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Karartma1, I don't think you need to abandon ship. Let's wait and see how this plays out. It's all good to have total freedom to do whatever we want, but do you remember how Elwar's seastead ended up? We've got to tread carefully, or my statement "we'll end up filthy rich, but unable to enjoy our riches" may come true.
For sure, if we are feeling overexposed to bitcoin, maybe we cut back on our allocation a bit.
But, even with various negative news like this, it remains difficult to figure out where to better put your money, and even if there might be some justifications, based on recent news, how to better allocate.
Of course, each person has to decide for themselves the extent to which they might be over-allocated in bitcoin, and also if s/he might become a target of governmental actions and/or overreach based on his/her own situation - whether that is being accused of some conduct that s/he did not consider to be against the law.. but sometimes safety measures may well need to be taken in regards to where to hold stash and how much of the private keys are kept off line. I personally find it can be quite difficult to attempt to sell BTC directly, especially if we start to get to very large numbers, in the future, so in that regard, it is likely better to have some arrangements with traditional institutions to be able to have avenues to liquidate portions of your BTC stash from time to time and also reporting on taxes, consulting with attorneys and accountants and things like that could be helpful too.
If any of us are pulling out anything approaching fuck you status levels, whether that is a million or more or even in the territory of $6million or more, then we may well need to have some of those liquidation relationships because it could be much more difficult to operate peer to peer with those kinds of quantities, and then might we be interacting in circles that might end up causing questions to our own actions, too - even if we personally believe that we are trying to stay above board with every one of our actions.
I seriously worry about being able to "cash out" when "fuck you" rich. I fear that, by that time, all the cameras, guns, machetes, rusty pipes and what have you, will be pointing at us HoDLers, even going so far as to label us criminals, DPR v.2 (or is it v.3?), or some other "guilty-until-proven-innocent" accusation. It all depends on how "accepted" Bitcoin will be at that point.
The "at that point" remains on a spectrum because there are a certain number of us who have already been cashing out here and there... so passage of time has incrementalisms as well as an all of a sudden components.
If some of us may have some worries about certain changes in liquidation avenues, maybe it does not hurt to be getting in the practice of cashing out here and there along the way, even if smaller amounts.
Practice cashing out and buying back again. $100 or $1,000 or some practical amount.
We should have some practice with our liquidation avenues, anyhow.
Sure, if we feel that we are mostly in BTC accumulation phase, then we might not be ready to go straight into a liquidation phase, but personally, I believe that bitcoin accumulation becomes a kind of "own it" way of life, so we have to figure out various ways to be comfortable in our Bitcoin skins, and therefore, it seems way more practical to go from accumulation phase to maintenance phase to liquidation phase - and for me, it seems that these phases are on a spectrum rather than being absolute categories.
I had always thought that at least a couple of liquidation avenues should be contemplated to be prepared for just in case some of those avenues might dry up, and sure of course, I am just a regular joe blow, so I am not really in any kind of position to give reassurances that liquidation avenues that you pick might not later end up drying up. I have already personally had some of my liquidation avenues dry up over the years, so I can even relate to increased levels of worries regarding my remaining liquidation avenues as they currently stand and how they might change (or get reduced) in the future.
So sure, one of the risks, calculations and costs does remain liquidation avenues, and surely the actions against Bitmex likely causes greater liquidation avenues uncertainties rather than inspiring confidence as some other bitcoiners seem to be arguing.
And, as you know, timescales in Bitcoin time are very short, meaning that we'll know quite soon.
Actually, that plays on another point that I was going to make regarding members being at various points on the spectrum. Sure there are some members who are full out ready willing and able to engage in liquidations at any time, some members
who are on the cusp of being able to liquidate, and other members who would feel much more comfortable with another BTC price exponential phase.
Those who are NOT quite ready but would be more ready upon another 3x, 5x or 8x might be more anxious...
Some people need 10x or more, and sure there are others who need much more than 20x or even 40x to 100x based on the size of their current BTC holdings and/or what amount of BTC that they might be able to accumulate in the shorter term.
It's all good to imagine an ideal world where TPTB have accepted and even endorsed Bitcoin, but I don't think this will be an easy battle. We may win, but there will be blood.
We should not be preparing for an ideal world.
We should be preparing for a variety of possible scenarios and a shifting framework - and maybe even some unexpected happenings along the way.
In other words, even though we are NOT specifically focusing on the best case scenarios or the worst case scenarios, we are prepared for those kinds of extreme and less probable scenarios along with the more probable scenarios that are a mixture of the two.
My thinking is already that bitcoin is way the fuck better along than I had expected it to be when I got in, so the fact that I am likely going to continue to have to juggle a variety of known inconveniences as well as unknown inconveniences does not come as a surprise to me, even though the specifics of the various inconveniences are surely still to be figured out at whatever particular time I am cashing out parts of my BTC or if I were to cash out larger amounts.
Remember that I personally remain with Jimbo in terms of anticipating incrementalism cashing out behaviors from myself rather than expecting that there is going to be some point(s) that I am going to be cashing out BIG ass amounts causing my lil selfie feelings of desperation and/or drawing unwarranted attention to my lil selfie and/or my hypothetical levels of richie-ness.
Of course this "cashing out" may not even be necessary, if things play out in Bitcoin's favour, and BTC (or satoshi, or whatever fraction of a satoshi results from a 2nd layer solution, should 1 BTC > $1M) ends up being usable in buying everyday goods and services.
Sure, the BTC price could go there, and I suppose it would not necessarily be a bad problem to have... but it seems to be on the lower level of probability in the immediate future.
Of course, if BTC prices goes shooting up to $300k in the next 6 months to 1 year, then million dollar bitcoin become more probable upon reaching those kinds of higher prices. Currently, our high price has merely been $20k.. so it seems to be a bit absurd to be placing too high of probabilities on $1million bitcoins.
Don't get me wrong, I do have projections of my BTC holdings and my cash holdings that go out to a million, but I do not place very high odds on such outcomes in this particular cycle... even though I am prepared for such.
By the way in 2015/2016 (when BTC prices were below $700), my UPpity preparations largely went until about $3k to $5k, and as the BTC price went up, including when we got into the $1ks and $2ks, I had to adjust my UPpity preparations and to assign greater odds to BTC price possibilities that went beyond $5k.. .. so there are likely ways that preparations can be adjusted along the way and to be able to assign higher probabilities to higher numbers once BTC prices cross some of those intermediate price thresholds (on the way up).
This would be an ideal situation, in which BTC's intrinsic value stays in the BTC realm and we directly use it to survive (food, shelter, Lambos, hookers, blow, the usual necessities).
Again, I personally don't believe we should be preparing for the ideal, even though we should be prepared in case the ideal happens... if that makes any senses.
But, somehow, I don't think it will be that easy. Not when the establishment sees their power taken away. They won't surrender without a fight.
Well, yes... more likely that there are going to be some obstacles along the way.. even if we cannot be sure exactly what those obstacles are going to be, we should attempt to prepare for a variety of potential obstacles along the way.
My advice is to be prepared for any possible outcome.
Yes. That is one way of putting it. I think that another way of putting it is that we put more preparations into more likely scenarios, and adapt along the way as scenarios become more likely, and of course, that is nearly the same thing as preparing for any scenario, while attempting to focus on the more likely scenarios before focusing on the less likely scenarios.
Personally, I'm more exposed to BTC than I am to more traditional investments, but I can surely survive (and ever enjoy the occasional little pleasures—but nowhere near "fuck you" rich status) without touching my BTC. I just follow the "invest what you can afford to lose" motto, while at the same time supporting and firmly believing that Bitcoin will succeed.
If you believe that you do not need to tweak anything, then that is on you.
It is good to reflect every once in a while to consider whether any tweakening might be helpful, either psychologically or financially....
and of course, if you have been largely or ONLY "investing what you can afford to lose" then that surely should be helpful in terms of NOT causing you to take rash actions... hopefully...
Sometimes, one of the problemas with bitcoin has been that when the price goes shooting with a large amount of exuberance, we cannot help but to become emotional and possibly unexpectedly transform into irrationality. It happens on the way up, as well as on the way down.
But if you have been attempting to really be honest with ur lil selfie in regards to how comfortable you are at various price points in case the BTC price kept going up or it reversed, and you are really contemplating that you would be neutral either way, then you may have structured what you are going to do at those various price points as best as you can and causing yourself less likelihood to actually panic when (or if) such scenario happens.
In short, as Bitcoin's value is rising, my feelings are bittersweet. Sweeter than bitter, of course, but there's always that aftertaste you get when chewing a dirty piece of paper...
That is fair enough. I am not going to say that ambiguous feelings might happen, even when you feel that you have prepared yourself to beat hell. Guys (and maybe even gal) are second-guessing the hell out of themselves on an ongoing basis, but when the BTC price reverses at $48k in the next year and a half, and crashes back down to $10k or even less, you have to be comfortable financially and psychologically, even if you had chosen NOT to sell any satoshis up until that point..... or whatever other variant of scenario that you might believe to NOT be very probable, but ends up playing out.
Those various price points in regard what to do, exactly, are completely on you and your comfort rather than what other balances (or lack thereof) that other guys and gal may have chosen along that path... that ends up playing out unexpectedly from your point of view.
Ok. I watched that clip.
How come when they left, they did not take the briefcase with them?
Am I missing something? By the way, I had never seen the whole movie, so surely I must be missing something about the meaning of that briefcase.
Also, why was the one cowering black kid spared? Travolta's character goes up to him in the end of the clip, and he asked why they were not told about the guy with the BIG gun who was hiding in the bathroom, and the kid does not answer - yet he was spared.
The briefcase is an enigmatic element of the movie, that is open to interpretation. I won't give you mine, since you haven't watched it yet. But you should.
I think that it was pretty cool that when Travolta's character opens it up, and it seems to glow on his face, and Jackson has to ask Travolta a couple of times before Travolta answers. hahahaha.
I'm a big fan of Quentin Tarantino, so my opinion is surely biased, but I do consider it one of the greatest movies of all time. The first time I watched it was with my (then) girlfriend, back in 1994. She hated it, and we even had a somewhat heated discussion about it. Could it be more appealing to guys than girls?
Since I did not see it, I would not know, but surely the fairer sex does seem to have differing sensibilities from the not so fair sex.
As for the kid being spared, my guess is that it's Samuel Jackson's way of thanking God for His "divine intervention" which saved their lives.
Fair enough.. It is an interesting moment, too.
BTW, the scene whose YouTube clip I linked to, is not a continuous scene. In the actual movie, it's split and its parts are shown at different times. The YouTube poster has joined them together in one continuous clip.
Another thing that will probably be irrelevant to most, is that Tarantino is a hardcore film fan, and insists on shooting his films on real film (no digital cameras involved). A true cinema lover, in its original media, with all its quirks that give true movies that special appeal.
Edit: Corrected typo.
Yes... bonus behind the scenes information.. Thanks, AlcoHoDL.
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