A few thoughts - Friday, May 2, 2014

[Steve Sokolowski]

I don't have all that much to say today, both because there simply isn't all that much that is happening and also because I spent my breakfast dealing with personnel problems with my mining pool.

1.

One of our employees, while a good worker, has not been contributing as many hours as the others have. Not only is that going to delay the project because I need to do his work, but also because I have to spend hours discussing with people what to do about it and following up with the employee to come up with a plan.

This reminded me that the most needed skillset in bitcoins right now is not developers, but managers. I wish I could simply hire a CEO to boss people around, keep on top of everyone's performance, interview new employees, determine what features need to be added, file paperwork, and to deal with the public. That way, I can focus on the actual technical work that needs to be done.

As you can see with incidents like Mt Gox, I am not the only one who laments this shortage. This shortage of managers in bitcoins is underreported, and is likely hampering development of the space just as much as a lack of attention to protocol issues is.


2.

Look at what /u/campassi demonstrates in this link (http://imgur.com/a/YzG7K), which compares what happened in July with what happened now. If you believe in the bubble cycle, then this chart indicates right now is the best opportunity you will ever have to invest in bitcoins. History predicts that we will not see this price ever again.

The bubble charts also confirm that, if the pattern holds, this is the last small dip before the slow upswing of this cycle begins.


3.

There is a 1% rule (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1%25_rule ... t_culture)) which states that for every person participating in an Internet community, there are 99 "lurkers" who read posts but do not contribute. I looked at some of the posts yesterday, and there were quite a few that received 30 upvotes (on average).

That means that there were approximately 3000 people who read those posts. To make an upvote, one would have to not only go through the trouble of registering an account, but would also have to click on the upvote button. Keep in mind that these numbers are far higher because people who *downvoted* those posts are also participants, so for all we know, there could be 100 upvotes and 70 downvotes.

I think that more people than we realize read posts here, and the groups of people who move markets aren't stupid. They go everywhere they can to get information, including here. The Chinese government doesn't stay in power by being ignorant of upcoming trends, and Wall Street traders scour the Internet for rumors upon which to trade. While there are certainly other sources of information that these people also consider when making decisions, there is no doubt that a few of the lurkers in this forum are people who have lots of money or lots of power. They see the bubble charts posted by /u/moral_agent and often follow with the herd to make money. And some of the "whales" that people criticize likely check here to see who is on to them and adjust accordingly.

Internet sites are not isolated islands. People can and do find them, and they often don't tell anyone which sites they read.


Days until July 24: 83