Fred Wilson is being interviewed and the topics will include immigration, regulation 2.0, bitcoin, and a few other things that will be common themes to the AVC community.
I look forward to the conversation on Bitcoin. I have a bit of a theory that it’s Silk Road that’s the primary driver for Bitcoin, along with the investor-minded folks who are playing the game.
Someone on HN the other day suggested having an automatic deflation happen to dissuade investor buying - that it might help. I’m not sure how well that would work, though I think it’s a worthwhile idea to explore if you want the mass consumer to join on; They won’t when cost of entry into market can be $200 USD, yet product and service suppliers don’t match that to real-world pricing - sometimes not even close - mostly because they don’t trust it’s not going to go back down X times before they can spend it themselves, and they can benefit / profit hugely - at least so long as new buyers keep coming in and they keep spending money.
If these factors all remain true though, then there will be a collapse in value - and then you’ll get a rapid buy and increase from investor-minded folks again … and the extreme up/down cycle will continue until either enough people are in the platform (100s of millions possibly), or some mechanism is put in place to limit gambling with BitCoin.
I haven’t been paying attention to Bitcoin until lately - there was no point in analyzing it being so newborn, nor using it until more stable / tested.
I really wonder if it’s a safe currency alternative though. Aside from security breaches / hacks / untraceable stolen money, etc. - if you have to wait for Bitcoin price to come back down so the price of goods in Bitcoin equals the cost of goods in reality, then it’s just too inefficient / inflexible.
Teaching my first private mini-class was overall great. It was very revealing. I’m thankful and fortunate that two friends showed up with relatively little notice - and feel lucky that one friend Meghan was very experienced, and the other friend James was fairly unexperienced. This provided a…
Vine is about forcing creativity and curation of the visual world around us. 6 seconds really limits the amount of content you include in order to tell a simple story. The 140 character limit on Twitter, whether purposeful or not initially, also forces this creativity and simplifying a message to give as much meaning possible in as little space possible.
The ease of content creation in Vine is the initial appeal for the masses. Anyone can be silly and record for 6 seconds. Then those who are or want to be more creative can rise above others, and create more consumable content that’s clever, entertaining, beautiful, fun, etc..
I can only imagine if Twitter had / was able to acquire Instagram. That, plus Vine, and I’d say Twitter would be on their way to helping rapidly kill Facebook; Now Facebook’s death will just be a bit slower, and they may own some more assets that might be worth something.
What would be interesting to see is how much of the content creator market Vine has or will take from Instagram. If you look at the Alexa chart for Vine - it’s impressive. I don’t use Instagram, though I’ve been walking around and noticing glimpses of things in a sequence that would be very lovely to remember and share with others. I’m more of a daydreamer though, and don’t particular waste time with apps - so I don’t have Vine installed, I am thinking I will though - I can see it being something fun, useful, a toy that creates long-term value.
If the stock market is actually using real-life comparisons of competition as part of valuation, then Facebook’s stock really should be dropping from the initial success of Vine. But we all know Facebook’s valuation is ludicrous, and not based on normal metrics — yet the abnormal metrics that I would be valuing a company by, their qualitative reasons, don’t bode well with how Facebook is run and what they have done or are doing.
The battle of the giants has just begun, and it’s exciting - while us disruptors can just play and have fun and watch in the background.
I first watched the video below via Fred Wilson’s post on AVC -
I needed to hear that.
I want to help bring health to everyone in the world. Wellness is the differentiation my business projects are taking, along with the not-for-profit charity I am starting which relates to helping implement a preventative/proactive healthcare system in Canada.
The why is so the things that have happened to me in life don’t have to happen to others; I won’t go into more detail here, perhaps at some point in the future I will write about my experiences, how and what I learned from it all. I hope I give myself this time, at some point, as I think it’s very important to know how someone or something came to be - storytelling - however I have other priorities currently to take care of.
One of those other priorities is I’m starting to teach yoga soon. I did my teacher training two summers ago now, though was too overwhelmed with everything in life to have enough time and focus to start teaching. I am more ready now, and actually teaching a small few-people-invited 90-minute practice class tomorrow, and then will have a full class to teach in a few weekends from now.
The why of this is to improve myself and help me ground more often, as you need to be in your body, calm mind, in order to create and hold a safe space and guide a class; I can see it becoming something very meditative, in more of a functional way - this will come as I trust myself with queuing and get comfortable with timing, etc.. Still scary though, it’s a new role to step into. I will do my best as I always try to do - and perhaps at times use my own queuing of “now breathe here” to take a moment too for myself.
Neomae, a not-for-profit charity I am starting this month, with the help of QBLC, will help implement and test a preventative / proactive healthcare system, starting with subsidizing yoga for individuals - among other things. There’s a local grant foundation, and some potential private business donors too, very interested in what I am doing - so the outlook is good. I have different incentivized systems I’d like to test. It’ll end up providing very important data, which needs to be properly kept track of for an accurate history data set, allow for cohorts, etc.. I hope to create a clear model that can be replicated in expansion test cities, which then could be rolled-out nationally/worldwide; Pretty much mimicking the process I will be using for my business projects — and all of my business projects have a wellness-focus, so the synergy with the metrics and people who will be involved is pretty awesome.
This year should be a great one - how great, I’m excited to find out. I’m more ready than ever to deal with whatever new challenges come my way.
These coming moments are the moments I have been working for and towards for nearly three years now, and it’s all really starting to come together - is shifting in a big way.
I have many people to be thankful for, for their support, their kind and motivational words, and I wish them all the best as I always will.
I know some relationships will deepen immensely this new year, and there will be many new ones formed, cared for and fostered to reach whatever maximum capacity they can hold - and I look forward to each and everyone I meet through serendipity or other on this adventure I’ve chosen to take.
I’m really excited to see who comes along with me on this journey, a mission and goals that I think everyone can be proud to be apart of - and that I hope is something everyone will aspire towards.
Of course I’ll try my best as I always do, though I’m confident now, based on the past, that the future is bright.
Entrepreneur, Life Learner. I've been involved in technology for 18 years. My life has taken me on a path of helping people find wellness and well-being in their own life. @mattamyers
