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[2017-01-06 09:01:03] - xpovos: i like DelReal's response. Basically it boils down to: do you know people who don't live in a city. I did also realize that the people who I know with trucks are all mountain bikers or coworkers (or both). none of us own trucks. ~a
[2017-01-05 21:39:31] - paul: my strategy for the last three years has been . . . buy in small amounts, often, spend, often, earn if anybody is willing to let me earn in bits. "sell" isn't something i plan on ever doing. so unless it truley stops functioning, i really don't care as much about the price. ~a
[2017-01-05 21:34:47] - paul: oh no, the bubble burst! jk, it's back over 1k. ~a
[2017-01-05 19:44:31] - Interesting (to me) kerfluffle. http://thefederalist.com/2017/01/04/watch-bunch-journalists-freak-asked-know-anybody-drives-truck/ -- Xpovos
[2017-01-05 16:54:50] - mig: Honestly, most video games sneak up on me now. I just don't have time to follow video game news like I used to. Legacy of the Void totally snuck up on me and SC2 is/was one of my favorite games of the past 10 years. Same thing with X-Com 2. Also, March is still pretty far away.
-Paul[2017-01-05 16:31:30] - although I guess I haven't been following developments on it as much as I did Mass Effect 3. - mig
[2017-01-05 16:30:58] - paul: how did that just sneak up on us (andromeda)? - mig
[2017-01-05 10:57:35] - a: http://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/05/bitcoin-plummets-after-nearing-all-time-high.html Looks like I missed out on a chance to back up the truck.
-Paul[2017-01-04 16:48:59] - https://www.masseffect.com/en-gb/news/mass-effect-andromeda-coming-in-march mass effect andromeda coming march 21, 2017 - aaron
[2017-01-04 16:05:26] - Best movie: Dr. Strange should get a nomination, I think. Pretty solid, despite some problems. -- Xpovos
[2017-01-04 09:45:47] - For gmail accounts, which I don't appear to have right now. Is that something I can set up? -Paul
[2017-01-04 09:45:31] - So, I had a thought recently that out of all my online accounts, the ones with the apparent weakest security (and I stress apparent, because I'm only saying this based on what I see) is ironically my bank account and brokerage. Does anybody know if there is a way to strengthen either? I also heard something about two factor authentication... -Paul
[2017-01-03 21:44:28] - https://twitter.com/voxdotcom/status/816451589695148032 wat? - mig
[2017-01-03 15:55:21] - mig: Yes, he was. http://www.roanoke.com/sports/columns_and_blogs/blogs/andy_bitter_virginia_tech_football/hokies-land-commitment-from-nation-s-no-dual-threat-juco/article_0536a4 -- Xpovos
[2017-01-03 15:42:01] - paul: do you know if Evans specifically was a Fuente recruit? - mig
[2017-01-03 14:53:39] - paul: valid points I guess. I guess it's a risky proposition either way. - mig
[2017-01-03 14:30:18] - mig: And (4) His offensive weapons leaving might mean more runs for him, which means higher chance of injury (he's already had some in his past and ran it a lot this year). After reading all of that, I can't blame him for testing the waters. This might be his best shot. -Paul
[2017-01-03 14:29:36] - mig: The article touches on that some. The author agrees that it seems odd, but gives reasons why Evans might've made that decision. (1) He saw what Dak Prescott is doing as a late round pick. (2) He's actually fairly old at 23 and this could be his best chance. (3) All his offensive weapons leaving might mean worse stats next year... -Paul
[2017-01-03 14:21:42] - paul: Evans declaring strikes me as bizarre. Is he even projected to go that high? I looked back at his #s and they were actually pretty amazing, but it still feels weird for him to declare now. - mig
[2017-01-03 13:17:46] - http://www.roanoke.com/sports/columns_and_blogs/blogs/andy_bitter_virginia_tech_football/making-sense-of-the-hokies-nfl-departures-and-what-s/article_2f6c0e16-d Yikes, I had no idea so many people declared early. Looks like quite a hit for our offense next year. -Paul
[2017-01-03 11:30:17] - Daniel: It'll be interesting to see how our Vanguard funds perform relative to each other over time. I'm curious if the mix I picked (higher on foreign markets than most would recommend) pays off long term. -Paul
[2017-01-03 10:29:01] - a / Paul: Vanguard says my 1 year rate of return is 11.6% for the money thats been with them all year (I rolled over my old 401k during the year so it doesn't have year history on that). -Daniel
[2017-01-02 12:11:45] - Daniel: I think I had medium levels of expectation for Rogue One, because I thought it was entertaining, but wasn't disappointed. -Paul
[2017-01-02 12:11:03] - a: It's not necessarily a random date, it's the end of the third quarter in 2015 (so around October 1st). -Paul
[2017-01-02 12:06:16] - a: Yeah, sorry, it's been 5 quarters of tracking for me. -Paul
[2017-01-02 01:59:50] - Saw Rogue One. Entertained but mildly disappointed. Did have some OH SNAP moments though which is nice in a franchise. Some cringe moments too though. -Daniel
[2016-12-30 17:08:49] - paul: my 2016 is 12% for s&p, 11% for my (vanguard) funds and 26% for my stocks. ~a
[2016-12-30 17:03:01] - paul: oh, "since inception" is some random date isn't it. can we please use year boundaries? ~a
[2016-12-30 17:00:16] - paul: i see s&p at 12% not 16% for 2016 with or without dividends. (2283.83/2038.20 without dividends). show your math? ~a
[2016-12-30 16:28:19] - Since inception, S&P is winning with 16.56% gain, Vanguard funds close behind with 14.14% and hand picked winners trailing badly at 4% flat. This was not a bad year at all for the market. -Paul
[2016-12-30 16:27:06] - Update for my 2016Q4 retirement numbers. The S&P apparently kicked both my ass AND Vanguard's. S&P up 3.23%. Vanguard funds up only 0.02% and my hand-picked winners down 0.97% -Paul
[2016-12-30 10:53:42] - yeah, i don't expect it to ever get anywhere near 1% of usd. on the other hand, it is strictly more useful than USD (unless volatility can't ever be tamed by hedging) and i see it as strictly more useful than the speculative/currency/store-of-wealth uses for gold. ~a
[2016-12-30 10:36:46] - a: Yeah, I think you did. Didn't intend to count derivatives. So I guess there's still some reasonable room to run for bitcoin. I don't expect it to get anywhere near USD anytime soon, but it's not even at 1/800th yet. -Paul
[2016-12-30 10:20:04] - yeah, ok, i think i understand. so yeah. i answered your question then? if you include derivatives though, the answer will be very different. ~a
[2016-12-30 10:15:46] - a: I think I'm referring to your M2 thing. Like, let's assume there's $100 trillion in USD that exists and compare that with how many bitcoins currently exist. -Paul
[2016-12-30 10:08:34] - or the world M2 (100T/16M) you get 1BTC = $6m. ~a
[2016-12-30 10:07:27] - otoh, if you just divide the M2 by the current bitcoin supply (13T/16M) you get 1BTC = $.8m. ~a
[2016-12-30 10:03:20] - currency is divisible, so i'm not sure how you define "much". for instance, you could imagine there being just "1" bitcoin and "1" dollar and "1 kg" of gold, and we're all using divisions of them. if we replaced the dollar with bitcoin, we'd all be transacting in trillionths of a bitcoin (which we might give a name for). regardless, i don't see it happening. ~a
[2016-12-30 09:39:41] - a: I wonder where bitcoin ranks in terms of world currencies in terms of how "much" of it there is. Like, if we instantly replaced the dollar with bitcoin, what would the exchange rate be? What if we instantly replaced the Euro or the Yen or the Bolivar? -Paul
[2016-12-29 17:37:12] - paul: i guess it had to get from 1000 btc / dollar to 1000 dollar / btc somehow (+100000000% increase). without governmental decree, or central planning of some kind, it's jarring to create a currency that's literally worth nothing out of the gate. and . . . somehow we're all convinced currencies are worth something. ~a
[2016-12-29 17:34:06] - paul: *HA* yeah, a pretty mild month, don't you think? there were some *weeks* in 2011 and 2013 that were in the 80%s. ~a
[2016-12-29 16:46:18] - That's like a 33% gain in one month? Roughly? -Paul
[2016-12-29 16:45:00] - Holy crap, what happened to bitcoin prices in the past week? -Paul
[2016-12-28 09:38:13] - BEST movie of the year. ~a
[2016-12-22 14:48:27] - Paul: Ouch! -Daniel
[2016-12-22 13:54:07] - a: If I win my fantasy basketball league, though, then maybe I can divert some of those resources elsewhere.
I'll be in touch, you're my main dealer. 
-Paul[2016-12-22 13:53:25] - a: Want to? Yes. Can do? Sadly, not right now. There's an even great strain on our finances currently because we're likely to be buying a new roof ($10k+) and possibly a new A/C (close to $10k) in the next few months, so we're scraping for every spare penny we can right now. -Paul
[2016-12-22 13:43:02] - paul: did you wanna buy more? i buy regularly (since i also spend regularly). ~a
[2016-12-22 13:18:06] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3Sjl1jc1Oc If you like at least 2 out of the 3 of the following then I think you'll appreciate this: Metallica, Journey, Christmas Music. -Paul
[2016-12-22 10:11:15] - a: That's the good kind of freefall, although I really wish I had more bitcoin.
-Paul[2016-12-21 08:55:05] - paul: reverse freefall. these usaully don't last very long (like 10 minutes or so usually), but imo they're fun to watch regardless. ~a
[2016-12-20 13:11:05] - http://reason.com/reasontv/2016/12/20/the-libertarian-holiday-gift-guide I thought this was funny, and there's a chance non-libertarians might think it's funny too.
-Paul[2016-12-20 12:16:51] - a: there's a difference between trying to be funny (even if they fail at it, like TDS is wont to do these days), and mean spirited moral scolding, which is what this mtv bit is. - mig
[2016-12-20 11:34:47] - I'm pretty forgiving of racist and sexist stuff as long as it's funny. I didn't watch the video, but this doesn't sound funny at all. -Paul
[2016-12-20 11:21:21] - not in my opinion. probably not in yours either. but, it's weird that mtv isn't the only one that gets this wrong. the daily show does it too. trevor talks to "white guys" on his show and i guess (until now) i thought it was all in good fun, but maybe i shouldn't have. ~a
[2016-12-20 10:55:14] - http://dailycaller.com/2016/12/19/mtv-offers-up-new-years-resolutions-for-white-guys-video/ i guess this sort of racism and sexism is socially acceptable. - mig
[2016-12-20 00:55:12] - Kind of sad that people like Faith Spotted Eagle and Colin Powell (and yes, even Ron Paul) got electoral votes and Gary Johnson did not. Disband the electoral college!
-Paul[2016-12-19 16:20:19] - http://lawnewz.com/high-profile/3-clinton-electors-vote-for-colin-powell-and-faith-spotted-eagle-instead/ clinton defectors leading so far... - mig
[2016-12-19 15:15:13] - Russia's ambassador to Turkey was assassinated at an art gallery earlier today. There's photos and video of the shooting as it was taking place. Creepy as fuck. - mig
[2016-12-19 15:07:58] - paul: Honestly I feel like more defections from Clinton than Trump is more likely. - mig
[2016-12-19 15:07:58] - paul: Honestly I feel like more defections from Clinton than Trump is more likely. - mig
[2016-12-19 14:50:20] - mig: http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/19/politics/electoral-college-donald-trump-vote/index.html "In Minnesota, one elector was disqualified after declaring he would vote for someone other than his state's winner, Clinton. Under state law, he was replaced, and the alternate voted for Clinton." -Paul
[2016-12-19 14:47:56] - mig: Yeah, I thought there was somebody who said they were voting for Kasich. I'm guessing since only a few have claimed they would swap, we're not going to see a bunch. -Paul
[2016-12-19 14:09:46] - paul: we know there's at least 1 in Texas who will flip from Trump to TBD, and 1 in Maine who will flip from Clinton to Sanders. - mig
[2016-12-19 13:40:31] - Anybody have any thoughts on how many electors will go rogue and vote for somebody other than Trump or Clinton? I'm thinking 3-4. -Paul
[2016-12-19 12:40:58] - or standing on concrete. or standing on dirt. ~a
[2016-12-19 12:09:32] - a: Fair. I think most people (and I definitely include me) don't have a good sense of what has dangerously high levels of radiation and what does not. For instance, some people seem to freak out over levels of radiation that are hardly different from what you get flying. -Paul
[2016-12-19 11:49:07] - paul: understood. and i think the samples we have in my office do not fit into that category. ~a
[2016-12-19 11:46:08] - a: It's not the level of radiation I'm talking about. It's almost the opposite. I'm talking about potentially strong sources of radiation that are "safely" housed in relatively common devices. -Paul
[2016-12-19 11:45:21] - a: Hmmmm, let me try to explain better. I think almost everybody would agree that the danger of radiation poisoning from medical equipment in a hospital is incredibly low. And yet, if something drastic (and yes, extremely unlikely) were to happen, those incredibly safe devices can become deadly. -Paul
[2016-12-19 11:29:39] - here are some other "safe" radiation sources to give you some context: concrete. and dirt. both put out a fair amount of energy. both "safe" and i don't think they can be horribly deadly. unless you try to hit someone with a piece of concrete. or bury someone in dirt. still the the cause of death will probably be blunt force trauma/suffocation. not radiation ~a
[2016-12-19 11:26:00] - paul: i'm not sure this is the same thing. but my ignorance would lead me to ask an expert before i did anything stupid like opening something up. ~a
[2016-12-19 11:02:01] - a: Well, maybe it's my ignorance showing, but I just figured even relatively "safe" radiation sources (like from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goi%C3%A2nia_accident) can be horribly deadly. -Paul
[2016-12-19 10:43:44] - paul: maybe the confusion, though, was because i was joking when i linked to the "criticality drawing". ~a
[2016-12-19 10:42:56] - paul: the samples are real. but they're very low energy compared to (say) medical patients walking around. ~a
[2016-12-19 10:31:56] - sorry i haven't seen rogue one yet. i might see it over the holidays or in a dream. please don't spoil it for me - aaron
[2016-12-19 10:31:55] - a: Ah, so the "samples" aren't real? I went back and added "knowingly" because I figured I probably am within 100 miles of some source of radiation poisoning. Radiation and zombies are two of my biggest irrational fears. -Paul
[2016-12-19 10:24:09] - paul: none of this would qualify as "radiation poisoning". regardless, you're within 100 miles of my office, so now you're boned. ~a
[2016-12-19 10:20:46] - i haven't seen it but i can look away. yes, you can still create sub-message boards. ~a
[2016-12-19 10:13:00] - mig: I've seen it, but if some haven't, can we still create sub-message boards? -Paul
[2016-12-19 10:09:34] - Is it safe to talk about Rogue One? - mig
[2016-12-19 09:56:29] - a: Not sure I want to (knowlingly) be within 100 miles of any potential source of radiation poisoning.
-Paul[2016-12-16 16:47:44] - you'd love my new project then. we analyze radiation sources. there's like a whole bunch of "samples" in the lab right next to my office. just imagine the lab looking like this: File:Slotin criticality drawing.jpg rot13: uggc://jjj.qnecn.zvy/cebtenz/fvtzn ~a
[2016-12-16 16:41:37] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Slotin Sorry, broke the link. -Paul
[2016-12-16 16:28:27] - a: I don't know why, but I am always morbidly fascinated by deaths from radiation poisoning (like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Slotin). -Paul
[2016-12-16 15:11:24] - TIL, the "PK" in PKZIP refers to the author (Phil Katz) who died in his 30s from alcoholism. he literally died next to three empty liquor bottles. ~a
[2016-12-16 15:05:02] - mig: yeah, ok, i thought it was interesting that reddit could be subverted so easily. it matters to me, but maybe not the world. ~a
[2016-12-16 15:04:29] - aaron: sorry, i thought you said your simulation said "it doesn't matter if you go to war or not". ~a
[2016-12-16 14:06:42] - a: what do you mean? my program showed all that stuff, i pretty much ran through all the steps i talked about on the message board... how a 0.5 loses to a 0.25, and a 0.25 loses to a 0.12, and there's a nash equilibrium at always going to war- aaron
[2016-12-16 12:45:36] - I mean in the bitcoin example, sure it affected the subreddit, but what of bitcoin itself? If the damage was contained to the subreddit, what really is the BFD? - mig
[2016-12-16 12:44:59] - I think he is vastly overestimating reddit's effects on RL. - mig
[2016-12-16 12:44:09] - a: I'm just not seeing anything in this video that's a particularly revealing. That reddit user behavior can be taken advantage of is certainly nothing new, and it's just a little eye-rolling that the video maker is treating this as some sort of massive real world crisis. It's not. - mig
[2016-12-16 12:40:18] - aaron: why didn't your program show this? ~a
[2016-12-16 12:39:35] - mig: honestly when i watched it the second time around i did notice how lacking it was in the "who cares?" category. so you can override a website on the internet and "claim" that it has wide ranging effects. they didn't really address that last part as well. i believe it, but it wasn't really proven. ~a
[2016-12-16 12:35:52] - yeah i definitely rolled my eyes at that part. sorry, it's not all gold. ~a
[2016-12-16 12:29:50] - a: "take Bernie Sanders, for example, his unpredictable rise can largely be attributed to reddit." evidence? - mig
[2016-12-16 08:43:49] - a: hmph the answer went up to that gold/war problem
- aaron[2016-12-15 22:33:40] - very interesting 8 minute video about easily subverting reddit and the impact that has on the world news. (plus a little about snowden, bitcoin, brexit, fake news: it's a good video) ~a
[2016-12-15 16:10:03] - xpovos: I just want to know precisely *what* these people want the US to do. - mig
[2016-12-15 10:07:45] - Since I'm far more involved in actively creating and raising those "future generations" than anyone I saw who posted such BS, I think such concerns are overblown. And if they're not, there are multiple logical reasons NOT to do something. Most significant is that "doing something" is not "making things better." And making things better is pretty much impossible.
[2016-12-15 10:06:17] - mig: The gist is, I'm sure, that failure to take action to do something (ideally something productive) to improve the lives of people in Aleppo (that's always the key word I see, not "Syria") then we're morally lacking and future generations will judge us. -- Xpovos
[2016-12-15 08:51:45] - aaron: "playing around with a simulation i made i kind of come to the same conclusion" yeah i considered making a simulation when i also had similar guesses about how it didn't matter if you went to war or not less than 0.5. i'm glad you made the program
~a[2016-12-14 13:27:25] - Lots of Syria related posts showing up in my feed the last 2 days. I get that things are bad over there and that's tragic, but it feels like there's an subtle nudge of "do something!" behind these posts and I'm not quite exactly sure what it is people want to happen. - mig
[2016-12-14 12:27:16] - a: the extra credit seems similarly silly; assuming my nash equilibrium is accurate, it doesn't change anything. if you take turns going to war, the first country always goes to war. if wars are more valuable, the first country super duper always goes to war. - aaron
[2016-12-14 12:09:34] - a: i mean, amusingly the "always go to war" strategy just can't lose statistically in the long run, since your opponent's decision literally doesn't matter. you'll always just win half the games. so yeah i think that's the nash equilibrium. playing around with a simulation i made i kind of come to the same conclusion - aaron
[2016-12-14 11:56:01] - a: so with THAT taken into account, it makes sense to go war any time your strength is greater than 0.25. but if you know your opponent's taking THAT strategy, etc... etc... i think it's got a nash equilibrium where both countries should always go to war. but since i'm stupid and i can program i can probably just program myself an answer to this one too - aaron
[2016-12-14 11:53:58] - a: the only time your decision matters is when you go war AND your opponent's strength is less than 0.5. so taking THAT into account, it makes sense to also go war when your strength is 0.4 -- in any given round that your opponent chooses peace, there's a 20% chance they'll lose to a 0.4. and if your opponent went war, your choice didn't matter anyway... - aaron
[2016-12-14 11:52:43] - a: regarding that gold puzzle it seemed trivial; if your strength is greater than 0.5 you go war since you'll get more than $1 trillion on average. but, hmm, if your opponent goes the same strategy -- then half of the time your decision doesn't matter at all... - aaron
[2016-12-14 09:49:14] - Wow, I missed my name AND posted twice somehow. Nice! -Paul
[2016-12-14 09:49:01] - a: Although part of me wonders if the problem is the SSD and if replacing it could make the netbook viable again.
[2016-12-14 09:49:01] - a: Although part of me wonders if the problem is the SSD and if replacing it could make the netbook viable again.
[2016-12-14 09:48:38] - a: I'm only worried about xubuntu because I tried the "light" version of ubuntu before on this particular netbook and it still mightily struggled with it. It's a seriously underpowered netbook whose only hope is running the lightest weight OS possible. -Paul
[2016-12-14 08:49:55] - i've never used either but i'm pretty sure you'll like xubuntu. i'm less sure that chromium will be awesome, i'm more sure it'll be lighter. but since both are free you seriously should try both: use one for a week until you find something you hate about it, then try the other. ~a
[2016-12-14 08:48:12] - short answer, i don't know. shorter answer, try both. ~a
[2016-12-13 23:49:00] - a: Random question which seems entirely unfair to expect you to know the answer to, but I'll ask anyway: Do you know what is a "lighter" OS that will run better on an old netbook? Chromium or Xubuntu? I realize Xubuntu probably has more functionality, but I don't really need functionality. I just need something that will run acceptably on a really old netbook. -Paul
[2016-12-13 11:24:12] - paul: yes, you can change the way it's displayed if you want in the "settings". i'm a big fan of "bits" as the standard denomination, but i'm not always in the majority there. ~a
[2016-12-13 11:19:32] - a: Nice! Yes, I appear to have 155k bits in my wallet. I guess 1 million bits is a bitcoin? -Paul
[2016-12-13 11:12:44] - oh yes yes yes. sorry, i thought you were being coy. you have 155,000 bits i believe. and that's worth $120+ today. which is like a 20% gain. which is good, imo. ~a
[2016-12-13 11:07:20] - -Paul
[2016-12-13 11:07:08] - a: So secret that I don't even remember?
I'm guessing this has to do with me paying off my bet and also getting some bitcoin at poker awhile back. Is this your way of saying my investment is going up?[2016-12-13 10:53:14] - a: That actually looks pretty thorny. The fact that Cox didn't "promptly" inform it's infringing users brings them to the aiding and abetting part of criminality. But reading deeper, it looks like Cox took offense at the wording of the infringement notices (understandably). There's probably a middle ground here that is sane. -- Xpovos
[2016-12-13 10:52:24] - paul: are we keeping that super secret?
~a[2016-12-13 10:42:05] - a: What is magic about 155,000 bits or $120?
-Paul[2016-12-13 10:41:29] - Daniel: I believe mine was originally equally spread between VFIAX, VEMAX, VSMAX and VTIAX about a year and a half ago. They're clearly not quite even anymore. That's roughly 25% in S&P500, 25% in emerging markets, 25% in small caps and 25% in international. -Paul
[2016-12-13 10:40:58] - mig: i hope not. ~a
[2016-12-13 10:40:38] - paul: 155,000 bits = ~$120. wooo? ~a
[2016-12-13 10:25:58] - a: I can't imagine that decision will hold up in an appeal. - mig
[2016-12-13 10:18:30] - paul: I'd have to go look for the exact percentages but I think for that 401k account its only ~30% in the S&P. It has some in an international index fund but it might be something only like 20%? Don't remember. -Daniel
[2016-12-13 10:11:07] - In the past few weeks, I've gotten warnings/notifications from Google, Facebook and now Microsoft that somebody else might've accessed my account. Each time, I've gone through their procedures to verify it's me and changed my password. Nothing malicious seems to have happened in any of those cases, but this is getting concerning. -Paul
[2016-12-13 10:10:37] - i have a hard time believing a jury decided that a music label deserved $25m. i mean i know we all hate cox communications, but i not-so-secretly wonder what instructions the jury got from the judge in this case. ~a
[2016-12-13 08:22:23] - daniel: lets do this again in january. paul and i have been assessing every quarter though really it would make more sense to assess every year (in january?)? ~a
[2016-12-12 23:43:55] - Daniel: Nice! I didn't realize the S&P had averaged that high of a return for the past decade. My collection of Vanguard funds appears to have returned 14% over the past 4 quarters, but I've got a lot of exposure to emerging markets, which I think have done well lately. -Paul
[2016-12-12 23:16:37] - paul: mostly directed at you since i know you are keeping track and seeing how you do against the market, in my old 401k that is almost all index based Vanguard says my rates of return are 10 year 8.8%, 5 year 11.4%, 3 year 5.8%, 1 year 7.0%. Just to throw out some numbers for my portfolio. -Daniel
[2016-12-12 15:07:06] - a: I don't know. I honestly have wondered if I should switch to Yahoo Finance. I hear people generally like Yahoo Finance and it seems like Google Finance doesn't get any attention and seems like something that might get Google Readered in the future. -Paul
[2016-12-12 14:41:49] - paul: i'm hating yahoo finance more and more. should i switch to google finance? i know you're having problems with UA right now, but it sounds like a horrible edge case (i.e. yahoo finance also had trouble with my goog/googl split). ~a
[2016-12-12 14:40:24] - aaron: "Riddler Classic" this week (the one about gold) seems very interesting to me. i'm actually not at all sure of the answer. thoughts? ~a
[2016-12-12 11:29:56] - a: Jesus, does Google STILL not have the UA split worked out? I'm trying to fix my portfolio and whenever I put in "UA" it defaults to UAA. I can still find the C-Shares under UA/C, but that seems like something that might get changed in the near future. -Paul
[2016-12-12 10:33:03] - yeah i spent hours trying to think up of non-monte-carlo solutions, so part of me doesn't want to try to understand the trivial solution as it'll just make me mad. ~a
[2016-12-12 10:31:48] - a: but wikipedia agrees that winning a world series in 1908 and 2016 constitutes a 108-year drought, so the problem-posters were correct, the answer should be 119.8. i was legitimately surprised there was a trivial non-monte-carlo way to come up with the answer though. it seems obvious in hindsight although i still find it hard to believe it's so simple - aaron
[2016-12-12 10:29:57] - a: it's more of a philosophical question. if the cubs win back-to-back world serieses, a pedantic pessimist could rationalize "phew, the cubs finally ended their 1-year drought of not winning world serieses." but you and i would argue back, "well the drought didn't technically begin until they failed to win a world series" - aaron
[2016-12-12 09:13:54] - i also had two very different solutions that worked for N=2 and N=3. i guess they all had the same bug. ~a
[2016-12-12 09:13:07] - aaron: though i'm not sure why we were off by one. was it because we were counting from 0 incorrectly? it's weird that we would both do that incorrectly though. i studied N=2 a lot before i went to N=30. ~a
[2016-12-12 09:09:58] - i was like killing myself on that. ~a
[2016-12-12 09:09:45] - their exact solution is so easy it makes me angry. ~a
[2016-12-12 09:08:48] -
~a[2016-12-12 07:54:09] - a: my program averaged 300,000 droughts, which worked out to about ~9 million years. the official answer was posted today and we're both off by one (i'll give you 3 seconds to figure out why) - aaron
[2016-12-09 14:52:06] - aaron: aw man. i upped my number of years, and now i think that 118.8 probably is right. bleh. ~a
[2016-12-09 13:07:00] - aaron: how many years did you average over? ~a
[2016-12-09 12:01:07] - xpovos: yeah my simulation made the inaugural year count, but just like adrian, i ignored the first ~2,000 years of data since we're trying to simulate this over infinity years - aaron
[2016-12-08 15:41:32] - xpovos: the inaugural year counts however you want it to count. since you're technically supposed to average this over infinity, the inaugural years shouldn't affect your final solution. (for the monte-carlo solution though i just ignored the first few dozen years) ~a
[2016-12-08 14:58:09] - aaron: my monte carlo solution came up with 118.9. i have a non-monte-carlo exact-ish-solution, but it's even slower.
~a[2016-12-08 13:47:01] - aaron: Are you Monte-carloing it? Does the first year of a league count? "The Rampagers win the inaugural trophy." = 0 years? -- Xpovos
[2016-12-08 12:06:24] - a: and yeah! if you came up with an answer i can compare it to my answer. i don't know how to solve it mathematically but i'm assuming we each wrote programs. my average drought came out to 118.8 years - aaron
[2016-12-08 12:03:28] - a: i think you corrected yourself, but there won't be a headline-making drought every year. so in 2016 there'll be a headline, "cubs break 108-year curse", and then maybe we'll go 2 years without a headline, and then in 2019 there'll be a new headline "indians break 70-year curse" - aaron
[2016-12-07 17:56:18] - paul: ok, i'm wrong on the details; with a traditional-ira/401k you have to pay taxes on withdrawal. how are those taxes calculated? i guess capital gains is not how it's taxed, is it? it's taxed as . . . income. yeah, nevermind. ~a
[2016-12-07 17:49:42] - paul: yeah it's especially weird that google finance would have trouble with this since google (alphabet) the company themselves did this split. ~a
[2016-12-07 15:50:26] - a: It's still super annoying, because there's not an easy way to just change ticker symbols and retain the transaction history, so I need to basically "sell" my positions and re-buy them under different tickers at the original cost basis. It doesn't help that Google seemed perplexed by what is going on with the tickers. -Paul
[2016-12-07 15:47:17] - a: ~90% of my individual stocks are in my Roth IRA, with the rest being in a regular brokerage account. My UA and UA-C (now UAA and UA) are all in my Roth IRA. Why would it matter if it were in a traditional IRA? -Paul
[2016-12-07 15:42:13] - paul: well non-tax-shelter isn't the only problematic situation. you also this problem with a traditional-ira! (or a traditional-401k, but i'm guessing you don't have individual stocks there either). is your UA-C in a non-tax-shelter or traditional-ira? ~a
[2016-12-07 13:48:14] - a: Thankfully I mostly only own individual stocks inside tax sheltered accounts. I actually do own GOOGL in a regular brokerage, but it was after the split and I haven't sold so I should be fine there. -Paul
[2016-12-07 13:40:37] - you think your finance portfolio is going to have troubles . . . just wait till april 15th. taxes on goog vs googl was a huge pain in my ass. (the cost basis isn't 50%/50% but even if it was turbotax doesn't do it automatically like it does for all of the other stocks) ~a
[2016-12-07 13:40:09] - a: Google did what? Completely ignored the stock split and just halved the price so we have to go in and manually change it? -Paul
[2016-12-07 13:39:27] - ahhhh. yeah, google did that. i hate it. ~a
[2016-12-07 13:34:46] - a: My guess is that's when the stock split happened. For each share of UA people got an extra share of UA-C. -Paul
[2016-12-07 12:14:07] - paul: what happened on april 8th? ~a
[2016-12-07 11:24:39] - Man, Under Armour's stock renaming is wrecking havoc with my google finance portfolio... -Paul
[2016-12-06 15:15:21] - my simplifications were too simple. the winner has to be in the longest drought. ~a
[2016-12-06 15:14:37] - oh wait, i guess that isn't right. oops. ~a
[2016-12-06 15:13:59] - aaron: assuming yes, i have an answer. should i share it? ~a
[2016-12-06 15:08:31] - aaron: are these correct simplifications of the question: "what is the average length of a drought?" or "on any given year, how many years has it been since the winner last won?" ~a
[2016-12-06 14:24:31] - http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/can-you-unmask-the-secret-santas/ a league of 30 teams has a winner chosen uniformly at random every year. each time the team that hasn’t won in the longest time does win, the length of that drought makes the headlines. what are the lengths of these headline-making droughts, on average? - aaron
[2016-12-06 10:36:11] - paul: yeah once you get used to it, it becomes as easier to send than cash/etc. the problem is there's a pretty steep learning curve and the penalty for failure is pretty high (typically some money is gone forever). ~a
[2016-12-05 23:16:43] - a: I think that worked. Thanks! If I knew how to send you bitcoin, I would give you some.
-Paul[2016-12-05 16:11:54] - oh there's an option to just make an entire color transparent. nm, that's easier. - mig
[2016-12-05 16:10:55] - if the image isn't too jaggy at the pixel level and the background area sectioned well you can use the magic wand to easily select the background area and cut out that once an alpha channel was added (if the image didn't already have one). - mig
[2016-12-05 15:09:14] - that last step is super important if you try to put it over a black background. ~a
[2016-12-05 15:07:12] - i could have stopped there, but i hate how these images often have white(ish) areas on the edge of the transparent boundary, so i extended the blue area to the edge of the image. ~a
[2016-12-05 15:06:28] - but (basically) my main goals were this: turn the white area into a channel that i could then edit. using a normal circle tool i could get rid of the middle areas. then using a "levels" tool i could clean up the "blue" area to make that area (and everything in it) completely non-transparent. ~a
[2016-12-05 15:04:18] - mig/paul: i send paul a png and an xcf that has the changes he's looking for. it actually was like a 10 step process: since i'm not a gimp expert i don't know how to do it in fewer steps. ~a
[2016-12-05 14:34:42] - mig: I do not have photoshop and I've heard of gimp. The file format can be PNG, if that's the question.
-Paul[2016-12-05 14:05:51] - More importantly, what format is this image in? - mig
[2016-12-05 14:05:11] - paul: do you have photoshop or know what gimp is? - mig
[2016-12-05 14:00:50] - a: Sent an email. Thanks a bunch for your help! -Paul
[2016-12-05 13:51:43] - regardless i'll tell you exactly what i did if it ends up working. ~a
[2016-12-05 13:51:05] - depending on the details of the image, it might not be to terribly difficult. if you email me the image i can do it if it's easy (and tell at least if it'll be easy or hard). ~a
[2016-12-05 13:50:22] - ~a
[2016-12-05 13:50:21] - yes you can do this but it's actually *really* hard.
[2016-12-05 12:51:11] - So, I have an image with a white background but also some white in the design of the image itself. I'm trying to modify the image so that the background is transparent but the white parts remain white. I'm sure this is possible, but I'm incompetent with image modification. Could anybody help me out? -Paul
[2016-12-05 11:21:32] - a: Well now I just look silly! I wonder if I could just post random things at random times and people would assume I was responding to a now deleted bot comment.... hmmm -Daniel
[2016-12-05 10:35:21] - mig: Not sure if a single game is worth spending a couple hundred dollars on another console yet. -Paul
[2016-12-05 10:26:31] - daniel: sorry i had to hide that comment. i don't want the spammers to beat the filter.
~a[2016-12-05 09:47:03] - wow that does look like an awesome internet site! -Daniel
[2016-12-04 12:49:28] - paul: time to get a PS4. - mig
[2016-12-02 10:16:28] - I did some reading into ESPP last night. Most things I read actually recommend selling as soon as possible if you can buy at a discount (even though it's not tax efficient since it's normal tax rates instead of long term capital gains) so you're not overweight on your company. -Paul
[2016-12-01 15:43:41] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employee_stock_ownership_plan According to that there a lot of companies that do stock programs. -Daniel
[2016-12-01 15:28:58] - a: Well, I was thinking of public companies when I said "tons". Don't a lot of tech companies just give stock grants instead of options? -Paul
[2016-12-01 15:18:31] - paul: i'll admit i was only thinking of private companies. and i'll admit raytheon (the only publicly traded company i've ever worked for) had some weird way of getting their stock into your 401k. ~a
[2016-12-01 15:16:35] - paul: wait wait, does it matter if the company is publicly or privately traded? like when you say "tons" did you mean tons of public companies or tons of private companies? ~a
[2016-12-01 15:15:49] - paul: which companies? i thought most companies did options. like, before i even knew what an option *was* i knew (in my perspective) that "stock options" was how companies rewarded employees. like i just thought "stock options" was what you called that. and didn't realize that you could buy the stock at a future date at the current (in my case) price. ~a
[2016-12-01 15:11:38] - a: No, not joking. I can see why options would be different (and I suppose smarter), but tons of companies DON'T do options. -Paul
[2016-12-01 14:17:06] - sorry i can't tell if you're joking or not. ~a
[2016-12-01 13:34:56] - stock option grant. ~a
[2016-12-01 13:34:15] - paul: stock options. ~a
[2016-12-01 13:33:35] - a: What would be the smarter alternative? -Paul
[2016-12-01 13:31:02] - paul: bogo is dumb. they're dumb. dumb. there's no reason not to do a stock option plan to get a similar long term effect. the company must be strapped for cash in the short term. and they're doing desperate and dumb plans. ~a
[2016-12-01 12:35:13] - mig: Maybe? I think it's perfectly justifiable in that it would be an immediate 100% gain and in general you don't want to hold a lot of stock in the company that employs you for diversification purposes. -Paul
[2016-12-01 12:22:36] - paul: employees selling right away. - mig
[2016-12-01 12:21:19] - mig: What feels short sighted? Employees selling as soon as they can? Or the employer offering the ability to BOGO? -Paul
[2016-12-01 12:16:41] - paul: feels kind of short sighted, unless you think the company is heading through hard times. - mig
[2016-12-01 12:04:39] - a: My immediate reaction was that it wasn't gaming the system to buy shares and sell as soon as possible for a 100% gain, but the more I thought of it, the more I realized it was a little.... not sketchy or anything, but I guess lame? -Paul
[2016-12-01 12:03:21] - a: Saying that any transaction that does not immediately increase the amount of vested shares may not be executed. -Paul
[2016-12-01 12:02:48] - a: But they also made a comment about counting on everybody to use the program in the spirit in which it is intended (increasing your stake in the company and encourage long term ownership) and asked for people to not game the system by trying to convert existing shares into BOGO shares. -Paul
[2016-12-01 12:00:43] - a: Um, I was mostly speaking in vagaries and not specifics. What initiated this conversation is that I know of a (privately held, which adds to the complexity) company which is considering offering employees a chance to BOGO shares (so buy 10 shares and get 10 shares free). Those free shares vest over time. -Paul
[2016-12-01 11:54:35] - i guess i also assume that the "strike price" is the market price when the option was written. all this is stuff my last company did. ~a
[2016-12-01 11:50:55] - paul: maybe we're disagreeing about "discount". i guess maybe you're considering it a "discount" if you're exercising at the strike price which is below the market price? i guess i don't consider this a discount, but i understand why you would call it that. alternatively, are you talking about a different discount? ~a
[2016-12-01 11:44:58] - "As a middle ground between stock grants and just requiring them to buy at regular price" wouldn't a better middle ground to be an option grant? like stock options? like (imo) the normal thing? ~a
[2016-12-01 10:55:25] - a: I think the idea is to encourage stock ownership and that in turn stock ownership makes people want the company to succeed since now they have a vested financial interest. I think the generally approved plan by financial peeps is to sell those but I think probably a lot of people don't. -Daniel
[2016-12-01 10:51:01] - a: To reward employees? As a middle ground between stock grants and just requiring them to buy at regular price? I imagine most plans probably also include vesting periods so you usually can't immediately sell. -Paul
[2016-12-01 10:43:57] - paul: so why the discount? i can't for the life of me understand the logic. ~a
[2016-12-01 10:43:40] - mig: yeah i thought that was more common. and it makes more sense. the discount thing sounds dumb. ~a
[2016-12-01 10:16:18] - when I was offered stock options there was a vesting period of about 4 years (25% vesting each year). A little different though, as the company wasn't public (and never did end up having an IPO). - mig
[2016-12-01 10:02:58] - a: Well, that's the thing. I don't think employers DO want that. I think they want people to hold onto the shares. -Paul
[2016-12-01 10:01:14] - "Buy at discount and sell pretty much as soon as you are able" why would an employer want this? ~a
[2016-12-01 09:38:22] - a: Okay, that's what I thought (and I agree), but was just curious if it was just me.
-Paul[2016-12-01 09:19:49] - I think Prag might have a roth 401k option? But they didn't for a long time. -Daniel
[2016-12-01 09:19:29] - a: I currently work for Accenture. They do have a roth 401k but I'm not contributing a lot right now cause we are still trying to get all of our financial stuff settled long term since Andrea hasn't started looking for a job here yet and Nathan will probably start daycare at some point in the next couple of months. -Daniel
[2016-12-01 09:17:41] - paul: No I think thats the general standard model for how employment stock programs should be handled. Buy at discount and sell pretty much as soon as you are able. -Daniel
[2016-11-30 16:51:09] - there could be some (non-ethical but otherwise lame) issues when you try to sell back to the guys that literally just sold to you. ~a
[2016-11-30 16:50:19] - they should have set it up as an option. or either way, option or not: there should have been *no* discount. there are a lot of smart things they could do, discounts are dumb. ~a
[2016-11-30 16:49:32] - no. next question.
~a[2016-11-30 16:47:06] - Is there anything at all wrong with purchasing those shares at a discount and immediately selling? -Paul
[2016-11-30 16:46:34] - Ethics question: Let's say your company has an employee stock purchase program where you are allowed to buy shares of the company at a discount, with the thought being to encourage employees to own stock in the company to foster a shared sense of commitment... -Paul
[2016-11-30 16:39:39] - daniel/paul: ok sounds like paul is 50/50 and daniel is mostly traditional. daniel, your company doesn't do roth-401k? where do you work, btw? ~a
[2016-11-30 14:28:48] - I have way more in traditional than roth. I'd have to check to figure out percentages in roth vs traditional but mostly I didn't really think about roth stuff until I wasn't allowed to contribute. -Daniel
[2016-11-30 14:17:29] - a: That difference is mostly a result of having rolled over my previous 401(k) to a traditional, though, and not some deliberately intentional act. -Paul
[2016-11-30 14:16:44] - a: If I am remembering correctly, I have my 401(k) contributions split evenly between Roth and Traditional. I do not contribute to my IRAs (not enough extra money), but my Traditional IRA is about 50% larger than my Roth. -Paul
[2016-11-30 13:54:32] - i guess i should specify future contributions, not holdings. ~a
[2016-11-30 13:54:18] - paul/daniel: what % of your retirement is roth vs what % is traditional? (ira+401k) ~a
[2016-11-30 12:28:23] - Daniel: Awesome, thanks! Learned a lot. This is a topic I have so little interest in, but it seems super important in terms of keeping my retirement funds, so I'm trying my best to learn it. I suppose I should probably read some of TMF's retirement stuff too.
-Paul[2016-11-30 12:24:44] - Once you are 59.5 you can make tax free withdrawals from a Roth. Before that age though you can only do principal withdrawals but only after that principal has been there five years. I'm reasonably confident I'm correct on this but should probably verify it if you are actually going to do any of it
-Daniel[2016-11-30 12:22:50] - Yeah you can make withdrawals from a Roth penalty free after five years. It might be principal only withdrawls? I'd have to check. But the roll'ed over $ from a traditional would count as principal since its all taxed when you convert. -Daniel
[2016-11-30 12:16:43] - Daniel: Oh, wait, 5 years after converting from traditional to roth? Is that it? -Paul
[2016-11-30 12:16:08] - Daniel: What is the five year thing? You get taxed on earnings in a Roth IRA unless you wait 5 years after retiring? your last contribution to the IRA? something else? -Paul
[2016-11-30 12:10:59] - go up a tax bracket. -Daniel
[2016-11-30 12:10:51] - Then in five years you can make withdrawals from the Roth at no penalty. So if you convert 50k a year then starting in five years after retirement you can start getting access to that rolling roth ladder and your only income taxes are on the conversion each year. If you ever start to earn income then you can just roll over how much you can afford and still not...
[2016-11-30 12:10:29] - Daniel: Jinx!
-Paul[2016-11-30 12:09:15] - Ah, I guess I should've clicked the link first. We can convert over a portion of our IRAs at a time? That's intriguing. -Paul
[2016-11-30 12:09:06] - You don't have to convert it all though. So if you have a large amount in traditional the idea is you retire so your income goes to zero. You move over 50 grand into Roth and pay taxes on that as income at a lower rate (presumably) and use withdrawals from some other taxable account to actually live on that year (which don't count as 'income'). -Daniel
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