Mercer

Sure, I'm down. It's funny but I always thought that this was 12oz's biggest advantage. Why publish graffiti photos on a platform designed and proven to rat you out warrant or no warrant.

For now, the only incentive is it's an open source browser superior in both performance, and user privacy due to it's unique "business model" if you can call it that. There's no need for add blockers, they're built in and don't sell white listing like other ad blockers. There's also no need to worry about this "free" product tracking your every move which is a plus, for now google stores that data for advertising purposes, but who knows how it could be used in the future. Once the advertising thing is worked out, users will be able to choose store their demographics, anonymized browsing data ect. and lease that info out to earn BAT. They'll also be able to watch advertising but instead of the browser, or website getting a tiny piece of revenue per impression, the user gets that tiny bit of BAT which can add up.

Facebook is by far much more profitable than Reddit, or Github combined. I think Microsoft just purchased Github for 7.8 B, and Reddit is valued at 1.8 B according to CNBC as of July 2017. By contrast, Facebook is valued in the hundreds of billions, and more profitable by an order of magnitude. I'm just describing the situation from a purely economic perspective. When you've got a board of directors, and shareholders to answer to, it boils down to return on investment, which will always be the final deciding factor on who's still in business, and who gets squeezed out, or liquidated in the end. IMHO nothing is free, every move you make in business, or life has a price. More people are waking up to this fact now, and realizing Facebook isn't a free service after all, every bit of user data collected and sold by them is the price you pay for a convenient way to share photos, or just interact with a larger circle of associates. Me personally, I don't really see the value in it, I haven't deleted my instagram yet, or the second FB I signed up for after deleting the first, after realizing it was the only option I had to stay in the loop with my extended family. Another opinion I have is that the "free" model is on it's way out. I don't know if you were aware of, or participated f the recent push for "Verge" which ended disastrously when they got millions of new users in a matter of days and their servers couldn't handle it. They had a non-free business model and a pretty good UI for mobile. Poesia posted a link on IG, and I checked it out and followed suit. I still get people I tried to put on telling me, "too bad that flopped". It's only a matter of time before the next competitor pops up and makes that model work. People hate facebook, and having a non chronological timeline in instagram, so most of the content creators would rather pay to not be sold out, and users would prefer to have the content they're subscribed to arrive in their feed chronologically, and not so manipulated. This "non-free" business model concept is carrying over to browsers now. Brenden Eich (inventor of Javascript and other cool shit) became a cryptocurrency convert, and has assembled a great team that just built an open source browser that has a very good chance of disrupting the entire advertising business model for the web. Highly recommend using it since it's not spyware like all other browsers, or in it's buggy beta phase anymore and very solid. They created an ERC20 or ERC23 standard Ethereum token for it called BAT (basic attention token). This token works much like Steemit does. The browser itself has a built in wallet, you can buy/earn BAT and deposit into your browser, then set a monthly limit on how much BAT will be given to the sites you visit, based on the amount of time you spend on them. You can also curate this list manually if you want by pinning your favorites, or turning the feature off for sites you visit but don't want to support. I've got mine set to spend 10 BAT a month (roughly $2.50) on my most visited list with a few pinned. Only 3 websites I visit regularly currently accept BAT payments, but there were zero accepting it a couple months ago so it's starting to build momentum. BTW You should get one of those green check marks next to 12oz and earning free money. The Brave browser's business model isn't fully developed yet, and the flip side of this business model comes in when advertisers want to reach prospective clients. As a Brave user, you can choose to see advertising, (it's all blocked natively by default without a need for plugins) and instead of an advertiser paying a website to target users, the advertiser can pay BAT directly into the brave system, and reach users directly. These users will be more engaged, and verifiable, and also willing to look at ads wile earning a small amount of BAT. The software is on Github, and open source. This allows large advertisers with their own dev team to audit the source code, and make sure they're getting the biggest bang for their decentralized bucks. I've been taking a look at it myself, along with the Brave browser's Metamask plugin. Way above my head but there's some pretty neat stuff involved. Imagine cutting out the middleman as an advertiser trying to reach an audience. Your payment is broken down into tiny digestible chunks, and spoon fed to willing participants that wanted to earn a little BAT on the side. Users will be able to track their own use, and remain private wile submitting their own interests to be targeted appropriately. I don't think most people are like me, and willing to pay, but there will be plenty of people who'd like to earn a few extra cryto tokens a month, either to cash out or use for paid access content. The best part is it's your choice, whether or not you see an add, pay a website out of your own pocket on a donation basis, or just browse the internet ad free assured you're every move is not being tracked. This is the future. I don't think Facebook, or Twitter will be around much longer in their current form. Disruptive open source technology like this is being developed now at a pace they won't be able to buy out, absorb, or squash before it's too late like they did with their other competitors. I don't fault Zuckerberg for what he's doing as far as his fiercely competitive scorched earth policy in social media. That's capitalism at it's finest. At the same time, I fully acknowledge he's a piece of shit. From the jump he's been nothing but a snake ever since he stole the original idea for FB from the Winkelwov twins. But with that said, I also think on some level, we're all complicit with his schemes, albeit on a much smaller scale. This is the problem with expecting everything to be provided to us for free, disregarding the fact that nothing is ever free, and you get what you pay for.

This is what DAO thinks when he see you on IG in tight jeans rocking long beards 2018 style...

I think people overlook social medias tendencies for consolidation. Much like public utilities will operate at a loss to establish market dominance, it's only after they've established a "monopoly" are they able to operate at a profit. Nobody in their right mind would choose today's Instagram, over the Instagram of 2013 when they were gaining market share and operating at a loss. The same can be said for Facebook, when they weren't so annoying and geared towards advertising/profits. The fact these services are good at first when they're focused on gaining market share, then turn to shit as soon as soon as it's possible to in order to make profits is off putting to their users. Unfortunately, if a competitor were to spring up, and break the market dominance, they too would either remain unprofitable, or end up being garbage like Facebook/instagram are today. That old saying "you get what you pay for" holds true in the digital age, as long as these services are free, they will suck.

Didn't really get over-drafted, just thought it was a funny situation during the market upswing, deserving of a meme reference. I actually had to cash out a pretty large amount recently for a move, and was hoping for a mistaken double deposit into my bank. Too bad the market was down when I'm moving into a new place, $4200 security deposit is killing me. Wish the new landlord would allow for an Ethereum smart contract security deposit, that would be nice to cash out in a few years when I move.

Lost $45 on fee's and overdraft charges, but ETH, LTC, and BTC went up and gained $450 which is nice.

Holy shit it would be amazing to see those dogs at work, and in training. If I were an operator myself, I'd hard time dealing with losing one in combat, almost as much as losing one of my brothers in arms. I've worked with secret service at NBC and had to remind myself not to try and pet their dog, that looks so much like my own cream puff at home. After becoming familiar with the dutch shepherd breed, I recognize their intellectual advantages, and intense work ethic compared to most other dogs. Mine is almost 11 years old now, and if I'd let him he'd harness up and pull me on my skateboard all the way to downtown brooklyn and back like he used to. The best thing I found to help ease his anxiety and make hime a little more tolerant of humans was giving him training for work tasks he could accomplish on his own with minimal encouragement. Kind of like a human, they just want to be an important member of a team somehow.

@Hua Guofang War On the Rocks is solid fucking gold, started listening earlier today and already 3 deep. Saving The Cipher Brief for tomorrow, lots of time behind the wheel.

@Fist 666 I hear that about leaving Colorado, I lived in the front range (Downtown Denver) for 5 years and we'd consistently get 70 degree weather in winter, sometimes even in January. This year has been especially harsh in NY, my cousins up by lake placid were at 50 below fahrenheit for quite some time in December. They all swear by pellet stoves up there, as opposed to wood burning tu supplement the furnace. @misteraven Dope flicks, please keep them coming. If you come across seed money get a bunch of horses, or a fleet of ATV's & Snowmobiles. You could have a nice tourist destination especially being that close to a ski resort. That's kind of me projecting my own dream. I see Otis up there chilling, he's got to be loving it out there compared to the pissing on trash bags lifestyle in Soho. I was wondering if any of those dutch shepherds are yours? That breed is normally very expensive if you want to buy one, and super smart. I honestly think they're smarter in many ways than most of the humans I know, especially in a tactical, or situational awareness sense. We've got an all black dutch shepherd my soon to be wife found wild. They found him starving, severely traumatised, and roaming the woods along the westside highway up in the heights. Took a week or two to finally catch him he was so wary of humans. Best dog I've ever had the pleasure of knowing. He's actually no longer scared of men anymore, doesn't flinch if anyone raises their hand, and turning into a bit of a cream puff. By nature, I don't think they're a very obedient breed. They're driven to dominate as the default and requires more of a partnership from humans they work with. That's actually helped work on my own patients, and other weaknesses more than he'll ever know. Cliche the dog rescued me type situation.

Very good read, I wanted to ask but wasn't sure how much you'd feel comfortable sharing publicly. Really glad to hear the kids are doing well, and that you've both been able to focus more on something important. Even though they're in a school now, hopefully you guys keep up that home schooling aspect and encourage them in subjects they're interested in. Being somewhat of an autodidact myself, I feel like being able to teach yourself the skills you need, or just want to learn is probably the #1 most important skill kids can learn. Not that I don't see strong value in schools for learning social skills, learning how to deal with administrative BS, etc. but I think schools can only be relied upon for a fraction of what's actually needed to be successful.

Pretty sure we've hit the floor, I think this entire month is going to be shitty though. From what I've noticed you can tell it's hit the floor in major corrections like this when it's between half, and a quarter of the all time high price, and trading volume starts picking back up. I don't fuck with anything I don't think is useful, or has serious potential outside of price. I'm not the best person to ask about this. IMHO the days of putting in a few cents and getting returns in the tens of thousands of percentile within months are pretty much over for non-accredited investors. One of the low cost coins I think has serious potential for 2018 is ADA, I also see Ethereum as severely undervalued at this point. EOS is also good a good hedge against Ethereum much like ADA is. EOS requires balls, and a little bit of technical know how to properly register the ERC20 tokens on my ether wallet via smart contract which is scary for most people, but a serious advantage to anyone willing to go through the learning process. Although I do hold bitcoin cash I don't recommend it as an investment unless it's potential is being measured against BTC, I just support their cause. TBH I don't think there's any "exchange of value" focused cryptocurrencies outside of Monero that have potential this year, including BTC. The market seems to be shifting away from cryptocurrencies, and into cryptoassets like Ether and other smart contract platforms. I only like Monero because of it's anti surveillance properties. Absolutely not, I know people who've lost a lot, either by trying to outsmart the market, or by having their funds sitting on an exchange that gets pwnt. During the aforementioned ETH flash crash people had market sell orders if the price drops below "X" well, if it drops below "X" and keeps going down because everyone else was thinking the same thing, by the time your order is filled you might be one of the people that sold at $10. I don't even like holding anything on exchanges, even the super reputable ones. I will make fiat deposits into them, and hold the fiat with buy orders for when the price dips but that's it. Looking back at my moves, the best ones hands down were buy and hold. I did get some trader luck on a shitcoin investment (IOTA). Truth be told I honestly had faith in the project back when it took a certain degree of technical prowess to even HODL, and later lost faith when I looked into it more. Luckily when I lost faith, the price was hitting gains in the thousands of percentile. I'm not saying day trading is bad, I'm sure there are people who consistently make gains, I've just never met one myself and more often find people that lose out in the long run.

I'm suffering through only tripling last year's investment now. Someone pass me a kleenex. On a serious note, outside of the bitcoin I bought in November 2016, I got in on the first major ETH pump up to $380 ish in June last year. Dropped about 8 grand (my entire savings) starting in May as it rose from $180, then $250, then $300. I watched it rise to almost $400 in June then boom, flash crash. It literally dropped to less than $10 in seconds. It bounced back up to like 300 right after but I was shook. I held as it slowly worked it's way down following the flash crash, then, my dumbass panic sold at around $150 before it bounced fafter dipping to $130. I took a loss of close to $4000 on ETH. From what I understand now, my story isn't too uncommon. You're more likely to get into this shit during a major run up, it just takes balls of steel to not panic sell. As any good gambling addict will tell you, the only way to make your losses back it to keep rolling the dice, so I put back what I had left back in in July, and dropped another $5 grand or so leading up until the August boom. Till this day that panic sell was one of the dumbest decisions I've ever made, my girl was pissed until it started pumping back up and I admitted I put a bunch more back in again, lol. I'm only sharing this painful, and embarrassing story because I'm sure there's someone on here with a panic sell gnawing away at the back of their head. If I wouldn't have panic sold I'd be around $15,000 ahead of where I'm at right now. That's like a fully loaded Hyundai Santa Fe with 10,000 miles on it. Moral of the story, don't buy high, then sell low. If anything take profits after a major pump to cover your initial investment, then these dips are easy to shrug off and feel like losing monopoly money.

True, but I sometimes wonder if most of that straphanger guise is in an effort to look unpleasant/unapproachable to bums, and weirdos. It's like when I go upstate to visit some fam and the people there seem genuinely stoked to see someone else, they'll wave at you and sometimes it catches me off guard. I'll think to myself "WTF you smiling at dickface" before catching myself slipping back into my unapproachable NYC mode. Here, people have had enough of seeing other humans, and just want to pretend they're alone for a moment especially North of 14th St. or down in the financial district. I don't think it's a healthy lifestyle to live crammed on top of each other, breathing in stray cigarette smoke, truck exhaust and a 21 million random farts with every breath. For now I'm just willing to put up with, and contribute to it.

In many ways I'm traveling in the exact opposite direction as both of you at the moment. I spent most of my 20's & 30's either writing my name on stuff, selling weed, and quitting my job every October to be a snowboard bum out West until moving here. I didn't even take it seriously when I moved here at first and I'm shocked I've lasted here this long. Starting out in a career a few years ago while in my late 30's was hard pill to swallow, but I'm starting to get the hang of it now. I'm basically working towards being able to work remotely on the side, while holding down a 60+ hour a week full time gig. Ultimately, my goal is sort of a combination of what both of you are doing. I want to both live on a ranch someplace remote, and move south of the border. Specifically, I'd like to operate a tourism ranch in Patagonia Argentina, befriend as many stray dogs down there as possible, and help tourist get great photos via horseback rides, and grueling hikes. Had a really good vacation to Los Glaciares National Park down there that I can't stop thinking about almost 3 years later. Sometimes I'll be showing a fellow photo enthusiast I've met online around NYC, just roaming, exploring good spots to take pictures. They'll thank me for spending all day on foot showing them the spots, thinking I'm taking time away from something else I'd rather be doing. I'm more like "This is exactly what I like doing". Feels like something worth working towards for me and my soon to be wife. Either way, if I ever make my goal or not, I'm at least content with what I've earned now, I've always assumed I'd be behind bars, or worse. I'm at a point where I'd regret going back off grid, without achieving some success in the rat race first to help make that lifestyle a little more comfortable. I just don't want to have regrets and if I wasn't on this path now I'd always have that voice in the back of my head. My current pursuit has brought the added benefit of forcing me to face my demons so to speak. I'm going out of my way to make sure focusing on the grind won't make me lose sight of what's important. I actually schedule time on a fairly tightly booked calendar to give my girl a 30 minute back rub, or spend quality time with the dog, and other weird shit most busy people would never schedule. I've accepted the fact that I'll probably never "find happiness", and honestly, I don't care at this point. I think life will always be about suffering in one form or another, for all of us. I just came to the realization it's important to choose the type of suffering I'm willing to accept. Right now, it's not having much free time and a social life.

Currently, very happy the portfolio is ETH heavy. Ether was 51% of my portfolio last week, haven't moved anything and it's at 61% today. Found this article today, stroked my brains own confirmation biases pretty well.

I'd probably invest in gold, and especially silver as part of my savings if it weren't for the further return on investment I'm anticipating on cryptocurrencies over the next couple of years. Once you go down the rabbit hole of investing, you start to see things in different ways. Noticed when I was in a fiat only frame of mind, I didn't really have a strong urge to save money. Once I got some crypto gains my entire thought process changed both consciously, and subconsciously. The entire time I was in the fiat frame of mind, I'd see very poor returns on my savings accounts. This got worse after 911, then diminished even further after the financial collapse of 2008. Since then, money has been practically given away for free. You can almost take out a loan with low enough interest to invest in something safe like bonds and make money. At the same time, you subconsciously understand that because of inflation, your saved dollar will buy less next year than it would this year. There's basically very little incentive to save, especially for people in middle, lower income brackets. It's smart, but it feels like trying to walk up a down escalator. I think this is the main reason why Americans have become so poor economically. Why store your fiat currency when basically anything you buy is worth more than the dollars you have. How many of you know people that actually saved their own downpayment for a house, without contributions from family? It's becoming almost unheard of. My zip code requires about $100,000 in savings just to make the bare minimum of a 20% down payment (on a small 1 bedroom apartment mind you). It's a tough sell to a young person who's trying to actually enjoy life. I see our economy as being built on this inflation, and debt. People spending every penny they make, as fast as they make them. Why hold that fiat, it's going to be worth less the longer you hold it, even cheap Chinese made plastic goods are worth more than that dollar you were considering stashing away. Oddly enough, I see the good side of this. By spending money on shit we don't need, we've inadvertently made China a 1st world nation, and somehow also kept our own economic system growing (for the rich that is). We work harder because we wanted that new iPhone, and that car we borrowed money to buy, and if we don't make the payments we'll lose it. This is what drives our economy. The downsides of this is so many people not being able to figure out why they're miserable, while missing out on life by chasing that next toy. At the same time it's slowly improving the world and providing economic opportunities for others. Now, Circling back to Cryptocurrencies. They are essentially deflationary since some is inevitably lost to people losing their keys/passwords all the time. I think by nature, they will always be deflationary and go up in value. Thus, people like me that HODL choose not to spend money on cheap Chinese shit, and save knowing next year I'll be able to buy a lambo if I pass on the range rover today (I def don't HODL that much BTW, just using it as an example). I don't think our economy could function in a cryptocentric currency system. Inflation, IMHO isn't such a bad thing looking at the big picture, and probably essential for modern economies to continue to grow. They'll have to figure this inflation/deflation problem out before Crypto is ever successful as a mainstream currency. Not good news for the next generation of HODLers. Why would anyone actually spend a dime on something that wasn't absolutely essential, when it's guaranteed that dime will be worth a quarter in the near future.

This has to be one of the best things I've seen on the internet. Rick Flair is still the man.

Spend so much time either behind the wheel, or just with headphones on that podcasts have become a regular part of my content consumption. Started running out of new music, got into podcasts, now I'm running out of podcasts, and getting into audiobooks. Would really appreciate suggestions on good audio books, listened to 2 productivity related audiobooks last week, and listened to Fire & Fury the week before when I signed up for Audible. Audiobooks seem to be a topic of interest judging by other threads. Nothing great on the audiobook front so far that I'd recommend. As far as podcasts go, I've got a few faves. Still somewhat of a mac fanboy, and tech nerd so I've got a few favorites on my overcast that focus on these subjects. Keep in mind these are probably boring as fuck if you're not into macs or cryptocurrencies. Accidental Tech Podcast App developers that originally wanted to make a car show, but had better results talking about tech. Mac Power Users Two tech savvy lawyers that mainly discuss productivity apps, automation, and workflows for both iOS, and macOS. Epicenter Long running podcast that covers blockchain tech. It's geared more towards people with advanced understanding of the fundamentals. Recent show with Elizabeth Rossiello was pretty good and there are a few real gems going back. So anyone got podcasts they recommend, or audio books they'd like to recommend?

Thanks, just cleaned the grammar up in that post a little. It's funny going back and reading it, didn't think I was that passionate about this topic. Reminds me of the days I'd try to convince non believers graffiti was the most important art movement of all times. I had this shpiel that included "You're wrong, what get's destroyed? If anything, the train cars will only rust slower."

When you've been deep in crypto as long as I have you start to see patterns. Remember, this is a huge threat to people who have profited the most from legacy financial systems. Even if they actually understood how cryptocurrencies worked, they'd never endorse them or encourage their popularity. Anyone who calls Bitcoin "a bubble" is usually just parroting someone else who's made the same mistake. Many people unfamiliar with cryptocurrencies try to understand this new financial asset by drawing comparisons to something they already understand. It's human nature, when someone sees a person that looks/dresses a certain way, they naturally make assumptions about the person based on past experiences with others that looked or dressed in a similar fashion. This false comparison to tulip mania, or other bubbles is favored mainly by people who do have a deep understanding of existing financial assets, and economics, but very little understanding of cryptography, and computer science. Sure, bitcoin is a bubble, one day it will be worth "nothing". The real question is when that will happen. Tomorrow, next week, In a couple of years, a few generations from now?. As someone who has a better grasp on how it works, the needs it can fill, and the actual forces behind it's exponential growth in popularity, I feel it will be worth "something" much longer than the US dollar, the Euro, the Yen, and other legacy Fiat currencies. The actual worth of a financial asset is driven by a shared mass hallucination. Gold isn't worth anything. If you're cold, hungry, or need shelter, gold won't keep you warm, feed you, or keep you out of the wind and rain. Outside of some minor industrial applications in an advanced economy, It's only value is that it facilitates trade. Sure, it's shiny, and makes for catchy jewelry, but no more so that costume jewelry with almost no financial value. Without the mass hallucination that gives it a universally accepted value, it's worth less than salt, or even fire wood by weight. The same can be said for all precious metals, the currencies that are backed by them, and other financial assets like fiat, stocks, bonds etc. The Mona Lisa might keep you warm for a short period of time, if it's broken up into small pieces and burned. That's it only real value without shared mass hallucination. As human beings, almost all of us share the same thought patterns when it comes to things like great works of art, that will almost universally lead to a priceless valuation of a Da Vinci painting, once the human understands exactly what makes the painting important. To deny bitcoin's value as a financial asset, while ignoring the same forces that give other "worthless" financial assets their value merely shows a lack of understanding. Once someone understands the combination of cryptography, computer science, and economics that gives bitcoin it's value, and have lead to it's meteoric rise, they usually don't make the mistake of calling it a bubble, ponzi, or a fraud. Unlike cash, and other existing financial assets decentralised cryptocurrency cannot be seized or confiscated without direct compliance by it's holder. It's uncounterfitable, the transactions are immutable & irreversible, and it's use cannot be stopped without shutting down the internet on a global scale. These advantages have never been achieved by any other financial asset. They are based in fact, and some of the main driving forces behind it's adoption. It will become more stable with scale, and adoption, it's still under 1 trillion. Soros's line of bitcoin denial went out of fashion sometime in 2016. The thing with tax evasion, money laundering, dark web applications is: yes, there's a small kernel of truth there. There are a minority of cryptocurrency users that are use it for nefarious purposes. At the same time, there are even more people using cash for those purposes. It would be just as ridiculous to say we should ban the use of cash because (fact) the vast majority of drug dealers on earth still use cash. Terrorism was funded through the use of banks, do we call for the ban on banks? It would be harmful overall to get rid of systems like banks, cash etc. just to stop bad actors that would inevitably use other means. Addressing the common misconception that "blockchain is a great technology, but bitcoin isn't" is even easier. Again, only shows a clear lack of understanding by the person making the statement. There are great advantages in using the legacy technologies that currently run our financial systems. Most of those advantages have to do with appeal to authority. Banks can reverse fraudulent transactions, governments can freeze, or confiscate ill gotten funds. None of those advantages are compatible with blockchain technology. If one wanted to create a State/Establishment endorsed financial asset by using an immutable ledger, they would lose 100% of those advantages. They might as well just use bitcoin itself, it's way more secure because it's got a massive amount of computing already power behind it. I'm not going to waste a bunch of time explaining this point further, but think about it. If you wanted a digital currency that had some sort of central control, the last thing you'd want to use is any form of immutable ledger. Large governments have already tried banning it with very limited success. They might be able to affect the price, and shut down public institutions dealing with it like exchanges, but they don't have enough control to stop it's adoption. I've struggled with understanding this until I watched what China was doing over the last couple of years. Besides, governments are sluggish when it comes to adopting, and understanding new technology. If you do enough business with government agencies in 2018, you still might need things like fax machines because that's how they are. Adaptation, and advancement get slower the larger a government is. Small local governments can evolve almost at the pace of a large business (if properly run), State/Provincial governments are much slower at adaptation, and by the time it scales to a Federal government in countries large enough for international influence, adaptation in most cases essentially grinds to a stop compared to the rest of society. By the time governments large enough for international influence start working together internationally to stop the advancement of cryptocurrency, my money is literally betting it will be too late. We might even be there already. Never forget the motivations of Satoshi and why he invented bitcoin. It's doing exactly what it was designed to do.

Now I'm starting to think instead of Casek, AOD was the guy that had Symbols beef and was mining bitcoin 2012ish??? Not sure though. I distinctly remember some sort of crossfire snafu where "fuck this I'm mining bitcoin" was mentioned. Had to be one of the libertarian leaning guys, It's bothering me now.

That's usually the easiest way to start. You have to go through an ID process with Coinbase by giving them your ssn/dob and scanning a copy of your photo ID and sending it in. Takes about a week to get approved last time I checked. They good thing about Coinbase is they own GDAX, and the accounts are interchangeable. If you use GDAX correctly you don't have to worry about exchange fees. Being in New York State, I only have "legal" access to 3 exchanges. Coinbase which has the highest fees, Followed by Gemini which is a little bit lower, then GDAX which is the lowest. Those are the only 3 gateways into/out of Fiat (USD) that I currently use. One of the reasons they're allowed to operate in New York State is they have to keep a certain amount of capitol in reserve, making them more trustworthy. Should the market tank, they "should" still be able to allow withdrawals, where some other exchanges are cutting it close, and will go down when and if the market tanks hard enough.

Fully agree, over 50% of my portfolio has been ETH since March. Basically the only one that has a real use case outside of speculation. Passing on NEO, but have a small Hedge against ETH with EOS & Cardano holdings. Eggs/Basket rule.

I assumed you'd start a "Post your lambo" thread since I remembered you talking about mining BTC way back when, I think pre MT Gox 2012ish. Either way man good to se you post in here, been a long time.