by kneebonian on 1/4/23, 6:12 AM
I laughed out loud at this and from now on whenever anyone is straying into nonsense territory I will loudly and excitedly exclaim "A land value tax could've solved the resurrection of the Christ."
Although honestly the "immortality as an STD" is a close second.
by hahnchen on 1/4/23, 2:01 PM
> People talk about “fuck-you money”, the amount you’d have to make to never work again. You dream of fuck-you social success, where you find a partner and a few close friends, declare your interpersonal life solved, and never leave the house from then on. Still, in the real world you clock into your job … everyday
This is unfortunately very relatable
by opportune on 1/4/23, 3:41 AM
The anti stock is actually a great idea, I am surprised Wall Street doesn’t do this already to create synthetic longs.
Unfortunately it would be hard to collateralize since there is technically no limit to the dividend, similar to a sold call, but just like a sold call you could collateralize with an equivalent sized long position. That could probably be useful for tax optimization (similar to how many of the crypto lending services require full or over collateralization of the underlying, with the market generally being people who want to spend appreciated crypto without realizing a gain). Congress would certainly eventually address this, but there would be a few glorious years of deferred capital gains.
It could also be extremely useful for market making - when you can’t get a share to sell to fill or collateralize an order, you generate a synthetic long and anti stock. But you’d probably have to get some system in place with clearing houses where you eventually replace the synthetic long with a real share. IIUC this is pretty close to how the system works already.
I want to go to this party, IME most Bay Area parties are just really awkward nerds trying to suss out who is making the most money
by perardi on 1/4/23, 6:20 AM
…I realize this is an extreme parody, but if this is even
close to a Bay Area party, I’ll stick to my Chicago scene, thank you very much.
Less AI alignment discourse, more house music and ketamine.
by swyx on 1/4/23, 4:53 AM
> the fact is, we live in a world where a tiny number of people have an outsized amount of power. We - by which I mean the loose network of left-wing radicals - tried our best to solve it politically. But we couldn’t. So now we try a different tactic. Whenever a tech billionaire is at the top of his game - raking in billions of dollars, buying up newspapers, considering a run for Governor - we send him an invitation to the Innovation Forum. He’s honored! He always thought of himself as a practical man of business, not the sort of person who goes to Innovation Forums and pontificates to thought leaders about the future of mankind. But maybe it’s just that the world is finally recognizing his genius! So he clears his calendar for a few days, puts off inventing a new superlaser, and attends the Forum. And then a little later, he gets an invitation to the Tech Futures Colloquium, and he thinks - yes, I deserve to go to that one too. And so he clears his next week’s calendar . . .”
“And then you invite them to so many Colloquia that they don’t have time to accrue more money and power?”
“You’d be surprised how few it takes! At that level, you spend most of your time just keeping on top of what you’re already doing. A Forum or two a month is enough to bring most billionaires from actively expanding their influence to just treading water. Sometimes they even get addicted. Like Peter Thiel; I don’t think the poor dear has made a business decision in years.”
my god. Scott just made the case for Innovation Forums.
by saagarjha on 1/4/23, 11:34 AM
I should have gone to bed an hour ago but you don't get high-quality satire like this every day…
by Apocryphon on 1/4/23, 4:44 AM
Fake. No one in this dialogue uses the words "lindy" or "mid."
by mastax on 1/4/23, 7:23 AM
I usually avoid things like this because they're usually not this well written. Worth the time.
by janalsncm on 1/4/23, 8:38 AM
It would be cool if there was an app that created parties as engaging and diverse as these. In my experience people mostly know each other from work, and it’s not nearly as cross-functional.
by wonderwonder on 1/4/23, 1:13 PM
As an outsider, are silicone valley parties really this ridiculous?
by AtlasBarfed on 1/4/23, 8:30 AM
This is the only thing in the last 10... 18 years I've read that makes me want to move to the bay area.
And I live in a place where 32 degrees is a fine April day.
by quickthrower2 on 1/4/23, 10:51 AM
Poes law,
never a truer word said than in jest,
etc…
by pfoof on 1/4/23, 6:43 AM
Note for myself in the future: avoid all invitations to forums and colloquia
by ElfinTrousers on 1/4/23, 1:43 PM
I lived in the Bay Area after the first dotcom bust and before the second boom started. The parties were better then. Perhaps coincidentally, there were very few techies at them.
by iseanstevens on 1/4/23, 5:57 AM
I’ve been to this party a number of times. Pretty good snacks.
by sizzle on 1/4/23, 7:17 PM
At first I thought this was written by Chat-GPT
by pcrh on 1/4/23, 7:25 AM
Sounds like a lot of undergraduate parties...
by mrandish on 1/4/23, 4:33 PM
The satire is so spot on it burns. So glad I managed to escape the bay.
by Balgair on 1/4/23, 3:33 PM
I love the comments here, especially the ones where people run with the obvious satire and try the idea on for size. The 'nerd-sniping' ratio for this article must be one of the highest I've seen on HN.
https://xkcd.com/356/
by tomgp on 1/4/23, 12:43 PM
People wear name tags at house parties?
by yownie on 1/4/23, 12:39 PM
This was great!