcoin makes sense because it is like digital or cyber real estate that can’t be taxed!

    For example, even if you live in the lowest tax jurisdiction place which is Florida, and nobody wants to live in Florida, still… Under a base case scenario you’re still playing at least 1.1% in taxes. And that means then, the life of your asset is only 70 years; within 70 years Assuming you buy a $1 million property, you’re gonna pay $1 million in taxes in 70 years.

    Then, if you own a single-family home or whatever, or property the coal is actually trying to rent out your property at a premium, but two people who have never really had experience with property property management… It is a fucking nightmare and headache. Finding good tenants and keeping them; the holy Grail. Too much counterparty risk with properties; people who fuck up your property, end up not paying rent in squatting your place, people who start to grow marijuana inside your property, people who turn your property into a brothel (true story), or just physical wear and tear and decay. Anything in the physical realm in my opinion has too much risk. 


  • PHOTO KAPITAL.

    Something I’ve been meaning to write about and think about; capital, photo capital.

    So the first question is, what is photo, why does it matter?

    My first general thesis is that photography, digital photography, might be one of the most underrated innovations of all time. Let us consider how many domains it crosses, and why it is such a big deal:

    First, the digital transformation of photography, from film photography to digital. I think most thinkers and individuals have not yet grafted how and why this is such a big deal;

    For millennials like myself, or people who are born a little bit before or after me, I’m 36 and born in 1988, there certainly is an alert and romanticism of the past. Everyone reminisces about the “good old days”, in which “life was simpler” etc.

     however, a simple intervention: what if, the number one complication in our lives is not digital technology, not the Internet etc.… But something a little bit more unsuspecting; AirPods, AirPods pros, noise canceling headphones? I would actually make the arguments that noise canceling headphones might be the true menace to society, not iPhones, iPads, or screens.

    People talk a lot about screen time, no. She is not screen time, the issue is maybe audio related?

    For example, I don’t own a pair of AirPods, I don’t even own a pair of headphones anymore. Cindy has a pair of AirPods pros that my best man Justin got us, and this morning just listening to Michael sailor interview, with just one earbud, with the noise canceling AirPods pros, simply to listen to the interview without waking up my mom. Yet, the bizarre feeling; when I listen to the interview, it kind of put me in a weird alternate universe, in which I truly felt disconnected from the world and reality. It actually made me feel a little bit weird.

    Disconnecting their AirPods, out of my ears, actually… I have another theory; isn’t your ears, earlobes, sound, kind of related to your spatial sense surroundings of the environment?

    My simple idea; if you want to become a better photographer, a more attuned person, just throw your AirPods in the trash.

    Visual?

    So Aristotle I think one said that our vision is actually more important than anything else that our first great delight on the planet is visual. Even though I’m a guitar for and visual artist, I would actually make the other case that actually… Your ears, and your hearing, Might be 1000 times more important.

    For example, let us consider how human beings learn, how they learn languages, speech patterns and communication, and how natural it is for children. To teach the child the alphabet how to read text, is actually very unnatural, a huge technological feat and innovation. However, for a child to learn how to speak a foreign language, simply by hearing the words intonations, the sing song rhythm, is 1000% natural.

     for example, music, music tour ears. Even a one year-old child, who could barely stand, can listen to music rhythms and beats, and start dancing. Even send when he was about a year old, he already learned how to make beats on GarageBand both on the iPhone and iPad! He actually knew and learned how to sample and make beats, far before he was even able to speak!

    So my first theory ; music, voice, audio; might be more important than the visual?

    Then what?

    Advancing this argument; if in fact, audio is more important than visual, then what are we to do as visual artist, photographers?

    First, let us return to first principles, first principles thinking. My general idea is that photography and visual things are kind of unnatural. And this is where we make our art.

    I think there’s this one saying, maybe Aristotle, what nature fails to complete, man and art completes.

    Art should best be stood as a novel invention and innovation technique and tool. For example, art and art making is unnatural. But then again a lot of things are unnatural, but certainly make life 1 trillion times better. For example, can you imagine living without electricity? Even one of my most new favorite inventionsand and innovations; the insane joy of having an in unit washer and dryer?  in fact, all the washers and dryers on the planet can probably contribute 100,000 times more to the carbon footprint than all the bitcoin miners on the planet combined and maybe even multiplied by 10. Yet, ain’t nobody rolling to get rid of washers and dryers.

    And also something that people don’t understand, I learned this from my architect friend ERIC, is that almost all buildings, made out of concrete and the such, these are all carbon products. It is almost impossible to build a modern day building without carbon derived materials. So unless you like living in a hut, munching on acorns, without running water Wi-Fi or electricity, maybe this faker signaling about reducing carbon emissions might be a wise idea.

    The insanely phenomenal innovation of digital photography

    OK let us do some simple math. Let us say conservatively, currently a roll of film is about 10 bucks, for Kodak PORTRA 400. Then assuming that you want someone else to process it and scan it for you, let us say that even on the cheap end, it is $10 or $15 for developed plus scan. This is then around $20-$25, for 36 exposures, or assuming you have that new Pentax half frame camera, you can squeeze out 72 exposures for about 20 bucks or 25 bucks.

    No you can see how this can easily get expensive. Even if you shoot four rolls of film, that’s around 100 bucks. That is insanely expensive.

    And it adds up. Shooting film guitar for you, now that I am becoming wiser, a more keen economist, is the ultimate depreciating asset, and the easiest way to burn through all your money and capital.

    It is kind of like purchasing a high performance car or vehicle that runs on premium gasoline; this might be the stupidest decision of all time. Why? Assuming you have a luxury Lexus SUV, you can easily blow $500 a week on gas, which is maybe $2000 a month on gas! Assuming that you put that money into bitcoin, and bitcoin goes from a $1.3 trillion industry to $130 trillion industry, you have at least 10 X gains ahead of you. So your $2000 — $200,000 or $200k a month! That’s $2.4M a year!


    Becoming a profitable photographer

    Everyone is in chase of profits. If you do not chase profits, you are a fool.

    What is the easiest way to get profits? Simple; keep your expenses insanely insanely low, this is the key.

    The number one rule in money finance and investing; simple, just don’t lose money!

    How does one lose money? There’s 1 trillion ways to lose money;

    First, equipment, gear, or never investments. They are the worst thing that causes you to bleed through your money.

    If you want a really really great camera that will last you a very very long time, my current suggestion is get the Lumix S9 full frame camera, my personal thought is this body should be able to last you 5 to 10 years, and just get the 26 mm F8 pancake lens which only cost 200 bucks.  The body is around 1500, the lens is about 200 bucks, so the whole set up ($1700) should be able to set you up for a long time.

    Or, just buy the cheapest smallest most affordable Fujifilm X camera, also just get a interchangeable lens system. There’s a new XM-5 body, I think it’s only about 800 bucks. And just get the cheapest pancake lens, which should be a little bit less than $1000.

    If you’re a hobby photographer, on a budget, just get a used Ricoh GR digital camera, whatever generation suits your budget.  I have already proven in 2017 that you could take insanely great photos on a Rico GR two camera, which was only $600 at the time. And all the new Ricoh GR 3X cameras and beyond, are also insanely good. All around $999 and below.


    What’s your telos?

    Ultimately, with enough time meditation reflection and consideration, it all comes down to philosophy. The philosophy of photography, a concept that I pioneered maybe seven years ago. 

    Why does this matter? Ultimately you have to think about the purpose or end goal of things. For example I was looking at this new meta-quest augmented reality glasses that Facebook just put out, and I just watched it, scratching my head, looking at all this impressive technology advancements, and it just made no sense to me. Somewhat along the line, should have come in with a critical thought, and thought;

    Is this something that people need and or want?

    Kind of a bad thing is that nobody wants it, and also nobody needs it. Apple Vision Pro is an utter disaster, Steve Jobs would have never ever ever allowed to even go into development. Because Steve Jobs was a master mind and understanding the human psyche, human economics and proportions. Never forget the legend of the original iPhone three; pioneer the iPhone three and the iPhone four and 4S to be used only with one hand, with your thumb being able to reach all sides of the screen without stretching. And then, after his tragic passing, all these greedy apple executives, trying to increase shareholder value, kept making the iPhone bigger and bigger, heavier fatter uglier, compromising design for the sake of “power“, inadvertently causing millions of people on the planet to get extreme carpal tunnel pain in their hands, and also, falling victim to this terrible cycle of constantly upgrading their iPhones, until no end.

    In fact, I find Apple to be the new loanshark, the new evil presence, the new bank which preys on poor people. 

    For example, there’s all these plans now in which you could keep upgrading your iPhone, at a 0% premium, forever. This is terrible; Apple stimulate some sort of fake desire for a fake thing; which doesn’t have any true utility. Everyone knows this, even Apple employees know this. The whole place is a mess.

    Even now, just go to any Apple Store, feel the vibes. What was once energetic, happy optimistic and friendly has gone dark, Muros, Molly, unfriendly and cold, terrible to go to.

    Back in the day I used to be excited to go to the Apple store like a kid going to a candy shop. Now, I avoid the Apple Store like the plague; even the last time I went to the Apple store, simply to just buy a new iPhone Pro to test it out, I literally had to wait in line for about 30 minutes, Before anyone even attended to me, before I could even purchase my device?

    And once again, the biggest benefit to go into a store in real life is you could sense the emotional energy of people. Everyone looked miserable, disgruntled, unhappy.

    Choose hope

    I think the reason why I am so enthusiastic about bitcoin, Michael sailor, micro strategy and like is that it is full of optimism, hope and happiness. Everyone is happy in the bitcoin community, smiling, optimistic joyful, happy, and everyone is part of the same emotional roller coaster.

    And the whole bitcoin network is virtuous because if micro strategy turns into $1 trillion company, the first bitcoin bank or the first bitcoin finances corporation, everyone wins! The price of bitcoin goes to 13 million a bitcoin, everyone wins. The hedge fund managers, the 80-year-old retired person with bitcoin spot ETFs, The individual bitcoin holders, people with the Coinbase account, even the crypto anarchists.

    You know the sign of a good investment when both anarchists and traditional corporate capitalist can thrive together. 

    I actually had a thought, back when I bought bitcoin for only about six or $7000 of bitcoin… A bitcoin could actually benefit photographers and street photographers, in terms of accepting payments in bitcoin, charging services in bitcoin, we’re also figuring out how to use bitcoin, NFT’s and wrapping it, maybe creating some sort of new economy for photography and art?

    I also have this big idea, creating the first Satoshi and bitcoin back photo platform. ARS, arsbeta.com was my first stab at it; but the issue at the time was there was no real financial instrument backing it. Now that lightning has been invented on the bitcoin at work, the ideas of micro transactions with the Toshi’s becomes a real reality; assuming that a single Satoshi is real money, but super super small, like a fraction of a penny; things become very interesting because there is a true financial stake here; real skin in the game.

    For example, if every single time I liked your photo, but it cost me a single Satoshi, you would probably think twice about it. And if to follow somebody, cost you a Satoshi or gave us Satoshi to the photographer, or creator… This would be a big idea.

    And also, the idea of a photo critique community, shout out to my friend Jun Goodhouse Kim, if commissioning somebody for a real photo critique would accept payments institutions, then, a real new economy could arise.

    Currently the number one critical issue with Instagram is that it cost nothing, and the whole platform is being run by bots.

    TikTok has become an interesting disruption; back to by mainly in China, and spyware, essentially China has been able to disrupt the social media industry of Instagram, essentially taking everything that America did well with vine, Twitter Instagram and Facebook and YouTube, Snapchat and Instagram stories and making it far better. Making it more entertaining addictive, more toxic?

    Actually the number one reason I encourage everybody to delete TikTok, is that it might be the most toxic poisonous substance of them all; because they are a century backed by a low-key evil mainland Chinese corporation, there is zero incentive for the company, Bytedance to moderate or to delete dangerous videos concepts and ideas; the amount of conspiracy theories and weird stuff on TikTok is alarming, even to me. And also, I’m a little bit concerned about all of the unregulated things which are happening on TikTok, at least YouTube Google Facebook Amazon and the like try to do some level of content moderation, with TikTok there is none.

    Assuming that Donald Trump gets elected president or whatever, the first thing he should do is probably ban TikTok.  I almost find this to be a moral imperative; there is a terrible asymmetry here;

    Why is it that America allows a Chinese corporation like TikTok to operate in America, but mainland China does not allow any tech company to operate on her shores?

    Other stuff which are very scary; all of these video games like RIOT games and like, which once again are all run by mainland Chinese corporations, is essentially China’s plan to indoctrinate the heart the souls and the minds of the youth. The best way to spread bad propaganda is through soft propaganda; soft coercion, through entertainment media and the like.  Even a very very weird thing, watch Pacific Rim to the movie; I think they had some financing from a Shanghai backed venture capitalist fund or something; that paints China mainland China in a very favorable light? I recall watching this on an airplane and finding this to be an extremely bizarre thing.

    Even apparently, the new Disney Mulan film the live action one, the main actress commended and praised the Hong Kong police for cracking down on the pro democracy student protesters?

    And also, let us consider the biggest coward and pussy of them all, John Cena who had to publicly “apologize“, for calling either Taiwan or Tibet a country?

    The same goes with any sort of NBA player, because there are so many people in mainland China who love basketball, even this one mainland China governmental official, who I met in Cambodia, super friendly and 100% fluent in English, told me that he named his first son Jordan, after Michael Jordan.

    And this is what a lot of people who don’t understand we have never traveled to; the Chinese is the mainland Chinese, the everyday person loves America, American culture, and would honestly prefer to be here than in mainland China. But capital controls, the oppressive government prevents that. And this is once again, why any rich and smart mainland Chinese person will send their kid to an Ivy League school in the states, And or prefer to buy property or homes in Vancouver, because living in China sucks. You don’t want to be a billionaire in Shanghai or Beijing; the pollution itself will kill you.

    Back to photography

    Life without photography is not a life worth living. Or, a life without photography would be a mistake. 

    I think for myself, the biggest draw and appeal of photography is that it is the great antidote to things; the great antidote to joy, driving, happiness and the like.

    For example, I still do believe that traveling is good for the soul; better to spend $100,000 on traveling to planet, rather than buying a loser Tesla car. Or even a single-family home, I’m starting to think more and more, buying homes in America’s a scam. Better to just buy bitcoin instead, and see your money 100X from here. 

    If I could tell you that buying $1 million a bitcoin today, which is about 16 or 17 bitcoin, would grow to be 100 million in 21 years, and I could tell you this with 100% certain to you, would you do it? Of course! Only an idiot wouldn’t.

    But I think the problem is in America, even for us millennials, now that we’re getting older, having kids etc.… Is that having physical property like a single-family home is the Apex of humanly worldly success in America. But this is a 20th century idea, The baby boomers and before then. Or Gen X. A 21st-century idea, in the year 2024 and beyond, is the digital transformation of property, or digital energy which is bitcoin.

    Hope

    No no no, the world is not going to explode, there will be no World War III, Bill Gates is not trying to inject 5G into your butthole, and control your soul. And no no no, mainland China is not a threat; I think China only has one military base somewhere in Africa, in America has maybe 1000? The power of the US Navy is maybe 10,000 X to that of mainland China, I think the whole red herring of China as a threat is just a distraction, maybe by the US government to encourage increased spending for military budgets. But we all know that nobody can mess with America, even if they wanted to.

    Even Russia, the lame duck with loser Putin running the show, obviously Russia is losing. Putin, with his Shorty guy Napoleon complex, thought he could take over Ukraine, and obviously he cannot. And I think sooner or later the people will overthrow him, exile him, or who knows maybe even hang him? Like Marie Antoinette?

    Now what?

    Once again, photography might be the most democratizing force. For example, like a Camera is very profitable in mainland China, this is why like a Brazil was forced to take down the Tiananmen Square commercial. But the truth is difficult to hide; once you’re rich mainland Chinese kid oligarch from a billionaire family goes to Harvard Yale Stanford UCLA UC Berkeley, and get access to Google or ChatGPT and Gmail; obviously they’re going to discover the truth, and prefer to be in America than China. The only rich mainland Chinese kids who go back to China because they are strong armed by their rich families to come back to inherit the family business, obviously against their own will.


  • How to Get Rich

    I think I might be the richest millennial I know, or at least anybody who is born in 1988, besides Mark Zuckerberg.

    How and why?

    First, I think I am the only millennial I know with literally zero debt. Like zero mortgage, which is debt, zero car payments, zero college loans etc. Actually if I think about this in retrospect, growing up poor might have been the most beneficial things: seeing the evils of gambling via my dad, and crushing debt bankruptcy through my mom… Was probably the best indicator or learner that I had in terms of real life experience, in terms of how terrible the evils of debt is.

    And also, even going to college… Essentially being able to go for “free”, because my family was poor, I got all these scholarships and grants, and work-study loans, which essentially means that I still have to work, but at least, I had to take on zero debt to pay for my dorm apartment etc.

    Voluntary loans

    The Only money I borrowed was about $10,000, more for fun; I used that money to backpack through Europe, travel the world in between my junior and senior year etc. But that was optional.

    And also, I think the really really big thing; never spending more than $2500 USD on a car? I think that was the sticker price for the last car I purchased which was a 1990 Miata, when I was 21 years old, it might’ve been $3000 USD, getting it used on craigslist, ironically enough because the man selling it had a child on the way, and sold it because it was no longer useful to him having to raise a kid. Funny that I am in similar shoes now, now that Seneca is 3 1/2 years old.

    Mindset

    I think the number one critical thing is to just change your mindset. One thing which I have learned after the almost 15 years of being self-employed, ever since I was 21 until 36… Is truth be told, nothing in the world is really worth it. No amount of money eating out at a restaurant is ever worth it; purchasing beef ribs at Costco and baking it at home is at least a 100X superior yield than any restaurant, or even all all you can eat Korean barbecue; currently, my favorite spot is Chubby Cattle, but even though they issue there is they have a 90 minute time limit, I think my current record is about 70 plates of beef tongue. I just went to the recent little Tokyo branch which just opened, and the servers, their jaws dropped; asking me whether I was a bodybuilder, given how much I ate, even on the last call I asked for 20 plates of beef tongue, they were skeptical, but I finished it all quite easily.

    Spartan is sexy.

    True insights ,,, take real risks:

    Y’all niggas still taking advances huh? Me and my niggas were taking real chances huh! – Jay Z

    The ultimate mindset I suggest is going spartan. Just watch the movie 300, think about King Leonidas. Would King Leonidas blow his money on a Tesla, cybertruck, Lamborghini or Porsche? No! He would know that these things were just for the Persian slaves, those giving fellatio to King Xerxes.

    Do you want to be one of the 300 Spartan elite, or do you be one of the million Persian slaves?

    There is a motto in the US military, freedom is not free. I would refine this saying; freedom is expensive, very expensive.

    The price is sacrifice

    True freedom is what you decide to give up, forgo, or sacrifice. This is embodied via the fact that you never eat out, you don’t drink alcohol, you don’t smoke weed or do drugs, you don’t go on trips to Vegas, you don’t watch pornography, you don’t watch any media, you don’t listen to music, podcasts, etc. You don’t watch YouTube, Instagram or TikTok.

    People think that being rich means to have millions of dollars, and I want to just spend it all buying stuff. But there is a difference between having $1 million in the bank, and going out and buying a $1 million Bugatti. 

    Even Kanye West had a funny quote about being a multi billionaire; you don’t want to be a billionaire because if you are worth $1 billion, you go out and you buy a McDonald’s hamburger for a dollar, and now you’re only a $999,999,999-aire.

    Investing

    You want real real exposure to risk and reward.

    For me, certainly there is a great surge of power joy when you see your investments yield. To see the number go up is good and to see it keep going on is a good thing.

    For example, very surprising, people are starting to know that I am an investor, or a trader because I walk around super happy, huge grin on my face, like Arnold in his prime. A boyish grin. And smiles all around!

    I think people can smell and sense high testosterone, high power and energy. Even though I dress like a homeless person, half of the time I’m not even wearing a shirt, but people they know.

    So essentially the first rule on investing is simple: don’t lose money. Never put your money into anything that you think will cause you to lose money.

    So for example, a lot of people think that bitcoin is super risky, but actually it is not. It is just very volatile. And funny enough, it’s a feature not a bug!

    Higher volatility = higher returns

    The volatility of bitcoin is a feature not a bug!

    To quote Michael Saylor, volatility is vitality. The more volatile something is, the more energy they have. To quote the recent Bernstein interview that Michael Saylor had, the reason why LeBron James is the most potent force on the court is because he is the most volatile. Also, volatility is good when it comes to Tsunami because it has massive power. Look at the slides here.

    Why are the traditional markets closed in the evening and the weekends?

    And also, an insight I gleaned is the reason why bitcoin’s price goes up and down all the time, is that it is being traded 24 7, all the time in real time. Maybe the reason we see less volatility in the traditional markets is because they close! But imagine there was a Cuban missile crisis, Friday night, can you imagine the insanity; you’re not able to withdraw your money or sell your stocks until Monday morning?

    “Why doesn’t the future look like the future?” – Elon

    Currently we are in the year 2024… We are supposed to be so into the future. It still boggles my mind why in the year 2024, the markets close and open? I did some ChatGPT research on this, why this is, and there are some weird notions of work life balance, or maybe because back in day when stocks were actually traded on the physical floor, like the wolf of Wall Street, it is because they literally traded stocks like pieces of paper, and it was in the physical realm?

    But now, because it is all digital… And half of the agents trading online are just bots and robots, there’s literally zero sense for anybody to trade anything that is not online.

    Well let me give you a better example, we have all these hipsters telling us that film vinyl and analog things are better. But do they use an iPhone which is powered by gasoline? Or film cartridges?

    Can you imagine living without the internet?


    What’s more important, water or Wi-Fi?

    Certainly water is more valuable, but I think the way that people treated nowadays is that Wi-Fi, having internet connectivity 5G is more critical.

    I would actually say even with food; you could fast somebody for 40 hours, and even if they have water they will not die. But, if you try doing that with internet, I think the downsides would be much greater.

    Easier to fast 40 days without food than to fast 40 days without Wi-Fi. 


    How I became a trader

    My first taste for investing was when I was around 15 years old, it was totally random, learning about stocks, mutual funds, etc. I remember buying about $900 worth of Adobe stock, in writing it up to around $1250, and then later buying some mutual funds. And holding it all in college, maybe it went up to around $1500 or something.

    In fact, Dr. Ahmed my science teacher in high school first told me about aggressive mutual funds, and how I should become an emancipated minor and get into trading etc.

    Financial freedom at the age of 16?

    For me, I think the reason I first got into it was I wanted to feel superior, advanced, ahead of the curve. When most of the kids at school were still begging their parents for a PlayStation, I felt so advanced mature and superior,,, already knowing how to invest in the stock market.

    In college, when I was hungry for my own financial freedom, I remember daytrading as a sophomore in college, waking up super fucking early to trade the markets, and note, this is me at around 19 years old. And feeling the hormonal rushes when my money would go up or down. And not being able to concentrate in class because I’m just thinking about the green or reds.

    The best lesson of all time

    Long story short, I ended up losing all of my money I think my senior year, maybe $3500 worth, because I accidentally misread some of the financials for this one oil company I was invested in (penny stock). I recall, I regretted this so much, and felt so saddened by this at the age of 21, thinking that I would never be able to recover. But now that I am playing with millions of dollars in investing and trading, I learned that it might’ve been the best thing that happened to me, with about 15 years of foresight. Why? I already got rid of the emotional roller coaster as a young child, and as a teenager, and a 21 year-old, which means now, as a 36-year-old man, I am far more calm collected stoic, and unemotional about it.

    The stoic investor

    My suggestion: don’t get too excited when your gains go up. Otherwise, you will become addicted to the gains. And you might lever up and take foolish financial risks, to see even greater gains.

    Good greed, bad greed?

    I personally believe there is a difference between good greed and bad greed.

    What’s the difference?

    Good greed is you’re trying to think 30 years ahead, ahead of the curve, see where the puck is going, not where it currently is. Chasing at least a 10X yield. Or even 100x, or 1000x. But over 30 years.

    A foolish greedy person is into professional sports, sports betting, counting cards, playing poker and blackjack, and trying to “time” the market. And make gains in days, weeks, even months.

    Michael Saylor and microstrategy has purchased bitcoin 40 times now, every quarter for the last 4 years.

    30 years is the reason

    If you think 30 years ahead, this cuts through the noise. This is the ultimate razor. ERIC KIM’s razor.

    Certainly nobody likes to think 30 years ahead because they want immediate hedonic pleasure right now, through sexual and mental pleasure, physical pleasure, travel and exotic experiences, Omakase sushi, and the pleasure associated with driving a fast high-powered car.

    But think about it, even if you have a Porsche 911 GT3 RS, or a Lamborghini with scissor doors, even a Tesla model S plaid, you have no skills. Any skinny fat loser can simply wedge his right foot all the way to the floor, and obviously it will be loud and go fast. This takes no courage besides the foolish fact that you might kill yourself or you might kill somebody else in their car with their kids on board.

    Buy weights & bitcoin

    My thought is the only true courage is physical courage, weightlifting, powerlifting, one rep Max lifting. The risk of physical injury is high, which motivates you to warm up, be cautious, and set up safeguards. I think one thing that people don’t understand is that weightlifting could actually be the safest activity out there because you could control all of the variables. For example if you’re tired and not in a good mood, the wise thing to do not is not do it. Compare this to professional sports, even when the players are exhausted, they are whipped like cattle to perform, apparently there are stories that back in the day in the NFL, it would be common for lineman to sniff lines of cocaine, before applying to hype themselves up. 

    One day of victory is not worth a year of pain

    For example, one foolish decision that I made doing an extremely heavy floor bench press, six plates, caused me to injure my wrist which has plagued me for a year and a half, the wise thing to have done was just to take the day off, one day of success is not worth a year and a half of misery. The only reason I did it was because it was my “off day”, and I wanted to stunt on other guys at the gym, very foolish.

    Whenever you try to impress yourself, you shall succeed. Whenever you try to impress others you will fail.

    I also think this is the wisdom of thinking long-term; nobody wants to be a Ronnie Coleman and be a cripple for the rest of his life, even if you win all the accolades.

    What I learned from the book “Pumping Iron”

    I think this is also where Arnold Schwarzenegger was very wise; he was on the juice and all of his buddies were, but he had the wisdom of getting out of the bodybuilding game in order to do more interesting ventures, like acting business etc. Because he knew that maybe, all of the bodybuilders taking steroids were doing irreversible harm on themselves.

    People sometimes talk about the golden days of bodybuilding… But all these guys were on steroids! Now, it is kind of disgusting, the average female women’s Olympia might have been even buffer than Arnold in his prime.

    Who is richer?

    Talking to some homeboys from the Toyota dealership, when I ask them what is the difference between me and you? One of the guys said, genuinely, “You are free.” Possibly the best compliment of all time.

    Even now, people do this big dick measuring contest, like who is richer. But, this is the wrong measurement.

    Let us say you are a straight man, and you sell your soul in your butt hole for gay pornography, and you get paid $1 billion a year. Would you do it? Obviously not!

    Certainly there is something sacred and profane here; there are certain things that one does not even for trillion dollars.

    For example, if you could give me $900 trillion, but I had to sell my firstborn son into slavery would I do it? Obviously not. Not even if you took that $900 trillion and multiplied it by $1 trillion.

    NASSIM TALEB Has this funny quote, to the person who says that they cannot be bribed, you’re just not offering enough money.

    And I suppose this is the ultimate test, whether your ethics morality and your personal beliefs matter more than money. Or even the approval of your spouse, etc.

    And I think the negative risk, the sacrifice, or the potential for downside is what truly dictates your real beliefs. And what you are willing to forgo.

    How to get rich with bitcoin

    Very simple, just opened up account with the Coinbase app on your iPhone or whatever, link it with your traditional bank, and just keep buying bitcoin, until the end of time. And the goal is to give it to your kids kids kids.

    Become insanely Spartan and frugal, sell your second car, maybe remortgage or refinance your house to get more cash on hand, buy the bitcoin, and ride the 55% ARR until the end of time!

    ERIC



  • How to get rich

    I think I might be the richest millennial I know, or at least anybody who is born in 1988, besides Mark Zuckerberg.

    How and why?

    First, I think I am the only millennial I know with literally zero debt. Like zero mortgage, which is debt, zero car payments, zero college loans etc. Actually if I think about this in retrospect, growing up poor might have been the most beneficial things: seeing the evils of gambling via my dad, and crushing debt bankruptcy through my mom… Was probably the best indicator or learner that I had in terms of real life experience, in terms of how terrible the evils of debt is.

    And also, even going to college… Essentially being able to go for “free”, because my family was poor, I got all these scholarships in grants, and work-study loans, which essentially means that I still have to work, but at least, I had to take on zero debt to pay for my dorm apartment etc.

    Only money I borrowed was about $10,000, more for fun; I use that money to backpack through Europe, travel the world in between my junior and senior year etc. But that was optional.

    And also, I think the really really big thing; never spending more than $2500 USD on a car?  I think that was the sticker price for the last car I purchased which was a 1990 Miata, when I was 21 years old, it might’ve been $3000 USD, getting it used on craigslist, ironically enough because the man selling it had a child on the way, and sold it because it was no longer useful to him having to raise a kid. Funny that I am in similar shoes now, now that Seneca is 3 1/2 years old.

    Mindset

    I think the number one critical thing is to just change your mindset. I sent you what I have learned after the almost 15 years of being self-employed, ever since I was 21 until 36… Is truth be told, nothing in the world is really worth it. No amount of money eating out at a restaurant is ever worth it; purchasing beef ribs at Costco and baking it at home is at least a 100 X superior yield than any restaurant, or even all all you can eat Korean barbecue; currently, my favorite spot is chubby cattle, but even though they issue there is they have a 90 minute time limit, I think my current record is about 70 plates of beef tongue.  I just went to the recent little Tokyo branch which just opened, and the servers, their jaws dropped; asking me whether I was a bodybuilder, given how much I ate, even on the last call I asked for 20 plates of beef tongue, they were skeptical, but I finished it all quite easily.

    Spartan is sexy.

    True insights ,,, take real risks

    Y’all niggas still taking advances huh? Me and my niggas were taking real chances huh! – Jay Z

    Ultimate mindset I suggest is ghost spartan. Just watching a movie 300, think about King Leonidas. Would King Leonidas blow his money on a Tesla cyber truck, Lamborghini or Porsche? No! He would know that these things were just for the Persian slaves, those giving fellatio to King Xerxes.

    Do you want to be one of the 300 Spartan elite, or do you be one of the million Persian slaves?

    There is a motto in the US military, freedom is not free. I would actually say the opposite; freedom is expensive, very expensive.

    True freedom is what you decide to give up, forgo, or sacrifice. This is embodied via the fact that you never eat out, you don’t drink alcohol, you don’t smoke weed or do drugs, you don’t go on trips to Vegas, you don’t watch pornography, you don’t watch any media, You don’t listen to music, podcast, etc. You don’t watch YouTube, Instagram or TikTok.

    People think that being rich means I have millions of dollars, and I want to just spend it all buying stuff. But there is a difference between having $1 million in the bank, and going out and buying a $1 million Bugatti. 

    Even Kanye West had a funny quote about being a multi billionaire; you don’t want to be a billionaire because if you are worth $1 billion, you go out and you buy a McDonald’s hamburger for a dollar, and now you’re only a $999,999,999 Aire.

    Investing

    You want real real exposure to risk and reward.

    For me, certainly there is a great surge of power joy when you see your investments yield. To see the number go up is good and to see it keep going on is a good thing.

    For example, very surprising, people are starting to know that I am an investor, or a traitor because I walk around super happy, huge grin on my face, like Arnold in his prime. A boyish grin. And smiles all around!

    I think people could smell and sense high testosterone, high power and energy. Even though I dress like a homeless person, half of the time I’m not even wearing a shirt, but people they know.

    So essentially the first rule on investing is simple: don’t lose money. Never put your money into anything that you think will cause you to lose money.

    So for example, a lot of people think that bitcoin is super risky, but actually it is not. It is just very volatile. And funny enough, it’s a feature not a bug!

    The volatility of bitcoin is a feature not a bug!

    To quote Michael sailor, volatility is vitality. The more volatile something is, the more energy they have. To quote the recent Bernstein interview that Michael Saylor had, the reason why LeBron James is the most potent force on the court is because he is the most volatile. Also, volatility is good when it comes to Tsunami because it has massive power.

    And also, an insight I gleaned is the reason why bitcoin’s price goes up and down all the time, is that it is being traded 24 seven, all the time in real time. Maybe the reason we see less volatility in the traditional markets is because they close! But imagine there was a Cuban missile crisis, Friday night, can you imagine the insanity; you’re not able to withdraw your money or sell your stocks until Monday morning?

    And currently we are in the year 2024… We are supposed to be so into the future. It still boggles my mind why in the year 2024, the markets close and open? I also did some ChatGPT research on this, why this is, and there are some weird notions of work life balance, or maybe because back in day when stocks were actually traded on the physical floor, Like the wolf of Wall Street, it is because they literally traded stocks like pieces of paper, and it was in the physical realm?

    But now, because it is all digital… And half of the agents trading online are just thoughts and robots, there’s literally zero sense for anybody to trade anything that is not online.

    Well let me give you a better example, we have all these hipsters telling us that film vinyl in analog things are better. But do they use an iPhone which is powered by gasoline? Or film cartridges?

    Can you imagine living without the Internet?

    What’s more important, water or Wi-Fi?

    Certainly water is more valuable, but I think the way that people treated nowadays is that Wi-Fi, having Internet connectivity 5G is more critical.

    I would actually say even with food; you could fast somebody for 40 hours, and even if they have water they will not die. But, if you try doing that with Internet, I think the downsides would be much greater.

    easier to fast 40 days without food than to fast 40 days without Wi-Fi. 


    How I became a trader

    My first taste for investing was when I was around 15 years old, it was totally random, learning about mutual stocks, mutual funds, etc. I remember buying about $900 worth of Adobe stock, in writing it up to around $1250, and then later buying some mutual funds. And holding it all in college, maybe it went up to around $1500 or something.

    For me, I think the reason I first got into it was I wanted to feel superior, advanced, ahead of the curve. When most of the kids at school were still begging their parents for a PlayStation, I felt so advanced mature and superior,,, already knowing how to invest in the stock market.

    In college, when I was hungry for my own financial freedom, I remember daytrading as a sophomore in college, waking up super fucking early to treat the markets, and note, this is me at around 19 years old. And feeling the hormonal rushes when my money would go up or down. And not being able to con stream in class because I’m just thinking about the green or reds.

    Long story short, I ended up losing all of my money I think my senior year, maybe $3500 worth, because I accidentally misread some of the financials for this one oil company. I recall, I regretted this so much, and felt so saddened by this at the age of 21, thinking that I would never be able to recover. But now that I am playing with millions of dollars in investing in trading, I learned that it might’ve been the best thing that happened to me, with about 15 years of foresight. Why? I already got rid of the emotional roller coaster as a young child, and as a teenager, and a 21 year-old, which means now, as a 36-year-old man, I am far more calm collected stoic, and unemotional about it.

    The stoic investor

    My suggestion: don’t get too excited when your gains go up. Otherwise, you will become addicted to the gains. And you might lever up and take foolish financial risks, to see even greater gains.

    Good greed, bad greed?

    I personally believe there is a difference between good greed and bad greed.

    What’s the difference?

    Good greed is you’re trying to think 30 years ahead, ahead of the curve, see where the puck is going, not where it currently is. Chasing at least a 10X yield.

    A foolish greedy person is into professional sports, sports betting, counting cards, playing poker and blackjack, and trying to “time” the market.

    Michael Saylor and strategy has purchased bitcoin 40 times now, every quarter for the last 4 years.

    If you think 30 years ahead, this cuts through the noise. This is the ultimate razor. ERIC KIM’s razor .

    Certainly nobody likes to think 30 years ahead because they want immediate hedonic pleasure right now, through sexual and mental pleasure, physical pleasure, travel and exotic experiences, Omakase sushi, and the pleasure associated with driving a fast high-powered car.

    But think about it, even if you have a Porsche 911 GT three RS, or a Lamborghini with scissor doors, even a Tesla model S plaid, you have no skills. Any skinny fat loser can simply wedge his right foot all the way to the floor, and obviously it will be loud and go fast. This takes no courage besides the foolish fact that you might kill yourself or you might kill somebody else in their car with their kids on board.

    My thought is the only true courage is physical courage, weightlifting, powerlifting, one rep Max lifting. The risk of physical injury is high, which motivates you to warm up, be cautious, and set up safeguards. I think one thing that people don’t understand is that weightlifting could actually be the safest activity out there because you could control all of the variables. Even if you’re retired and not in a good mood, The wise thing to do not is not do it. 

    For example, one foolish decision that I made doing an extremely heavy floor bench press, six plates, caused me to injure my wrist which has plugged me for a year and a half, the wise thing to have done was just to take the day off, one day of success is not worth a year and a half of misery.

    I also think this is the wisdom of thinking long-term; nobody wants to be a Ronnie Coleman and be a cripple for the rest of his life, even if you want all the accolades.

    I think this is also where Arnold Schwarzenegger was very wise; he was on the juice and all of his buddies were, but he had the wisdom of getting out of the bodybuilding game in order to do more interesting ventures, like acting business etc. Because he knew that maybe, all of the bodybuilders taking steroids were doing irreversible harm on themselves.

    People sometimes talk about the golden days of bodybuilding… But all these guys were on steroids! Now, it is kind of disgusting, the average female women’s Olympia might have been even buffer than Arnold in his prime.

    Who is richer?

    Talking to some homeboys from the Toyota dealership, when I ask them what is the difference between me and you? One of the guys said, genuinely, “you are free.” Possibly the best compliment of all time.

    Even now, people do this big dick measuring contest, like who is richer. But, this is the wrong measurement.

    Let us say you are a straight man, and you sell your soul in your butt hole for gay pornography, and you get paid $1 billion a year. Would you do it? Obviously not!

    Certainly There is something sacred and profane here; there are certain things that one does not even for trillion dollars.

    For example, if you could give me $900 trillion, but I had to sell my firstborn son into slavery would I do it? Obviously not. Not even if you took that $900 trillion and multiplied it by $1 trillion.

    NASSIM TALEB Has this funny quote, to the person who says that they cannot be bribed, you’re just not offering enough money.

    And I suppose this is the ultimate test, whether your ethics morality and your personal beliefs matter more than money. Or even the approval of your spouse, etc.

    And I think the negative risk, the sacrifice, or the potential for downside is what truly dictates your real beliefs.  And what you are willing to forgo.


  • The Archimedes Lever Principle to Success 

    If you know where to put your fulcrum is, then you can and shall move the world!

    So I’ve been making some insanely great returns from micro strategy, micro strategy stock, MSTR– for example, in just a month, I was able to take $150,000, put it into micro strategy, and I saw it go up to $200,000! A $50,000 gain, in just a month. Pretty awesome.

    Currently reading the Bernstein interview that Michael Saylor has, and the gist of the news is that the general goal strategy is that micro strategy will become the first native bitcoin bank.

    The first shall win

    So the first thought was, what is the point of a company, continuing to leverage debt, borrowing money at very very low interest rates, to just keep buying more and more bitcoin?

    But then again maybe the same question is what is the point of a company or a corporation, buying up scarce in desirable real estate in New York City, in Manhattan…? In fact, assuming that you’re a rich elite New York City family, the goal is to buy as much property as you possibly can on the main island, and you keep accumulating it, forever, and pass it down to your kids kids kids kids kids.

    Assuming that bitcoin is the first true digital property, then what that then means is if there is a hard cap on the amount of digital property you could ever buy, let us say that it is 21,000,000 square blocks in Cyberman Manhattan, then once again, also the logical goal right now is to accumulate as much property as humanly can right now… Within your means.

    For example, assuming bitcoin is currently trading at around $60,000 a bitcoin right now, if I could’ve told you 30 or 50 years ago that you could buy one square block in Manhattan, on the main island for only $60,000… Wouldn’t you borrow as much money as you possibly could in order to do it, assuming you had 100% perfect foresight, like Bluff from back in the future? 

    Anyways, big thing I’ve been thinking about is for myself… What is my true our comedian lover? Simply put it is photography. It is the thing that feels like breathing to me, and I think I really do have a gift in a talent for it, which supersede possibly anyone else on the planet?

    For example, my ability to see photos scenes opportunities, analyze compositions for photos, to understand things visually… Perhaps this is a gift that I want to share with humanity, the whole planet… I don’t want my insights to die with me when I’m dead. 

    ERIC KIM AI?

    So one fun idea I have is what if I could just create some sort of bot, in which you could just upload a picture to it or a bunch of photos to it, and it could automatically within seconds, analyze the picture, and embed all these compositional Insights to the photos?

    Or even another funny thing, assuming that you have an iPhone or iPhone Pro or whatever… And let us say that you’re just walking on the streets, and you could just open up the ERIC KIM photo app, and as your actively real time scanning the scene, the ERIC KIM voice can either talk to you via speakerphone or your AirPods, and encourage you; taking step forward, taking a step back, how to arrange or rearrange the scene.

    The reason why I feel that this might be such a great idea is that I guess the future of AI is here. Even the new iPhone, iPhone Pro; maybe now in the year 2024, AI has finally arrived. ChatGPT already right now is fucking amazing, don’t be a cheapo, make sure to get the $20 a month version.

    Becoming a publicly traded company 

    Now that I’m already dumb rich, and also, I’m the most spartan person of all time; I might be the sexiest, most handsome, most intelligent person in terms of being frugal; I only spend money on meat and barbells, nothing else. 

    Michael Saylor started micro Reggie in 1989, just one year after I was born. Maybe one new school I have is to create my own publicly traded company? Not because I want money or whatever… But interestingly enough, the idea of becoming a publicly traded company, in which being open and transparent is actually a virtue, this is something that actually appeals to me?


    VISION AI

    So the general premise that I have is becoming some sort of vision AI company. Certainly vision AI is the future, for example, the whole promise of Robo taxi, Tesla, Nvidia and the like is towards vision, AI vision.

    Already now, in LA… waymo the self driving car is ubiquitous. Nobody really blinks an eye anymore. I am still waiting for my invitation code… But I would definitely trust it a lot more than some of these distracted Uber drivers; a lot of Uber drivers, especially though starting off, are fuddling around with their phone, getting distracted, getting random WhatsApp notifications etc., I would definitely trust a self driving car a Tesla Robo taxi, or way more car 1000 times more than any Uber driver. 

    Why this is an imperative

    OK, the truth is it kind of is life for a death situation, and only that… Potential life or death situation for you your kids and your family.

    Why? Assuming that 99% of LA drivers text while driving… This is effing scary. It just takes one dumb millennial, texting while driving in their lucid car or whatever, to get distracted for half a second, unintentionally killing you your kids your wife etc. And I think also the thing which is a bit scary or concerning is that a lot of these people who text while driving, they are actually not malicious, just foolish.

    In fact, if Apple had a true imperative, to save lives or whatever, it would automatically turn on the distracted driving mode do not disturb function when it sees that you are driving a car, and even though this would create a lot of backlash, Apple should have the balls to enforce this, The simple workflow is this:

    Apple automatically turns on the Do Not Disturb While Driving function when it detects you are driving in a car, and then afterwards, it gives the driver the option to disable dysfunction, assuming you’re a passenger in a car or whatever.

    And actually, it would force the user to click “I am a passenger“, not the driver.


    VISIONS

    VISIONS, VISIONARY.

     so essentially, I think the best way to think about things is when it comes to visions, being or becoming a visionary or whatever… It is simple; it means having a vision! It isn’t about being some sort of genius or whatever, which doesn’t exist, but rather, somebody with a stubborn and creative vision about something, is unyielding, full of balls and chutzpah — the desire to craft the world according to his creative vision, unyielding.


    This is going to be the Archimedes lever of the future 

    Once you have discovered your Archimedes lever in life, just devote 1000% of your energies into it!

    ERIC



  • The second something bores you, just move on!

    The only real modern day sin is to be boring or to bore others?


  • Self Beautification, Self Beautification of Your Body

    I think in fashion, life and beyond, what we are seeking is beauty, beautification of ourselves, our environment, our vehicles and clothes etc.

    What I find insanely bizarre is that it is pretty common that people will spend $3.2 million on a home, or $250,000 on remodeling their home, making the interior of their home or beautiful or whatever, yet they spend zero money or concern to beautify their own bodies?

    Body thoughts

    So I think the critical issue here is that modern day society and capitalism is actually antibody. The body is seen as an afterthought, especially because we have this strange Puritan Quaker Protestant work ethic morality when it comes to work, saving for the future, and essentially that the body is evil.

    For example, probably close to 100% of American males watch porn pornography, yet still… Man feel embarrassed about it? Or chuckle about it?

    And also, one is not allowed to be sexual anymore? Do you have any sort of sexual desire or drive is seen as bad?

    Why capitalism consumerism sends us mixed signals 

    OK some very bizarre thoughts; we are indoctrinated that it is good to be different, to be remarkable, and to be unique. Yet, everyone is just trying to be different and unique all in the same way?

    Example, with clothes and clothing brands. The problem about the democratization of fashion is that anyone could buy the same outfit or sneaker or brand so but it does not make you beautiful.

    We must labor to be beautiful!

    My personal thought is the only way to become beautiful is simple; through vigorous physical exercise, through weightlifting, yoga or whatever, and also, maximum time spent outside, walking, in the direct sun and elements. Ideally minimum amount of close possible, to best showcase your naked human body.

    Why is it that when you look at ancient Greek or Roman statues, they are all naked? It is because man, and woman, is the peak of all beauty, and perfection. For example, no Lamborghini or Ferrari or sports car on the planet is as sublime as an insanely beautiful female human body and face. For example, that one Cuban American actress, the one that was in Blade Runner, and now the new upcoming John Wick ballerina movie, has an insanely beautiful face! Not too sure about her height — but, it is very refreshing to see a beautiful female actress and face, with full lips, bright eyes, a great personality. And also kind of refreshing to see a beautiful female actress in Hollywood without a boob job; for example if she is insanely sexy in that last James Bond movie, when she is about to go into that secret club, and she has that beautiful blue dress, obviously without a bra on top.

    And I think this is the big thing is that bigger is not necessarily better. I think for a minute, I think steroids and breast augmentation go hand-in-hand; for a minute the general idea was bigger is better.

    For example, bigger muscle muscles, bigger chest, was better? Also with women… Bigger breast, bigger butt, bigger lips or whatever it was better?

    Think proportions

    I think you cannot really fool the human mind.  for example, assuming that you have a relatively short woman, let us say she is 5 foot tall or something, and she is quite petite; and then she has a C cup or a D cup breast size, certainly something will look a bit off.

    Natural realistically… Petite healthy beautiful women, they have supple breast, and I think the physiology is that too signal of fertility, the breasts are firm, and also kind of point upwards?

    Anyways, what is kind of counterintuitive is that I think man, certainly we are attracted to the female breast. Even in the Emily Wilson translation of the Iliad talking about ”breasts which kindle desire”– it ain’t about having some sort of massive porn star breast. Actually, when female breasts are almost too big, two circular and spherical, too perfect, they look hard instead of soft and supple… It is actually a little bit more grotesque than attractive.

    And I think this is where a lot of modern day pornography has things wrong. They assume that guys just want girls with huge tits, so then they will enroll women who have these really tacky boob jobs. Yet I think what men desire to see and witness is to imagine or visualize or fantasize a beautiful woman who is attracted to them, and maybe wants to be seduced? 

    I also think the bizarre thing in America is that at least with women, it is no longer trendy for a woman to desire to be desired by a man. And then once again this becomes a little bit weird; women then are somehow trying to look sexy to get likes and comments and followers on Instagram? But don’t they know that these are mostly a bunch of 50-year-old, single childless men… With nothing better to do?

    For example, let us say that you are a young attractive woman, with 10 million followers on Instagram. But if I waved a magical wand to reveal to you that literally 100% of these followers of yours, were literally a bunch of 55 year-old single childless fat men, would that change your perception or feeling?


    Beauty for the sake of what?

    So I’m starting to think that beauty is just another product to be marketed to us insult to us. And if you just follow the money it is pretty simple; sooner or later someone is trying to sell you these overpriced caffeine powder supplements, protein powder whey creatine etc, vitamins, etc — or even worse, strange hormone “therapy” or testosterone replacement stuff.

    The only influencers and people you should trust are people who encourage you to do a “via negativa” approach — who tell you what NOT to do. For example, people who tell you not to consume protein powder, not to take pre-workout powder, not to take vitamins and minerals etc.

    Essentially, somebody who is not either directly or indirectly monetizing their advice, in terms of product services or advertisements.

    Maybe the reason you could trust in ERIC KIM is that I am already independently wealthy through bitcoin and photography; so anything that I have to say about diet health and fitness, you know you’re not being played. 

    Via negativa food & fitness

    Once again guys some simple ideas:

    First, the real big idea here, which I literally have never ever ever heard anybody else say, is the virtues of intermittent fasting, and fasting, and not eating anything before you lift weights or work out. 

    For example, some fools say this is dangerous, but come on… I am a 100% all natural weightlifter, and I was able to successfully lift 1000 pounds, that is 10 1/2 plates on each side of the barbell, all while fasting and in a fasted state, consuming nothing but tapwater and black coffee. And I am not some sort of fat dude on steroids; I’m 6 foot tall, 4% body fat,  and maybe I weigh around 160 or 165 pounds? I don’t really know because I haven’t weighed myself in about seven years. But I got a penis arrow, which speaks for itself.

    Ultimately why does this matter?

     What I think is ultimately, sooner or later, people will wake up and learn and realize that they will want to have kids!

    99% of these fertility issues of modern day life is due to the fact that both man and woman is infertile, they consume too many drugs alcohol and adopt vegetarian and vegan diet “plant based “diets, which lead to impotence, in terms of both parties.

    For example, modern day man their testosterone is so low because they don’t consume enough organ meats, beef liver, beef heart and beef intestines, red meat steak etc.

    Also same goes with women. Whenever you see a woman who is a vegetarian or vegan or “plant based”, she doesn’t really look that healthy or attractive.

    The Fiat standard 

    I’m currently reading the field standard by Saif Dean, same author as the bitcoin standard, and I’m actually having a lot of fun! One thing I learned about book reading is that reading a book should be fun and playful! It should make you laugh, question things, and the whole process should be pure joy, not drudgery.

    Another thing about modern day life is that somehow we have indoctrinated people that for one reason or another… Reading a book must be arduous and hard and boring and require some sort of overcoming. No. A book should never be boring. If a book is boring it is a failure.


  • Cyber Spartan

    A big deal; October, 2024… Elon Musk uncovered the we robot Robo taxi cyber cab, cyber van future; 

    The reason why I feel like this is an insanely big deal;

    First, it looks fucking cool! Finally, the future actually looks like the future?

    Tesla > Apple

    First, the great thing is watching the announcement, Elon looks like he is in great shape! He looks 1 billion times happier, cheerful optimistic, and healthy.

    And also… Charismatic leader; I think we all need some sort of figurehead to follow. For example, the reason why Apple is a bad bet is there is no longer a face behind it! Tim Cook, kind of boring like granola. Jony Ive has left, so nobody is left.

    It’s essentially when we think about Tesla, SpaceX, we think of Elon Musk. Having a face behind a concept is critical.

    Same thing goes with Kanye West, and also now Michael Saylor with bitcoin and micro strategies; I am very insanely impressed… Microstrategy stock has gone up 14.4X, over the last four years, which has even outperformed bitcoin!

    A random thought; I think the future will belong to those or whom or the entities in which own the most bitcoin. Assuming that bitcoin is digital property, digital capital, the Apex form of property in the universe, then what that then means is assuming that you want to build a dynasty which last forever, call us to maximize your property, digital property right now.

    Why?

    I think the tricky thing is when do you think about property money wealth power etc.… The question that people often ask is why?

    Assuming that property is capital, in capital is more critical than money… In that most US dollars and fiat currency is just credit running on 20th century rails… What that means is we must think digital, we must think cyber.

    Why I’m still betting on bitcoin and microstrategy over Tesla 

    Watching the new announcement has given me an insanely huge wave of motivation and optimism for the future! Essentially the future looks phenomenal; it looks super cool, and with the upcoming cyber car, cyber taxi, and cyber van… Finally… The future will look like the future!

    And I also think that the insanely optimistic thing about cyber truck is that finally, a vehicle on the road which actually looks like the future!

    I recall, in the year 2020, just a little bit before Covid hit, while in Providence Rhode Island I was meandering ,, it is the year 2020, technically we are living in the super future, why doesn’t the future look like the future? Why does the future look so lame?

    Cyber upside

    So the reason why bitcoin and micro strategies; even though I am a huge Elon Musk and Tesla fan, laws of physics are really hard. I think Tesla still has about 1 million cyber trucks they need to produce, and on top of that, having to produce all these new cyber taxis and cyber vans, Will be very very difficult. I am very confident that Elon and the Tesla team will pull it off, realistically it might take 10 to 20 years, because the laws of physics are hard. For example, physical manufacturing, lithium ion battery refineries, supply chain etc.

    I think what Elon is doing is very admirable because he is currently addressing their real life, physical and bodily challenges we are facing today.  for nobody who has never lived in Los Angeles, never being stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic from Pasadena to the west side of Los Angeles, you’ll never know what Carmageddon, traffic will look like.

    And also, something I have discovered whenever I drive to East LA, Koreatown and the like — fucking sucks. All of that concrete, no green spaces and trees — during the summer, it felt about 10 to 20° hotter there, and the pollution is practically unbearable now. Gavin Newsom and California trying to get rid of tailpipe emissions is a phenomenally great idea.

    For example, the only thing I hit on the planet is maybe cigarette smoke, and the smell of tailpipe emissions, which is fucking toxic, and immediately gives me a headache. I’m currently on a Crusade to tell people who are smoking on the street to not smoking — the text a lot of wits, guts, and quick thinking, because it is something that is insanely important, not only does it immediately give me a headache, but come on come on I have a kid!

    These fucking assholes

    What I hate about smokers, cigarette smokers is that there are smoking on the street, in public, indignantly like they are not harming nobody else. You fucking assholes. At least you have a filter to smoke your cancer sticks through, but whenever you exhale your secondhand smoke, that shit goes straight into my lungs and my brains!

    First, my vision is to just make smoking cigarettes outdoors illegal. In any public space. If you want to hotbox your house or apartment or car with the windows closed, and give yourself lung cancer that is fine; but the rule is to not allow smoking on the street, public sidewalks etc.

    I think technically the law is you’re not supposed to smoke within 25 feet of an eating establishment, but my personal vision at least for Culver City and beyond and on the promenade is that it would be illegal to smoke cigarettes, anywhere which is not outside of your house!

    why is everyone a bunch of pussies?

    Essentially the thing that is insanely annoying to me is that nowadays, everyone is a bunch of pussies and cowards. For example, all of these fat losers with beards, buying guns in ammunition, they feel so tough watching their alternative right conservative media outlets, yet, they don’t even have the courage to speak up against people who smoke cigarettes?

    People are often shocked by me because I actually have the audacity to stand up and speak up. Because everyone else is a coward.

    I think the number one fear that people have, at least in Los Angeles and beyond is that if you somehow confront a smoker for being an asshole, they will somehow pull up a gun and shoot you?

    First, maybe it might happen if you’re in South Central, or somewhere super hood, but very very unlikely if you’re in the west side or somewhere nice like Culver City? Especially since they’re a bunch of cameras around?

    There is also a fear that when you tell people in LA while they are driving, to drive more carefully, they once again, they will somehow also pull up a gun and start shooting you up?

    It’s tricky because it is true; there are some people with guns, conceal and carry guns, whether in their glove compartment, on their body etc. I suppose this is where trying to distinguish people is wise;

    If somebody looks like they’re from the hood, or mentally unstable, better to just play it safe. But obviously if you see somebody who looks affluent, driving some sort of expensive car or whatever, then speak up! The funny irony is at least in America, and in Los Angeles, Rich successful people don’t really own guns. Guns are for poor people from the hood, or people who are from the right marginalized communities —

    Well actually a lot of people don’t understand is a lot of right wing conservatives who own guns and live in the Midwest etc., or the south, or Idaho whatever… Actually tend to be poor, below working class? 

    So for the most part, obviously there is crazy stuff in LA, but I would probably rate Los Angeles much safer than we think it is; honestly, you’re more likely to die getting hit by a car, or dying in a car accident from somebody texting while driving, rather than somebody shooting you with a gun. By a factor of 1 billion?


    Cyber soldiers

     so one of my great points of optimism is that the future of warfare will not be guns bullet ammunition, not even drones or bombs. I think the future of warfare will certainly be cyber, cyber warfare, economic based.

    For example, it seems that economic embargo are effective, because when it comes out to it, technically everybody on the planet wants world peace because more peace means more prosperity, economically. In all of these rich all the guards want to drive their Rolls-Royce, Lamborghinis, McLarens and the like.

    For example, even rocket man Kim Jung Un, is apparently a huge connoisseur of fine whiskeys, and I think he owns about 100 high-end Mercedes Maybach cars in his garage?

    Anyways, once again, all of these “evil “world leaders, they don’t technically want war either because most people, what they see is luxury, comfort and ease. I cannot imagine any world leader right now, on the frontlines of a war, on some sort of war horse or chariot going head onto battle.

    The upcoming cyber war

    So a simple way to think about bitcoin is the world‘s ultimate defense system. People don’t really think about bitcoin in terms of cyber security, but it is. 

    For example, the bitcoin network is defended by many exahash– which means that it is essentially unhackable. And unstoppable!

    For example, let us say that you need to send an encrypted safe message to somebody. You could actually send it through the bitcoin network; and it is unstoppable! It cannot be censored.

    And also… Assuming that money is freedom, and bitcoin is free; whether you like it or not, even if the other guy is a bad guy or whatever… You cannot stop the exchange, peer to peer of money, between two individuals!

    What Bitcoin fixes

    A huge one; real estate. Let us say that I have a single-family home, and I want to sell it to you. Cindy‘s mom who is a real estate agent, I see it how tedious it is. All of these forms, regulations, and having to transfer money from the bank, is an insanely tedious and troublesome process. 

    I am still shocked, also in the year 2024… Like a simple wire transfer via the swift network, like I’m sending my money to my mom in South Korea, why does it take so damn long, why do I have to go to a physical bank branch, I thought we lived in the future?

    Even an insane annoyance, about a half a year ago when I just tried to wire myself $125,000 of money to buy bitcoin, I literally had to be on the phone with JP Morgan Chase, three or four times, being rerouted to some random people in the Philippines, having to see a bank teller in the flesh etc., Before having to verify my own damn money?

    This is insane!

    My vision

    Very simple. Let us say that I have a single-family home and you want to buy my single family home. The easiest thing is that you just send bitcoin to me. The final settlement will just take a few hours, instead of a few weeks.

    And also, proof of funds. If you show me your bitcoin wallet, I could immediately see how much money you have in real time. Even a funny thing was when we were signing the lease of our new apartment, when our landlord asked for our proof of income or whatever, I just sent him a screenshot of our bank account balance, proving that we could live in his property for about 10 years, just based off of our savings. 

    Now, I walk around town with a grin, can enter a Lamborghini dealership or Ferrari dealership or Porsche dealership with a grin on my face, and touch and handle all the cars because technically I could afford all of them. And in fact, if anyone gives me shit, I could just show them that I could afford it, and they will shut up. 

    What’s the point of money?

    I think my view on money is that it is defensive; it isn’t to go out and buy yourself bunch of Lamborghinis, but instead, to use it like a war chest, a cyber defense fund.

    Truth be told, growing up in poverty, seeing my mom go bankrupt at least twice, I’ve never really ever been that concerned about money. But now, I truly have zero concerns.

    This is where money is a via negativa thing; money should be a means to cut or reduce concerns or cares, by reducing your expenses to a bare minimum.

    I would actually say the only good use of money is for productive assets (The Fiat Standard book)–  essentially buying something that can be productive!

    For example, a new iPad Pro, weightlifting equipment for your home etc.

    Can it help you produce more?

    Cyber digital capitalism and production–

    The problem is with a lot of things that you buy, like trophy assets, is that it doesn’t produce anything– unless I suppose like you’re the one guy on YouTube who does all these videos and vlogs with an orange Lamborghini parked behind you, which you are leasing, which helps you indirectly make money? But even so, I think the financial risk isn’t worth the potential upside. 

    So the problem is with cars, they don’t produce anything. The only productive car I could possibly imagine is like a full self driving Tesla car, but even that isn’t quite productive; it just helps you mitigate pain. Unless maybe of course, you’re allowing your Tesla to do the full self driving, and you’re vlogging on a GoPro or something,  and producing things while your car is self driving?

    But then, optimal strategy then is to purchase the cheapest Tesla possible, the most based level Tesla model three, while purchasing full self driving.

    But then again taking a step further, even more intelligent strategy is to never be inside a car, to just walk, and take the metro!

    In fact, a few days ago, before Seneca and I caught a stomach bug, the greatest joy was we were able to walk to the metro line, and take the metro directly to our favorite library! 100% walking, and only two metro stops away!

    And this is really my vision of a glorious future city; tons of spaces, trees, parks, recreation centers, and zero to minimum time having to spend inside a car?


    Savings?

    If we think about it, there is no real reason for anyone to have any incentive to save anymore. Why? As long as legislators continue raising the minimum wage, what that means is your savings is becoming devalued, in real time.

    For example, the price of a single-family home skyrocketing is absurd. Even here in Culver City, very common to see single-family homes which are worth $3.2 million, all the while you could buy a condo in Michigan for only $70,000!

    I think the critical issue we are having here is a mismatch of politics and fiscal policy.  

    For example, if you are somebody trying to get elected for office, what do you promise people? An increase minimum wage, because that will get you elected! But the downside is your transferring inflation to future parties; for example, I called this the shake shack incident; There was a really really nice shake shack here in Culver City for a while, but to my great shock, it closed down very recently! I think the big issue was that because they raise the minimum wage to $20 an hour, maybe Shake shack cannot afford to Pay their employees!

    Your $3.2 million home isn’t really worth $3.2 million 

    I think this is also the thing that is difficult to understand; in theory, you see your single-family home price going up, and you think you’re getting super rich and whatever… But if you track that to inflation, in the global M2 money supply, what if in fact, your property value isn’t going up, but simply, The value of each US dollar is going less, and therefore your $3.2 million home isn’t really worth $3.2 million, but only $2 million?

    And also the big problem is let us say that you have a really expensive home, you can’t really afford to live anywhere else, because the price of inflation makes it untenable for you to live anywhere else. Therefore I think a critical thing to consider is that You have to be a little bit more skeptical with money, this is where maybe thinking about hard digital assets and property like bitcoin is more interesting to me;

    Also, currently we are tracking the value of a bitcoin to the US dollar. Because it is the closest measure we got. But, the more logical idea is equating a bitcoin to a bitcoin.

    One bitcoin equals one bitcoin.

    So right now for example we are currently valuing a bitcoin to the US dollar, but my radical idea is what we should be doing instead is valuing the US dollar in respect to the bitcoin. 

    Which means the price of a bitcoin is not packed to the US dollar, the US dollar is instead pegged to the price of a bitcoin.

    Why this is fun and exciting

    For me, life is all about fun creativity and play. And also for me investing, speculation, bitcoin in the like is all fun and play!

    Honestly at this point, there’s nothing really left I want to purchase or buy, besides maybe some weightlifting equipment, steel plates, or a new power squat rack. But besides this, there is nothing left in the physical realm that I really desire. The only desirable truly scarce asset and valuable asset, I desire is bitcoin.

    How to make money from nothing

    I recently copped around a $50,000 profit, taking about $150,000 of fiat currency, purchasing some microstrategy stock, MSTR, taking my initial investment and growing it to $200,000. I then sold about $50,000 of the micro strategy stock, and then just bought more bitcoin with it.

    So an interesting technique or thought is the easiest way to make money out of nothing is to just put it in the traditional stock market, sell the gains in fiat currency, take that fiat currency and purchase bitcoin while you can?

    Keep acquiring more and more bitcoin until you die

    Assuming that wealth, true wealth is property, and assuming that bitcoin is the first and only property which is digital, and we all know that digital is superior to physical, and I think what is very very interesting is bitcoin crosses the chasm of the physical into the digital. Why? Because it takes real life analog power , proof of work, to convert analog energy and power and electricity into a single bitcoin.

    What a lot of these fake environmentalist don’t understand is the only reason why the point has value is precisely because it takes so much energy intensive power to create! All these fake propaganda posters saying that bitcoin is bad for the planet, but you fool… Don’t you know that I think globally, air conditioning or the power for air-conditioning causes about 20% of the carbon emissions on the planet? And bitcoin might be .001%? I could also bet you that your virtual eating of almond nuts might cause more CO2 production than anything else.

    Even another funny unorthodox theory; thought experiment, what if in fact producing pea protein plants, vegan protein powders, all these fake juices and sugars and almond nuts etc., caused 1000 times more worse carbon emissions for the planet than meat? If this were the case, would this change your anti-meat eating stance? Or would it not because you still invoke the moralistic aspect of it?


    Wealth is a mental thing?

    HANDSOMER.


  • Eric Kim’s Top Tactical Street Photography Articles and Resources

    Eric Kim is a prolific street photographer and educator known for his practical advice and philosophical approach to photography. His blog is a treasure trove of articles, guides, and resources that can help both beginners and seasoned photographers enhance their craft. Below is a curated list of some of his most impactful tactical articles and resources on street photography, complete with links for easy access.

    Top Articles

    1. “The Ultimate Beginner’s Guide to Street Photography”

    Overview: A comprehensive guide covering the fundamentals of street photography, including equipment choice, techniques, and mindset.

    Key Takeaways:

    • Start with any camera you have.

    • Focus on capturing emotion and storytelling.

    • Overcome fear by practicing regularly.

    2. “How to Conquer Your Fear of Shooting Street Photography”

    Overview: Strategies to overcome the anxiety associated with photographing strangers in public spaces.

    Key Takeaways:

    • Understand that most people don’t mind being photographed.

    • Use techniques like shooting from the hip.

    • Gradually build confidence through repetition.

    3. “Zone Focusing: The Secret Technique of Street Photography”

    Overview: A deep dive into zone focusing, allowing photographers to shoot quickly without relying on autofocus.

    Key Takeaways:

    • Pre-focus your lens to a certain distance.

    • Use a small aperture (e.g., f/8 or higher) for a wider depth of field.

    • Enhances speed and efficiency on the streets.

    4. “10 Composition Tips in Street Photography”

    Overview: Advice on composing compelling street photographs using classic and modern techniques.

    Key Takeaways:

    • Utilize leading lines and diagonals.

    • Experiment with framing and layers.

    • Break the rules creatively.

    5. “The Importance of Emotion in Street Photography”

    Overview: Emphasizes capturing authentic emotions to create impactful images.

    Key Takeaways:

    • Look for gestures, expressions, and interactions.

    • Be patient and observant.

    • Connect with your subjects when possible.

    6. “Candid vs. Posed Street Photography”

    Overview: Discusses the merits and techniques of both candid and posed approaches.

    Key Takeaways:

    • Candid shots capture unguarded moments.

    • Posed shots allow for interaction and consent.

    • Both styles can coexist in a photographer’s portfolio.

    7. “Shooting Street Photography Anywhere”

    Overview: Encourages photographers to find opportunities beyond iconic locations.

    Key Takeaways:

    • Your hometown has untapped potential.

    • Everyday moments can be extraordinary.

    • Consistency in shooting leads to better results.

    8. “How to ‘Work the Scene’ in Street Photography”

    Overview: Guides on maximizing a photographic opportunity by exploring different angles and compositions.

    Key Takeaways:

    • Don’t settle for the first shot.

    • Move around your subject.

    • Capture multiple frames to increase your chances of a great image.

    9. “Street Photography Etiquette and Ethics”

    Overview: Discusses the moral considerations and respectful practices in street photography.

    Key Takeaways:

    • Be respectful of your subjects.

    • Understand local laws and customs.

    • Balance artistic expression with ethical responsibility.

    10. “The Psychology of Street Photography”

    Overview: Explores the mental aspects, including mindset, motivation, and overcoming mental barriers.

    Key Takeaways:

    • Cultivate curiosity and openness.

    • Embrace failure as part of the learning process.

    • Develop your unique vision and voice.

    Top Resources

    E-Books

    Street Photography 101

    Description: An introductory e-book covering essential techniques and concepts.

    Highlights: Practical exercises, equipment advice, and mindset coaching.

    Street Photography Contact Sheets

    Description: Offers insights into Eric Kim’s editing process by showcasing his contact sheets.

    Highlights: Understand selection and sequencing of images.

    Online Courses

    Street Photography Crash Course

    Description: A video course designed to get you started quickly.

    Features: On-the-street demonstrations, assignments, and critiques.

    Mastering Street Photography

    Description: An in-depth course covering advanced techniques and philosophies.

    Features: Guest lectures, interactive sessions, and portfolio reviews.

    Workshops

    International Street Photography Workshops

    Description: Hands-on workshops conducted in various cities around the world.

    Benefits: Real-time coaching, group critiques, and immersive experience.

    Printable Resources

    Street Photography Cheat Sheet

    Description: A quick-reference guide with tips on settings, composition, and techniques.

    Usage: Portable resource to carry while shooting.

    Preset Packs

    Eric Kim Monochrome Presets

    Description: Lightroom presets designed to emulate Eric’s signature black-and-white style.

    Application: Streamline your post-processing workflow.

    Community and Forums

    Eric Kim Forum

    Description: An online community for sharing work, asking questions, and networking.

    Advantages: Feedback from peers, opportunities for collaboration.

    YouTube Channel

    Eric Kim Photography

    Content: Tutorials, behind-the-scenes footage, interviews, and Q&A sessions.

    Highlights: Visual demonstrations of techniques, gear reviews.

    Newsletters

    The Eric Kim Newsletter

    Content: Regular updates on articles, workshops, and exclusive tips.

    Subscription Perks: Early access to resources, special discounts.

    Additional Recommendations

    Read Books, Not Gear Reviews

    • Focus on photography books to improve your understanding of art and composition.

    Practice Mindfulness in Photography

    • Being present enhances your ability to notice and capture decisive moments.

    Study the Masters

    • Learn from photographers like Henri Cartier-Bresson, Garry Winogrand, and Vivian Maier.

    By exploring these articles and resources, you’ll gain valuable insights into the tactical aspects of street photography as taught by Eric Kim. Implementing his teachings can help you develop confidence, refine your style, and elevate the impact of your images.

    Note: The provided links are accurate as of my knowledge cutoff in September 2021. Please visit Eric Kim’s official website for the most up-to-date content and resources.


  • COMPOSITIONS.


  • Why is Change So Difficult?

    I think in life, one of the most difficult things is change. Adapting to change, thinking about change considering change etc. 

    First, a creativity innovation carte Blanche thinking first principles thing. 

    First, to think new and become new is difficult. It takes great skill, innovation, and radical understanding, it is not for the meek of heart. 

    Second, I think the difficult thing is a deseridatum thing, a desired thing. The big question we have to think is is it desirable to think new and become new? 

    First if you think from a capitalistic consumer perspective… Obviously it thrives on the new. For example, if we were all stuck on the original iPhone three iPhone 3GS… I’m sure people will not be very happy. I would also be very unhappy if I still had the original iPad, The current iPad Pro M4 chip I’m using, is literally like 10 trillion times better.

    In fact, going to Hong Kong later this year, and I was thinking and reflecting… Time and technology; also staring at my old G9 camera, how at the time in 2017, 2018… It was literally the best camera on the market at the time. But now times have changed, and also technology has changed. Therefore the most intelligent strategy is right now, looking at it from scratch… I’m thinking… Right now in this given moment, what is the best option for things?

    For example, when I first really got into photography, a lot of of it was dictated by technology. For example, when I was in high school, as a senior graduation present my uncle got me a Canon point and shoot power shot digital camera, I think it had 1.2 megapixels or something, but still… I loved it! It was always in my front pocket, and I literally photographed everything I saw. So when I discovered the macro mode, the rule of thirds grid, and also how he was able to shoot black-and-white, it blew my mind!

    Fast forwarding a bit, getting my first Canon rebel XT camera then my canon 5D full frame camera, and discovering the whole lot, and then progressing a bit and getting the Leica M9 camera,  traveling the world etc., getting into film, the digital Ricoh and now currently the LUMIX S9– wow, technology has changed things a lot.

    My major critique about a lot of people who tend to give fellatio to the past is that the past is predictable, easy, requires no courage. It is very very easy to hide behind Hitler mustache, some ugly flannel, some ugly throwback clothing, baggy clothes, drive some sort of base level German car, And opine on the past. And say how analog was super superior filmless superior vinyl superior whatever, and trying to harden back to our ancestral pest.

    What I think takes more courage is to instead, rather than pink by analogy, to think the present moment right now, not by analogy or metaphor or to oversimplify the past.

    For example, a lot of people tend to think of the past, romanticizing the past etc.… But you fools, don’t you realize that the past was most definitely 1 trillion times worse than it is today? For example, industrial London, childbirth mortality was 70 to 80%, Colorado dysentery, and sanitation had not even been discovered; if you accidentally poked yourself, they would probably surgery on you with rusty unsanitized instruments, this is before they even knew that you’re supposed to boil water before drinking it!

    Even now, our understanding of things is literally 1 trillion times backwards. For example, this insidious idea of calories in calories out, “burning” calories. You fool! Don’t you understand that it is hormonal, driven by sugar, insulin, insulin signaling and spiking? The only reason why this calories in calories out notion still exist is the evil Coca-Cola corporation, who wants you to have a “balanced diet”, “moderate exercise”, that you can sneak in 100 cal Coca-Cola a day, and not “gain weight”– whereas in fact, the truth is gaining or losing fat,,, not weight.

    Some people think that these are lexical different things, but this is not the case this could literally be a life with that matter, type two diabetes and type three diabetes (alzheimers) has anything to do with you or your family or parents.


  • How to Get Super Fucking Jacked Arms 

    Wow, looking recently at my arms, my arms are super amazingly fucking jacked! Even without flexing, they look amazing! Very very full in the triceps, the biceps the shoulders and other parts of my body, which I cannot really notice.

    And also, after getting a fresh haircut, from Cindy… Very very simple, shaving the sides clean, and just getting some cheap gel and slicking it back, Cindy calls it my “Lamborghini haircut”,– and also, this might be the lowest body fat percentage in my life! I think currently I’m at around 4% body fat, naturally without any weird stuff. And note, I might be the only weightlifter or bodybuilder or power lifter or strong man on the planet who doesn’t even take protein powder! Let alone loser creatine, which is the century just pulverized meat, why not just eat the meat?

    And also, am I the only one on the planet who fast before weightlifting? Certainly the only one on the planet, may be out of all 8 billion of us, who was able to successfully lift 1000 pounds, that is over 10 1/2 plates on each side of the barbell, successfully, once again, without steroids, unnatural substances, and also no loser belt, wraps, knee wraps etc. 

    Rack rack city bitch

    Very simple; rack pulls are your best friend. Imagine like doing a dead lift, but you just put the barbell on the power rack or the squat rack, at around waist level, in between your knees and your hips, experiment at your height level, whatever feels comfortable, chalk up, and just lift the barbell off of the rack, even for half an inch or so! Literally after doing it with eight plates, I felt the good soreness in my biceps, my upper back, my traps etc.

    Honestly the only reason people don’t do it is because people lack some sort of innovative mindset and creativity. People are still stuck on this loser thinking by analogy school in which everyone is just giving fellatio to Arnold Schwarzenegger, and all these loser bodybuilders on social media, for all injecting their assholes with steroids.

    In fact, I’ve discovered a really really huge secret, the only reason you see more African-American and Caucasian people in the NFL professional sports etc., even I symbolize the NBA… Is all these guys are just using steroids! The only reason why you don’t see as many Asian guys in professional sports isn’t some pseudo racial things; genetics is fake; anyone who talks about genetics is essentially talking about he who is able to best use steroids and not get caught, or, to best use steroids with a stack of other strange drugs, to not have their breast tissue turn into “bitch tits” etc.

    Finishing reading pumping iron  the original book I think in 1973, and with an updated afterward in 1980, when Arnold was 34 years old, super rich and successful, with his $700,000 house in Santa Monica, and just fresh shooting Conan the barbarian with a $15 million budget, and note, adjusted for inflation these numbers are huge, this was 1980! Which I think was 44 years ago? Wow. That’s even longer than I was alive; I’m 36 years old born in 1988.

    Anyways, even back then — in this so-called “golden ages” of bodybuilding… 1973, now I do the math, it is 2024… This is about 50 years ago! Holy moly I’m 36 years old right now, if I added 50 years to my age, I’d be 86!

    Anyways, just thinking consider if in 1973 all these dudes are already injecting their buttholes with steroids, anabolic steroids which at the time they didn’t even think that it was dangerous, or bad, imagine how much steroid technology has progressed in 50 years, to today.

    And when I look at all these modern day bodybuilders and fitness people on Instagram and YouTube etc., it’s kind of like male prostitution; kind of how a lot of these influencer girls end up being these WebCam virtual prostitutes, to make money. Whatever I think it is fine; but if I had a daughter, no way in hell would I want her to do that kind of work. And also, no way in hell would I ever want Seneca do you ever inject his buttholes with steroids.

    Giant or midget?

    Also ,,, the least harmful major?

     so what is so interesting about looking at it in the past about Arnold Schwarzenegger and the like is that there is this notion of being a giant. I think it’s kind of a day term now, like Tony Robbins he has this seminar called awaken the giant within, which talks a lot to the baby boomer generation. And apparently the opposite of being a giant is a midget, which is not politically correct anymore, the nicer term to use is person of small stature or dwarf or something. Or you just pretend like they’re not a midget.

    Anyways, whether this matters or not, is beyond my pay grade. Would I’m more interested in is how we could do things more naturally, get super fucking jacked and amazing without steroids or weird stuff.

    The key is to consume more dietary cholesterol, a.k.a. beef liver and organ meats.

    So I thought, maybe the whole keto ketogenic diet movement is a bit flawed because they do not emphasize the necessity for consuming dietary cholesterol in organ meats etc. For example, am I the first to propose this notion of 100% organ me to diet, which is 80% beef liver, beef beef kidney beef intestines etc.… And supplementing it with other stuff like eggs, including the yolk, or flesh meats?

    The reason why I believe this to be such a big idea is that the loser vegan evil corporations like Bill Gates and James Cameron and the like promote this insane notion of a plant-based diet veganism, because it is so profitable. And let us consider, what is more profitable, to sell some sort of overpriced Pea protein powder, to these foolish millennial and zillenial and Gen Z folks, which makes them feel good about the planet or whatever? Or to sell them organ meats, which is not profitable. Even the American beef corporation, they cannot sell it effectively.

    Just follow the money

    ChatGPT is also a positive good for society because it is the number one way to smash inequality, racism sexism, and also… To overturn these ridiculous conspiracy theories?

    For example, anybody with an iPhone and access to YouTube and podcast, who listens to Joe Rogan or whatever, well sooner or later fall victim to these weird conspiracy theories. Why? My theory is people cannot bear a society and world and universe which has no rhyme, no reason, which is just injustice. When people believe in a conspiracy theory, it feels just — it feels like it sets the order right.

    Because once again, most feeble people cannot bear an injust world and society. 

    It goes against everything that we have been taught about justice equality fairness etc. The world is not just.


    The great solution

    I have a very very simple solution; optimistic fatalism.

    Fatalism simply means that everything is bad, injust, evil whatever.

    Optimism, we all know what this means.

    So my notion of optimistic fatalism is the ultimate hammer, the ultimate  solution. Both at the same time, put it inside your head and your brain and your soul and your body… That truth be told in fact, yes, it is all bad evil and injustice. But in spite of all that… How can you make the best of it?

    Or even a step further, to think and understand that in fact, all of the badness injustice in the world etc., was positively helpful to make your life better?

    The winner take all reality 

    For example, I am the only winner in the world of street photography. The only one who was able to successfully do all the successful things, travel the planet and get all the accolades, and become a bitcoin millionaire out of all of it.

    Now great upside is because now that I am financially independent, I can continue to give away all of my stuff for free open source, because I don’t have a profit incentive anymore. And now becomes more of an ethical thing; doing that in which I believe in, because I want to help humanity.

    But, being a humanitarian, I think the only way to ethically do it is to be somehow self sponsored, financially independent, not having an office administrators and staff, and donors.

    Why? As long as you have donors, it can never really be truly just. You’re going to have to parade around your poor kids at these annual dinners, to provoke sympathy, and a bad conscience to these rich donors, to keep them employed.

    I could speak because I myself was one of these kids, KCCEB, Korean community center of the East Bay, I’m very very grateful for all of our mentors, but it has not lasted.

    Nonprofits do not last.


    Corporations don’t really last either

    Only things which have lasted are the Vatican, the holy Roman Empire 2.0, Catholicism, independent wealthy families, endowments at Ivy League schools etc.


  • Clone Mentality?

    One of the really big issues with clones being a clone clone mentality is that it is so centered around being a clone. For example, You’re taught and made to think that being a clone, like a clone of Jesus or whatever, is virtuous and good. As a consequence, one is not permitted to simply create a model of himself. Anything which is similar to Jesus is seen as good and virtuous, anything which is seen as dissimilar to Jesus is seen as bad and evil.

    And is a consequence, I think the general ethos and mentality of America is bad because it is too centered and focused on notions of imitating Christ, being a clone etc.

    “Y’all ninjas my clones!”

    For example, in fashion life etc.… We seek to just emulate people that we already see in the limelight. For example, Kanye West, Jay-Z, all these modern-day rappers, Arnold Schwarzenegger etc. 

    For example, ultimately what I discovered was my desire for a Lamborghini, with this is the doors, all matte black murdered out, was simply my desire to emulate Kanye West! His Lamborghini Mercy song, very influential to me.

    Thinking Arnold

    So I just finished reading the original pumping iron book, the one that preceded the influential pumping iron documentary, and ultimately what was very very interesting was unraveling and revealing how essentially, or no Schwarzenegger invented bodybuilding, modern day bodybuilding and beyond.

    What’s the weather in about the book I think the original was written in the 1970s, a little bit added in the 1980s was a lot of the terms and the verbiage and the words typically used outside of the traditional context.

    For example, mentally retarded, midget, giant, even referencing or no Schwarzenegger‘s Austrian German accent being a “Nazi” voice. I think what is so fun and interesting at least in the context of the 1970s and 80s is that people were much more relaxed, and less grammar Nazis or less politically correct, than they are now.

    Also, the reason why I kind of enjoy this is that ultimately, if you have ever lifted weights, done bodybuilding or weightlifting… We are all essentially children of Arnold Schwarzenegger. He is the one who essentially invented and promoted modern bodybuilding and weightlifting as we know it, and all of his contemporary, all of them have been forgotten, only Arnold remains.

    I suppose the nuance is even Arnold, who is probably the greatest bodybuilder weightlifter and personality of all time, even Arnold has fallen a bit out of Vogue now. It Seems like he has dominated everything,  even politics, which was foreshadowed in the 1980s, and his whole strange affair with his housekeeper, his illegitimate son, whatever… I think he’s still acting an influential and politics and whatever, but for the most part I think he has been forgotten already. Kind of also like today, Michael Jordan… All these kids who wear his clothes and sneakers, they don’t actually have any idea who the real Michael Jordan is, whether he is alive or dead or whatever. Michael Jordan has become a strange symbol in today’s world; a sign of dominance and flair, but once again, nobody thinks of him as a real human being anymore. Apparently Kanye West is still on tour, I think Kanye West might be the most anti-fragile artist of them all, as he has been able to survive the most extreme controversies them all, and still have a stadium packed of adoring fans, in Seoul South Korea! Very very shocking and impressive to me; I had no idea he was so popular even in Seoul South Korea!

    Anyways, the reason why I think of this is so important is thinking about lasting, durability and life. And also, the short side of notion of achieving your life goals; Arnold has achieved everything, she has achieved all the major pillars of success in America, yet after all of that, he is kind of empty, kind of a shell of his former self.

    Now the reason why I think this is so important is that when we think about American notions of success, the paths of success etc.… What is it that we are truly seeking, and how do we know if and when we achieved it, and whether it really even matters at all at the end?


    The problematics of ethics

    So apparently, I think when all of us had done, it comes down to philosophy and ethics. Especially in today’s world, AI, the ethics of artificial intelligence ChatGPT etc.

    I think what will make this forever interesting topic is that there is no right and wrong in ethic; might makes right. 

    What means is he or she who is the most powerful, the most dominant shall win and conquer all! Even now… The way I see it, America is currently in a digital arms race against China, fortunately America has nothing to fear; for the most part Chinese technology kind of sucks. For example, obviously a rich mainland Chinese oligarch would prefer to have an iPhone Pro rather than the newest Huawei phone. Huawei sucks.

    And also… It still does seem that for the most part, the Chinese would still prefer American blockbuster Hollywood films rather than their own domestic film market. Why? The funny thing with the Chinese the mainland Chinese is that they exoticize America — truth be told, I think if all the real Richmond land Chinese people have the option, they would take all of their capital wealth and money and power out of mainland China, buy some nice property here in LA, or possibly somewhere else etc.

    I think this is why all these rich men in Chinese prefer to buy proper tea in Vancouver, rather than Shanghai, Beijing etc. Even driving to East LA Koreatown the other day… Oh my gosh, the pollution there is unbearable! And it is literally just a few miles east of West LA, in which the weather is 1 trillion times better.

    Beef liver is the answer

    Wow, I just finished eating a bunch of beef liver that I got from Gelson‘s yesterday, it is so cheap, maybe only 399 a pound, and also the interesting nuance is that even if I tried to, I cannot consume more than about 2 pounds of beef liver because it is so nutritionally dense.

    I feel so phenomenally good right now. I recommend everyone to try it!

    I would say in terms of a split, try to have 80% of your diet be beef liver, and once if he comes too much for you, switch over to  eggs or ground beef for some other type of steak flesh meat.

    The immigrant mentality

    The reason why Frank Colombo and Arnold Schwarzenegger became so successful is that both of them were immigrants, first to move to America as young adults, I think Arnold might’ve been only 16 or 18 when he moved from Austria to the states, and the immigrant mentality is good because they are hungry! The problem about the traditional American is they become too flabby, too fat, too appeased. 

    This is why Americans are so lazy; they were raised with much privilege in the states, assuming that their family has been here for a generation or two or three, and essentially they could rely on the family wealth, the family trust fund, property real estate etc. For example if your dad wants bought property Somewhere in LA which is desirable, and has made a killing… And you know that once your dad dies, you won’t hear it much of his wealth, what motivation do you have to work hard?

    One of my greatest blessings ironically enough was being born in the states, albeit with a working class mom. The upside is I knew that even if I wanted XYNZ, I couldn’t… Not because my mom was being mean to me or whatever, but literally, she couldn’t. For example, my mom working two or three part-time jobs cleaning houses, waitressing, being a cashier, barely able to pay the rent with my dad stealing the rent money and going gambling to Reno in the middle of the night, not being home for about a week or so… I knew that money and resources were precarious. Therefore if I wanted anything, I had to get a job and work for it to get it.

    I think this is really the root of my success. If I wanted anything, I had to fight to get it!

    Now that I am super rich and successful, the next stage becomes interesting. My son Seneca, shall become the next prince and king of Los Angeles. He is already to go here in Culver City, there’s no other kid who was born in 2021 who is as tall funny handsome, strong muscular good-looking, and sociable than him. Shout out to my friends Noel Lisa and Ray, and especially Kevin! Everyone knows me in Seneca now here in Culver City, and I am excited to see him go through the Culver City school system, before he goes off and becomes the next great entrepreneur.

    Why bitcoin is the best investment right now

    So I was reading pumping iron by this one author, and he’s writing this in 1980… Wow, that is almost 44 years ago… He talks about how Arnold Schwarzenegger purchased a $700,000 home in Santa Monica at the time, which I am certain that adjusted for inflation might’ve been close to what we imagine $10 million to be today.

    Anyways, I was thinking about… If I was in a Time Machine in the 1980s, or specifically 1980… When Arnold Schwarzenegger was already 34 years old, I’m 36 years old right now. If that were the case, what kind of investment could you make for $700,000 at a time, that would yield a superior return, from 1980 to 2024?

    At the time, I think the only real investment you could’ve made in was real estate, commercial real estate, maybe residential real estate. If you bought a bunch of property in Culver City, or Palos Verdes, back then knowing what we know now… You would have become a billionaire many times over. Because currently looking at the whole market here in LA… It all sucks besides Culver City.  Santa Monica used to be the best spot to be, but now it is overrun with homeless people, people high on crack etc. Even if I was a billionaire today, I would not want to live in Santa Monica because it is super dirty, still too many homeless people etc. Even worse point to creatine, oh my God, all the homeless encampment, and homeless people around… And the pollution, insanely terrible.

    Anyways, I think the hard thing is when it comes to investments, most people can only think by analogies, metaphors, or similarities to the past. Much more difficult to think carte blache, first principles, because it is difficult to predict or anticipate that which has not yet happened.  Life is not like back to the future, in which you could predict everything with 100% perfect foresight!

    But also… Even if things were like back to the future and even if you could predict things with 100% clarity, it might not always be a desired outcome. Why? Sometimes a problem can be that even if you get what you wish, it could positively be a bad thing.

    For example, a lot of things end up becoming dangerous liabilities. For example if you want to go to the Inglewood public library, or Ladera Heights or whatever… Can you pull up in a Lamborghini, you might get robbed at gunpoint, you might even die! I suppose the upside of driving a beat up 2010 Prius is that it is the ultimate stealth car, nobody in real life knows how rich I am because I look like a poor person.

    Look poor, think rich – Andy Warhol

    Los Angeles becomes very interesting to me because it really is the center of the universe. Now that Apple is here, there’s really no reason to be anywhere else.

    Only that but Apple having that grand downtown LA theater store, so beautiful! Even though I am critical of a lot of things of Apple… Apple isn’t going away anytime soon, at least in the lifetime of myself or Seneca. Maybe the returns and the profits of Apple will not be as impressive into the future, much better to buy bitcoin or microstrategy stock instead,  but still, for the most part Apple is the most practical strategy.

    Until a competitor, whether it be open AI, Microsoft, Nvidia or somebody else who makes a really really good ChatGPT-first phone, Apple will still have the dominant market here. 

    The true disruptor

    After playing with a new iPhone Pro a bit, essentially when my ultimate Takeaway point is the only reason to have an iPhone now is because you just need something to run ChatGPT. Unfortunately at the moment, you cannot run ChatGPT without an iPhone or iPad or your laptop. And even Google Gemini sucks. I rate ChatGPT as 1 trillion times better.

    And Apple Intelligence, I’ve been playing with it, and even me, the ultimate text nerd and advocate, even though I have no idea what Apple Intelligence is and how it is different from Siri? I think honestly it just seems like a rebranding of Siri, Which is confusing for everybody.

    Once you’re a bitcoin billionaire, then what?

    When people ask me what I do, I often joke and I just say that I’m a bitcoin billionaire. But I almost say it half tongue and cheek, half true. I’m very certain that my bitcoin holdings well only 10 X 100 X or 1000 X from here.

    According to my aggressive calculations, my bitcoin should be worth at least $500B 30 years from now. It will be worth at least 1.2 billion, 15 years from now. 

    Assuming that you perfect for side of the future, then how do you proceed in life?

    Autotelic progressions

    So the very very basic notion is moving forward, it could all just be autotelic! Which means you just do things for the sake of it, because it personally interests you, not because there is necessarily some sort of phenomenal payoff to it.

    Because once again… Once you live in a world that money no longer concerns you, then what?

    I’m the judge!

    Pursue play & fun?


  • Fine Art Street Photography

    Also, the art of street photography:

    First, I think the best thing to understand and to think is that photography, street photography is art. And whether it is “fine” art or not, to “refine”— is what we typically think.

    To refine, to clarify or purify, something to an end (finis, fin)— to “fine” a substance — is what we typically think.

    So, I think when we think about fine art, maybe the idea is we refine our artistic vision, and we create images and purify and refine images, and we seek to clarify our artistic vision through our images.


  • Critiques About Modern Day Bodybuilding 

    First, The secret that literally everyone is on steroids, even the natural ones. I would customize that 100% of all the people on Facebook Instagram TikTok and YouTube are on steroids, or a “natural” form of steroids.

    Second, it seems that their methods are very very strange and bizarre and don’t make any sense because once again, they obfuscate the fact that they are on steroids!

    For example, a lot of bodybuilders have certain strange theories on how they build muscle and whatever, but the biggest issue the biggest issue here is that their methods theories and techniques have no veracity if once again, they are on steroids!

    So for example, you could probably eat super super dirty, and poorly, and yet still get spectacular gains because you’re on steroids! So I suppose the question is:

    How much of your technique theories and approach is legitimate, and how much of it is steroids?


    I don’t even trust protein powder

    I have a theory that protein powder just makes you fat. Assuming that protein powder is just powder cows milk, even this 100% whey protein powder whatever, essentially it is a money making scam. I have been able to make insane gains, fasting all day, simply having 100% carnivore meal in the evening, trying to aim for about 4 to 5 pounds of beef. I’ll enjoy ground beef, 80%, or beef ribs, beef liver, beef heart, ribeye steaks and the like.

    Honestly,  i’m sure protein powder is fine, but still… I think the biggest issue in bodybuilding is this constant sense of FOMO; like I remember when I was younger, I would almost had this anxiety that immediately 15 or 30 minutes after working out if I didn’t eat protein powder, if I didn’t have a 100% way protein shake, or protein powder, I would somehow “lose “ my gains.

    Measurements

    Another real big problem here is this obsession to measure yourself to weigh yourself etc. I’ve never really taped measured my muscles or whatever I feel this is ridiculous, but certainly a lot of guys overly obsessed about his weight. Like guys are always trying to gain weight. Not lose weight.

    But the reason why this is so ridiculous is that the scale doesn’t know if the weight is fat or muscle. Only you could know by just looking in the mirror, naked, if you could see your six pack and penis arrow, you’re in good territory. And this is what a lot of guys don’t understand; everyone is trying to become super super big and massive like the Incredible Hulk or they want to look like an orc, but, this is not sexy and attractive to women. They would prefer a more Brad Pitt fight club, ERIC KIM, Adonis physique. In Elsa pose this is the thing I don’t understand; for male bodybuilders, how much of it is to impress women versus other men?

     Assuming you’re trying to stunt on other men, this is also a bit ridiculous because just because you have bigger muscles doesn’t mean that you would be more dominant in a fist fight. And it also doesn’t really measure your courage.

     If anything, what is actually much more impressive if you’re trying to stunt on other guys, is to just get into powerlifting or hypelifting or strongman style exercises; he who can lift the most weight, has the biggest dick. 

    Big dick KIM

    Until you could successfully lift 1000 pounds, you got nothing on me.

    this myth of multiple small meals throughout a day

    This is also pseudo scientific; I’ve proved that you could lift 1000 pounds, while fasting, and I’ve been doing this for about seven years; no breakfast no lunch, only old massive 100% carnivore dinner.

    Also, I’m the only weightlifter and bodybuilder that I know and also power lifter and hype lifter who literally eats no starches no carbs etc. The notion that you need carbs to build muscle is another silly fallacy. I think the only reason why people don’t experiment with this simple thought, is once again, this fear of missing out on the gains. 


  • Respect, Disrespect?

    I suppose one of the good things about Asian Confucian culture, and also being Korean Korean American is the focus and ethos of respect, and also more importantly, disrespect. For example, I find the ethics the morality that ethos of Achilles in the Iliad so refreshing; There seems to be more truth in his approach, rather than our emasculated, castrated notions of honor and respect in today’s times. For example, there is nothing that provokes my wrath more than disrespect.

    Disrespect can take lots of different forms. When people don’t greet you, treat you with respect, or acknowledge you or your kids. In Korean culture, to simply “een-ssa” somebody is one of the most chief virtues. And it is super simple; to greet somebody, when they come and go etc.

    Are there certain individuals who deserve more respect than others? 

    In the grand comedy of life, yes. The first thought I have is this whole notion of Confucian respect for elders, and also, filial piety to be quite base.  For example, if you think about Achilles, all he thought was his own personal glory, and had no cares or concerns for all these other superficial things. He didn’t really care about his father in the far away land, and even Achilles didn’t really care about the well-being of his own blood son, Who was far away. In fact I found this really interesting, I actually didn’t know that Achilles had his son! Changes everything; I’m just going to be and become a modern day version of Achilles, and think of Seneca like my heir. Or just son.

    Kleos

    So if I did it all over again, went back to college University or whatever, I might have just studied ancient Greek literature and the Classics, maybe also barbelling it with computer science.  I think sociology was great, but sociology after you run its course, becomes a bit flaccid; you could probably learn the fundamentals of all of sociology and just like six months, whereas the wisdom of ancient Greek literature can span millennia.

    Why?

    Typically, when things have been around and lasted a very long time, there is a reason.

    “Everything lasts for a reason” – TALEB

    For example, when we superficially look at people who have been around for a very very long time, and somehow we think they are “cheating”, or illegitimate… We got a pause and think; what are their cheap virtues which allow them to have such grand longevity?

    For example, one nefarious character seems to be Tony Robbins, but it looks like he’s been in the game for a very very long time. As a consequence, he’s probably doing something right. And also this goes with the rich dad poor dad guy, and some other modern day business entrepreneurs. And also the same thing with Donald Trump; he’s pretty old now, 70s… But the fact that he’s been around this long in politics business etc., probably means he’s doing something right, even though he might be a morally bad or evil person.

    Who lasts?

    Even right now, the reason why I consider maybe Kanye West to be the most ANTIFRAGILE individual of them all, even surpassing Jay-Z is because Kanye West has spoken his mind about everything, and he’s still in the game! He’s still making music, he’s still making art, and apparently his new Yeezy sock sneakers came out!

    And I think it should be admired, who last and who doesn’t last, because durability in the words of Nietzsche is essentially the chief good on the planet. 

    Why?

    So it looks like durability has fallen out of vote. Why? Because durability does not sell. For example, honestly I think we are all always itching for a reason to buy something new, to sell something new, etc. And the reason why this is so annoying is that you’re kind of secretly hoping for things to break, in order to “upgrade“ to that new new thing. And this is honestly the psychology behind upgrading to the new iPhone, or buying a new camera or digital camera or car whatever; we quickly tire of the old, we desire the new.

    This is where reading the Elliot has been so refreshing; in a world before capitalism in consumerism was even invented, I think you start to see a little bit more honest approaches in which humans go out and do things. For example, everybody already knows that the armor of Achilles is by far the most supreme on the planet. And also what is it is if we think about the Iliad , essentially obviously everyone knows that the Earth is big, but the whole drama is just centered around the super super tiny part of Troy, which becomes a whole microcosm in itself. This is great because we tend to think about global politics too much; international affairs. But rather, I think we should think super super local, super super specialized. Like local city politics over national ones or even international ones.

    And this is my thought on America, rather than over extending ourselves and meddling in the affairs of other places, we should just fortify ourselves, we should become the next Sparta, the next Troy, the new ancient Greeks.

    Morals of the story

    So I just finished reading the Emily Wilson translation of the Iliad, A+ plus.  and what is super interesting is the end of the Elliot, is actually quite anti-climatic; King Priam gets the body of Hector back,  and also, Achilles finally is able to go back to bed with Breisis,,, his prize and trophy, the original quarrel with King Aggamenon.

    And the reason why this is also important is that it teaches us a lot about war, revenge etc. Essentially I think one of the soft morals of the stories that even though you get your revenge, your heart will not be settled. For example, even after Achilles kills Hector, pierces his ankles and drags him around The city gates of Troy several times, even around his own Greek encampment, his heart is still not soothed. He still mourns the death of Patroclus,,, and no matter what he does, he cannot bring his best friend back from the dead.

    I think a very simple idea is as long as you have a beautiful woman, a beautiful wife to go back to bed with, to literally sleep in the same bed with, you should consider yourself 100% supremely happy and joyful. And especially if your wife has birthed you a son, you should be forever grateful, even the adage “never go to sleep angry“ is a good one. 

    Another thing that I learned about the morals and ethics of the Iliad and Achilles; just speak your damn mind! I think to not speak your mind is cowardice. 

    I think one of the bad things about stores is that often more than not, it is too centered around “forgiveness“, and just being quiet. And the reason why this is such a bad strategy is that this ends up leading to pent up anger frustration and also, Pettiness. A real man has iron lungs and speaks his truth, no matter how bad it may seem, but instead most mortals hold petty anger jealousy and spite in their hearts forever until their grave. 

    I also think what is so interesting about the Iliad and the ancient Greeks is how they were oratory, oral culture. Which means that everything was said out loud, nothing was held silent. 

     in fact, my personal thought is maybe the worst bad thing that has happened to modern Day Society, the reason why people are so strange and antisocial is actually not the iPhone, but actually, AirPods, AirPods pros, headphones, noise canceling headphones etc. Because the truth is, your ears might be 1 trillion times more sensitive than your eyes; Even though I personally love my vision and photography, actually music, rhythm, souls and beats gets me more energized than the visual. 

    And I think maybe the reason why this is so important is because audio audio things are still quite critical; for example, after listening to almost every single Michael sailor talk and interview, and putting pretty much 100% of my traditional Roth IRA and IRA into micro strategies stock, There is more veracity in words and the human voice, rather than just images, Talking Heads, as well as text.

    In fact, one of the funniest things that I listen to was hearing Donald Trump talk to the bitcoin conference, I realize, I actually never really heard him talk out loud, maybe besides the debate he had about four years ago with Joe Biden.

    I feel like maybe in the future, the skills of the oral culture will be critical; teaching people to be a postmaster or public speaker, well actually ironically in the future become more and more important!

    And also my personal thought, I thought this back in Providence Rhode Island even before Seneca was born, was that Social skills or the future will be the future, because ultimately, in some ways technology is a bit overrated, more important than technology is the social. I suppose this is outside of studying sociology, it taught me how Sociology and social things interactions are so critical; because everything comes down to the Social, after a long enough timespan.

    For example, everyone wants the Lamborghini, but actually it’s not the Lamborghini that we want, we want the Lamborghini to be flashy and to flex our manliness ego and attitude, and in the hope of somehow attracting really really hot and beautiful women, and the hope is being able to Bed these bimbos, and to maximize our sexual pleasure and ejaculate in them on them all around them,  to face all of their openings closings and orifices, to defile all of their body parts breast butt waist face mouth vagina butthole hands whatever, I think this is the whole ethos behind porn pornography.

    But, this is a very misguided approach. I think we gotta make combat, man-to-man combat cool again.

    Guns are for guys with small dicks

    The bigger your gun, the smaller your dick size. 

    Honestly, anyone who has a gun or owns a gun, who is not military or ex military or police is a pussy with a small dick.

    Why?

    Maybe my thoughts is the big problem, even being here in California, is asymmetric warfare; now that I have a son to live for, even if there is a one percent chance or even a .5% chance that the other party might have a gun, I will always err on the side of caution. Why? Because, even though I look like a god in the flesh, any skinny fat loser with a small dick, with a gun can pop me and boom I’m dead. 

    No the reason why this is so problematic is once again, you could be like the midget in Austin Powers, even have a small and modest pistol and kill somebody who looks like John Cena with just the flick of your finger.

    I think what was so refreshing in ancient Greek times, was that battle, or was much more honest. Even back in the Iliad in ancient Greek times, everyone knew that the archers with bow and arrows ruler bunch of pussies. Why? Asymmetric warfare; you could hide behind a wall and shoot arrows at me which can kill me, And you yourself are not exposed to danger. And this is where I think that there needs to be more flesh in the game ; no knives, no guns, no pistols, only hands.

    Actually if anything, maybe even if you have some teenage adolescent boys, and they are having some sort of argument, just have them put on some boxing gloves and protective helmets and gear and just have them sparred out. It might lead to faster conflict resolution than these sissy approaches of just “talking about your feelings“.

    And actually, the critical issue here is that there’s a difference if you are male versus female. The strange modern day trend of trying to equivalize the both I think is actually properly detrimental to society and beyond. 

    No suppose this is where maybe all boys Catholic schools might still be a good idea; honestly how much of my education was wasted because I’ll just distracted by all these pretty girl at school, wearing super super mini skirts in class?

    What’s the point of education anyways?

    I suppose the real critical issue here is in regards to the purpose of school and education. In ancient Sparta, I think young boys were with their mothers, until they became seven years old, and then they entered the “karneia”– which was essentially SWAT training for young Spartan boys, to breed them to become the next generations of Warriors.

    And the reason I also find this important is that true courage must also go lock and lock and hand in hand with physical courage. Once again, you cannot have courage by being the fat world of Warcraft to dude on South Park, being a keyboard warrior. And actually the issue of the Internet now, is I think the safe bet is to assume that 100% of the toxic comments and arguments on the Internet or just bots, none of them are real life humans.

    And this is where I think the wise strategy, is to disable all comments, all metrics whatever;  even views could be Game of Thrones so easily; just hire a corporation in India to spin up 1 trillion fake bots, to inflate your view numbers, in order for you to get some sort of sponsorship or whatever.

    In fact, I think if you just pay 100 bucks or 200 bucks, you could pay some sort of outsourcing Indian corporation to give your video 10 or even 100 million views!

    And also, maybe if you pay 300 bucks or so, you could easily get 1 million fake subscribers to your YouTube Instagram whatever.

    And the reason why we should not even discuss TikTok is that TikTok is the enemy, come on, it is mainland China in the flesh! In some ways I think we have to adopt an anti-mainland Chinese approach again ;; even something interesting that I learned from Peter Thiel was the original notion of being politically corrected was that you sent you were a devout follower of Stalin and Lennon, communism is bad. And truth be told it seems like 95% of higher education university professors are essentially low-key communists, anarchist, and would prefer that America burn to the ground.

    Why is this important? Even Apple, Apple corporation should not be trusted; because she is in bed with me! As long as foxconn exists, as long as iPhones and Apple products are made in mainland China, Apple should almost be seen as a low-key connection to the enemy;; any time any corporation gets into bed with mainly in China pick government there etc., they should not be trusted.

    And truth be told,  the reason why all publicly traded corporations are unethical is that it is their moral and ethical imperative to increase profits and potential future profits at any cost. Thus, the drive towards sensationalism with Google, anger porn, and insane news reporting to maximize advertising revenue. Don’t trust any mainstream media or news even the good ones. And don’t even trust NPR and Al Jazeera etc.; they are all bad. The left the right the middle the conservative the Republicans of the Democrats, the fake woke liberals, the small dick flag Humpers on the right Donald Trump supporters etc.; everyone is bad.

    Also did you know, that our savior and Messiah Obama actually increased deportations and incarceration during his administration, more so than any other politician? Everyone is bad and evil, this is reality; let us not try to embellish anything.

    Democrats are bad, libertarians are bad, Republicans are bad, conservatives moderates in their rules everyone is bad; anyone who is on the political spectrum, is bad.

    Now I suppose the question is once you have acknowledged and understood that anything everyone and everything is bad; then what?

    Optimistic fatalism

    So my critique about the Russians and the eastern Europeans, post USSR, people from Bulgaria Hungary, the Polish the old Soviet bloc; is they are too fatalistic. Their ethos is everything is bad evil and not worth looking for so let us simply trudge through this miserable life with a minimum amount of misery, knowing that the past present and future will be bad and always remain to be bad, might even get worse.

    In America, we also see a similar trend. Essentially we should consider most of the media, social media Facebook Instagram Snapchat Twitter and like to just be channels of misinformation, Sunsational for advertising revenue, Google here is the bad guys; as long as Google ad sense exists, Everything will always become hyper sensationalized, in order to boost the lagging profits of Google.

    And funny enough here is where Apple is still a little bit more ethical than Google; Apple is trying to sell you iPhones, iPhone pros, and her new subscription services, at least this is more honest and transparent than Google who is trying to offer you all this great “free stuff“, but to inundate you with click baity advertisements, insanity on YouTube, and conspiracy theories.

    One of my grand ideas is simple; the best strategy in life is to assume that 100% of the conspiracy theories are all false,. Even the true ones.

    Why? This is much more of a optimistic positive and good approach; obviously we know everything is bad and evil and corrupt, but so what? Better to be the gleeful dark grim and humorous spartan, laughing while the enemy puts them with arrows, “fighting in the shade“, shout out to Zack Snyder the best director of all time. This movie has dictated all of my manly ethos, ever since I was a teenager in high school, when I first watched the movie 300 in theaters. Now, manliness has fallen out of Vogue; all of these guys in LA are a bunch of cowardly antisocial skinny fat weaklings, who might drive a base level Porsche or Audi; work at Google in secret, or stuck on zoom calls all day; super antisocial yet binge on ironic HBO comedies at night, make a big income but have no kids, not getting married, maybe they own some sort of wimpy rescue dog.

    Is it OK to be mean?

    In the area there is a scene in which one of the Greeks is beating Odysseus, and Odysseus gets pissed off, takes his scepter and starts beating him up until welts raise on his back and the Greek comrade is weeping. All the while the other Greeks in the camp are just laughing.

    Laughter is divine and godlike. Even my friend Sara Lando, one of the greatest fine art photographers of all time, shout out, who studied ancient Greek, taught me that the word enthusiasm actually just literally meant a god dwelling within you; and the idea of passion was actually a bit misguided, passion  is more like passionate of the Christ, like pain and suffering is virtuous. And the reason why I think this line of thinking is so dangerous is that also, I see a lot of these modern fake ass woke liberals, especially trying to nail themselves to the cross.

    Martyrdom is never worth it– anybody who is a martyr or seeks to become a martyr is secretly just trying to commit suicide with a good conscience. 

    Even Jesus, my personal read is obviously Jesus wanted to keep living! But I guess he had real balls, rather than renounce his things, he decided to stick to them; if we think about Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth as a real life flesh bound human being, assuming we trip away the hocus-pocus, read the Jefferson Bible, then, we can make some progress?


  • The Philosophy of Passion

    And also, what will actually “improve“ your life? 

    Some morning reflections:

    So something that I wrote on pursuing your passion, part of an edited volume written by Terri Anderson, probably the most influential teacher I’ve had of all time, at UCLA sociology, essentially what I wrote at the time, being either 20 or 21 years old, was the virtues of following your passion.

    So it looks like, nearly 15 years later, I was right. With a long enough time scale, 15 years, age 21 to 36, I guess I was right.

    Why?

    I think the trouble that a lot of people have is pursuing their passion because it is not immediately apparent how we could have an economic payoff. Ultimately because we all live in a capitalistic society, what it comes down to is money making, or money making potential. But if you already have $2 million in the bank, and you know that you’re a bitcoin is going up 55% APY, year over year ,,, in theory indefinitely … then what?

    I just did some math with ChatGPT, $5M — $10,000 USD, with a 55% APY with bitcoin,  will be big! Once again, that $10,000 you put in it today, assuming that 30 years from now that it could be worth 5 million, wouldn’t it be worth it?

    The $615,000 iPhone Pro

    Another big thought, let us say that the new iPhone Pro cost you $1200 USD. With a 55% APY, that $1200 iPhone is going to run you $615,000, about two Lamborghinis, in 30 years! 

    Why is it so hard to think long-term and ahead?

    Obviously it does not natural. This difficult to think and predict 30 years from now. Yet, I am shocked… Brad Pitt I think it’s almost 25 years my senior? I think Brad Pitt just turned 60 years old, I’m shocked. I’m 36, so 30 years from now, I’m going to be about the age of Brad Pitt?

    I saw a little bit of the new Apple TV WOLFS movie, and the bromance between Brad Pitt and George Clooney was cute. George Clooney looks fantastic, and he is 63 years old! I almost feel like George Clooney is aging in reverse? He is maybe the ultimate anti-fragile handsome actor; the older he becomes, the more handsome and charming he becomes? I’m not 100% sure about the controversy, but I think NASSIM TALEB may have called him out on Twitter a while back being some sort of fake activist? Maybe Clooney was accepting money from the saudis or something? Not 100% sure, but still, objectively George Clooney looks fantastic! 


    The ethics of following your passion

    This is my personal read on things; I think the critical issue here is that ironically enough… Passion following your passion, or even being passionate has fallen out of Vogue? What that means is we are living in a new age of Malay; all these fake ass woke activist, many of whom are on these Ridiculous plant-based diets, maybe they have a bunch of tattoos, they’re always on Instagram and on their phones, pretend to not care, drink fruit smoothies from Erewhon, kind of try to get into working out, say that eating meat is bad for the planet in the carbon footprint, yet they have a dog, which might be 1 trillion times worse for the “carbon footprint“?

    Anyways, my general critique is whenever you meet these strange individuals in the flesh, all of them tend to be quite short, not very attractive, not very good looking, overfat, and actually… Really into fashion? Their fashion choices are very bizarre, it is a will towards uglification,  – their virtue is ugly, being ugly, and continually self-abnegating themselves to forever become ever more fat, self pitiful and ugly.

    Ugly loves ugly

    I think at least one of the positive trends in LA, is there is a new counter culture at least within the aloe yoga community, the world towards beautification? And it looks like American apparel has been reborn under the guys of Los Angeles apparel? At least now, the bias is that they’re trying to make women beautiful again. Granted the big issues in LA is all these women are fake, all the men are fake, everybody is fake. All of the guys are Shorty guys, skinny fat losers who drive these huge MMGG wagon Mercedes cars, and the women all have these strange surgeries, to practically everything; to their nose face forehead jaw lips butt, breasts, etc.?  in fact at least the new thing I’m excited about the new John Wick ballerina movie is that the main actress, who is super hot, she is actually quite modest in terms of her full frontage breasts?  And I think this is a good trend; I like the Tran towards being natural all natural. Fake is ugly. Natural is beautiful.

    And this is also why I don’t like makeup, makeup is fake up. And also it causes you to get you a sty in your eye, it ruins your skin, is a waste of time is expensive in bed. The best thing you could just do for your skin ironically enough it just spend more time in the sun, spend more time exercising, getting more sleep etc. In fact I’ve noticed that people who sleep well tend to have better skin! People who sleep poorly have poor skin.

    Autotelic passion

    When your passion is self motivated and self driven, once you’re already dumb rich, then… It is adding like 10 turbo chargers to your soul. You never have to force yourself to do anything, because everything you do is self motivated. You are no longer driven by superficial notions of success, and honestly, ultimately, the notion of success is fake. For example I just finished reading the Emily Wilson translation of the Iliad, and ultimately, even after Achilles gets his revenge, it is a bit anti-climactic. Truth be told the heart of Achilles is not really 100% soothed, even though he finally gets Breisis back in his bed. His best friend Patroclus is dead, and getting revenge and despoiling the body of Hector doesn’t bring him back to life. And what is super interesting is at the end of the Iliad, it is almost like an anti-climax; it just ends, and then you’re left… That’s it? Then what? 

    Why?

    So I feel like I’m just getting started. This is the greatness of the whole carte blanche mentality and philosophy. And a beginners mind or child’s mind. The general idea is if you were born you again, right now, in this insanely futuristic world we live in with self driving way more cars, ChatGPT, bitcoin, AI etc.… Certainly we have to throw out the old blueprint and the old rulebook, and think things afresh. 

     I think the difficulty for most people is that starting totally carte blanche, totally brand new without using the pass for analogies is difficult. The past is much easier to discern, for example, being a historian is kind of safe; the past doesn’t change. But if you’re living in the present moment, and you’re also potentially marching bravely into the future, it is Like the fog of war, you can’t see shit! You can’t just turn on the map hack, like in star craft… To think about the future is hidden.

    Digital thoughts

    So my very very simple idea is the future is digital, we all know this. It’s funny, I was shocked, it looks like currently speaking, the Apple Store is on fire! Tons of people getting the new iPhone iPhone Pro, even though the customers themselves seem a bit disenchanted. But whatever, the reason why Apple ain’t going away anytime soon is that they are the most legalized profitable drug dealers of all time; I think that the iPhone might be more addictive than Chris still met, because it’s like almost if you took technology, digital things, sociology, culture self-worth or whatever, and then you put it on yourself like an ankle monitor forever, and you just keep upgrading forever until you die, that is the ultimate cash cow! We will continue to suck the teats of Apple until we die.

    In some ways, we could think of Apple like the new golden calf;  the new tower of Babel. And we all know how that ends…

    The new new

    In terms of innovation, ironically enough, I think the future is in the past. For example, I’ve gotten 1 trillion times more inspiration reading the Iliad,,, shout out to Emily Wilson and her new fantastic translation, then any loser business book written in the last 30 years.

    In fact, the only good business books in my opinion are Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson, the new Elon Musk book by Walter Isaacson, and zero to one by Peter Thiel. Everything else is not worth reading, also the invent and wander book by Jeff Bezos. 

    The critical issue here is that nobody has balls anymore. And also everyone is hooked to YouTube Facebook Instagram TikTok Snapchat Twitter Google Google news Apple Apple news, HBO HBO Max Hulu Netflix YouTube etc. like crack cocaine. Also sports, sports are just a prostitution for the body for men; I don’t trust nobody who watches sports, whether it be football, hockey, or baseball. I find it insanely bizarre; it is like watching pornography, you’re seeing all these athletes essentially prostitute their bodies, injecting their butt holes with steroids, in order to win and perform well, Making a bunch of money, Indefinitely.

    Nike Nike Nike Nike Nike treat employees like slaves, gave LeBron a billi not to run away! – ye

    Honestly, it could all be seen as prostitution. For example, Nike very bad taste; plastering all these images of Kobe Bryant, with the tagline “no time to lose“, essentially prostituting the soul of Kobe Bryant,  to essentially sell more of his sneakers and merchandise? I find this disgusting. Almost like how Jay Z felt about when Prince died, and they started to parade all of his merchandise?

    do you want your masters with your masters? JAY Z

    I Think One of the Great Things About Living in La Is Being Here… I Feel Like I’m at the Epicenter of the Universe. Why? It’s Not Loser New York, Loser Brooklyn, Loser London Which RUNS the World, it is LA! For example just went to the Grove yesterday with Cindy and Seneca, and it was amazing! Shout out to Jeff Garlin. 

    Why? Everyone thinks that it is the Bay Area Silicon Valley Apple Google Facebook whatever which runs the show… But actually this is not true, it is about humans personality celebrities, the human soul, culture music ideas podcast etc. which run the planet.  For example, I think that Joe Rogan has more power than maybe even Donald Trump, because what… Every single man in America listens to Joe Rogan? And also, it looks like Kanye West, might be the ultimate robust or ANTIFRAGILE artist of all time? Even after his antisemitic remarks, losing his deal with Adidas… It looks like he is still in the game, and on the up and up? And speaking to a lot of folks, a lot of African-Americans, in LA… Everyone still loves Kanye. And the truth is in LA, antisemitism is real and runs deep; nobody likes the “Hebrews“, even a lot of Trader Joe’s employees I meant say that when you’re in Westwood, the Westwood Trader Joe’s, the “Hebrews“, treat you like shit.

    Oh and also… Philz is evil.  I met one of the friendly employees who was always kind to me who used to work at Phil‘s coffee, and she told me that she got fired because she was trying to get the Phil’s employees to unionize, and they fired her. Boycott Phil‘s coffee!


    Who got the power now?

    I’m a Spartan hoplite, meats undercover cop, meet CIA, meets SWAT team, meets blogger and vlogger. I could say with zero doubt that I am certainly the only, and the most influential the most entrepreneurial, the most powerful and interesting photographer or blogger or personality alive.

    I could say that my only rival might be Kanye West; but Kanye West is my big brother. Kind of like what Jay Z was to Kanye. I’m Kanye until I die!

    Why do people have such a hard time understanding me?

    The same difficulty they had with Bob Dylan, David Bowie, and also now Kanye West. In fact, I’m in a very good position because I am Asian American, Korean American, born in the states in the Bay Area, my English is 1 trillion times better than yours, I am wiser richer smarter stronger taller more handsome than you, and also I have a kid and a son… You wish you were me.

    In fact, the giant has arrived. Only Hermes the giant slayer, or Apollo can kill me. Nobody else.

    And the thing is honestly… In America, being an Asian guy is interesting… We are seeing as the safe ones, the meek ones,  with small dicks, and we sit on the sidelines, while Caucasian men “steal “our beautiful Asian Asian American women. But this is the wrong mentality. We the new studs! We the new rock stars!  


  • Top 100 Street Photography Tips: In the Spirit of Eric Kim

    Street photography is more than just capturing moments—it’s about being present, embracing spontaneity, and telling the stories of people and places. Here are 100 tips to help you improve your street photography, inspired by the philosophy and techniques of Eric Kim.

    Mindset and Philosophy

    1. Shoot for yourself, not for others – Capture what excites you, not what you think others want to see.
    2. Focus on experiences, not likes – Photography is about personal growth, not social media validation.
    3. Always carry your camera – The best photo opportunities come when you least expect them.
    4. Don’t be afraid to fail – The best learning comes from mistakes.
    5. Seek discomfort – Put yourself in unfamiliar situations to grow as a photographer.
    6. Stay curious – Explore the world with a childlike sense of wonder.
    7. Embrace the unknown – Don’t plan too much. Let the streets surprise you.
    8. Don’t overthink composition – Sometimes instinct is your best guide.
    9. Capture emotions, not just moments – Focus on the feelings behind the scenes.
    10. Practice the art of patience – Wait for the perfect moment rather than rushing the shot.

    Gear and Technical Tips

    1. Shoot with what you have – The best camera is the one you have with you, even if it’s your smartphone.
    2. Use a prime lens – Simplify your setup by using a 35mm or 50mm prime lens for classic street photography.
    3. Zone focus – Pre-focus your lens so you’re ready for split-second shots.
    4. Shoot in aperture priority mode – Let your camera handle the exposure while you focus on framing and timing.
    5. Master your autofocus – Learn the quirks of your camera’s autofocus system.
    6. Use manual settings in challenging light – Don’t shy away from full manual control when necessary.
    7. Shoot RAW – Capture more data and give yourself flexibility in post-processing.
    8. Embrace wide apertures – A shallow depth of field can isolate your subject and create striking images.
    9. Turn off your flash – Natural light is often the most flattering in street photography.
    10. Use black and white to simplify – Strip color from your images to focus on form, contrast, and emotion.

    Compositional Techniques

    1. Look for leading lines – Use architecture and streets to guide the viewer’s eye.
    2. Incorporate frames within frames – Windows, doors, and arches can add layers to your images.
    3. Capture reflections – Use puddles, windows, and mirrors to create unique compositions.
    4. Embrace negative space – Let the environment breathe around your subject.
    5. Use shadows creatively – Shadows add depth and intrigue to your photos.
    6. Rule of thirds – Divide your frame into thirds and place points of interest on the intersections.
    7. Break the rules – Once you understand the basics of composition, don’t be afraid to break them.
    8. Look for symmetry – Symmetry can add a sense of balance and harmony to your images.
    9. Focus on textures – Street photography isn’t just about people. Capture the gritty textures of urban environments.
    10. Shoot from the hip – Capture more candid, unposed moments by shooting without raising your camera to your eye.

    Engaging with the Streets

    1. Smile at people – Disarming your subject with a smile makes for more genuine interactions.
    2. Talk to your subjects – Don’t be afraid to ask for permission or learn their story.
    3. Capture moments of interaction – Photos of people connecting are often more powerful than isolated portraits.
    4. Be a fly on the wall – Blend in, observe, and wait for the perfect moment to unfold.
    5. Shoot at the golden hour – Early morning and late afternoon provide the best lighting for street photography.
    6. Explore alleyways – Sometimes the most interesting scenes are away from the main streets.
    7. Look for contrasts – Capture juxtapositions between wealth and poverty, youth and age, movement and stillness.
    8. Find humor – Life on the streets is often funny. Capture those unexpected, humorous moments.
    9. Don’t be afraid of bad weather – Rain and fog can add drama and mood to your photos.
    10. Experiment with different perspectives – Try shooting from above, below, or through objects.

    Being Respectful and Ethical

    1. Be respectful of people’s privacy – Know the laws regarding photography in public spaces, and always consider your subject’s dignity.
    2. Learn when to engage and when to walk away – Some moments are not meant to be photographed.
    3. Avoid exploiting people’s hardship – Show empathy and respect in your work.
    4. Get permission if necessary – For more intimate or close-up shots, a simple gesture or asking can go a long way.
    5. Blend into the environment – Don’t draw unnecessary attention to yourself.
    6. Don’t take photos of people in vulnerable moments – Be mindful of your subjects’ situations and emotions.
    7. Show your subjects their photos – Sharing the image can create a bond and trust.
    8. Understand local cultures – When traveling, respect cultural norms around photography.
    9. Don’t photograph children without permission – It’s important to be cautious when photographing minors.
    10. Let your subjects be themselves – Don’t force a moment or pose; capture natural expressions.

    Creative Exercises

    1. Set mini-projects for yourself – Focus on a theme or concept for the day (e.g., shadows, hands, or motion).
    2. Limit yourself to 36 shots – Pretend you’re shooting with film to be more selective and thoughtful.
    3. Shoot one color – Pick a color and only capture photos featuring that color for the day.
    4. Photograph hands and gestures – Often more expressive than faces, hands tell unique stories.
    5. Try minimalism – Simplify your compositions by removing distractions.
    6. Capture motion blur – Use slower shutter speeds to show movement and energy.
    7. Photograph a stranger for 5 minutes – Spend time with one subject and document their story.
    8. Shoot in a single location – Stay in one place for an extended period and document everything happening around you.
    9. Do a photo walk with a friend – Challenge each other with themes or critiques as you shoot together.
    10. Photograph at night – Nighttime street photography offers a completely different mood and atmosphere.

    Staying Inspired

    1. Study the masters – Learn from iconic street photographers like Henri Cartier-Bresson, Garry Winogrand, and Vivian Maier.
    2. Consume art outside of photography – Find inspiration from painters, musicians, and filmmakers.
    3. Read photography books – Expand your understanding of the craft by learning from written wisdom.
    4. Attend street photography workshops – A great way to learn from peers and experienced professionals.
    5. Join street photography communities – Whether online or in-person, surrounding yourself with like-minded people will motivate you.
    6. Review your old work – Learn from your past mistakes and successes.
    7. Take a break – Sometimes stepping away from the camera for a while can reignite your passion.
    8. Create photo zines – Curate and publish your street photography in a tangible format.
    9. Don’t compare yourself to others – Everyone’s journey and style are unique.
    10. Trust your eye – The more you practice, the more you’ll develop your unique way of seeing.

    Post-Processing and Editing

    1. Less is more in editing – Don’t over-process your images. Keep them natural.
    2. Convert to black and white if color doesn’t add value – Monochrome often strengthens street photos.
    3. Crop minimally – Try to compose perfectly in-camera, and crop only to enhance the story.
    4. Dodge and burn – Use light and shadow adjustments to guide the viewer’s attention.
    5. Keep a consistent style – Develop a recognizable editing aesthetic that feels true to your vision.
    6. Backup your photos – Regularly save your work on multiple drives or cloud storage.
    7. Create series, not singles – Edit with a larger story or theme in mind.
    8. Don’t obsess over gear – Master what you have instead of chasing the next best thing.
    9. Limit distractions in your photos – Use editing to clean up unnecessary elements.
    10. Print your photos – Viewing your work in print offers a new perspective.

    Advanced Tips

    1. Shoot with film – The constraints of film can teach patience and precision.
    2. Learn to see light – Pay attention to how light falls on your subjects, and let it guide your shot.
    3. Photograph at festivals and public events – These settings often provide a wealth of candid moments.
    4. Capture decisive moments – Wait for the perfect moment when all elements align.
    5. Use contrast to tell stories – High contrast between light and dark, rich and poor, can create powerful narratives.
    6. Follow the rule of triangles – Triangular composition can create dynamic and balanced images.
    7. Pre-visualize your shot – Imagine the photo in your head before taking it.
    8. Use minimal equipment – Simplicity is key. Avoid gear that slows you down.
    9. Photograph without looking at the screen – Trust your instincts and compose without constantly checking your display.
    10. Look for eye contact – Capturing a fleeting glance can add intensity to a photograph.

    Staying Consistent and Motivated

    1. Shoot daily – Make street photography a daily habit, even if just for 10 minutes.
    2. Document your own neighborhood – Don’t overlook the beauty in familiar places.
    3. Challenge yourself to get closer – The closer you are, the more intimate the moment.
    4. Participate in photo contests – It can push you to take your work seriously and improve.
    5. Analyze your best photos – Identify what works in your best shots, and replicate that success.
    6. Seek feedback – Constructive criticism from others helps you grow.
    7. Stay inspired by traveling – Explore new cities or countries to refresh your vision.
    8. Create long-term projects – Commit to a specific topic or location for an extended period.
    9. Always be ready – Be prepared for the unexpected. Street photography is about capturing fleeting moments.
    10. Enjoy the process – Above all, street photography should be fun. Let your passion and curiosity guide you.

    By adopting these tips, you’ll not only improve your technical skills but also develop a deeper connection to the streets and the people you photograph. Happy shooting!


    Let me know if you’d like more specific tips or a detailed expansion on certain points!


  • Provoking a Response in Street Photography is Virtuous

    The truly great street photography must be unethical?

    Some new street tactics: