I used to be a gamer. -Console games across the board, although Super Smash Bros was the one I put over a thousand hours into. -For PC, I played a lot of Subspace Continuum, StarCraft I and 2, and Overwatch. I hardly play any digital games anymore, mainly because I work on my computer all day and want to touch grass in my spare time, although I do play Dungeons and Dragons tabletop. View quoted note →

The complicated aspect about the Social Security system in the United States is that it was falsely marketed. It's called an "entitlement" because people pay into it and are supposed to get it back like a pension, regardless of whether they are rich or poor when they retire. And so the Baby Boomer generation views any cuts to their social security as a rugpull, basically. It's not insurance or charity; it's an entitlement. However, although it was marketed as like an entitlement/pension, that's not how the math worked out in practice. And it's because population growth is slowing. It was based on ponzi math, assuming that every generation will be bigger than the one that came before it. But the Baby Boomer generation was huge. In addition, when Social Security was created, the retirement age was set near the average life expectancy. Many people would not live long enough to collect it, and most would collect it for a handful of years. Only a small minority of outliers would work for like 40 years and then live off social security for like 20+ years. But then over the decades, life expectancy increased by like 15 years, so the default assumption is indeed that someone can work for 40 years and then have 20+ years of retirement, even though the amount they pay into it doesn't really mathematically cover that. It's not designed for that en masse. And so Baby Boomers had like a 3.5 worker-to-retiree ratio to support in their peak earnings years, while Millennials will have more like a 2.5 worker-to-retiree ratio or less to deal with. Which means they get a worse deal. Many Millennials don't even think they'll get it at all, despite paying into it. That breaks up the social contract and sets up inter-generational political conflict. "Fourth Turning" stuff. It's a big reason why "defined benefit" plans are inherently unstable; they rely on being able to predict the future. And it's also a big reason why, when speaking about deficits, nothing stops this train.

Sometimes life feels like a parody of itself. View quoted note →

I like the guitar work in this one.

I posted a bunch of evidence on Twitter for how 1) grocery stores have razor thin margins, 2) food producer margins are more average but haven't changed in two decades, 3) of course farmers aren't the ones getting rich so 4) no, the food companies are not gouging you on prices. It's monetary inflation. Grocery stores and food producers are trying to keep up. Most people agree due to the inherent audience selection, but the tweets kind of went viral and reached a broader political audience, so a bunch of people came in like, "How come they can put chips on sale for 50% sometimes!?!? Checkmate Alden." (it's because they don't understand fixed costs vs cost-of-goods sold) or "How do you know any of the filings are real? What if they're literally all just lying on their audited SEC filings?" Post-truth, some of people are. The grasping for price controls is the short-time public and political instinct that ultimately makes things worse, every time.

Kind of.

I’m really bullish on the next six months of Nostr development. I don’t know if it’ll generate user growth in that time period, but I’m more confident that it’ll improve UX and applications, and thus bring in more capital for the next stage, which can then be used for more user acquisition.

If for some reason you were to find yourself in a knife fight, would you rather have a tanto knife or a bowie knife? Any knife connoisseurs here? Serious question though.

Guy Swann has provided an audio version of my long-form article about Nostr. It reminded me that he was another example of someone I paid for non-tipping things using Nostr as the payment discovery mechanism. Guy performed the audio editing for the individual files of my "Broken Money" youtube video. And I paid him for it not by having to ask for his invoice or anything, but rather just by looking him up on Nostr and paying him. Venmo-like payment discovery in an open-source and globally-interoperable way is a big deal in the long run.

Fountain: Podcasts & Music

Bitcoin Audible • Read_839 - The Power of Nostr • Listen on Fountain

"In fact, this is the key feature that re-energized me toward Nostr a second time after my initial experience with it. Bitcoin and Nostr combined t...

I don't think John Wick is a good movie series, but part of me likes them anyway because it's Keanu.

I've solidly become one of those people whose music tastes got locked in during their teens and twenties. So for me that's like 1990s and 2000s rock, or newer bands of the same genre. Does anyone ever deviate from that trend?