Marvin’s Best Weekly Reads May 30th, 2021
“The happiness of a man in this life does not consist in the absence but in the mastery of his passions.” — Alfred Lord Tennyson
It’s been another nutty crazy week. So short one this round. Gonna be saying NO to many things a lot more for the rest of the summer and probably year. I’m supposed to be on sabbatical.
- Talk about the long con.
“Kurniawan seemed to have boundless cash and a knack for finding extremely rare vintage bottles that lifelong oenophiles had only ever dreamed of — 1920 Petrus, 1945 Romanée-Conti, 1947 Château Lafleur.
In a few short years, he would sell off millions of dollars’ worth of his wines to some of America’s wealthiest connoisseurs.
But behind the ever-flowing stream of Burgundies, Kurniawan harbored a dark secret: He was carrying out history’s greatest wine fraud.
And it would take a vengeful billionaire, a French vintner, and the FBI to get to the bottom of the barrel.”
https://thehustle.co/the-man-who-sold-millions-in-counterfeit-wine-to-rich-collectors/
2. Down with Tbilisi, Chiang Mai and HCMS!
https://nomadcapitalist.com/2013/12/01/top-5-best-cities-live-bootstrapping-young-entrepreneur/
3. Cool story.
4. This is worth listening to if you want to understand what’s happening in tech. 2 of sharpest guys in Silicon Valley.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbnDay35L8I&t=2477s
5. “With the pullback in growth stocks and the crash in SPAC prices and now crypto, I imagine we will see a reset in seed stage pricing at some point soon, but this is all anecdotal through my eyes and ears.
Chasing/pushing prices higher at the seed stage puts so much pressure on the founders and companies to deliver immediately. It is really disappointing to see this sloppy behavior so early in the company life cycle.”
https://howardlindzon.com/tiny-bubbles-seed-stage-edition-and-sunday-reads/
6. “This is the beauty of bitcoin. The countries that seek freedom and true economic competition will embrace bitcoin. They will encourage their citizens to participate in the revolution. The authoritarian countries will fight the technology. They will do their best to prevent entrepreneurs and investors from participating.”
https://pomp.substack.com/p/china-gave-us-a-gift-last-week
7. This is so awesome.
“One such Twitch food streamer is L.A. Geronimo, a Florida-based former sushi chef and the creator behind the Twitch channel The Hunger Service. Geronimo’s livestreaming centers on sushi and other Asian dishes stemming from his ten years of experience in Japanese and Asian restaurants. But he also leans heavily into pop culture, creating dishes inspired by anime like Food Wars and Studio Ghibli films along with video games like Final Fantasy XV.”
https://www.themanual.com/food-and-drink/l-a-geronimo-the-hunger-service/
8. Yikes. Although if I am honest I’d be okay being called Darth Vader.
“In Russian political circles, Sechin is known as “Darth Vader.” They call him that because he’s particularly ruthless, notably venal, and kind of a dick. While colorful and provocative, this nickname misses the point. The Star Wars villain, father of Luke and Leia, was supremely talented in his own right. Through years of disciplined training, he harnessed the Force.
Igor Sechin has no such mystical powers. He’s a crony and a thug. True, he is a linguist by training, fluent in both French and Portuguese, and thus more refined that your average brute. But in practice, this just means he can say “Give me my fucking money” in three different languages. A goon who enjoys jazz is still a goon.”
https://gregolear.substack.com/p/igor-sechin-russias-darth-vader
9. This is bar none the best guide to becoming independent in 2021. All young people (and old) need to read this & follow the formula (wish I knew about it earlier).
https://bowtiedbull.substack.com/p/1m-us-token-10-years-or-10-btc-no
10. Its about being long term greedy, so many people (investors, LPs & founders) forget about this.
https://bothsidesofthetable.com/playing-the-long-game-in-venture-capital-97f017811707
11. Good to know!
https://blog.coinbase.com/fact-check-is-bitcoin-mining-environmentally-unfriendly-3559823af6f1
12. “With this in mind, the timing of the CCP’s latest wave of regulatory scrutiny could not have been better. The ensuing miner exodus currently taking place is one of the most positive fundamental developments for Bitcoin in 2021. Even if we see short term drops in monthly Implied Hash Rate figures as miners emigrate, it would be for an important cause.”
https://medium.com/coinmetrics/bitcoin-miners-are-escaping-china-d3937e8f018c
13. 110% agree with this view.
“The content I create works for me when I’m having downtime with my family. When I’m sleeping, it’s still going. Making new connections, generating opportunities, and creating deal flow.
By creating content, I’m building leverage. By activating an audience, I’m applying it.”
https://davenemetz.com/audience-leverage/
14. Longevity: so very interesting and the next big code to crack.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/humans-could-live-up-to-150-years-new-research-suggests/
15. Rise of Pseudononymous future.
“Anonymity is key. Being a virtual creator is about enjoying the self-expression and creativity that come with creating content, while avoiding the scrutiny and invasion of privacy that have traditionally accompanied fame.”
https://digitalnative.substack.com/p/transhuman-the-rise-of-digital-identities
16. “The realization that if workers can be productive from anywhere, why not look abroad where the cost of living is lower and thus, cost of labor is lower. Meaning that in time, companies will realize they can cut human capital costs without sacrificing quality of work by looking abroad. A globalized labor arbitrage will take place.
This further reinforces the reduction in localized real estate needs. It also validates a move away from hybrid models to purely remote. And the ultimate consequence is further pressure on corporate real estate values in the developed world.”
https://dougantin.com/a-meta-consequence-of-remote-work/
17. “Bitcoin was launched in the 2008 financial crisis as an antidote to bad central banking policy. What policymakers did then was unprecedented in all recorded financial history.
But that pales in comparison to 2020 when policymakers completely abandoned any rational long-term thinking.
This is why Bitcoin was created, to protect against recklessness by the financial elites.”
https://danheld.substack.com/p/inflation-is-coming-0a6
18. “The first is that you MUST learn the basics — of anything. There are no shortcuts or easy paths to success. I’ve written about this over and over and over again in The Agoge, and it is an absolutely critical lesson. You must always focus on learning the basics of anything — or, as I’ve said in the past, “learn the rules — then break the rules”. That is how you achieve mastery of any practice or art.
The second is that multitasking is a sure path to failure. Having had to engage in plenty of that sort of nonsense in the past, I agree entirely with this sentiment. Multitasking ensures mediocrity. Focus on doing one thing at a time — and doing it to the absolute best of your ability. Then move on to the next thing. That is how you focus and how you win.”
https://didacticmind.com/2021/05/guest-post-lessons-learned-from-erich-fromm-by-the-male-brain.html
19. “For now, Russia has financial reserves to weather near term economic storms, and Putin still has an approval rating above 60%. But that number is falling, and while Russia’s rainy-day funds are in solid shape, the Kremlin’s inability or unwillingness to diversify the Russian economy ensures there is little reason to believe things will change for the better.
That’s the bad news for Putin. The bad news for Ukraine and the West is that as conditions get tougher, Putin will feel the need to look tougher still.”
https://time.com/6004236/russia-ukraine-border-putin/
20. I actually think China is the major illiberal threat to the West and we better get our act together ASAP.
“COVID-19 was a test of the American and Chinese systems, and one side clearly did better. Even if China made mistakes at the beginning, given the way that the West has failed in its COVID response, it’s simply not credible to think that Europe or America would have done better if they had to go first.
This is why 2020 saw China make up more ground on the US economy than in any other year on record. If COVID-19 is any indication, China is better suited to deal with unforeseen disasters than the US is, meaning that I may be underestimating the extent to which it will overtake America as the most powerful country in its region, and ultimately the world.”
21. “The bottom line is that cyber attacks are going to become more frequent. The economic consequences will become more severe. And at some point, a cyber attack will lead to kinetic warfare. As individuals, we can take steps to prepare for these outcomes and reduce the economic burdens when they happen.”
https://dougantin.com/economic-damage-by-cyber-attack-is-the-digital-age-attack-vector/
22. “For most of us, the goal of financial independence isn’t to just check out and quit life,” he says. “We just want the freedom to work on what we choose. When you take money out of the equation, you can spend your time doing more important things for yourself and society.”
https://thehustle.co/how-to-retire-early
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