Theme: Incentives

I DETERMINE BUBBLES BY THE OFFERINGS COMING TO MARKET, MARKETING PROSE, SALES PITCHES, WHO IS SAYING WHAT, AND SO ON – not financial measures.

I use asymmetries of knowledge and value. In other words, I measure by what other people are NOT measuring. (This is also what soros does.) Why? Because markets head toward disequilibrium then correct during shocks. The harder the currency the less disequilibrium before corrections. The looser the currency the more disequilibrium before corrections. The problem with the current monetary system is that we cannot insure sectors experiencing shocks without increasing the disequilibrium of the unaffected sectors. Although I know how to fix that it’s not a good thing.

Someone just showed me a NYC tech fair. I follow most of the new product blogs and sites. I mean, the major players are total f-ck ups (microsoft, and apple). The near monopoly of advertising between fb and google is creating a regulatory certainty that will define the next generation. And amazon is doing more damage to the local economies than did the generations of department stores, then malls, then big box stores – and creating tax and monopoly problems there too.

Meanwhile we have $2M ranch houses in SF, the catastrophic failure of large numbers of tech companies, and all tech innovation seems to be nothing but fashion redecorating of the past generation of applications combined with marketing.

Meanhile underinvestment in infrastructure, underinvestment in improving business software, and overinvestment in tablets and handhelds continues.

I have been predicting this crash and the long term consequences forever. I said that the crash would happen in 08, that the effects would last through 14, that we would have another correction around 17, and that we would see a generational upheaval in 2020 to 2025. I was really, really wrong on china. I still don’t freaking understand china. I just don’t know how they are getting away with it. It must be so much more hugely inefficient a system with so much excess but willingly desperate labor that I can’t model it in my head.

So as far as I know, this is going to suck.

My hope is that we get a trifecta of the economy, overseas warfare, attempted impeachment, or maybe zuckerberg running for president, and that this combination creates sufficient anxiety to demand a revolution.