New politics gives rise to new elites

The past few years and the opportunity that has arisen in the crypto space fuelled a desire in me to get above the crowd, to gain models of reality that the majority of participants in the space do not have.

I wanted to be like a young Buffett at the racetrack in his teens, at an advantage over those with less information. In a quantitative age, that informational advantage is typically construed to be a killer algorithm or statistical edge. Yet, coming from a humanities background with an abnormal interest in the psyche, I decided to develop an instinct on where we are based on prior periods in human history.

So, back in August 2020, when I first observed bubble-like qualities forming in bitcoin, I read up on 16th-21st century bubbles in financial markets. From Tulipmania to the South Sea bubble, all the way to the dotcom boom and everything in between, I read on the repetitive nature of human emotion in periods of financial extravagance. Coupled with an appreciation for Soros’s principle of fallability (*not* reflexivity, as crypto salesman bastardised the concept as an excuse to rip people off) that got me interested in Neuroscience and Kants transcendental idealism, I could see just a little further (it was hard even after I’d read 20 books on bubbles to not get emotionally carried away as you’d see 100% weekly gains, which I had to check myself and tell my lizard brain that it’s very state was verifying my intellectual position) than others. I was Buffett at the racetrack.

Always striving to emulate Druckenmiller, I wanted to stay 18 months ahead, so early 2021 I wanted to qualitatively model what happens in the trough post-bubble. I didn’t do too much intellectual heavy lifting, looking back at the 2000’s internet era and analogising broadband to rollups/layer in bringing mass adoption. I decided I wanted to stay close to the core tech and ethereum.

I also got interested in new industries in 19th century america. Railroads, Oil and the Robber Barons a fascinating reflection of the modern crypto age. In americas first century a system of trust amongst participants was being built out, property rights legitimised and new vehicles of finance developed. It rang a similarity to the blockchains of the day. In that age, a few accumulated vast wealth, though were threatened by the systemic collapse of their industry.

Thus, in 1869, one year after his stellar railroad coup, Rockefeller feared that his wealth might be snatched away from him. As someone who tended toward optimism, “seeing opportunity in every disaster,” he studied the situation exhaustively instead of bemoaning his bad luck.4 He saw that his individual success as a refiner was now menaced by industrywide failure and that it therefore demanded a systemic solution. This was a momentous insight, pregnant with consequences. Instead of just tending to his own business, he began to conceive of the industry as a gigantic, interrelated mechanism and thought in terms of strategic alliances and long-term planning.

New politics gives rise to new elites

The past few years and the opportunity that has arisen in the crypto space fuelled a desire in me to get above the crowd, to gain models of reality that the majority of participants in the space do not have.

I wanted to be like a young Buffett at the racetrack in his teens, at an advantage over those with less information. In a quantitative age, that informational advantage is typically construed to be a killer algorithm or statistical edge. Yet, coming from a humanities background with an abnormal interest in the psyche, I decided to develop an instinct on where we are based on prior periods in human history.

So, back in August 2020, when I first observed bubble-like qualities forming in bitcoin, I read up on 16th-21st century bubbles in financial markets. From Tulipmania to the South Sea bubble, all the way to the dotcom boom and everything in between, I read on the repetitive nature of human emotion in periods of financial extravagance. Coupled with an appreciation for Soros’s principle of fallability (*not* reflexivity, as crypto salesman bastardised the concept as an excuse to rip people off) that got me interested in Neuroscience and Kants transcendental idealism, I could see just a little further (it was hard even after I’d read 20 books on bubbles to not get emotionally carried away as you’d see 100% weekly gains, which I had to check myself and tell my lizard brain that it’s very state was verifying my intellectual position) than others. I was Buffett at the racetrack.

Always striving to emulate Druckenmiller, I wanted to stay 18 months ahead, so early 2021 I wanted to qualitatively model what happens in the trough post-bubble. I didn’t do too much intellectual heavy lifting, looking back at the 2000’s internet era and analogising broadband to rollups/layer in bringing mass adoption. I decided I wanted to stay close to the core tech and ethereum.

I also got interested in new industries in 19th century america. Railroads, Oil and the Robber Barons a fascinating reflection of the modern crypto age. In americas first century a system of trust amongst participants was being built out, property rights legitimised and new vehicles of finance developed. It rang a similarity to the blockchains of the day. In that age, a few accumulated vast wealth, though were threatened by the systemic collapse of their industry.

Thus, in 1869, one year after his stellar railroad coup, Rockefeller feared that his wealth might be snatched away from him. As someone who tended toward optimism, “seeing opportunity in every disaster,” he studied the situation exhaustively instead of bemoaning his bad luck.4 He saw that his individual success as a refiner was now menaced by industrywide failure and that it therefore demanded a systemic solution. This was a momentous insight, pregnant with consequences. Instead of just tending to his own business, he began to conceive of the industry as a gigantic, interrelated mechanism and thought in terms of strategic alliances and long-term planning.