“There’s a billion-dollar elephant in the room; any startup that wants to bring an eVTOL air taxi into commercial service needs to structure its entire operation to meet the same aerospace standards Boeing does. Does anyone have the money?” | learn more
A reader shared this with me after seeing my story about Lake Michigan last week. It’s an excellent read! “Chicago has a weakness at its very foundations. The towering skyscrapers and temples of commerce were built upon a swamp.” | learn more
Analysis from a friend: “Terrible incentives ✔, Lack of any regulatory oversight ✔, Insiders with opportunity cash out immediately ✔, Massive payday for investment bankers ✔, “Medical reimbursements” sort of historically shady biz ✔, “Complex data analysis” and “disruption” name […]
“The friendship paradox is the phenomenon first observed by the sociologist Scott L. Feld in 1991 that most people have fewer friends than their friends have, on average.” | learn more
“…If you include in their household net worth the net present value of their retirement benefits.” Is this a fair thing to do? Kinda… | learn more
“Authorities say Ramon Abbas, aka Hushpuppi, perfected a simple internet scam and laundered millions of dollars. His past says a lot about digital swagger, and the kinds of stories that get told online.” | learn more
“The authors estimate that holders of staked coins on PoS blockchains are currently generating some $9 billion in revenue annually from their staked holdings.” | learn more
“As of June 2021, over $1 billion has been committed towards blockchain-native analogs of traditional corporations called decentralized autonomous organizations or DAOs.” | learn more
“Peter Thiel’s former portfolio manager says that the crypto narrative is built on half-truths and a nonchalance about the security provided by the nation-state.” | learn more
So many reasons. “Not only are these projects inordinately expensive, states and localities are not even attempting to build particularly ambitious projects. The US is the sixth-most expensive country in the world to build rapid-rail transit infrastructure…” | learn more