Pelagic

Think "The Hunger Games" and go from there ;) I think you addressed the crux of the problem, coming up with a metric for "effectiveness" is hard. Attempts at standardized grade level testing have met with a lot of resistance from teachers, students and parents despite being a relatively straightforward quantitative assessment of a student's progress and in a roundabout way, a teacher's capabilities. While I probably would have supported them had I had to deal with them as a student, end of grade assessments clearly aren't the right standard to judge all students or all teachers and fall short of measuring many of the other factors that compose an effective education system. I think in this case cloning is the right strategy. There are thousands of education systems out there, cherry pick what works best and hope the end result melds together. Unfortunately, education systems tie into the broader economy more than one might expect so isolating an effective education system is harder than it looks because most that appear "effective" are showered with money from wealthy tax bases and traditionally more involved parents. I don't know enough real world examples where I could point to an education system and say look their ROI is great they're able to put together a quality education system with relatively scarce funds and little waste although I suspect there are some examples of this and it's where I would start looking to clone. If we try to come up with a metric like dollars spent per graduating student we also have to determine if "graduating" is actually worth something, so you have a high school diploma, now what? Perhaps identifying something that correlates with student success like teacher:student ratio and then optimizing the system for that and hoping you can come up with a metric to asses the teachers is best. I say this coming from public high school where classes were often 30-40 people and teachers were obviously overwhelmed and then transitioning to a private university with small class sizes and plenty of TAs to help out, the difference was like night and day. One thing my hypothetical system would include is a hard check on a students grade level progression. Pushing students to the next grade without them demonstrating proficiency in subjects just widens the gap and discourages them. If they're reading at a 5th grade level but are a 10th grader don't force them into the class their age says they should be in. It doesn't have to be an end of grade assessment, perhaps every 2 or 3 years is better but having students demonstrate a level of proficiency in subjects before advancing them has always seemed like the right idea to me. Still let them graduate but have something like a college transcript that allows employers or continuing education institutions the ability to determine where they got in high school. This removes some of the aura of a diploma and allows for a more nuanced assessment of each student.

Even Democrats wouldn't be caught dead voting for that in an election year. It's being sold as a tax on evil oil companies but who really pays the cost? American consumers. It's a regressive tax on working families who would be hit the hardest, taxing a commodity they need every day to commute or heat their homes isn't how you win votes. People might claim to support green initiatives but at the end of the day they usually vote with their pocket book. Clean energy and transportation will have its day, tossing taxpayer money at uneconomical "green" ventures that don't scale or have a prayer of competing with established foreign producers isn't the way forward.

Thanks for starting this, interesting topic. Do you have a relationship with other hard money lenders whom you can refer business to and vice versa when you can't make a loan yourself? How much time/effort on your part is the paperwork end of the business? What's the most interesting thing someone has asked to loan money for?

I think more of you guys should check out Venmo. For transactions in the $100s of dollars range that you'd normally use cash for it's great - direct bank transfer between parties with no fees, quick and efficient. Venmo cautions against using it for paying merchants but between friends and friends of friends its perfect for transactions. Frankly I have no idea how they make any money and was kinda concerned they're not going to be around much longer but PayPal bought them so we're good - hopefully. With a lot of banks offering check deposit through their mobile apps now checks might see a come back in lieu of cash or cards, makes it actually pretty easy for both parties involved, assuming the checks are good and the parties trust each other.

Or perhaps people are better at statistics than they realize. Expected value of a ticket for a 40 million jackpot is quite low since the odds of winning remain the same, as the jackpot increases the value of the ticket increases as well to the point where it's close to the $2 of the ticket or even above it whereas lower jackpots offer a worse proposition.

Is there a 2016 return thread? :'( By the looks of the poll the first week of 2016 knocked out most of 2015's gains, at least for me it did. Hey, years are an arbitrary measuring stick anyways buy and hold forever right?

Anyone else see this? http://www.economist.com/news/middle-east-and-africa/21685529-biggest-oil-all-saudi-arabia-considering-ipo-aramco-probably Could be an interesting investment opportunity depending on how much negative sentiment still exists when/if they decide to IPO.

Wouldn't Iran have more to lose than to gain from attacking the Kingdom? It can be certain that the nuclear deal wouldn't be dropped. It's all about influence. An Iran - Iraq style conventional war with Saudi Arabia is unlikely IMO. But if Iran can chip away at Saudi Arabia's influence across the Middle East - Yemen, Iraq, Syria etc. Then Iran's is winning. I think Iran recognizes their best shot at Saudi Arabia comes from encouraging internal dissent and exposing the Saudi regime, they'd like for nothing more than another Arab Spring style awakening in Saudi Arabia. If when it happens Saudi forces are engaged in counterinsurgency operations across the ME, so much the better.

http://en.farsnews.com/newstext.aspx?nn=13941012000529 I'm not sure how accurate these figures are but it's hard to imagine SA being able to sustain these kind of casualties much longer. Perhaps "Saudi-led" means Yemeni forces friendly to SA in this instance. The conflict does seem larger than I would have guessed though, I don't think I've seen any coverage of it recently in western media. Where are Yemeni forces receiving these missiles from and who's providing the training to operate them? Iran?

Ted - Here is a searchable database of public companies by geographic location: http://www.atlasofpublicstocks.com/ It was created by Miguel Barbosa who is familar to many in the value community. Alex That is a fascinating interactive map, thank you for sharing.

I too have trouble understanding KSA's actions in regards to executing the cleric. They knew it would piss off Iran and other Shia groups that they're currently fighting but perhaps more importantly, it makes it harder for the US and other western "allies" to support them. Why not keep him in a dark hole somewhere, I just don't see what they gain from taking a hardline stance on this. I've kind of avoided incorporating the powder-keg in the ME into my oil investment thesis, if something happens then oil will probably spike but it's such a wild card I'd rather look at the situation without it. However, I think several posters in this thread have made a point I tend to agree with, there are a lot of groups who would benefit from an attack on SA's oil infrastructure that are also capable of executing such an attack. These groups run the spectrum from Iran and Russia to Yemeni rebels to ISIS, will the US pull security duty over SA's oil infrastructure if an attack happens to prevent a repeat and protect the global flow of oil?

The theoretical elevator would get you to geosynchronous orbit, 22,000 miles which would be anchored over a point on Earth, from there going anywhere in the universe is a lot easier than if you're starting on Earth. As a general rule of thumb, about 90% of a rocket's weight is fuel used to escape Earth's gravity. If you can skip this step with a space elevator, coil launch track, high altitude balloon platform or some other method, you can put a lot more stuff into space and use the fuel to start them in the right direction rather than use 90% of your fuel to just get off Earth. Maneuvering in space requires significantly less fuel than fighting gravity and to a smaller extent, Earth's atmosphere.

Space elevators are probably a non-starter, neat idea though. You'd have "anchor" it in geosynchronous orbit (22,000 miles) while low earth orbit is quite a bit closer for example the ISS is at about 250 miles. You can't exactly ride the elevator up to the LEO floor and hop off either since you need horizontal speed to stay in orbit. If I were forced to bet on our next path to orbit after chemical rockets it would be a very long coil "gun" up the side of a mountain at the equator. Chemical rockets will probably still be our only ticket off this rock for the next couple decades though which is why getting their cost down is such a monumental achievement. With current technology you are correct a space elevator is not possible. I think you will see one in your lifetime however. The rail gun method will only work for cargo, never for humans. The acceleration would kill you. A coil gun is a series of railgun, each providing acceleration which could be scaled to achieve the necessary velocity over a long track theoretically making the acceleration survivable for cargo and humans. One thing everyone who's a proponent of space elevators seems to miss is this. They require an extraordinary amount of engineering and materials science to construct on Earth. If we're to the point where constructing one is a possibility, why not just build it on the moon where construction and design requirements would be orders of magnitude easier and then just use lunar resources for construction.

Space elevators are probably a non-starter, neat idea though. You'd have "anchor" it in geosynchronous orbit (22,000 miles) while low earth orbit is quite a bit closer for example the ISS is at about 250 miles. You can't exactly ride the elevator up to the LEO floor and hop off either since you need horizontal speed to stay in orbit. If I were forced to bet on our next path to orbit after chemical rockets it would be a very long coil "gun" up the side of a mountain at the equator. Chemical rockets will probably still be our only ticket off this rock for the next couple decades though which is why getting their cost down is such a monumental achievement.

I like this explanation to an extent. However, even level-headed voters don't really have the option of picking candidates issue by issue. In our two party system you're forced to pick a side if you want to participate, even if you only agree with your side on 50.0001% of issues. An extension of this is how our debates center around individual leaders and their character (or lack thereof) rather than focusing on the merits of policy in regards to current issues, you're electing the individual and their stance on things is something in the background we're vaguely aware of. Once you support a candidate you are seen as supporting their position on all issues, there is no room for nuanced stances. It's funny how the author of that quote seems to portray humans as having passed this point in our history though. While you might not be killed or imprisoned, there are still massive rewards for being on the winning side, why else would businesses give so much to political campaigns.

Would you mind elaborating a little on the last point, I love hearing examples of investors getting involved in startups. If you'd prefer not to share specifics that's fine and I understand. It seems Angel investors come in two types if they decide to be hands on. Some focus on providing access to a network of professionals (lawyers, accountants, tech experts, other investors etc.) that the entrepreneurs can benefit from. The other group is more hands on, particularly if they're investing in a field they're passionate about or have experience in, and takes an advisor role to the founders. I've always thought this was an interesting facet of Angel investing that you don't really see in other fields, I guess it is kind of an ego thing like you said but it's also a chance to shape the company as it grows. Not that Angels don't bridge both of these types sometimes or choose to be completely hands off and just provide funding.

I don't think anyone ever claimed the jet in question was attacking ISIS. Rather the Russian's were likely conducting air strikes on anti-Assad rebels that Turkey supports which supports the shoot down in this instance when other airspace violations have been handled with less aggression. Russia was bombing Turkey's allies and they took the shot to get payback for it when they were technically within their rights to do so. The more I learn about the conflict in Syria and Iraq the more I think ISIS is just the tip of a much larger iceberg of regional instability that Russia and the West are going to wrestle over for some time to come. To the broader point of regional instability of late, I think it's useful to at least know of the Sykes-Picot agreement that essentially created the modern Middle East following the breakup of the Ottoman Empire. Basically French and British diplomats drew lines on the map, completely ignoring existing tribal divisions in the region and the advice of their own personnel in the region like T.E. Lawrence, and we're stuck with those lines today. The only reason we haven't seen this kind of chaos in the region in the past few decades is dictators like Saddam and Assad held things in check with their own brand of terror. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sykes–Picot_Agreement

I wish I had the time still for strategy games, I used to love playing the Age of Empires and Command and Conquer series. I think the last game I played with any regularity was PlanetSide 2 which I really enjoyed. It did a good job bridging the gap between FPS and team based strategy game, you can learn a lot about group dynamics trying to coordinate 100+ people in that game. As far as board games go I'm surprised no one has mentioned Risk.

Thank you, that was a great read. I particularly liked this philosophy, it would be great if more businesses encouraged their employees to think like this.

I find his rhetorical answer a little odd here. Most of us spend the majority of our lives being consumers of goods and services. Competition is an ideal state - for the consumer. Companies are thrown into a cage match and told the winner will have our business, Thiel's example of the airline industry is perfect in this case. Airlines have competed themselves down to nothing with the victor being the consumer who can easily find cheap flights from multiple different airlines. So while competition may produce middling results for companies, it produces excellent results for consumers who benefit from more choices, lower prices and the ability to take their business elsewhere if they feel one company has mistreated them.

I'll second ToS, I don't use TD as my brokerage but love their platform for options analytics. Takes some getting used to but once you're familiar with it there's very little it can't do and their support staff is amazing and will promptly answer just about any question you have.

It's interesting how we're all products of our time. The argument that labor has little power over business owners with whom it negotiates seems straightforward enough and resonates well with most people today. In the current economic climate we all know someone who has been laid off in the past few years or may have even had it happen ourselves. Events like the financial crisis, the great depression etc. tend to stick in our collective memory and reinforce the idea that labor exists at the whim of business owners. I'd argue that we're blinded by the memory of these events making it hard to see the times when labor, not business owners, was in the driver's seat. Labor shortages during WWII for instance played a major role in bringing women into the workforce and throughout the 1950s the growing economic climate put skilled labor in high demand. Even today, skilled or specialized labor in many industries can command a premium having multiple companies vying for a single individual. My point is simply that it is wrong to assume that labor is always subservient to business owners. Our goal should not be employment for the sake of employment but rather to reach a point where labor is scarce because the engine of our economy is firing on all cylinders powered by a multitude of efficient companies a goal which I believe Icahn and others like him share.

Maybe I should try to persuade my wife to get VC funding then. She +1 are working on website kinda in Vistaprint area part-time, not funded. Might not be world changing billion-user-chat-app enough... I think a lot of it has to do with a self reinforcing culture of high valuations for startups. If founders have success and are bought out by another company, they take their "winnings" and often become angel investors or VCs themselves. Thus, they're more willing to pay high multiples because they had success at those multiples themselves. Anecdotally, I was having a discussion with a tech VC and they said the goal of companies they invest in is for them to be bought by someone else while expanding user base, profitability was irrelevant. Investors, at least some, are content to sacrifice profitability for the metrics that "matter" to other investors like users essentially transferring the onus of successfully monetizing the underlying product on to the next group of investors. While it makes sense from the perspective of early stage investors and founders, a company can't grow users forever while operating at a loss. That said, I think it's hard to generalize if the industry as a whole is in a bubble. Some products probably are worth their valuations while the valuations of others benefit from the rising tide the best companies create. On a personal level, I find it difficult to reconcile value investing with the mindset of investors involved in startups, it's like two different worlds speaking a completely different language.

No, no no, it would be too difficult to go from truck to truck that way if it were on wheels. The autonomous refueling drone aircraft hovers above it matching its speed, attaches to it, and refuels it on the highway. Then moves on to the next truck. The road will be covered in solar panels with wireless charging stations imbedded in it at intervals which the truck will pass over keeping its battery charged without ever needing to slow down. It will be like hitting a power-up in Mario Kart.

If driverless trucking becomes a thing (I think it will eventually) we'll likely see a network of service stations that trucking companies pay to care for their trucks while they transit each stations region. So if the truck breaks down or needs gas, the station for that region provides the maintenance if required. That way you have a small human workforce servicing all the trucks passing through their area, most are probably fine to just keep on going but if one needs anything, they're there to take care of it. On the security discussion, what makes you think truck drivers today are so keen to defend their cargo. I don't think they get paid enough for that and the carrier has insurance for that occurrence. A self-driving truck should have minimal down time while on the road so security is even less of an issue since looting a semi doing 70 on the highway is the stuff of Fast and Furious movies.