—Highlighting Notable Sayings and Their Significance in Rhetoric and Philosophy—
Cato the Elder (234–149 BCE)
1. “Carthago delenda est.â€
• Translation: “Carthage must be destroyed.â€
• Context: Cato the Elder ended many of his speeches in the Roman Senate with this phrase, regardless of the topic, to emphasize the threat he believed Carthage posed to Rome. His relentless repetition was a rhetorical strategy to keep the issue at the forefront of political discourse.
• Significance: This quote exemplifies the power of persistent messaging in rhetoric and has become synonymous with unwavering commitment to a cause.
2. “Rem tene, verba sequentur.â€
• Translation: “Grasp the subject, and the words will follow.â€
• Context: Although sometimes attributed to Cato the Elder, this phrase underscores the importance of understanding one’s topic thoroughly to communicate effectively.
• Significance: Highlights the value placed on substance over style in oratory, a principle that resonates in rhetorical studies.
3. “Patres conscripti, res publica in extremo est.â€
• Translation: “Conscript Fathers, the republic is in extreme danger.â€
• Context: While not a direct quote, it reflects the urgency Cato conveyed in addressing threats to Rome.
• Significance: Emphasizes his role as a vigilant guardian of Roman values and security.
Cato the Younger (95–46 BCE)
1. “I would rather people question why I have no statue than why I have one.â€
• Context: Expresses Cato the Younger’s humility and his preference for genuine virtue over public accolades.
• Significance: Reflects Stoic ideals of modesty and integrity, prioritizing personal ethics over external recognition.
2. “It is better to suffer wrong than to do it.â€
• Context: Aligns with his Stoic belief in enduring hardship honorably rather than compromising one’s principles.
• Significance: Illustrates the Stoic emphasis on virtue as the highest good, even above personal well-being.
3. “The multitude is fickle and changeable.â€
• Context: A reflection on the unpredictability of public opinion, possibly influencing his steadfast adherence to his own moral compass.
• Significance: Highlights the philosophical stance of relying on reason and virtue rather than popular approval.
Analysis and Significance
• Rhetorical Impact: Both Cato the Elder and Cato the Younger utilized their oratory skills to influence Roman politics and society. Their memorable statements have been studied for their rhetorical effectiveness and moral depth.
• Philosophical Reflections: The quotes encapsulate their philosophical beliefs—Cato the Elder’s focus on practical wisdom and state security, and Cato the Younger’s commitment to Stoic virtues.
• Legacy: Their words have transcended their own time, offering insights into leadership, ethics, and the power of rhetoric in shaping history.
Conclusion
The famous quotes of Cato the Elder and Cato the Younger serve as enduring testaments to their convictions and rhetorical prowess. They not only influenced the course of Roman history but also continue to offer valuable lessons in philosophy and communication.
References
• Plutarch, Lives of Noble Greeks and Romans: Provides detailed biographies and anecdotes about both Cato the Elder and Cato the Younger.
• Cicero, De Officiis (On Duties): Discusses moral philosophy relevant to Cato the Younger.
• Seneca, De Providentia (On Providence): Explores Stoic themes exemplified by Cato the Younger.
• Cato the Elder, De Agri Cultura (On Agriculture): His treatise offering insights into his values and practical wisdom.
Note: While these quotes are commonly associated with Cato the Elder and Cato the Younger, exact phrasing may vary in historical records. Ancient sources often paraphrase speeches, and translations can differ. The quotes provided capture the essence of their documented beliefs and rhetorical style.
—Exploring the Lives, Philosophies, and Rhetorical Contributions of Two Influential Roman Statesmen—
Introduction
Cato the Elder and Cato the Younger were two prominent figures in Roman history, connected by family lineage and a shared reputation for moral integrity and conservatism. Despite these similarities, they lived in different eras and faced distinct political challenges. Understanding their differences and contributions provides valuable insights into Roman rhetoric, philosophy, and the historical context of their times.
Cato the Elder (234–149 BCE)
1. Background
• Full Name: Marcus Porcius Cato.
• Era: Lived during the aftermath of the Second Punic War.
• Roles: Roman senator, statesman, historian, and orator.
• Notable For: His persistent call for the destruction of Carthage, encapsulated in the phrase “Carthago delenda est†(“Carthage must be destroyedâ€).
2. Contributions
• Traditionalism: Advocated for traditional Roman values and customs (mos maiorum), opposing the growing influence of Greek culture.
• Anti-Hellenism: Believed that Greek philosophy and luxury threatened Roman morality and simplicity.
• Rhetoric: Used repetition and emotional appeals to persuade the Senate, effectively keeping the focus on perceived external threats.
• Literary Works: Authored De Agri Cultura (On Farming), one of the earliest Latin prose texts, emphasizing traditional Roman virtues.
3. Impact on Rhetoric and Philosophy
• Rhetorical Techniques: Demonstrated the effectiveness of persistent messaging and the use of simple, direct language.
• Philosophical Stance: Emphasized practicality over abstract philosophy, focusing on duty, discipline, and austerity.
Cato the Younger (95–46 BCE)
1. Background
• Full Name: Marcus Porcius Cato Uticensis.
• Era: Lived during the Late Republic, amid civil wars and the rise of Julius Caesar.
• Roles: Politician, statesman, and Stoic philosopher.
• Notable For: His unwavering commitment to the Roman Republic and Stoic principles, and his opposition to Caesar’s dictatorship.
2. Contributions
• Stoicism: A devout practitioner, embodying Stoic virtues such as wisdom, courage, justice, and temperance.
• Political Integrity: Known for his incorruptibility, he resisted political bribery and maintained strict ethical standards.
• Rhetoric: Used moral authority and logical argumentation in his speeches, often emphasizing the importance of virtue and the rule of law.
• Final Stand: Chose suicide over submission after Caesar’s victory, symbolizing the ultimate act of resistance to tyranny.
3. Impact on Rhetoric and Philosophy
• Moral Exemplarity: His life became a model for personal integrity and resistance to corruption.
• Philosophical Influence: Inspired later thinkers and writers, such as Seneca and Dante, as an exemplar of Stoic virtue.
Comparative Analysis
1. Family Lineage and Legacy
• Relationship: Cato the Younger was the great-grandson of Cato the Elder.
• Shared Values: Both emphasized moral integrity, austerity, and dedication to the Republic.
2. Historical Context
• Cato the Elder: Faced external threats, particularly from Carthage, and cultural changes due to Hellenization.
• Cato the Younger: Confronted internal turmoil, civil wars, and the collapse of the Republican system.
3. Philosophical Orientations
• Cato the Elder: Practical and conservative, skeptical of Greek philosophy, focusing on traditional Roman virtues.
• Cato the Younger: Embraced Stoicism, integrating Greek philosophical concepts into his Roman identity.
4. Rhetorical Styles
• Cato the Elder: Utilized repetitive slogans and emotional appeals to influence public opinion and policy.
• Cato the Younger: Relied on ethical persuasion and logical reasoning, often appealing to the Senate’s sense of duty and justice.
5. Cultural Attitudes
• Cato the Elder: Opposed the adoption of Greek culture, fearing moral decay.
• Cato the Younger: While upholding Roman values, he incorporated Greek philosophical teachings into his life.
Conclusion
Cato the Elder and Cato the Younger, though connected by blood and a reputation for steadfastness, navigated different challenges in Roman history. Cato the Elder’s relentless campaign against Carthage highlights the power of rhetoric in shaping foreign policy and reflects concerns over external threats and cultural integrity. In contrast, Cato the Younger’s Stoic philosophy and opposition to Julius Caesar underscore the internal struggles of the Late Republic and the moral complexities of resisting autocracy. Both figures exemplify how personal conviction and rhetorical skill can influence political landscapes, leaving legacies that extend into philosophical and ethical discussions for generations.
Further Reading
• Plutarch, Lives: Provides biographies of both Cato the Elder and Cato the Younger.
• Cicero, De Senectute (On Old Age): Offers insights into Roman attitudes toward aging and virtue, relevant to Cato the Elder.
• Seneca, Letters from a Stoic: While written later, reflects Stoic principles exemplified by Cato the Younger.
• Appian, The Civil Wars: Details the political context of Cato the Younger’s era.
• Polybius, Histories: Offers background on the Punic Wars and the period of Cato the Elder.
By examining the lives and contributions of both Cato the Elder and Cato the Younger, we gain a deeper understanding of the complexities of Roman politics, the evolution of rhetoric, and the enduring influence of philosophy on leadership and ethics.
History of Carthage must burn and why important rhetoric and philosophy
Haha! End every speech in Senate, regardless of the topic—
Carthago delenda est!
Anti hannibal
Rhetoric is Key.
…
—Exploring the Origins and Impact of Cato the Elder’s Famous Phrase—
Introduction
The phrase “Carthago delenda est†(“Carthage must be destroyedâ€) is one of the most famous utterances from ancient Rome, attributed to the statesman Cato the Elder. This declaration played a pivotal role in the events leading up to the Third Punic War and the ultimate destruction of Carthage in 146 BCE. Beyond its historical context, the phrase has become a significant example in the study of rhetoric and philosophy, illustrating the power of persistent persuasion and the ethical considerations of such an uncompromising stance.
Historical Context
1. The Punic Wars: The Punic Wars were a series of three conflicts between Rome and Carthage from 264 to 146 BCE. These wars were primarily over control of the Mediterranean trade routes and regional dominance.
2. Carthage and Rome: Carthage was a powerful city-state located in present-day Tunisia. By the end of the Second Punic War, Rome had emerged victorious but remained wary of Carthage’s potential resurgence.
3. Cato the Elder: Marcus Porcius Cato, known as Cato the Elder, was a Roman senator and historian known for his conservatism and advocacy of traditional Roman values.
“Carthago delenda est†and Cato’s Rhetoric
1. Repetition for Emphasis: Cato the Elder ended every speech in the Senate, regardless of the topic, with the phrase “Carthago delenda est.†This relentless repetition served to keep the issue of Carthage at the forefront of Roman political discourse.
2. Rhetorical Strategy: By constantly repeating the phrase, Cato employed a rhetorical technique that underscores the power of persistence in persuasion. It created a sense of urgency and inevitability about the need to address the “Carthaginian question.â€
3. Emotional Appeal: Cato tapped into the collective fears and anxieties of the Roman people, who remembered the devastation brought by Hannibal during the Second Punic War.
Philosophical Implications
1. Moral Absolutism vs. Pragmatism: Cato’s unwavering stance raises questions about moral absolutism. Was the destruction of Carthage a justifiable act of preemptive self-defense or an immoral act of aggression?
2. The Ethics of Persuasion: The phrase exemplifies how rhetoric can be used to shape public opinion and policy, prompting reflections on the ethical responsibilities of orators and leaders.
3. Imperialism and Its Consequences: The destruction of Carthage symbolizes the aggressive expansion of Rome, prompting philosophical debates about the justifications and ramifications of imperialism.
Impact on Rhetoric
1. Legacy in Oratory: “Carthago delenda est†has become a classic example of effective rhetoric, studied for its demonstration of how repetition and emotional appeal can influence an audience.
2. Strategic Communication: The phrase illustrates the importance of consistency in messaging when attempting to persuade others or bring about political change.
3. Modern Usage: The expression is often referenced in political discourse to denote an unwavering commitment to a cause or the perceived necessity of decisive action against a threat.
Conclusion
The historical call of “Carthago delenda est†by Cato the Elder is more than a mere footnote in Roman history; it is a profound example of the power of rhetoric and its ability to shape events. The phrase’s significance extends into philosophical discussions about morality, persuasion, and the use of power. It serves as a timeless reminder of how words can influence destinies, both of cities and of civilizations.
References
• Polybius, Histories
• Plutarch, Life of Cato the Elder
• Livy, Ab Urbe Condita
• Cicero, De Senectute
• Scholarly analyses on Roman rhetoric and philosophy
The text in the image is a classical Chinese poem. Here is a full translation of the content:
I sit by the riverbank, my father fishing by my side.
He casts his line, while the sun rises above the waves.
His words, simple yet profound, speak of the essence of life.
“The river flows endlessly, yet never the same twice.
Water departs, new waves take its place—such is time, such is life.â€
Reflecting, I understand:
A person may grasp at what is fleeting,
Yet must let go of what is past.
The world spins forward, untouched by our despair.
The river whispers wisdom:
Do not cling to what is gone; embrace the flow.
Even as the tides rise and fall, life’s rhythm is eternal.
What is lost returns in new forms, what departs is reborn.
As the water carves new paths, so must we.
Our hearts, like rivers, flow toward an endless horizon.
This is the way of nature—change, motion, renewal.
This is a poetic and approximate rendering. Classical Chinese is deeply interpretative, so different translators might focus on slightly different nuances. Let me know if you would like further analysis of any part!
The text in this image is also written in classical Chinese. Below is an approximate English translation of the content:
Dwelling away from the mortal world, I rest in solitude,
Like a wild crane perched on a southern cliff.
The winds of nature whisper softly, carrying the essence of tranquility.
Beneath the ancient trees, the autumn breeze awakens memories of time.
Leaves fall like crimson waves, drifting through the seasons.
In the wilderness, I see the traces of life ebb and flow.
Mountains stand tall, gazing at the boundless sky,
While rivers ripple endlessly, mirroring the stars.
Through the ages, the essence of existence lies in its impermanence.
From the ancient past to the present, the rhythm of life remains constant.
My humble dwelling reflects the vastness of nature:
Bamboo forests sway, clouds gather, and streams weave through the land.
Though life moves with ceaseless change,
The stillness of the spirit endures beyond all motion.
This translation attempts to capture the reflective and serene mood of the text. If you’d like a more nuanced interpretation or have questions about specific phrases, feel free to ask!
As the water carves new paths, so must we. Our hearts, like rivers, flow toward an endless horizon. This is the way of nature — change, motion, renewal.
So currently random thoughts;; about thermodynamics and heat loss. Assuming that energy is not created nor destroyed, what that then means is if we think about shit hit loss, is that technically your body is already a perfectly thermal regulated closed system. This was really really hard for me to understand when I was young, even now… The idea that when you put on a thick ass warm down jacket, or a Canada goose jacket or whatever, your body is not “creating†heat“, rather it is just preserving the heat inside your body so that your body is not losing heat.
The best way to warm up your house or home or habitat or habitation
Los Angeles is actually kind of bizarre; on one hand, during the day like yesterday, it was an extremely glorious 71, 72, 73°, absolutely beautiful. And this is like the end of November, practically early December? I still recall when I was a undergraduate at UCLA, walking down Bruin walk, and being shocked that in the middle of December, I saw all these pretty and sexy girls walking down Bruin walk, in tank tops, Spaghetti straps, booty shorts?
Even yesterday, seeing all these happy young people, basking the sun, once again, all these beautiful and pretty girls, just wearing black Lululemon tights, and black Lululemon top sports bras.
Anyways, the thing that is really shocking to me is that night it gets cold as shit. Like I think in the evening, Los Angeles could dip down to the high 30s? Like if it is super super late or super super early before the sun comes up, it is like 38° outside? But when the sun comes out, it could be a beautiful 73°?
Anyways, but that then means is that for your apartment your house habitation or whatever, the number one critical thing you do is just seal up the doors, get rid of the holes the drafts, etc., and just prevent heat loss!
For example, probably one of the most joyful things for myself at least, was the glory of living at this really really wonderful high-rise condo building, the edge in Providence Rhode Island. The apartment was super super tiny, feels like a 300 square-foot studio, at the time it was just me and Cindy, but what I personally loved about it, then seeing an extreme joy that had was my room the room, the whole apartment, the whole apartment building and complex, and also even the gym, Was like always a perfect 72° and warm, idregardless of whether there was a snowstorm outside. I still remember, complaining to Cindy that I was too hot in bed, taking off my blankets, complaining that was too sweating, and then just looking outside and seeing that it was snowing outside.
Anyways, I think the thing that is difficult to think and understand is that if you buy these nice single-family homes, and then it gets cold as shit at night, good luck trying to thermo regulate it.
I don’t know maybe I’m more sensitive to the cold than the average person, because I’m like 5% or even sub 5% body fat; which means is that I fucking hit the cold. To me Cold is evil.
What that means is anything that you could do to prevent heat loss or the cold is a good thing. And that just means if you’re cold, just buy really really ultra warm UNIQLO heat tech tights, which actually worked insanely well, as well as just like put on a merino wool long sleeve, a down vest, and a thick ass down jacket.
Just focus on doing what you’re good at 
One big idea I had was in regards to an Archimedes lever– just focus on what you’re super super insanely good at, and just ignore everything else.
What that means is with houses, housing stuff, etc., the ideal is that you never have to muck around with any housing stuff.
For example, I like the idea of leveraging other people, like what that means is just let other people focus on what they’re good at, for example, things that I’m not good at include like doing anything about house stuff house repairs house maintenance etc. I think the unfortunate trend is post Covid, you had a bunch of successful millennials, kind of like myself, in their 30s, late 30s, early 40s, etc. purchasing single-family homes, and like hunkering down during and post Covid, because people can no longer travel to Japan or whatever, they just spent all the money they would have otherwise spent on travel to purchase a single-family home, get into gardening etc.
Yet, that was like 2020, 2019. Times have changed.
We are now, witnessing this new movement, a totally radical paradigm shipped, even words failed to describe how phenomenally epic this all is.
Essentially bitcoin hit $100K yesterday, or maybe in the middle of the night, or like to be more accurate like $99,510 or something, but it’s funny when you look at the prices, you have all these short sellers trying to short bitcoin and microstrategy, I think there’s actually a new ETF which is minus 2X MSTR (MSTZ), which long story short, is trying to make a huge profit off of the downturn of MicroStrategy and bitcoin. So for all the bulls, all the people who think bitcoin and micro strategies going to go down, they are essentially shorting bitcoin and microstrategy. 
You cannot stop exponential growth even if you want to.
This is starting to feel like the early days of Facebook like I still recall the early days of Facebook in which there was no newsfeed. I made an account when I was like a freshman in college, because at the time Facebook was only open to university students, you needed a “.edu†account to even sign up.  And the growth was pretty astronomical. At first it was just like university students, I still remember the early days where you would flirt with girls you liked by “poking†them. There was not yet any direct messages you could only post on the walls, which was 100% public. Even at the time, Mark Zuckerberg said that advertisements were lame, there was no newsfeed, no ads. You actually had to click into somebody’s profile to just check up on them. There was no status updates really yet,
iPhone, iMessage, even Kakaotalk?
How do you know if somebody is Korean or not? Simple, if they have kakaotalk, and or if they have that little bright yellow chat icon, and the sound of a notification sounds like “Apple!â€
Also they’re funny things, the Japanese only use line, Cambodians only use telegram, Europeans use WhatsApp, Americans we tend to just use Facebook messenger and or Instagram direct message and or text messaging iMessage?
Anyways, do you remember when the iPhone first came out, and everyone was riding on it, and apparently there was a lot of industry people, who obviously were a bunch of idiots, who said that the iPhone was going to be a failure because it did not have a physical keyboard like the popular blackberry at the time.
And this is the genius and vision of Steve Jobs; he fought nail and tooth to ensure that in fact, the iPhone would never ever ever have a physical keyboard, and that the genius of the iPhone was it was able to become all screen, and that if you wanted access to a keyboard you will just use the little virtual keyboard instead.
Think the original iPhone
 so do you remember, the original iPhone, the iPhone 3G, didn’t even have copy and paste! It was very very basic and rudimentary; but still… Like probably the most important product innovation and technology of all time.
Even I went to the Mr. brainwash exhibition in Beverly Hills Rodeo Drive a few weeks ago, and I really really liked this painting an image of Steve Jobs, as like a digital, Silicon Valley cowboy, his gift of the iPhone iPad etc. was like the best gift of all time.
The gift of fire
So obviously life with fire is better than life without fire.
Same thing with electricity. And water.
You could waterboard somebody, and kill a man with water. Also, you can electrocute and zap a man to death with electricity with the chair.
You could obviously burn a man alive, as well. Or you could use sashimi knives to kill somebody, better to use the sashimi knife instead to just make yourself some delicious ribeye.
Once again, fire is good, a stove oven is great. It makes cooking beef ribs a lot easier.
A lot of people hate on Apple and Steve Jobs and iPhone saying that it is destroying the minds of our youth whatever. But once again, it is like fire; if you use fire irresponsibly you can kill yourself and others or the whole village, but if you use it responsibly, it is like the best thing of all time.
Bitcoin, today, is like the early iPhone?
An analogy I don’t think no one has really done yet; realizing that bitcoin right now, might be like the iPhone in the early days?
With the first iPhone, no one was quite sure what to do with it, what the function or utility of it was. Then do you remember that that huge aftermarket market exploded, with the ability to strap on that external battery pack to the back of your iPhone to give it more charge?
So I also think that with bitcoin we will see a similar surge. We will start to see a huge third-party after market market explode.
For example, even the huge after market for iPhone cases is still quite robust.
Why is bitcoin the ethical option?
Immaculate conception of bitcoin. As somebody who is raised and born and baptized Roman Catholic, I really really do see some strong metaphors and analogies for bitcoin, Satoshi, and thinking of bitcoin like a new religion, a new economic religion?
The general idea is that bitcoin is phenomenal because bitcoin does not require a PR team, a marketing team, a foundation, or some sort of nerdy loser leader.
So for example, I’m like 100% Elon Musk, but the reason why Dogecoin, and all these other meme derivatives are positively bad is because they are backed on the charisma or the fashion of a single individual. If Elon Musk just randomly dies tomorrow in a rocket ship accident, I’m pretty much sure that the price of Dogecoin would go to zero.
Also, the reason why I got off of chain-link, and went back 100% into bitcoin was that I started realizing that invested parties in chain-link started using Sergey Nazarov as a puppet, trying to get him to stoke up investor confidence to pump up the price of chain-link. But even as bitcoin is pretty much $100,000, even chain-link has not hit the record high of like $50 or $55 a chain-link.
False prophets
Vitalik Buterin – yeah I don’t trust the guy. Look at him he’s like the ultra uber nerd. Something that what people don’t understand, like if you read the original Ethereum white paper is that the proposal of Ethereum from Vitalik was that bitcoin had too many problems, and that he was there to solve it, and that Ethereum would fix all the problems of bitcoin.
Even a thing that I was into for a bit was digibyte, DGB, which was essentially like imagine the silver coins or the copper coins of bitcoin. The idea was bitcoin was too slow for transactions, and that gigabyte was like 1 trillion times faster, making it more suitable as a daily cryptocurrency transfer thing.
Anyways, I think time is shown that everything that was not bitcoin has failed. Kind of like Thomas Edison, and DC electricity, AC electricity apparently better than a lot of records, but because Thomas Edison had more marketing chops, I guess he won.
Another analogy is that like bitcoin is like Tesla, and bitcoin has the world bitcoin network which is like the Tesla super charging network; honestly, I don’t think any human being should ever buy any electric vehicle which is not a Tesla. It’s like deciding to live in mainland China instead of living in America. Or choosing the Chinese yuan over the US dollar.
Another analogy; bitcoin is like Gatorade, I don’t even know what number two is? Powerade?
Or, bitcoin is like having the newest iPhone Pro, desert titanium, and Ethereum is like a Google pixel or android Samsung derivative; nobody wants it.
Or, bitcoin is like Coca-Cola, and Ethereum is Pepsi. Nobody wants Pepsi.
Or, bitcoin is like Nike and or Jordan, and Ethereum is Adidas. Adidas was only cool for a minute because Kanye West endorsed it and created his Yeezy line, but now that Kanye has dipped out, nobody wants Adidas anymore.
Or, bitcoin is like McDonald’s, and Ethereum is like Burger King. Nobody wants Burger King.
There is no second best
I think with choosing a life partner, a wife, having a kid your kid etc., is understanding that there is no second best.
I look at the whole field of crypto, and crypto derivatives, essentially I think the best way to think about it is that like everything that is not bitcoin is just an Ethereum derivative; which is like building your kingdom on cotton candy or quicksand.
Bitcoin is like the solid asphalt which is beneath Manhattan. But in Cypress space which is like 1 trillion times more secure.
Getting paid $2000 an hour
So let us assume that you’re getting paid 20 bucks an hour, if you’re on the bitcoin standard, and if you’re pouring all your moneys into bitcoin, then, in theory you are getting paid $200 an hour, or $2000 an hour. 
Also some other analogies; if you spend like $1000 on a new iPhone, that’s almost like spending $10,000 on a phone, or even worse, $100,000 on a phone. Or even worse, $1 million on a phone, assuming that bitcoin Will 10 X, 100 X, 1000 X, or even 10,000 X from here.
So why does this matter?
Assume that your whole life, you yourself as a child, you were only fed sewer water. And you’re always sick, and full of cholera, and you have no idea why you’re always so sick, and feel so unwell. And then you have a kid and do you think the sewer water is safe, and you start feeding your kid the sewer water! What is going to happen to the health of your kid?
This analogy is good for money, and capital and thinking of bitcoin like the first 100%, God inspired, perfect money. And also perfect capital.
Bitcoin is both money, and capital? And cash?
The hard thing with the real estate like if you own a square block in Gangnam, or Shibuya, or Ginza, or fifth Avenue in Manhattan, is that you cannot immediately liquidate like a 10th of your property to buy a cyber truck or a cup of coffee.
The really interesting thing about bitcoin is that it is both property like digital property like owning land, and also it could in theory be used as money and currency.
My personal thought is that owning a single bitcoin is like owning a single family home. Assuming that the price of a single-family home in Culver City is $4.4 million, for a tiny awesome minimalist house, then my personal thought is the price of a single bitcoin should be worth at least 4.4 million, Maybe 10 X or 100 X. Why? $440 million a bitcoin; my current price target. 
My very simple idea is that if you own a single-family house, in a locked piece of land, you cannot move it, it’s not like a game of the Sims or Minecraft; but with bitcoin, you can!
Minecraft economics
I find this to be really fascinating because once again, bitcoin is like Minecraft capital and money. If you have ever seen a child or a teenager on Minecraft, you will be shocked to see how phenomenally imaginative they could become, when there are no longer restricted by time, money, access to capital, the laws of physics, space etc.
I been thinking about cyberspace is kind of difficult to imagine because it is like 1 trillion times more expensive than land, Joshua tree, Yosemite, the desert, etc. Like if you watch the movie Dune, and you see the infinite sands, infinite desert, imagine like that but times 1 trillion. Why? Space cyberspace is not limited by the laws of physics.
***
I bought every V 12 engine, wish I could take it back to the beginning
This is like year one, or year zero of bitcoin. Now that you see CNBC practically on fire with bitcoin, bitcoin options, bitcoin derivatives, and now that ibit the black rock bitcoin spot ETF practically owning close to 1 million bitcoins now, that means is this is a massive paradigm shift. It’s like going from horse and buggy to Tesla model S plaid.
Don’t trust the zombies
I was watching an interview with Natalie Brunelle and ERIC Semmler, and ERIC was talking about how his company semler scientific was the century like a zombie company. But when they took out the skeleton, and re-infused it with adamantine skeleton, like what they did to Wolverine, their company spring back to life with 100 X vigor.
Once again, if you’re living in the hood, drinking sewer water, Fanta, and McDonald’s hamburgers, and you have the option of living in beautiful Culver City, surrounded by trees, happy people the sun, fresh air, and the finest organic food and meats from Erewhon, wouldn’t you want to make the swap?
Why the red wave is a big deal
Michael sailor currently put out a presentation on the red wave, at Cantor digital. The general idea is that now that we pretty much have a 100% Republican red party and government and Senate, this is insanely phenomenal news for bitcoin.
Why? Senator to Cynthia Lummis is proposing the bitcoin act, which is that America sells a bunch of her gold notes, and uses that profit to buy bitcoin.
This is kind of a big deal because then, maybe, we could actually revitalize the US dollar and essentially maybe even reverse inflation, because if we pack the US dollar to our bitcoin reserves, what that that means is our country will become super fucking prosperous? Like we’re going to be showered with so much money and wealth, we’re going to be like “too much wealth and prosperity! Please no more!â€
Also, even though I’m pro bitcoin and anti-crypto and everything else; you’re going to see a huge crypto Renaissance, because note, Trump’s kids his sons are actually actively in the crypto space; and even Donald Trump accepted a Donald trump NFT, which sold out like in a minute. So you’re going to see a massive boost to Bitcoin and the whole market.
And also, all these meme coins, I’m quite anti it because once again, they’re backed by nothing but popular ideas, and charismatic individuals. The difference of bitcoin is that it is backed by like $1 trillion of real capital; which means like already… Over $1 trillion of real money has already been put into it, and what is defending the bitcoin network is like maybe 100 X the computer power of even the US military and Navy.
If America was super smart, because we want to be #1 forever, we would want to stock pile our bitcoin reserves, to make sure that no other country could even come close. Because what people also don’t understand is the point is like cyber defense as well; if you have a wall of encrypted energy, it is essentially hacker proof, you cannot have malicious Chinese people trying to hack the network.
What drives me?
Once; super simple; growing up poor, having a dad addicted to gambling, my mom working like two menial labor jobs cleaning houses and waitressing, working at a gas station or convenience store just to pay the bills, yeah this was pretty bad.
As a consequence, I don’t know I feel like financial independence, financial freedom might be the peak virtue. Like 1 trillion times more important than anything else.
For example, art photography aesthetics ethics and the like. You could only  only privilege yourself to these luxuries only if you are financially healthy. And economically healthy. If you are economically sick, you can’t do nothing.
 I think the big problem is that a lot of conservative often criticize and critique people for staying poor, but, can you complain and blame people for being constantly sick, if they only have access to sewer water?
“I grew up in the era when clean water was only served to the fairer skin†– Ye
Once again, imagine like we’re living in a postapocalyptic, dystopic world and reality in which only rich people or a certain race of people are allowed access to clean water. And clean air and clean food.
Imagine like you’re giving people maggots to consume. Or like an episode of Snowpiercer, the poor people in the back of the train being fed the “protein bars“, which is essentially grinded up bugs.
But imagine, you could be in front of the train, eating the finest ribeye steak, the finest sushi etc. That is what bitcoin is!
ERIC
***
Bitcoin is financial freedom?
There is nothing more lovely to me than my morning walks?
• Your body doesn’t create heat; it preserves it. Jackets, homes, and insulation are about minimizing heat loss, not generating warmth.
• The best way to stay warm? Seal the drafts, layer up with Uniqlo HeatTech and merino wool, and focus on preserving what you already have.
2. Life is About Delegation
• Focus on what you’re insanely good at—your Archimedes lever.
• Don’t waste time fixing houses or on maintenance. Outsource it. Let others do what they’re good at while you stay in your zone of genius.
3. Bitcoin is Ethical Money
• Bitcoin doesn’t need PR teams, leaders, or marketing—it’s pure, decentralized, and immaculate.
• Unlike Dogecoin or Ethereum, it doesn’t rely on celebrity hype or false prophets. Bitcoin is the Tesla of money: innovative and unstoppable.
4. Bitcoin is the New iPhone
• In the early iPhone days, no one knew its potential. Same with Bitcoin now. It’s the beginning of a massive aftermarket boom, like iPhone accessories but for finance.
5. There’s No Second Best
• In crypto, it’s Bitcoin or nothing. Ethereum, Dogecoin, or any altcoin? They’re like Pepsi or Burger King—nobody really wants them. Bitcoin is Coca-Cola, Nike, McDonald’s.
6. Bitcoin Equals Financial Freedom
• Growing up poor, financial independence became the ultimate virtue. Bitcoin is a tool for liberation.
• Just like clean water and fresh air, Bitcoin represents access to true economic health.
7. Bitcoin as Property and Cash
• Owning Bitcoin is like owning a single-family home in Culver City but infinitely scalable.
• It’s digital property and liquid cash at the same time—unmatched in versatility.
8. Exponential Growth is Unstoppable
• You can’t stop Bitcoin’s rise—it’s like early Facebook or Tesla’s ascent.
• BlackRock and ETFs are pouring in. Governments are noticing. This is the beginning of a financial paradigm shift.
9. Revolutionizing Society
• Imagine living in the back of the train eating bugs, or moving to the front for ribeye and sushi—that’s Bitcoin.
• It’s a chance to move from economic slavery to freedom, from drinking sewer water to fresh springs.
10. Why Bitcoin Matters
• It’s the antidote to poverty, financial despair, and economic inequality.
• Bitcoin is not just money; it’s ethics, philosophy, and the foundation for a better future.
This is the Year Zero of Bitcoin. We’re witnessing history in real time, and it’s only the beginning. Stay focused. Stay strong. Bitcoin is life.
A very interesting way to understand bitcoin is that it is almost like a sociological phenomenon, mixed with science, mathematics, modern day cryptography, and engineering.
first, store of value. The idea of being able to store permanent capital and value in cyberspace alone is worth bitcoin. The idea that you and your family will stay rich forever, and indefinitely become even richer… This is awesome.
Most profitable in the USA, fastest growing company
.
Question of leverage?
.
20x buy faster than available supply
.
1x
$10B a capital, still make money off the arbitrage
We make 10x that! ***
$3B , or make $30B in convertible bonds
$35B of permanent capital
. overnight deposit
Cannot create duration and exploit invest at 60%, borrow at 0%
.
Buy your own stock?
.
Buy our convertible bonds, downside protection , $500M in a 20 minute meeting
.
3 choices
Buy MSTR CONVERT
2x Bitcoin is MSTR
55% premium, 5 years , 0%
5 converts in a single year
.
I love the battle!
.
$1M a coin next year?
$29ARR, 60% ARR, to 20% ARR, 60 vol to 25 vol,
Head wind into tail wind! ***
Always be the stronger capital asset
..
$13M a coin by 2045,
MicroStrategy is powered by its #Bitcoin treasury operations. We sell volatility through our ATM offerings, strip BTC risk, volatility, and performance from our fixed-income securities, and transfer that performance to our $MSTR equity holders. pic.twitter.com/QedCazsrsN
So currently random thoughts;; about thermodynamics and heat loss. Assuming that energy is not created nor destroyed, what that then means is if we think about shit hit loss, is that technically your body is already a perfectly thermal regulated closed system. This was really really hard for me to understand when I was young, even now… The idea that when you put on a thick ass warm down jacket, or a Canada goose jacket or whatever, your body is not “creating†heat“, rather it is just preserving the heat inside your body so that your body is not losing heat.
The best way to warm up your house or home or habitat or habitation
Los Angeles is actually kind of bizarre; on one hand, during the day like yesterday, it was an extremely glorious 71, 72, 73°, absolutely beautiful. And this is like the end of November, practically early December? I still recall when I was a undergraduate at UCLA, walking down Bruin walk, and being shocked that in the middle of December, I saw all these pretty and sexy girls walking down Bruin walk, in tank tops, Spaghetti straps, booty shorts?
Even yesterday, seeing all these happy young people, basking the sun, once again, all these beautiful and pretty girls, just wearing black Lululemon tights, and black Lululemon top sports bras.
Anyways, the thing that is really shocking to me is that night it gets cold as shit. Like I think in the evening, Los Angeles could dip down to the high 30s? Like if it is super super late or super super early before the sun comes up, it is like 38° outside? But when the sun comes out, it could be a beautiful 73°?
Anyways, but that then means is that for your apartment your house habitation or whatever, the number one critical thing you do is just seal up the doors, get rid of the holes the drafts, etc., and just prevent heat loss!
For example, probably one of the most joyful things for myself at least, was the glory of living at this really really wonderful high-rise condo building, the edge in Providence Rhode Island. The apartment was super super tiny, feels like a 300 square-foot studio, at the time it was just me and Cindy, but what I personally loved about it, then seeing an extreme joy that had was my room the room, the whole apartment, the whole apartment building and complex, and also even the gym, Was like always a perfect 72° and warm, idregardless of whether there was a snowstorm outside. I still remember, complaining to Cindy that I was too hot in bed, taking off my blankets, complaining that was too sweating, and then just looking outside and seeing that it was snowing outside.
Anyways, I think the thing that is difficult to think and understand is that if you buy these nice single-family homes, and then it gets cold as shit at night, good luck trying to thermo regulate it.
I don’t know maybe I’m more sensitive to the cold than the average person, because I’m like 5% or even sub 5% body fat; which means is that I fucking hit the cold. To me Cold is evil.
What that means is anything that you could do to prevent heat loss or the cold is a good thing. And that just means if you’re cold, just buy really really ultra warm UNIQLO heat tech tights, which actually worked insanely well, as well as just like put on a merino wool long sleeve, a down vest, and a thick ass down jacket.
Just focus on doing what you’re good at 
One big idea I had was in regards to an Archimedes lever– just focus on what you’re super super insanely good at, and just ignore everything else.
What that means is with houses, housing stuff, etc., the ideal is that you never have to muck around with any housing stuff.
For example, I like the idea of leveraging other people, like what that means is just let other people focus on what they’re good at, for example, things that I’m not good at include like doing anything about house stuff house repairs house maintenance etc. I think the unfortunate trend is post Covid, you had a bunch of successful millennials, kind of like myself, in their 30s, late 30s, early 40s, etc. purchasing single-family homes, and like hunkering down during and post Covid, because people can no longer travel to Japan or whatever, they just spent all the money they would have otherwise spent on travel to purchase a single-family home, get into gardening etc.
Yet, that was like 2020, 2019. Times have changed.
We are now, witnessing this new movement, a totally radical paradigm shipped, even words failed to describe how phenomenally epic this all is.
Essentially bitcoin hit $100K yesterday, or maybe in the middle of the night, or like to be more accurate like $99,510 or something, but it’s funny when you look at the prices, you have all these short sellers trying to short bitcoin and microstrategy, I think there’s actually a new ETF which is minus 2X MSTR (MSTZ), which long story short, is trying to make a huge profit off of the downturn of MicroStrategy and bitcoin. So for all the bulls, all the people who think bitcoin and micro strategies going to go down, they are essentially shorting bitcoin and microstrategy. 
You cannot stop exponential growth even if you want to.
This is starting to feel like the early days of Facebook like I still recall the early days of Facebook in which there was no newsfeed. I made an account when I was like a freshman in college, because at the time Facebook was only open to university students, you needed a “.edu†account to even sign up.  And the growth was pretty astronomical. At first it was just like university students, I still remember the early days where you would flirt with girls you liked by “poking†them. There was not yet any direct messages you could only post on the walls, which was 100% public. Even at the time, Mark Zuckerberg said that advertisements were lame, there was no newsfeed, no ads. You actually had to click into somebody’s profile to just check up on them. There was no status updates really yet,
iPhone, iMessage, even Kakaotalk?
How do you know if somebody is Korean or not? Simple, if they have kakaotalk, and or if they have that little bright yellow chat icon, and the sound of a notification sounds like “Apple!â€
Also they’re funny things, the Japanese only use line, Cambodians only use telegram, Europeans use WhatsApp, Americans we tend to just use Facebook messenger and or Instagram direct message and or text messaging iMessage?
Anyways, do you remember when the iPhone first came out, and everyone was riding on it, and apparently there was a lot of industry people, who obviously were a bunch of idiots, who said that the iPhone was going to be a failure because it did not have a physical keyboard like the popular blackberry at the time.
And this is the genius and vision of Steve Jobs; he fought nail and tooth to ensure that in fact, the iPhone would never ever ever have a physical keyboard, and that the genius of the iPhone was it was able to become all screen, and that if you wanted access to a keyboard you will just use the little virtual keyboard instead.
Think the original iPhone
 so do you remember, the original iPhone, the iPhone 3G, didn’t even have copy and paste! It was very very basic and rudimentary; but still… Like probably the most important product innovation and technology of all time.
Even I went to the Mr. brainwash exhibition in Beverly Hills Rodeo Drive a few weeks ago, and I really really liked this painting an image of Steve Jobs, as like a digital, Silicon Valley cowboy, his gift of the iPhone iPad etc. was like the best gift of all time.
The gift of fire
So obviously life with fire is better than life without fire.
Same thing with electricity. And water.
You could waterboard somebody, and kill a man with water. Also, you can electrocute and zap a man to death with electricity with the chair.
You could obviously burn a man alive, as well. Or you could use sashimi knives to kill somebody, better to use the sashimi knife instead to just make yourself some delicious ribeye.
Once again, fire is good, a stove oven is great. It makes cooking beef ribs a lot easier.
A lot of people hate on Apple and Steve Jobs and iPhone saying that it is destroying the minds of our youth whatever. But once again, it is like fire; if you use fire irresponsibly you can kill yourself and others or the whole village, but if you use it responsibly, it is like the best thing of all time.
Bitcoin, today, is like the early iPhone?
An analogy I don’t think no one has really done yet; realizing that bitcoin right now, might be like the iPhone in the early days?
With the first iPhone, no one was quite sure what to do with it, what the function or utility of it was. Then do you remember that that huge aftermarket market exploded, with the ability to strap on that external battery pack to the back of your iPhone to give it more charge?
So I also think that with bitcoin we will see a similar surge. We will start to see a huge third-party after market market explode.
For example, even the huge after market for iPhone cases is still quite robust.
Why is bitcoin the ethical option?
Immaculate conception of bitcoin. As somebody who is raised and born and baptized Roman Catholic, I really really do see some strong metaphors and analogies for bitcoin, Satoshi, and thinking of bitcoin like a new religion, a new economic religion?
The general idea is that bitcoin is phenomenal because bitcoin does not require a PR team, a marketing team, a foundation, or some sort of nerdy loser leader.
So for example, I’m like 100% Elon Musk, but the reason why Dogecoin, and all these other meme derivatives are positively bad is because they are backed on the charisma or the fashion of a single individual. If Elon Musk just randomly dies tomorrow in a rocket ship accident, I’m pretty much sure that the price of Dogecoin would go to zero.
Also, the reason why I got off of chain-link, and went back 100% into bitcoin was that I started realizing that invested parties in chain-link started using Sergey Nazarov as a puppet, trying to get him to stoke up investor confidence to pump up the price of chain-link. But even as bitcoin is pretty much $100,000, even chain-link has not hit the record high of like $50 or $55 a chain-link.
False prophets
Vitalik Buterin – yeah I don’t trust the guy. Look at him he’s like the ultra uber nerd. Something that what people don’t understand, like if you read the original Ethereum white paper is that the proposal of Ethereum from Vitalik was that bitcoin had too many problems, and that he was there to solve it, and that Ethereum would fix all the problems of bitcoin.
Even a thing that I was into for a bit was digibyte, DGB, which was essentially like imagine the silver coins or the copper coins of bitcoin. The idea was bitcoin was too slow for transactions, and that gigabyte was like 1 trillion times faster, making it more suitable as a daily cryptocurrency transfer thing.
Anyways, I think time is shown that everything that was not bitcoin has failed. Kind of like Thomas Edison, and DC electricity, AC electricity apparently better than a lot of records, but because Thomas Edison had more marketing chops, I guess he won.
Another analogy is that like bitcoin is like Tesla, and bitcoin has the world bitcoin network which is like the Tesla super charging network; honestly, I don’t think any human being should ever buy any electric vehicle which is not a Tesla. It’s like deciding to live in mainland China instead of living in America. Or choosing the Chinese yuan over the US dollar.
Another analogy; bitcoin is like Gatorade, I don’t even know what number two is? Powerade?
Or, bitcoin is like having the newest iPhone Pro, desert titanium, and Ethereum is like a Google pixel or android Samsung derivative; nobody wants it.
Or, bitcoin is like Coca-Cola, and Ethereum is Pepsi. Nobody wants Pepsi.
Or, bitcoin is like Nike and or Jordan, and Ethereum is Adidas. Adidas was only cool for a minute because Kanye West endorsed it and created his Yeezy line, but now that Kanye has dipped out, nobody wants Adidas anymore.
Or, bitcoin is like McDonald’s, and Ethereum is like Burger King. Nobody wants Burger King.
There is no second best
I think with choosing a life partner, a wife, having a kid your kid etc., is understanding that there is no second best.
I look at the whole field of crypto, and crypto derivatives, essentially I think the best way to think about it is that like everything that is not bitcoin is just an Ethereum derivative; which is like building your kingdom on cotton candy or quicksand.
Bitcoin is like the solid asphalt which is beneath Manhattan. But in Cypress space which is like 1 trillion times more secure.
Getting paid $2000 an hour
So let us assume that you’re getting paid 20 bucks an hour, if you’re on the bitcoin standard, and if you’re pouring all your moneys into bitcoin, then, in theory you are getting paid $200 an hour, or $2000 an hour. 
Also some other analogies; if you spend like $1000 on a new iPhone, that’s almost like spending $10,000 on a phone, or even worse, $100,000 on a phone. Or even worse, $1 million on a phone, assuming that bitcoin Will 10 X, 100 X, 1000 X, or even 10,000 X from here.
So why does this matter?
Assume that your whole life, you yourself as a child, you were only fed sewer water. And you’re always sick, and full of cholera, and you have no idea why you’re always so sick, and feel so unwell. And then you have a kid and do you think the sewer water is safe, and you start feeding your kid the sewer water! What is going to happen to the health of your kid?
This analogy is good for money, and capital and thinking of bitcoin like the first 100%, God inspired, perfect money. And also perfect capital.
Bitcoin is both money, and capital? And cash?
The hard thing with the real estate like if you own a square block in Gangnam, or Shibuya, or Ginza, or fifth Avenue in Manhattan, is that you cannot immediately liquidate like a 10th of your property to buy a cyber truck or a cup of coffee.
The really interesting thing about bitcoin is that it is both property like digital property like owning land, and also it could in theory be used as money and currency.
My personal thought is that owning a single bitcoin is like owning a single family home. Assuming that the price of a single-family home in Culver City is $4.4 million, for a tiny awesome minimalist house, then my personal thought is the price of a single bitcoin should be worth at least 4.4 million, Maybe 10 X or 100 X. Why? $440 million a bitcoin; my current price target. 
My very simple idea is that if you own a single-family house, in a locked piece of land, you cannot move it, it’s not like a game of the Sims or Minecraft; but with bitcoin, you can!
Minecraft economics
I find this to be really fascinating because once again, bitcoin is like Minecraft capital and money. If you have ever seen a child or a teenager on Minecraft, you will be shocked to see how phenomenally imaginative they could become, when there are no longer restricted by time, money, access to capital, the laws of physics, space etc.
I been thinking about cyberspace is kind of difficult to imagine because it is like 1 trillion times more expensive than land, Joshua tree, Yosemite, the desert, etc. Like if you watch the movie Dune, and you see the infinite sands, infinite desert, imagine like that but times 1 trillion. Why? Space cyberspace is not limited by the laws of physics.
***
I bought every V 12 engine, wish I could take it back to the beginning
This is like year one, or year zero of bitcoin. Now that you see CNBC practically on fire with bitcoin, bitcoin options, bitcoin derivatives, and now that ibit the black rock bitcoin spot ETF practically owning close to 1 million bitcoins now, that means is this is a massive paradigm shift. It’s like going from horse and buggy to Tesla model S plaid.
Don’t trust the zombies
I was watching an interview with Natalie Brunelle and ERIC Semmler, and ERIC was talking about how his company semler scientific was the century like a zombie company. But when they took out the skeleton, and re-infused it with adamantine skeleton, like what they did to Wolverine, their company spring back to life with 100 X vigor.
Once again, if you’re living in the hood, drinking sewer water, Fanta, and McDonald’s hamburgers, and you have the option of living in beautiful Culver City, surrounded by trees, happy people the sun, fresh air, and the finest organic food and meats from Erewhon, wouldn’t you want to make the swap?
Why the red wave is a big deal
Michael sailor currently put out a presentation on the red wave, at Cantor digital. The general idea is that now that we pretty much have a 100% Republican red party and government and Senate, this is insanely phenomenal news for bitcoin.
Why? Senator to Cynthia Lummis is proposing the bitcoin act, which is that America sells a bunch of her gold notes, and uses that profit to buy bitcoin.
This is kind of a big deal because then, maybe, we could actually revitalize the US dollar and essentially maybe even reverse inflation, because if we pack the US dollar to our bitcoin reserves, what that that means is our country will become super fucking prosperous? Like we’re going to be showered with so much money and wealth, we’re going to be like “too much wealth and prosperity! Please no more!â€
Also, even though I’m pro bitcoin and anti-crypto and everything else; you’re going to see a huge crypto Renaissance, because note, Trump’s kids his sons are actually actively in the crypto space; and even Donald Trump accepted a Donald trump NFT, which sold out like in a minute. So you’re going to see a massive boost to Bitcoin and the whole market.
And also, all these meme coins, I’m quite anti it because once again, they’re backed by nothing but popular ideas, and charismatic individuals. The difference of bitcoin is that it is backed by like $1 trillion of real capital; which means like already… Over $1 trillion of real money has already been put into it, and what is defending the bitcoin network is like maybe 100 X the computer power of even the US military and Navy.
If America was super smart, because we want to be #1 forever, we would want to stock pile our bitcoin reserves, to make sure that no other country could even come close. Because what people also don’t understand is the point is like cyber defense as well; if you have a wall of encrypted energy, it is essentially hacker proof, you cannot have malicious Chinese people trying to hack the network.
What drives me?
Once; super simple; growing up poor, having a dad addicted to gambling, my mom working like two menial labor jobs cleaning houses and waitressing, working at a gas station or convenience store just to pay the bills, yeah this was pretty bad.
As a consequence, I don’t know I feel like financial independence, financial freedom might be the peak virtue. Like 1 trillion times more important than anything else.
For example, art photography aesthetics ethics and the like. You could only  only privilege yourself to these luxuries only if you are financially healthy. And economically healthy. If you are economically sick, you can’t do nothing.
 I think the big problem is that a lot of conservative often criticize and critique people for staying poor, but, can you complain and blame people for being constantly sick, if they only have access to sewer water?
“I grew up in the era when clean water was only served to the fairer skin†– Ye
Once again, imagine like we’re living in a postapocalyptic, dystopic world and reality in which only rich people or a certain race of people are allowed access to clean water. And clean air and clean food.
Imagine like you’re giving people maggots to consume. Or like an episode of Snowpiercer, the poor people in the back of the train being fed the “protein bars“, which is essentially grinded up bugs.
But imagine, you could be in front of the train, eating the finest ribeye steak, the finest sushi etc. That is what bitcoin is!
So currently random thoughts;; about thermodynamics and heat loss. Assuming that energy is not created nor destroyed, what that then means is if we think about shit hit loss, is that technically your body is already a perfectly thermal regulated closed system. This was really really hard for me to understand when I was young, even now… The idea that when you put on a thick ass warm down jacket, or a Canada goose jacket or whatever, your body is not “creating†heat“, rather it is just preserving the heat inside your body so that your body is not losing heat.
The best way to warm up your house or home or habitat or habitation
Los Angeles is actually kind of bizarre; on one hand, during the day like yesterday, it was an extremely glorious 71, 72, 73°, absolutely beautiful. And this is like the end of November, practically early December? I still recall when I was a undergraduate at UCLA, walking down Bruin walk, and being shocked that in the middle of December, I saw all these pretty and sexy girls walking down Bruin walk, in tank tops, Spaghetti straps, booty shorts?
Even yesterday, seeing all these happy young people, basking the sun, once again, all these beautiful and pretty girls, just wearing black Lululemon tights, and black Lululemon top sports bras.
Anyways, the thing that is really shocking to me is that night it gets cold as shit. Like I think in the evening, Los Angeles could dip down to the high 30s? Like if it is super super late or super super early before the sun comes up, it is like 38° outside? But when the sun comes out, it could be a beautiful 73°?
Anyways, but that then means is that for your apartment your house habitation or whatever, the number one critical thing you do is just seal up the doors, get rid of the holes the drafts, etc., and just prevent heat loss!
For example, probably one of the most joyful things for myself at least, was the glory of living at this really really wonderful high-rise condo building, the edge in Providence Rhode Island. The apartment was super super tiny, feels like a 300 square-foot studio, at the time it was just me and Cindy, but what I personally loved about it, then seeing an extreme joy that had was my room the room, the whole apartment, the whole apartment building and complex, and also even the gym, Was like always a perfect 72° and warm, idregardless of whether there was a snowstorm outside. I still remember, complaining to Cindy that I was too hot in bed, taking off my blankets, complaining that was too sweating, and then just looking outside and seeing that it was snowing outside.
Anyways, I think the thing that is difficult to think and understand is that if you buy these nice single-family homes, and then it gets cold as shit at night, good luck trying to thermo regulate it.
I don’t know maybe I’m more sensitive to the cold than the average person, because I’m like 5% or even sub 5% body fat; which means is that I fucking hit the cold. To me Cold is evil.
What that means is anything that you could do to prevent heat loss or the cold is a good thing. And that just means if you’re cold, just buy really really ultra warm UNIQLO heat tech tights, which actually worked insanely well, as well as just like put on a merino wool long sleeve, a down vest, and a thick ass down jacket.
Just focus on doing what you’re good at 
One big idea I had was in regards to an Archimedes lever– just focus on what you’re super super insanely good at, and just ignore everything else.
What that means is with houses, housing stuff, etc., the ideal is that you never have to muck around with any housing stuff.
For example, I like the idea of leveraging other people, like what that means is just let other people focus on what they’re good at, for example, things that I’m not good at include like doing anything about house stuff house repairs house maintenance etc. I think the unfortunate trend is post Covid, you had a bunch of successful millennials, kind of like myself, in their 30s, late 30s, early 40s, etc. purchasing single-family homes, and like hunkering down during and post Covid, because people can no longer travel to Japan or whatever, they just spent all the money they would have otherwise spent on travel to purchase a single-family home, get into gardening etc.
Yet, that was like 2020, 2019. Times have changed.
We are now, witnessing this new movement, a totally radical paradigm shipped, even words failed to describe how phenomenally epic this all is.
Essentially bitcoin hit $100K yesterday, or maybe in the middle of the night, or like to be more accurate like $99,510 or something, but it’s funny when you look at the prices, you have all these short sellers trying to short bitcoin and microstrategy, I think there’s actually a new ETF which is minus 2X MSTR (MSTZ), which long story short, is trying to make a huge profit off of the downturn of MicroStrategy and bitcoin. So for all the bulls, all the people who think bitcoin and micro strategies going to go down, they are essentially shorting bitcoin and microstrategy. 
You cannot stop exponential growth even if you want to.
This is starting to feel like the early days of Facebook like I still recall the early days of Facebook in which there was no newsfeed. I made an account when I was like a freshman in college, because at the time Facebook was only open to university students, you needed a “.edu†account to even sign up.  And the growth was pretty astronomical. At first it was just like university students, I still remember the early days where you would flirt with girls you liked by “poking†them. There was not yet any direct messages you could only post on the walls, which was 100% public. Even at the time, Mark Zuckerberg said that advertisements were lame, there was no newsfeed, no ads. You actually had to click into somebody’s profile to just check up on them. There was no status updates really yet,
iPhone, iMessage, even Kakaotalk?
How do you know if somebody is Korean or not? Simple, if they have kakaotalk, and or if they have that little bright yellow chat icon, and the sound of a notification sounds like “Apple!â€
Also they’re funny things, the Japanese only use line, Cambodians only use telegram, Europeans use WhatsApp, Americans we tend to just use Facebook messenger and or Instagram direct message and or text messaging iMessage?
Anyways, do you remember when the iPhone first came out, and everyone was riding on it, and apparently there was a lot of industry people, who obviously were a bunch of idiots, who said that the iPhone was going to be a failure because it did not have a physical keyboard like the popular blackberry at the time.
And this is the genius and vision of Steve Jobs; he fought nail and tooth to ensure that in fact, the iPhone would never ever ever have a physical keyboard, and that the genius of the iPhone was it was able to become all screen, and that if you wanted access to a keyboard you will just use the little virtual keyboard instead.
Think the original iPhone
 so do you remember, the original iPhone, the iPhone 3G, didn’t even have copy and paste! It was very very basic and rudimentary; but still… Like probably the most important product innovation and technology of all time.
Even I went to the Mr. brainwash exhibition in Beverly Hills Rodeo Drive a few weeks ago, and I really really liked this painting an image of Steve Jobs, as like a digital, Silicon Valley cowboy, his gift of the iPhone iPad etc. was like the best gift of all time.
The gift of fire
So obviously life with fire is better than life without fire.
Same thing with electricity. And water.
You could waterboard somebody, and kill a man with water. Also, you can electrocute and zap a man to death with electricity with the chair.
You could obviously burn a man alive, as well. Or you could use sashimi knives to kill somebody, better to use the sashimi knife instead to just make yourself some delicious ribeye.
Once again, fire is good, a stove oven is great. It makes cooking beef ribs a lot easier.
A lot of people hate on Apple and Steve Jobs and iPhone saying that it is destroying the minds of our youth whatever. But once again, it is like fire; if you use fire irresponsibly you can kill yourself and others or the whole village, but if you use it responsibly, it is like the best thing of all time.
Bitcoin, today, is like the early iPhone?
An analogy I don’t think no one has really done yet; realizing that bitcoin right now, might be like the iPhone in the early days?
With the first iPhone, no one was quite sure what to do with it, what the function or utility of it was. Then do you remember that that huge aftermarket market exploded, with the ability to strap on that external battery pack to the back of your iPhone to give it more charge?
So I also think that with bitcoin we will see a similar surge. We will start to see a huge third-party after market market explode.
For example, even the huge after market for iPhone cases is still quite robust.
Why is bitcoin the ethical option?
Immaculate conception of bitcoin. As somebody who is raised and born and baptized Roman Catholic, I really really do see some strong metaphors and analogies for bitcoin, Satoshi, and thinking of bitcoin like a new religion, a new economic religion?
The general idea is that bitcoin is phenomenal because bitcoin does not require a PR team, a marketing team, a foundation, or some sort of nerdy loser leader.
So for example, I’m like 100% Elon Musk, but the reason why Dogecoin, and all these other meme derivatives are positively bad is because they are backed on the charisma or the fashion of a single individual. If Elon Musk just randomly dies tomorrow in a rocket ship accident, I’m pretty much sure that the price of Dogecoin would go to zero.
Also, the reason why I got off of chain-link, and went back 100% into bitcoin was that I started realizing that invested parties in chain-link started using Sergey Nazarov as a puppet, trying to get him to stoke up investor confidence to pump up the price of chain-link. But even as bitcoin is pretty much $100,000, even chain-link has not hit the record high of like $50 or $55 a chain-link.
False prophets
Vitalik Buterin – yeah I don’t trust the guy. Look at him he’s like the ultra uber nerd. Something that what people don’t understand, like if you read the original Ethereum white paper is that the proposal of Ethereum from Vitalik was that bitcoin had too many problems, and that he was there to solve it, and that Ethereum would fix all the problems of bitcoin.
Even a thing that I was into for a bit was digibyte, DGB, which was essentially like imagine the silver coins or the copper coins of bitcoin. The idea was bitcoin was too slow for transactions, and that gigabyte was like 1 trillion times faster, making it more suitable as a daily cryptocurrency transfer thing.
Anyways, I think time is shown that everything that was not bitcoin has failed. Kind of like Thomas Edison, and DC electricity, AC electricity apparently better than a lot of records, but because Thomas Edison had more marketing chops, I guess he won.
Another analogy is that like bitcoin is like Tesla, and bitcoin has the world bitcoin network which is like the Tesla super charging network; honestly, I don’t think any human being should ever buy any electric vehicle which is not a Tesla. It’s like deciding to live in mainland China instead of living in America. Or choosing the Chinese yuan over the US dollar.
Another analogy; bitcoin is like Gatorade, I don’t even know what number two is? Powerade?
Or, bitcoin is like having the newest iPhone Pro, desert titanium, and Ethereum is like a Google pixel or android Samsung derivative; nobody wants it.
Or, bitcoin is like Coca-Cola, and Ethereum is Pepsi. Nobody wants Pepsi.
Or, bitcoin is like Nike and or Jordan, and Ethereum is Adidas. Adidas was only cool for a minute because Kanye West endorsed it and created his Yeezy line, but now that Kanye has dipped out, nobody wants Adidas anymore.
Or, bitcoin is like McDonald’s, and Ethereum is like Burger King. Nobody wants Burger King.
There is no second best
I think with choosing a life partner, a wife, having a kid your kid etc., is understanding that there is no second best.
I look at the whole field of crypto, and crypto derivatives, essentially I think the best way to think about it is that like everything that is not bitcoin is just an Ethereum derivative; which is like building your kingdom on cotton candy or quicksand.
Bitcoin is like the solid asphalt which is beneath Manhattan. But in Cypress space which is like 1 trillion times more secure.
Getting paid $2000 an hour
So let us assume that you’re getting paid 20 bucks an hour, if you’re on the bitcoin standard, and if you’re pouring all your moneys into bitcoin, then, in theory you are getting paid $200 an hour, or $2000 an hour. 
Also some other analogies; if you spend like $1000 on a new iPhone, that’s almost like spending $10,000 on a phone, or even worse, $100,000 on a phone. Or even worse, $1 million on a phone, assuming that bitcoin Will 10 X, 100 X, 1000 X, or even 10,000 X from here.
So why does this matter?
Assume that your whole life, you yourself as a child, you were only fed sewer water. And you’re always sick, and full of cholera, and you have no idea why you’re always so sick, and feel so unwell. And then you have a kid and do you think the sewer water is safe, and you start feeding your kid the sewer water! What is going to happen to the health of your kid?
This analogy is good for money, and capital and thinking of bitcoin like the first 100%, God inspired, perfect money. And also perfect capital.
Bitcoin is both money, and capital? And cash?
The hard thing with the real estate like if you own a square block in Gangnam, or Shibuya, or Ginza, or fifth Avenue in Manhattan, is that you cannot immediately liquidate like a 10th of your property to buy a cyber truck or a cup of coffee.
The really interesting thing about bitcoin is that it is both property like digital property like owning land, and also it could in theory be used as money and currency.
My personal thought is that owning a single bitcoin is like owning a single family home. Assuming that the price of a single-family home in Culver City is $4.4 million, for a tiny awesome minimalist house, then my personal thought is the price of a single bitcoin should be worth at least 4.4 million, Maybe 10 X or 100 X. Why? $440 million a bitcoin; my current price target. 
My very simple idea is that if you own a single-family house, in a locked piece of land, you cannot move it, it’s not like a game of the Sims or Minecraft; but with bitcoin, you can!
Minecraft economics
I find this to be really fascinating because once again, bitcoin is like Minecraft capital and money. If you have ever seen a child or a teenager on Minecraft, you will be shocked to see how phenomenally imaginative they could become, when there are no longer restricted by time, money, access to capital, the laws of physics, space etc.
I been thinking about cyberspace is kind of difficult to imagine because it is like 1 trillion times more expensive than land, Joshua tree, Yosemite, the desert, etc. Like if you watch the movie Dune, and you see the infinite sands, infinite desert, imagine like that but times 1 trillion. Why? Space cyberspace is not limited by the laws of physics.
So currently random thoughts;; about thermodynamics and heat loss. Assuming that energy is not created nor destroyed, what that then means is if we think about shit hit loss, is that technically your body is already a perfectly thermal regulated closed system. This was really really hard for me to understand when I was young, even now… The idea that when you put on a thick ass warm down jacket, or a Canada goose jacket or whatever, your body is not “creating†heat“, rather it is just preserving the heat inside your body so that your body is not losing heat.
The best way to warm up your house or home or habitat or habitation
Los Angeles is actually kind of bizarre; on one hand, during the day like yesterday, it was an extremely glorious 71, 72, 73°, absolutely beautiful. And this is like the end of November, practically early December? I still recall when I was a undergraduate at UCLA, walking down Bruin walk, and being shocked that in the middle of December, I saw all these pretty and sexy girls walking down Bruin walk, in tank tops, Spaghetti straps, booty shorts?
Even yesterday, seeing all these happy young people, basking the sun, once again, all these beautiful and pretty girls, just wearing black Lululemon tights, and black Lululemon top sports bras.
Anyways, the thing that is really shocking to me is that night it gets cold as shit. Like I think in the evening, Los Angeles could dip down to the high 30s? Like if it is super super late or super super early before the sun comes up, it is like 38° outside? But when the sun comes out, it could be a beautiful 73°?
Anyways, but that then means is that for your apartment your house habitation or whatever, the number one critical thing you do is just seal up the doors, get rid of the holes the drafts, etc., and just prevent heat loss!
For example, probably one of the most joyful things for myself at least, was the glory of living at this really really wonderful high-rise condo building, the edge in Providence Rhode Island. The apartment was super super tiny, feels like a 300 square-foot studio, at the time it was just me and Cindy, but what I personally loved about it, then seeing an extreme joy that had was my room the room, the whole apartment, the whole apartment building and complex, and also even the gym, Was like always a perfect 72° and warm, idregardless of whether there was a snowstorm outside. I still remember, complaining to Cindy that I was too hot in bed, taking off my blankets, complaining that was too sweating, and then just looking outside and seeing that it was snowing outside.
Anyways, I think the thing that is difficult to think and understand is that if you buy these nice single-family homes, and then it gets cold as shit at night, good luck trying to thermo regulate it.
I don’t know maybe I’m more sensitive to the cold than the average person, because I’m like 5% or even sub 5% body fat; which means is that I fucking hit the cold. To me Cold is evil.
What that means is anything that you could do to prevent heat loss or the cold is a good thing. And that just means if you’re cold, just buy really really ultra warm UNIQLO heat tech tights, which actually worked insanely well, as well as just like put on a merino wool long sleeve, a down vest, and a thick ass down jacket.
Just focus on doing what you’re good at 
One big idea I had was in regards to an Archimedes lever– just focus on what you’re super super insanely good at, and just ignore everything else.
What that means is with houses, housing stuff, etc., the ideal is that you never have to muck around with any housing stuff.
For example, I like the idea of leveraging other people, like what that means is just let other people focus on what they’re good at, for example, things that I’m not good at include like doing anything about house stuff house repairs house maintenance etc. I think the unfortunate trend is post Covid, you had a bunch of successful millennials, kind of like myself, in their 30s, late 30s, early 40s, etc. purchasing single-family homes, and like hunkering down during and post Covid, because people can no longer travel to Japan or whatever, they just spent all the money they would have otherwise spent on travel to purchase a single-family home, get into gardening etc.
Yet, that was like 2020, 2019. Times have changed.
We are now, witnessing this new movement, a totally radical paradigm shipped, even words failed to describe how phenomenally epic this all is.
Essentially bitcoin hit $100K yesterday, or maybe in the middle of the night, or like to be more accurate like $99,510 or something, but it’s funny when you look at the prices, you have all these short sellers trying to short bitcoin and microstrategy, I think there’s actually a new ETF which is minus 2X MSTR (MSTZ), which long story short, is trying to make a huge profit off of the downturn of MicroStrategy and bitcoin. So for all the bulls, all the people who think bitcoin and micro strategies going to go down, they are essentially shorting bitcoin and microstrategy. 
You cannot stop exponential growth even if you want to.
This is starting to feel like the early days of Facebook like I still recall the early days of Facebook in which there was no newsfeed. I made an account when I was like a freshman in college, because at the time Facebook was only open to university students, you needed a “.edu†account to even sign up.  And the growth was pretty astronomical. At first it was just like university students, I still remember the early days where you would flirt with girls you liked by “poking†them. There was not yet any direct messages you could only post on the walls, which was 100% public. Even at the time, Mark Zuckerberg said that advertisements were lame, there was no newsfeed, no ads. You actually had to click into somebody’s profile to just check up on them. There was no status updates really yet,
iPhone, iMessage, even Kakaotalk?
How do you know if somebody is Korean or not? Simple, if they have kakaotalk, and or if they have that little bright yellow chat icon, and the sound of a notification sounds like “Apple!â€
Also they’re funny things, the Japanese only use line, Cambodians only use telegram, Europeans use WhatsApp, Americans we tend to just use Facebook messenger and or Instagram direct message and or text messaging iMessage?
Anyways, do you remember when the iPhone first came out, and everyone was riding on it, and apparently there was a lot of industry people, who obviously were a bunch of idiots, who said that the iPhone was going to be a failure because it did not have a physical keyboard like the popular blackberry at the time.
And this is the genius and vision of Steve Jobs; he fought nail and tooth to ensure that in fact, the iPhone would never ever ever have a physical keyboard, and that the genius of the iPhone was it was able to become all screen, and that if you wanted access to a keyboard you will just use the little virtual keyboard instead.
Once America buys 1M, or hopefully 2M, 3M or 4M or even more BTC’s,,, let us assume 20M coins can even be purchased, the 1M Satoshi wallet will probably never be touched —
Triple Trump max
If we own 4M btc’s,
4M out of 21M, what percentageÂ
To find what percentage 4 million (4M) is out of 21 million (21M):
Kind of reminds me like the early days of Facebook adoption,,, or iPhone adoption? Or the internet adoption, AOL, AOL 3.0? Or iPad adoption and purchasing?
BITSANITY: Let’s try $70b in volume today for The Bitcoin Industrial Complex, crushing yesterday’s record.. About $50b of that was from $MSTR and its 2x friends (all of which dropped records). $IBIT no slouch tho at $5b, its second biggest day ever. $MSTZ w its first $1b day. @ericbalchunas
The US government hasn’t even bought the 1M Bitcoins yet, and price of BTC is *already* like $100k. When the US actually does sell sell her gold notes and buys the underlying Bitcoin as the underlying asset, then the price of BTC might like 3x from there.
So, another $3B bitcoin buy, at around $100k a coin?
The net proceeds from the sale of the notes were approximately $2.97 billion, after deducting the initial purchasers’ discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by MicroStrategy.
MicroStrategy Completes $3 Billion Offering of Convertible Senior Notes Due 2029 at 0% Coupon and 55% Conversion Premium
Press Release • November 21, 2024
The notes were sold in a private offering only to persons reasonably believed to be qualified institutional buyers in reliance on Rule 144A under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the “Securities Actâ€).
The notes will mature on December 1, 2029
Now is 2024, will mature on Dec 1, 2029– implied strike price at $672
ERIC KIM ANALYSIS
So this is really fascinating because when this was announced, MSTR was around $499, $500, $520s a share ,,, and so you’re kind of getting like a $2B , multiplied by 18%-20% gain (100% guaranteed for the institutional investors with Huuuuge bucks, … almost a 0% risk free option, because Dec 1, 2029,,, $672 a share ,,, of course, 5 years from now MSTR is like 1000% guaranteed to be like maybe $15,000 a share.
Simplify
Subject to certain conditions, on or after December 4, 2026, MicroStrategy may redeem for cash all or any portion of the notes at a redemption price equal to 100% of the principal amount of the notes to be redeemed, plus accrued and unpaid special interest, if any, to, but excluding, the redemption date, if the last reported sale price of MicroStrategy’s class A common stock has been at least 130% of the conversion price then in effect for a specified period of time ending on the trading day immediately before the date the notice of redemption is sent.
Starting on or after December 4, 2026, MicroStrategy can redeem the notes for cash under certain conditions. The redemption price will be the full principal amount of the notes, plus any unpaid special interest up to the redemption date. This option is available only if the price of MicroStrategy’s class A common stock has been at least 130% of the current conversion price for a specified period before the redemption notice is issued.
4 year old
Starting December 4, 2026, if MicroStrategy’s stock price gets really high (130% of a set number), they can pay back the notes in full with any extra interest they owe, as long as they give a heads-up first.
…
So if MSTR gets 130% of the set number, can pay back the notes in full with extra interest they owe, as long as they give a heads up!
Conversion rates, premium
The conversion rate for the notes is initially 1.4872 shares of MicroStrategy’s class A common stock per $1,000 principal amount of notes, which is equivalent to an initial conversion price of approximately $672.40 per share. This represents a premium of approximately 55% over the U.S. composite volume weighted average price of MicroStrategy’s class A common stock from 1:30 p.m. through 4:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time on November 19, 2024, which was $433.7997. The conversion rate is subject to adjustment upon the occurrence of certain events.
Premium of 55% ,,, guaranteed, on November 19 2024, $433.7997 a share, which is $672.40 a share.
