Good News for People who Hate Bad News(calacanis.com)
calacanis.com
Good News for People who Hate Bad News
http://calacanis.com/2008/10/28/good-news-for-people-who-hate-bad-news/
26 comments
Thank you for pointing this out.
People's willingness to point out what they know about markets _for certain_, without being willing to actually make the bet, has always amazed me.
The truth is, if someone was 100% certain that the market would not recover from where it is, it's easy to bet on that without committing any capital and you'd even make the money if the market stayed exactly where it is.
I see a quote on Dec 350 GOOG calls at $24. If you feel lucky, write ten contracts and take the $24,000... all you'll need is your broker to trust that you can cover the bet if you're wrong.
It's ok to hedge your language, it's alright to admit you're guessing. The less often you make definitive statements, the less often you'll look like a fool in hindsight. And the less often you make definitive statements that exactly mirror a market position, the less often you'll look like a fool in foresight.
People's willingness to point out what they know about markets _for certain_, without being willing to actually make the bet, has always amazed me.
The truth is, if someone was 100% certain that the market would not recover from where it is, it's easy to bet on that without committing any capital and you'd even make the money if the market stayed exactly where it is.
I see a quote on Dec 350 GOOG calls at $24. If you feel lucky, write ten contracts and take the $24,000... all you'll need is your broker to trust that you can cover the bet if you're wrong.
It's ok to hedge your language, it's alright to admit you're guessing. The less often you make definitive statements, the less often you'll look like a fool in hindsight. And the less often you make definitive statements that exactly mirror a market position, the less often you'll look like a fool in foresight.
"Bottom line: there is zero chance of a short or medium term-rebound. Zero."
I don't see any claim about share prices there. He's talking about economic growth, consumer confidence, investor confidence, etc.
Another way to say what he stated there is: "We're headed for a deep, long recession, and there's zero chance of it miraculously getting better in the short or even medium term."
That's not a statement about share prices, it's a statement about the economy.
Also, how do you know he doesn't have a bunch of shorts on the markets?
I don't see any claim about share prices there. He's talking about economic growth, consumer confidence, investor confidence, etc.
Another way to say what he stated there is: "We're headed for a deep, long recession, and there's zero chance of it miraculously getting better in the short or even medium term."
That's not a statement about share prices, it's a statement about the economy.
Also, how do you know he doesn't have a bunch of shorts on the markets?
He does spend a paragraph before that talking about the state of the Dow and a lot later on how companies will manage their earnings, so I went with the parent posters interpretation. But you're right, I could have misinterpreted.
Also, I don't know his trading positions. I just find these statements that are _so_ certain to be mildly irritating, when it's been clear for a while that no one really has a knows what is going on or how to fix it.
Also, I don't know his trading positions. I just find these statements that are _so_ certain to be mildly irritating, when it's been clear for a while that no one really has a knows what is going on or how to fix it.
Granted, but the truth is, no one has any clue what's going on, ever. And yet, "Who the hell knows what will happen?", despite being always truthful, is not really good advice at any time. It doesn't matter what the state of the economy is - no one knows what will happen next.. if they did, they could make some good bets on the stock markets and become rich. All that anyone ever has is opinions.
I think that opinion pieces would get tedious fairly quickly if they were constantly paraphrased with "imho"s...
I think that opinion pieces would get tedious fairly quickly if they were constantly paraphrased with "imho"s...
> Granted, but the truth is, no one has any clue what's going on, ever.
Hmmm... that sounds like a pretty absolute statement... is there any way to bet on that ;~)?
Hmmm... that sounds like a pretty absolute statement... is there any way to bet on that ;~)?
You can but who can ever prove it.
You have to have absolute knowledge to know if someone else has absolute knowledge. In the end you have to take people's words on things based on their acquired and intuitive knowledge.
You have to have absolute knowledge to know if someone else has absolute knowledge. In the end you have to take people's words on things based on their acquired and intuitive knowledge.
Nice-sounding metaphor + leaky abstraction: maybe useful.
2817 words of take-your-breath-away verbosity: useless.
2817 words of take-your-breath-away verbosity: useless.
Ugh, what is with the subscribers only, but on popular demand farce?
A sneaky ploy to gain more subscribers?
[deleted]
"I’m retired from blogging and have moved to the comfort of my email newsletter, where 9,400 of my close friends and I have a nice intimate discussion."
I like Calacanis and the things he has to say in his emails, but to say the 9,400 people are his close friends and that he has an intimate discussion with them is just stupid.
He's a blogger using the Cartmanland technique.
I like Calacanis and the things he has to say in his emails, but to say the 9,400 people are his close friends and that he has an intimate discussion with them is just stupid.
He's a blogger using the Cartmanland technique.
When blogging, I didn't like the fact that all the feed readers were anonymous. At least with an email list one can see someone's email address and contact them no matter whether they've stopped subscribing or read your emails. Even with Friendfeed subscribers, one can discover quite a lot about a person, and then contact them directly in most cases with a little bit of investigation (like a LinkedIn profile, blog feed or YouTube account that one might explore.)
While the anonymoity and ease of subscribing to RSS gives it appeal to surfers, the former aspect can still be unattractive to writers, especially with lurkers and non-commenters often going above 95% of a blog's traffic, thus the lack of a feedback loop can make blogging unattractive, (poor return on energy, feelings of depletion to others - at least on HN there's mod-points, profiles and the likelihood of replies to encourage hefty postings) and also with advertising or sponsorship unsuitable unless a blog is extremely trafficked or focussed. The difficulty with blogging on FriendFeed is it only allows micro entries. Also, micro-entries can be too interspersed with one's other feeds.
Solution: startup offering key-based RSS urls individualized and presented on a blog site if readers are logged-in to the startup site (or hold a cookie). Also, by revealing a reader identity to an author, the author can at most tailor their writing and find offers or opportunities for readers, and at the least continue blogging. The idea is also useful for bands as they release new material to fans. There can be an option to prevent the display of non-keyed RSS URLs (ie you must be logged in to see the rss URL on a blog page.)
This idea would be useful for a new startup networking site, a tipping site (eg Tipjoy), comment site (ie Disqus), networking site (ie Linkedin, Younoodle, Friendfeed as a way to promote each one's service and make it useful offsite) or a web analytics site.
Alternatively, Google could reveal blog readers to blog authors with information from Reader, provided readers opt-in to the feature and setup a profile, and blog owners claim their blog.
Personally, I may restart blogging if such a service existed, likewise I would also be very happy to use it when subscribing to others. Right now I only blog mainly via linking to HN comments on my Friendfeed.
From experience, I know that anytime I contacted a blog reader whom I had known about, they were generally always helpful for whatever the reason, but many readers just won't contact the author, so it became a guessing game as to who was reading my material. Even in a blog posting if you ask readers to email you, they won't because it's tacit that there's no obligation. So rather than setup a list of 500+ LinkedIn contacts who I barely know, a typical blog (ie an exercise in charity to some extent), I'd rather keep a blog using this startup's feed-identifying tool, and then I can contact and network with those on my reader list if the need arose. This is something Calacanis can do to a greater extent with his list than he could've done with his blog (which incidentally I never was interested in): identify and contact readers who cannot lurk so easily.
While the anonymoity and ease of subscribing to RSS gives it appeal to surfers, the former aspect can still be unattractive to writers, especially with lurkers and non-commenters often going above 95% of a blog's traffic, thus the lack of a feedback loop can make blogging unattractive, (poor return on energy, feelings of depletion to others - at least on HN there's mod-points, profiles and the likelihood of replies to encourage hefty postings) and also with advertising or sponsorship unsuitable unless a blog is extremely trafficked or focussed. The difficulty with blogging on FriendFeed is it only allows micro entries. Also, micro-entries can be too interspersed with one's other feeds.
Solution: startup offering key-based RSS urls individualized and presented on a blog site if readers are logged-in to the startup site (or hold a cookie). Also, by revealing a reader identity to an author, the author can at most tailor their writing and find offers or opportunities for readers, and at the least continue blogging. The idea is also useful for bands as they release new material to fans. There can be an option to prevent the display of non-keyed RSS URLs (ie you must be logged in to see the rss URL on a blog page.)
This idea would be useful for a new startup networking site, a tipping site (eg Tipjoy), comment site (ie Disqus), networking site (ie Linkedin, Younoodle, Friendfeed as a way to promote each one's service and make it useful offsite) or a web analytics site.
Alternatively, Google could reveal blog readers to blog authors with information from Reader, provided readers opt-in to the feature and setup a profile, and blog owners claim their blog.
Personally, I may restart blogging if such a service existed, likewise I would also be very happy to use it when subscribing to others. Right now I only blog mainly via linking to HN comments on my Friendfeed.
From experience, I know that anytime I contacted a blog reader whom I had known about, they were generally always helpful for whatever the reason, but many readers just won't contact the author, so it became a guessing game as to who was reading my material. Even in a blog posting if you ask readers to email you, they won't because it's tacit that there's no obligation. So rather than setup a list of 500+ LinkedIn contacts who I barely know, a typical blog (ie an exercise in charity to some extent), I'd rather keep a blog using this startup's feed-identifying tool, and then I can contact and network with those on my reader list if the need arose. This is something Calacanis can do to a greater extent with his list than he could've done with his blog (which incidentally I never was interested in): identify and contact readers who cannot lurk so easily.
I thought he was being sarcastic.
This is just weak fearmongering by the people who have the most to gain from it. I'm actually glad about the drama, as it means that less of the cheap money will be coming into the software space, giving those who care about real products time to polish, rather than having to release as soon as possible because of the sheer amount of competition.
I like the album that Modest Mouse album quite a bit...
OK for Modest Mouse it is actually, "Good New for People who Love Bad News"
http://www.amazon.com/Good-News-People-Who-Love/dp/B0001M7P7...
OK for Modest Mouse it is actually, "Good New for People who Love Bad News"
http://www.amazon.com/Good-News-People-Who-Love/dp/B0001M7P7...
Thumbs up for the Modest Mouse reference.
I realize the actual line is "people who love bad news" but close enough to make me smile.
I realize the actual line is "people who love bad news" but close enough to make me smile.
Yeah, but by switching around the words, he makes you wonder if he understood why the original album title was clever.
When you first heard the Modest Mouse album name, it begged a question: what's good news for people who love bad news, anyway? Bad news? Good news? Bad news that's good news? It was a clever bit of wordplay.
When you first heard the Modest Mouse album name, it begged a question: what's good news for people who love bad news, anyway? Bad news? Good news? Bad news that's good news? It was a clever bit of wordplay.
1) It didn't beg the question.
2) Bad news, obviously. For people who like bad news, good news is bad news. You just need to avoid the assumption that the phrase "good news" means the same thing at different levels of abstraction.
2) Bad news, obviously. For people who like bad news, good news is bad news. You just need to avoid the assumption that the phrase "good news" means the same thing at different levels of abstraction.
Dupe (sort of): http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=345463
yeah I think a blog without comments wouldve served his mission better, but this option includes a list to spam later
it's a good read.
i don't think the meltdown is going to be QUITE as bad as he insists. must be that entrepreneural bias...
i don't think the meltdown is going to be QUITE as bad as he insists. must be that entrepreneural bias...
The severity of what has happened can’t be underestimated... What you do in the next 30 days will probably make or break your company. The storm is upon us and the death spiral has started.
Oh shit - I'm just gonna jump off a bridge then, Jason. What's the point of living?
Oh shit - I'm just gonna jump off a bridge then, Jason. What's the point of living?
The price of a security is its expected value, more or less. If the market thinks a security has zero chance of going up, the market must also think it has zero chance of going down.
The possibility of a rebound is priced into this market, and so is the possibility of further decline; the two should balance.
Even in really crazy markets with forced selling due to liquidation, this rule shouldn't get too far out of whack. If a security can only go up, people will buy it until it can go down again. If a security can only go down, people will sell it until it can go up again. If this guy really believes he has privileged info that the market can only go down from here, he should short-sell his way to a risk-free fortune.
But somehow, I doubt that, once this is pointed out to him, he will be anywhere near as confident with a few thousand dollars of his own money, as when he is helpfully advising entrepreneurs about their business strategy for years to come.