The end of the year is a perfect time to reflect.
2020 was a year of discovery for me, while 2021 has been my year of survival. I got hit with a bunch of challenges and realized that some things need to change.
It was truly a rollercoaster of positive and negative events that I’m still recovering from but I am grateful for all of the support I’ve received.
As I head into the new year, I am going to try to implement the change that I so direly need. And I will definitely continue sharing my life’s journey and the lessons I am learning along the way.
This letter has been very important to me for so many reasons, I appreciate you giving me some of your precious time this year to read my ridiculousness.
I hope it’s been of value to you.
Recovery
Last year, I wrote Goodbye 2020. It was a more brutal piece in response to a President I could not stand and an event I did not yet understand.
This year, I found that my experience on the rollercoaster of life made me more aware of my place in the wider world we all live in.
I took to participating in my life again. I cautiously returned to the world outside of my house.
I tackled some demons and dealt with some strife.
I embraced my new love for the world of finance and investing.
I continued my studies and allowed my desire to understand lead me into new and interesting places.
Finally, I recognized that the ability to distill all of life’s complexity into simple terms that I’ve been chasing all of my life requires some ground rules. And it is this final discovery of the year that leads me into the next…
Some Snapshots of 2021
Almost a 1000 point gain in the S&P 500 this year:
Over 5000 point gain for the Dow Jones Industrial Average:
In America, Covid-19 has infected over 50 million and killed 815,000 people:
The Federal Reserve’s total assets have grown to almost 9 trillion USD:
The Power of UX (Good & Bad)
User experience (UX) is a central component of our modern, digital life. The apps on our phones, the websites we peruse the most often, and the e-commerce stores we buy from are all expected to make “it” easy.
Amazon is probably the biggest example of the power of how good and bad UX appears and controls our lives, or at least mine. I don’t own a Kindle anymore because it was too restrictive, I couldn’t get the fucking YouTube app on that damned device and I’m paying for YouTube Premium so not getting that benefit made this tablet useless to me.
But at the same time, when I shop for anything, I look on Amazon first. Every once in a rare while, I’ll try to check elsewhere but there is no other experience that comes even close to Amazon, their logistics power (especially during a pandemic), and can beat their prices (including shipping).
Sure, I can find a fringe store that may give me a better deal… but those stores are more complicated to traverse, then I have to pay my own shipping and handle my own tracking. Fuck that. And if I have an issue with my order? At least with Amazon, I have multiple methods of remedy.
What is the definition of the user experience?
Well, it’s the overall experience of a person using a website or an app on a smartphone, especially when it comes to ease of use. It’s usually used in the world of software development as an expensive iterative effort of refining existing (and utilized) infrastructure that is derived from a united vision & need.
Crypto UX
Utility is what matters today. In terms of crypto, the things I want to invest in need to have utility.
Think about that credit card you carry: Can it pay for everything, everywhere? Pretty damn close... But not quite. It's not perfect. Why isn't it perfect?
Well, some cards don't work in some areas.
What if the reader can't read your card? How will you pay that bill?
What if your card gets blocked on a holiday or weekend & you can't get it restored? What if they only accept cash? & you're carrying none?
Crypto is like cash in the above scenario, you should have some so you can participate if you so desire. You can't buy most NFTs if you don't have ETH or SOL. NFTs today are pointless IMO, but they won't always be even if just a tiny part of the crypto/metaverse promise becomes true… (more on NFTs in a future letter).
But once you have utility, then what?
UX. User Experience will decide the true victors of the crypto era. Trust me, we will not have millions of coins and NFTs once Crypto matures. Every historical example of human creation proves this. Let’s just remember what the Dot Com era was like:
Every business jumped on the bandwagon of adding “.com” to their business model in order to chase the hype back in the 1990s. But by 2010, was e-commerce the prevalent method of shopping? No, not even close. It would take another decade and a global pandemic to really elevate e-commerce into the mainstream. It took 25 to 30 years after the hype for e-commerce to rise as the primary method of shopping.
How many shopping options do you have online?
If it’s not on this list, then it’s probably a small business e-commerce website that is hosted by Squarespace, Shopify, Wix, GoDaddy, or some other website creation/hosting platform.
That’s not a lot of winners.
So too in the future of crypto, there will only be an extremely small set of long-term mainstream winners. To identify these winners, I am watching how any crypto project/coin/NFT/shit performs in the following stages of development:
Proof of Concept - Ideas and talk are cheap, implementation is expensive.
Utility - Now that you got something that works, why do I need it? What does it do for me and/or for others that I can benefit from?
Adoption - Once it has some use, will people actually go out of their way to use it? Bonus points if it’s hard to use but still gets used, that’s a sign you got something special going on.
Centralization - Alright, people are using it and now they want to provide feedback. They want improvements, they want to complain & be heard, and they want to do it without going out of their way anymore. The developers need to have a vision. They need to invest in it and prevent deviation from their vision. Someone needs to be held accountable.
UX - Okay, so a central party is now in control or at least out of the shadows. Now let’s make it pretty. Let’s add in more features, advantages, and benefits.
Meta - Crypto has finally bolstered the weaker parts of the internet and enabled new businesses to thrive. Just in time too, because the metaverse is here and it’s actually decent. Now, this is where those pointless NFTs will actually be meaningful. The hype paved the way for all of this.
Integration - With the metaverse making the internet tangible and personal, we will want to merge it with our real world in unimaginable ways.
Some crypto projects may flip parts of this blueprint, but I think this is the most natural and likely to happen within the industry that is the blockchain.
Note: We're on the tail end of the Proof of Concept phase and entering the Utility phase as we enter the year 2022.
Here’s What I Think (2021)
I think the worst case could be the best case.
I think inflation is complicated, but by its nature transitory.
I think capitalism can be amazing when everything is priced properly.
I think we need to embrace a moderate approach to governance.
I think apathy is one of the biggest threats we face today.
I think Gross Domestic Product is a bullshit measure of the national production of "valuable" products and services.
I think crypto has promise as an industry but most existing projects/coins will never see long-term, widespread success.
I think SPACulation always points to better trades already in the public market.
I think if you're not participating in the stock market, you're giving yourself a handicap.
All of these thoughts are generalizations that aim to create simplicity amongst the actual complexity that makes up the real world. They are imperfect.
Note: To read more about these thoughts, click the title of this section (see above).
One Final Thing
I enjoyed Hawkeye, and this musical has been stuck in my head for days: