Too good to be true (Or is it?)

Am writing my next newsletter and touching on the covid money printing by the US. We know that the money printer went crazy ($3.3 trillion) in 2020 alone My question is: does the US not have any strategic reserves that it could have deployed? Singapore for example, deployed its reserves 3 times for covid according to wikipedia. The last time it deployed its reserves was the 08 crisis, and back then it was only 1 time. The country seems to not have deployed its reserves any other times. What makes up the US strategic reserves as of the covid era? Is the composition and value disclosed publicly? Lets see it Nostr. #AskNostr #US #MoneyPrinting #COVID #Singapore

As I am writing articles explaining the importance of Bitcoin both to deepen my understanding and to prepare materials for orange-pilling folks, I realized that @Parker Lewis's "Gradually, then suddenly" is what I am slowly working towards: a compilation of essays in explaining why Bitcoin is important. Still, nothing is more valuable than actually writing things down as it forces me to organize my thoughts and fill the gaps of what I do not yet understand. And no harm in showing my own proof-of-work. One step at a time. kianjer.substack.com #Writing

Was doing some research on global adoption and came across this article by Reuters on El Salvador in Feb 2024. The title itself already tells you a lot. Little to no data on the actual returns in fiat terms as of today. Mainly cherry picked anecdotes. Any limited data has no benchmarking against peers or past performance of the country. The worst part is knowing that most people will only read the title, and the word choices will successfully invoke all sorts of negative impressions about bitcoin on them. Obviously an intentional attack but gotta admit they played the emotion game well. We need to spread more positive and good as well. #ElSalvador #Bitcoin https://www.reuters.com/technology/short-cash-el-salvador-doubles-down-bitcoin-dream-2024-02-02/

Proof-of-work is meritocracy; proof-of-stake is aristocracy #Bitcoin #PoW

I know the institutions’ stacks doesn’t affect the protocol or network stability, but I can’t help but wonder if they could be planning some coordinated dumps-and-purchases to increase price volatility to shake off the weak hands and reduce confidence for the not-yet convinced. Those who are still early in the btc journey will still use the BTC/Fiat pair to determine its potential. But what if the institutions betray each other i.e. A, B and C agreed to sell together, but only C sold while A and B keep stacking. Another form of game theory? Or I’m just overthinking things. Fun thought though

Maybe a controversial take but my potential co-founder and I were having a discussion around jobs. We both agreed that a significant portion of jobs (especially white collar jobs) that currently exist are actually not necessary. They provide little to no value to the company or to society. I could relate from my previous job. The owner was basically running a private welfare company. Almost nobody gets fired (unless you commit some crime). So you get a bunch of C-players staying in the company. And we think its partly because the fiat system requires people to commit to these "dead end" jobs to make ends meet. Or because public companies need to grow at all cost to satisfy stakeholders. So we were wondering: what happens if we truly enter an age of abundance and more people were free from the 9-5 jobs? 1) Would most people go crazy and be completely unproductive like playing games all day long? 2) Or would most people find time to learn and discover themselves, maybe commit more to entrepreneurship and the likes; finding out what gives them meaning in life and get really good at doing those things? Of course its not a simple 2-case scenario, but thats the general direction we think things will go. Hopefully the latter scenario dominates.

I’m fairly convinced memes are the most effective way of sending your key messages across nowadays. Keep memeing ladies and gents. View quoted note →

What are your go to analogies/reasonings in explaining a deflationary world to friends & family? Feels like my explanation is still seems too "far fetched" for most people around me. Inspired by Grant's tweet

Any other cultures or practices that treat gold as "generational savings"? In Asia a big practice is to for the groom's parents to buy gold for the bride. And the mentality there is always "you can pawn it in the future if you need money". The gold my wife got is just sitting there collecting dust. Literally HODLing the gold. Imagine doing that but with bitcoin. With all the obvious benefits. Just needs consistent messaging and education. Looking to do something there for the Asian + Southeast Asia scene soon. We are usually 3-5 years behind.