yadayada

I can speak for poker, but with poker information usually wasn't so open out there. There are some coaching sites, but they didnt tell everything. There was one guy and he did a certain thing really well and I got coaching from him. But only because the information wasn't freely available. But with investing all the best investors put out their mistakes and best picks out there in painstaking detail. With a lot of other professions you usually want to guard valuable information more closely because it is more a zero sum game. Or it is less a matter of sitting back and thinking, and more a matter of doing it just right in the moment. I think valueinvesting is pretty unique in that regard. I personally think if you don't have that attitude of wanting to read everything you can about it, valueinvesting is probably not for you. You constantly have to read tons of books, articles and boring reports to get better. So if you cannot be bothered to read even the basic books on it, then maybe you should do something else. Probably a very important reason buffett is so succesfull is because he spends so much time reading. The only reason he got mentored by graham was because there was not nearly the same amount of detailed information out there. He had to get it from graham. So yeah start here: http://www.cornerofberkshireandfairfax.ca/forum/books/

A lot of smart people have said that temperament is the most important factor: not more data. In that case, learning from someone else's experience seems like a good way to refine and mature your own temperament, does it not? yeah but almost every good investor out there has written a book or two. Or a lot of letters in buffett's case. Burry's write ups. VIC write ups etc. You don't really need a mentor if you want to go in investing.

what the hell do you need a mentor for with almost all human knowledge at your fingertips with the internet. To pour the skill of investing in your lazy ass without much effort? A better question would be, what books to read.

haha it was at over a billion$ at some point. What the hell is going on there? is it some kind of money laundering sceme or something? People cannot be that stupid.

what have been some outliers? I found this one https://www.google.com/finance?q=OTCMKTS%3ACYNK&ei=HH-rU_i8MumgwwPiuoGQBg A company valued at 700m$ with no assets, no revenue and no website lol. Would also love to hear some the other way around :)

how do the banks play into this. It seems they take almost no risks with mortgages at the moment. Once that picks up again (what could be the catalyst for that?) you should see the housing market pick up? Is this because of the new regulations?

An engineer was crossing a road one day, when a frog called out to him and said, "If you kiss me, I'll turn into a beautiful princess." He bent over, picked up the frog and put it in his pocket. The frog then cried out, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a princess, I'll stay with you for one week and do ANYTHING you want." Again, the engineer took the frog out, smiled at it and put it back into his pocket. Finally, the frog asked, "What is the matter? I've told you I'm a beautiful princess and that I'll stay with you for one week and do anything you want. Why won't you kiss me?" The engineer said, "Look, I'm an engineer. I don't have time for a girlfriend, but a talking frog, now that's cool."

I saw a blind test where they put heinz beans in some brandless tin and in a Heinz tin. They all liked the Heinz tin better. Personally still always pick heinz ketchup, and not another brand. Also Apple? Beats? Bose?

fwiw that briggs meyer test is mostly bullshit and pretty innacurate. I can get different results depending on my mood. It is also not v well respected in the field op psychology and psychiatry.

http://www.beyondproxy.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/paul-lountzis-annual-letter-2013.pdf His letter

No so long ago, the US was losing access to space and had fewer capability than in the 1960s, and costs were ballooning up. The shuttle was out, the replacement might come in years if not decades, and even basic rockets had to have engines made in Russia. Musk comes around, and in a few years, he goes from nothing to potentially having fully reuseable rockets that land vertically on land with costs that are orders of magnitude lower than anything before. That's a necessary, if not sufficient, thing for anything else that follows. He puts the goal of Mars back on a real schedule (not the BS that politicians talk about), and he puts ambition back on the table too (not sending a man there to take a few selfies and come back, but he wants a base there -- which btw isn't all the terraforming stuff you keep talking about). He's likely totally changing the course of space exploration history with his company, and I don't see anyone doing what SpaceX is doing, so if they didn't exist.... It doesn't mean that he'll solve all the problems himself - and nobody but you has been saying that - but he's making a huge difference (likewise in electric cars and solar, btw). DaVinci? That makes no sense to me. In any case, this is enough for me on this topic. I encourage you to read more deeply on SpaceX than mainstream media coverage and see for yourself. I have no doubt that he will send a rocket to mars with humans on it and bring them back. And that is an amazing feature in itself. But in order to have a base there with humans, you will have enourmous expenses to sustain that. You need to bring oxygen there. They cannot stay there for very long due to gravity issues (have to take into account the time travelling to and from mars). And the odds of getting cancer increase every second you are there due to radiation. What the hell are you going to do there? You can only have a few hours a day of exposure in sunlight. The rest is spent sitting in your small and hyper expensive colony while increasing your odds of getting cancer by a lot every day. To sustain all this will be extremely expensive, who will fund it? How do you get that money back? And we have enough room on earth. Why live on some inferior planet (to live on for humans)? What use is that. To say as a back up for nuclear war doesnt make sense. Might as well try to live in the ocean then. Probably costs the same, and at least it is closer to home. And for what? What then? If we really want sustainable life, we need to go to other planets outside our solar system and for that even the most amazing current rockets will not do. You would really need faster then light travel. And I did read more deeply on SpaceX. That is why I came to these conclusions. I mean think about it. If Musk wasnt here and some scientist would make a breakthrough and advances physics enourmously and invent alternative ways to produce a lot of energy or travel faster then light, then we can easily go to space. Without any super efficient rockets.

Well the discussion started out on me asking how musk will make life on more planets then earth possible. I dont think he will do that because you will need a LOT more then just reusable rockets to do that. What will probably happen, we go over there, find out Mars is barely more interesting then the moon, and it will all come grind to a halt. But at least satellites are now a lot cheaper. Untill other fields of science experience break throughs, then we will have sustainable colony's on other planets. I compare him more to davinci. The guy came up with the principle of a helicopter, except the technology to propel it forward wasnt available yet. Was Davinci crucial for the invention of flight? No. Was he awesome and a genius? Yes.

That's somewhat like saying Alexander Graham Bell didn't have a large effect on the internet. True, but someone's gotta lay the foundation or light the spark for further development. Not comparable. Bell invented a entirely new technology. Musk didnt, he just made the current tech better. But current tech is worthless if we want to travel across solar systems. We would need break throughs in physics and not just engineering.. To colonize mars we would need breakthroughs in terraforming, in building very large and sustainable spacecrafts (and the problems with oxygen etc that brings), how to protect from radiation mars and in medical knowledge how to bypass effects of much lower gravity on human body. All things Musk likely wont provide. Again I think Musk is extremely awesome, but people are overhyping this all a lot. Still curious about the things he will do though. He has suprised people before.

Can you imagine how impossible almost all the technologies we use daily sound if you describe them like that? I dare you to look into how a GPS works, with Einsteinian physics and all, not to even mention all the other technologies on which a functional GPS system depends (CPUs, satellites, radio waves, etc) and all the fields of science you need to master to even contemplate creating those (quantum physics, complex material sciences, advanced mathematics, etc). yes but I am not arguing that it will never happen. I am just arguing that Elon musk wont have a large effect on it. But likely some genius einstein like physicist who comes up with a new interesting viewpoint on the laws of physics that would make these things possible. And if that happens we won't need extremely efficient rockets, and look back on them like we look back on steam engines now.

But still, to live on other planets, we don't yet know how gravity affects things, there is almost no magnetic field on mars. So you would have to look outside of the solar system. And I dont think Elon musk is that important to make all that happen. You would need a lot of big break throughs in various scientific fields to make inter solar system travel possible. Just improving the rockets won't cut it. You would need to build a huge space ship that could sustain generations in space, and then also have an effective way to terraform planets somewhat quickly. Or find planets that already have the conditions of earth. But I guess getting a lot of probes and a bit telescope outside in space would improve the odds of finding one of those planets closer to earth. The nearest star is 4.2 light years away. If we travel with 250k km/hour (which would be extremely fast already), it woudl take about 16000 years to get there. So You would need faster then light technology. 9.4 trillion km x 4.2 / 250k/24/365= ~16k correct? You have to 1. assume all computers and sources of power are destroyed. There isn't a single computer with a diesel generator working somewhere? All it takes is a few usb sticks to store all info. And 2. assume that everyone with expertise is killed off everywhere. If that is true, then losing technology would be the least of your worries. If like 500 million people would survive, some computers and some sources of power generation and also some smart people would survive. and also 3. Assume nobody of all the billions of people think of this and print out important information and store it somewhere safe. ALlthough you might get groups that are against tech because of what happened. And religion would probably grow like weed again.

Don't read this book: http://www.amazon.com/Global-Catastrophic-Risks-Nick-Bostrom/dp/0199606501/ well thanks for the recommendation, im going to ignore your advice I think :D But isnt it easier to save information now? In the old days, if the local library burned down, you were screwed.

yeah i read about that. But apparantly that is not possible with current materials. You would need some kind of break through with carbon nanotubes I think. I do think that technological progress will not be linear, but more like an exponential function. There are a lot of smart people saying that the next 20-30 years will make the last 100 years look pale in comparison. Also I am not too worried about the dark ages returning. We have very advanced communication networks to prevent that, that werent present before the middle ages. Even if we run out of oil.

Humanity's practical spaceflight capacity was actually going backwards until SpaceX came around, with prices going up, not down. Better materials and computers from other industries are great, but they don't get you a foot off the ground. What you need are better rockets... yeah but my point is, he is trying to make extremely good steam engines in an airplane to fly to antartica. I think that is a better analogy then columbus going to the americas. No matter how good the rockets, once you get to any planet inside our solar system, living there is not practical and usefull and many times more risky expensive and dangerous then living across the ocean a thousand years ago. With a lot less to gain. Terraforming will take at least a thousand years (so why the rush?). And going to some planet light years away is not feasible with rocket technology, unless you can build a self sustaining space ship. But for that you need to advance many other scientific area's that is outside the control of musk.

Difference between mars and the america's is, with the America's you could actually live there without resources from the other side of the ocean. And there were things of value there. And second, there was not much research done on ships otherwhise, because the incentives werent really there. I really dont think space flight will not be advanced by a lot if Musk wasn't around. We would invent new materials and fuel sources for other industry's that could also be used for space flight. For example very light and strong materials to build airplanes (and also spaceships). There is an enourmous incentive to make breakthroughs there right now. So I seriously doubt spaceflight wouldnt be advanced by a lot without musk. With current technology we could for example not really reach the nearest earthlike planet which is many light years away still. Just playing devil's advocate :) edit: http://www.science20.com/robert_inventor/blog/why_elon_musks_colony_on_mars_in_2020s_is_unfeasible_what_could_we_do_really-134586

yeah i agree that they are doing great things, and I am a fan of the guy. I just wonder why the hell we should bother with going into space besides satellites. And why should we go to mars. Ofcourse it would be great if he would make launching satellites into space cheaper. But other then that? You can only launch small space crafts with our current fuel sources, this isnt like to be improved on much. It takes a v long time to get to another planet. And once you get there, there is really nothing there. For other more practical planets that we could actually colonize, the distance is way further, and it would take years to get there (or possibly much longer). And it would be extremely risky and expensive (even with much cheaper launch costs from earth) So you would need huge spacecrafts to make that possible and practical. I guess one way to build a v large space craft is to build them actually in space or on the moon, and mine asteroids to get hydrogen fuel for them.

Musk doesn't want to go to Mars for the money. He thinks it's good for the human civilization to eventually become multi-planetary, and Mars is #1 on the list of places where a self-sustaining base could be possible. We're not going to terraform the whole planet any time soon, but you have to start somewhere. He's mentioned it many times in interview. I suggest you have a look. yeah but good for human civilization = economic reasons. And to make it cheap and practical, we need a new technological break through. The size of things we can launch into space is limited by our shitty fuel sources we have now. And it is still somewhat risky. If something goes wrong, you are toast. It is not like the work for this new necesairy technology is not being done, as the world is hugely benefited from it if you exclude space flight. His argument is, if nobody does it, then no progress will be made. But Im not so sure about that.

what is on mars that is interesting? You have to build an atmosphere through terraforming (which might not be feasible). And you also need a magnetic field to protect from radiation from the sun right? And I dont think that is currently present on mars? ALso I can imagine that staying on mars for and extended period could be bad for your body given that there is less gravity. Isnt he really using mars for PR reasons? There might be other planets in our solar system that could potentially be more interesting once we learn more about them. But ofcourse if you say you will try to go to these planets, it will sound a lot less interesting to your average person. Just trying to see the economic benefits and payoffs for the risk you are taking.

look out for growing company's that are about to pay dividends in Asia. A lot of these things trade on what they pay out to shareholders. Lot's of stocks with low PE's. And a lot of them could stay low for a long time. But if you find the ones that will have a catalyst in the form of returning capital, you could make v nice returns.

+1, also if they have like publicly traded bonds or something, look for presentations on that. Usually they go more in dept then the average annual report on the business model.

This guy apparantly summarizes new tech break throughs every week. I dont really browse reddit on a regular basis, so just following this guys posts comes in handy then. http://www.reddit.com/user/Portis403