May 8 - May 25
/commented on investor jargon/ "value" and "growth".
It's not binary. It's different loci on a single axis. The locus of risk which is called "value" has a distribution of possible portfolio outcomes which have higher cash in hand in the short term; the locus of risk which is called "growth" has a distribution of possible portfolio outcomes which have lower cash in hand in the short term... with contrapositive long term portfolio outcomes :P
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I really hate makeup. But at the twenty-fourth hour, a lot of kludge happens in getting things to production...
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I have a staff who is an absolutely shitty communicator. Today I had to practice getting him to attempt spatial communication via gestures, instead of freezing when he can't find words.
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SEEKING: COFOUNDER
Also F&B related. But I just need a CFO to chase investors as I'm still stuck on product. 3.5y in, and prototype is looking OK. Second biggest hole is regulatory compliance. I can do these roles but they are not a priority, so the alternative is someone could come in and do product+ops instead lol - good luck replacing me vs my targets though.
B2B long game is backend management services for hotel/restaurant/cafe and all modern equivalents. We've already rolled out internally some capabilities in marketing automation, and green/energy management. Of course we have process controlled procurement, inventory, customer order placement, cash management, and financial reporting already implemented for our own use. Built to clone.
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I'll be sad to see you go, but you're antsy and I can't afford to do the chasin. 😇
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Talking to a guy in the network whom I met many years ago at an interview:
"I used to be very stressed, but I have learnt to control my emotions."
"I am the opposite. Need to find business to make me less lazy."
:P
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More trouble. More things to do. Exhaustamundo. Well, better than having nothing to do.
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Whenever I tire, I reflect upon my motivations and anchor myself in disdain for my fellows. :) Then I go back to work, because that is all I can afford that improves.
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Now I know why we don't fill the vacuum pump with more than the minimum amount of oil.
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/commented on trading/
A community of technical analysts create
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s self-fulfilling prophecies. That is because technical analysts are diametrically opposed to fundamental analysts.
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Fundamental analysis for things like AU and BTC?
Off the top of my unkempt head:
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- precious metals: (i) fundamental function one, is as an industrial consumable (ii) fundamental function two, is as a safe haven... vs other safe havens, and the other asset classes
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- cryptocurrencies: pure fad... there's no moat... there's nothing stopping anyone from booting up their own cryptocurrency so it's literally the opposite of gold; do you know what else is the opposite of gold? Fashion. So you trade it as pop culture.
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Stressed. On defense.
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(Earlier I told the guy, we need talent, not money. Then I came up with a better answer.)
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"What do you need funding for? Maybe you do not need a CFO to raise funds."
"The number has always been 10x, so we're looking for 4.3MM. The first 300k to 600k is to hire senior executives to make up for the shortage of founder talent, and to lock down junior executives into sustainably compliant frameworks. After we fix that, we can grow B2C and B2B. Airy-fairy, but consistently the story."
"From my experience with VCs, you should never mention a shortage of founder talent. Just razzle-dazzle them, and after you get funded, fix the real problem."
"I think we are of different brands - our shortage of talent has been placed front and centre since day zero."
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Retreat. Regroup. Attack. 1/3 done... :p
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I used to think Tim Gunn was an apt character for me to charade. After 3.5 years of running a business, I'm upgrading to Anna farkin Wintour...
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Do you ever have those days when your intentionally risky bets are blowing up, and the absence of assistance for 3-4 years starts to grate on you, and you owe twenty people a monthly report on why they're not going to see their money any time soon, and you have to teach kindergarten, weld some pipes, and check spoilage on foodstuff in the same afternoon? I think the best response is to remember that these are trivial problems in a small theatre, where the actor is dissuaded that the audience is the party to be pleased. Other people are actually suffering out there, losing loved ones, unable to truncate their sources of pain, coalescing into fellowships, building teams, and largely living in a mode that avoids destruction because it intimidates them? Where are the ones who enjoy light chaos? Where does one find equals on this sparse earth? #feelingcute might go do accounts, later.
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I believe in things to do. Not going to help it if you don't :p
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Upcoming 26.5 hour shift over Raya. Who wants to come over and talk cock sing song?
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Tolong sebarkan. Send me your gender unspecified relatives of all ages and inclinations. You can think of this role as being that of a [cook + maitre d + bartender + entrepreneur in residence].
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Life is so long and boring. And the world a pitiful state of affairs. What else is there to do, but involve oneself in it?
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What does it mean, "to take a short position on empathy and affection,"? Well rather simply, if we can identify anyone who cares about something, in such a way that their behaviour is more predictable as a result, we move into a position which has a relatively higher (not necessarily absolutely high) chance of profiting from that predictable behavior. Who then, cares about their life's work, or their children's future, or their parents's happiness, or justice, or equality, or God's will, or a certain form of the natural world, or a particular balance of account... we, takers, are watching you.
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/commented a heuristic for small town dating, while immobile/
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1. Configure profile to filter in from a wider radius people who are ready, able, and willing to travel TO their dates on weekends (or relocate completely); that's the top of your funnel.
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2. Then filter from those, the ones whom you would care to be in a relationship with.
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The rationale for putting 1. before 2. is that 1. is a harder thing to change.
"I have all the people who would visit me in straight line ranked by desirability," is an easier line to walk up and down than, "I have all the people I'd want to date, in a straight line ranked by willingness to visit me, but I don't know how to traverse this line."
Ok, I hope that made sense lol
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Finally found time to analyse kinematic performance issues evident over the last 18 months. I need to run more. Neural tone is weak, and needs to be firmed up.
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It was a very talky day, so I am taking a break now.
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1. Haggled with a number of interview candidates on their needs and our supply of work, mostly attempting to dissuade them from overwrought expectations.
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2. Exchanged messages with a bloke who is looking for a business partner, but who struggles to place figures on the table. Probably a heavily intuitive thinker who doesn't do details. This one is marked for deletion if he can't answer questions about post-deal valuation.
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3. Meeting with a bloke who wanted to hear what we do in food and beverage. Apparently a conservative entrepreneur, the kind that doesn't want to lose money over unpredictable gambles.
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4. Interview with a cook, in person.
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5. Best friend and source of a rented car needed affirmation.
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6. Police officers needed talking too about paper work.
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7. Sales consultant who wanted a video call but couldn't secure an Internet connection. Seriously, if one is going to waste that much bandwidth instead of just texting, one might want to invest in secured infrastructure lol.
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8. Miscellaneous staff discussing miscellaneous operational issues.
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9. Loss adjuster needed documentation.
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10. Dude putting up a bar for sale.
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11. Community discussion on 10.
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12. People on/from dating apps.
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As usual I'm of two* minds about this. I believe all the following propositions are true. While (1.) there is space for addressing suicidal tendencies as a public health concern, (2.) there is also space to regard the final act of suicide as a celebration of each individual's free will. (3.) Suicide remains illegal in Malaysia, and so are certain other related acts, but this does not imply that they are necessarily unethical - only that they are the official custom according to rule of law.
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Finally, I am generally not suicidal, but if I do kill myself for shits and giggles, or out of explosive angst, or in desperation... before you celebrate, please do not treat my death as a necessarily sad thing.
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(* Metaphorically - I mean I have exactly one coherent point of view which may seem internally conflicted, bit it is not, really.)
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Lunch break. If you have to name the meals for, convenience. I had one meeting this morning with a candidate who thought the job paid 4x what it does, so I just used the time to grandstand the nature of our business to her. Following some administrative work, I am observing the people where I eat, near my office.
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I wonder how much each of them worries about their families, or their pets, or the environment, or their own sense of security. And I worry that they worry that others, like myself, do no allow their concerns to concern us, for the most part. Everyone builds a moat, while playing their game. Some people take their games more to heart, some do not worry when their games are written off, at all.
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And on the world goes, a few organisms cooking up notions of justice, others raping innocents, all sorts dying left, right, and centre, as a result of offensive manoeuvres (or just their luck amidst the elements). And then the aggregate reaction to the aggregate outrage, limbs torn out, tongues wagging in thirst, the same motley crews on the left and right.
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So few care to evaluate these without active involvement. What a pity.
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I think teaching is tiring. Since selling is teaching, selling is tiring. This is why I tend to avoid active selling. No, I do not believe in getting excited about what is being taught/sold. No, I don't think people... who get excited about what they teach/sell... are very interesting. I am only interested in the dispassionate ones. I am quite tired this week, as I have been selling our complex product to many people, as well as teaching many items to internal parties. Generally, this is why I tend to think that our new products are not ready for sale. But that doesn't mean we should allocate zero resources to selling. But it does mean I need to get more sleep :p
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if anyone wants a healthy but nervous kitten, female, it's on a traffic island at 3 Damansara mall, where the Sprint meets the LDP. It's capable of bonding, and will follow you if coached, but I was on my way and didn't have more than three minutes to work on it.
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I'm impressed. DIS is dubbing its movies.
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A kind man sent me a ticket to watch a movie, about fiduciary duties, dog lovers, and hospitality managers. I swear it was work-related.
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Hate to say it, but John Wick is almost as bad as Game of Thrones. Always has been, still is. In terms of deployments..
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Awake. Still sluggish. Must improve neural tone.
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I wondered for a moment, if I was too young or too old to make the most of college. I basically behaved like a PhD student in an architecture designed for bachelor's degrees, and moved into my own study program after deciding that my interests were not facilitated by the organisation - this is the argument for having been too old. I also had a lot of rudimentary knowledge to catch up on, which is basic canon, or contemporary advancement, and I woild have benefited from having studied that prior to college, so that college could have been more focused on the political form of publishing. Oh well, too many silly thoughts before one gets out of bed, the goldilocks problem shall be assumed to be a non-problem.
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(on people who do not want to change themselves, but wonder why no one likes them) I have actually met this variety, extended personal help, and risked business continuity on them. But there are some things it is not fated to be in our budget to change, like the strays we can move to safer places, if only they had the ability to overcome their fears in the three minutes we had to work with them. End of the day, I figure, it's just natural selection. Some traits will just evolve out of existence albeit gradually.
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I think all op-sec should begin with training units to lose the fear of death. But who am I to comment :P
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No time to write an app. Thinking to set up a Facebook page for busy people looking to date other busy people :P.
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I know there are apps for that already...
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/commented/ Banking is the business model for anyone whose main competitive advantage is holding a lot of cash, and whose main revenue generator is the collection of interest on that cash. If your business model is to turn into a bank, just be up-front about, and quit dressing it up as some new fangled thing. Just go back to Basel 3, and shut up already. Also, if you're a VC, and you can't tell the difference between becoming a bank, and funding a high-risk portfolio... just quit already.
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Follow up from discussion: if the competitive advantage of "neo-banks" is simply to have lower cost due to the absence of [branch rentals, human tellers, fire insurance, etc.] then in order to compete with "neo-banks" we should expect to see some (not all) traditional bricks&clicks banks split their balance sheets (or business units) into "neo-bank" and "physical teller" sections. From this we expect the cost of physical teller services to increase, as the cost of delivering these becomes a separate concern from the abstracted concerns of virtual banking.
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I basically went the other way because I'd run out of fundamental knowledge to acquire at desk jobs. Once you can hack DCFs, legal documents, algorithmic trading, art direction, and politics... it gets kinda slow. Now I'm working closer to the metal.
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Potheads are weird. But so am I, and we're just on different MOs, I suppose. Just try not to tell me anything about where your supply is coming from. Because I will probably think nothing of telling the authorities if asked and then someone may hang.
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Call me when it's legal, and we'll smoke a joint together. Hurr up, Putrajaya...
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Politics in Malaysia: I think there's a lot of to be said for the apparent absence of grand strategy, whereby we would see the effects of concerted multi-year efforts to subtly destroy the foundations of racial polarisation before making overt policy actions about them. Haha
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Noobpreneurs: "I have an idea to use AI to do X."
Oldpreneurs: "It is cheaper to use meat to do X. AI is like a child you have to watch constantly for years."
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It's a good day. It's raining. The girls are pretty. I'm almost done with April accounts... *groooan*
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Sadly we must remember that World War II was fought, not to stop genocide, but to exert sovereignty. Nowadays, the clever genocidists tip-toe around sovereign claims, and carry on their business as usual.
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On Maszlee denying interest in non-Muslim religious education in schools: That was his last chance. Oh well. :)
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First run in a long time. APM is up. Everything seems to take longer. The girls are still pretty.
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Sacking Maszlee would be Mahathir politically shooting himself in the foot. Why would he do that? You chinks stupid ah?
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Worst case scenario: Maszlee actually drinks his own kool-aid, doesn't have a systematic view of education and racial politics. This is the Dumbo hypothesis.
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Best case scenario: Maszlee knows exactly how reality works, but is building his credentials with the right-wing by sticking knives in the Chinese every so often even though he knows some of his statements are bullshit. This is the Dog Whistling hypothesis. (I think it's good because I think his core ethics are more centrist than popular opinion holds them to be.)
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Second-to-worst case scenarios: this is the Kludge hypothesis. Maszlee doesn't actually have control over his messaging, whether it is due to a lack of his own understanding of how he comes off, or, he's actively infighting his own PR team who are trying to stick him in the back.
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God, I love spectating Malaysian politics... sometimes.
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Over the years my office has received many cold calls from purported agents of delivery services such as FoodPanda, such as one person called us today. Despite being told again, "I'm sorry, we do not use XYZ, thank you very much, have a good day, CLICK," this person 0172631057 called us back to complain that we were rude. I hope they never get hired again, because they shouldn't be working in direct sales. :p
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Risk management is the theme of the month. At the minute to minute level of operations, short term memory is almost fully loaded with only a subset of all ongoing operational risks. A lot of swapping happens. I have financial risks, and market risk, succession risk, mechanical risk, fire risk, electrical risk, hydraulic risk, biochemical risk, (sooo much biological risk), share of voice at risk, public relations risk, and a few other things. We have three guys who moved 3,700 kilometers just to be able to work here and put up with shit from me on a daily basis, one guy who might as well be retired, and then some others, including a bunch who threatened to blow up the operation at a moment's notice, so all in all I tend to move very, very, carefully... especially when working on projects with higher electrical and explosion risk. While I did train myself in 2012 to burn my own money, burning other people's money comes with its own set of concerns. Whereas I am not personally affectionate towards my flock, I only own 10% of every decision that I blow up, and so I have this novice tendency to have a 90% weight on how much I should reflect on things before committing them to my usual target of a 50% failure risk rate. One moves less than judiciously, too often. I am sad, but for the most part I identify it as a psychosomatic reaction to being physiologically tired. On we go. Same shit, different day.
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Thinking about people who complain that I talk too much about risk, and not enough about reward. I think they're missing the point. I'm motivated by active control over greater degrees of freedom, as I find that's where my competitive advantage lies. You basically couldn't pay me to do a job with a zero probability of failure, unless it was a short term contract. Did I mention that I love contracts? Contracts should always be written such that there is zero probability of unexpected failure - that is what contracts are for.
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Stuck doing accounts for a week. Engineering goes on hold. Another freezer breaks. Staff reports it two hours after discovery. Pew pew pew...
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/commented/
Rule one, don't hire quitters.
Rule two, if you hire quitters, the sooner they quit, the better. So smoke'em...
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On people hiding things when they are afraid: And some morons bring in this culture from outside and start hiding things before you even crank up the heat.
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"COMMENT | Maszlee Malik is the weakest link in the cabinet and a great liability to the Pakatan Harapan government."
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Commenter is just being (redacted) "tactically naive," and probably doesn't know how decoys work. Wonder how much covering fire he actually has tho. I guess that's wha DoTA is good for...
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At best Maszlee is a centrist, dog whistling to the ring wing, and being deployed by cabinet as a decoy to smoke out hot topics.
At worst, he is clueless.
If he is actually far right, it's no change from the past, then this is boring.
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/commented/ I have the opposite problem.
"This is not my passion."
"I don't believe it."
What the hell do I say to these people?!
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Whatsapp reminders to staff have been pipelined for automation:
"[This is an preset reminder, to remind you to be less timid. Being afraid at work will get you in trouble.]"
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Better than anything MoE related...
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Muhyiddin - Calling them "enforced disappearances" is an admission of culpability 🤣
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/commented/ Why do so many commenters associate killing with mental illness? Surely a reasonable person can kill for fun.
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/commented/ I have a lot of these customers. We put up signs on the pedestrian facing furniture "no feet on furniture." With the indoor chaps, we drape modesty aprons around their feet.
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Any manager that can't quantify "good attitude," doesn't deserve to hire it.
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Hotels, restaurants, and cafes, are already complicated. People ask me why I want to do my suppliers' jobs for them. I don't - but actually I can't find the suppliers that I want from design, to construction, to compliance, to agriculture, to quality control, to operations staffing. So I would like to build out the entire supply chain, at a quality, and cost, which meets my demand. Measurements of delivery should be exacting. I want to know of no link in the chain which has greater than a 10% net margin, with higher than 30% variance. If we build internal capabilities for these, I will be happy to divest and use the divested operations as our suppliers. If we do not divest, I expect to sell these very services. This is a very basic business model which had been executed in other verticals by some of the largest companies in the stock market. I do not think we are guaranteed to succeed, but I am also disinterested in other models at this time. Do your best to convince me otherwise. :)
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Addendum: I have a first-pass framework for bucketing negative behaviours in actors. I ask if primarily, the actor was (a) lazy, (b) stupid, or (c) evil... I suppose we can add in (d) fearful. If you see that X is good, but do not do X, ask yourself, why am I like this? So if you disagree that the business model above should be applied to HORECA, please comment if you feel it is because you are a/b/c/d, or if you just disagree that the end-game is preferable. ;)
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Addendum to addendum: some say all things stem from (b). But we can discuss that further after business hours.
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I think I fucked up our night-time sales today. Ask me in a week if I think the correction to the overcorrection worked. (We'll probably have made at few changes along the way.)
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I DID MY TAXES. I was not taxable. CRY
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Being on standby for a staffing emergency in two weeks. It's like being on vaca. Catch up on paperwork and housekeeping....
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The problem with most students of machine intelligence... has nothing to do with their grasp of machinery. The problem is that they do not have a firmly anchored grasp upon models for quantifying that which they would emulate with machinery.
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"There's some tension, as he and I both want to be monogamous."
"But not with each other."
"Maybe. Not right now. But there's so much I want in a monogamous partner, and it's so hard to find one."
"Well you're fixated on the notion of monogamy for arbitrary reasons - if I had to employ monogamy as a forcing factor, I'd have a very long list of criteria too. But the statistical probability of passing such a list makes it more expensive to define than the expected value of finding a monogamous partner, so I don't bother..."
"Oh, in that case... I'll just be with him forever. But forever is a floofy word."
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/commented/ If you have a problem with the law, go and do something to change it. Whining on Facebook just makes you look sad.
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I just watched my friend play computer games for an hour. It was one of those skilless artless fuel burning things (some cross between the Sims and Snood) which put me into a defensive mood and now I am taking a nap to try and forget what rubbish I saw. It's bad enough when fools like this pollute the workplace... best to weed them out of R&R hours...
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Explaining to a colleague, why we do not accept third-party payment gateways (yet):
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Gateway brand gets:
- brand exposure
- more cash to hold
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Our brand gets:
- reduced brand dominance
- reduced workflow minimisation
- association with a non-global brand
- sometimes more sales
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I think not 🙂
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/commented/ The alternative to condescension is complete avoidance of the inferior. One requires some variety!
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I find it tiring to talk to many people, but it is always worth the effort, in case one finds some which are better than average. Meanwhile, it's just a lot of:
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You should travel. (No)
You should fall in love without choosing to turn it off and/or on. (No)
You should value the common man/woman/person. (No)
You should regard meat and machine as different. (No)
You should take less risks. (No)
You should be averse to death. (No)
You should be averse to poverty. (Nawp)
You should buy insurance. (Not yet.)
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Ohmaigawd it's like the night of the living dead sometimes...
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Sisyphian stress. Adding more people to my list of net time sinks. Avoid with certain prejudice.
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Taking some time to review the risk portfolio at hand. Talent risk has risen, and so it is back in the spotlight. Looking forward to having this blow over by Eid, but standing by for further emergencies anyhow.
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Much to do, and few reliable allies, so on defense we go, and snipe at what can be had from a distance. Time to turtle...
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A good to time to reflect upon the states of mind of others.
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Many people view themselves as social entities, devoid of anchorage without the existence of others whom they deem to be people, whom they interact with; these prefer not to dissociate themselves from a notion of society.
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"Society," is an abstract concept: there are furthermore, socially defined people who specifically expand upon their sentimental attachments and emotional dependencies; these prefer notions of loyalty, or affection, which form the basis of their piety.
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I have to take a step back and review the fact that these people make up the majority of the population, and must be strategically accounted for in the planning of any deployments. As a primarily individualised entity, with business dealings with such as the above, I must not forget to hedge against the absence of a common goal between my own time, and theirs.
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This is economics.
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So many things to do. So many human traits to destroy. So tired. But that is life, I suppose. Until it ends. More ingenuity may be required.
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Very, very, stuck doing low risk work due to emergencies. Need to pay more attention to low risk work to ensure it gets done properly before emergencies completely destabilise corporate development.
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