Author: user

Why Doesn’t Anyone Have American Pride Anymore?

Why is it that people prefer to buy a Lamborghini or Ferrari over a Shelby Cobra? 

Simple heuristic:

Don’t trust nobody who owns, or bought a foreign car; this includes BMW, Mercedes, Audi, AMG, Lamborghini Volkswagen, Ferrari, Land Rover, Range Rover, anything produced by the Volkswagen group or Tata group, Porsche, etc.

The funny thing is it seems in today’s world, having a Toyota or a Honda is almost like having an American car?

Simple rule:

If you want to be a true American, if you want a sports utility SUV car, just by a Ford Explorer ST, which is essentially a cop car. 

If you want some sort of sports muscle car, ultimate flex… Buy some sort of Ford Mustang Shelby Cobra car, or even… the Ford GT. I think Brad Pitt owns one. Mustang GTD

Buy FORD

Anti-American sentiment?

In America, if you only care about money, I don’t think you’re a true American. What does a real American care for? Diversity, access, democracy, egalitarian values, and meritocracy which means the goods you are delivered is based on merit, hierarchy and ranking.

The diversity myth? 

Apparently when Peter Thiel was an undergraduate in college he wrote a book called The Diversity Myth… I think he wrote it when he was at Stanford as an undergraduate, something about how too much focus on diversity is bad. I haven’t read the book, but I think what it means is that trying to do things like affirmative action in his eyes is bad.

My personal thought is it is obvious; obviously if you have a kid from the hood, a kid from Compton, certainly his or her GPA or SAT score is not going to be as good as a kid who went to some sort of elite private school in Beverly Hills. Therefore there needs to be dynamic weighing here.

For example, if you’re the Valevictorian or the top #1 student in a ghetto school… your application to college should be weighed higher than a kid who went to an elite private school, who is only the top 100.

Therefore it isn’t necessarily “affirmative action”, but rather, wisdom in evaluating someone’s social economic status as part of their application.

Diversity should not be forced

Certainly diversity is good, but it is not good when you try to force it.

For example, trying to force more gender equality or racial equality when it isn’t really warranted seems like a bad idea.

This is where the philosophical thing matters; we must ask ourselves and consider… does it really even matter in the first place? If so, why?

Guns?

Discovering a gun at my sister’s wedding.

Being an American or a true American has nothing to do with gun ownership. I’m not anti-guns per se; I did Boy Scouts and shot a rifle and a shotgun, got both my merit badges and also an archery merit badge when I was a high schooler.

I think the strange notion is that somehow… if you own a gun, or have a gun somewhere at home or whatever… it makes you more manly? (It does not).

Jewish people are super wise

I wonder… Is it that people hate Jewish people because they’re so smart wise and good with money?

Also, I don’t really trust any Christians, or God-fearing people especially in the news and mainstream media, even underground media etc.

For example, I really enjoyed the Kanye interview on info wars, but the guy who hosts the show… seems like a strange guy. Anybody who takes the Bible literally is not to be trusted.

How did Jewish people become so successful? Simple: they make money don’t spend it.

Also, I think Jewish people, that is consider how much trials and tribulations and anti-Jewish sentiment and bad things happened to them throughout their whole existence. If they were able to survive it all, probably a good sign.

America is more Jewish than you think 

One of the funniest things that my friend Daniel Schaeffer told me he was… “I’m Jew…ish”.

I might be wrong here, but I think that there is a huge list of really really famous and influential Jewish people in America, which include I think, Gal Gadot, Joseph Levitt, Scarlett Johansson, Jerry Seinfeld, Larry David etc.

Also, Steven Spielberg, Kirk Douglas (changed his last name to blend into Hollywood), a lot of really famous people in Hollywood.

Also I think John Stewart, he changed his last name.

I think a simple strategy what you could do is just Google it, famous Jewish people who changed their last names or famous Jewish people in the media.

I think even Lenny Kravitz is Jewish?

Apparently there is “Jewish” sounding last names, anything related to Gold or Goldsmith, because a lot of Jewish people were once gold merchants back in the day, or anything with “itzh” or “Horowitz” etc… “itz”. Ben Horowitz.

Also a lot of really mainstream American words are actually Yiddish! For example, “chutzpah”, “schlep”, “schmuck”, etc. 

I didn’t know… But my friend Janae told me “I’m such a bad Jewish American, I had no idea that Seinfeld was a TV show about Jewish American culture”. I then responded, in shock, “It is??”

It doesn’t really matter

I have a theory that everyone is looking for some sort of scapegoat. My personal thought on why people believe in conspiracy theories is because nobody likes to think that they themselves are the cause of their own pain suffering etc., and they think of it like some sort of virtuous task and duty to uncover all the “evils” or “injustices” in the world.

For example, I’ve actually met a lot of Palestinian Americans who fall victim to conspiracy theories. Why? To psychoanalyze; they have been seriously fucked over. Even the whole conflict right now in the Gaza Strip, it really does seem that the Palestinians are the victims here. Israel, funded by the American government in military, America is really the bad guy here. 

Even China; China is not a threat. When I was in Phnom Penh Cambodia, I would keep reading these newspapers on how mainland China would complain that they only have one military base somewhere in Africa, whereas America has thousands. As long as Americas military powder is 1000X that of everyone else in the world, America is fine. 

Even Russia, not a threat. I think people just like to paint Putin as the devil, because once again, people like having some sort of devil figure, some sort of Adolf Hitler to see as the enemy.

Ideas?

In South Korea if you’re a man, you’re required to have at least 2-3 years of military duty. I think it’s a good idea if America did the same. Or if they instituted more ROTC programs in high school, optional.

And also, I think having some sort of part-time army reserve officer military training programs for normal civilians like myself is a good idea. Even my friend Andrew, became a part-time naval officer, more for pride. Harvard undergraduate graduate, professor now.

Apparently Westpoint is a really good institution. Maybe if Seneca gets a full ride there I will send him there. 

So what?

I think people are actually low-key praying and wishing for some sort of global armageddon. Why? Once again, a lot of people who are miserable in life want to see the world go into shambles. 

I am highly dubious of a World War III, or some sort of true international military demise. Why? Rich mainland Chinese oligarchs don’t want nobody to take their Rolls-Royce, or their mansions in Vancouver Canada.

Also, Americans like their consumerism, and capitalism.

Whether America likes it or not, it seems that they are in bed with China. As long as Apple still produces iPhones in China, ultimately… economically we will not see any real antagonism between both countries.

Economics is the new world religion

Money, capital, economics is the new world religion. Everybody globally… the only thing that people seem to really care for is to continue to self richen themselves. 

As a consequence, I think we will see a decline in military intervention and deaths, and other bad world issues.

People want to see the ones and zeros and commas increase in their bank account, not more deaths and casualties.

So what should we really be concerned about?

Simple things: 

  1. Pollution: nobody wants to be a billionaire in Beijing or Shanghai, the pollution and the air there is so toxic.
  2. Health diet and fitness: this trend towards “plant based” diets is a bad one, all this vegan nonsense is bad for the planet. Maybe more sustainable animal, beef or lamb production is a good idea. For example at Erwhon I discovered this new “ancestral blend“ — FORCE OF NATURE ground beef which is made with 100% grass fed ground beef, and beef liver and heart actually grinded it in; it is the new only thing that I’m feeding Seneca, it is his natural steroids. Let us not forget that organ meets, beef liver is a natural steroid, the more cholesterol you consume, the stronger you will become and the more testosterone will go up. So a novel thought; addressing the issue of food waste, particularly with beef kettle and cows in America; consume more of the scrap meat. Beef tongue, heart, head, liver, intestine etc.
  3. Media? My personal belief is that the real bad guys here is the media and advertising corporations; let us not forget that Google is an advertising company. Same thing goes with Facebook. And let us not forget that Google owns YouTube, and Facebook also owns Instagram. The reason why online advertising companies are so bad is that media thrives on the sensational, anger, fear, and all of these base human emotions. My personal thought is a lot of racial antagonism is actually stirred up by the media which is run on advertising. For example, it seems that the new clickbait is anything to do with “anti-Semitic“, or “anti-Semitism“; both on the Jewish, African-American front, and mainstream media, a lot of which is run by Jewish families. The more people who click “anti-Semitic” new stories and see more Google AdSense advertisements, the more money that Google makes. Also Facebook, Instagram, the more sensational things are posted, the higher the advertising revenue for them. 

Why I am uncancellable

I am already independently rich and wealthy from my savings and cryptocurrency, and I also live like a poor person, which means that I’m making more money than I could spend it. Because I don’t even like spending money in the first place.

In fact, besides myself and maybe NASSIM TALEB… I don’t think I really know any other free thinkers? Everyone is either hooked to some sort of algorithm, social media platform, YouTube… or podcast… no freedom. This is where I don’t really put any trust in anything that Tim Ferriss says, or even Joe Rogan, because they are run by advertisers.

Who not to trust? Anybody and everybody on YouTube, or has any sort of podcast which is supported by advertisers.

So how can you make money?

Maybe it is a good idea to make money elsewhere, for example, I think I’ve made more money in cryptocurrency speculation than I have in my whole decade plus of teaching photography workshops.

Also selling products is a good idea  because… especially if it is your own products, have more faith and leather than information. HAPTIC INDUSTRIES — in the world of AI and artificial information, having physical leather products is a good idea because it will outlast you. HENRI x ERIC KIM STRAPS.

ART?

Ultimately after you’ve made your trillions of dollars, what is it that people really care for? Art.

How many Jackson Pollocks, Basqiats, or Picassos do you own? 

Art collection

It is wise to understand a Ferrari as an art object, not as a car. Just go to the Peterson automotive museum and go into the vault; these cars are art objects.

Art is the main disruptor here; this is where I am so into [AI art](). Maybe I will do some AI art workshops in the near future.

EricKim.ai

Now what?

Trust ChatGPT more than you trust Google or weird Internet conspiracy website forums. Also, delete Reddit and stop using Reddit; I legit think it is the worst thing for humanity, perhaps even worse than pornography.

Quit reddit, not porn.

In fact, maybe it is best to just think about pornography like entertainment. Men who watch sports, drink alcohol or smoke weed, without having actually ever played the sport, sports is like some sort of domestication of the modern day human, a modern day pornography for men. At least sexual pornography is a positive motivator, drinking beer, eating french fries and watching football if you have never played football yourself in real life… seems worse.

Even basketball; my simple heuristic is if you decide to watch basketball, maybe one should play real life basketball at least once a week.

Assignments

  1. Start your own blog. Ionos.com or bluehost.com and install WordPress.org
  2. Subscribe to ChatGPT plus, start creating your own AI generated art via DALL-E 3. Post on your own blog or arsbeta.com — I want ARS to also be a home for not just photos, but AI generated art. 
  3. Make your own ChatGPT bot, once you have subscribed to the premium model. For example, I re-created the Y app on ChatGPT, it is great. 
  4. Fitness: Buy weightlifting equipment on titan.fitness– and start lifting weights in your own parking lot garage. I recently picked up the Titan fitness Farmer’s carry handles, I like them, and also maybe the best 500 bucks I’ve ever spent in my life was the Texas power bar squat bar, my most prized possession.  Lift weights every day at least once, maybe even twice a day; the upside of doing it in your own backyard, your own parking lot is that you will just save a lot of time. If you want ghetto squat rack or rack, just go to Home Depot and buy cinderblocks. I was able to stack three cinder blocks on top of one another, and I have been able to successfully rack pull over seven plates with it. Cross leg deadlift good idea.
  5. Maybe dabble in crypto? Just get a Coinbase account, link it with your traditional bank, I think everyone should own at least one bitcoin. Personally I just swapped or traded or converted nine of my bitcoin into chainlink (20,800 chainlink)– my personal prediction is within the next three years to five years, it should be above $50 a link, maybe even 100 or 200 bucks a link. Currently speaking I am anti-Ethereum; it is just too complicated and complex. Then also now that they are offering Ethereum for enterprise (private ethereum)… A bad sign. Also try bitcoin babe.
  6. Organ meats? Everyone says that eating meat, red meat is bad for the planet blah blah blah. But what about organ meats? Nobody really says anything bad about organ meats, beef liver, beef heart, beef intestine, beef kidney. As a fun experiment just try out 100% organ meat diet; the true demigod diet. Also bone marrow. Just pick up organ meats at Whole Foods in the frozen freezer, they sell 100% grass fed frozen beef liver and beef heart and beef kidney there, even beef tongue. Or just go to the local Halal market, the local market and get it there.

Now what?

EXPERIENCE EK— unlock your true potential.

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Experiments

  1. Try to troll AI and ChatGPT for; once you get the paid version, see how far you could push it until you invoke some sort of content moderation issue,
  2. Have ChatGPT disprove some sort of strange conspiracy theories. In fact, I think the biggest benefit of ChatGPT is that it doesn’t get suckered by conspiracy theories.
  3. Actually, ChatGPT is pretty factual. For example, just ask whether George Floyd was in a pornography film (he was). ChatGPT answers truthfully. 

Now what?

Going on a hike. Leave your phone in the car and just enjoy a nice walking nature, just walk slowly. Do it in vibram five finger shoes or even barefoot. 

Order some weight lifting equipment on titan.fitness and have fun at home.

FaceTime a loved one. The best gift to give somebody is just a simple phone call!

What do you want for Christmas this year?

  1. Ask somebody to gift you a gym membership, or even a yoga, CorePower membership. Investing in your health is perhaps the best thing you could do as a gift.
  2. In terms of gyms, I really like crunch fitness, LA fitness is OK, or whatever commercial gym is close by. Even golds gym is good.
  3. Costco gift cards; to buy more meat.
  4. Ask somebody for airline fare; to go fly somewhere and travel somewhere for the holidays. 
  5. Vibram 5 finger shoes — ELX KNIT.
  6. Texas power bar squat bar
  7. 400 pound roguefitness.com sand bag
  8. Money to purchase a website hosting domain
  9. iPad Pro (small one)

What else?

Infinite ideas on the ERIC KIM BLOG: Some new thoughts:


  1. It is better to rent in an insanely great neighborhood and location then to even own a $5 million home in a good location
  2. Physiology hack: take insanely hot baths at home, at the verge of boiling your skin. Very refreshing.
  3. Drink robusta coffee, not arabica. Even Costco sells the Deathwish coffee now, which I assume is robusta coffee. Otherwise get ERIC KIM 100% fine robusta coffee. 
  4. The best clothing to wear in winter is down, merino wool, cashmere. Layer up!
  5. Milo of croton ate 20 pounds of meat a day, let us use that as our benchmark.
  6. A life goal: read the Iliad by Homer front to back. Just download free PDFs online, and keep looking for a good translation until you find one that you like.

Book list

  1. Invent and wander by Jeff Bezos
  2. Zero to one by Peter Thiel 
  3. Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson, also the new Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson 
  4. Going Infinite – Michael Lewis. Also flash boys.

START HERE

  1. Books
  2. Products
  3. Downloads

Forward the thoughts

If this part even one interesting thought within you, feel free to forward to a friend!

ERIC KIM NEWS >

#savemoney collective

The new life goal should be to save money, not to waste it.

Instead of wasting money, better to use that money towards buying meat at Costco, weightlifting equipment, plates and bars and barbells, iron etc. Physical fitness is the ultimate luxury.

Stay lit!

ERIC KIM BLOG

***

How to Go Infinite?

To infinity and beyond!

Book review of Going Infinite, and also some thoughts on walking:

Book Review: Going Infinite by Michael Lewis, the Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon, the Story of Sam Bankman-Fried and FTX and Alameda Research

So I just finished going infinite by Michael Lewis, highly recommended read. Why? Very very fun read, and also… Fascinating insight into the world of crypto, money, currency, Fiat currency etc.

Quick summary:

  1. Sam Bankman Fried isn’t the evil villain everyone wants to paint him as. He is just like an extremely uber genius math prodigy whiz kid, who has zero concern for social norms.
  2. Perhaps the real culprit here are the effective altruists (“effective altruism”— bad), these new tech money elites, who follow utilitarianism, who want to find a reason to “save the planet”, and I think… they actually want to see humanity destroy itself, in order to go to Mars or whatever.
  3. This whole trend of creating your own cryptocurrency or token is a bad idea. FTT, which was the token for FTX, was probably the biggest critical downfall of ftx.com. You should never hedge your finances on imaginary token.
  4. Money is fake
  5. CZ, the CEO of binance, seems like kind of a strange character. Once again he isn’t evil either… but, it seems that petty rivalries and feuds often escalate into some sort of market downsides.
  6. Apparently from what I understand, besides all of the bad behavior, ftx.com was actually a good trading platform. It allowed novice traders to trade, and also more advanced quants to trade as well. Apparently it was very cutting edge at the time, offering advanced treating tools for experts.
  7. Alameda research, which actually was in existence before ftx.com is the strange case. Essentially it was the place where money was being funneled into, which may be turned out to use customer funds to fundraise strange effective altruist campaigns. For example, Sam Bankman Fried essentially had an unlimited US dollar bank account, to throw money at any sort of celebrity endorsement, which includes Tom Brady and Stephen Curry, And also, throwing vast sums of money at political candidates running for office, to essentially ensure that Donald Trump did not get elected (he still did). I believe that Joe Biden and his campaign was given over $100 million from Sam Bankman Fried.

So what happened?

Some interesting things:

First, learning about Jane Street, one of the high frequency trading firms, a bunch of quant, quantitative folks, doing some sort of hedging, maybe dynamic hedging as Nassim Taleb calls it — essentially a lot of the trading world is automated by algorithms, and bots. Jane street recent news.

It also seems that a lot of this is run by people who are highly mathematically trained, people who are essentially mathematical thinkers.

Maybe this is where math is interesting; it isn’t math for math, but instead, the purpose of math is to think more critically, and to also think quicker.

So what happened?

I think essentially what happened was all of the customer accounts of ftx.com were funneled into Alameda research, which then either directly or indirectly went to Sam’s discretionary spending fund on political matters, building infrastructure for the headquarters in the Bahamas etc.

Also, the demise and downfall of ftx.com was that it relied too much on hedging; essentially let us say that $10 billion worth of US dollars worth of crypto was in the platform, customer money… and let us assume that at once, 100% of the customers would want to pull their money. This would not be possible because at one point a time, ftx.com might only have a total of 10% of the customer funds.

I think this is actually what happens similarly in traditional banks as well. A bank never has all the customer money, they essentially use your money as leverage to speculate elsewhere.

Also this is where I’m starting to get more skeptical of traditional IRAs, 401(k) plans, Roth IRA etc.; once again, certain companies and corporations in the US government are trying to leverage your money right now to make a profit on something, while you have to sit there and just twiddle your thumbs.

Now what?

It seems that I think, the best trading platform is Coinbase. I see it like it is the PayPal, the new PayPal for crypto.

Also, I am not really like a crypto anarchist; I like the government, I like being able to transfer it into my normal American Bank account, and I like the idea that if I wanted to, I could easily convert it into US dollars. Of course it all comes with the fee; but that fee is nominal for the convenience and the practicality of things.

I recently converted 90% of my bitcoin into chainlink, and one of the driving factors is what if chainlink becomes like the next SWIFT for international banks? This would help a lot of the global finance industry.

For example, my mom currently lives in South Korea, and having to transfer money from my US Bank account to her South Korean bank account and vice versa was a major pain in the ass. Having to literally go to a bank teller in real life and having to sign all these paper forms was insanely cumbersome annoying and time-consuming. It should all be able to be done digitally, in terms of cryptographic truth.

Also, another subtle funny thing; a lot of hourly wage service workers have to punch in punch out, but… it seems difficult to know for 100% certain or not if they actually truly showed up for work or not. Maybe chainlink could solve that.

Useful tools?

I still love bitcoin and I think bitcoin is sexy, and I think that everybody should own at least one bitcoin, just in case it goes to $10 million a bitcoin or who knows even $100 million a bitcoin by the time that we are about to die.

Also, I think everything in crypto should be done in the spirit that literally it could all go to zero. It probably won’t, but it might go down to just one percent of the value what it was worth before. For example I was able to ride digibyte from 20 cents a dgb to maybe 50 cents a digibyte, in which I literally traded to chainlink, and then converted it all back into bitcoin. But now, digibyte in now in shambles, worth less than a penny.

The reason I like chainlink is that it actually does something useful. To create a technology which actually does something is a good idea. Bitcoin is great, but ultimately I think of bitcoin more like digital electronic gold. Most people never spend their gold, they just hoard it.

Data price feeds?

Data.chain.link

A very useful technology and service that chainlink provides is giving you an accurate price of certain cryptocurrency assets. For example, if you really wanted to precisely know the price of one bitcoin pegged to the US dollar, down to the cent… who do you trust? Because some platforms give you slightly different numbers. Ultimately we want ultimate truth, the most accurate number. Chainlink will offer that.

The reason why this is critical is that one thing I learned from going infinite and flash boys… literally even a quarter of a penny, if leveraged and hedged with trillions of dollars can make a fat profit. These really really big firms will want accuracy of crypto prices down to even a fraction of a penny.

Illuminati influences

So one character I find very interesting is Eric Schmidt, the ex CEO of Google. He made Google to become the Google it is today. Apparently one of the things he said, a strategy that he had when see you at Google was genius; “We made sure to put a little bit of Google into everything”. YouTube video.

Quite genius. I think nowadays almost every single product tracking thing is somehow connected to google analytics and Google Adsense somewhere. Even when you Google something and open up the hyperlink and click it, there is this long ugly URL with a bunch of Google tracking code in it.

Also I find Eric Schmidt interesting because he was mentioned in the going infinite book. Even apparently ERIC Schmidt I think… ran for Senate or something, it might hold a board seat somewhere?

Now this is the killer: Eric Schmidt joined chainlink as part of their board of trustees. This is good news for chainlink, because then what it means is that I think… ERIC Schmidt, probably owns a substantial number of chainlink in his own personal account, and now that he has political power, he will most likely use his political power to enrich himself. Therefore as a consequence, if you own chainlink, it is a good promise that ERIC Schmidt is probably behind the scenes, helping you become richer.

Also

I took some screenshots, but essentially all the rich people are banding together to become richer together. Apparently there’s lots of private parties in which Jeff Bezos shows up, a few of the Kardashians, etc.

I find this interesting not from a conspiracy theory perspective, but essentially the elite are essentially giving each other back rubs, maybe wealth is just a huge circle jerk.

Michael Lewis for the win

I love Michael Lewis for his candor, his humor, his offkilter humor. And also would I like by Michael Lewis now because he is so successful, I think he’s just really writing these books out of self interest and fun. You could tell that he is actually legitimately interested in the life of Sam Bankman-Fried, expensively interviewing his parents, his friends etc.

You cannot fake passion and enthusiasm and fun. It is a hugely entertaining read and insightful. Highly recommend.

ERIC

So now what?

Walk more, think less.

I think one of the really big critical issues here is that in modern day times, we spend too much time thinking, not enough time walking.

My vision is that the future, we are essentially going to be like elite homeless people. That the new tech trillionaires of the future, we will be like some sort of off the grid, Zen Stoic monks. We will be mostly shirtless, walking around 50 miles a day, aimlessly for fun, lifting weights here and there for fun, and not have access to a phone, and not be contactable.

We will bask in the sun, and we will only prefer to lift weights in the direct sun, topless.

We will be maximally friendly, courteous, fun. Like overgrown children. Yet we will also be insanely wise, intelligent critical and deep.

If you haven’t already, don’t be a cheapo and just subscribe to the ChatGPT plus. This is literally the ultimate life hack.

What to become?

Just become a street vlogger like ERIC KIM. Just walk around a lot, vlog any random thoughts on your mind and upload it to YouTube and your own blog. As long as you get more than two views, consider it successful!

Also, double dip; shoot photos and make photo art, and also use DALL-E, DALL-E 3 to make AI art! And simple; keep it all open source.

So what can money buy?

Money can buy you experiences, and also leather products.

The more I use HAPTIC PRODUCTS, the more I love it. For example this ERIC KIM PORTFOLIO CASE Cindy and I made and designed back in Saigon in 2017… I still use it every single day, and the beauty of it is that the more I use it, the more comfortable it becomes, the more it becomes.

This is ultimate wabi-sabi— the general idea with leather which I love is that it will last longer than you. You can hand it down to your kids!

You don’t buy a HAPTIC PRODUCT for yourself, you buy it for your future children (ripoff some watch, Rolex, AP ad I saw somewhere).

SHOP HAPTIC >

EXPERIENCE EK

All access to some of the most interesting thoughts on the planet.

ERIC KIM EXP >

Some more fun thoughts on walking:

THINK LESS, WALK MORE.

A thought in modern day society: we think too much.

For example, some modern day ills include the fact that we wake up, we stay at home, work from home, never leave the apartment or the house all day, or even worse… we go to the office, stay in the office, don’t leave all day, eat lunch at our desk in front of our laptop or computer… even worse, if you’re hardcore you don’t leave the office for days weeks or even months… You just sleep in a beanbag next to your desk or in a sleeping bag under your desk.

Problems?

This is the big issue I’ve discovered:

I think what the modern day man or person strives to be is to become the ultimate productivity machine robot who doesn’t need anything. That somehow you could optimize yourself out of going outside, getting natural light by just popping some vitamin D tablets, don’t need to exercise, and if you exercise, the minimum amount of exercise necessary not to atrophy your body, Find no need of the sun, or no need to walk because it is “inefficient”.

In fact, I wonder if this whole bizarre trend of “running“, or “jogging“, is because people don’t think that walking is “effective”, or “efficient “. People are somehow trying to maximize their movement activity; they don’t think of walking as “exercise“, and somehow that it doesn’t “burn calories” (the calorie in, calorie out myth).

As a consequence, modern day man becomes strange. A strange plant. Lacking natural light and melanin in their skin, lacking ability to make iContact with people in embodied reality, and prefer to not interact with any humans. Thus the trend towards mobile orders etc.

Think ancient Greece

A lot of people like to think about ancient hunter gather lifestyles whatever… I prefer to think about ancient Greece, ancient Sparta. Before money was invented, and you could only measure your wealth by how many cattle you owned. Or how many men you governed.

For example, in the Iliad, I think it was Nestor who told Achilles that king Agamemnon was the superior man, because he commanded more men.

What are we striving for and looking for?

I think a lot of us are dealing with some sort of modern day pain suffering and discontent and we’re not really sure what to do about it. I think this is why we seek out “therapists”, see psychiatrists, get prescribed some sort of generic medication, etc. In fact, besides the extreme edge cases, I think medication should be avoided at all costs. I think when people are depressed, it is a physiological and physical depression. Not enough time outside walking, in the direct elements, in the direct sun, not enough exercise and lifting weights, over consumption of alcohol, caffeine, coffee, drugs, marijuana etc. I don’t think anything is wrong moralistically with marijuana… but I distrust anybody who consumes or takes or does marijuana on a daily basis. Marijuana does strange things to your mind.

I trust nobody who is woke, who tokes!

Also, if you’re reliant on marijuana to fall asleep at night, once again… not a good sign.

Back to ancient Sparta!

I think what we are having an issue with in modern day society is more of a moralistic and ethical one. The thought is we are born to be productive, and our self-worth and value is simply predicated on how productive we are, how much money we make, how much we increase our money number in our savings account, buying houses etc.

Therefore, anytime we are not actively doing that… we feel some sort of inner guilt, shame, and we lose respect for ourselves. We end up self-flagellation ourselves.

Don’t trust nobody on social media

Several things; first and foremost, any human being who uses Twitter, Instagram, Facebook etc.… they’re hopped on a strange matrix simulation like dopamine machine. I think using social media and having notifications on your phone might actually be worse than gambling. At least gambling has to do more with money… social media has to do more with your self-respect, your self-esteem esteem.

“I’ve been awakened by an enlightened man’s dream… checking Instagram comments to crowd-source my self-esteem”— KANYE

Burn the boats!

Very simple. Just stop using social media, uninstall all of the apps from your phone, or just delete them.

For example, I think one of the most glorious moments of my life, one of the greatest things I have done in my life as a photographer and “influencer“, was deleting my Instagram in 2017. Why? Since then, I feel like I unhooked my brain from the matrix. I took the red pill. Anyone who still uses Instagram, Facebook, Gmail, Twitter, YouTube, listens to podcasts, has Spotify, Netflix, etc. is still on the blue pill.

Why? The best way to have more interesting thoughts is via negativa— actively canceling out, or deleting, or getting rid of external stimuli in the spirit of books, blog posts, media, Reddit, the news, etc. In fact the big problem in today’s world is that we are almost like in a human centipede consumption of information use and media; one media outlet regurgitates and quotes the other one, which quotes the other one, which might’ve ultimately just been written by ChatGPT or some sort of AI bot. In fact I’ve been experimenting a lot with chatGPT4, the paid premium one, and what I’ve discovered is funny; even ChatGPT doesn’t know that it was written by ChatGPT.

For example, for fuzzies, I ChatGPT’d myself. I would open up ChatGPT 4, the premium paid one, and asked simple things like “who is ERIC KIM“? ChatGPT with then do an effective summary and overview of me my life story in my life loss etc., and then I just copied and pasted the information, and literally published a blog post on what ChatGPT said. I then later a few days later, ask ChatGPT “ERIC KIM philosophy“, and then once again, it re-summarized things and actually linked back to my blog giving me a citations and footnotes, but the funny thing was… the citations and footnotes gave me were actually the blog post written by ChatGPT itself!

Or another words, ChatGPT doesn’t know that I am ERIC KIM.

The thinker

To think is to sit on your butt and ruminate and think. No no no… to think is to walk. In fact maybe we should stop call it “thinking”, but just walking.

My personal thought is the noveau luxury is walking. If you have the privilege of having a 100% pedestrian lifestyle, 100% biped lifestyle, in which you’re just literally walking everywhere, without having to use the agency of a car, it is a sign that you are truly truly rich and wealthy. Secondly if you don’t always have to check your phone. Thirdly, if you could have all the notifications on your phone disabled.

How and why is walking so critical?

First without thinking about it too much… just think about this: if you walked 50 miles a day, I think 99.9% of your life cares concerns and worries would disappear. Especially if you do it in nature. With uneven surfaces, different grades and elevations, no two steps are alike.

One of the greatest things about being in nature, just going on a simple hike, is that sometimes it is steep, sometimes it is level, sometimes it is dirt, sometimes it is pavement, sometimes it is gravel, sometimes it is grass, etc. Having variation in the texture of the environment and the terrain is critical.

In modern day times, everything is flat. And everything is the same thing; typically just concrete.

I actually wonder and think, I wonder if a lot of the issues with modern day health and physiology has to do with the fact that everything is flat. I think the reason why we are bipeds is that as a biped, we are very very very good at traversing uneven terrain. In fact, one could even argue that human who is upright and biped could better navigate rocky and mountainous terrain compared to a four-legged animal.

Also the best thing you could buy with money is vibram five finger shoes. Just buy it for yourself for Christmas or ask somebody to buy for you.

We got to stop calling it “hiking”

One of the biggest issues I’ve discovered about the whole “hiking” notion is that people think too much that it has to be done a certain way. We think that somehow we have to buy those silly hiking poles, buy a hat, buy some hiking boots at REI or whatever, and wear all this expensive outdoor clothing.

Technically you could just do a barefoot, or… get some vibram five finger shoes, and just go on a fun walk!

Another weird thing I’ve discovered is we think we got to purchase the thing in order to somehow justify getting into a certain lifestyle. For example, we think we got to buy some sort of off-road four-wheel-drive car some sort of Subaru or jeep or sports utility SUV car in order to do “outdoorsy” stuff. This is silly. For a while Cindy and I work on hardcore hiking and camping stuff, and literally 99.99% maybe even 100% of the places we went to, we were able to simply do it in a simple four-door sedan, the Ford fusion which is just a normal sedan with a front wheel drive car.

I think this is the insidious nature of capitalism and consumerism; it makes you feel insecure and uncertain and unqualified, and we think that in order to do the thing that we want to do, we must buy the things in order to do it.

So now what?

I can’t speak for you or others. I think everyone has different talents, different skills, different desires.

First, I think having some sort of life dreams and goals is a good one. And striving with all your might to meet them and accomplish them and achieve them.

Then the next question is… then what? Should you just keep doing this into infinity? Ad infinitum?

Maybe not. Or maybe.

For example with weightlifting, a simple path is just to keep increasing your one rep max until the end of time. I don’t think this is a bad idea.

But also at the same time, you don’t need to be tied down to this either. Technically real life, reality is not metricated.

For example, if you think about the Iliad, Achilles, Hector, nobody could care less about “how much you can bench“. It was a simple binary; if you were in hand to hand battle with another fighter or warrior, would you kill him, or would he kill you? Who was the more courageous and superior and dominating force?

Also well interesting is that it seems that in the Iliad, nothing was really accidental or by chance. For example when warriors would go to battle, one warrior would not “accidentally“, get killed by the other warrior. It really did come down to courage, skill, power, who was the better fighter.

Even the final bout between Achilles and Hector; Hector was essentially hoodwinked and tricked… He was deceived into thinking that he had his charioteer, his trusted fighting buddy by his side to take on Achilles, because Hector was no dummy; he actually knew that Achilles was the superior fighter, and if you went head on with Achilles, he would lose. He was hoodwinked by one of the gods, who made an illusion and made themselves appear to be the friend of Hector.

Real life

So then the question is in real life, what do you seek to do, achieve, etc?

Heraclitus one said, “The greatest glory is to seek immortal glory amongst men, yet the majority of men stuff themselves like cattle.”

Who will not be remembered?

I don’t think that any modern day tech CEO will be remembered, nor cared for. Exceptions include CEOs who were also founders.

Also, I think people who will be forgotten include people who sell their companies. I don’t know… If you ultimately decide to sell your company, even for $10 billion… I think it is a signal that you care more about money than the thing you built. Why? As long as your business is making an income and you can somehow pay yourself a base salary, pay your rent, your utilities, your meat, etc.… what else need do you have for money?

This is where I give Mark Zuckerberg great credit. In the early days of Facebook he had so many offers to be bought out, but he stuck to his guns and refused. Highly intelligent.

Some people I think who compromised include Jack Dorsey of Twitter, I’m even starting to get a little bit suspicious of the cofounders of Google, Larry Page and Sergey Brin; why did they end up leaving running Google and building the board of Alphabet instead?

Perhaps one graceful exit is Jeff Bezos at Amazon; I think he’s put in his fair share and his duties; I think space travel was his ultimate dream, and if you read invent and wonder, I think he really did stay true to his principles and never compromised. Also, him publicly exposing his controversial affair in the public, was insanely bold ballsy and respectful. He refused to be blackmailed. What a true mensch.

People who will be remembered

I think Elon Musk might be remembered forever. Why? Through pure force of will, might, and craziness… He was able to achieve the impossible. His thinking was only limited by physics, the laws of physics, first principles. Aristotle would have been proud of him.

Second, Kanye West. I really don’t think there is any thinker innovator or artist quite as bold, innovative, and amazing as him. Even now, randomly in the middle of the night, this morning I thought about his “Runaway“ song, and his perfect album my beautiful dark twisted fantasy. Actually if you think about all the albums and songs he has ever produced, he was so ahead of the game, so innovative and unique, he really did care for creating true magic in his music.

Also Steve Jobs. It seems that nowadays kids don’t really know who he is, but, for innovators and thinkers like myself and countless others, they will always sight Steve Jobs as an inspiration. Also, it seems that Steve Jobs died at the right time; he fulfilled all of his creative visions, never compromised his beliefs, and I think he set the path for other creatives down the line.

I think the last vision of Steve Jobs was to create a creative company so infused with creativity that it would stand the test the time. I think he was quite successful.

What is the value of thinking?

The big question at hand is what is the value of thinking? Why think?

I think some people think, engage in thinking because they hope that it will lead to some sort of money making opportunity.

For me, I love thinking and sharing my thoughts because it is fun! To me, a life devoid of thoughts or interesting thoughts is not a life worth living.

The best way to live life

Very simple: only pursue and do that which you are genuinely interested in, ignore everything else.

Also, in terms of happiness and food… maybe the single most critical thing to improve your happiness is to increase the quality of your meat. Beef, beef liver beef heart beef intestines, lamb, grass fed ground beef etc. Wagyu ground beef at Costco is great.

In fact, I have a theory that a lot of the modern day issues that we got is that we’re under nourished. We aren’t eating enough red meat, enough beef or lamb. Pork is not meat, chicken and turkey is not meat.

Don’t let the feelings of others govern your behavior, in terms of how you eat or live

Another bizarre thing I’ve learned is the way that some people live their lives and they decide what to eat, what not to eat, how to live, how not to live, how to talk, what to say what not to say based simply on other people; they center themselves or don’t really see what’s on their mind because they’re afraid of:

“How do you think that makes me feel?”

But we don’t do the opposite; we don’t then tell that person the same. That “How does that make me feel?”

For example this nonsense behind gender pronouns. That you demand that I call you a certain pronoun, but what if I don’t feel comfortable calling you that pronoun?

It has to be faster, more seamless

One of the good reasons I think of building your own gym at home is that it reduces a lot of the friction. For example I generally love the gym and I think gym life is good, but here in LA I haven’t been able to find any good gyms; they all suck. Therefore this motivated me to build my own gym, just in my back yard, parking lot garage, in the back of my apartment.

I love this off the grid approach because literally… there is no friction. I don’t have to jump in the car and I don’t have to check in or scan my QR code or whatever whatever, I never have to wait for equipment etc.

If you have tight quarters, a simple solution is to just buy really really heavy kettle bell, 105 pounds and up. Or just buy a heavy sandbag, go to the playground and fill it up with sand, and just exercise with that picking it up and throwing it around. Even with us experienced weightlifters, I encourage buying the 400 pound sandbag on roguefitness.com or just get it on Amazon for cheap, fill it out with playground sand and experiment lifting that at home. Titan.fitness is also good.

I actually think that the most critical factor is to exercise outside, in the direct sun. If it is cold, just layer up.

Why exercise outside? It is more fun, more lively, more uplifting. Also one of the good benefits of working out at home is when you need to stop by the bathroom to pee, you could just pull yourself another espresso! Good luck doing that at any gym.

In fact I have an idea; I think all gyms should have some sort of coffee bar or espresso bar. Not these bad energy drinks, which is just fake sugar added.

Lift with EK

If you’re interested in lifting with me, shoot me an email at eric@erickim.com, if you live in LA or anywhere in the southern California area.

Now what?

Ultimately never forget that you’re an artist, a visual artist. Photography is just another tool in your creative tool kit.

Use dall-e, ChatGPT plus and premium, make your own AI generated art. Have fun with it, don’t take it too seriously.

Post it to your own self hosted blog, and keep updating! The ultimate sim of a blogger is this:

If somebody opens up a new tab and loads your blog, and they don’t see anything new.

ERIC

Some good freebies

Always updating the ERIC KIM start here page with more fire.

Also, free and open source books here.

Forward the fire!

If this sparked even one fun creative idea within you, feel free to forward this to a friend!

EK NEWS >

“Happiness is walking (a lot).”

ERIC

BARBELLS & BITCOIN.

Either have a full manual transmission car, five speed or six speed manual shifting transmission, or, or have a fully automated self driving car, or some sort of minimalistic automatic car.

Also with design aesthetics, I really really really hate automatic shifting knobs and cars. Aesthetically it is so ugly and unnecessary. Good to look at the design of Hyundai, Genesis, Acura and Honda which has gotten rid of the silly automatic shifting stock, and instead, turned it all into buttons.

“Get rid of the stalks!” – Elon Musk

I really think that Elon Musk is like Steve Jobs 4.0. By comparison he makes Steve Jobs look unambitious.

Why Elon Musk? I think what people don’t understand or appreciate is how obsessed Elon Musk is with design, design thinking, design principles. For example, his obsession with designing a Tesla without any steering wheel, shifting mechanisms, stocks, etc. In fact, Elon Musk is almost like an extreme minimalist.

What I personally love about Tesla and Tesla cars is the Spartan luxury, extreme minimalism. For example, I still marvel at the Tesla model 3; first, I’m just so happy and excited and proud and amazed that Elon Musk pulled it off. I remember before it was put into production and before I saw any on the streets… it was just a rabbit hole fantasy. Now it is live!

What I find so insanely innovative about the Tesla model 3 is the extreme simplicity, the extreme minimalism. To make the dashboard so sublimely simple is a design masterpiece.

Personally, I really dislike the Tesla model Y; my general thought is that any sort of crossover vehicle, or even sports utility vehicle is some sort of a design compromise. Even the Tesla model X is almost like a Tesla model S on steroids.

Why is it so difficult to minimize?

I think the reason why it is so difficult to minimize is that there seems to be some sort of trend or market desire for their to be new features, new products, new additions to motivate people to buy something. But, from a zen capitalism perspective, perhaps this is not a good idea.

Why? I’m more effective way to think about things is figuring out what to get rid of, what to reduce, what to delete. For example, let us never forget the pure genius of Steve Jobs getting rid of the keyboard on the smartphone, and also getting rid of all these silly ugly ports. If it wasn’t for Steve Jobs and his insane design vision, we wouldn’t have the beautiful minimalistic smart phone that we have today.

Would it have eventually happened or not?

I think a lot of people think about technology and think that it is all inevitable… given enough time resources and people… these things will magically get invented anyways. I don’t think this is actually the case. You actually need a few insane individuals to bring these things into fruition.

Once again, read Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson and also Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson. You find that both these individuals have an insanely epic and grand life mission… is what drives them.

Idea:

Walter Isaacson should write a book or a biography on Kanye West?

Other things you can barbell in life

  1. 90% of your savings and money in boring bonds, high yield interest CD’s or high yield savings account (5%!) and 10% in insanely speculative crypto (imagine losing it all). Best advice I got from NASSIM TALEB in ANTIFRAGILE.
  2. Often, 90% of your annoyances in life come from 10% of the people in your life. Get rid of these 10%.
  3. 90% of your joy and happiness and life come from 10% of the things. Try to determine and ascertain what this 10% is.

How to think better:

  1. ZEN OF ERIC BOT
  2. ERIC KIM BOT: For photo
  3. Bitcoin Babe: speculate in crypto

Have fun with EK!

Super fun workshops in the pipeline:

  1. INTRODUCTION TO STOICISM WORKSHOP: Downtown LA, DECEMBER 2nd, 2023
  2. DOWNTOWN CULVER CITY FAMILY STREET PHOTOGRAPHY WORKSHOP, DECEMBER 16, 2023

2024

  1. CONQUER CONFIDENCE ONLINE WORKSHOP: Jan 27, 2024
  2. March 2nd: ERIC KIM CREATIVE AI & PHOTOGRAPHY WORKSHOP (New!)— Culver City, LA
  3. April 20th, 2024: SF ZEN PHOTOGRAPHY WORKSHOP – Now Live!

EK WORK

HAPTIC

HAPTIC PRODUCTS >

What is EK up to?

So I just finished the book going infinite by Michael Lewis on the rise and fall of Sam Bankman Fried and FTX. Super fun and fascinating read. My personal suggestion is even if you have a tiny interest in crypto, bitcoin or whatever… It is definitely worth a read.

A quick summary is that Sam isn’t the evil villain that everyone wants him to be. He is almost like an uber genius autistic mathematical servant, who seems to just lack common sense.

Also on a positive note, I think the great upside to consider here is that if bitcoin was able to bounce back after the fall of FTX and Sam Bankman-Fried… a very bright future ahead of us in crypto. My personal price projection is I am quite certain that bitcoin will bounce back to at least $65,000 a bitcoin by next year. Therefore if you want a quick 2X profit, seems like a fun speculation. and no no no, don’t bet your house on it. Once again our financial thinking is simple:

Never put more than 10% of your life savings into anything. Irregardless of how good.

Also for funsies, a fun little essay I’ve written on the philosophy of crypto:

The Philosophy of Crypto

“Greed is good” – Gordon Gecko

So it seems and appears that a lot of people seek getting really really rich, really really fast, in order to buy a bunch of stuff. For example, I think the general idea is that you want to make a ton of money, feel good, buy a Lamborghini or whatever… And then what?

Crypto, cryptocurrency, crypto technology to me is fascinating because it is new, sexy, unorthodox, and interesting.

It seems that a lot of people are interested in crypto, bitcoin etc because they want to get really rich. But the tricky thing with crypto is that essentially you are really rich on paper, but typically most crypto speculators never actually dilute or convert their crypto to US dollars, which means that crypto money is not liquid, it is locked.

Crypto is intrinsically optimistic?

Crypto to me is interesting because it is edgy, optimistic, radical, and bold. Also a bit reckless.

The general idea is that with crypto, people are seeking a new revolution, something to up and the old system. Definitely a lot of anarchy vibes here, and a lot of people who are typically distrustful of big organizations, big government, etc.

Honestly I have nothing against the government, I am very happy paying my taxes, I still consider myself a bay area, liberal, open minded, at heart. I love democracy, democratic thinking. Why? It was mostly about how I was raised, how I was supported. If I did not get all of these government aided resources, like going to UCLA as an undergraduate, I would have never been able to become who I am today.

Also, simple organizations that I am grateful for include the Boy Scouts, Boy Scouts of America. I am forever grateful to my troop, my troop leaders, who helped me become an Eagle Scout, and helped me become the citizen that I am today.

Growing up, I grew up thinking that conservatives, Republicans were the devil. Why were they so greedy, if they had so much money, why don’t they help more poor people or people in need?

Irregardless, I think the promise of crypto is a more brilliant future. A lot of people seem to disdain the volatility of crypto, but I love it. With traditional stocks, you will never see a 10X gain, a 100X gain, or even a 1000x gain. Also with crypto, you could win it all, or you could lose it all. My general strategy towards crypto and cryptocurrency speculation is this:

Only put money into crypto, assuming that it will go to zero.

Perhaps the best piece of advice that I got from Nassim Taleb in his antifragile book is the idea that to maximize your gains, better to put 90% of your money in maximally boring funds, like bonds, yield savings account etc.… it is pretty crazy even now Cindy and I have a bunch of money just locked in a simple 5% APR savings account, and we get close to $2000 a month in “passive income” interest. Then, what I did was I put 10% of our savings into crypto, maximally speculative bets, initially investing in digibyte and bitcoin, later swapping it all to chainlink, along the way getting some Dogecoin, later transferring it all 100% back into Bitcoin.

All of the gains were mental. And along the way more recently, I’ve been drawing out some money from bitcoin, $5000 USD here US$5000 there… Simply to cover up moving expenses to LA.

The zen of crypto?

Ultimately what I find interesting is that crypto, people who speculate in crypto all tend to live kind of a more monastic Zen monk lifestyle. Even this one guy that I met who first got me into chainlink, revealed to me that he was a crypto whale in chainlink; apparently he first put his life savings in it, maybe $10,000 USD or so when it was worth about $.70, and then he saw it rise all the way up to $50 USD.

It was funny, because I would just see him at the local LA fitness working out, thinking and meditating, we would engage in some lively conversation, and he just drove his mom‘s old Honda Accord, I think he later told me that he was moving to Puerto Rico or something in order to avoid taxes on his crypto or some other regulatory aspects. Apparently even Sam Bankman Fried moved his corporation to the Bahamas, in order to avoid US regulation.

So what do you want to do with your wealth?

So once you are worth $20 billion, or $150 billion or whatever … then what?

Ironically the best use of money is simply peace of mind. That means money is not really a tool or a mechanism to buy a bunch of stuff that you like, but rather, being able to live a more zen, tranquil, more focused life.

For example, I think the reason why people are so addicted to email is that people are always desiring new “opportunities”, it is predicated on the fact that somehow other people will give you an afford you new opportunities and also, does predicated on the fact that somehow new opportunities will rise in which other people give you money.

But… assuming that no human being who messages you in your email inbox will give you money… would you still be interested in working with them?

For myself personally, I have close to zero interest in money. I am more interested in new opportunities, fun, new novel experiences. The things that I am proud of, or interested in, or grateful for is all of the cool interesting and sexy opportunities that I’ve had and done. Some of the people that I met, etc.

But ultimately, is there a human being more interesting than you?

Future trends

I’m currently reading the book “Going Infinite” by Michael Lewis, which chronicles is the life of Sam Bankman Fried and FTX and I find it insanely fascinating read. It seems that the same guy isn’t really the super evil guy that a lot of people in the media make him to be; the kid seems to be like a prodigy genius, mathematical minded, who really didn’t care for money or wealth. My personal theory is that he got suckered too much into this utilitarian “effective altruism“, concept… that he misused customer funds in order to “maximize“ his abilities for effective altruism.

I think effective altruism is a bad idea. Why? First of all, I think the general idea of altruism is bad; I think it puts other people in an inferior position, which I personally find is disrespectful. I think a better thing to do instead is on a day-to-day basis, instead of donating money to charities or whatever, to help empower other human beings on a one-to-one basis.

A simple thing; whenever I go to the park with Sen, and I see all these kids running around, who don’t really seem like they get much attention or love from their parents, I try to give them a little bit of that love and attention by talking to them, entertaining them etc. Perhaps this is a more effective way to “change the world“, than anything else.

The future of crypto?

Try to think about things on a 30 year basis. That means, the simple question; in 30 years, are people going to be using crypto more or less? Or, in 30 years, is the price of bitcoin going to go up or down? It seems pretty obvious that it will go up.

Also, the notion of a “digital wallet”. The general idea is that for the future, we ain’t gonna use cash money anymore. Why? I see more and more restaurants in institutions not except paper cash money. Why not? Because it is difficult to track, and I think there are also issues with employees at restaurants stealing money it etc. Even at my mom‘s old sushi restaurant where she worked at for a long time, she later found out that one of the head managers, a guy that we thought was a super good guy… Was secretly stealing money the whole time.

I think into the future, we will see less and less of “under the table“ payments; why? Because it is not trackable.

What else?

Some personal thoughts:

First, I don’t really like Ethereum. Why? It is kind of like android; maybe it is the better technology, but it isn’t sexy, only nerds know about it and use it, it ain’t mainstream and sexy like bitcoin. Bitcoin is like Apple, having the newest iPhone, iPhone Pro etc.… Ethereum is more like android, having an ugly Google pixel or some sort of generic Samsung smartphone.

Another analogy, bitcoin is like having the Lamborghini Countach, with the scissor doors, whereas Ethereum is like having the Toyota Corolla?

Altcoins?

Don’t trust old coins, or alternative coins. Why? Everyone just wants to become the next bitcoin, but ultimately… There is too much meme culture behind alt coins, like Dogecoin and Shiba Inu.

I am very dubious that the price of these Altcoins will ever go up; it seems that a lot of people in the crypto world simply over hype certain crypto technologies and coins, in order to pump it up, sell it, and make money.

Chainlink

Besides bitcoin, only other crypto I find interesting is chainlink. I’ve read all the white papers, and been following the chainlink blog for a long time. Currently the only reason that I’m still committed to bitcoin is that my gut feeling is that even though chain-link is really great, the issue is that it is going to be difficult for it to become mainstream.

First and foremost, it is difficult to explain what it is. The technology is good and great, but I don’t think the general market will understand it.

Also, the fact that there was a chainlink version two is not a good sign. Anything with a version two is probably a bad sign; same thing with Ethereum.

Also, the logo in blue is not very attractive. And the name isn’t that catchy.

Now what?

I recommend reading going infinite by Michael Lewis, it is an insanely fascinating read, if you’re interested at all about financial markets, how it is all gamed by bots etc. My first revelation reading Michael Lewis was flash boys… Learning the truth behind these hidden high frequency trading firms.

And also, I think the sign of good writer, like Michael Lewis is at the Rita’s fun entertaining and also insightful. It seems that the best way to kill two birds with one stone is simple; make it both entertaining to read, and also interesting knowledge.

Think more, walk more

My simple suggestions on living a better life:

  1. Walk 50 miles a day
  2. Maximize your direct sunlight UV exposure radiation
  3. Just build a simple home gym: Titan.fitness equipment seems fine. Ideally work out outside in the direct sun, like an ancient spartan would do.
  4. Start blogging! bluehost.com and install WordPress.org. If you’re more nerdy you could also set up WordPress with lightsail— I did this for erickimphilosophy.com and also erickimfitness.com

Now what?

The world is yours! No drugs, no alcohol, no weed… just joy, bright light, weight lifting and exercise, walks in nature .. we the new zen stoics!

EK

Start Here

Some good freebies:

  1. Ultimate beginners guide to street photography PDF
  2. Street portrait manual
  3. 100 lessons from the masters of street photography

BOOKS BY KIM >

Forward the thoughts

If you feel like you even got one fun thought here… feel free to forward this to a friend!

EK NEWS

The Future of Photography and AI

What is the future of photography and AI? The question at hand.

First, my personal creative vision is that the future of AI and photography should be a hybrid of using AI to actually motivate you to be more creative. No no no, AI is not going to “take your job“, or “take over the world“. is going to take your job? Is Google search going to take your job? No.

What is AI good for?

AI, ChatGPT, DALL-E, DALL-E 3 is like a personal echo chamber; you could use it to flesh out your ideas, to think more critically, and just ask yourself the question… why?

My first take and attempt at creating my own artificial intelligence chat bot was the WHY APP? Essentially the idea was motivated by the notion; if you just ask yourself the question “why?” five times… you gain a deeper truth or insight about something.

The difference between human feedback and machine feedback

Arsbeta.com is all about human feedback. You upload a photo, and you randomly get a real human being giving you feedback on your photos, in a constructive and critical way.

My next vision is to integrate AI into it; which means you upload a photo to the AI, and then it could give you some sort of interesting critical feedback on your photos.

What you could do right now is subscribe to ChatGPT plus, only 20 bucks a month, and upload a photo to it, and ask it for feedback on your photos, how you can improve etc. Some of the feedback is interesting… it makes you think more.

AI as a mirror

AI is a mirror. A white mirror.

AI can only think as deeply as you do; there’s no real right or wrong here. Typically the questions you ask it is simply a reflection of what you’re personally interested in.

Also with DALL-E, DALL-E 3… the name of the game is how funny and aberrant are your ideas?

Creative ideas

Once you got the paid ChatGPT subscription, you can upload up to three or four images, and then just ask ChatGPT to help you choose your best photo.

AI can help you give photography tips. For example, ask ERIC KIM BOT, or ERIC KIM AI for photography tips, photography assignment ideas, street photography tips etc. It is very smart because what it essentially does is just scrape my blog, and gives you interesting ideas in a conversational way.

The integration between camera and AI

Rather than upgrading your iPhone, just use the iPhone you already got, and pay for the ChatGPT subscription, and finally… your smartphone actually becomes smart.

For example what you could do is open up the ChatGPT app, click the camera icon, take a photo of something, and help you analyze the scene. Also, you could even take a photo of a collage that you’ve made in real life and ask it to analyze the image. Recently Cindy and I printed out a bunch of photos, and framed them nicely, and I’ve been having fun asking it to analyze the collages and making sense of it.

AI ART?

Is AI art “real“ art? Of course! The better question is whether you like the photo and the image or not.

What is art? Art is anything that you create. Art can be manifested however you interpret it.

My thought is now with AI, and it being so easy to generate images… What is more critical is actually your ability to filter. The art of choosing your favorite photos is a really important thing here.

Why photographers should use DALL-E

DALL-E is the specific component of ChatGPT which creates images from scratch, purely based on your own imagination.

It is phenomenal. For example, once you subscribe to the Chi PT plus, open up DALL-E on the sidebar, and things you could ask it to design you:

  1. Bitcoin babe driving a Lamborghini Countach in ancient Sparta
  2. Peter Pan with samurai sword in zombie apocalypse
  3. Spartan stoic philosopher lifting bitcoin weights
  4. Beautiful Korean woman at Met Gala in bitcoin dress

DALL-E truly becomes magical the more ridiculous and ostentatious you make it. Make it as ridiculous silly and random as possible; the more ridiculous, the better.

Where should I post all of my images?

Your own blog.

Ionos.com and WordPress.org or bluehost.com

Why? The reason is you’re going to create lots of AI generated images and artwork, and also your photos.

I like the idea of artistic and creative double dipping; the idea is that now that you’re a visual artist, you’re not constrained to just one medium. It is not mutually exclusive; you could do both! You could shoot photos and make AI art!

Make yourself laugh

Cindy has been enjoying watching me how much fun I have been having with ChatGPT and DALL-E. For example a recent thing that I did which made me laugh out loud was asking DALLE to make me a hardcore Spartan image, and then I keep asking it “more muscular”. There is a certain point in which it becomes hilarious and I laugh out loud where the limits of muscularity just become preposterous. It makes the incredible Hulk look like a twig.

Content moderation

One good thing that ChatGPT has integrated is the notion of content policies to prevent bad behavior. The fun thing to do is actually see how you could work around it; rather than asking DALL-E to make you a picture of a “sexy Korean girl“, which it will refuse… use the word “babe” instead, and instead of calling it “sexy”, you can say “beautiful” or “gorgeous”.

The word babe is funny… I got the word from Calvin and Hobbes, because Hobbes was always so fascinated by the babes.

So I think the real fun thing about ChatGPT is actually finding creative ways to subvert the content moderation policies. See how far you could push it and nudge it.

Brave New World of AI

I made a ChatGPT bot called “Bitcoin Babe”. My personal creative vision was in the spirit of fun; how you could use an AI chat but to help you be more zen, stoic, and calm about crypto… given how volatile it is.

For example, I never checked the price of bitcoin or any of my crypto acids. I only ever know the price if I stumble upon it on accident, if it is in the headlines of a newspaper, on the television at airports, in magazines at the airport etc. I never seek it out.

Why, why not and why am I glad that I didn’t do this? Because I know myself and how sensitive I am… I used to actually daytrade when I was in college as a sophomore, and I realize that I was too emotional. Essentially what I did was I thought a long time about my decision, went 100% into bitcoin, and I just never looked at it or touched it, did other stuff instead. The hilarious thing is that I actually avoided and I actually didn’t even know about the whole FTX meltdown and the Sam Bankman-Fried guy. And I’m glad that I intentionally made myself ignorant of all the modern day news… Bitcoin is bouncing back, and since the last time I bought more bitcoin for the third time, everything is totally in the green.

But anyways, I think 99% of crypto, cryptocurrency speculation is all about having a zen and stoic mindset. Essentially not to let emotions perturb you.

I specifically programmed Bitcoin Babe in such a way that it tries to help you think more critically about things, and not get suckered by hype.

Also, ZEN OF ERIC and also ERIC KIM BOT— zen of ERIC is all about stoicism and philosophy, and ERIC KIM bot is all about photography.

No more Google

I am starting to think that Google is the bad guy; this whole system we got which is predicated on advertising is a positively bad one. Why? The more sensational and crazy the news, the more advertisements get viewed or clicked on. As a consequence, the nature of the news and media is becoming too outlandish.

Also my critical analysis is that a lot of this stuff on racism, race riots, anti-Jewish sentiment etc.… the real bad guy here is Google and Facebook. Why? Google which owns YouTube, makes money off of these hot button topics. Not only that but Facebook owns Instagram, and once again… the more sexual, overt, and loud something is… the more attention and advertising money is made.

Actually one thing that made me very anti-Instagram… I don’t even have a daughter but I’m starting to realize… When I watched the Kanye West interview on info wars, Kanye West commenting that Instagram is essentially like pornography; a lot of these “fitness influencers”, or women… are essentially selling their bodies for attention and money.

But now that ChatGPT and DALLE can make you your own beautiful women, photo realistic, all which are virtual… There is really no more need for these models or “influencers“.

Short Google and Facebook/Meta/Instagram.

Now what?

The other days when I was at Philz coffee, I saw a guy order a croissant and a coffee and spend $17 on it. Do yourself a favor and just buy the ChatGPT premium subscription, and spend the best $20 of your life.

Play with it, have fun, create your own ChatGPT bots, and also, see how far you can push it.

Think with EK

ERIC KIM WORKSHOPS FOR LIFE!

STACK IT WITH HAPTIC

HAPTIC TOOLS — create your own visual jewels!

The limits of muscularity?

More muscular

Increasing the muscularity further might lead to an unrealistic depiction, as the current images already portray the Spartan warrior with an extremely muscular build, akin to a bodybuilder. If you’re seeking an even more exaggerated portrayal, it would venture into the realm of fantasy or comic book-style characters. Would you like to proceed in that direction?

Food & Happiness

I wonder if one of the best ways to optimize your happiness and health is simple… Optimize your food.

  1. Bone marrow
  2. Beef liver
  3. Beef heart
  4. Beef shank
  5. Pasture raised eggs
  6. Grass fed beef, or wagyu ground beef — whatever has more cholesterol.
  7. Lamb, lamb shank.
  8. Beef ribs, lamb ribs

Things to avoid?

  1. Pork
  2. Dairy, butter

Maybe I should give up pork? Whenever I eat it, I always get really bad digestion and poor stools?