albertshin

In reality though I wonder how many of the "unsophisticated" investors have even opened a 10-K before investing... Let alone know what it is...

from what I read on some of the administrators on Twitter the program has been (semi privately) running since last fall and there are already 10+ participants

now the decision to take it public may have been motivated by sequoia's launch

This is a pretty cool site. do you happen to know why this is classified under "retail" roadshow?

the "grouping" by domain name (e.g., stack overflow or reddit threads) like Google does

when I was younger and I had all the time in the world, I used to enter all these sweepstakes and contests that said you could buy X and then be entered into a prize pool/raffle/etc. the pro tip was to read the fine print, Ctrl+F no purchase necessary, and enter using the "alternative method"

my guess is that there must have been some gambling law requiring that there be a method to enter for free.

never got the top prizes but our mailbox was full of random things that confused my parents.

why do you think that's the case? is it because people will feel 'sketched out' by the bareness and leave?

I agree with the sentiment of lofty multiples, but what do you think happens to good product companies in that scenario? Sure their stock tumbles quite a bit but would it actually affect the business itself?

I heard the dot com bubble "garbage" was full of companies with no revenue, no customers, etc. I'm not sure many of the high growth tech companies burning $$s are cut from the same cloth though as they really do have products and customers in the present; it's just that the market expects an insane number of new services/customers in the near future...

For example, I'm guessing customers can't just cut off Snowflake easily (time wise and effort wise) so the cashflow would remain stable for a while. As long as they don't need to do a secondary offering (and have some cash), wouldn't they be able to weather a storm? Perhaps at the cost of some massive layoffs/refinancing but would still prevent an actual collapse?

I understand where you're coming from in that the technical abilities to create something (someone?) like this may seem like a low barrier to entry.

However, I disagree that this is "quick" money or just a fad. The value of this AI for sponsorships/ads comes more from a team of actual people that scan social media to search for trends, photo styles and carefully helps curate its presence. For example, look at how the first "photo" in the article is created. Notice how the AI isn't looking at the camera? Or how the perspective is somewhat tilted? Overall, the image has many subtle details also very in line with how many millienial/gen-Z Korean girls upload birthday photos from cafes on Instagram.

It feels like Rozy represents a broader movement towards abstracting out the elements that make us resonate with a brand or image more. I think brand strategists and marketers have figured out that the model is more of a vessel to store and convey those elements/emotions and for particular types of ads there is no real need for the model to actually exist in reality. Think about how many ads where you don't know the model in any other context.

Rozy probably adds more value than the nameless models in some sense because there's a persona/brand the team has built up in social media/other ads. Definitely not easy money.

you might find this video amusing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8SER24F0U8

I agree with most points made here. However, I wonder if it's as easy to predict the new high-growth/high-margin units as you suggest that Tesla has none.

Were most people in 2011-2015 aware of the "AWS / Ad explosion" that was about to come? Or did we know ex ante that Amazon was willing to shift their focus towards these units? Likely not, but the high multiples (despite the retail margins dragging down the gross margins) suggest that a large portion of investors were willing to bet that better units with protective moats (i.e. AWS) were coming soon.

I don't follow Tesla as much, but it seems difficult to dismiss that some of their business units won't follow high-growth/high-margin paths. What if their FSD software is licensed out? What if the supercharger network is shared with other EVs for a per-charge fee? Given Musk's personality, I can see investors taking on risk and betting that he'll be bringing something better than just selling cough regulatory credits cough cars. It makes me wonder if Tesla losing market share in the EV market will be the ultimate catalyst for this shift.

That being said, I agree with you that the market has "priced in" all these what-ifs for Tesla with extremely high expectations of success -- which did not seem to be case for Amazon. A slip or trip in car sales these days doesn't seem to move $TSLA much - investors that are long seem to be betting on other stuff and we'll see how patient they are in times to come.

I find many "productivity" books tend be easily summarizable... but reading the book is really to drill the concept in your head so that you're conscious of the tips/advice in your day to day.

Plus, if you spread out the reading over a few days/weeks, you can apply what you've learned throughout the day as you read along.

any plans to make this site public?

I can confirm this... happened when texting to US from Korea a few times last summer. the message just ... disappeared?

perhaps the most "non-metro" areas I've used it in has been the outskirts of Oaxaca, Mexico and Engelberg, Switzerland and I had no issues at all with coverage.

as expected, slight delay when you switch countries (and thus carriers). it also gets a little confused at the borders of Switzerland/Germany.

this is also why Amazon started dropping the item names in the email order confirmations

in the few times I've traded BTC, I've personally seen tighter spreads in Coinbase (fixed + % fee) than Robinhood Crypto ("free").

I'm aware there can be many reasons for this but I couldn't help but wonder if Robinhood was baking in some hidden fees.

coinbase is still a company with shareholders - decentralized or not. there are shareholders who want liquidity; there are investors who want in now.

the choice of listing has nothing to do with the monetary unit of trade ($, euro, btc, doge etc). the exchange simply enables them to trade the equity of their company. NASDAQ/US is just the most liquid one (and likely where their immediate investors past and future are going to have access to already)

but perhaps I'm not aware of alternatives where one can trade equity in the crypto/defi market?

happy to learn if you point me to the right places.

pretty sure when I bought the refresh package in 2019 they still required you send the "corpse" to get a replacement

I'm familiar with the IB -> HF/VC/PE route but where do usually accountants head post burn out?

also, I spoke with a junior analyst at a bulge bracket recently and apparently he had signed for his next job in PE before he even started his analyst job...

I agree in the literal way, but if you're kept captive for 95 hours regardless, does the distinction of work vs being present really matter? I doubt they're able to schedule anything meaningful for personal growth/enjoyment (e.g. dinner with friends?).

The end outcome is that it hurts the employee. The survey was for 13 people, but it still saddens me to see that they unanimously agreed on having negative relationships with friends/family due to their work. Those are harder (and sometimes impossible) to repair...

I feel like the artists/celebrities/directors who publicly announce that they're quitting usually end up coming back in a few years... Director Miyazaki comes to mind in more recent years.

Those that actually "quit" just quietly drift away out of the public scene.

While I won't comment on your other points, I do want to correct you that many SPAC acquisition deals involve a lengthy investor presentation deck that shows historical/projected financials (which are then republished in a more typical/formatted SEC document closer to the proxy vote date of the merger).

Here's 23&Me from the SEC website: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1804591/000095010321...

See page 34 for summary of financials.

Quuite unsettling to see listed videos of (alleged) bombing videos alongside Tom and Jerry though...

I'm surprised these are made available with no lock or warning...

False. Must already sold - https://www.marketwatch.com/story/large-gamestop-shareholder...

Please read the article or superkuh's comment below. The headline is somewhat misleading.

curious to see what you think about the government's reluctance to adapt though. south korea is one of the few developed countries where UberX still can't operate, and a similar Korean rideshare company (Tada) was forced to pivot after taxi drivers protested. on the topic of mobility: e-scooter businesses are also now at risk technically you need a literal drivers license to ride one since November...

I always find it amusing that prominent investors can move the markets with these interviews regardless of the validity of the underlying statement they make (and how they're probably very much aware of this...)

In what sense?

In the early 2010s, I used to be an Couchsurfing user - as a host, guest, and even just meetups for tours/recs while traveling internationally.

> After all, why do something for free when you could get paid instead?

I really doubt the Couchsurfers were the ones who were converting their listings to Airbnb spots initially. Rather I think Airbnb enabled previously unwilling (or unmotivated) people to start hosting others for a cost.

The type of people I would meet were from a different cut of cloth than Airbnb folks. One picked up my friend and I from a Megabus stop and later we ended up going to our host's second home on Martha's Vineyard. One let us try out his expensive cycling bike out for a bike ride. I've attended a yoga session with my Couchsurfing host before on a trip. When I hosted, I took my guest (a cadet at West Point who hadn't had drinks in forever) on a spontaneous bar hop with my group if friends.

There was always a mentality of paying a good experience forward and a sense of community - which is tough to preserve when it becomes a transactional experience.

That being said, I agree Airbnb likely led to the downfall of the CS community. There were some sketchy ppl in that world. After running into one of those, I slowly found myself preferring to pay for the security and safety although deep down I knew I was going to miss out on all the fun that I couldn't simply pay for. As for hosting, I just wasn't interested anymore knowing that if someone were paying to crash at my place, it would be less about hanging out or getting recs but more about just needing a reliable roof to cover... where's the fun in that for a host?

I got to level 20 or so and had figured out a working algorithm for two cuts whereby you would cut off 1 in the first cut and then find a good angled second cut to split off all the remaining pairs. This got a little more complicated when it went up to 3 cuts though...

There has got to be some math theorem to generalize a solution to n swipes.