mockingbirdy

Had this exact situation. Turned to drugs. Lived like a GTA character. That’s unsustainable, similar to luxury vacations which turn dull. Now I‘m finding investors for curing MS with a team of researchers who‘ve built sth that is more accurate than CRISPR to cure my sister. I actually want to get in contact with Sergey Brin about that because we might have something interesting for him - but my American contacts are only connected to Musk and people like a Polygon founder and music/hollywood people. This is not a psychotic or exaggerated message, I‘m sure HN can vet us (@dang) and get us contacts, currently I‘m talking to family offices in Saudi Arabia. About meaning: if you get bored, aim for bigger positive impact.

paper: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29857928/

short: We have a rigorously validated antigen-specific immune tolerance platform with bystander suppression, NIH/MS Society backing and a clear translational gap.

> There's a breaking point of widespread democratized (runnable by like 1-5 people, or a small community) technology where these companies don't have the same ability to absorb all these gains

That is actually a technological solution for a societal problem that I see as a way out:

A device that produces food, water, energy and does sanitation for a family of 4-5 people. This device would make it possible to give families higher leverage in any negotiation because they can not be forced to work for survival. We have the tech, only limiting factor is the size, but we will find a way.

- Solar Foods [1] (Protein production with CO2 and solar energy with a fermentation process)

- Omni Processor which recycles human waste [2]

- Tiger Toilet [3]

- Low cost waste water treatment [4]

- And potato production in a small vertical setup

[1]: https://solarfoods.com

[2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tdlqjGlN3A

[3]: http://www.easol.in/tiger-toilet-overivew

[4]: https://www.tbfenvironmental.in

Here's [1] a data analysis looking into the phenomenon: "Professionals with higher cognitive ability drop out of STEM careers earlier and faster", "High-ability workers are faster learners, in all jobs. However, the relative return to ability is higher in careers that change less, because learning gains accumulate"

[1]: https://whoisnnamdi.com/never-enough-developers/

Your operation is amazing, mobilizing air fright is massive. I'll definitely write you, we'll try what we can to support although we're much smaller.

I'm part of a team that does (very small-scale compared to the big NGOs) logistics (food, clothing, baby stuff, hygiene, everything) and provides/mediates shelter in the North East of Germany and sending food, first aid kits and medical supplies to the borders/directly to Ukraine with the supplies and support of the people of the city I'm living in (I'm managing one of the provisional warehouses). We have bus companies driving people and other things.

If you'd like to work together, I'd love to talk. Petrol has become pretty expensive, so pooling resources makes a lot of sense.

95% of everything is logistics. Fully agree with the quote.

I've used nearly the same code for years with a trampoline function (JMP instruction instead of simply writing the code right there), so not too sure about it being a new technique. In my opinion, CreateRemoteThread is the function that usually triggers AVs and injecting code into processes is the suspicious part.

Would love to read more about this because my understanding is that the increase in M2 money supply is a big part of the current inflation (very simplified - it's way more complex when looking at money velocity and supply chains in general).

> If I decide in the future (perhaps once my account is to that 50-100M range) that the site is more of a liability for me than an asset, I may close it, with or without grandfathering.

I'd like to offer to take care of it and manage all aspects of it if you ever get annoyed by it. These algorithms are life-changing and the more (and especially lower income) people have access to them, the better.

You talk in plural form, but I can only find information about you on the page. With this kind of alpha, I'd expect a team of quant traders and physicists working on it (I actually talked with the creator of alphahub.us, he's a physicist). Are you intending to work full-time on it and what are the other plans (I saw you started a job at a new company)? Not trying to be skeptical, but this could be something life-changing if it works - already pretty hyped tbh.

The alphahub.us strategy has execution problems because some of the smaller companies in the NASDAQ have low trading volume, so it doesn't scale as easily as a macro strat. I've talked with people who run it and it runs into scalability issues even with limited amounts of capital. Still trying to find the catch with your offer because it looks amazing.

The performances of the models are almost unbelievable. I only saw something similar with alphahub.us in the past (but higher max. drawdowns) - what do you think of them?

I'm interested in running the Gold Plan, are there any resources on how to set up a fully automatic trading system with it? I'd love to connect.

For sales: After attaining product-market fit and everything becoming more stable, it’s all about sales. Software development in the growth stage turns into an endless grind of features and bug fixes and is regularly seen as simply a cost. Sales is the mechanism that allows the business to get new customers, so this is something which has a higher impact in the growth stage.

For finance: Managing finance and deals is one of the most important aspects in any business. You can make the same money compared to tech without a ceiling and I’m personally interested in economics and financial topics.

Both have a quantifiable aspect (deal/fund size, new revenue/customers) that makes it easier to measure your impact on the business. This means that it’s easier to get a fair compensation - although bad performance will get noticed easily, too. And the knowledge in these areas compound, especially in sales.

On a personal note, I’m interested in psychology and economics and can build connections with others quickly, so these two fit quite well and I'm convinced that sales and finance are important ingredients for any type of work (philanthropic included).

Best of all worlds would be to build a MVP using software development skills until product-market fit is reached, then being able to grow customers using sales skills and then supporting further growth with external capital and managing an exit using finance skills. - In reality, these are all separate roles, but I'd like to be able to work in these other two areas, too.

> But if I was in my 20s or early 30s, I'd be looking to leave tech entirely and go into something else where experience is actually appreciated and valued.

I'm in my 20s and think about this a lot although I already moved to management (with a lot of software development, still) as well.

There's a great article [1] analyzing this problem (quotes from the article: "Professionals with higher cognitive ability drop out of STEM careers earlier and faster", "High-ability workers are faster learners, in all jobs. However, the relative return to ability is higher in careers that change less, because learning gains accumulate").

Knowledge depreciates a lot faster in software development than many other fields. That's why I really think about going into finance or sales (still fast-paced), but attending expensive top business schools and starting as an analyst with a low salary again is pretty rough after already building my current skillset. Currently feel a bit stuck with my career options right now. Money's still good and the work is fun, but working in a field that is set up to be a grinding mill as an IC is not an entertaining thought. High-tech projects will still be fun, I guess, but still definitely something to consider. Specializing early on may mitigate this.

[1]: https://whoisnnamdi.com/never-enough-developers/

I know crypto millionaires that had to show their e-mails to the tax officers to show which addresses were used for getting paid. I really hope you're right.

It's still very young. If crypto gets relevant adoption, it'll be impossible to discern legitimate transactions from illegitimate ones. If it's technologically impossible, you can have all the laws you want - you're not able to enforce them. People will have their official wallets for tax collection and their anonymous ones for everything else (and will do their main transactions with them).

> buying things directly with crypto will become more widespread

I'm expecting this to be the case if adoption happens.

Because you can't know how much the person really has (edit: and receives) with crypto. Historically, you could simply walk to their properties and look at their wealth and tax accordingly (like serfs getting taxed on their agricultural output based on the land size they worked with). Or you could look at their bank accounts or (like the Panama papers) find their off-shore accounts.

But now, they can hide enormous wealth in an untraceable way on many wallets. It's not entirely new - tax evasion is as old as taxes - but it's easier and accessible now for large wealth that was more difficult to hide in the past. If crypto stays legal, you can't control this aspect.

> But when you stop and think about it for a sec you realize that we need intermediaries or else the richer will become unstoppable kings with control that cannot be deflated.

I agree. This is something that I'm not sure people who go into crypto fully understand with the resulting consequences. The FED is basically printing money and I can understand people who don't agree with the inflationary mechanism that is built into fiat currencies - this is one of the main criticisms of the fiat system because it's debt-based.

On the other hand, having no means to get taxes (because of anonymous currencies like Monero and anonymous wallets) and having no control over the currency is a safe way to a plutocracy. Some would argue that we're already living in a plutocracy, but currently we have democratic ways to intercept (although we're currently not good at exercising that power). But if it's technologically impossible to intervene, there's not a lot of ways to fix this.

Good article about this [1].

[1]: https://medium.com/@dionyziz/blockchains-are-inherently-plut...

> For me, it’s something new and interesting.

Same for me. I'm programming Web3 and Solidity contract interactions. It's just refreshing to have a new aspect (contracts and money) that you can easily interact with now.

I agree with the comments condemning the resource consumption. I also see big problems with the resulting loss of control over currencies that governments could face. I'm trying to be a part of this development because if it doesn't go away, these systems could be a defining part of the future. But if I'm honest, I'd like crypto in most of its current form to go away - it's very likely that it can damage democracies and we're currently already busy saving our democratic processes from social media, inequality and manipulation. Maybe crypto has a solution to these problems, but currently I'm not convinced. I've talked to founders of the biggest crypto currencies and the vision of most of them is highly anarchistic and idealistic (a DAO as a government replacement, taxes will be paid in a voluntary form or something like that) which makes me deeply sceptical. But maybe that's just me being uncomfortable that a multi-billionaire is explaining to me how he wants to change how the world is governed.

Thanks for the tip with Poland and Ukraine! Do you have a link for a good AFF training provider? I found this one [1] which looks good.

[1]: https://tandemy.pl/en/training-parachute-jump/

> keeping my possessions to what can fit in two suit cases

I really want to do that as well while learning piano. Any recommendations for articles / checklists for people who want to live like this? Minimalism while having music gear seems hard. I'd love to do it with just one backpack, already did 3 week travels that way (but without musical instruments) but didn't have the opportunity to try it for longer periods of time with a complete setup.

Thinking about living in portugal as well.

> Did the basic training and looking forward to start jumping in wingsuit next year

Nice! Thought about paragliding too, but decided I like the action of flying in a wingsuit more. Booked my first tandem skydiving jump and will start the basic training in 2022. In Germany we're only allowed wingsuit jumps when we complete 200 normal jumps, do you know if there's a jurisdiction where this requirement is lower?

Love this response!

> having >5h of free time a day is detrimental to happiness

Experienced this first hand, so true! Didn't know about the shorter live expectancy. Thanks for linking to the sources :)

Hey prelifecrisis, I’m from Germany too and I have some friends who experienced windfalls in the 2-10 million range (some of them in crypto, some of them selling their businesses). I can connect you to them so you have trusted people to talk to in Germany that have lived through exactly the same stuff. I think talking to others who experienced this who can relate is really important (with friends and family it’s usually not necessarily useful advice). I see a ton of not-that-useful advice in this thread already.

> I have no idea what to do with the money.

Set aside €50k that you spent freely on whatever you want for half a year (for traveling, small things you always wanted to have). Put it in another bank account and live with it for half a year and have fun. Maybe take a break semester (Urlaubssemester), especially if you feel low right now.

Don’t do anything with the remaining money for the next 6-9 months - just hold fiat (I’d suggest holding CHF instead of Euro/USD), don't worry about inflation - it's about you now. Don’t spend it on luxury items to fill any holes you might feel inside right now. Then after that time you can still invest in conservative assets and real estate, but now it's about you and your well-being. - I really don't like the comments here talking about the money and what to do with it, please don't listen to it. It's secondary to your situation.

> And I also have no idea what to do with my life now.

> I start to feel fatigued

The fatigue is most likely happening because your mind is enumerating all the life options - it's working very hard right now and that's why you're feeling down. Before the windfall, it was all focused on building a startup and getting successful which is a very clear goal. Now that you've attained wealth, you’ve lost the clear goal you’ve had before.

Now that you have enough money, you are left alone with the question that most success-oriented people would rather avoid: Who am I? What’s my motivation for doing things? What do I really want? I really like the waitbutwhy articles to help with that [1].

Let me know if you want to connect, these friends of mine are really great and have battled with the exact same questions. It's not easy to find people who can relate to this situation, most non-millionaires can't imagine the tension the money brings to relationships with friends and family and stuff like that. Trust issues etc.

[1]: https://waitbutwhy.com/2018/04/picking-career.html

There are some studies which reveal possible connections between wealth, compassion and how generous people are. [1] and [2] for articles about studies like [3]. I see some shortcomings in some of the studies (looking at drivers of luxury cars is not informative about all types of wealthy people, just the ones who care about spending it this way which self-selects a certain kind of person), but I think that the general direction could be informative for more research. There are also studies about cognitive costs of empathy [4] which may relate to this.

[1]: https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/wealth/save/why-poor-pe...

[2]: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-wealth-reduce...

[3]: https://www.pnas.org/content/109/11/4086.short

[4]: https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/xge-xge0000595.pd...

You can mount SFTP with Mountain Duck [1], from the creators of Cyberduck. Costs around $40.

[1]: https://mountainduck.io

> The majority of the western world's economic output is collecting rents

Would love to read more about this, do you have any links?

I don't think that people experiencing racism have "surrogate adversity", but I can certainly relate to the general notion. I've "struggled" with this because I too had no "real" adversity in life and people like some greek philosophers and Nietzsche put adversity into their centre of attention. I'm convinced that sometimes, people just get hurt by adversity without any advantages later on. It’s also perverse to think that the pain serves a kind of purpose, it justifies an extremely toxic and abusive mindset. If it happens and you can grow from it - that's wonderful. But it should never be used as an excuse to do harm or to endure abusive situations, especially if the abusers are using this kind of narrative.

It seems that some dogs are even able to learn to communicate via sound buttons [1]. Maybe that's interesting if you have smart dogs, might be a good way to better understand their needs.

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LQt5TCHq6E

This is the kind of inefficiency that startups can use to get ahead of established competitors. So don't be sad, this is just a reminder to be an entrepreneur.

As a college dropout myself, this really makes me think about continuing my degree. What did you answer to Google and others who grilled you?

This. I've realized years ago that the current fiat system can be unsustainable because it's very hard for regulators to avoid the temptation of applying QE and other monstrosities. But I realized way too late that BTC is the vehicle to flee from that (in a simple way compared to moving physical assets across borders).

It already succeeded in helping rich people in China to bring their wealth out of control. This has maximum utility for a lot of people. I'm not sure what will come after the current financial system (and it most probably won't go anywhere and will co-exist for some years before crypto will be banned everywhere), but this new type of wealth transfer mechanism already gets used a lot. Everyone who distrusts the current financial system or is oppressed by their regime is interested in it.

I don't know how the world will look like (it'll probably be very hard to continue the current path because capital has found a new way to move across borders and avoid taxes, again) and I don't know if it's generally good for global society, but Pandora's box is open.

I agree with the energy discussion and that it's wasteful, but the utility of it (transacting without governmental permission) seems to be higher for the participants. And they don't care about its socioeconomic impact, they care about its utility for them (money for miners and speculators who keep BTC's value high and the network functional, permissionless transaction for the actual target audience / users of BTC). BTC was built for permissionless money transactions, the speculation is just a byproduct and everyone is focusing on it instead of looking at its actual value for its users.

edit for the sibling comments: You need BTC only to move your assets from one country/wallet to another. You can then move it to a stable coin like USDC and slowly and safely get it out of the crypto system without having to deal with the volatility. This takes you half an hour and you're done. It's currently an investment vehicle, but its utility comes from being able to get money from A to B regardless of government intervention. Even if BTC drops to $3k, it still has this value. Looking at the price of BTC is missing the point: it's more than $0 and you can do a transaction in 10 minutes and that is all that matters to move assets.