ERIC KIM ₿

Idea and theory:

Whenever possible, always invest in the most radical and cutting-edge design of the time, because it will last longer.

Or in other words, Cybertruck or nothing!

Cool

The true Spartan Stoic man

Self staunch

—> learn from your past mistakes or regrets

Money lasts forever

Money which lasts forever

Hold the best money

Become the most indestructible

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There is no second best ***

Invest in money

Over a long term horizon, laser focus is rewarded

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$1M–> $1 B

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7% real world yield

Crushing everybody

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Keep buying, don’t sell.

200T–>

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Full potential

30x, 500x increase

What to demonetize?

1923-2023– USD loses 99% vs Gold

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Most investment gains are driven by monetary inflation

Money supply. m2–

Tracking monetary inflation rate

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365 , 99.5% nothing happens

Laser eyes

HODL

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Money lasts forever

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Bitcoin is Sound Money

The reason why Bitcoin is good is because it is difficult to create, fiat currency — a need on a computer can just push a button and trillions of it can be printed.

Good real true money — it must be difficult to produce.

Difficulty adjustment

Never to rush your kid, but instead, have them independently decide when to leave the park 

Memento mori. And also once you have a kid, or kids, memento more for your kids. Also your mom, your partner, etc.

In this short and uncertain world in which we all live in… I suppose the big question is this:

What do you desire to build or create or develop, while you’re still alive? 

Simple thoughts

Everybody has a different Archimedes lever, a place to stand, gifts talents etc.  I think the best way to think about life and how to approach life is realizing this:

Not desiring the skills or talents of others, that which you don’t have.

For example, I don’t know how to program, write code, develop in the tradition computer science. However, I’m really good at building websites, blogging, riding, thinking, coming out with creative ideas etc.

Thus, I feel the most effective way to approach life is to maximize your commutes lover, rather than wasting time on that which you’re not really good at, rather, keep leveraging that with you’re really good at and strong at.

For example, let us use weightlifting as an example. Rather than trying to improve a lift that you are really poor, or you have poor leverage in, better to maximize your strength and your leverage and your training on the lifts which you are really good at.

Traditional education is broken

I’ll give you an example, traditional K-12 education is broken in so far much as this generalized idea that one must be “well-balanced”, in all the subject categories.

However, the reason why I think this is a poor strategy is that truth be told, once contribution to the world and society is based on typically one or two really good skills, not the weak ones.

For example, I am very poor at math, traditional sciences. And funny enough, I’ve essentially made my living from writing and photography, yet I never really did that well in English class, and by traditional sense, I have “bad “English. Also, I never went to art school, the guitar school, I never studied photography formally, but, I’m the most successful photographer that I know.

Also, in finance, economics, investing… Once again, I have never studied economics formally, or business, yet I have been very successful in my investments insulations, because I have the outside effect; I could think outside the box, because am not a slave to traditional thinking.

Why make an impact?

I think it is the desire of each and every single human being to make an impact, create a legacy, etc. There are different ways people do this. Some people do this by having kids, some people do this by writing books, articles, videos, making art etc.

In fact, when you make art, or you write stuff, it is like your metaphorical children. I think this is why before you have kids, you’re really focused on writing, and producing art. But once you have a kid or multiple children, you then realize then you’re next and new and ultimate art project is actually in fact your kids.

The solution for artists  

Funny enough, a lot of writers, photographers, artist often have creative block, in which they have a difficult time finding motivation or inspiration to make art. But ever since Seneca was born, even while Cindy was pregnant, this has been by far the most photographically productive I have ever been. I think in the past I struggled with pictures, but now, I shoot on average of around 1000 photos a day. In fact, I’m shooting so much that even right now, I have a very very difficult time keeping up. 

Ideas

I been studying a lot of bitcoin lately, I think the best new way I’m thinking about bitcoin is making the analogy that bitcoin is like the new App Store for the iPhone. Trying to learn how to virtuously use bitcoin as the developmental platform, the new open protocol.

I’ll give you a good example of an idea, which is very simple: how to get rid of advertisements on the Internet. I think bitcoin is the solution.

A very very simple idea; to create a new sharing website or platform which has zero advertisements. 

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100x

Low risk

Think 100x

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Volatile is because it is desirable! ***

Longest duration asset

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Bitcoin is the best asset class

Ecosystem of products, services, companies, securities, derivatives, professions

The Internet of money

.

Never decreasing only goes one way

One way ratchet capital ratchet

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Bitcoin is the place to stand!

Generate performance with leverage

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There is no second best way

Crypto Cowboys

2020-2024 crazy years

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Pure economic energy

Solution to other 50% problems in world

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Growing vs destroying capital?

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What do you desire to build or develop? 

Digital Transformation

The digital wave

Life isn’t fair

Global economy isn’t fair

The second best idea is worth nothing

Digital transformation of matter & energy –>

Matter & energy vs information

900T of assets in the analogue world

.1% is digital… still very early

Everything is still analogue

Crypto proof of work

The world wants digital capital

Proof of Work

Energy -> information via cryptography

Not all crypto is digital capital

Decentralized asset

A physical asset **-> thermodynamic link to universe , not just the “metaverse”

97% of proof of work

Dogecoin is second best

Best crypto asset

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Don’t trust stupid people

Unstoppable .. 70% a year

Pure digital power

20 nuclear reactors

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Best crypto brand

Solana?

Fail

100% acceptance

Best investment brand

No second best investment brand

Cool, useful, global, standard, interesting, egalitarian, prestigious

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Blood sugar, 400M passionate fans sports team

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Standardized

Economic Solution

Standard, standardized

Standard Oil ***

The Bitcoin Standard

Standard investment brand

Always interesting

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Ultimate luxury brand

Best digital commodity

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Satoshi walked away!

Digital, fixed in supply

.

Programmable, inelastic

DuPont: escape a commodity business, become a specialty business

Zero profitability?

Produce something at a loss?

Investor

Gold least worst

Peter Schiff doesn’t own gold!!

Only scarcity

No amount of money will buy you more time or bitcoin

Bitcoin is time?

Bottled time in a bitcoin ***

Digitally transform time into an asset

Time is Money

Digital Time is Bitcoin

Made money in property

They’re making more land!

There is no second best city in the world

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Immortal, sustainable

10,000 years

Sustainable no painting

Property corrupting in the real world

276^3

276 blocks wide, high, and deep

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Buy one block, that’s all there is

21M… cubed

No second best property *

Pure economic energy –> capital

Equity, credit, currency

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Impaired by physical constraints

The myth of gold?

What’s REAL?

Indestructible , inevitable

.

394%.

SP500– 50%

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Best capital assets

Bond -20%

Economic Empowerment

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Modern day life is all just about hedonism?

Exposure to the real world

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Unique vision

Become iron man

BUILD THE WORLD!

Stoic principle #1

1. After Tesla, there is no second best car or electric vehicle

Digital Transformation

The digital wave

Life isn’t fair

Global economy isn’t fair

The second best idea is worth nothing

Digital transformation of matter & energy –>

Matter & energy vs information

900T of assets in the analogue world

.1% is digital… still very early

Everything is still analogue

Crypto proof of work

The world wants digital capital

Proof of Work

Energy -> information via cryptography

Not all crypto is digital capital

Decentralized asset

A physical asset **-> thermodynamic link to universe , not just the “metaverse”

97% of proof of work

Dogecoin is second best

Best crypto asset

.

Don’t trust stupid people

Unstoppable .. 70% a year

Pure digital power

20 nuclear reactors

.

Best crypto brand

Solana?

Fail

100% acceptance

Best investment brand

No second best investment brand

Cool, useful, global, standard, interesting, egalitarian, prestigious

.

Blood sugar, 400M passionate fans sports team

.

Standardized

Economic Solution

Standard, standardized

Standard Oil ***

The Bitcoin Standard

Standard investment brand

Always interesting

.

Ultimate luxury brand

Best digital commodity

.

Satoshi walked away!

Digital, fixed in supply

.

Programmable, inelastic

DuPont: escape a commodity business, become a specialty business

Zero profitability?

Produce something at a loss?

Investor

Gold least worst

Peter Schiff doesn’t own gold!!

Only scarcity

No amount of money will buy you more time or bitcoin

Bitcoin is time?

Bottled time in a bitcoin ***

Digitally transform time into an asset

Time is Money

Digital Time is Bitcoin

Made money in property

They’re making more land!

There is no second best city in the world

.

Immortal, sustainable

10,000 years

Sustainable no painting

Property corrupting in the real world

276^3

276 blocks wide, high, and deep

.

Buy one block, that’s all there is

21M… cubed

No second best property *

Pure economic energy –> capital

Equity, credit, currency

.

Impaired by physical constraints

The myth of gold?

What’s REAL?

Indestructible , inevitable

.

394%.

SP500– 50%

.

Best capital assets

Bond -20%

Economic Empowerment

“Why should I pour my precious salves into the sea?” – Nietzsche

I think a certain ideal which is fascinating is this whole idea and notion of forever. It seems that we are seeking forever as a generalized concept, but why, for the sake of what? 

You must die

As I thought experiment, if an angel or demon came down to you, and told you that you would live forever, it might be considered the worst curse of all time. Why? Sooner or later, you’re probably going to get bored of life, and you will want to die.

To live forever might be the worst curse of all time.

The first general philosophical Stoic thought that I have is that the truth is, having things which are limited is a positively good thing. Why?

First, when things are limited, you actually appreciate it more. For example, my mom is currently visiting from Korea, and because we know her time here is limited, I feel that we are living and spending time with her much more intentionally, savoring every single moment with her. This means never taking any moment for granted; each and every moment is infinitely precious, and is to be made grateful.

I’m sure if I always have my mom with me, forever, most likely I would not be as grateful.

Also having a kid, having a son, having Seneca; I appreciate each and every moment with him. Literally by the day, every and each single day he wakes up, he is a transform boy, a transformed man. Each and every day he’s becoming more cognizant, he is talking better, he’s becoming more intelligent, more aware, More funny and silly and hilarious, stronger taller more muscular, more capable.

I think the big problem is that they don’t have enough pride in their kids. Traditional jail Christian moral ethics say that pride is a bad thing, to brag about your kid and to show off your kid is a bad thing… But what is the opposite? Being humble and not having pride in your kid, which leads to parents just being on their iPhones all day, while their kid is playing at the park. People often lament the fact all these parents are on their phones all the time, watching YouTube or on Facebook, or on Instagram or TikTok or whatever, while their kids are playing at the park… my personal read on this is that most parents just don’t find their children fascinating; they are not impressed by their kids. And that is fine, let mediocre parents raise mediocre kids, it is none of our concern.

Our concern is to elevate our own children, to glorify them, to them with praise, and to lock away your loser iPhone, and devote 1000% focus on your kid. 

In fact, a single tip I have for parents and new parents is this:

No iPhone Pro

Instead, just get an iPhone SE or an iPhone mini.

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Is your body forever?

Certainly sooner or later, we will and we must die. It is possible to die from a traumatic death, which means getting hit by a car, while you are texting while crossing the crosswalk, or, dying in a car accident when you were texting while driving. I saw an advertisement other day that apparently 50% of people don’t survive if they are hit by a car going at just 30 mph. Living in Los Angeles, I often see cars blasting by 50 mph!

I’m in the best shape of my life

People often lament the fact that they are no longer in their prime. People always think of their prime as behind them, never in front of them.

This typically has to deal with age, biologically aging or whatever.

However the really interesting new ones is apparently the ancient Greeks thought that the future was behind them, and the past was in front of them. Why? I think the general idea was that we could see the past with 100% clarity, but we are blind to the future.

 for example, at the age of 36, I feel like I’m in the best shape of my life. The most confident, tall, handsome, the best full body tan, my biceps shoulders and arms, my legs and thighs, my overall confidence etc.

At the age of 36, I’m in peak shape. Much better than when I was 28, 22, 16 or whatever.

The best is yet to come?

I think the critical issue we have here is when we think about aging, what we tend to think about is bodily decay and degeneration. The scientific term for this is “senescence”.

 However, I’ll never forget… One of the guys I met at my old crunch gym, insanely great shape, look like a super healthy fit dude in his 40s, told me that he was actually 72 years old, I was amazed! Also when hiking near Stoneview nature center, I met this one really really fit African-American lady, also who look like a really fit 45 or 47-year-old, wearing Lululemon leggings, all with silver hair, also told me she was in her 70s!

The problem in Korea, America and beyond, the general thought is as we get older, it is inevitable that we degenerate and decay. 

Certainly sooner or later we will die. Whether that be 122 years old, 110 years old, 100 years old, 90 years old, 80 years old or whatever. But it seems that in two days world, being in your 80s is like the new 50s, and being 50s is the new 30s.

And actually ironically enough, now at the age of 36, I’m starting to feel like the new Brad Pitt. I think I’m about his height, I’m 5 foot 11, and my body fat levels are similar to Brad Pitt and fight club, except I have much more muscle mass and I am much stronger. And I have the coolest haircut of all time, courtesy of Cindy.

What to do?

Some techniques, tactics, ways of thinking: 

1. The past you was the worst you: Why do we always think that somehow, the past version of ourselves was a superior version of ourselves?
2. Thank God for America: if you’re reading this and you’re living in the states, have access to Amazon prime, Titan.fitness, you can purchase bitcoin on Coinbase or whatever, consider yourself blessed. I still remember simple things like trying to buy an SD card in Japan or Korea, it was like 50 bucks for just a simple 64 GB card! On Amazon I think you get it for like 10 or 15 bucks. Also, according to my mom, apparently clothing and shoes is insanely expensive in Korea. For example, a T-shirt is like 50 bucks! Something you could easily buy on under Armour website in the states for only 20 bucks! Everything is cheaper in the states.
3. Censorship resistance: if you’re an American, and you have never traveled outside the states, consider yourself myopic. The typical conceited, self indulgent, fake patriot American is all about talking about how the government is trying to censor them or whatever, but until you have gone to Vietnam, mainly in China, Cambodia, etc. in which you literally try to type in gmail.com and you cannot open it, or you cannot download the ChatGPT app in the App Store, or you cannot use Google, Access your Coinbase account, whatever… You don’t know what true censorship is. And can you also imagine, tweeting or posting negative things about Donald Trump or the president or political candidates, and randomly having the secret police knock at your door, incarcerate you without trial, four years? This will never happen in America, consider yourself blessed. as an example, there were often times that I could not even access wordpress.com in Vietnam! And also during one of the student protest, the Vietnamese government shut down all of Facebook, Facebook messenger, Instagram for a whole day; really bad news because 99% of Vietnamese commerce happens over Facebook messenger, consider All of the millions or billions of dollars of economic activity which could not happen that day.

Fitness & food?

Time to dispel some myths:

1. Fiber is fake: no no no, you do not need fiber. I follow 100% carnivore diet, and I go to the bathroom regularly every morning. My personal theory about this whole fire thing is probably propaganda or political lobbying from the wheat and bread group in America.
2. Fruit is candy with a good conscience: Traditionally, if you look at fruit in the Levant, oranges were very very small, bitter, 99% pulp. If you look at a modern day orange, nectarine, cutie, tangerine, apple or whatever… They are genetic monstrosities. Essentially like a solidified Coca-Cola can.
3. You don’t need vegetables: certainly dark bitter green like colored greens, kale or whatever has a pleasant bitter taste, but you don’t need it.
4. Alcohol causes cancer: according to the national Canadian health organization, any amount of alcohol is toxic, and will give you cancer. Even two drinks a week is bad for you. And let us consider there is no downside of not drinking alcohol.
5. Marijuana makes you stupid
6. Running is for losers: either walk around town with a 60 pound weight best, at a leisurely pace, or engage in Usain Bolt like sprinting. Running at moderate or even moderate high or even high intensity is bad.
7. Meat is not bad for you

So what should one do instead?

1. Buy a 60 pound weight vest: I think the critical issue that everyone has in regards to fitnesses nobody has time for nothing. I say just go to Titan.fitness, and buy the 60 pound weight vest. When you wake up and after you have your morning coffee, just drop it on and just walk around the block! Or if you’re a tech worker, just wear it at the office, your standing desk! Or if you’d like to do the treadmill or whatever, just drop it on and walk on your treadmill with it! The upside is I’m quite certain it could act as a bulletproof fest. Or like some sort of modern day body armor; if somebody tried to punch you or kick you with your 60 pound weight vest on, they would most likely fracture their fists or bodies.
2. Build your own home gym? Titan.fitness, just build your own home gym. Now living in Los Angeles, no more gems. Literally even driving local, you’re gonna be stuck in traffic going 15 minutes one way, not worth it. However if you do have access to a good gym, just go to the gym! at least once every day, maybe even twice a day!
3. Insanely hot bats: the hot sauna at the gym, or if you have a bathtub at home, take insanely hot baths!
4. Consume organ meats, beef liver, beef heart, beef kidneys, intestines, just go to the local grocery store or meat market. If you have access to Costco, get the beef ribs, or the Wagyu ground beef, or get the frozen 100% breast-fed ground beef. Beef is better.

Why is this whole weird plant-based diet trend?

My theory is it has to deal with virtue signaling; misinformation, lack of religion. To be a plant based person is seen as a new religion of sorts; maybe you have a dog, dogs, a cat or multiple cats, perhaps you don’t have kids or whatever. I also think it is a virtuous annoying thing; it is seen as morally evil and bad to consume, because apparently it is bad for environment, the planet, cruel to animals or whatever.

Inside, the hilarious intervention is if you really want to be an ethical person? Only consume or meet, the leftovers in the scraps. For example in Orange County, you go to the local super king, you could buy beef liver for only $1.99 a pound! Typically people throw away the liver and the organ it is not desirable by the American public.

> Stop eating plants, eat organ meats.

The best food in Japan

Motsu-nabe

A very interesting thing that Cindy and I learned while living in Japan, is Motsu Nabe the history of it. 

Motsu just means soup, Motsu is innards, intestines, the like. 

The history of Motsu nabe is super fascinating; essentially the really poor Koreans who immigrated to Japan as labor workers, would just take the throwaway scraps from their wealthy Japanesecounterparts, and just boil and make a soup out of it. The Japanese would throw away the innards. And now the hilarity is now Motsu-nabe is the new elite food; foe the rich and privileged. Kind of similar like how former slaves in the south would make gumbo, jambalaya, with pig intestines, which was scraps from the slave masters. Now everybody loves it!

Also what is super fascinating is the Korean and Vietnamese word for liver, “gan” means gold, or something of great worth. Apparently back in the days, the liver was only reserved for the super rich and privilege, the emperor. Even my mom knows that when a wolf kills the prey, the first thing it eats is the liver, then intestines, etc. and it leaves the flesh meets for the scavengers.

Also another interesting thing, pate, duck liver mousse or pate is seen as the Apex of sophistication for the French. It is essentially liver.

Why liver? It has the highest nutritional density. 

And the funny thing; is liver even “meat“?

More thoughts

I guess my thoughts on bitcoin was right. Now that bitcoin is currently hovering at around $70,000 at bitcoin, it looks like I was right all along.

Some things that I learned from Michael Sailer which seemed really really useful and practical:

1. The real rich and wealthy people only keep one percent of their net worth in Fiat currency, the US dollar. No rich person will brag to you that they have $1 billion of US dollar currency in their JP Morgan chase checking account. The real rich people will typically have their wealth tied up in Capital like land or real estate. For example, owning a square block in Manhattan or Hong Kong or in the middle of Tokyo. The problem with Fiat currency, the US dollar, is that the value of it is slowly bleeding at 7 to 10% a year. That means if you hold $1 million of cash in your checking account, your purchasing power will diminish by 7 to 10% every single year.
2. The easiest thing to do is store one percent of your money in paper currency, the US dollar, and use 99% of your excess money to just buy bitcoin. Even a year or two ago, I had the thought that the optimal strategy is to just convert all your fiat currency into bitcoin!

What about ethereum and other stuff?

“There is no second best”- Michael Saylor

My new favorite thinker is Michael Saylor, his knowledge of history, science is astounding, just listen to the three hour podcast interview with Lex Fridman — better than any college course or degree I have ever gotten!

Anyways, I think this sentiment that there is no second best is a good one. Nobody ever remembers those who won second place or the silver.

Even more nuance, we often forget those who are number one, or the gold. Let alone second place.

Nobody cares about second place

Apple is number one, iPhone number one, android is number two. Nobody cares about android

Globally, America’s number one, China’s number two. Nobody cares about China. Maybe in terms of field currency, the US dollar is strongest, and then maybe after that it might be the pound, the euro, or maybe the CNY, but the truth is there is no second best fiat currency after the us dollar.

 nobody wants the euro, because my personal prediction is in the next 30 years, Germany will probably break off from the European nation, and reinstate her own Deutschmark. Why? Seems that Germany is the last and only productive nation and all of Europe; the rest of all the other nations are just dragging her down. 

The British are dying a slow debt. I think it is a good idea that they broke off from the EU, but still… The value of the British pound is slowly dying.

Japan is in a severe crisis, and also Korea.

China seems to be doing OK, but even China, nobody wants the CNY. No matter how much China tries to coerce Cambodia, Cambodia, Cambodians would still prefer the US dollar.

Even Vietnam, the Vietnamese would prefer $100 US dollars, brand new Benjamins over the local Vietnamese dong.

However critical downside is even though that the US dollar is the most supreme currency on the planet, it is still flawed. The purchasing power of the US dollar is falling rapidly, at an alarming rate. Even in Los Angeles, average gas prices are over five dollars a gallon, 6 dollars a gallon in some places.

And also, the new minimum wage for McDonald’s has jumped from $16 an hour, to $20 an hour overnight! This means the inflation has gone up 30 to 40% overnight, and I think that within the next two or three years, you will slowly see the price of everything creep up by 20 to 30%, rent prices, The price of buying a single-family home etc.

What to do?

I feel like we have several options:

First, leave the states. Honestly if Cindy didn’t have a job in the states, I would personally see zero reason to live in here. I would prefer to live in Panin Cambodia, live in Hanoi or Saigon in Vietnam, maybe Bangkok in Thailand, etc. I prefer Southeast Asia the states. Why? America’s too expensive, your purchasing power here is very weak.

Second: become insanely frugal, and just intelligently funnel your access US dollars into bitcoin. And keep your living expenses low, as you see the value of your bitcoin go up!

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Now what?

At the end end of all this, once you become a millionaire, a bitcoin millionaire or billionaire or whatever… Then what?

Michael tells us to keep stacking those satoshis, I see that there is probably a certain point in which it is good to just be content, and be focused on other things like your photography, artistic production, your philosophical production, etc.

I still believe with all my heart and soul blogging, websites, email newsletters are the future.

Why? It is permissionless, open, censorship resistant. Anybody who is still using Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, even YouTube is a loser. 

Build the future

In America, and a lot of the world, you have the right to build. Building things physically in the physical world is often too expensive, too cost prohibitive. This is where I think building websites, blogging, vlogging or whatever is good. 

First, certainly it cost your time labor, but the raw materials of digital things is free!  if you do not have a personal website, you’re missing out. Honestly I practically think it is free, just making a simple wordpress.org website with blue host.com is maybe what five dollars USD a month? Cancel all of your Spotify subscriptions, your Netflix and whatever… And funnel that money into your own website instead.

Let us say that your own property or house, and your mortgage is like four to $5000 a month. Digital real estate is superior; it is 1000 times cheaper, or 100,000 X cheaper . The most obvious economic leverage!

Ideally your website and your domain name should just be your first and last name. I think the genius of Michael Saylor is he owns michael.com, as well as hope.com. Very impressive.

Even Elon Musk, the genius of him purchasing.com; genius.

It looks like all of the bitcoin domains have been gobbled up, I still think there is great opportunities to be had in the online domain world. 

Or, Bitcoin on your body!

So lit

Currency vs credit

How did billionaires become billionaires?

Bitcoin is digital property

Buying … cyber family? Cyber city in cyber space?

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Gold is waste a of time, dead money

Virtue signaling

Before WW1

Went off the gold standard

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30 year half life, 0% vs 2% inflation

The true stoic and wise way —

For me — photo

Making money is simply a path to the end passion and goal? 

Ignore the news … stay focused!

1. You smoke weed, drink alcohol, do drugs
2. You own a dog or pet
3. You go to festivals
4. You are plant based or vegan or drink juices
5. You buy new cars, and finance, or even worse … lease
6. You own property and or have a mortgage
7. You don’t understand real economics
8. You have a subscription service to Hulu, Disney+, Netflix, Spotify etc
9. You don’t want to get married and or have kids
10. You watch sports and tv
11. You have debt
12. You buy clothes
13. You own an iPhone Pro
14. You drive a Tesla
15. You don’t own any Bitcoin
16. You trade things in
17. You watch “shows”

Bitcoin as the digital property!

OK, now that the bitcoin ETF, the spot ETF has been approved… truth be told, I don’t think there is really any more risk in regards to bitcoin, owning bitcoin, or the like. 

1. Before, it was really really hard to acquire and buy bitcoin

For me, acquiring bitcoin in around 2017 2018, I suppose around four or five years ago, the only practical option was using something like Coinbase, beautiful user interface and experience, to buy my bitcoins. At first I think I bought bitcoin around 6000 or $7000 a bitcoin… around $25,000 worth of it.

Even today, the thing that is really insanely annoying is that making wire transactions to purchase more bitcoin has been horrific. Simple wire transfers of around $120,000, I had to go into the bank at least three times, sign a bunch of things, Talk to real life being tellers, and then having to be stuck on the phone for an hour or two talking to some outsourced customer support labor and the Philippines or Manila, and then having to call back another week later, figuring out why my damn wire transfer had not gone through yet.

The more street for workaround has been using the built-in plaid integration with Coinbase, purchasing daily maximum of $50,000 USD worth of bitcoin at a time.  every time I do this it is insanely anger-fying, because when I have the right opportunity to buy, because I have this lame restriction put on me, I lose opportunities and I also lose the ability to purchase more bitcoins.

For example, when I wanted to buy bitcoin when it was low, when it dipped down a bunch, because the wire transfer took me about a week or two, I think finally when the money was available, or finally when the purchase went through, bitcoin up at least $10,000 a bitcoin, which means that I was able to purchase few bitcoins than I wanted to. 

Anyways, I’m so grateful that the technology even exist in the first place for me to purchase bitcoins at all. Sometimes I limit at the fact that me and my friend Kevin do not buy $100 worth of bitcoin, back in 2009, when my roommate Kevin told me about the bitcoin pizza incident. I will never forget how I shrugged my shoulders, and I said we should not, because I thought it was a scam. I think if we had bought hundred dollars worth of bitcoin the time, both of us would have owned thousands if not 10 and thousands of bitcoins, making both of us hundred millionaires, or potentially maybe even billionaires.

2. It is never too late 

So I think the main issue that we have is we always lament the fact that we are “too late”. This applies to almost everything in life, finding a life partner, getting married, having kids, getting into shape and doing fitness, investing whatever.

But, as I speak these words, it is still early! Apple has not yet integrated bitcoin support into their iOS or iPhone, once Apple does this, the price of bitcoin will explode.

3. Do you remember blockbuster? 

One thing that I’ve learned in life, it is easier to predict what will fail, rather than what will succeed.

For example, I think I’m really lucky that I was born in 1988, because I recall life before the Internet, in life after the Internet. And also the Internet came out around a formative time for me, when I was living in New York, and I got my first computer with AOL 3.0, a 38.8k dial up modem,  I think when I was around 11 years old. Maybe the fourth or fifth grade?

Anyways, back in the day, I recall how we used to go to Blockbuster to rent VHS tapes to watch movies. I remember in college, when I got really into investing in stocks and stuff,  blockbuster was still a publicly traded company. I remember my roommate Kevin, our freshman year, having a Netflix subscription when they still use to send DVDs in the mail. I knew with great certainty that blockbuster would go bankrupt and go under, and I wanted to short blockbuster stock, but I had no idea how to do it. my prediction was right. Blockbuster went bankrupt, I could’ve made a good profit had I done this.

Or on the other hand, if I had invested in that in college, in 2007 or 2008, this would have also been good.

Anyways the big pot was dematerialization. The fact that in my short life, I have already seen the transition from the materialized world of going in person to choose a blockbuster VHS tape, to rent or borrow or to watch, I actually used to do this with video games too… It actually made a lot of sense, Instead of paying $50 for the Nintendo 64 video game, which I would eventually beat, I rented for only like five or $10, and then try to beat it really fast, so economically as a kid, it made a lot of sense.

4. YouTube premium

I really random thing that my mom has been getting into lately has been tai chi, Cindy’s mom got my mom into it. It has been great every morning my mom has been practicing it, but no matter how many blockers I tried to install, google is smart enough to figure out how to disable the ad blockers. 

I suppose the genius of getting a YouTube premium family plan, whether it is $20 a month or whatever, then intelligence is you think about it… It might be the new most important utility that we got.

Even random things, like me preparing to change the oil in my 2010 Prius, watching YouTube videos on how to do it, is 1 trillion times better than written tutorials.

Even whenever I talk about house construction or maintenance or whatever, all the handyman I know tell me to just watch it on YouTube.

So if you think about the economics of it, assuming that having a studio membership for Pilates or yoga $200 a month, and technically you could just stream it on YouTube for $20 a month, economically it is extremely intelligent.

Anyways what is very interesting about the whole YouTube premium thing that is how it has dematerialized so many different things. 

And this is what I think is the genius of bitcoin, it has the materialized money. Yes bitcoin is money, even as time goes on I put less than less faith on field paper currency. To me it is like cotton candy.

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5. Money philosophy

So I just finished watching the whole Michael Saylor series on money, and I feel like I just got a new PS in economics, economic theory, as well as corporate finance and accounting.

The main takeaways are the following: 

a) Inflation

The basic idea is because the money creation rate in America and beyond is expanding 7 to 10% a year, because the price of minimum wage keeps going up, out of thin air, this is what drives inflation, or another words, the price of everything going up. 

For example, I’ll never forget this moment; when me and Seneca bought  our typical single burger patty, just the patty nothing else, just a month ago for $1.50 at Patty, it going up over 90 to $2.50 just for a single patty! This was because minimum wage was raised from $16 an hour to $20 USD an hour.

The reason why this decision was bad is because honestly, it just seems like a political ploy, for politicians to get elected or reelected. The reason why this is a scam is this:

I want to get elected, and I promise you that I will raise your minimum wage. Vote for me!

And then, the real after effects of inflation is going to happen when I am out of office.

b) History of money

Some of this is a rehashing of Michael Saylor quoting the book, the bitcoin standard, which I find really fascinating not because of the whole bitcoin thing, but about the history of money.

Long story short, bitcoin might be the best money and asset because it is infinitely durable and will last forever, because it is so intensive to create it has value, it has a hard cap of 21 million bitcoins, which will be certain even 1000 years from now, And also… it is money perfected. 

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6. My thoughts

I am very very happy and grateful that I did not study economics formally. I’m sure that I would have fallen into the same pitfalls as a lot of these loser economic peoples who has never done business in the real world.

I’ll give you examples; when I went to UCLA as an undergraduate,  we didn’t have a formal business major, only a Hybrid business – economics major. Out of all the people that knew who studied business economics, none of them became entrepreneurs, self-employed, none of them started their own companies, none of them worked for themselves, and none of them became successful. They all ended up just becoming low or mid-level managers at some company, probably clocking in the typical $80,000 thousand dollars a year to $120,000 a year salary. 

In fact, what made me so successful in my realm of Farsi, entrepreneurship, etc.… It totally up ended any traditional economic theories. For example my open source vision; it would probably had been deemed as heresy by any traditional school of economic thought.

Also as a side thing; I am very very happy that I did not study photography formally, and I am also grateful that I did not go to art school. Why? Once again, you get stuck in these loser ways of thinking, these incestuous ways of thinking about photography and the art world is quite filthy.

Anyways, as a general thought, true innovation and entrepreneurship comes from expertise domain expertise outside of that certain domain. For example, let us note that flight was invented by the weight brothers, who I believe were actually bicycle mechanics. 

I feel that I am well positioned to talk about money, economics, economic theory because I grew up poor, single mom working minimum wage jobs, also, becoming a successful self-employed sole proprietor, having zero debt, and applying my economic theories to real life.

Also, I am also moderately booksmart, and my wife has a PhD. And then helping Cindy get her PhD, I feel like I got a PhD.

And also other things which I have done which I consider very intelligent: I have never spent more than $2500 USD on a car, in my whole life, from age 15 to at age 36.

1. 1991 Nissan Sentra XE (5 speed, manual transmission, $1000)
2. 1991 Nissan Sentra SE-R (5 speed, manual transmission $1500 USD)
3. 1990 Mazda Miata, five speed manual transmission, no air conditioning no power steering, $2500 USD
4. 2002 Subaru outback, five speed manual transmission, $800 USD
5. Current, 2010 Prius, free. ($0.00)– free 99

I put zero faith in any individual who has ever purchased any brand new car. It is a true signal that they are economically a fool.

Doesn’t matter if you bought the new Tesla or whatever, all fools.

7. Why does this all matter?

Whether you like it or not, our whole life revolves around money.

There are certain things which are negotiable, certain things which are not negotiable.

Nonnegotiable include paying rent, gas and electricity, Wi-Fi, food, coffee etc.

Negotiable things include purchasing any sort of clothing, eating out, drink alcohol or smoking marijuana or doing drugs, cars, purchasing a home or property etc.

Also, unfortunately I think 99.9% of the photography industry is predicated around purchasing your cameras, lenses, accessories etc. Was the first to start the anti-gear movement, by books not gear, and being the first to really make the Ricoh GR camera mainstream? 

Issue debt?

Courageous with a clarity, a vision

10 years is the shortest period in the finance world

Create a financial product

2% fee?

$100 trillion is broken because it is based on bonds?

Hermetically sealed world isn’t good

Credit worthy

Proof of work to counter spam

Civility

Yeah

Commodities are not scare

Governed inflation of equities

Can always issue more stock

They will issue more stock

2021– meme stocks, print more equity

Acreage in Miami Beach –> only so many linear beach in beach front property

1000x in last 100 years–> money expansion rate , but not treasury asset

Creating your own treasury asset?

Tax deferred

.

Fair value accounting

Treasury management

Bitcoin is tax deferred asset appreciation

–> share holders

.

Well capitalized company

Think Scaleable

.

Mental Models?

20 years, 100 public companies failed because of their treasury strategy

Accumulate an endowment ***

Harvard, Yale

Lived a long time because of endowment

Don’t grow your student base

2024 new regime

.

1.5% interest debt to buy Bitcoin

More than 10x

Investment income

Positive capital?

Road to serfdom

Big is bad

Big entertainment?

.

Treasury

.

Think thermodynamic

Scarce, desirable real estate

Levered long property

Hold for long period of time …

Wealth creation & wealth preservation

.

More money vs more risk?

…?

.

1,000 year bond? Hold it forever?

50 year?

I’m not going to live in America forever?

.

ChatGPT sucks

A thought and observation: perhaps bitcoin is the best investment because it is the new religion.

For example, that is consider that in modern day times, capital, capitalism, money is the new religion. Let us consider how much we sacrifice in our lives in order to accumulate more money, more capital, and we deify money above all.

For example, one self-worth is based on their capital worth. Their net worth is based on how much property they own, the amount of stock they own, bonds, CDs, investments, appreciating assets, power and influence etc.

However perhaps the problem about all of this is that money and things becomes the new carrot and stick.

For example, I’m a huge fan of cyber truck, cars in general, but the savvy investor and real rich person will always think:

Why spend $100,000 on a car, when I could invest that money into something else, and my money, instead of bleeding it?

For example, no matter how expensive your car is, it will always be a depreciating asset.

For example, even if you have a rare Ferrari or Porsche or whatever, the maintenance and upkeep cost for it are horrendous. Even if the market value of your car goes up overtime, maybe at your breaking even, most likely you’re actually bleeding money because of all the expensive parts maintenance cost, labor, having to run your car every once in a while, keep it clean etc. And therefore these trophy assets become toxic assets, negative liabilities:

You’re bleeding a slow death, your like a bathtub with a half working stopper, you have to keep filling up the water to just keep it even.

Stop the bleeding?


Apparently the first thing that you learn in medical emergencies is first, stop the bleeding. As long as the person doesn’t bleed to death, what that means is even if they suffer broken bones or whatever, with enough time healing and recovery they will be OK, but once a person has lost a critical amount of blood, they’re dead forever.

Going back to money in general, I look at all these people, and they’re all slowly bleeding themselves to death, being hooked on drugs and methamphetamines and painkillers and other weird things in order to just keep self flagellating themselves to produce.

Money as religion?

I wonder if in someways, we could actually think about the modern day government as almost some sort of religion. Consider taxes, it is like tithing. 

Death & taxes are the only two certain things in life.

Cash rules everything around me

A few weeks ago, the priest that my Korean Catholic Church did something very very funny, for Mother’s Day, during his homily, took out $100 bill, and said that he would give it to the mother at church with the most amount of children, which was five kids.

Everyone left in good spirits, because it almost felt slightly sacrilegious for a priest to talk about money, or bust out money, or even present money as a good thing.

However, the truth is all these institutions, churches etc. all rely on donations. A church cannot survive without donors, nor can your local pickle ball club.

Messiah figure?

Something which is actually really baked into Christian Catholic, Judeo Christian ethics morality and storytelling is  the notion of a savior, Messiah figure. Most likely crucified, or sacrifices their life for some greater cause. This is a common trope ever since Greek notions of Dionysus, maybe Egyptian notions of life after death, or whatever.

Basically the idea is one individual, one man, comes to save humanity or whatever. And he must sacrifice his life in order to give immortal life to everybody else.

So in the case of bitcoin, this becomes really really fascinating because Satoshi was a metaphorical messiah figure, who ended up disappearing into thin air, a picture perfect ending.

I think maybe Banksky is similar; somebody to essentially troll and reveal the ridiculousness of the art world, through his anonymity.

Death & immortality 

The other day my mom Cindy and Seneca we all went to the Broad Museum in downtown LA, insanely epic! Then infinity room is totally worth it, and the whole space is an architectural marvel and masterpiece. It makes me so proud to be a Los Angeles citizen.

Anyways, we stumbled onto this one room, and I was shocked… I saw the famous skull painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat, one of my favorite paintings of all time. I said really loud, in shock “wait… Is that real?” a friendly fancy looking York artist appreciating woman to my right, laughed, and said, yes it is! I was more shocked that we had in Los Angeles, instead of it being in New York or New York City, which I imagined it should be. 

Anyways, I really appreciate it, but my mom was horrified. She said something really funny that the artwork and paintings of Jean-Michel Basquiat was “disturbing”. I said that was true, because he was addicted to heroin cocaine and all these other weird drugs, and eventually died because of a drug overdose.

My sister Annette something interesting, which was that the theory is if Bard didn’t die so early, he probably would have eventually been demoted, from the art world, because of his overreliance on drugs, partying, and like in order to produce artwork. Any sort of art which is produced based on an artist being overly reliant on drugs alcohol, etc. is degenerate bad art. Even Jackson Pollock, he was notoriously an alcoholic, and the truth that a lot of art critics and collectors try to hide and obfuscate is the fact that he died because he was drinking and driving, under the influence. We should mark then Jackson Pollock as a bad one; sure he killed himself, but what if while drunk and under the influence of alcohol while driving, he killed a little kid running in the road, or even worse, a full car full of other human beings?

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Limits & value

Anyways, my personal take on why Jean-Michel Basquiat ended up becoming so famous was he died early, and even my sister said that because he died so early, his stock of paintings is limited, and no more will ever be produced. This is what makes them so valuable.

This is where bitcoin gets so fasting, because everybody on the planet  knows that only 21 million bitcoin will ever ever ever be produced in eternity.

This is a big deal because with traditional fiat currency, the government could keep printing cotton candy paper fiat money currency forever. 

In fact, about a week ago, after tipping my masseuse a $20 bill, and I knew that I had to go to the ATM to withdraw more cash money currency, in case of emergency or tips or whatever, I paused and stopped, the thought:

Whenever I pull out paper currency or cash money, eventually it all eventually disappears, and have to keep refilling my wallet with more paper currency.

And this is actually the funny thing about holding paper currency and cash money; simply by having it on you, you will end up losing it. Why? To put a $20 bill in the church basket, to give it to a friendly waiter, to use it on silly things, etc.

So I suppose the tricky thing is this:

All of this, capital accumulation etc.… for the sake of what?

Kids

So the first thought I have is the prime obvious one: if you want to have the supreme amount of happiness in life, the true meaning and joy in life, I think you gotta have at least one kid. Two, maybe 2.2 kids to re-populate the planet or whatever. 

I think we’re going through a weird time, in which capital, capitalism is running a milk. Which means that I think the reason why a lot of people don’t wanna have kids anymore is because in some funny way it seems anti-capitalistic.

For example, if you’re a woman, and you get married, become a stay at home mom no longer work… Who is going to buy all of this Louis Vuitton clothing and whatever? Let us consider the capitalist dream is a single working career woman… All of this disposable cash and income they have to buy Subarus, Mercedes, Porsches, designer handbags, etc.

 Certainly there is still a big industry for people who sell kids stuff, but this is a super tiny market compared to the market for the average consumer.

Why this is a big deal

For myself personally speaking, I would not be shocked if we see a $1 million bitcoin, a $3 million bitcoin, maybe even a $10 million bitcoin or $50 million bitcoin price our lifetime. I still remember very vividly as a kid, being in becoming a millionaire was The dream! But now… Even if you’re a millionaire, it might buy you a mediocre condo in LA, the new ethos is being a billionaire.

Also, I will not be shocked if within a few years or decades we will see Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos or somebody become the worlds first trillionaire.

Spending money?

Certainly there are things that we must spend money on. Spending money on rent, food, gas, etc. Alao certain truisms I’ve discovered while living in Los Angeles is that owning a car is better than owning no car in Los Angeles, even if you live in a walking paradise like Culver City.

However, in terms of practicality, owning a 2010 Prius might be the superior option and decision then owning any Tesla car, any gas or electric vehicle.

People slowly bleeding themselves to death?

Now that gas prices are universally five dollars a gallon and above, I am very very certain we will never see us ever again at three dollars a gallon, two dollars a gallon, etc. Once the price goes up, it will never go back down to what they used to.

For example, minimum wage for fast food workers went from $16 an hour to $20 an hour, which means the rest of the economy must adjust to this new $20 an hour benchmark.  I’ve been talking to a lot of fast food workers, laborers, security guards, people at Shake shack etc. and I wondered to myself and asked them:

“Isn’t the optimal strategy for everyone to just get a job at McDonald’s and earn $20 an hour?”

One of the security guards at the Huntington Gardens and library laughed and said “That is true… But then you gotta work at McDonalds!”

The smell of money?

Apparently as a plumber, you can easily make a salary of $120,000, $200,000, $250,000 a year. But, the downside is you have to smell the horrendous smell of human excrement, and sewage in general for the rest of your life.

To me, no amount of money is worth that.

Also I saw an advertisement on the 405 or La Cienega that apparently starting salary for a CHP California highway police officer is $120,000 a year! Once again, not worth it.

People often make the wrong decision in life, choosing the bad job in order to get a higher salary. Even hearing to young Asian American 20 something-year-olds at the Huntington Gardens: a nerdy skinny Asian American guy, saying that he did not want to get a job at Amazon, but, he was tempted because the salary was so good… At least $200,000 a year!

The problem is this:

$200,000 a year ain’t what it used to to be. 

So what should we do about all this?

 if you own an iPhone or a smart phone, we are all implicated in this capitalist system. So the question is this:

How do we maximize the upside of living in a capitalist society, while clipping the downsides? 

1. Intelligent living

The first very pragmatic one is living intelligently. Being moneywise.

A very simple one is stopping the bleeding.

How do we bleed money? We bleed money by All of these stupid subscription services. They are all bad, mass unsubscribe to all of them. 

This includes your Disney+, Hulu, YouTube premium, Spotify, deliver services apps, Netflix, hbo max, etc.

My simple thought is this: 

There has never been a streaming TV series which has ever been created which is worth it.

Only good things which have been produced our movies and cinema, so if there is really really really a movie or something you want to watch, just pay money and watch it in the theater, or purchase it on Apple TV+.

Also let us consider and think, truth be told, in terms of overall value I think there have only ever been maybe three or four movies which had any real big impact on my worldview. Therefore the hard thing is trying to filter all of it.

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Yeah

Things to consider:

1. Satoshi as saviour?