EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

[GRG55]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

It appears that the Coronavirus is more serious than what Wall Street thinks...

Exactly what Wall Street indicator are you using to come to this conclusion?

[santafe2]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

Regret we had to ban Largo temporarily but we can't ignore complaints from other community members forever and the endless trolling was getting old. Hope he has a change of heart and returns to contribute constructively.

I found the continued trolling embarrassing and insulting. We don't always agree but no one here is dumb. LW acted as if his role here is to save the unwashed from themselves. Those of us who've been around iTulip for a decade or more are mostly successful folks in our various endeavors. It's been a while but I think we had to be accredited investors to consider VirZoom. While I didn't invest, I love the idea. My lack of action says more about me as a very conservative investor than it does about the product.

Since I didn't invest I've tried to remain quiet on this issue but I would like to say I see no comparison between another huckster gym product like Peloton and VirZoom. It may not be perfect and is on the bleeding edge of technology, but to my mind, it's addressing the essence of a relaxed, personal recreation for all of us who work hard all day.

Think about it. You work 10-12 hours a day and sleep 6-8. Do you really want to compete with strangers to get some exercise? Yeah, that's called a 20th Century gym. Pelonton subscribers have been out-competed in their daily lives or they would never subject themselves to this environment at a time when they should be enjoying themselves. I love the idea that one can leave their competitive work space and relax/exercise in a personal space.

VirZoom is old, (think TM), and it's the future. Wish you all the best. You have a great idea.

[lakedaemonian]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

I found the continued trolling embarrassing and insulting. We don't always agree but no one here is dumb. LW acted as if his role here is to save the unwashed from themselves. Those of us who've been around iTulip for a decade or more are mostly successful folks in our various endeavors. It's been a while but I think we had to be accredited investors to consider VirZoom. While I didn't invest, I love the idea. My lack of action says more about me as a very conservative investor than it does about the product.

Since I didn't invest I've tried to remain quiet on this issue but I would like to say I see no comparison between another huckster gym product like Peloton and VirZoom. It may not be perfect and is on the bleeding edge of technology, but to my mind, it's addressing the essence of a relaxed, personal recreation for all of us who work hard all day.

Think about it. You work 10-12 hours a day and sleep 6-8. Do you really want to compete with strangers to get some exercise? Yeah, that's called a 20th Century gym. Pelonton subscribers have been out-competed in their daily lives or they would never subject themselves to this environment at a time when they should be enjoying themselves. I love the idea that one can leave their competitive work space and relax/exercise in a personal space.

VirZoom is old, (think TM), and it's the future. Wish you all the best. You have a great idea.

I’m of a similar belief, and full disclosure have invested in VIRZOOM.

I view VIRZOOM as a medium to high risk startup, but with the risk declining with both user growth and VR/AR adoption showing signs of growing beyond just early adopter.

With a tailwind of cocooning due to coronavirus.

A few things on Peloton:

1)Reiterating EJ’s point about Peloton’s incredibly high retention rate. Peloton must have high retention, or they fail. But it is still incredibly impressive, nearly unequalled.

2)Community is incredibly important. I suspect Peloton acts as a digital proxy for in person community that the overwhelming majority of humans need to maintain health and wellbeing. Peloton loyalty and engagement borders on cult-like, without the negative aspects that go with cults.

3)Status symbols. I’ve heard Peloton ownership dropped in a number of conversations. There’s perceived value for owners in that.

Home based remote work, remote community, remote fitness will probably all benefit from the trend of humans to disperse for public health reasons, but still needing to herd(digitally) for mental health.

[shiny!]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

If anyone is interested, I started a new thread in the public forum for discussing COVID-19. Finster started one behind the paywall but I thought it would be better if the discussion be made public so as many people as possible can participate.

[EJ]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

I’m of a similar belief, and full disclosure have invested in VIRZOOM.

I view VIRZOOM as a medium to high risk startup, but with the risk declining with both user growth and VR/AR adoption showing signs of growing beyond just early adopter.

With a tailwind of cocooning due to coronavirus.

A few things on Peloton:

1)Reiterating EJ’s point about Peloton’s incredibly high retention rate. Peloton must have high retention, or they fail. But it is still incredibly impressive, nearly unequalled.

2)Community is incredibly important. I suspect Peloton acts as a digital proxy for in person community that the overwhelming majority of humans need to maintain health and wellbeing. Peloton loyalty and engagement borders on cult-like, without the negative aspects that go with cults.

3)Status symbols. I’ve heard Peloton ownership dropped in a number of conversations. There’s perceived value for owners in that.

Home based remote work, remote community, remote fitness will probably all benefit from the trend of humans to disperse for public health reasons, but still needing to herd(digitally) for mental health.

Hey, Shiny! The original thread was moved from behind the paywall to here at your request. Ok with you if we delete your new one?

[EJ]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

I’m of a similar belief, and full disclosure have invested in VIRZOOM.

I view VIRZOOM as a medium to high risk startup, but with the risk declining with both user growth and VR/AR adoption showing signs of growing beyond just early adopter.

With a tailwind of cocooning due to coronavirus.

A few things on Peloton:

1)Reiterating EJ’s point about Peloton’s incredibly high retention rate. Peloton must have high retention, or they fail. But it is still incredibly impressive, nearly unequalled.

2)Community is incredibly important. I suspect Peloton acts as a digital proxy for in person community that the overwhelming majority of humans need to maintain health and wellbeing. Peloton loyalty and engagement borders on cult-like, without the negative aspects that go with cults.

3)Status symbols. I’ve heard Peloton ownership dropped in a number of conversations. There’s perceived value for owners in that.

Home based remote work, remote community, remote fitness will probably all benefit from the trend of humans to disperse for public health reasons, but still needing to herd(digitally) for mental health.

Thanks, guys. I'm fairly patient he's been with us for quite a while, but was getting tired of being trolled on my own site, and we have important matters to discuss.

[FrankL]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

Her assessment is that COVID-19 cannot be contained at this stage and is now permanently part of the global virus set and will be with us from here on out. Her immediate concern is that the average 15% of cases that are Serious or Critical will quickly overwhelm ICU capacity in the US if the infection rate continues at the current rate. An emergency conference among Boston hospital ER practitioners called for next week to develop a coordinated strategy, but was cancelled due to concerns that medical staff are already infected, and spreading it among each other at a conference is not going to help matters.

...
The COVID-19 pandemic has launched a global health care system effectiveness contest that so far is favoring countries with socialized healthcare systems.

Germany is in the lead with 565 cases and 0 fatalities, France with a 1.4% fatality rate, and S. Korea with a 0.7% fatality rate. Skewing these ratios is the rate of testing, with S. Korea far in the lead with free drive-through testing and results in hours, and the US trailing pretty much every country on earth, including Iran and Italy. The US with 232 cases and 14 fatalities is today coming in a 6%, but this ratio may improve as 1,000s of new cases are discovered after large scale testing finally gets underway next week.

...

Your friend is right on the ball here. I've also read and heard plenty of anecdotes of young health care workers dying in China and Iran, probably because they've been completely overworked and excessive exposure plus fatigue has a big toll on their immune system.

Quality of health care systems are irrelevant once you hit ICU saturation point, and I very much doubt we can prevent that from happening in the densely populated western Europe and metropolitan areas in north america, even in the first wave.

China only managed to contain this relatively fast outside of the Hubei province due to draconian measures that can only be implemented by a totalitarian regime that uses their total surveillance state apparatus to try and track contact of infected people.

Looking at figures that depends on functioning ICU, most of the 70- population will be fine.
It's relatively safe to state that this virus will be devastating for the elderly cohorts of population.
I'd like to see a study showing the number of people below 70 needing ICU...

[Mega]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

Eric
Hate to nag, but er...........the coming collapse?

Cheers
Mike

[shiny!]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

Hey, Shiny! The original thread was moved from behind the paywall to here at your request. Ok with you if we delete your new one?

Sure! Thank you so much!

[drumminj]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

Hey, Shiny! The original thread was moved from behind the paywall to here at your request. Ok with you if we delete your new one?

Seems to still be behind the paywall, EJ (at least for me)

[EJ]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

Seems to still be behind the paywall, EJ (at least for me)

Okay, let's try that again. Should be public now.

[touchring]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

Exactly what Wall Street indicator are you using to come to this conclusion?

Looking at gold and silver, there's no panic yet.

I'm quite surprised with the amount of complacency that world governments have on the Wuhan virus. If you look at it, only Chinese speaking countries/cities outside of China are really taking the virus seriously, Taiwan, HK, Macau.

The great chinese firewall has succeeded in keeping the world hoodwinked.

[LazyBoy]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

Okay, let's try that again. Should be public now.

Shiny's "Discussion" thread is accessible, but your link above is to an "Impact" thread which is behind the paywall.

[jk]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

Looking at gold and silver, there's no panic yet.

I'm quite surprised with the amount of complacency that world governments have on the Wuhan virus. If you look at it, only Chinese speaking countries/cities outside of China are really taking the virus seriously, Taiwan, HK, Macau.

The great chinese firewall has succeeded in keeping the world hoodwinked.

italy has locked down a quarter of its population. italy, at least, doesn't seem complacent to me.

[EJ]

Re: EJ: The countdown to the next crisis of The System has started.

italy has locked down a quarter of its population. italy, at least, doesn't seem complacent to me.

Earlier I said that the only effective COVID-19 containment approach that's been proven to work once the cat's out of the bag is the one that China took: lock down. The approach is both economically and politically disruptive.

Italy is now doing taking this approach out of desperation since their health care system was already in pretty tough shape before the crisis. Iran's leadership has stated an intent to employ the military to contain the spread but so far has not done so, presumably because this cure may be worse than the disease, so to speak.

But that's not quite accurate. There's Taiwan, a nation of 25 million, 80 miles across the Taiwan Straight from mainland China, and not far from South Korea where as of today out of a population about twice the size of Taiwan's there are 7,500 confirmed cases and 54 deaths. In Taiwan: 45 cases and 1 death.

Here's how they're doing it.

It's an impressive display of technical and institutional competence developed out of necessity to survive a giant hostile neighbor.

Missing from the commentary about the stock market crash and bond market's extreme reaction to the prospect of sudden deleveraging of a trillions of bad debt accumulated over the past decade is the usual lauding of the stock market as an efficient discounting mechanism. Today the market reaction is attributed to irrationality, algorithmic trading, anything but what it is: a recognition of the fact that the USA and most of the 100+ countries now coping with COVID-19 don't even remotely have their act together like Taiwan.

Here's how this goes worldwide over the typical course for a new virus like this one, if the numbers continue at the current average of Italian, Iranian, German, US, etc.