Post: #1

After some reading yesterday, here are some thoughts I've been having. I'm not any kind of expert in crypto, but do have a finance and trading background and very familiar with markets in general. I find investing in anything often follows the same core principles. Think about these 3 points:

1. Investing in Bitcoin is not investing in blockchain. Bitcoin might bring the tech to the forefront, but probably won't end up on top. I'm seeing Bitcoin almost like the blockchain's version of Napster. Napster changed the game completely - Napster almost single handedly imploded the CD industry - but it didn't end up on top! We don't really want to be invested in Napster, we want to be invested in iTunes, Spotify or even Pirate Bay.

2. Next point: Although Napster "died", the people behind it didn't. One rule that served me well in investing is this: Good people never run out of good ideas. If we follow on from the Napster analogy, it's not actually Napster we want to invest in but Sean Parker himself. After Napster, Parker went on to be heavily involved in both Facebook and Spotify - two more huge companies that changed the game. Follow the brains and you can't go wrong.

3. When it comes to people in new tech, we want young people, not just smart people. Vitalik Buterin is an example. Buterin is 23! He grew up in the tech age, he has a healthier perspective on tech than us, he is not caught up in the "good old days". These are the ones that dominate these new technologies. Moreover, your twenties is when you have the brain power and energy to put in 18 hour days and build great things. Let's not forget that Warren Buffett, the king of the stock market, passed on Facebook, Amazon and Google, because he "didn't like internet companies". Those are now the biggest companies in the world. All three are worth more than Berkshire today. He missed the boat. It's going to be the same for investors who "don't like blockchain companies". Buffet spent 60+ years amassing a $70 billion fortune, Zuckerberg caught up to him in less than ten. The new blockchain billionaires will do it in less than 2. Follow the young brains and not the old ones.

My point is: When investing I find it better to follow the good people rather than the good ideas. Rather than study the whitepaper, study the people behind the whitepaper. Study the people who have already read it and like it. They're smarter than you and have already done the hard work.

My question is: Who should we be following?

Post: #2

Obviously Vitalik Buterin is one - who's involved in Ethereum, Kyber, OMG. I've already got holdings in all 3.

Post: #3

Justin Sun is another guy I like, who founded Peiwo and TRON, which Jack Ma is also backing now. I'm interested to see what project he shows support for next.

Post: #4

Vlad Zamfir and Joseph Poon come to mind. Both extremely intelligent, very young, and have done very important work (Vlad on developing Proof of Stake for Ethereum and Poon on Lightning Network for Bitcoin and Plasma for Ethereum).

Some guys who are a bit older: Joe Lubin, CEO of Consensys, which is developing a lot of dApps on Ethereum. Gavin Wood, who was instrumental in launching Ethereum, I believe the man has a PhD in Computer science and worked at Microsoft Research. And Nick Johnson, who has been working on the ENS system for Ethereum.

Post: #5

Nick Szabo, Bram Cohen

Post: #6

Joseph Poon is the guy involved in OMG right? Another reason to invest in that coin.

Post: #7

Dan Larimer.

i find him to be built from the same genius mold as vitalik in terms of raw intellect and vision. already has not 1 but 2 successful projects under his belt, built out steem within 2 years and it did everything he said it would, and surrounds himself with other hot shit talent like brock and ian. when the dust settles on cryptos within the next few years, he'll still be here, delivering real solutions to actual problems. his contributions are so ahead of their time that we are all just playing catch-up, calling for decentralized exchanges way ahead of the rest of the world (and inventing graphene as a result), inventing the dPOS consensus algorithm, etc.

one of the very few guys in the space whose projects i'd back almost sight unseen.

Post: #8

Follow Sunny Lu. he's the guy who is about to make Ven moonshot.

Haejin on seemit is also a pretty legit guy to listen to.

Also, check out the "unchained" podcast.

Post: #9

(01-05-2018 09:02 PM)Fortis Wrote:  Follow Sunny Lu. he's the guy who is about to make Ven moonshot.

Haejin on seemit is also a pretty legit guy to listen to.

Also, check out the "unchained" podcast.

I think Sunny has the best shot of bringing crypto to the corporate masses. He's lovable, is bright, and passionate about his project. VEN is my main pick for 2018.

Post: #10

Suppomannnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

Post: #11

I find this topic ESPECIALLY interesting - and the OPs initial post definitely acute and valid!

Peter Thiel might seem to have replaced Warren Buffet in confirming new talent trends (eg, Facebook and social media in the previous decade; and "Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund Makes Monster Bet on Bitcoin" prescience in crypto this one, https://www.wsj.com/articles/peter-thiel...1514917433 )

The central difficulty in knowing the horses in a new industry is always the inside/outsider problem - those who know best arent' telling, and those who don't tell too much and too often.

Sorting 'em out is definitely a serious crowd-sourcing problem-solution opportunity.

Post: #12

Adam Meister - Gets the scoop on all these bitcoin forks and airdrops... warning, his voice is pretty annoying
Tone Vays - Well respected guru on technical analysis with regards to BTC
Trace Mayer - Longtime BTC advocate, mixes in Austrian economics with knowledge of law
Coinmastery/Datadash - Mostly fundamental analysis type stuff, Datadash is a little more TA driven
CrytopsRuS - New player to the scene: have no idea about his background (schlubby Chinese guy) but he makes specific pics and can piggyback off the sentiment of his fast growing viewership

Post: #13

Am I the only one who just hates listening to people prattle on on youtube?

Wish people wrote text stuff, but it seems youtube is where it's at. I guess I could just set it to 10x speed and put them on mute...

Post: #14

(01-19-2018 07:15 PM)SamuelBRoberts Wrote:  Am I the only one who just hates listening to people prattle on on youtube?

Wish people wrote text stuff, but it seems youtube is where it's at. I guess I could just set it to 10x speed and put them on mute...

Let's face it SBR. Vblogs have replaced the magazine column (or syndicated newspaper column). They are cheaper, more timely, and more info dense. And unlike its ancestor, cheap to start and distribute, and allow superior talent to rise faster instead of wallowing in "editor/publisher" gate-keeper Hell!

Post: #15

Magazines? Who the hell reads magazines?

I was talking about forum and blog posts.

Post: #16

Agreed, I figured out a long time ago that watching videos are an inefficient way of learning unless you really need the visual, like a step by step tutorial of something. You could read all the information in a 10 minute video in about 1-2 minutes, depending on the quality of the video. I would prefer if they wrote about crypto rather than make videos.

Post: #17

LOL god help whichever guy is getting his crypto information from magazines ...