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Hedge Funds Are A Symptom - ADDRESS THE CAUSE
Hate Hedge Funds & Wall Street - Why Not End Them All? With so many users on WSB, there are many point of views about Wall Street and the market. However, it seems to me the majority of the community dislikes Hedge Funds and the big players who have trampled over retail investors to make a living. Considering the current economic environment, it's more imperative than ever to be "invested" in the stock market. The problem is the financial system and Wall Street ultimately benefits from the growing amount of investors. Even when retail outperforms hedge funds or manages to achieve trades like $GME, it eventually works in their benefit. The value of assets increasing allows higher returns, speculation, and the securitization of these assets(& rehypothecation) to use for financial gain. The Financial system has changed ever since 71s departure of the Gold Standard(which had problems due to Bretton Woods) and 1977 amendment of the Federal Reserve Act. Ever since then you can see interest rates have trended in down for 40 years now - this is because the Federal Reserve's mandate of "maximum employment" causes Fed to stop recessions with lowering interest rates which to incentivize debt/consumption. Ever since the beginning of the 80s community banks have been annihilated due to monetary policy, its structure, and Congress. Wealth inequality just so happens to start it's trend upwards, favoring the 1%(really the.1%), and corporations shift board compensation from salary to stock/option compensation; corporations have also increased share buybacks and dividends as a % of profits too. Again, this is caused by monetary policy and it rewarding speculation and short term invesments over long term(capex/wages). This structure/policy is also why private equity went on a boom in the 90s and continued ever since. If you examine corporate bankruptcies from private equity their % is more than double the average. Pestakeholder.org has a report titled Pirate equity or something along those lines and they tracked retail employment for from 2007-17 or a time frame close, and in 10 years the retail sector had added over 1 million jobs while retail owned by private equity had "suffered" almost 600k job losses! The monetary system is how the financial sector and big banks control our economy. They have more power than Congress and literally direct how capital flows and which sectors thrive or die. The Federal Reserve is just an extension of Wall Street - the NYFED is a corporation with a board that is mostly bank CEOs or members of their board. These people are responsible for bank supervision... I saw a popular post on here about a guy holding his $GME position.. It was titled: "This is for you, Dad". They were holding their position just to inflict any pain and losses possible on hedge funds. Their explanation for this was the housing crisis and how it caused his dad to lose his business and a lot more, all while these funds were bailed out and their livelihoods unaffected by a crisis they helped create. Unfortunately, his reasoning doesn't address the real culprit that caused his father's and families pain.. Along with millions of Americans. The Federal Reserve has created an economy for the Big Banks and their control - assets have literally only grown at big banks(mostly big fousix). In fact, the Office of the comptroller of the currency quarterly report will show you FOUR banks control 155 TRILLION of the derivative market while ALL OTHER BANKS control 23 trillion. The 800 billion bailout for banks has been mentioned as well... Try 16 trillion(Google GAO audit) or 29 trillion(Link below) if we include currency swaps(which were for other countries not the banks). The Fed created emergency facilties to specifically bailout banks and AIG. These emergency facilties were managed by... WALL STREET. In fact, 8 out of 10 of the highest paid contracts to manage facilities with taxpayer money to bailout themselves were given "non-competitively" - usually gov contracts have to provide a fair auction so they can't favor companies over another. The Fed can just say these are "unusual and exigent circumstances" to bypass that. They paid Blackrock over 100 million to help manage these facilties. I think PIMCO was over 100 million too. Then BofA and other banks were paid tens of millions as well. The banks literally were involved in bailing out themselves. They received trillions in lending by the Fed - Citigroup had the highest total at 2.6 trillion. They literally had their toxic debt offloaded onto the Feds balance sheet. It took the Fed 10 years to unload all of their "Maiden Lane" MBS purchases. Present day they bailed out banks in 2019 - before covid - with repo operations. From Wallstreetonparade.com "If the Fed had wanted the public to clearly understand that its repo loans were ongoing but had simply gone dark, it could have printed a statement to that effect on the daily page it posted showing zeros going out in repo loans. After reading the F-SOC revelation, we searched the New York Fed’s website for hours to see if it had ever made a public statement that it was going dark on the dollar amounts of its repo loans. We finally found this statement dated June 11, 2020: “Beginning with this month’s release, the Desk will no longer publish daily updates with the next business day’s operational details.” The Fed's cumulative loans from Sep 2019 to mid March 2020 totaled over 9 trillion. Half way into 2020 they stopped publishing. However, as WSOP points out from the F-SOC the big banks are currently using 2.5 trillion of loans. These are typically overnight or a few days. None of this is transparent because the NYFED is a corporation and is not subjected to FOIA - The board of Fed is but I tried getting records on the emergency facilties and they stated they do not have these records because the NYFED conducts the lending and facilties. So, the trillions of bailouts in 2008-10 and in 2019 and 2020 are literally at a corporation and not the agency(Board) of government. Alright, I could go on for another 100 pages quite literally.. Let's get to the point. The only way to beat this system is to stop using it - practically impossible. The only way to achieve that is to stop using Dollars... Also practically impossible. However, a huge impact to the system would be to not hold any savings or any large holdings of dollars the banks. It's imperative. Investing in anything outside of dollars, debt in dollars, and any investments is necessary - holding savings in metals is one and there are many others(dig c) could actually inflict major problems IF many people actually committed to this. If a few percent of Americans did this the banks would have huge problems. Nothing is going to change until we address the Federal Reserve. Anything less is just a *game that won't *stop the pillaging of avg Americans from this industry. Didn't proofread sorry if there are many typos. http://www.levyinstitute.org/publications/29000000000000-a-detailed-look-at-the-feds-bailout-of-the-financial-system https://bettermarkets.com/newsroom/new-report-details-first-time-20-plus-year-crime-spree-six-largest-wall-street-banks https://bettermarkets.com/blog/jp-morgan-chase-bernie-madoff’s-648-billion-ponzi-scheme-crime-wall-street http://webuser.bus.umich.edu/gfdavis/Papers/Davis_Kim_financialization_revised.pdf
Harold Wilson is the 50 year old current Prime Minister, and Leader of the Labour Party, a post he has held since 14th February 1963
Edward Heath is the 49 year old current Leader of the Conservative Party, a post he has held since 28th July 1965
Jo Grimond is the 52 year old current Leader of the Liberal Party, a post he has held since 5th November 1956
Background
1964 – The election of 1964 saw the end of an era of Conservative dominance with Harold Wilson’s Labour Party winning the election. However, Wilson only won a majority of 4 MPs due to a late Tory uptick which placed him in a precarious position. Wilson wanted another general election to secure a larger majority. In early 1966 the Labour MP for Hull North unexpectedly died. This was a seat Labour had only flipped in 1964 and had a majority of only around 2.5%. This could have been a routine pick up for the opposition, but the end result was a swing of +8.9% to Labour, signifying Labour could perform well electorally. The Liberals also saw a bit of a revival in 1964 gaining 3 seats and increasing their share of the vote by 5.3%, the Liberals also picked up seats in London, whereas from 45-64 they had been seen as a party which clung on in the fringes of the country: Cornwall, Wales and Scotland’s Highlands and islands.
The Economy Stupid – One of the largest issues facing Labour as soon as then entered office was the large deficit and poor balance of trade left by the Conservatives. Labour moved quickly – establishing a new ministry of technology, unveiling a national plan for the economy, and cutting back on the military, raising protective tariffs on imports, and raising taxes. The deficit has been cut from £750m to £350m and the balance of trade has also improved. This early “test” reflected positively on Wilson and Labour’s ability to run the economy. Labour have also repealed the controversial charges on prescriptions and increased the amount of houses being built.
The 1965 Conservative Leadership contest – After the defeat of 1964 Douglas-Home may have been able to stay as leader of the Conservatives after the improvement in Conservative polling, however the party had been in power for 13 years and reacted very negatively to its return to opposition and Home did not believe he was suited to being leader of the opposition. Home changed the Conservative Party’s leadership election process which had led to so many issues for Home. Now a simple election between Conservative MPs with each having one vote decides the next leader. The winner of this contest is Edward Heath. Heath was somewhat of a surprise with the more widely known former Chancellor of the Exchequer Reginald Maulding expected to win. Heath however had served as Chief Whip – with his job being to wrangle Conservative MPs into voting one way or another and Heath had a more intimate knowledge of how to win over his party members while fighting a clear and focused campaign.
Heath vs Wilson – Heath and Wilson will (spoiler!) fight over 4 general elections so let’s compare them. In many ways both are remarkably similar. Both were born in 1916 and both had middle class upbringings, both excelled at school and won scholarships to Oxford. Because of this both are seen as more modern “technocrats” as opposed to the nobility who traditionally became Prime Minister. Both were involved in Oxford student politics although Wilson only somewhat. Heath on the other hand became President of the Oxford Union debating society and of Oxford University’s Conservative society. Heath travelled extensively throughout Europe before World War 2, even attending a Nuremburg Rally in 1937 and attending an SS cocktail party with Goering, Goebbles and Himmler (whom he described as the most evil man he’d ever met). Heath therefore stood as a pro-interventionist candidate in student politics, heavily backing the Spanish Republic and defeating a pro-Franco candidate for leader of the Conservative society. Heath fought in World War 2 and rose to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel whereas Wilson signed up but was regarded as too important to fight in the war and stayed in Britain organising coal stocks. Both served in multiple ministerial positions and both as President of the Board of Trade. Here Heath instituted an extremely controversial policy during Home’s last year as Prime Minister – lifting the restrictions on the amount of foods Supermarkets could buy. This law was put in place to help small grocers and Heath was warned if he repealed it he’d split the party before an election by antagonising one of the Conservative’s key supporters in small business owners (Heath went on anyway and the split never happened). Heath’s experiences as chief whip during the Suez Crisis, negotiating entry into the EU, and in repealing this law imbued a great deal of self-confidence within him as he’d soldiered through incredibly difficult circumstances but always come out the other side undamaged. On the other hand Wilson’s time as “Nye Bevan’s dog” during the battles between Bevan and Gaitskell reinforced the importance of maintaining party unity and managing big personalities within government.
The quiet man – Heath however has one key disadvantage when compared to Wilson in his charisma or lack thereof. Wilson is incredibly witty and charismatic, but Heath seems to shun the concept of even giving interviews, sometimes going years between television appearances and appearing very stiff and wooden when he does talk. This hasn’t helped the fact that Heath has had less than a year as Leader of the Conservatives before the election. As a result very few voters have even heard of him, and Wilson is incredibly effective at making fun of Heath. Heath believes that the electorate will tire of Wilson and see him as a fake like Heath does (for his public persona and Wilson’s exaggerations about his childhood and upbringing with Wilson trying to paint himself as rising from the working class despite being comfortably middle class) and because of this… Basically does very little to make arguments as to why the voters should back him, instead just sitting back and waiting. This has alarmed his supporters who elected him as a direct answer to Wilson.
Liberal dilemmas – For the Liberals 1964 was a great success. While still nowhere as near as popular as Labour or the Conservatives the Liberals did manage to make themselves seem like a true 3rd party instead of some regional relic of the 1800s. Grimond however is facing new issues – Grimond presented himself as a young, radical alternative to the old Tories but that role has become adopted by Wilson and the Tories elected a technocrat. Grimond is the oldest of the 3 leaders and a firm member of the upper class of society. Grimond also struggled with supporting Labour. Since Labour had such a thin majority there was always the question of if the Liberals would agree to support Labour on certain issues which many Liberals disliked the thought of. Wilson and Grimond seemed to come to an agreement on institution proportional representation – a long-term aim of the Liberals but Wilson has not upheld his end of the bargain. Grimond is also struck by the suicide of his son Andrew during the campaign which takes a great mental toll on Grimond and seemed to take a lot out of him (as you’d expect).
Europe again – Edward Heath is one of the firmest supporters of Britain’s entry into the European Economic Community, a policy which the Liberals also support. Wilson’s position is more confused. Wilson personally opposes entry as does the left-wing of the Labour party, but those on the right support entry. Wilson in a desire to keep the party together has made speeches indicating he supports entry but has not committed to actually joining and has accused Heath of “rolling on his back like a spaniel at any kind gesture from the French”.
9-5-1 – Heath has managed a rare hit on Wilson by referring to Britain’s economic figures. As mentioned before Labour has gained the trust of the public by managing to quickly bring down Britain’s budget and trade deficits but Heath has referred to 9-5-1 meaning the 9% rise in wages, 5% rise in prices and meagre 1% rise in production. Heath is warning about the issue of inflation, but Wilson saw the unpopularity of Home’s attempts at a wage pause, and also wishes to continue full employment both of which have led him to committing little action to combatting inflation.
Issues
Labour:
New incentives for exports, maintenance of tariffs on imports, cuts onoverseas military expenditure, new taxes on overseas income and control over the export of capital to stop the flight of the rich abroad
Increased productivity by selective investment, incentives to reinvest profits, a new corporation and board to reorganise industry and increase productivity
Encouragement of agricultural and horticultural co-operation, increased and cheaper marketing of foodstuffs, support for farm workers
Fixed income, prices, and rent control to curb the cost of living
500,000 new homes a year by 1970, continuation of Crown Land Commission to seize land at below-market prices to combat “land famine” and remove land from the free market, improved public transport for commuters, modernization of old city centres, and continuation of the policy of building new towns
Commitment to full employment, new recognition of the right to a trade union, equal pay for equal work
increase by 1970 the annual spending on hospital building to a figure double the highest sum spent in any year by the Conservatives, increase in medical students, rapid expansion on health and welfare services for old and disabled
Creation of “The Open University” by using TV and Radio to deliver University lessons
A new tax on gambling and gaming, and a land tax based on the difference between the value of the land as it’s currently used and the price received when its sold for redevelopment
Votes at 18 years old, reorganisation of civil service, local governments, law commission to revise and modernize old laws, and a conference to review the UK’s voting system
“Realistic” controls on immigration
Increase in police officers, new youth parole system to cut down on numbers in jail
Commitment to European Free Trade Association but no commitment to join or stay out of European Economic Community
Conservative:
Tax incentives for saving money, a new act for industrial relations to end restrictive practices, intimidation and establish that agreements between unions and employers are legally enforceable, encouragement of competition between businesses
Wider ownership of houses, pensions and capital
Restrictions on immigration and fairer treatment for immigrants
An attack on rising rates of crime
Goal of 500,000 new houses
Entry into the European Economic Community
New cost effectiveness department to cut government waste, reorganisation of economic ministries into one department as well as combining the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance and the National Assistance Board into a single Department, hiring of university and industry professionals to help draft legislation and policies
New inspectors of welfare to co-ordinate support between local authorities and hospitals, improved benefits for old, children, and widows
Establishment of education television centre to help teach children, more power to local education providers and authorities, more choice in education for parents
Expansion of education and higher education budgets for Scotland and Wales
Initiate peace talks to break the deadlock in Rhodesia
Support for admission of China into the U.N.
Liberal:
Simplification of tax system, reduction of direct taxes, cutting of tariffs, continuation of incomes policy but wages to rise in line with productivity,
New works councils to force management of businesses to regularly consult and negotiate with workers, workers to become shareholders in their place of work, A standard contract of service to be introduced covering the right to Union representation; an equal range of security benefits for wage and salary earners; holiday pay based on average earnings; a guaranteed opportunity for further education and training in employer's time; and equal rates of pay for men and women doing identical work
Increased prices for beef, expansion of production of cereals to eventually end tariffs on cereal imports
Parliaments for Scotland and Wales, elected regional councils responsible for the use of land, including new towns and new industries, public transport and hospital building, water supplies, regional resources and all facilities for leisure and the arts, streamlining of government ministries
Creation of new motorways but for all new motorways to be pay roads
No controls on amount of immigrants entering UK, expansion of teaching facilities to teach immigrants English and special funds for housing in areas with rapidly growing immigrant communities
Cuts to defence spending, British nuclear weapons to be given to international organisations
Proportional representation, votes at 18
Increase in state pensions, encouragement of employers to supplement them, increase in sick and unemployment pay, paid for by A Social Security Tax, replacing National Insurance stamps and levied on employer (two thirds) and employee (one third)
Increase in number of GPs and nurses, better facilities for them, and new hospitals as well as improvements to existing hospitals
salaries, working conditions and pensions of teachers to be improved, 11+ exam to be abolished, slum schools to be improved
Entry into European Economic Community
Increased trade and international aid for poverty stricken countries, pressure on Rhodesian government to step down and the formation of a new government to represent all Rhodesians
RoyalRoad First Previous Next Not all traders were taking Galactic Credits. That was consistently a problem whenever cards and virtual currencies replaced cash in human society. In tech business terms, this is called adoption. In financial terms, there's a slightly fancier name for the people who didn't have an account: the unbanked. In modern banking, it is sometimes used as a more politically correct synonym for "poor". Unfortunately for Galactic Credits, adoption was low, and the unbanked were the vast majority of traders. In a human financial system, the way that banks solved this problem eventually was through incentives. Other than simply being convenient, credit cards were exclusive and gave off a feel of luxury. It made people feel richer than they are. But what really drove adoption over the edge was spamming them to everyone through the mail and promising they'd get discounts and money for using them. Also unfortunately for Galactic Credits, the alien traders that used it didn't feel luxurious and rich. Instead, they had a sneaking suspicion that they were being ripped off by the humans. They just weren't sure how. Some, like Zikzik, saw the convenience benefits, but the galactic aversion to debt and taboo of anything more advanced than a barter system counterbalanced with their innate businessbeings' need for efficiency. Sarah had no idea why. All she knew was that only a quarter of the traders coming in were open to using Galactic Credits, and new traders were coming in every day. She can't go down to the spaceport, set up a booth, and try to talk every new merchant into ignoring all their financial instincts to adopt GCs! This was unsustainable. It was time to get an expert. They needed someone who could help resolve the problem and get more traders on board. She'd found him on social media. Dr. Max Stearns had struck it rich working at an early fin-tech startup, got bought out by Bank of America, and then retired at 35. He came out of retirement to teach graduate level Economics classes at a local college, and then somehow fumbled his way into a Professor position. Darn it, he was just here to not be bored out of his mind, not get a second wind in his career as an academic at age 50! For a profession that was increasingly favoring non-tenured instructors over professors, it was a testament to how much they wanted to keep him there. It turns out he was almost as good at explaining things to students as he was at designing financial systems. So, when Sarah, who was most definitely not a student though she could probably pass as one if she wanted to, came to his predictably empty office hours, he thought maybe she was lost. After the initial confusion, apology, and introduction, Sarah started explaining her problem. In short, aliens have an extreme reluctance to adopt credits, blah blah blah. Normally, Stearns was thinking, people would be charging for this. But like all nerds who know a good problem when they see one, he couldn't resist tackling it. He was nerd-sniped. "You actually have two problems," he began, "first, your system isn't worthy of trust. Your company is non-sustainable and everyone knows it. The other human traders bought into it because they know they wouldn't risk much by doing it. As you can see in these charts you're showing me, they're immediately converting their GCs back into cash. And when they want credits because they've agreed generally to use it, they come back to you, buy GCs with cash, and then immediately use them on the traders." "The human traders are well aware of your position, but they're temporarily using the system because it is far, far more convenient than barter. Unfortunately, the alien traders don't have that intuition. You're being kept afloat now by selling and trading goods, not by your business of being a financial firm," Stearns continued. "I've thought about starting to charge the other human traders a fee to keep the business sustainable," Sarah explained, "but wouldn't that drive them away?" "No. In fact, judging by what you're saying because the transaction costs of bartering is so high, the benefits the human side derives would keep them there even if you charged what would normally be considered absurdly high fees. This is one of those very few cases where charging people money might actually make them more likely to use your business!" Stearns replied. Then, he made a rough waving gesture with his hands. "I need to see more details and there needs to be an iterative process to build a model, but I suspect you would keep almost all of your human traders even if you charged a fee as high as about 20% for each transaction." "Twenty percent!" Sarah yelped, "that sounds like an exorbitant fee! Wouldn't they just start another currency system?" "Hah, it's an estimate, and you probably don't have room to lose any human trader right now. But no, they can't replace you. They'll face the exact same problems you face now. If they try to replace you, they'll also have to deal with the fact that they've just discredited your credits system. In fact, the aliens will probably trust them even less." "Ok, I'll think about adding a fee structure for the humans," Sarah said thoughtfully, "what was the other problem you were going to mention?" "Your second problem is actually an opportunity. Every functional economic system is a system of incentives and disincentives. The only incentive you're giving the aliens to switch to your credits is one they clearly don't understand. You need to provide incentives they do understand. Or, in this case, maybe disincentives if they don't switch." "Like what? Get the spaceport to ban them from trading if they don't recognize GC?" Sarah asked. "Nothing that extreme. And if you did that, I suspect they would simply meet up in orbit and exchange goods there. Without money, it won't be efficient for them, but for some, it would be an acceptable alternative. No, you'd need to provide them a more soft touch but clear disincentive that they understand when trading without GCs to drive them away from barter." "Can you give me an example?" Sarah asked. "Ah this is where I normally start charging an hourly consulting fee," Stearns smiled but made a dismissive wave as Sarah began the motion of pulling out a wallet, "but I think I'd rather have a stake in this. A bit of your company and the opportunity to go into space and see what I suspect is about to happen there if your little venture succeeds. Think about it, and let me know." "I'll be in my office." Sarah and Jen split the company evenly four ways: one for each of them, one for Benny and Junior combined, and one for Stearns. It was incredibly generous, they knew. Normally, the first few startup employees would get up to one or two percent of the firm, but this was a financial company without anyone with financial experience, and they'd owe it to Benny that they'd gotten their start. After all, it didn't matter how big their portion of the pie was, if the pie was zero. And that's what their pie was right now: a big fat zero. It didn't make any money; it facilitated some of their food trades and ensured they got more profits there, sure, but it required them to be constantly recruiting and cutting into their time actually selling stuff to the aliens. Sarah was sure that it was only a matter of time before a big bank caught wind of this and simply put them out of business. The only advantage GC had was they started first. Stearns had said that the first mover was an edge, yes, but they'd be nuts if they were gonna just rest on their laurels and depend on it. They needed Stearns, and from their meeting, he seemed genuinely interested in helping them grow the enterprise. He had seemed to be surprised to be offered that much stake in the company, but the women both agreed that all they had so far was a good idea, which was worth nothing without good execution. If anyone could turn their novelty into a business, Dr. Stearns was their guy. And if him giving notice to his employers that it was going to be his last quarter at the college a week later was any indication, it was generous enough. The first thing Stearns did was institute a human merchant transaction fee as he had suggested. Except in very rare circumstances, most payment networks used by humanity charged a fee. In the US, this was around 1-3%. In countries where networks are growing, the percentage is lower to encourage growth. In countries where networks have high transaction costs, the percentage is higher to reflect costs. Having to barter was the ultimate transaction cost. At Galactic Credits, they charged 8%. This was an extraordinarily high fee, calculated using careful models, but the alternative was literally bartering, which all the human have agreed by now is just plain dumb. So, they grumbled at the fee, but not a single human trader got off the network. They used this newfound income and the allure of the stars to poach the branch manager and several of his employees at the BoA office next doors, and put them to work selling the idea of cards and currency to the aliens. As time went on, they noticed that more and more human traders were beginning to specialize. It used to be they all bought and sold. Now, some were only buying, or only selling. As Stearns had predicted it would, behavior started to change. The aliens saw that more humans were now coming to the spaceport with only a card and driving away with goods, or vice versa. It signified trust in the system. Some of them started signing up not intending to use it, but just to try to figure out what the humans were doing. A few of the more daring ones even started asking about using credits to pay for their fuel at the spaceport facilities, which many of the human traders were happy to facilitate, for a fee. Stearns put a stop to that pretty quickly when he learned about it. They just signed up the spaceport authorities for an account and cut out the middlemen. Sarah and Jen also noticed that some human traders complained about the transaction fees to the alien traders in small talk. For the alien businessbeings who saw trade as an adversarial relationship where the trader on the other side of the table was someone to be convinced or even defeated, the humans’ complaints actually increased trust in the Galactic Credits system. After all, if Sarah was ripping the other guy off, maybe she’s not ripping me off so much. Adoption among aliens reached half by the end of the week. The second thing Stearns did was to start offering incentives for the aliens to sign up, or rather he made it uncomfortable for them not to. Normally in a payment system, the merchant eats the cost of each transaction. When you swipe your card at a point of sale terminal, you don't pay the fee, the merchant does. She may charge you more money to use a card, which is not supposed to be allowed, or she may just quietly up some of her prices, but that's another story. In the Galactic Credits system, because all the transactions took place in the hands of a human, the human had to pay the cost of doing business on both sides, both when they were buying and selling goods. This was the target of a lot of the complaints from human traders, especially the increasing number of exclusive buyers. This was where the incentive came in. Human traders that agreed to only buy items from aliens that took galactic credits had their buy fees waived. This incentive was supposed to be enough to drive business towards the alien traders taking credits at the expense of the others, but not enough to force humans who exclusively sold items (fruit truckers like Benny) to become exclusive buyers to avoid fees. After all, the fee was 8% but this was a gold mine. Everyone was making exorbitant profits from the aliens. Moreover, Stearns wanted the complaints to change. The human traders could still complain, but he wanted them to complain about something else. He reasoned that businessbeings that were part of a standardized galactic trade network instinctively understood the value of institutions. An institution responsive to complaints is an institution good for business. This would logically drive up adoption. Unexpectedly, this second reason did not even come into play. They would only much later learn why. The incentives themselves, on the other hand, started to work… Gorok belongs to a species that developed out of an ocean planet, called Ara. The R is silent. Their civilization had started underwater, and after hundreds of thousands of years of development, the Arans managed to breach the surface of their ocean world and reach the stars using technology developed and refined in water. To the casual human eye, they were humanoid robots, robotic feet and manipulators, with a head peeking out from an aquarium. Many traders called them "dolphinheads" behind their backs. Because of how long it takes for an underwater species to develop anything, they often took a long view of things. The dolphinheads were an old species. They didn't mind taking things slow. Some might even call them patient. In Sarah's view, they were just goddamn stubborn. Gorok isn't a particularly obstinate member of her species, but the average of stubborn is still stubborn. It was annoying to have to deal with her, and a few of the human traders openly joked about punching her and her stupid fishbowl face if the security guards were not there. Gorok does not trust these human Galactic Credits. N'har is an unremarkable bipedal humanoid businessman. His planet, Yis'meh is known for incredibly beautiful and jarring landscapes, formed from active tectonic plate behavior and extreme weather patterns at high altitudes. On the list of most interesting things on his planet, his species does not rank top 50. Like most of the galaxy, he too had no concept of money, credit, or literally any economic system more complex than barter. N'har does not trust these human Galactic Credits. Scrulvi is from a species of six foot tall hedgehog-like quadrupeds called the Dlaivo. They are born with incredibly hard shells, grow poisonous spikes on their back, and can gallop deceptively fast. Also, they breed very quickly. In the early days of their development, some combination of these factors was how they survived. It was definitely not their brains. Most galactic species consider the Dlaivo to be the dumbest species to ever gain sentience and reach the stars. They survive in spite of their brains. When they finally discovered FTL, predators on their home planet were actually still a major threat to their average resident because the Dlaivo had never found a solution to them. A neighboring species (the Bhaks) pitied them, decided to use their planet as a military training camp, and killed off all their natural predators for them over a couple of months of target practice exercises. The Dlaivo thanked them profusely and never considered the possibility that they might be there to occupy and sell their people into slavery. Which, to their credit, the Bhaks did not do. The Dlaivo were the butt of many village idiot jokes in the galactic community. For example, some would joke that the underwater Arans actually discovered how to make fire at an earlier point in their development than the Dlaivo. Like other galactic beings, however, their prejudice against credits ran deep. Scrulvi does not trust these human Galactic Credits. Scrulvi trusted the humans, though. After all, Sarah and Jen had never cheated him. None of the human traders ever did. Sure, it seemed like they were giving the other traders better goods for their items, but the humans’ goods were very valuable, everyone could win, and Scrulvi almost always stumbled into one small profit or another anyway. When Sarah offered to give him a credit account and to start trading with credits, he didn't understand, but Sarah is so nice! Surely, what she's offering can't be bad for him. So Scrulvi stumbled into the greatest profit of his life when he was the only trader landed on the spaceport taking credits when Stearns’ incentives program got announced. He offloaded all his sale items, filled his cargo hold with the highest quality fruit, all in record time, and with a fairly big chunk of change in his credits account. He didn't know what to do with the credits, but maybe he can ask Sarah about that the next time he comes back to Earth… oh well. N'har, the unremarkable, did not trust these credits, but he was seeing with his own six eyes what it's doing. For some reason, all the humans wanted to trade with the idiot Dlaivo next to him first. Thinking about it, hah, they must be scamming him out of all his goods. When Scrulvi took off half an hour later with a full hold, he was shocked. This must be some new scheme the humans are running with their new credits. But when another Dlaiva (seriously, how did these morons even figure out how to operate spaceships?) took off ten minutes after she started taking credits, he was beginning to wonder. Alright, maybe he was the mark, but he was burning to know what the trick was. The worst he has to lose is a little of his cargo, right? And whatever clever scam the humans thought up, maybe he could learn it and try it on someone else later. He beckoned Sarah over, got a credits account, and took off half an hour later with a full hold of fruit and some leftovers in his credits account. Must be a long con. Gorok did not fill her hold that day. She watched angrily as the other traders around her all offloaded their goods and filled their cargo with fresh fruit. One after another took off. She refused to take credits from this Sarah human. It was silly. It's just all numbers on a viewscreen. She was a trader. She traded goods, for goods. That's how it's done. That's how it's always been done. And that's how it'll always be done. Eventually, the other traders in orbit complained that she was occupying the landing pad for far too long. She was forced to leave Earth without conducting a single sale or transaction. After this trip, Gorok did not make many sales. Dwindling profits meant that she was forced to trade her ship in for a relatively small underwater plot near where she grew up. She built a beautiful home, had many little Arans, and lived happily ever after. Not everyone was built for the offworld trading life. They quit the fruit business. That was a side hustle that built up capital for them initially. What Galactic Credit had now was a bustling bank business that no longer needed that extra profit on the side to sustain their business model. And they didn’t want to remain in competition against their customers. Benny Jr and Jen had done a little side project on a jailbroken Bohor air filter, and found that with a little tweaking, they could have the air filters intake the aerosolized oxides of carbon clogging up the atmosphere and forge them into beautiful pure diamonds. They were selling that on the side for now, purely because of how profitable it was, but it was likely once everyone else figured that out, the artificial diamonds flooding the market would force a commodity crash, like gold had when alien gold flooded Earth's markets. There were rumors that the De Beers diamond monopoly company was buying up numerous Bohor air filters from the newly opened Johannesburg spaceport in South Africa. Other than that, the fees were more than covering all their cost of doing business. The lawyers, the accountants, the servers, and a sizable salary for every founding employee. Over the alien trader booths, more and more traders started putting up the signs that said, "I ❤️ GC”. Sarah was especially proud of those signs. They were given to traders who would take GC for all transactions to signal to humans that they were open for business. By now, this was most of them. Some new traders would occasionally come down and not have an account. They would quickly get an account and one of the GC signs, or rarely, they would refuse and be asked to leave by other traders waiting in line in orbit. As it turns out, peer pressure was often just as powerful an economic force as a market incentive. Getting the alien FTL comms tech from a bunch of technical drawings to interface with the Galactic Credits site was not easy, but Jen and her team of engineers had done it. They'd put together the first financial application on the GalacticNet, and to go with it, the first offworld point of sale system in the galaxy. You can instantaneously access your credits account from one side of the galaxy to another. Several backup systems were also copied from existing human credit card systems, like offline transaction storage and carbon copy card sales slips. After the traders' credits cards were upgraded to chip cards, Galactic Credits were rapidly becoming indistinguishable from any other payment systems on Earth. As a result of the aliens' consumer economies being restricted in scale by barter, their GalacticNet was used much like the human Internet was in its early days: for academic, governmental, or military use. Much of the traffic was for big picture information exchange. What passed through the FTL comms were big news headlines, research data, emergency calls for help…etc. Without widespread consumer goods in most societies, there were no personal computers, tablets, and phones. It's not that aliens couldn't produce those goods; in fact, their electronics were in some ways much more advanced than human ones, but few people had them. They were produced in big batches, and then bartered off one by one to people with goods that electronics makers had. The first consumer apps on the GalacticNet were made by humans because the first consumers on the GalacticNet were humans. And like the academics who watched normies flood the Internet in its early days, the existing users on the GalacticNet were filled with fascination, mixed with a noticeable trace of horror, as the residents of Earth began to flood the GalacticNet with porn, social media, games, businesses, and more porn. At first, it was lonely. The GalacticNet wasn't much different from the Internet, plus a few brave aliens who would venture to upload videos introducing themselves to the masses of Earth. Not to be left behind, some other civilizations started buying consumer electronics from Earth traders and handed them out to their people. And what started as a lonely project was starting to make the galaxy a closer, more connected place. What the residents of Earth saw was definitely not what they expected. As Sarah learned more about the way the galaxy worked, the more she felt bad for the aliens. From what she heard from the traders, saying that life sucked outside of Earth was an understatement. There were always shortages. Not enough things were always being produced, so beings had to share things that shouldn't be shared. Most beings lived in absolute squalor. The tiny percent of traders that she'd interacted with are supposedly some of the richest beings to have ever existed in the galaxy, and yet they still sometimes have trouble upgrading their ships, finding supplies or maintenance, or even just to buy a nest or house. They had few luxuries and quality of life goods. "Without widespread usage of currency, economies are extremely limited. Bartering is so primitive by human standards, that there are some economic historians who say no barter economy has ever existed in human history because currency is so vital to any real economic activity that they have always gone together," Stearns had said. Other economic experts on Earth have been predicting the same thing since the news of lack of money spread. She didn't believe it until she saw the footage on GalacticNet. Video of what the aliens considered to be normal life looked like ghettos, or even worse, disaster zones. They had been able to make and acquire the ships and goods they had, through tens or hundreds of thousands of years of inheritance and hand-me-downs. They could create technological marvels beyond humanity's current means, but they could only do so with time. Lots and lots of time. On a technological basis, they were collectively a bit further advanced than Earth. They could travel between the stars, cure cancer, and modify the atmosphere! On a GDP or production per year basis, forget about industrialization. The galaxy hasn't even fully entered the feudal age. This paradox shocked humans to their core. For Sarah: At first Galactic Credits was a project to make money off aliens. At some point, it started being a project to make aliens smarter, to make them understand money, so it was easier to make money off them. And now, she could only see a path forward for it as a charity or some kind of galactic advancement project. The galaxy needed help — now. Galactic Credits was about to hold the galaxy's hands through a speed run of the last three millennia of human economic development. A couple months after Stearns started making changes, the whole company drove down to the spaceport. As Sarah and co reached the trader booths, they noticed a mix of human and alien traders chatting and joking around. "Oh how about this one. What's the easiest way to become a millionaire?" Asked a human trader, with one of the oldest money jokes in the book. After a pause where the other human traders respectfully didn't ruin his joke, he delivered the punchline, "you start as a billionaire and let your son go shopping with your credit card harharhar." The humans grinned and the aliens made their approximations of laughter. "Hey it's Sarah and Jen! Speak of credits and cards, and here she comes!" Zarko said as he noticed them approaching. "Hey-o Zarko, here's Dr. Stearns. Dr. Stearns, Zarko," Sarah introduced the two, and they nodded at each other in the traditional universal greeting that's become commonplace on the spaceport. "Ah! Dr. Stearns," said Oliver, a human trader, grinning, "I hope you're not here to increase our fees again." "You better believe your fees are increasing. I know what you put in that OJ you sell. That much sugar isn't good for the poor alien children, you know?" replied Stearns, who could take it and hit back about as good as any boomer could. The other traders pretended to look at Oliver scandalously. Hah, as if they weren't all pumping their goods full of additive sugars to get the aliens hooked. "Speaking of orange juice, I was trying to offload two tons of it for some reactor fuel on Zakabara Prime, and unfortunately the exchanges there did not accept fruit juice as an acceptable trade item for reactor fuel. Guess I won't be taking my business there again," huffed Zarko. The other traders nodded knowingly. Zakabara Prime rarely accepted food products in exchange. The Zakabarans were an incredibly protectionist planet that had many farmers who didn't like the incredible competition that Earth was bringing to the table. "Actually, that's one of the things we came here to talk about," Stearns put on his serious face, "we're about to start making offworld Galactic Credits consoles available to the trading public, within a year. It would allow you beings to buy and sell from other traders from anywhere in the galaxy!" By this point, many of the alien traders that had normally bartered or traded with each other would come to Earth to use the terminals that the human merchants had to conduct fractional transactions, for a processing fee from the humans, of course. There was a small but growing number of human traders that would come with just their tablets and process cargo for aliens for free all day. Technically, this was rent seeking of the worst kind, but GC had not discouraged this type of behavior. For one, Earth was growing to be an increasingly popular destination for traders galaxy-wide. This was excellent for business, and it was cementing Earth as the trade goods and exchange center of the galaxy. All trade routes led to Sol. For another, technically these processing merchants were providing a service, one that was only necessary because there was no offworld usage of credits. Now, GC was about to put them all out of business. The implications of this were not lost on the aliens. They didn't understand money, but they are not stupid. Well, except the Dlaivo. Those oversized hedgehogs are very stupid. What the traders knew is that whatever the humans were doing with these credits on Earth was very profitable for the traders, and they no longer thought of credits as a scam or scheme, but rather an intricate new institution that was rapidly expanding. Traders everywhere were whispering about Earth's new system. The idea of a currency was becoming less of a taboo. The pamphlets freely handed out at its spaceports certainly didn't hurt. Skeptics were still coming down the gravity well to see how it all worked, and not all of them were convinced. But many lifted off with a full cargo of fresh fruit and a credits account… If you could use human credits offworld, no one was really sure what could happen. Not even the humans. "Sounds good, where do I sign up?" Sneak peek on themes for the next chapter:
This chapter was meant to be a natural stopping point for the first arc of the story. The next chapter gets a bit darker and deals with some pretty mature themes to set up the next arc. There's quite a bit of death, not due to war.
Feb/8/2021: (1) Army reforms, prof. contractors, service time (2) Snap or no snap (3) Azeri mothers' message to Pashinyan (4) Wrath of Arayik (5) US State Dept clarifies (6) Regional transport routes & trade (7) Kindergartens (8) Shurnukh's new district (9) National mall (10) Births increase (11)..
Your 17-minute Weekend-Monday report in 4033 words. Part 1.
upcoming army reforms / contractor or conscript? / Service length
Earlier we learned about rumors that Artsakh Defense Army service could reduce from 2 years after a restructuring. They want to have an army consisted of professional contractors. The reduction of conscription time within the Republic of Armenia was denied by a Republic of Armenia official, but the reform discussions continue. Artsakh president's spokesman: steps are being taken to quickly shift to a professional army. There are discussions about reducing the conscription time. Artsakh sec. councilman Balasanyan Vitalik: we are currently working on a professional contract-based army for the protection of our borders. (The aforementioned Artsakh officials speak about the Artsakh army. What about the service within the Republic of Armenia?) Parliamentary sec. committee chief Andranik: the Artsakh Defense army isn't being dissolved. It will keep its regular format (կանոնավոր ձեւաչափ). Increasing the share of professional contractors won't change its management structure. There are various army modules around the world. We have many soldiers who participated in the war and have immense experience; they could be recruited as contractors now and help develop the army. Republic of Armenia citizens can volunteer to serve in Artsakh Defense Army. It has always accepted them on a volunteer basis. This won't change. The MOD Vagharshak hasn't mentioned the shortening of the 2-year service in Artsakh. As for a shortening in the Republic of Armenia, we have to analyze first and understand what type of army we want, what size, what structure. This all depends on the final reform package approved by the government. When we finalize our vision about the restructuring, we will provide you the details. It would be impossible to hide anyway because people will go and serve there. We need a 21-century army with special forces that possess fantastic weapons and intellect. We should have done this since 1994 instead of screaming that "we have the strongest army in the world." All the general who today demand the government's resignation, while they weren't generals yet, were securing victories for us. But when Serj and Kocharyan began handing over ranks and wealth in exchange for favors, they de-facto hindered the future development of the army. Our lesson today is to find the 44-day participants with high intellectual capabilities and give them an opportunity to control the army in the future and guide the government on how to reform it. Science and education should have a place in the army, and the army should become the locomotive for the economy. Question: do your conversations with the MOD Vagharshak and govt give you hope that these reforms can be achieved soon? Andranik continues: Did anyone believe in 1990 that we could have an army that forces Azeris to a ceasefire in 1994 and call itself the strongest army in the region for years? After the 2016 4-day war [April war, when Armenia lost lands in the south and north], we should have realized that something is wrong with our army. Could the Pashinyan administration, who took power in 2018, immediately solve those issues? No, because the army capabilities were squandered from 1999 October 27th to 2018. Everyone has their share to blame. I don't want to look for traitors. Everyone should realize their role in this defeat. When they pulled the army from the front lines and used it against the protesters in 2008 March 1st, they demoralized and devalued the army. We need to restore the trust in the army. MOD Vagharshak and I had a conversation about Yerkrapah (a veteran group that helps the army). Both of us are a member. Yerkrapah has a lot to do today. They silently help the army without bragging. MOD and I discussed legal reforms to satisfy the army's needs and its structure post-war. Expect interesting things in February. I can't reveal details. I also met the ruling party and Parliament Speaker. The needed legal reforms require their support... They should be perceptible not only to the officers involved in the army but also to the whole society outside the army. This is where the political majority has a major task to accomplish. We must achieve success without wasting time. I support the appointment of ex-Artsakh army chief Jalal Harutyunyan to his new position in the Defense Ministry of Armenia. If you look at the areas where Jalal commanded during the war, we didn't sustain big losses. He isn't indifferent to the army. Question: Should we have a committee to investigate the 44-day war like the one that investigated the 4-day war? Andranik: The April War investigatory committee was formed 3 years after the war. There must be a calm situation. Let the army find strength in itself to analyze. Seyran Ohanyan's (Serj's MOD) 2016 analysis about the 2016 April war had many flaws; everyone was guilty except for them. The new investigative group summarized the info and found the source of the problem. The President of the Parliament has the finalized report. It will be published. https://www.armtimes.com/hy/article/206012
snap or no snap? / ruling QP party holds a meeting with PM Pashinyan
They agreed on three things: opposition parties rejected Pashinyan's offer to hold snap elections, there is no widespread public movement to demand it, the party will continue to support Pashinyan's Roadmap presented on Nov-18 (about finishing implementation of the trilateral statement, securing Syunik borders and involving Russia in some regions, social aid packages for refugees and Artsakh, etc.) QP MP Alen: We made the offer for snap elections but the opposition did not agree. Is the ruling party supposed to beg the opposition to hold snap elections? It doesn't work like that. They rejected the offer because they know that after snap elections either the Parliament will look similar to what we have today, or even worse for them. The public elected us and they want us to work for now, then they'll see what's next. The government publicly offered opposition to agree that they won't nominate a candidate for PM, then Pashinyan will resign and snap elections will be held. The opposition, however, chose to continue its street rallies. Today they contradict themselves. QP leader Makunts: One of the primary mechanisms for formulating public demand is in the form of representation by political forces. Parliamentary and non-Parliamentary parties have not insisted on snap elections. Opposition LHK leader Marukyan: QP is manipulating things. There will be snap elections. The question is when and how. Our stance remains the same: Pashinyan has to resign. Our party does not wait for elections to work towards POW and humanitarian issues. Ind. MP Gor Gevorgyan: In the current tense domestic political situation, holding snap elections is an "adventure". Elections should be done to solve problems, not create more. We have POW and humanitarian issues that require an urgent resolution. // The opposition continues to insist that Pashinyan has to resign before elections, and Vazgen Manukyan has to become the new Prime Minister to rule for a year before organizing elections. Human Rights Ombudsman criticized the government and the opposition, saying that lately, the only public discourse in politics has been the topic of the change of the government, while there are other important humanitarian topics (and the fact that you could soon grow industrial weed). https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042652.html , https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042753.html , https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042707.html , https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042718.html , https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042753.html , https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042759.html , https://factor.am/336308.html , https://factor.am/336317.html ,
Artsakh president criticizes recent barrage of fake news that "manipulates people's emotions"
Arayik Harutyunyan: Recently, disinformation around Artsakh has become more active. Unfortunately, it mainly comes from Armenian circles. Without thinking, some people write stuff for narrow personal interests. This is a criminal game against the nerves and fate of the Artsakh people. One person (likely referring to Serj's son-in-law Mishik) writes that the Artsakh army and Foreign Ministry are being dismantled. Another one writes that we'll abandon the Karmir Shuka-Shushi road area. The third one claims that we'll install Azeri flags in the capital Stepanakert. These are all nonsense. We will not cave to the dreams of internal and external enemies. I officially demand everyone to refrain from manipulating the nation's emotions and Artsakh's name. Every state agency works and will work, regardless of hard times and the haters. I would like all of us to focus our energy and efforts on the reconstruction and development of Artsakh, to ensure security, to alleviate the pain of loss, to solve the problem of captives and the missing, instead of further weakening the existing values. Common sense and compassion to all of us. https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042648.html
Artsakh president has a new press secretary
Arayik has appointed Lusine Avanesyan as his office spokeswoman. https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042595.html It turns out Vahram Poghosyan wasn't actually Arayik's spokesman. Everyone thought Vahram was fired after the appointment of the new spokeswoman. It turns out, he was just a deputy chief of staff and held another position in the media relations department. "I've never been President Harutyunyan's spokesman. It was just a perception." https://www.armtimes.com/hy/article/206046
re: US State Department responds to ambassador's "congratulatory message" to Azerbaijan
Context: Earlier we learned that the US ambassador to Azerb. allegedly congratulated Azeri Economy Ministry with the land gains and promised to help to rebuild those areas. It received direct criticism from US House Rep. Adam Schiff, while Artsakh MFA, without giving names, urged everyone to refrain from making such congratulatory statements. The US State Department responded: the official statements represent our stance on the issue, but foreign sources may not describe them accurately. We will cite Ambassador (to Azerb) Lee's Twitter post about that meeting [The ambassador's Twitter page has a message about a general regional development but no congratulations to Azerbaijan.] State Department continues: we're concerned about the events of last Autumn and realize that the region needs humanitarian assistance. The US supports the OCSE Minsk Group format and the Helsinki Act about no threat of force, respect to territorial integrity, equal rights, and people's right to self-determination. https://factor.am/335987.html
Italian ambassador: Italy did not invite Azerbaijan to participate in the G20
"Another falsification of the Azerbaijani media," writes Armenpress citing the Italian embassy in Armenia, about an earlier report by an Azeri outlet that claimed that Italy invited Azerbaijan to the upcoming G20 summit. "As for Italy's stance on the resolution of Nagorno Karabakh conflict, it is clear, balanced, and was presented on November 11th," said Italian ambassador Giovanni. https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042669.html
group of Lithuanian MPs urged Azerbaijan to expedite the POW return process
They cited the trilateral statement and called for an unconditional return of POWs, and the establishment of an atmosphere of trust between AM and AZ. https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042697.html
Azeri families ask Pashinyan for help to find missing sons
A group of Azeri parents held a protest in front of the Azeri MOD with demands for news about their missing relatives. "I need Pashinyan's help. Please. I've searched for my son. No one in the MOD has helped us," said a mother, who was among a group who complained that the MOD ignored their calls and refused to meet them. "Let them find the bodies if they are dead. If the government cannot find them, they should allow us to participate in search operations. It's possible they were captured and aren't dead," said the parents. https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042733.html , https://factor.am/336377.html
Azeri truck explodes on a landmine in Jabrayil
Ilgar Ahmedov was driving his vehicle in the former battlefield area when an explosion happened. It left one person dead, with the other two missing from the vehicle. https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042673.html
correction re: teacher qualifications in Armenia
Recently I wrote about how teachers can take a test, place in a higher Tier, and earn a higher salary. I confused Tier-1 (lowest) with Tier-4 (highest). There are no Tier-4 teachers in Armenia. The majority are Tier-1 and 2. Only two teachers are Tier-3. https://www.armtimes.com/hy/article/206024
new district is being built in Syunik's bordering village Shurnukh
Shurnukh was one of the two villages that lost a dozen houses because they were located on the internationally-recognized Azeri side of the border. The affected district is called "Verin Tagher". The government is building a new district nearby called "New Verin Tagher" after discussing it with the residents. The houses will be single-story, with a basement and land for farming. Additionally, each member of an affected family will receive ֏300K and ֏68K/mo for 6 months. An electric fence was installed so the cattle won't cross to the Azeri side. https://youtu.be/PsLPk108IMs , https://factor.am/336033.html
rare wine from occupied territory is being auctioned
Earlier we learned that winemaker Grigori Avetisyan from Artsakh's Togh village managed to save the last few thousand bottles of "Kataro" wine. They will be placed on an auction. The proceeds will be used towards building a new factory. Armenian symphonic orchestra organized a charity concert recently. The winemaker was invited. He gifted a bottle to the orchestra conductor. The latter placed it on an auction. It was purchased by a patron who, in turn, gifted it to the legendary composer Tigran Mansuryan on his birthday. They shared a photo: https://www.armtimes.com/hy/article/206037
soldiers' prosthetics center will have modern look
Medical Univesity isharedphotos from the new center that will use high-tech mproesthetics. https://factor.am/336055.html
Ninotsminda-Bavra accepts vehicles now. Georgian citizens need to take a test within 3 days of the arrival and receive permission from the Georgian authorities, too. Armenian citizens need to take two doses of vaccine before entering Georgia. Many Javakh Armenians had been waiting for this day; they recently organized several protests in Georgia. https://www.armtimes.com/hy/article/206077
trade between the Black Sea and Persian Sea
A week after meeting Iranian colleagues, Deputy PM Avinyan met the Georgian ambassador to discuss trade between the Black and Persian seas, new transport route opportunities, and the North-South energy route connection. https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042744.html
Yezidi-Armenian MP visits Iraq to pay farewell to 104 victims of genocide
ISIS fighters committed genocide against Yezidis in Syria and Iraq 6 years ago. Many of the unidentified victims were buried in mass graves at the time. 104 were recently identified and re-buried in northern Iraq yesterday. Ethnic Yezidi QP MP Rustam Bakoyan participated in the funeral. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-55968068 , https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042613.html
Yezidi-Armenian MP Rustam is appointed as the head of Armenia-Iraq Friendship Group
... brought 20 trucks with construction aid to help the local population with energy and water issues. https://factor.am/336076.html
֏12B in subsidies to pay Artsakh residents' utility bills
The government held talks with Artsakh energy monopolies ArtsakhEnergy and ArtsakhGas to negotiate a deal over the government's plan to subsidize the residents' utilities for a year. It applies to <180m3 gas and <500kW/h electricity consumption. The settlements that don't have a gas network and heavily rely on electricity, will have a 1,500kW/h limit. Maintenance costs associated with installing a gas system inside houses will also be subsidized in full. The lawmakers are still debating on how to subsidize the utilities. It could be done through the aforementioned method, or the prices could generally decrease, etc. https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042607.html
Parliament returned ֏1.3B to state coffers
The savings were made in 2020 and returned to the budget. "But the media won't write about this," wrote visibly-salty QP MP Alen Simonyan. https://factor.am/336011.html
techies want a sharp increase in science funding
Gevorg Safaryan, the founder of EarlyOne and Limetech companies, wants the Education Ministry to add an amendment to the ongoing education reform bill to secure a +50% rise in science funding. "Science funding should account for 4% of the budget by 2024. It should increase gradually. We need a clear development path and an understanding of why we're doing that." "The government should lay out the foundations by increasing science funding in the initial period. The private sector will take on and continue from there." Krisp is an app that removes background noise over internet calls. They are one of the pioneers. It went international and is valued at $120M today. Its co-founder Artavazd brings Krisp as an example of how investments in science can benefit the economy. https://factor.am/336114.html , https://factor.am/336118.html , https://factor.am/336125.html
Infrastructure Minister Papikyan: 2021 is an economically difficult year but we're doing everything possible to keep the budget for road repairs, amid a reduction in the overall infrastructure budget. The subsidized road repair budget is almost the same as in 2020. The regional road unblocking should not only reopen the Vardenis-Qarvachar road [northern road that used to connect Armenia to Artsakh, shorter than Lachin], but we should also use Vardenis road to develop internal tourism. The SouthCaucasus Railway company assessed the cost of restoring the northern railway route that connects Ijevan-Ghazakh (Armenia-Azerbaijan) and found it ~$500M. The southern railway route (Syunik) will be slightly cheaper. These are preliminary numbers. In 2020 we launched a project to lay asphalt around Lake Sevan and make a ring around it. We'll build another 20km this year to finalize it. https://factor.am/336374.html Yeghvard's infrastructure (medical center, schools) and vehicle fleet is being replenished as part of a ֏1.5B federal iwsubsidy project. https://youtu.be/qVJ5gmete1E
Lake Sevan water levels
As of February 7th, the water in Sevan is 12cm above the mark from last year. It stood at 1900.53m, the highest since 2012 (as of Feb 7th). Graphs: https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042721.html
COVID vs kids: parents want kindergartens to reopen
A group of parents protested in front of Yerevan city hall. They want a proper organization of the kindergarten admission process. "12,000 children are still waiting for public kindergartens. We don't know when the admissions will begin. We patiently waited 1 year under quarantine. The quarantine was recently extended without news about kindergarten reopening, while the rules for schools were relaxed to ensure proper admission." The municipality spokesman met the parent and said they are working towards increasing kindergarten capacities. "It's no secret that we had to make changes due to the pandemic. We are waiting for instructions from Healthcare and Education Ministries. We're in talks with them to resolve it; the solution is near. Many working parents need their children to attend kindergartens." "The use of an online admission registration system has nothing to do with long waiting lines," said the spokesman in response to a statement made by a parent. "The work done by us since 2018 has freed up many facilities to increase room for kindergartens. Over 1,000 additional children were admitted, as a result. Every year, up to 8,000 children used to wait in queue lines for admission. Last year due to the pandemic there was no admission at all, so that number sharply increased. Please do not associate the pandemic issue with the online registration system." Currently, children whose both parents have a job are prioritized on the queue list. A protesting parent is against that system because [not everyone is "officially" registered as a worker but is still busy working.] The aforementioned queue issue is about the free public kindergartens. "Private ones accept kids for $140/mo. Their business is booming today. They don't respect safety rules. Why should the free public kindergartens remain closed?", said a parent. Full: https://factor.am/336142.html , https://factor.am/336145.html , https://youtu.be/-Thf7_FzC5I
public survey about COVID / news source and Livestreams
64% of the population gets its COVID news from the TV, radio, and print media. 46% from the internet. 53% believe that the population is not acting responsibly, only 7% believe there was discipline. Pashinyan and HealthMin Torosyan were periodically posting updates during the pandemic. 27% of the population received their COVID info from such broadcasts by officials. 51% said Pashinyan's Livestreams and posts were the most trustworthy source for COVID news. The research was done by CRRC/CivilNet on August 2020. https://youtu.be/l_g51VuKkfM
national debt grew 8.8% in 2020
From $7.321B to $7.968B. Foreign debt was $6.053B, or +4.6% (govt debt +5.6%, Central Bank debt -6%) Internal public debt was $1.915B, or +25%. https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042660.html
COVID vs construction: stats for 2020
Private businesses spent less, while the government spent more on construction. Overall -9.5% or ֏414B, from which ֏141B came from the govt. Construction with federal funding +6%. With international credit -6%. With local municipality public funding +43%. With charity funding -68%. With foreign investor funding +58%. With local private sector -34%. https://factor.am/336152.html
National Mall: a mall that only sells products made in Armenia
drones will be used during search & rescue operations
The Emergency Ministry wants to use surveillance drones to find and rescue people after natural disasters, or hikers who go missing. Three scenarios were tested in Aparan: lost in a forest, disoriented and lost in darkness, buried in snow. The drones successfully found those missing in forests or darkness. It has room for improvements in dense forest areas and flying altitude. In the darkness, the drone's speaker instructs the person to follow instructions and move around so the drone will spot them more easily. Upon detection, it automatically sends the data to the rescue center. https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042685.html
bear in captivity
Econews.am nature activists raised an alarm about Hanqavan's "Nairi Spa Resort" hotel keeping bears listed in the Red Book. The Nature Ministry asked the inspectors to investigate while reminding that the law that regulates the animal world is currently being amended to count the animals in captivity, establish the system of permission to keep certain animals in personal zoos, etc. https://factor.am/336192.html
ever wonder why Iran needs to import electricity from Armenia?
Big if true. "Calciomercatoweb" writes that Juve is waiting to see if Heno extends the contract with Roma. The latter two are currently negotiating. https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042701.html
today in history
1828: writer Jules Verne was born. 1834: Dmitri Mendeleev was born. 1879: Canadian architect Fleming suggested dividing the planet into timezones (proof that the Earth was flat before 1879). https://armenpress.am/arm/news/1042578.html
RoyalRoad Next Story contains a lot about markets, logistics, development, and the best and worst of human history. Not so much Space Marines nuking aliens. If you enjoyed the trade negotiations and Senate politics in the Star Wars prequels, and wished that there was an entire standalone story consisting solely of those parts, this might be for you! In response to all the helpful feedback I've gotten, I am making major revisions to the start of this story, especially focusing on chapters one through three. While this occurs, there may be some inconsistencies. The names of the brave astronauts aboard the first manned FTL spacecraft will forever be recorded in the annals of human history as a triumph of human ingenuity, determination, and international cooperation. However, what came immediately after would be far more remembered. "Hello, people of Earth! Humans! Welcome to the galactic community." A shocked planet watched on their screens as an utterly alien character that looked like it was lifted out of a bad sci-fi show spoke. The alien mouth movements of what could only be described as a frog creature did not match the very human words that came out of the robotic translator. The aliens did not pirate TV networks, nor did they hack into important government websites. They simply broadcast this openly on satellite TV for anyone with an antenna to hear. And for anyone who did not, there were CNN and social media. "First, we would like to congratulate you on your first successful use of the blink drive. That itself is a feat of enlightenment most species we monitor do not achieve. Indeed, the physics of it all is not only extremely complex, it requires the cooperation and sacrifice of many beings, over many generations." The young people at Mission Control in Johnson Space Center patted each other on the back tepidly as they watched the green headed frog-like alien addressing their hard work on the main screen. "We come in peace. We are representatives of the Galactic Trader Guild." Some humans let out a sigh of relief. Others, skeptical, watched intensely on. "We are not here to take your resources or your people. The thousands of planets and species in the galaxy live in total peace and harmony with each other. Regional conflicts on planets are inevitable, but one thing we as a Guild pride ourselves on is our ability to ensure that none has ever reached the sacred frontiers of space." That's a little odd, most people thought, and probably at least a little propagandized. After all, war is such a big part of human history and the human condition that it was hard to imagine an entire galactic community of thousands of FTL-capable species that never fought in space. "Our spaceships represent millions of years of hard work, and these incredible investments must never be put into jeopardy. Therefore, weapons designed for use in space are banned. This ban will be enforced by regular ship inspections from your local Guild representatives, who are exceptions to this rule." Most of the peace-loving people of Earth thought this was great news. After all, many nations had banned the usage of weapons in space. The only exceptions were, of course, the nations that actually had the capability to make use of space weapons. Government lawyers in the world were already starting their first drafts on their inevitable memos on how these rules obviously wouldn't or shouldn't apply to their country. "As our name implies, we are a trade organization. We have rules for proper trade conduct that ensure a free and fair exchange of goods. All offworld traders from your planet must abide by them. Any breach of our bylaws and all fraudulent transactions can be reported to your local Guild representative. All our Guild documents will be transmitted to your people, translated to your dominant language." A quick string of bytes followed on the digital transmission. Amateurs on the Internet quickly decoded the document. The content was a goldmine of information about the galaxy. Coordinates for alien planets on the blink drive, some engineering documents, and standardized units of measurements. These are the temperatures and pressures at which pure water boils. This is the standard strength of iron. This is the distance light can travel in a vacuum while certain atoms decay. And so on. Indeed, the big frog alien continued, "inside, you will find the specifications for an FTL beacon and the requirements for a standard trading spaceport. Once you have built them, traders around the galaxy will make the journey to make fair exchange with your people. Commonly traded items are food, manufactured goods, and workers. We are certain that your planet has many items of value for trade." "We hope that you have a good cycle, and we eagerly await the arrival of you and your descendants in our spaceports!" With that message transmitted, they and their ship disappeared. There were no negotiations. No exchange of handshakes. As their ship blinked away, humanity pondered the colossal implications. "Which planet is next on the list?" asked the big green frog as he parched his throat with water after the broadcast. "That was it, representative. The railgun upgrade betting pool has Planet-3822 and Planet-8901 as the most likely next contenders for enlightenment. Would you like to place a wager?" Some governments decided to suppress the news. North Korean state television cut to an orchestra playing classical music. Others made laws prohibiting the distribution of the material transmitted by the aliens until further study could be made. In most of the connected world, the Internet rendered these measures pointless. By the end of the day, everyone had seen the aliens and that's not a genie that you could put back into the bottle. Most governments used this as an opportunity to justify dramatic increases in funding for space programs and defense. There were very few incidents of the often exaggerated threat of civil unrest. Most people went on with their lives. They went to school, to work, and to ball games. The arrival of the aliens had profound implications on the future of human philosophy. Most major religions had a dogma-compatible explanation by the end of the hour. Some sects even proclaimed this as evidence that their worldviews were correct. In the stock market, this news was a massive upheaval in expectations. Thousands of alien worlds. This meant new markets with potentially trillions of customers. It also meant that potential alien technology could put entire industries out of business. Stock prices swung wildly as uncertain traders rapidly changed their positions. Several development companies immediately announced their intentions to start construction on the spaceports mentioned in the Guild documents. As it turned out, building a place for spaceships to land wasn't that complex. You just needed something hard, durable, and flat that could withstand a bit of heat and wear. Using the formulas provided by the documents, experts agreed that the asphalt concrete normally used for airport tarmac would do just fine. Normally, environmental reviews would need to be done, the sound pollution would need to be contained. Hundreds of tests needed to be conducted on site, but from what the frogheads said, if you built it, the traders were going to come. Nobody wanted to be left out of what was going to be the new gold rush. So, money changed hands to grease the gears that ensured these new projects went through. Some lobbyists in Washington DC made a lot of money ensuring that no new regulations on "spaceport construction and operation" were added. Even in California, the capital of NIMBYs and tree huggers, people could smell an opportunity if it boomed down from orbit and bonked them in the nose with it. Which it did in this case. Thus, Livermore Spaceport. What used to be a bunch of warehouses and parking lots just a short five-minute drive from Lawrence Livermore National Labs became a rapidly growing construction site. It was close enough to the San Francisco Bay Area metro that people could commute to it and see the first of the new generation FTL spacecraft take off and land, but far enough that they didn't have to hear about it when they slept. BREAKING: LIVERMORE SPACEPORT OPERATIONAL Looking up from her morning coffee, that's what the muted TV screen was trumpeting in big words on the CNN ticker. The mayor was talking, judging by the scrolling captions, something about how this will bring new jobs and money to the city. Sarah snorted. Everything is always breaking news. She absent-mindedly watched as the TV played stock footage of the construction workers installing the antenna last month and humanity's first interstellar ships took off and landed on the concrete lot as she sipped her coffee. Sarah Miller would not call herself a hard worker. She graduated from the University of Washington with a degree in Communications, not exactly a field high in demand. When she got offered a job as a "marketing person" at a tech startup in SF, she grabbed it, more like you'd grab a life raft and less like it was an opportunity of a lifetime or anything. Then, two years later, the startup failed. Funding dried up, and now she was out of a job in a metro with some of the highest cost of living in the world, with not exactly the hottest resume. So now she was sitting at a breakfast shop just outside her rented apartment in Livermore, checking her emails to see whether she got any replies on her job applications (she had not) and contemplating how long she'd last before she'd have to go home to live with her parents in Seattle. It was not exactly a fun thought. "You going to the spaceport opening too, Sarah?" Rudely interrupted from her self-pity, she looked to see the woman across from her. She racked her memory to match the face to a name, but nothing came immediately. Mid to late 20s, Asian American, hipster glasses, t-shirt and jeans. The writing on the coffee cup in her hand said her name was "Jan". Ah, yes, they met a few times on the BART commute into the city. Was her name Jan or… "Hey Jen, naw I was just staring at the news. How's it going?" "Great! What about you? Haven't seen you on the BART for a few. You still working at that place downtown?" Sarah sighed internally, here it is again. "Not anymore, we just got shut down. So, I'm pretty much just lounging around." "Aww that's terrible!" Then Jen thought for a second. "Listen, I've got a business idea about the spaceport stuff, but no one to share them with. You should come with me to the opening." "Oh yeah? Why's that?" Sarah asked, leaning forward. Normally, this would sound like the start of some kind of MLM scam or something, but she'd been unemployed long enough but that the word "business" piqued her interest. She knew that Jen was some kind of fancy engineer who made enough to still have savings despite living in one of the most expensive places in the world, so she probably wasn't asking for money. Jen almost whispered, "my cousin's one of the construction workers at the spaceport, and he said he could get me in. They have a lot of big companies bidding to get on the ground floor of the alien trade with truckloads of all kinds of goods, but he's got an employee pass that'll get us in on day one." "Wait, what?" Sarah said, confused. "I thought we were just going to see the opening." "We are," Jen replied, "but I'm thinking we rent a truck, load it up with food, and see what the aliens will give us!" "What do you need me for?" "Well," Jen hesitated, "I have money for the truck and the food, but I don't know much about selling stuff…" Neither did Sarah. She was in marketing, not a saleswoman. But she wasn't going to mention that. "Sure, I sell a ton of stuff on Craigslist," she said instead, "but I'm sure nobody has experience selling to aliens!" Jen looked relieved. Really, she just wanted some kind of backup instead of going alone. "Ok, since I'm putting up the money, and you're going to do the selling, I think we split profits fifty-fifty after I recoup the cost of the U-Haul rental and the food. How's that sound?" Sarah thought for a while, but not too long. It probably wouldn't make them that much money, she thought. Then again, she wasn't putting anything on the line. And she needed money, if there were any to be earned here. She reached her arm out for a handshake. "Deal!" It's not like she had anything else to do on Saturday. Costco, Livermore The froghead had said that aliens traded food, and food was relatively cheap, so it was probably a safer bet to stick to than manufactured goods. Who even knew if the aliens could ride a bicycle or were interested in a PlayStation? The part he mentioned about trading workers sounded an awful lot like slavery, so that was an obvious non-starter. "Do you think the aliens eat meat?" Sarah asked, holding up a massive bag of hamburgers. Jen considered that for a second. Some vegetarians and vegans would probably postulate that a morally superior species would not partake in the consumption of animal flesh. Then again, she didn't have to guess. She pulled out her phone, and looked up the Guild documents summary someone had helpfully compiled into Wikipedia. "Hmm it says that many of the other alien species are omnivores because that's how they get a wider variety of calories," Jen said after browsing a while. They loaded one bag of each of meat onto their carts, and made sure to buy ice boxes to keep them frozen. It took several trips to their rental truck, but they finally loaded it with enough fruits, vegetables, and frozen meats to make a dent in Jen's sizable bank account. They hoped that these aliens liked apples and pears. Those were on sale. Livermore Spaceport, Earth It looked like the entire Bay Area showed up and were lining up to get in. Tourists were bussing in from out of town. They saw several groups of international tourist groups that were corralling their customers around with loudspeakers. As they drove past the long line towards the vehicle entrance, they waved at the excited crowds and got a few whoops and cheers in return. The security guards at the gate checked their pass and let them through to the security checkpoint. Several men that looked like they meant business opened up their truck and scanned it carefully with metal detectors and x-ray scanners to ensure that no one got any funny ideas. There was a short delay while the customs officer tried to figure out whether they needed to fill out an elaborate looking form for the fresh food in the back of their truck. A few calls to his supervisor later, amid angry glares from the truck drivers waiting behind them, he let them go. Sarah and Jen drove into a parking lot closer to the landing pads. The pads were large concrete surfaces with white and yellow painted targets. Off in the distance, they could see hangars and a tower that looked like an airport traffic control tower. There were also a few buildings under construction, including one that looked like the start of an upscale luxury dining establishment. From behind, they saw some of the crowd were filing into a waiting area from where they could observe the aliens from afar. Jen felt lucky. If the food in the back was the price of admission for seeing the visitors from outer space up close and personal, to her, it would have been well worth it. Sarah was checking the battery on her phone to make sure that there would be enough left to take pictures or video, if the opportunity arises. Most of the other trucks in the parking lot with them had logos of recognizable companies on them. Several tech companies in the Bay Area that sponsored the construction of the spaceport won bids to get in on the action. Others were some local companies that had connections to the spaceport like Jen did. Sarah saw them first before she heard it. First one, then several more, spaceships descended from the sky, accompanied by sonic booms as the excited crowd looked up into the sky with hands on their brows shielding from the sun. The alien spaceships couldn't be mistaken for human rockets, but there was a certain familiarity. Long, pointy, utilitarian hull shapes with rocket flames coming out the bottom. Like modern cars that all look like they're designed in a wind tunnel, it seems like there's one efficient way to build spaceships, and everyone stuck to it. It's nice to know that at least we were on the right track, Sarah thought to herself as the ships touched down gently on the target landing pads. Human ships can't maneuver as sharply, nor are they anywhere near the same scale and size, but at least we got the shapes right. The cargo-plane-sized spaceships settled on the concrete landing pads without so much as a crunch. Small hatches opened at the bottom of each, and walkway ramps rolled down. At some hidden signal, the security guard gestured to the parking lot that they were free to approach, and the dazed merchants sprang into action. The alien they've just greeted through a translator calls himself "Zarko". He was apparently part of a species of rock planet humanoids called the Zeepil that came from a system about 200 light years from Earth, and his skin had a charred appearance that made him look like a heavily sunburned sloth on two legs. "Let me guess, what you've brought is your native foods," Zarko's translator said in a monotone Stephen Hawking voice that did not match the movement of what looked like his lips. "Yes! How did you guess? Can you guys eat the fruits and vegetables that we have?" Sarah asked. She stopped herself from mentioning the steaks and chicken in their ice boxes. She figured there's no knowing whether these aliens thought about carnivores, so she started with the safe stuff first. "We consume silicon and uranium for sustenance," Zarko made a strange face and then burped, "I am joking. Every newcomer species asks the same question. Most species share the same diet. Some species eat meat from other animals. Sapient meat is of course illegal on most planets." Relieved that Jen didn't just waste thousands of dollars on the meat, they showed Zarko their wares. And with their permission, he sampled some of each goods they had, including a bit of the raw meat. "Good, good," Zarko was pleased. "I detect a high amount of sugar and starch in a lot of your wares. I would take it all." The Gaks would be impressed the next time he stopped at their planet. "Can we see what you have?" Jen asked excitedly. She pushed a funny image of the aliens grabbing all their stuff and just taking off out of her mind. They wouldn't go through all the trouble of coming here just to steal some food… would they? "Yes, yes," Zarko pulled out a tray of gadgets and started describing his goods to them. "This is a spaceship rated fire extinguisher," he described several slightly oversized aerosol cans, "good for even reactor fires!" "First aid kits for basic bandaging and wound cleaning, compatible with human physiology." They were several plastic looking boxes with an alien looking skull marked on all six sides. It looks like the red cross symbol wasn't so universal anymore. "Civilian hunting rifle," Zarko set it on the table. "Powered by laser. Holds twelve shots." It was a familiar looking weapon. Jen and Sarah looked nervously around at the security guards, but they didn't seem to notice. This was very illegal in the state of California. They shook their heads at that one and asked to see something else. Whoever was dumb enough to buy that one would probably get it confiscated on their way out of the spaceport. "Advanced mathematics calculator, base-24," he said. This one looked like a regular calculator but with more buttons. Interesting, but probably not that useful to humans. "Stasis box. Keeps food safe to eat for years. Operates on solar power." Ah, a space fridge, basically. Finally, something that would probably cover their expenses. Zarko also claimed to have tons of raw materials in his ship, including what he called "better concrete" and "better steel". The translator had some problems with these; it seems like they just hadn't been invented on Earth yet. But Zarko had customers for those on other planets already, so he didn't bother to put them out for display. After a little haggling, Sarah and Jen settled on four of the first aid kits, six of the fire extinguishers, and one of the stasis boxes. Sarah reasoned that the stasis box could probably fetch a much higher price if they resold it as "alien technology" online, and Jen deferred to Sarah's experience in selling her old stuff online. Zarko printed out instructions for each of the items in English, even if they did all look fairly intuitive to use by themselves. The aliens may look different from them, but by the way the fire extinguisher buttons seem to activate, the way they made their stuff did not seem that different. The most significant difference they saw between the alien goods and what their human counterparts would be is the amount of care that clearly went into making each item. Each of the first aid kit boxes, Sarah observed, looked just a little different from each other. The adornments and decorations on the side were painted or carved on with details that weren't exactly the same, and one even had a bright gold finish. She wondered why. As she got home around midnight, Sarah immediately got onto Craigslist and thought about where to list "alien first aid kits". Technically, it could be under "household items", or "tools", but "collectibles" would probably get them the most- That's when she found the "alien" section. Of hecking course. For a website that looks like it was made in the 90s, they'd already adjusted to the latest fad with remarkable speed. She found dozens of listings of alien items that she saw that Zarko was parading around, and quite a few that he didn't have. There were no other first aid kits listed on the market. Which was strange because she definitely saw dozens of those being sold by the other traders. Hm… without a starting price, it was hard to gauge how much she should be selling it for. She refreshed the page out of habit and watched the new items scroll in. Her first reaction was: Ah, someone just posted a first aid kit. Her second reaction was: Wait, for how much? There was a listing of a first aid kit for $20,000. Which was ridiculous. It's a collectible, but a box of bandages was not worth the price of a brand-new car. Something nagging at her instinct, Sarah opened one of them up. It was just a bunch of bandages, syringes, and basic medical stuff. Some of it had the wrong shapes, or had a different color than they'd normally be, but there's only so many ways to bandage an open wound, and everything looked familiar-ish. She read the English manual that Zarko had printed for her. It said: "Rated for human use. Includes: Bandage 4 rolls, Skin adhesive 16 pieces, Pain relief cream 2 ounces, Radiation exposure injection 2 doses, Cold relief medicine 24-" Wait, what? Radiation exposure injection? Like in case the spaceship hull leaks or something? Sarah skimmed through the list and looked at usage instructions for: "Radiation exposure injection: use in case of emergency hull exposure. Rapidly repairs cell and bone marrow damage for patients with acute radiation exposure and kills all cancer cell growth in body. Dose takes effect within 30 seconds. Side effects may include nausea, dehydration, drowsiness…" Her blood chilled. She read it again. And again to be certain. Then she wiped away the sweat around her eyebrows to make sure she wasn't dreaming. "Kills all cancer cell growth in body." She looked at her laptop and refreshed the page. The previous first aid kit listing she saw had been taken down, presumably sold for $20,000. If this kit did what it said it would… Excited, she refreshed the online listing page again. She saw two listings for the alien first aid kit, both up to well over $100,000 now. Refresh. A million. Some guy was selling a darn first aid kit for a million dollars. This was incredible. Some corner of her brain whined something about putting a price on health, but she cast that out of her mind to refresh again and see more listings in the millions of dollars. And she was holding four of them in her lap. Half an hour later, it seemed that the prices had stabilized around $4 million, the price of a small closet in downtown San Fran. This was evidently the market price for the life of a cancer patient. Horrific. She put up a listing for $15 million for her four boxes. Instantly, her email inbox started getting notifications, a number of apparently wealthy individuals with sick relatives desperate to buy a miracle cure that hadn't even been tested or proven on humans yet, introducing themselves and sharing their life stories. There was a guy who owned a large database company but had recently been diagnosed with lung cancer. He knew he should have stopped smoking years ago, but he needed something to manage the stress. Another, a business executive, who had a heartbreaking story of her dad dying of liver cancer. Then, a short and simple "Willing to offer twenty million in cash today for all 8 doses of anti-radiation medicine in alien aid kit, J&J VP of Research and Innovation, Alexi G." She looked him up online. He was legit, from a big pharma R&D. She reasoned that maybe selling to someone who could do research on it would help more people. And he was offering more… She replied. He wanted to meet at their company office downtown first thing in the morning. Downtown San Francisco Alexi had made good on his offer. He hadn’t tried to haggle the price, as she’d know some Craigslist buyers would try to do once you met them in person. It was generally considered a jerk move. It was Saturday, so the offices were mostly empty, except for one conference room with several employees as well as Alexi. She handed over her duffel bag with the four kits, he opened and checked each to make sure their contents were all there, and handed over a cashier’s check for the agreed amount. And that was it. It had taken her bank an hour to process the check, and several additional hours to clear it. The money appeared in her account around midnight, at which point Sarah let out a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding for a day. Sarah was rich. Sarah got out her phone to text Jen the news. Huh, there was an email notification "Hey Sarah, thank you for your interest in applying to be our marketing assistant. If you can send us your resume and a co-" Delete. Twenty million dollars was a lot of money. Neither Sarah nor Jen had ever seen that much money, but they knew enough to leave something like this to a professional. An accountant at a Big Four company helped them divide up the assets and ballparked how much they’d eventually need to render unto Uncle Sam the things that were his come April 15th. Sarah paid all her bills on time, a first in months. Jen quit her job the next day. After all, what was the point of being a web developer for a measly six-figure salary when there was a gold rush next door? Figuratively speaking. They both vaguely knew the history of the gold seekers during the California Gold Rush. Some of them struck it rich, but some found nothing in the river beds of the Sacramento. The people who had made the most money in 1849 were actually not the flood of gold prospectors who came into the area. The people who had gotten the richest out of the gold boom were the merchants who sold them the prospecting equipment they used, the services they needed, the food they ate, and the clothes they wore. The masses of pioneers who came for a new life in the American West: they were the real gold rush. Most people today do not know the name of a single gold seeker. Most people today have heard of some of the merchants who got rich off the gold seekers’ businesses. Levi Strauss, John Studebaker, Sam Brannan. And of course, Henry Wells and William Fargo. This was the fourth time they've been back to the spaceport, Sarah thought, and they'd gotten something new each time. They'd dealt with different traders each time, though they did see Zarko at least one other time as he was leaving with a full hold of fresh fruit. After the first couple days, the alien traders had noticed that there seemed to be shortage of first aid kits on Earth, and the inevitable flood of anti-cancer syringes put online dramatically lowered its listing price. Several large pharmaceutical companies had also issued press releases that they were within months of the development of generic anti-cancer medicine. The lawyers were working overdrive over the IP implications of adapted alien technology, but there didn't seem to be any laws preventing companies from doing it… This brought its price down to the tens or hundreds of thousands. Nothing to sneeze at for most people, of course, but it was a literal cure for cancer and well within range of some other items the aliens were bringing. Today, Zarko was trying to sell her and Jen on some kind of liquid medical adhesive in industrial quantities. Some hardy tree-like species use it to glue deep wounds together or something, but Sarah saw a few listings for it on Craigslist a couple of days ago that had no takers, even for cheap. Medical companies must have thought it not really worth pursuing as Earth already had similar products. Unfortunately for Zarko, he'd already filled his cargo hold with tons of the liquid after hearing how well medical supplies were selling on Earth. His reward for his entrepreneurial spirit was an empty paw. It was beginning to look like he'd need to dump his cargo for a few boxes of worthless Vton trinkets on his way home. Sarah and Jen had driven all the way out here with a U-Haul truck worth of pears, and most of the other traders were ready to leave for the next cycle of traders to come in anyway. They could dump their goods on Zikzik, the trader next door, but all he had left are a bunch of "better steel". Apparently some construction companies were learning to work with it, but from what she heard, it was annoying to sell those because the government was still looking at the regulations around these new building materials. And they looked soooo heavy to have to carry home. Sarah had learned to read a little more of the humanoid sloth's facial expressions, and he was clearly not happy about having made a trip for nothing. "Tell you what, Zarko. I'll give you the fruit, and you can bring me my goods the next time you come back," she said. Zarko's snout perked up as he thought. Fundamentally, Zarko considered himself an honest trader. He didn't cheat or skimp on quality of materials, and he didn't lie about what he sells. Sure, he embellished a little sometimes, as all traders do, but who doesn't? Zarko had never taken on debt to a customer. He's heard of other traders doing this, but the far more common use of debt across the galaxy was to trap people into a lifetime of hard work in unpleasant conditions. But Sarah and Jen didn't seem like the kind of people who would be capable of doing that. For a second, Zarko thought about cheating them. Just take their fruits, and never come back to Earth, but immediately he put the thought out of his mind. That was not the right thing to do. Zarko agreed. He would just have to remember to bring more first aid kits next time right? "Did you see the way Zarko reacted to the IOU?" Sarah asked Jen on the way home. "Yeah, do you think he'll just abscond with the fruit?" "Nah, apparently the pears are selling out like hotcakes. He can't just leave Earth and never come back. I heard Zikzik say he got a brand-new reactor upgrade just from one trip of pears alone," Sarah sounded confident, and hoped that she was right. Something else was bothering her about the alien traders. "Good. Maybe he's worried we're naive or something and someone else will take advantage of us," Jen brainstormed. Naive? For what? Getting cheated out of a truck full of ugly pears Safeway was going to throw out at the end of the day? Then, it dawned on her. "I think there's something missing," Sarah said slowly, thinking about their past interactions with the alien traders, "they don't think about selling things the way we do." "You mean they don't have money?" Sarah smiled and rolled her eyes in her head, of course Jen was thinking about money. "Yeah. Come to think of it, they clearly don't live in some kind of Star Trek galaxy where everything is free," Sarah continues her train of thought, gears turning in her head, "they just barter and haggle for all our stuff." "They don't have money, they don't have debt, they don't have Craigslist!" Jen blurted, the implication of this was beginning to excite the inner businesswoman in her that she's been discovering the past week. "Coming to the spaceport is their Craigslist, but without money or debt, they must also not have a lot of the other stuff we take for granted," Sarah was already making a list in her head, "that explains why the small variety of consumer goods they have are all related space travel and cargo storage, and why most of their big trade is in industrial goods. They can't have banks! What about loans and mortgages! What about paying fines! How do they even buy stuff normally?" "Ah, must be such a simple and happy existence without having to think about money," Jen said wistfully. "Yup," Sarah grinned, "let's go ruin it!" RoyalRoad Next
Tunisia development plan : Right/Left perspectives and the Nordic Model approach :
Okay, even with the greatest plan and experts, we won't get anything done with the current political situation anyway. This is just a thought game and a very lazy one.
I) Right Wing program (with Neoliberal characteristics) :
- Restore the Presidential regime. End the power sharing between the "three presidents". - Privatize as many public companies as possible. Allow foreign firms to establish themselves in new free economic zones devoid of Tunisian cumbersome legislation with competitive labor and financial costs. Subject national firms (STEG/SONEDE/STT) to international competition. Destroy the old febrile UGTT and replace it with dispatched local Labour Unions across the country, freeing the Individual from heavy and corrupt institutions. - Deregulate financial sector and labour markets. Lift barriers to investments, business opening and employment. - Deploy the Army to : 1- force workers in Gafsa to get back to work. 2- destroy informal markets and subject the middle-class to heavy taxation to pay foreign debts, increase Dinars value, and accumulate capital for further investments in new technologies and infrastructure. - Encourage foreign firms to delocalize their assembly line in Tunisia, build other plants or research centres, e.g. car, communication, high-tech and medical companies. - Increase Industrial production : the brains and infrastructure are here, we know how to make high-value industrial components, we can and must make more. - Tax reduction for employers and entrepreneurs in highly-valued industries like cheap high quality medical healthcare for foreigners, massive Luxury SPA/Hotels, industrials, etc. - Keep salaries and social benefits low for workers, increase production with new technologies and strong corporate leadership. This is is temporary of course. When Tunisia's economy gets stronger, the "trickle-down" mechanism will enrich all levels of the social pyramids. Just work hard and be patient for brighter tomorrows. If you work hard enough you may become an entrepreneur as well one day ! Make the Rich and the Poor richer ! - Death penalty for every individual involved with Terrorist/Islamist groups. Label the Muslim Brotherhood and its affiliates (Enahda) as terrorist organizations. Fight crime with new AI tracking technologies Made in China. Make Tunisia one of the safest/cleanest country in the world to attract tourists and investors. Follow the Singaporean/South Korean model of development. - No minimal wage. Drop the Labour laws. We must attract investors and pay our debts. - Ratify free trade agreements with China, Europe and the United States (maybe integrate the European Union ?) Specialize and increase Tunisian First sector production for a few commodities, namely : olive oil, dates and seafood. Get rid of traditional ineffective agriculture practice and modernize production with drought resistant GMOs. - Basically, follow the IMF/World Bank development austerity plans to get more loans from them (and a solid grade). - Reopen the debate on the National Identity : people won't follow the government of a country they feel they do not belong to. -Protect family and Islamic values : criminalize LGBT, post-structuralist, neo-feminists and lib-tards movements to keep good composure with neighbours and satisfy conservative elements in Tunisian society, but keep it cool with foreigners (we want more gay rich tourists/engineers, so maybe open a few informal gay bars in free economic zones ?)
II) Left Wing program :
- Reinforce public institutions by opening up more job positions in administration, education and public companies to increase efficiency and relationships with all society stakeholders. - Restore the UGTT's past greatness by reinforcing the "côtisation obligatoire" for all professions. UGTT will have the Manpower and talent necessary to enforce strict Labour regulations and ensure a strong national labour movement that will guarantee workers' rights, dignity, solidarity and education. - Augment salaries, especially for teachers and workers. - Restore the "Cycle Court" starting from 14 yo. Students willing to pursue a vocational training should be set on the right path as soon as possible, and cultivate their pride to belong to the Nation Builders. They may start working as soon as 16 during their formation as an apprentice. - Set up an aggressive Tax legislation : every single Tunisian national abroad or at home will have to declare their revenues to the Fisc and pay a progressive income tax. Anyone with a revenue above 1,5 times the national average revenue will pay 55% in taxes. The top 1% will have to pay 75% in tax and investment revenues. - Follow the Cuban model : free high quality healthcare and education for all. Everyone will receive a topnotch education in whatever fields he/she wants to pursue. - Make all drugs legal and free to use under condition : consumption shall be under medical supervision in state-sponsored facilities. (except for recreational weed maybe, follow the Dutch model) - Support local artisans and small agricultors : resist big Agro and GMOs usage. Increase the use of agroecologist and permaculture models with local drought resistant seeds. Make more land available to young farmers thanks to new desalination plants . Increase food self-sufficiency at all cost by subsidizing it ! - Try to (slowly) operate a decentralisation process : give more freedom and flexibility to governorates while allowing them to set up their own fiscal system, rendering them more responsible and autonomous. Also, will decrease the risk of corruption. - Decriminalize homosexuality and legalize gay marriage. Ensure sexual freedom and birth control to all. - Protect local businesses by imposing heavy import taxation. - Suppress traditional "Fatalism" by investing everything in the individual : by setting him free from all tribal/religious dogmas and attachments, providing him with high quality education, he will find the courage and growth mindset to innovate, undertake challenges and create high value for himself and society. And eventually, all problems will sort themselves out. - To fight corruption, informal economy and ensure total fiscal efficiency and transparency for a direct democracy : end payment in cash. All transaction will slowly go virtual.
III) The Nordic Model : A Combination of Both.
A) What's the Nordic Model ? A comprehensive welfare state and multi-level collective bargaining based on the economic foundations of social corporatism, with a high percentage of the workforce unionized and a large percentage of the population employed by the public sector (roughly 30% of the work force) It seems the historical struggle of the working class for a more egalitarian society in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland created a set of highly inclusive institutions that allows for a perfect balance between social justice and free markets (also known as the Third way). These institutions aims partly to enhance individual autonomy, mobility and flexibility in a fast changing environment disrupted by globalization, immigration and a open free market. Although highly competitive (best countries to do business according to WB), they score the lowest in terms of wage gap and wealth inequality due to the heavy taxation on the 55% highest revenues and solid redistribution of wealth through pensions, social services and free high quality education and healthcare. The Nordic countries score the highest in the Happiness Index, low corruption Index, financial health and general trust in political institutions. These highly transparent institutions include a wide range of extremely efficient collaborative Labor Unions and Employers Association ("Patronnat") who negotiate TOGETHER the wages and workers' benefits , with the mediation of the state. Unlike in France or Tunisia where Unions are mostly used as tools of brute contestation, the Nordic syndicates provides efficient communication tools, free education for adults in their reconversion process, career consulting, cultural centres and so on. They do not have social workers. They abhor the French "Nanny State" apparatus and their monstrous bureaucracy policing and surveying citizens to determine which deserves such and such social benefits. The simplicity of their concept is as follow : everyone gets free stuff. Free education (childcare, primary, secondary, trade school) at all ages and abilities, free healthcare, and a pension if you are unfit to do any work. But does it work ? B) A Model that works. Conventional wisdom links innovation to wide inequality. The belief is that inequality motivates, by increasing both the risk and potential reward, attracting talented people who love adventure. The bold ones make the breakthroughs that propel invention and innovation. It sounds reasonable. Three researchers at the London School of Economics examined that patent filings in Sweden a so called "nanny-state", had more patent filings per resident than the United States for most of the last half-century. The advocates of inequality invokes the concept of meritocracy. They point to the olden days in the United States when high rates of upward mobility showed that the poor with talent and grit found the country a land of opportunity... but studies have shown that mobility and equality actually increased freedom and entrepreneurial spirit. There is something in Denmark and Norway that they call "Flexicurity" : If the business you own can no longer compete in the world market, it's fine with Norwegian government and Labor Unions for you to close it and lay off your workers. Flexicurity means the Government has a social contract with those laid-off workers to do everything possible to help them land a new job that's just as good or better for them. Your unproductive capital becomes available for a new start-up. Rates of start-up creation in Norway are among the highest in the developed world, and Norway has more entrepreneurs per capita than the United-States. Same for Denmark, Canada and Switzerland. By investing as much as possible in the Individual, the Nordic countries has created nations of independent, self-motivated problem solvers with high skills and high self-esteem. Nordic Workers are among the most productive and efficient : they work 359 hours less than Americans (lowest in the OECD countries) and still have a higher GDP per capita. They also get one month of paid vacation per year and 18 months of paid parental leave. Full evidence that social benefits does not curtail innovation and production, but rather INCREASES them. C) How did it happen ? Social-democrats parties and coalitions ruled for centuries and managed to stay out of the marxist/capitalists ideological wars. They established a "consensual democracy", where both parties, the owners and workers, managed to keep their rights for property and decent working conditions. They COLLABORATED to induce perpetual innovation in all sectors in order to remain competitive in an increasingly globalized world. They did not choose to cut themselves out of the global market by increasing import taxes, but by increasing innovation. And it worked ! Cooperatives are prevalent. Less likely to fail. Also turnover in co-ops averages 15% against the industry standard of 40 to 60%. The housing co-ops created 750 000 apartments with 860 000 members in Sweden. Parents co-ops provide between 10-15 % of day-care centers. D) The Neoliberal experience In the 80's, two countries the Nordics held in high regards (UK and USA) started implementing their new Neo-Liberal policies : unrestrained by the law, private banks were now free to sell any kind of securities to anyone, disregarding their long term solvability or not. Taxes were lowered for the top earners, workers wages and administrative jobs were cut. We know the results : successive financial crashes in the 90's and the 2008 crisis. In Iceland, a small nation of 350 000 people, a few private Banks tinkered hard with Neolib tendencies : they sold highly volatile bonds to British Citizens and set up a Ponzi scheme that blew up after the sub-prime crisis. What happened next ? Usually, the IMF-pressurized Governments applied austerity measures. They make the average citizen pay for the irresponsible behaviours of some private Hedge Fund managers. But Iceland did not. They let their bankers down and refused to pay the British their money back, after 10 000 people (5% of the population) went down the capital city to protest the 30% cut in Social Service. Same for Norway and Sweden : they did not follow the IMF plan and kept up with this strategy : increase taxes on the rich, reduce taxes on the working class, force banks to write off mortgages for householders under the water. They even strengthened their social safety nets ! From all OECD countries, The Nordics, (including Iceland who suffered the most from this ordeal) recovered the fastest from the crisis. E) Comparison with the Anglo-Saxon Model Soviets and Capitalists justify maintaining high level of poverty reassuring their 99 per cent that the sacrifice would pay. "Communist rule will one day shower you with goods and services" or "A rising tide lifts all boats" (in the US) Among 32 OECD countries, the ten most equal countries include Denmark, Norway, Iceland and Swede. The United states are among the five most unequal along with Turkey and Mexico. F) Can we apply the Nordic model in Tunisia ? It has been said regularly that applying the Nordic approach in other non-Scandinavian countries was impossible because...different culture/mindset. The Nordics are supposedly more united linguistically, racially homogenous, have a religion that promotes hard-work, individualism, responsibility and so on... It's half-true. If you get a glimpse of Norway history you'll realize : - They got colonized by Denmark for centuries, had 100 different dialects (villagers set 200 m apart could not understand each other because of mountain chains). - Were controlled by capitalists overlord who tried to fund some fascist coup to stay in power. - Only 3% of the land was fit for agriculture. - They did not have much natural resources except for some fish and logging. They were extremely poor and backward compared to other industrialized economies. So they had to invest everything in sea trade and had thousands of experience doing it. - They could have emulated the Soviet revolution since there were many powerful red movements ...but fearing to loose their properties, the party of farmers opted for a cooperative model, rather than a collectivist one. This set the tone for a long history of inclusive institutions, ensuring constant bargain between work and capital. But it wasn't easy. It was a constant struggle. For decades, inequalities rose as the economic elite resisted change for a while. Eventually, they created a visionary movement that grew, engaged in struggle, attracted allies and won. By winning non-violently. This is the power of political association and cooperation between all fractions in a society. The Nordics were not smarter or more skilled than Tunisians. Their working class simply managed to get more power because they were more independent. Tunisians have been living in servitude for most of their existence. There is no national union, or common goals, although Movements like the "Jeunes Tunisiens" or Neo-Destour managed to bring up some reforms like women liberation and education for all, the civil society is not strong enough. People are strangers to each other and do not trust their institutions. But this can change. Slowly, thanks to new technology, social benefits can be distributed much quicker without the need for tens of thousands of social workers or labour lawyer. It didn't take 10 000 years for the Papus to transition from the stone age to the post-industrial age. Only 30 years. I don't think we'll have to wait 100 years like the French to get a more inclusive government (not necessarily democratic. Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea, all reached top-level development under dictatorships. Maybe we'll have to go through a technocratic stage with strong governance at the beginning.)
Without a major content update, Genshin Impact hits #1 grossing in every major market
https://sensortower.com/ios/rankings/top/iphone/us/games?date=2020-10-21 KLee banner went live at 6PM local time in each market, so the effect is slightly delayed for some regions. But as it stands, Genshin Impact is #1 grossing in the top four mobile gaming markets of US, China, Japan and South Korea for 10/21. Top 3 in many more markets like Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Singapore, and Spain. I wrote about Mihoyo's history and the gacha gaming industry in https://www.reddit.com/Genshin_Impact/comments/j9eqw5/indepth_look_at_mihoyos_history_misconception/, but even I did not see this coming. It is one thing to be top 5 grossing in every major market, but beating local champions like Honor of Kings in China, Monster Strike in Japan, and Candy Crush in America at the same time across vastly different cultures and gaming habits? To do this when just about every streamecontent creator and the majority of their fans spend money on PC/PS4 instead of mobile, without a major content update? AR30+ players supposedly ran out of things to do and players are quitting the game out of boredom. I fully expected a drop off from the unsustainable $100 million in two weeks (without counting PC, PS4, and China Android! That is at least another $50-$100 million!) pace, at least until the next content update, what happened? Weapon Banner Is Underrated For starters, while KLee is an extremely well-designed character and absolutely adorable, she alone can not propel the game to such a new height. What many people, myself included missed is the power of weapon banners. In terms of pure strength, a 4-star character with a 5-star weapon is going to beat a 5-star character with a 4-star weapon, because the base attack in this game gets scaled like crazy and 5-star weapons have far better abilities as well. Whales will not only max constellation their character, they will also max refine a chosen 5-star weapon for them as well. This greatly increases the ceiling of what a whale can spend on a banner that features two of the best weapons in the game. The top 10% population in this world owns 85% of the wealth. Whales spend $40000 the way the rest of us spend $40. PVP mobile games like Rise of Kingdoms and Game of War always had a much higher ceiling for whales, they still do, but Genshin Impact's model is allowing PVE games to catch-up. End Game Loop Is Holding Up I averaged two hours a day since mobile release and only hit AR 34. There is actually a lot of things to do like looking for ascension materials in the open-world, spend resin on gold, artifacts, and talent books, plus the chests, puzzles, and world quests I missed. I can easily see myself not even finishing everything by patch 1.1 despite putting in 80-100 hours into the game by then. I actually welcome 1.1 update to further reduce the daily commitment needed, by allowing me to collect resin and spend it on weekends, and spend double resin for double reward on domains to further reduce the grind. There will always be a new game that takes me away, like I just got my Oculus Quest 2 and my entire family fell in love with it. But the easy dailies ensure I continue to log into Genshin Impact and I am always close to my next pull which pushes me closer to my next pity. For whales who max constellation and refine on 5-star characters and weapons, they still need to explore the open world to get ascension materials, they still need to farm talent books, artifacts, and gold. It is still a very long grind and the max resin purchase is clearly not a random number, it is derived from big data analytics to maximize the longevity of the game. It is what prevents Genshin Impact from turning into an all-you-can-eat buffet like Diablo/Path of Exile season starts, and we all know how quickly we are sick and tired of buffets and move onto a new restaurant. Global Multi-Platform Release Is Ridiculously Powerful More than the quality of the game itself, I am still in awe that Mihoyo launched the game in 100+ countries with four-voice languages, cross-play on PC/PS4/iOS/Android on day one, and successful marketing in so many major countries. No company in the history of gaming was able to do a launch of this scale and scope on day one. If I am a competitor, I will pay double the salary to hire Mihoyo's program manager of the launch, not their artist. The result of such a wide release is when something like the KLee banner came out, I can get on Twitch to see streamers whaling, I can go to multiple country's popular forums to read about the reactions from different cultures, I can get NSFW videos/images from multiple cultures on my favorite characters. I can play the game on a 65-inch screen and controller with great graphics when I have a large block of time, or just do dailies on my phone. The game becomes a lot more socially engaging even if it is mostly a single-player game, a lot more addictive to follow even when you are not playing it. I do not see anyone dethroning Genshin Impact in two years because it will take time for a competitor to build a global cross-platform game like this, the bar of entry is so incredibly high that a single platform game making a splash in the East or West (say Cyberpunk 2077 in the west, next Zelda game in Japan, or the latest Tencent MMORPG mobile game Moonblade in China which took #1 grossing before KLee banner) just won't be able to compete with Genshin Impact's overall player base, sustained revenue and hours played. The game really pulled in a huge audience from Zelda fans to MMORPG/ARPG retirees, and converted many of them into gacha gamers overnight. It is truly special to have such a large global audience on the same game and I hope the next three content updates further propel it to one of the highest impact games ever made on any platform.
2020 was my 11th year as a freelance translator, and my highest-earning yet. I thought I'd put together a detailed summary of my year and work, with the goal of helping others not take as long as I did to start really earning money doing this work! I hope this is helpful to folks starting out, or seeking to improve/optimize their business, and I hope this is a good enough balance of what works for me but also some general tips that may prove useful to others. Maybe you'll find something below that will help you. Part I: The Numbers Translating is my job, it's not really a passion. Occasionally I do translation projects for fun, but they usually sit on my desk for literally years before I finish them. This work takes a ton of mental energy from me and I am starting to resent that and look towards career pivots, because I can see the writing on the wall as machine translation and AI keeps getting better. I do have another part time, salaried job, and it goes well with being a freelance translator. I've been working from home long before 2020, and I like it and the flexibility that comes with it. My pre-2020 life had a lot of travel in it, and while I wouldn't call what I do digital nomading as I have a home base, all of my work is definitely location independent and has been for a long time, pre-pandemic. Here's a P/L summary for the last few years. As you can see, profits really increased while overhead has stayed quite stable, and I've even trimmed some fat there over the last few years by switching phone providers and banks. No complaints. Some of the past five years, I was doing more of other work, less translating, but the last two years I've really focused on building my freelance translation business and (finally) putting into practice what I've learned over the years. In 2020, I earned just under $40,000 gross on a cash accounting basis as a freelance translator, with about $2500 in expenses, including Cost of Labor, Materials and Supplies, Membership/Subscriptions, Telephone, and PayPal/Money Transfer Fees. For Cost of Labor, I occasionally hire out editing (for example, I had one large project this year for a direct client that requested it) or complex formatting - saving me time, energy, and sanity with a better result the first time than OCR software can provide. I attribute my higher earnings this year due to me being more available because I've mostly been at home, but also due to bidding at higher rates, gaining some new regular clients who pay those rates, and getting rid of some clients where the relationship no longer worked well and started to "cost" me emotionally and in terms of administrative time. However, I still took about 10 days off for a road trip, and despite a few brief periods of overextending myself, I've had pretty decent work-life balance. As far as currencies and payment methods go, I'll accept almost anything. I make a slight profit if I am earning Euro or GBP, but sometimes I'll bid in USD because it represents a "discount" to my client and I'm still getting a rate I'm comfortable with. I turn away projects that are below my minimum. While I prefer payment via check, bank transfer, or Transferwise, I'll take PayPal even though it's more expensive, because no matter how I'm getting paid, I keep track of that as an expense and claim it on my taxes. It's a cost of doing business. Once I start adding it up and breaking down the total cost over a month or year, it's not usually as bad as it can sometimes seem with an individual payment. About a year or two ago, I switched to a bank that had a free checking account, so since I've eliminated a monthly charge for my checking account, I'm also a bit more ok about transfer fees - which are always going to be there. Friendly reminder: Transferwise and PayPal are not banks, your money is not safe there as even perceived TOS violations can take that away, and most likely (though depending on your country) your bank has deposit insurance. Years ago, I had a debit card for my PayPal, but I'd never do that now and I can wait the day or so for those incoming transfers. As soon as money goes into those accounts, it gets transferred out and to my checking and savings accounts in the bank. So, in terms of rates and negotiation, what's most important to me is my cost per word rate (or a fair flat rate, depending on the project), getting as close to my daily sales goal as possible and ideally exceeding it, and net 30 payment terms. I am not in the business of offering no-interest loans to agencies that can't manage their cashflow, I'm a translator. Part II: Always be hustling Over the years, I've had a few direct clients, but for the most part, I work for agencies. This means that now, I bid less and I have more work offered to me directly. As much as possible, I automate this process. Proz makes it pretty easy to find agencies in my country and the countries where my source languages are used, so I use that to find agencies with good ratings to send my CV. When I find an agency that looks like it'll be a good fit, I have a template set up in my email so that I am not wasting too much time. It introduces me and my areas of expertise, directs people to my Proz profile, and includes my ideal per word rate, so that people can decide if they can afford me and I can decide if I can afford to work with them, and my time zone. Remember, we're selling our time and energy - if I don't have to work 8 hours a day, I don't - that's a real benefit of being a freelancer. As I'm working on projects, I keep my What I'm Working On updated as much as possible, and direct people to that in my "cold call" email, so that I can show I'm an active freelancer doing a wide variety of projects. A side note: if a job is cross posted on both Proz and TranslatorsCafe, it's probably a company you want to work with and they're casting a wide net for potential linguists. But more than once, I've searched a company posting on TranslatorsCafe on the Proz Blue Board and they're banned from posting there, with tons of bad reviews. YMMV, as there are also good businesspeople on TranslatorsCafe, but do your due diligence because end of the day, you want, need, and deserve to get paid on time. In 2020, I sent out about 300 bids and emails to agencies, not accurately including the number of the forms I filled out on agencies' websites, but as you can see, I'm sending out about one targeted but semi-automated email a day. One thing I did back in early 2019 that seems to have paid big dividends is to have my CV/resume translated into my source languages by native speaker colleagues. It makes a difference when bidding on jobs, and even if we're mostly communicating in English, it gives a great impression and as many of us know from what we get paid to do it, it won't cost that much when you're paying wholesale rates. :) Yes, I still bid on jobs posted on Proz and TranslatorsCafe. Often, those successful bids lead to lasting relationships, and that's valuable - but I cast my net wider than that by sending out my resume unsolicited. Little bit of this, little bit of that, so that I can keep myself employed. The flip side of the hustle is also soliciting feedback from happy customers. You want to do everything you can to keep them as recurring customers and to build that relationship, but also ask them for feedback on LWA/Blue Board so that when you're applying to jobs, you are showing that you have a positive track record. This is something I tend to do especially towards the end of year when I'm checking back on any unpaid invoices, updating records, etc. Part III: Workflow Please forgive me as I repeat myself here: remember, we're selling our time and energy - if I don't have to work 8 hours a day, I don't - that's a real benefit of being a freelancer - there are other things I want to be doing with my time. I start each work day with a sales goal: $100. Sometimes I invoice more, sometimes I invoice less - but that helps me to decide how much work I'm going to take on, and it reminds me that I'm selling my time and that this is a business. Admittedly, I'm not very romantic about this work at all. I also try not to do more than 2500 words a day - I can do more, but as I said, this is very mentally taxing work for me and I have other things I need and want to do in the day. So, hopefully I wake up with some offers in my inbox, because most of the agencies I work with are 5-6 hours ahead of me - they know this because it may be in their database, and I include my current time zone in my email signature. Occasionally I do some digital nomading, and I also want to manage expectations about when I'll be working and answering my emails. Because I'm constantly sending my resume out to agencies, sometimes there will be some onboarding paperwork to do, but I get a pretty steady stream of work straight to me from about 5 agencies that represent 50% of my income. In 2020, I invoiced 35 different companies or individuals. For invoicing, I use the Proz platform. I've used Wave in the past, but I find nothing is as useful to me as a platform designed for this industry and international use, and it works well because it's flexible enough to either generate PDFs and/or it can send invoices on my behalf, depending on the client's requests. Since I pay for Proz, I try to use it as much as possible, and it really is a very good value, because I use it for invoicing, the Blue Board, term searches, and marketing myself - my Proz profile really is my calling card as a freelance translator and part of that is the availability calendar I keep updated and the What I'm Working On feature. It seems to me that folks who don't think it's worth paying for Proz aren't using it to its fullest extent and over the last 2 or so years, they've done a much better job of explaining and training on what the platform provides to freelancers. To me, it's a great value. In the last year or so, I've shifted some of my most regular clients over to end-of-month invoicing. I feel like I can do that now, because I've gotten better at cash flow management, and it means less time spent on administrative work. Draft invoices are maintained throughout the month, and then I open and send them, ready to go, on the last day of the month. From the handbooks I sometimes get from agencies, and from what I read here and in other translator hangouts, I can't emphasize enough that invoicing is really important and you need to find a system that works for you as soon as you can. As a freelancer, the only person who cares if you're getting paid isyou. Like my bids, I have email templates for delivery, invoicing, customer service, and responding to posts. This saves me the time and mental energy of composing an email in highly predictable and repetitive situations. It's all right there as a Gmail plugin. Part IV: PAY YOURSELFFIRST Once the income rolls in, good record keeping is essential. Now that I have a system that works for me, it makes it very easy at the end of the year when I'm sending things to my accountant for tax time. I don't do anything fancy, but I have a spreadsheet that calculates withholdings for taxes, retirement, and a few other savings goals, which tend to change over time. In 2021, I'll be saving for vacation, new hardware (my phone and computers will probably need a refresh in the next 24 months), and adding to my personal emergency fund. We're getting into personalfinance territory here, but it's so important. Once I pay myself, that money goes into a separate savings account and that savings account is able to be subdivided into those categories. Once I hit $500 or $1000 in retirement savings, I put that money into the market, where it can work for me in a mix of individual stocks and roboinvesting index funds. This means that strictly 50% of any invoice I get goes straight into savings. I live in the USA, so 25% goes for tax withholding between federal, state, and local. It makes it much easier to write that check come tax time if the money is already waiting, and gaining interest. Usually I don't get a refund, but I may have a bit extra left over in that pile of money to make an unofficial refund. 10% goes to retirement, 5% towards vacation/time off, a savings goal, and E-fund, respectively. Interest rates are a joke right now, but with all that money sitting in one place, I'll take the $100 in interest I earned this year, too. The other 50% goes to pay any expenses I may have for my business and otherwise goes into my personal checking account to pay other bills and spend as I want. Of course, tracking expenses and saving those receipts is also important for tax time. Do all this stuff immediately and throughout the year so that you don't have to spend time at the end of the year being an amateur forensic accountant. This is where your workflow is important - if you have a process you go through with every project, you're doing the work as you go and you're spending minimal time and mental energy on the administrative part of this job, while staying organized. Part V: Miscellany I wish it hadn't taken me so long to develop a workflow that worked for me, and a client base that kept me in work with minimal effort on my part. Now that I'm more established and comfortable with my work, I also have to constantly remind myself to maintain boundaries. To me, that means not setting the expectation with clients that I'll be answering my emails in the middle of the night or working on weekends - even though I do both of those things occasionally, it's on my terms, not theirs. I don't use Skype anymore for work, I do everything over email, which also sets reasonable boundaries about how I can be contacted and how often I can be interrupted. The email I use for my translation business is separate from my personal email, I use it for all of my business-related accounts, and I try to keep that inbox as organized as I can. There are filters set up for various agencies, scams, bids, etc., and I try to get to inbox zero at the end of the month, with varying degrees of success. This year I also set up a queue system that's a bit more advanced than just the top of my inbox, so that I don't miss anything and can keep track of projects in progress, because sometimes things pile up a bit. It's been a game changer for me, helps me to feel organized, pace myself, and keeps clients happy. Similarly, I keep separate checking and savings accounts for my translation work - it just makes things easier. FOMO remains a bit of a thing - if I take a week off, what if I miss out on a huge project that's worth a thousand or two? I've managed this by keeping the availability calendar on my Proz profile updated and sending out an email to my most frequent collaborators in advance of any time I take off. Of course, when I'm on vacation, I have an auto-reply email going out, too. I'm a huge fan of the CAT tool CafeTran Espresso. It's free with a Proz Plus membership, has really robust support and documentation, and I don't have to buy Trados and run it using a Windows emulator on my Macs. I don't run Macs to look trendy, I don't want to use Windows! Part VI: Looking Ahead My main goals for 2021 are:
to work on building partnerships and connections with freelancers in other fields, so that I can help them add value to their other clients, expand my business more towards direct clients, and explore options for pivoting my business in the next 5-7 years;
continue to optimize my self-marketing with a slightly more polished web presence;
to get to B2 level in my hobby language with the longer-term goal of possibly adding it as a working pair;
save more of my income!
tl;dr: find a workflow that works for you so that you can stay organized, pay yourself first, and work smarter, not harder, by automating as much as you can. Proz is a great value if you use it as a platform, and not only as a place to find work. Edit: thanks for the award! happy new year!
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