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Harlequin Poison Frog Oophaga histrionica
Harlequin Poison Frog Oophaga histrionica
IUCN Status: Critically Endangered (IUCN SSC Amphibian Specialist Group, 2019)
Location: Colombia.
Endemic to the Chocó rainforest of Colombia, the Harlequin Poison Frog (Oophaga histrionica) inhabits humid lowland and foothill forests. These frogs thrive in leaf litter and near small water sources, where they reproduce and communicate using distinct vocalisations.A dazzling splash of colour against the deep greens of Colombia’s Chocó rainforests, the harlequin poison frog is as deadly as it is beautiful. Cloaked in hypnotic shades of orange, yellow, green and black, this tiny amphibian is a master of chemical warfare—their skin is infused with powerful alkaloid toxins that can paralyse or kill predators. But despite their formidable defences, they are completely helpless against human destruction.
Once thriving in the dense, misty forests of western #Colombia, this critically endangered frog is now on the brink of extinction. Illegal mining, rampant deforestation for #palmoil plantations, and the relentless #wildlifetrade have devastated their fragile rainforest home. The same vibrant colours that warn predators away have made them a prime target for #poachers supplying the exotic #pettrade.
This extraordinary species is a vital part of its ecosystem, controlling insect populations and contributing to the rainforest’s delicate balance. But unless urgent action is taken, the harlequin poison frog could vanish forever.
Protect their rainforest home. Say no to palm oil, reject the illegal pet trade, and demand stronger protections for Colombia’s amphibians. #BoycottPalmOil #Boycott4Wildlife
Harlequin Poisonous #Frogs 🐸🐸have vivid shades of 💛💚🧡. Unlike other frogs both males and females fiercely guard eggs. #PalmOil #Soy #Meat and #GoldMining are threats in #Colombia. Help them when you #BoycottGold 🥇☠️⛔️ be #vegan #BoycottPalmOil 🌴☠️⛔️https://palmoildetectives.com/2021/03/20/harlequin-poison-frog-oophaga-histrionica/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterDazzling Harlequin Poisonous #Frogs 🐸💚 of #Colombia 🇨🇴 are sensitive to noise 🎶📢 Their rainbow colours 🌈 make them #rainforest works of art! ✨🎨Critically Endangered by #mining and #palmoil #BoycottGold 🥇🩸⛔️ #BoycottPalmOil 🌴☠️⛔️ @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2021/03/20/harlequin-poison-frog-oophaga-histrionica/
Share to BlueSky Share to Twitter Harlequin Poison Frog Oophaga histrionicaAppearance and Behaviour
Few creatures rival the harlequin poison frog in sheer visual spectacle. No two individuals look alike—each frog sports a unique pattern of vivid colours, a living work of rainforest art. These colours serve as a bold warning to predators: “Eat me and regret it.” Unlike other frogs that rely on camouflage, this species flaunts their toxicity in the open.
Growing to just 32.9 mm in length, these frogs are tiny but fiercely territorial. Males perch on fallen logs or leaves, calling loudly to attract mates and defend their domain. Their vocalisations shift depending on their surroundings—frogs near noisy streams produce higher-pitched calls to cut through the background noise.
Unlike most #amphibians, they do not lay their eggs in water. Instead, the female carefully deposits them on the forest floor. Once the tadpoles hatch, she carries them one by one on her back, climbing high into the canopy to deposit them in the tiny water pools inside bromeliads. She returns regularly to feed them unfertilised eggs, ensuring they receive the nutrients needed to grow. Without this dedicated parental care, the tadpoles would not survive (Medina et al., 2013).
Geographic Range
The harlequin poison frog is found only in the Chocó region of western Colombia, a biodiversity hotspot teeming with rare and endemic species. But its habitat is shrinking fast. Once covering vast swathes of rainforest, this species is now confined to small, isolated patches between 300 and 730 metres above sea level. This extreme habitat fragmentation is pushing the species closer to extinction (IUCN SSC Amphibian Specialist Group, 2019).
Diet
Harlequin poison frogs are insectivores, feasting primarily on ants, mites, and termites. Their diet is directly linked to their toxicity—these frogs do not produce their own poison but instead absorb toxic alkaloids from the insects they consume. In captivity, where their diet is different, they lose their toxicity entirely, proving just how essential their rainforest ecosystem is to their survival.
Reproduction and Mating
This species’ reproductive strategy is one of the most fascinating in the animal kingdom. Unlike most frogs that lay hundreds of eggs in water, the harlequin poison frog invests heavily in just a few offspring. The Harlequin Poison Frog demonstrates remarkable parental care.
Males attract females through distinct vocal calls, often influenced by environmental factors such as stream noise. After the female lays her eggs on the forest floor, the male guards them until they hatch. Then, the mother carries each tadpole on her back, one at a time, up into the trees. She carefully places them in separate bromeliads—tiny pools of water trapped in the plant’s leaves. To ensure their survival, she periodically returns to each tadpole and lays unfertilised eggs for them to eat. Without this specialised care, they would not survive (Medina et al., 2013).
This highly specialised reproductive strategy ensures tadpole survival in an ecosystem with limited standing water.
Threats
The major threats to the Harlequin Poison Frog are deforestation caused by small-scale agriculture, including livestock, mining activities, and logging, resulting in degraded and fragmented forest at the only known locality (M. Pareja pers. comm. February 2019). However, some patches are still in good condition (M. Pareja pers. comm. February 2019). Pollution associated with mining also represents a threat to the species.
IUCN RED LISTThe harlequin poison frog is critically endangered due to a perfect storm of human-driven threats:
Illegal pet trade
These frogs are highly sought after in the exotic pet trade, with many dying in transit or being removed from wild populations at unsustainable rates.
Noise pollution
Increased human activity and deforestation near water sources are affecting their ability to communicate and reproduce.
Deforestation and Palm Oil Expansion
• Colombia’s rainforests are being rapidly cleared for palm oil plantations and cattle ranching. Illegal logging and land conversion have fragmented the frog’s habitat, leaving it nowhere to go.
Illegal Wildlife Trade
This species is highly sought after by collectors in the exotic pet trade. Despite international protections, poachers continue to smuggle these frogs out of Colombia.
Gold Mining and Mercury Contamination
Illegal gold mining pollutes water sources with mercury, poisoning amphibians at all life stages. Deforestation caused by mining activities is wiping out breeding and foraging habitats.
Climate Change
Rising temperatures and shifting rainfall patterns threaten the species’ delicate reproductive cycle. Extreme weather events may impact the availability of bromeliads for tadpole development.
Take Action!
The harlequin poison frog is on the edge of extinction, but there’s still time to help:
- Boycott palm oil. The destruction of rainforests for palm oil plantations is wiping out amphibian habitats. Choose products that are 100% palm oil-free.
- Reject the illegal pet trade. Never buy wild-caught poison frogs. Support only reputable captive breeding programs.
- Support rainforest conservation. Donate to organisations protecting Colombia’s rainforests and wildlife.
- Demand stronger protections. Contact policymakers to advocate for stricter enforcement against wildlife trafficking and habitat destruction.
Every action counts. Resist and fight back before it’s too late. #BoycottPalmOil #Boycott4Wildlife
FAQs
How toxic is the harlequin poison frog?
The harlequin poison frog produces powerful alkaloid toxins known as histrionicotoxins, which block neural receptors and can cause paralysis or death in predators. The toxins are acquired from their diet—frogs raised in captivity without their natural diet are completely non-toxic (Medina et al., 2013).
What makes Harlequin Poison Frogs toxic?
Their toxicity comes from consuming alkaloid-rich ants and mites. When deprived of this diet, such as in captivity, they lose their poison.
Why do Harlequin Poison Frogs have different calls?
Research by Vargas-Salinas and Amézquita (2013) found that their calls adapt to environmental noise levels. Frogs living near noisy streams produce higher-frequency calls to ensure their signals are heard, while those in quieter areas use lower-frequency calls. This shows how environmental conditions shape evolution in real time.
Why is the harlequin poison frog critically endangered?
Deforestation for palm oil, soy and meat, illegal wildlife trade, gold mining, and habitat fragmentation have driven this species to the brink. With an extremely limited range, any further habitat loss could mean extinction (IUCN SSC Amphibian Specialist Group, 2019).
What is unique about the harlequin poison frog’s reproduction?
This species exhibits exceptional parental care. Unlike most frogs, they do not lay eggs in water. Instead, females transport newly hatched tadpoles on their backs to water-filled bromeliads, where they are fed unfertilised eggs until they mature (Medina et al., 2013).
Do harlequin poison frogs make good pets?
No. While some poison dart frogs are legally bred in captivity, wild-caught harlequin poison frogs are often smuggled illegally, contributing to population decline. Captive frogs also lose their toxicity, making them less vibrant and potentially unhealthy (Zamora et al., 1999).
How many Harlequin Poison Frogs are left in the wild?
Exact numbers remain unknown, but population declines due to habitat loss and illegal trade are well-documented. Their Endangered status indicates a high risk of extinction if conservation efforts are not strengthened.
How long do Harlequin Poison Frogs live?
They typically live 5–8 years in the wild.
Are Harlequin Poison Frogs good pets?
No. Keeping these frogs as pets is a selfish act that contributes to their extinction. Many individuals in the pet trade are illegally captured, harming wild populations and destroying delicate ecosystems. If you care about these animals, advocate for their conservation instead of supporting the illegal pet trade.
How can I help protect Harlequin Poison Frogs?
Avoid and boycott palm oil, support conservation efforts, and speak out against the illegal pet trade. Protecting their rainforest home is the key to their survival.
Support the conservation of this species
Manchester Museum captive breeding programme
Further Information
IUCN SSC Amphibian Specialist Group. 2019. Oophaga histrionica. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2019: e.T144231367A144443857. https://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2019-2.RLTS.T144231367A144443857.en. Downloaded on 16 February 2021.
Vargas-Salinas, F., & Amézquita, A. (2013). Stream noise, hybridization, and uncoupled evolution of call traits in two lineages of poison frogs: Oophaga histrionica and Oophaga lehmanni. PLoS ONE, 8(10), e77545. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0077545
Wikipedia contributors. (n.d). Harlequin poison frog. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlequin_poison_frog
Harlequin Poison Frog Oophaga histrionica
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Pop Cryptid Spectator 7
Welcome to the Pop Cryptid Spectator no. 7. This edition is chock full of news, media, and pop cryptid information. Cryptid popularity is exploding. Even old cryptid ideas are resurfacing in new ways all the time, as we’ll see regarding sea serpents and living dinosaurs. Books, movies, internet content, and music work to spread the modern concepts of cryptids, leaving behind crusty old ideas of “unknown animals” and repackaging them as new and exciting entities that share whatever “reality” we wish to embrace.
In this edition:
- Cryptozoology diploma
- Saxsquatch in Rolling Stone
- Past and future of Small Town Monsters
- Modern resurgence of mokele-mbembe
- Fresno Nightcrawler on Monstrum – Is it a cryptid?
- Frogman Festival in March
- Cryptid biographies
- Book review: A Natural History of Sea Serpents
Cryptozoology Diploma
A participant on the Forteana Forums on the Pop Goes the Cryptid thread pointed me to a “Cryptozoology diploma” provided by the Centre for Excellence online shop. You can take a (paid) course that claims to teach you to able to “decide whether lake monsters, sea serpents, Thunderbirds and other mythical monsters are rumours or a reality”. That is, if your really need to pay for that! This tip was in response to the item in last PCS 6 exposing the ridiculous article on the Indeed job search site regarding “How to Become a Cryptozoologist”. This “diploma” is worthless as credentials but might be fun if you like learning new things you don’t known anything about. And, it shows just how mainstream the topic is. Unfortunately, as I discovered with a similar course, I can safely assume the instruction is terrible, the source material is low quality and full of errors, and the effort might make you more misinformed than educated in the topic.
Saxquatch in Rolling Stone
Regarding the Saxsquatch story from last week, he then appeared as a Creature Feature in Rolling Stone. He’s a very BIG deal!
Past and Future of STM
You really can’t talk about the spread of cryptids in popular culture in the US without recognizing Small Town Monsters, a production company founded by Seth Breedlove and friends, that has been making documentary films for 10 years now. They make little-known cryptids into icons, small towns into tourist attractions. I was a big fan of STM films starting with The Minerva Monster (Ohio) and Beast of Whitehall (New York). Since those early projects, it’s become increasingly difficult to keep track of, let alone watch, all the various monster and paranormal content that they put out. Every time I watch a new film or YouTube series episode, I see familiar faces from the field of high strangeness, and I learn new things. While STM prides themselves on being the only company who take an “objective” approach to their subjects, making an effort to let the witnesses and researchers do the talking, they have slanted more towards the extreme paranormal stuff as time has gone on. This tendency, however, is the normal trajectory of Pop Cryptids, so it’s altogether possible that STM isn’t just riding the wave, but also helping to steer the boat.
Seth has produced a new intro video for this year explaining some of the challenges to the small company, mainly distribution issues, that shed light on the seemingly chaotic release schedule. He also gives a preview of the movies for 2025.
- The Kinderhook Creature is a story about a Bigfoot that terrorized families in the Catskills of New York in the 1980s. I am unfamiliar with this story which Breedlove calls “Minerva Monster writ large”. I fully expect the film treatment will launch this cryptid into the popular sphere.
- Dawn of the Dogman promises to explore the origins of the Michigan dogman, which is known to have been popularized by a hoax story put into song. Breedlove says that Linda Godfrey was consulted on the project prior to her death in 2022. Again, really looking forward to this topic since Dogman is the current king of Pop Cryptids.
- From the Beyond: The Bennington Triangle will take on the array of different phenomena reported in this area of southern Vermont. Window areas are of particular interest to me related to my Spooky Geology niche. I have written about the Bennington Triangle.
You can see Monster Chronicles: The Past and Future of STM on YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VE7xW4yfN5c
Modern resurgence of mokele-mbembe
Syfy website put out an article regarding the claim of living dinosaurs in the African Congo River Basin. The most famous of these is mokele-mbembe, which cryptozoologists interpret as a potential sauropod dinosaur. The article is, as you will often find, clickbait promotion, in this case linked to the next upcoming Jurassic Park franchise movie. It piggy backs off a Nat Geo article from early February about deforestation. Due to this environmental condition, encounters between locals and wildlife are becoming more frequent. People aren’t all that used to being so close to elephants and gorillas and seem to be attributing sounds and experiences to the folklore creature instead.
“In bigger settlements where habitats are being pushed into and people aren’t used to seeing large animals, they’re suddenly encountering them all the time,” says Laura Vlachova, a Czech conservationist. “It’s these people who tell me they’ve seen mokele-mbembe. I think what it really shows is how folklore is starting to reflect the reality of a shrinking ecosystem.”
Fresno Nightcrawler on Monstrum – Is it a cryptid?
Monstrum is a very popular PBS produced series on folklore creatures. The latest episode is on Pop Cryptid star, the Fresno Nightcrawler – a creature known from a grainy video from 2007 that shows a pale entity made up almost entirely of billowy legs and maybe a really tiny head on top. Host Emily Zarka can’t decide whether this is a “cryptid” or not, first calling it that but then suggesting it’s something else. She defines a cryptid as a biological creature that people say exists but science hasn’t documented, which, as I have shown in previous issues of PCS, can be problematic. The old school idea of a cryptid is zoological, however, the nightcrawler doesn’t seem to be perambulating anywhere near the path of zoological discovery. Mostly perceived as a hoax, I have seen some attempts to recreate it – digitally and manually. But nothing quite works. So the Nightcrawler remains a fun and creepy mystery. But, is it a cryptid?
- Yes. People claim to encounter the creature in other areas after the original Fresno incident came to light. If we consider cryptids as a mysterious and unrecognized creature that, supported by anecdotal (and bad video) evidence, then it’s a cryptid.
- Yes. Even if the supposition is that it’s an alien or spirit being, it’s a usually hidden entity that sometimes walks through our physical space. This is boosted by poorly sourced claims that it resembles some creature of Native American lore.
- No. In no way does it depict a plausible biological creature, and there is no indication it can be captured or has a typical organic existence; it looks like a pair of puppet pants; it’s a made-up creature.
- Yes. The Fresno nightcrawler always ranks high on lists of favorite cryptids. People remain fascinated by it, and it is the subject of a crazy amount of merchandise because it is cute and easy to draw! Pop cryptid all the way.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrGcxeyIPx4
Frogman Festival in March
Coming up on March 1-2 in Loveland, Ohio is the Frogman Festival celebrating the sightings of a humanoid frog- or lizard-like entity reported in 1955, 1972 and 2016. The festival features the usual family fun and merch vendors riding the Pop Cryptid wave. But the speakers are always my main interest. Among the paranormal and metaphysical “researchers” speaking at the event is an academic who is the most knowledgeable of all these presenters put together, Dr. Jeb Card. Unfortunately, this location is a bit too far for a day drive for me. If you are within reach, give it a go and let me know what you think.
Cryptid biographies
Incidentally, the Frogman has no well-researched cryptid biography. Surprisingly, neither does Mothman. Here are some recommended books to explore the “true” stories behind some famous cryptids:
- Tracking the Chupacabra: The Vampire Beast in Fact, Fiction, and Folklore – Benjamin Radford, 2011
- The Secret History of the Jersey Devil: How Quakers, Hucksters, and Benjamin Franklin Created a Monster – Brian Regal and Frank Esposito, 2018
- The Untold Story of Champ: A social history of America’s Loch Ness Monster – Robert Bartholomew, 2012
- Ogopogo: The True Story of the Okanagan Lake Million Dollar Monster – Arlene Gaal, 1955
- The Beast of Boggy Creek: The True Story of the Fouke Monster – Lyle Blackburn, 2012
- Lizard Man: The True Story of the Bishopville Monster – Lyle Blackburn, 2013
- The Great Sea Serpent: An Historical and Critical Treatise – A.C. Oudemans, 1892
- The Great New England Sea Serpent: An Account of Unknown Creatures Sighted by Many Respectable Persons Between 1638 and the Present Day – June P. O’Neill, 1999
- Bigfoot: The Life and Times of a Legend – Joshua Blu Buhs, 2009
- Bigfoot: The Yeti and Sasquatch in Myth and Reality – John Russell Napier, 1972
Might I suggest purchasing books from local or independent booksellers instead of Amazon. Try https://bookshop.org/ or https://www.ebooks.com/en-us/.
Book Review: A Natural History of Sea Serpents
A Natural History of Sea Serpents by Adrian Shine (Coming March 2025)
I am a tough book critic, particular regarding my favorite subject. No copy-paste, Wikipedia-sourced garbage passes muster with me. What I truly appreciate is a genuine expert, who has put in the time, presenting their well-reasoned arguments, supported by evidence. You can hardly get a better example of this than Adrian Shine’s new volume on sea serpents. Shine is the world’s foremost expert on the Loch Ness creature reports.In this book, he guides us through the history of a long-bodied swimming creature that people have reported for centuries, how it changed, and what people probably saw. For example, early sea serpent sightings were of “loops” surfacing in the water with the suggestion of a flexible tubular animal. But around 1848, Shine explains the change to interpreting the same shape as “humps” connected to the back of an animal with a larger middle, like a plesiosaur. This version of the idea also continued into Loch Ness reports.
There are an array of historical sightings by sailors and other credible witnesses for which sensationalistic cryptid literature will label as representing mysterious creatures or unknown species. Shine declares what all reasonable people with some biology background already know – a hooping/looping animal is absurd. Maned water creatures, like cadborosaurus, make no sense. The volumes of eyewitness testimony, examined individually, is not compelling to suggest a mystery creature exists; there is a complete dearth of scientific evidence for these water cryptids.
Shine blasts a few worn tropes clear out of the water. First, locals and professionals don’t always know the animal they are seeing, if it’s an animal at all. Everyone can be fooled by viewing an unfamiliar or atypical situation. Second, there is no need to invent new animals to account for these sightings. Third, no single animal is going to account for all the various descriptions grouped under a single phenomenon, such as “Nessie” or “sea serpent”.
Shine provides convincing explanations for the most famous accounts cited by cryptid proponents, and he supports his conclusions with photographic examples. Even though no exotic cryptid is proposed as an explanation, his presentation is fascinating.
As with other cryptid-related books of outstanding scholarship, cryptozoological proponents will reject, ignore, or foolishly try to sink it. Back in 2012, a few big-mouthed and small-minded cryptid fans protested the book Abominable Science by Loxton and Prothero, probably because it spelled out cogent arguments against the zoological reality of famous cryptid creatures. The bottom line for sci-cryptozoologists is that they still lack substantive evidence for their extraordinary claims. I suspect they will dislike Shine’s book too. Their loss. Or, the accumulated wisdom he has will be acknowledged and respected.
Thanks for reading! Send comments, questions, or suggestions to popcryptid(at)proton.me. If you want to send some cryptid plushies or other merch, or books to review, email for my physical mailing address.
For more, click on Pop goes the Cryptid landing page. Make sure you subscribe to all the posts – it’s always free and I don’t send annoying spam.
Pop Cryptid Spectator is also available on Substack. Please share this with cryptid fans you know!
#7 #ANaturalHistoryOfSeaSerpents #bookReview #cryptids #Cryptozoology #FresnoNightcrawler #LovelandFrogman #mokeleMbembe #popCryptid #PopCryptidSpectator #popCulture #seaSerpents
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An inspiring story about working with #Oakum!
My #Carpentry101 crash course, and the wonders of oakum
by Kathleen McQuillan, September 26, 2024
"With the season about to shift to autumn, my mind has been focused on the final steps to restore the exterior of my log house. A project I thought would take one summer is now rounding out the end of its third. And this summer, which I thought would surely be the last, will likely leave some important steps left for next year. My inner voice repeatedly chants, 'Perseverance, dear girl. Perseverance!'
"When I began this journey into the unknown, I decided to leave work on the east wall of the house for last because, in my preliminary assessment, it looked like it would require the most time and attention. Our bitter Minnesota winters and scorching summer heat had definitely taken a toll. Dense forest surrounds my place and is closest on the east side, creating persistent shade and humidity, and poor air circulation, that together contribute to more rotting and insects. Saving the worst until last was a big, big mistake. I learned too late. Never save the hardest stuff for the end. I know that now because, in my current state of project fatigue, facing that east wall is a bit like facing El Capitan.
"I thought I was so smart back in May when I jumped on that string of nice days we had and scraped, scrubbed, and sanded five decades of detritus from that east wall just to ready it for the first coat of penetrating stain that would protect the logs from rot and bugs for many years to come. No one could have predicted that June would produce some of the heaviest rains in centuries, followed by weeks of what meteorologists called 'pop-up showers' that showed up on a nearly daily basis until mid-July.
"It would take many weeks before the now saturated logs would dry thoroughly enough to stain. My frustration with the weather spawned waves of anxiety. Our summers are short, and time was a-wastin’! I knew I’d have to review the priorities on my to-do list and recalibrate the timetable. What I needed to identify was an indoor project until the weather decided to cooperate.
"I found myself completely shifting gears from exterior log work to something indoors. The lightbulb went on. I could start upgrading my 1980s experiment with #solar power. The equipment I’d installed way back then still functioned, but I knew it was losing its zip and was shockingly obsolete. This could be my opportunity. I resumed researching where I’d left off last winter. I determined how much power I would need and how much I could invest in new equipment. I also realized that I would need to construct an area suitable to assure my system could be kept warm in the winter. I decided to design an insulated 'closet' in my three-season addition.
"For that month of sequestration, I created a personalized Intro to Carpentry 101 crash course. Thanks to the generous array of battery-powered saws, drills, bits and blades that my sons had gifted to me at Christmas two years ago and some great YouTube videos I found, I was able to complete my first solo construction project. And now I have power! That rainy weather I’d so lamented had in fact allowed me the experience of learning to read a tape measure right down to the '16ths', and everything else involved. My next #DIY challenge will be wiring my own house.
"Finally, the weather began to cooperate. The logs were drying. But before I could start staining, I would need to insulate and seal the spaces between the logs. In times past, log builders would often turn to whatever materials were on hand whether #moss and #straw, shredded newspaper, or scraps of cotton and #woolen clothing. Today, the 'make-do' materials of our ancestors have been replaced by manufactured products such as fiberglass batts, spray foam, and 'elastometric' caulks, all of which I considered, until I discovered oakum.
"Oakum is made from multiple twisted strands of #jute and #hemp soaked in #PineTar and #bentonite, a compound derived from #VolcanicAsh. It is easily manipulated to fit the varied spaces between the logs and accommodate variations from their knots and other unique features. It acts as a natural deterrent to insects and can swell or shrink with changes in humidity, enhancing its sealing capabilities. It’s been around for centuries with one of its first uses in shipbuilding when skilled maritime craftsmen would salvage worn ropes from ships’ rigging to repurpose as filler for cracks and leaks in their 16th- and 17th-century wooden sailing ships. Later it was used to build the massive networks of pipes that transport drinking and wastewater underneath our major cities. It’s still used for many modern-day plumbing repairs.
"Working with oakum has taken some getting used to. Like so many aspects of my restoration project, it’s been another trial-and-error process, learning what it can and cannot do, requiring my patience and concentration in an almost meditative way. There is an art in how tightly to twist it, so it conforms and fills the nooks and crannies endemic to log buildings. I was able to purchase a vintage shipwright’s cast iron caulking tool that has proven to be perfect for the job. I sometimes muse the by-gone era when Maritimers masterfully employed the skills I’m just learning, ones that allowed for vast ocean crossings. I appreciate attempting a traditional practice that I hope will not be lost.
"I must confess. At times, I’ve questioned my sanity, as may have some of my friends. This endeavor to restore my cabin began in sheer ignorance, and has tested every part of my being — body, mind, and spirit. My biggest fear this year has been that I might 'age out' before it’s complete, something that would be a huge disappointment to me, and a burden left for somebody else.
"I owe my family, friends and community thanks for their patience and support. I’ve turned down many invitations to commit with my truth, 'If it’s a sunny day, I’ll need to work.' Next summer, I’d like things to be different. But this year has shown me, when it comes to time, or the weather, there are no guarantees. Our priorities will sometimes need discernment and adjustment. And everything we choose to do has the power to message something meaningful.
"In many a stressful moment, working with oakum has messaged me this. Take more time when you can. And appreciate the twists and turns."
Source:
https://www.timberjay.com/stories/my-carpentry-101-crash-course-and-the-wonders-of-oakum,22030#SolarPunkSunday #DIY #BuildYourOwn #NaturalMaterials #LogCabins #Shelter #Building
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Is Your Bank Really Texting You? 3 Red Flags of a Phishing Message.
2,483 words, 13 minutes read time.
The Psychological Architecture of the Smishing Epidemic
The mobile phone is the most intimate piece of hardware in the modern world, a device that lives in our pockets and demands our immediate attention with every haptic buzz and notification chime. This proximity creates a dangerous psychological feedback loop where the user is conditioned to respond to SMS messages with a level of trust that they would never afford an unsolicited email. While email has decades of junk mail filters and visible header data to warn us of danger, the SMS interface is deceptively clean and stripped of context. When a text arrives claiming to be from a major financial institution, it enters a high-trust environment where the barrier between a legitimate service alert and a criminally organized credential harvest is virtually non-existent. Analyzing the current threat landscape, it is clear that the surge in smishing is not merely a technical failure of our telecommunications infrastructure, but a masterful exploitation of human neurobiology. Attackers understand that by bypassing the corporate firewall and landing directly on a victim’s personal device, they are catching the user in a state of cognitive vulnerability, often while they are distracted, tired, or multi-tasking.
The sheer volume of these attacks indicates a shift toward the industrialization of mobile deception. According to recent data, bank impersonation via text message has skyrocketed to become one of the most reported scams, primarily because the return on investment is staggering compared to traditional phishing. It costs almost nothing for an adversary to blast out thousands of messages using automated scripts and cheap gateway services, yet the potential payoff is total access to a victim’s financial life. This is not a hobbyist’s game; it is a highly refined business model that relies on the trusted screen effect. We have been trained to view our phone numbers as a secure second factor for authentication, which ironically makes us more susceptible to the very messages that seek to undermine that security. Consequently, the first step in defending against these attacks is to dismantle the inherent trust we place in the SMS protocol, recognizing that the medium itself is fundamentally insecure and easily manipulated by anyone with a malicious intent and a basic understanding of social engineering.
Red Flag #1: The False Sense of Urgency and Emotional Manipulation
The most potent weapon in a smisher’s arsenal is not a sophisticated zero-day exploit, but the manufactured crisis. Every successful bank-themed phishing message is designed to trigger a physiological response that prioritizes immediate action over rational analysis. When you receive a text stating that your account has been suspended due to suspicious activity or that a large transfer is pending your approval, the attacker is forcing you into a high-stakes decision window. They know that a panicked user is unlikely to look for the subtle technical flaws in the message because their primary focus is on resolving the perceived threat to their financial stability. This artificial urgency is a deliberate tactic to bypass the critical thinking filters that would otherwise identify the message as fraudulent. In the world of social engineering, time is the enemy of the victim and the best friend of the predator. By imposing a deadline, the adversary effectively shuts down the user’s ability to verify the claim through official channels.
Furthermore, these messages often utilize a push-pull dynamic of fear and relief. The initial fear of a compromised account is immediately followed by the perceived relief of a simple solution provided in the form of a link. This emotional roller coaster is a hallmark of sophisticated phishing kits where the goal is to drive the victim toward a pre-built landing page that mimics the bank’s actual login portal. I see this pattern repeated across thousands of observed samples: the language is always direct, the consequence is always severe, and the solution is always a single click away. Professionals must understand that a legitimate financial institution will never use a medium as volatile and insecure as SMS to demand immediate, high-stakes action involving sensitive credentials. If a message makes your heart rate spike before you’ve even finished reading the first sentence, that is not a customer service alert; it is a psychological exploit in progress. The grit of the situation is that these attackers are betting on your human instinct to protect what is yours, and they are winning because our biological hardware hasn’t evolved as fast as their social engineering software.
Red Flag #2: Deconstructing the Malicious URL and Domain Spoofing
The technical linchpin of a bank impersonation scam is the hyperlink, a digital trapdoor designed to look like a bridge to safety. In a legitimate banking environment, URLs are predictable, branded, and hosted on top-level domains that the institution has spent millions of dollars securing. However, attackers rely on the fact that the average mobile user rarely inspects the full string of a URL on a five-inch screen. To obscure their intent, they leverage URL shorteners or link-in-bio services that strip away the destination’s identity, replacing a recognizable bank domain with a sanitized, high-trust string of characters. When you see a link that begins with a generic shortening service, you are looking at a deliberate attempt to hide a malicious redirection chain. This infrastructure is often backed by sophisticated Phishing-as-a-Service platforms which generate unique, one-time-use links for every target. This makes it significantly harder for automated security filters to flag the domain as malicious because the URL effectively dies after it has been clicked by the intended victim, leaving no trail for threat researchers to follow in real-time.
Beyond simple shortening, more advanced adversaries utilize typosquatting or punycode attacks to create a visual illusion of legitimacy. They might register a domain that replaces a lowercase letter with a similarly shaped number, or they use international character sets that look identical to the English alphabet but lead to an entirely different server in a jurisdiction where law enforcement is non-existent. These spoofed domains are often hosted on legitimate cloud infrastructure, which allows them to bypass reputation-based filters that only look for bad neighborhoods on the internet. Once you click that link, you aren’t just visiting a website; you are entering a controlled environment where every pixel has been engineered to mirror your bank’s actual interface. The gritty reality is that by the time you realize the URL in the address bar is off by a single character, your keystrokes have already been captured by a headless browser or an Adversary-in-the-Middle proxy. Analyzing these landing pages reveals a level of craft that includes working help links and legitimate-looking privacy policies, all designed to keep you in the trust zone just long enough to hand over your credentials.
Red Flag #3: Inconsistencies in Delivery Architecture and Metadata
If you want to spot a fraudster, you have to look at the plumbing of the message itself. Legitimate financial institutions invest heavily in Short Code registries—those five or six-digit numbers that are strictly regulated and vetted by telecommunications carriers. When a bank sends an automated alert, it almost always originates from one of these verified short codes because they allow for high-throughput, reliable delivery that is difficult for scammers to spoof at scale. In contrast, most smishing attacks originate from standard ten-digit Long Codes or, increasingly, from email addresses masquerading as phone numbers via the SMS gateway. If a message claiming to be from a multi-billion dollar global bank arrives from a random area code in a different state or a Gmail address, the architecture of the delivery is screaming that it is a fraud. These long codes are essentially burner numbers, bought in bulk through VoIP providers or generated via automated botnets of compromised mobile devices. The disconnect between the supposed sender and the technical origin of the message is a massive red flag that is hiding in plain sight.
Furthermore, the metadata and lack of personalization provide critical clues to the message’s illegitimacy. A real bank notification is tied to a specific account and a specific customer profile; it will often include a partial account number or use a specific format that matches previous interactions you have had with that institution. Smishing messages, however, are designed for the spray and pray method. They use generic salutations like “Dear Customer” or “Valued Member” because the attacker doesn’t actually know who you are; they only know that your phone number was part of a massive data leak from a social media breach or a compromised e-commerce database. These messages are sent to thousands of people simultaneously, betting on the statistical probability that a certain percentage will actually have an account with the bank being impersonated. This lack of specificity is a hallmark of industrial-scale social engineering. When you receive a text that feels like a form letter with an artificial sense of emergency, it is a clear sign that you are being targeted by an automated script rather than a legitimate service department. The absence of your name or specific account details isn’t just a lapse in customer service; it is a fundamental technical indicator of a malicious campaign.
The Failure of Traditional MFA against Modern Smishing
The most dangerous misconception in modern personal security is the belief that Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) via SMS is an impenetrable shield. While having any MFA is better than none, the grit of the current threat landscape is that smishing has evolved to bypass these secondary layers with ease. Modern phishing kits are no longer static pages that just steal a password; they are dynamic proxies that facilitate Adversary-in-the-Middle (AiTM) attacks. When a victim enters their credentials into a fraudulent bank portal, the attacker’s server passes those credentials to the real bank’s login page in real-time. The bank then sends a legitimate MFA code to the victim’s phone. The victim, thinking they are on the real site, enters that code into the attacker’s portal. The attacker then intercepts that code and uses it to complete the login on the real site, effectively hijacking the session. Within seconds, the adversary has bypassed the very security measure designed to stop them, proving that SMS-based codes are a liability in a world of proxied attacks.
This technical reality necessitates a shift toward more robust authentication standards. Analyzing the successful breaches of the last few years, it is evident that the only reliable defense against smishing-induced MFA bypass is the implementation of hardware-backed security keys or FIDO2/WebAuthn standards. These methods use public-key cryptography to ensure that the authentication attempt is tied to the specific, legitimate domain of the service provider. If an attacker directs a victim to a spoofed domain, the security key will simply refuse to authenticate because the domain signature doesn’t match. Consequently, relying on “text-to-verify” is essentially building a house of cards in a hurricane. We must move toward a zero-trust model for mobile interactions where no incoming text message is considered valid until it is verified through a separate, trusted out-of-band channel, such as calling the official number on the back of your physical debit card or using the bank’s official, sandboxed mobile application.
Hardening the Human and Technical Perimeter
Defeating the smishing threat requires more than just a sharp eye for typos; it requires a fundamental change in how we interact with our mobile devices. The first line of defense is a technical one: treat every unsolicited message as a potential payload. This means never clicking a link in an SMS, regardless of how legitimate it looks or how much pressure the message applies. Instead, the standard operating procedure should be to close the messaging app and navigate directly to the bank’s official website by typing the address into the browser yourself, or by opening the official app. This simple act of “breaking the chain” completely neutralizes the attacker’s redirection infrastructure. Furthermore, users should take advantage of mobile threat defense (MTD) tools and carrier-level spam reporting features. By forwarding suspicious messages to the “7726” (SPAM) short code used by most major carriers, you are contributing to a global database that helps telecommunications providers block these malicious origin points before they reach the next victim.
Ultimately, we have to accept that the SMS protocol was never designed with security in mind; it was designed for convenience. In a professional context, this means that organizations must stop using SMS for sensitive customer communications and move toward encrypted, authenticated in-app messaging. For the individual, it means adopting a mindset of aggressive skepticism. If your bank really needs to reach you, they will use a secure channel or a verified notification system that doesn’t rely on a fragile, easily spoofed text message. The gritty truth is that as long as people keep clicking, criminals will keep texting. By identifying these red flags—the manufactured urgency, the mangled URLs,
Call to Action
The digital battlefield is no longer confined to server rooms and encrypted tunnels; it is in the palm of your hand, vibrating in your pocket every time a predator decides to test your defenses. You can no longer afford to treat an SMS as a “simple text.” In an era where organized crime syndicates use automated botnets to exploit human fear, your only real firewall is a shift in mindset. You have the technical red flags—the artificial urgency, the mangled URLs, and the broken delivery architecture. Now, you have to use them.
Don’t wait until your balance hits zero to start taking mobile security seriously. Audit your accounts today. If you’re still relying on SMS-based two-factor authentication for your primary banking, you are leaving the door unlocked for any adversary with a proxy kit. Switch to a hardware-backed security key or an authenticator app immediately. The next time you receive a “critical alert” from your bank, don’t click. Don’t reply. Delete the message, open your browser, and go to the source yourself. The criminals are betting that you’ll be too distracted to notice the trap; prove them wrong by staying relentlessly skeptical. Your data is your responsibility—defend it like it.
SUPPORTSUBSCRIBECONTACT MED. Bryan King
Sources
- Verizon 2024 Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR)
- CISA: Identifying and Mitigating SMS Phishing (Smishing)
- NIST: Behavioral Science and Cybersecurity Phishing Research
- MITRE: Strategies for Stopping Phishing Attacks
- Krebs on Security: The Era of Easy Smishing
- FCC: New Rules on Combating Illegal Robotexts and Smishing
- MITRE ATT&CK: Phishing: Forging Communications (SMS)
- Proofpoint: The Smishing Landscape and Mobile Threat Trends
- Zscaler: The Rise of Phishing-as-a-Service (PhaaS)
- Microsoft Security: Evolving Trends in Smishing
- FTC: Reports of Phishing Texts Top All Other Impersonation Scams
- Scamwatch: Deep Dive into Bank Impersonation Tactics
- ENISA Threat Landscape: Social Engineering and Phishing Trends
Disclaimer:
The views and opinions expressed in this post are solely those of the author. The information provided is based on personal research, experience, and understanding of the subject matter at the time of writing. Readers should consult relevant experts or authorities for specific guidance related to their unique situations.
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These are tough times for #YouthWorkers in NZ right now - I just had to cancel another training workshop due to low ticket sales (and we have one of the best, and most respected, trainers in the industry).
Due mostly to massive funding cuts across the charitable & non-profit sector organisations can't afford to invest in PD at the moment, and that means less-qualified staff, who feel less valued, and who we know from internal research are paid well below other sectors.
Every week, another charity providing critical social work with at-risk populations goes under - even while funding for prisons is increased.
It reminds me that, actually, we have *all* of the answers we need to solve social problems - and the people to do it - but we do not have the will.
For some, it seems, charities must eternally exist as part of a moral eco-system where poor & vulnerable people must also eternally exist, along with 'baddies' that do crime. "That's just the way the world is" they will say, smiling, as they dispense Weetbix and budgeting advice with a patronising smile.
It's all rubbish. We made this world, and we can choose to make it different. The people I work with daily show-up and change people's lives for the better. They get shit pay and no respect, but they do it anyway. They have hope for the young people they work with. They foster that hope in these rangatahi. It is infectious. It is crucial. And I wish we had that same hope and aspiration for our society as a whole.
As it stands we are most definitely not #Sorted.
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The fault in our system: Why The George Stinney Jr. story is still important
Table of Contents
- Introduction: The Fault in the System
- The Systemic Failure of 1944
- The Architecture of a Loophole
- The 13th Amendment and the “Except” Clause
- 81 Days: The Velocity of Injustice
- Isolation, Confession, and the Ten-Minute Verdict
- The Silent Suspect: When Justice is a Shield
- The Burke Family and the Protected Elite
- The Physical Impossibility
- Engineering and the Laws of Physics vs. State Narrative
- The Pattern: Beyond Alcolu
- The Ghosts of Alexander McClay Williams, Joe Persons, and James Arcene
- The Filter of Justice: Calibrating the Outcome
- Over-Policing, Differential Processing, and the “Crime Rate” Myth
- The Economic Engineering of Poverty: Wealth Theft
- The Removal of the Breadwinner and Generational Economic Erasure
- The “Why” of the Present
- Modern Parallels and the Continuity of Disparity
- A Note on “The Green Mile”
- Magical Realism vs. Historical Reality
- Conclusion: Closing the Loophole
Introduction: The fault in the system
When I first told my wife and my son about the subject of my next article, they cringed. I don’t blame them. As an engineer who spends my days developing solutions that ensure the reliability and integrity of the systems my clients depend on, my life is dedicated to solutions that are sound. But the story of George Stinney Jr. is a systems failure so profound, so gut-wrenching, that the natural human instinct is to look away.
I struggled with the “why” myself. Why revisit a tragedy from 1944? Why drag a 14-year-old boy back into the light only to watch him sit on a Bible to fit into an electric chair? The answer lies in the foundation of our country. If we do not understand the “Stinney Era,” we cannot understand the modern carceral state. We are not just looking at a sad story; we are looking at the blueprint of mass incarceration—the “teeth” that gave the Jim Crow era its bite.
The Architecture of a Loophole
To understand why George Stinney was executed in 81 days, we have to go back further than 1944. We have to look at the 13th Amendment. While we celebrate it for “ending” slavery, it contained a structural flaw that was exploited by design:
“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States…”
That “except” clause is the most expensive word in American history. It created a legal bypass. If the state could label a Black person a “criminal,” it could legally return them to a state of servitude. Following the Civil War, Southern states engineered “Black Codes”—laws that criminalized everything from “vagrancy” to “loud talking.” This wasn’t about public safety; it was about labor and social control. The convict leasing system that followed was a direct evolution of the plantation, and by the mid-20th century, this system had evolved into the machinery of state-sanctioned terror that caught George Stinney in its gears.
81 Days: The Velocity of Injustice
In March 1944, in the segregated mill town of Alcolu, South Carolina, two young white girls—Betty June Binnicker and Mary Emma Thames—were found dead in a ditch. The town wanted blood. George Stinney Jr., a 95-pound Black boy who had been seen near the girls earlier that day, was the easiest target.
The “system” functioned with terrifying efficiency:
- Isolation: George was interrogated alone. His parents were forced to flee town under threat of violence, leaving their child in the hands of a mob-controlled state.
- The “Confession”: The police claimed he confessed. No written record of this confession exists. There were no witnesses to the statement.
- The Trial: The trial lasted barely two hours. George’s court-appointed lawyer, a tax commissioner with no trial experience, called zero witnesses and performed no cross-examination.
- The Jury: An all-white jury took less than ten minutes to find him guilty. They did not recommend mercy.
On June 16, 1944, George Stinney Jr. became the youngest person executed in 20th-century America. He was so small that the adult-sized electrodes wouldn’t fit his head. They used a Bible—the very book used to swear in the “justice” that was killing him—as a booster seat. When the current hit, the oversized mask fell off, exposing his terrified, weeping face to the witnesses.
The Silent Suspect: When Justice is a Shield
If George Stinney Jr. did not kill those two girls, then who did? For seventy years, the state of South Carolina acted as if the question were settled. But in the decades following the execution, a much more sinister reality began to emerge from the shadows of Alcolu.
The leading theory, supported by local testimony and research presented during the 2014 exoneration hearing, points toward George Burke Jr. He was the son of a prominent white businessman who owned the lumber mill where George’s father worked. More chillingly, Burke’s father was the foreman of the jury that sent George Stinney to the electric chair.
The community had whispered for years about a deathbed confession from the Burke family, but in 1944, those whispers were a death sentence. In the social hierarchy of a segregated mill town, a member of the Burke family was untouchable. The “system” didn’t just need a culprit; it needed a diversion. By sacrificing a 14-year-old Black boy, the state provided the white community with “closure” while ensuring the powerful remained protected. This is the ultimate callousness: the law wasn’t used to find the truth; it was used as a shield for the privileged and a shroud for the innocent.
The Physical Impossibility
We must also look at the physics—the cold, hard data that the 1944 court ignored. The girls were killed with a fourteen-inch railroad spike, suffering massive skull fractures. Forensic experts in 2014 testified that it would have been physically impossible for a 95-pound child to wield such a weapon with the force required to kill two people while also managing to overpower them both.
George had an alibi—his sister, Amie, was with him grazing the family cow when the girls passed by—but in a system designed to exploit the “punishment clause” of the 13th Amendment, an alibi is just noise. The “duly convicted” label was the goal, and the state achieved it by ignoring the laws of physics and the screams of a child.
The Pattern: Beyond Alcolu
George was a centerpiece, but he was not an anomaly. As I researched this, I found the ghosts of other children whose names have been scrubbed from the collective memory:
- Alexander McClay Williams (1931): At 16, he was the youngest person executed in Pennsylvania history. His “confession” was coerced, and the state suppressed evidence of a bloody handprint that didn’t match his. It took until 2022 for his conviction to be vacated.
- Joe Persons (1915): A boy in Georgia, estimated to be 12 or 13, who was so small that officials debated adding weights to his feet so the hanging would “work.”
- James Arcene (1885): A Cherokee youth executed for a crime committed when he was just 10 years old.
In each of these cases, the 13th Amendment’s “duly convicted” clause was the shield. By providing the thin veneer of a trial, the state could legally commit what was essentially a lynching.
The Filter of Justice: Calibrating the Outcome
When we discuss mass incarceration, a common counter-argument often arises: “Don’t Black people simply commit more crime?” I know that if you calibrate a sensor to only look for anomalies in one specific area, your data will be skewed. To understand the disparity, we must look past the “output” and analyze the “filter” of the legal machine.
1. The Frequency of Interaction Fallacy
The argument that Black people “commit more crime” often confuses crime rates with arrest rates. A 2023 UCLA study using smartphone data from 10,000 officers across 23 cities found that police spend significantly more time in Black neighborhoods, even when those neighborhoods have the same crime rates and income levels as white neighborhoods.
The result is simple math: if you put 100 police officers in one neighborhood and two in another, you will “discover” more crime in the first one—even if the actual behavior is identical. This creates a “feedback loop” where higher arrest records are used to justify even more policing, artificially inflating the statistical profile of a community.
2. Drug Use vs. Drug Arrests
This is the “smoking gun” of systemic bias. For decades, federal surveys from the CDC and the NAACP have shown that Black and white Americans use and sell drugs at almost identical rates. However, despite similar usage, Black Americans are nearly 4 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession and 6 times more likely to be incarcerated for drug charges overall. It’s not about who is committing the crime; it’s about who the system is looking for.
3. The “Differential Processing” of Justice
Even when the crime and the criminal history are identical, the system treats the bodies differently:
- Bail: Black defendants are 21% more likely to be denied bail, which forces them to stay in jail while awaiting trial—leading to lost jobs, lost homes, and a higher likelihood of eventually taking a “guilty plea” just to go home.
- Plea Bargaining: Prosecutors are more likely to offer plea deals that include prison time to Black defendants, while white defendants are more likely to be offered “diversion programs” or probation.
- Sentencing Length: According to 2026 data reports, Black men receive sentences that are 19.1% longer than white men for the exact same crimes.
4. Wrongful Convictions: The Margin of Error
If the system were truly objective, the rate of “mistakes” would be equal. It isn’t. Black people make up 13% of the population but over 50% of the exonerated population. Innocent Black people are 7 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of murder and 12 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of drug crimes than white people.
George Stinney Jr. is the historical proof of this. The system didn’t care about the truth; it cared about “closure” that fit the racial hierarchy. When someone says, “they commit more crime,” they are looking at the output of a machine and assuming it is a neutral scale. But as an engineer, I see a filter. It filters out white crime through warnings and diversions, and it filters in Black crime through over-policing and structural bias.
The Economic Engineering of Poverty: Wealth Theft
If you want to understand why a large percentage of the Black community remains trapped in poverty today, you need to look no further than the “teeth” of mass incarceration. It was never just about free labor for a season; it was about the permanent maintenance of a lower class.
When the state arrested George Stinney Jr., they didn’t just take a child; they destroyed a household. Within hours of his arrest, his father was fired from the local lumber mill. The family was given mere hours to vacate their company-owned housing and flee the town. They left behind their possessions, their community, and their stability.
Mass incarceration acts as a surgical strike against the Black family unit. By removing men—and in George’s case, the future men of the community—the system achieves several objectives:
- Destruction of the Household Anchor: Historically, when a man was incarcerated or executed, the family lost its primary earner. According to the American Journal of Sociology, paternal incarceration is one of the single greatest predictors of a family falling below the poverty line.
- The “Marriageable Men” Gap: By disproportionately removing Black men from the community, the state created a demographic vacuum. This forced single mothers into a cycle of “survival labor,” where the ability to save, invest, or purchase property became a mathematical impossibility.
- Educational Depletion: A 2014 study by the National Academy of Sciences found that the children of incarcerated parents are significantly less likely to graduate from college, creating a “secondary sentence” that spans generations.
The Numbers Behind the Theft
The statistics are staggering:
- The Wealth Gap: Today, the median white household holds roughly eight times the wealth of the median Black household. This is not a failure of work ethic; it is a result of a century of wealth-stripping policies.
- Lifetime Loss: The Brennan Center for Justice estimated that formerly incarcerated people lose an average of $500,000 in lifetime earnings. When you multiply that by the millions of Black men swept up in the “War on Drugs,” you are looking at trillions of dollars in wealth that never entered the Black community.
- Voter Disenfranchisement: In many states, a felony conviction (the “duly convicted” status of the 13th Amendment) leads to the loss of voting rights. This removes the community’s ability to vote for the very policies—school funding and housing—that build wealth.
Mass incarceration is not a “side effect” of poverty; it is the architect of it. It ensures that the Black community remains in a state of “perpetual catch-up.” Every time a generation begins to build equity, a new wave of “tough on crime” legislation resets the clock.
The “Why” of the Present
People ask me why this matters now. It matters because the “punishment clause” is still in the Constitution. The transition from the Jim Crow executions of the 40s to the mass incarceration boom of the 80s and 90s is a straight line.
I know that systems don’t fix themselves. When we look at the racial disparities in our modern prison system, we are seeing the same logic that executed George Stinney. We are seeing a system that prioritizes “closure” and “control” over “integrity.”
When the Stinney family was run out of town, they lost their property, their stability, and their history. This is how the wealth gap was engineered. Mass incarceration isn’t just about the person in the cell; it is about the “Generational Theft” of Black potential. We care about George Stinney because his execution was a warning shot: The law does not belong to you.
A Note on “The Green Mile”
By the way, as I dug into this, I noticed how many people believe that Stephen King’s The Green Mile is based on George Stinney. While King has never confirmed this, the parallels are undeniable: the two girls, the rural South, the wrongful execution.
But there is a dangerous difference. In the movie, John Coffey is a “Magical Negro”—a gentle giant with supernatural powers. In reality, George Stinney had no magic. He was just a scared 14-year-old child who wanted to go home. By turning these tragedies into “magical fables,” we risk softening the edges of the reality. We don’t need magic to explain George’s innocence; we just need to look at the physics of a 90-pound boy and the corruption of a system that didn’t care to measure the weight of the evidence.
Conclusion: Closing the Loophole
In 2014, seventy years after he was killed, Judge Carmen Mullen vacated George Stinney’s conviction. She cited “fundamental, constitutional violations of due process.” It was a victory, but a hollow one. You cannot return 70 years of life to a boy who was burned to death by his own government.
We revisit this story because the “crack” in the foundation is still there. As long as the 13th Amendment allows for slavery-by-another-name, and as long as our system views Black children as “superpredators” rather than children, George Stinney is not a ghost of the past. He is a mirror of the present.
If a system is designed to protect some by sacrificing others, it has no integrity. It is a bridge waiting to collapse. We owe it to George—and to the children whose names we don’t yet know—to stop patching the cracks and start questioning the blueprint. Until the “except as punishment” loophole is closed and the law is applied without the filter of power and race, we aren’t living in a state of justice. We are just living in a very long, very crowded Green Mile.
Glossary of Terms
- 13th Amendment (Punishment Clause): The section of the US Constitution that abolished slavery except as punishment for a crime, creating a legal loophole for involuntary servitude.
- Black Codes: Laws passed by Southern states after the Civil War to restrict the freedom of Black Americans and compel them to work in a labor economy based on low wages or debt.
- Convict Leasing: A system in which state penitentiaries leased incarcerated people to private companies (e.g., coal mines, railroads) for labor.
- Differential Processing: The phenomenon where individuals of different races are treated differently by the criminal justice system even when the alleged crimes are identical.
- Doli Incapax: A legal doctrine (often ignored in the Jim Crow era) suggesting that children below a certain age are incapable of forming the intent to commit a crime.
- Generational Wealth Theft: The systemic removal of assets, property, and earning potential from a specific community over time, preventing the accumulation of intergenerational wealth.
- Jim Crow Era: The period (late 19th century to mid-20th century) characterized by state and local laws that enforced racial segregation in the United States.
- Vacated Conviction: A legal ruling that voids a previous conviction, treating it as if it never happened due to errors or violations of rights (as seen in Stinney’s 2014 case).
Bibliography & References
Legal & Historical Documents
- U.S. Const. amend. XIII. (1865). The 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution.
- State of South Carolina v. George Stinney, Jr. (1944). Trial Transcript and Court Records (Archived).
- Mullen, C. (2014). Order Vacating Judgment in the Case of State v. George Stinney, Jr. Circuit Court of South Carolina.
Academic Research & Books
- Alexander, M. (2010). The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. The New Press.
- Blackmon, D. A. (2008). Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II. Doubleday.
- National Academy of Sciences. (2014). The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences. National Academies Press.
- The Sentencing Project. (2023). The Color of Justice: Racial and Ethnic Disparity in State Prisons. ### Articles & Data Reports
- Brennan Center for Justice. (2022). Conviction, Imprisonment, and Lost Earnings: How the Criminal Justice System Deepens Inequality.
- UCLA Department of Sociology. (2023). Police Activity Analysis: Surveillance and Deployment in Urban Environments.
- U.S. Sentencing Commission. (2024-2026). Report to the Congress: Federal Sentencing Statistics and Fentanyl Trafficking Trends.
- Urban Institute. (2026). Racial Disparities in Charging and Plea Bargaining: A Longitudinal Study.
- Introduction: The Fault in the System
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What is greenwashing?
Over the course of the 20th century, capitalism preserved its momentum by moulding the ordinary person into a consumer. Using advertising to encourage in people the ravenous hunger for purchasing more stuff and the accompanying feeling of hollowness and a need for more and more.
At the end of the 20th century, environmental problems began to arise from unchecked capitalist growth
Ever-expanding growth and the over-exploitation of land, water and animals continued at pace. Even despite its immense cost to animals, ecosystems and people in the developing world.
Even despite predictions by scientists that the world would be destroyed.
Out of-control global corporates needed strong storytelling and PR to support their continued exponential growth.
This insane need for economic/corporate growth gave rise to the ‘Green Growth’ and ‘Sustainability’ movements. The marketing and PR tactics employed to justify the continued growth of these brands and products despite their destruction, is known as:
Greenwashing
https://twitter.com/esm_magazine/status/1448197400879943680?s=20
https://twitter.com/Context_Group/status/1126528027402203138?s=20
Original Tweet
https://twitter.com/FoodNavigator/status/872467048009486336?s=20
https://twitter.com/RubenBrunsveld/status/1448552977665507330?s=20
https://twitter.com/Morgante_Fra/status/1191550867561836544?s=20
https://twitter.com/Context_Group/status/1271130962089381888?s=20
The origins of greenwashing can be found in the origins of consumerism, advertising and marketing itself
This is most powerfully illustrated by one of the original source about marketing from between the world wars by Edward Bernays, a landmark book called Propaganda published in 1928. This book would be instrumental for setting in train the agenda for economic growth in the West in the 20th Century.
Propaganda by Edward Bernays (1928)
“The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.… It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind, who harness old social forces and contrive new ways to bind and guide the world”
Mass production is profitable only if its rhythm can be maintained—that is if it can continue to sell its product in steady or increasing quantity.… Today supply must actively seek to create its corresponding demand … [and] cannot afford to wait until the public asks for its product; it must maintain constant touch, through advertising and propaganda … to assure itself the continuous demand which alone will make its costly plant profitable.
WHO considers marketing by the palm oil industry to be akin to tobacco and alcohol marketing
Marketing of palm oil does not occur in the traditional sense. Responding to a backlash against accusations of poor environmental and labour practices, the industry has sought to portray its products as sustainable, while highlighting the contribution to poverty alleviation.
There is also a mutual benefit for the palm oil and processed food industry, with the latter targeting advertisements for ultra-processed foods towards children (similar to efforts by the tobacco and alcohol industries in targeting children and adolescents) and the palm oil refining industry benefiting from the corresponding increase in sales of foods containing palm oil.The palm oil industry and noncommunicable diseases, (2019),
Sowmya Kadandale, a Robert Martenb & Richard Smith.
World Health Organisation Bulletin.A 2019 World Health Organisation (WHO) report into the palm oil industry and RSPO finds extensive greenwashing of palm oil deforestation and the murder of endangered animals (i.e. biodiversity loss)
Read moreWorld Organisation of Zoos and Aquariums (WAZA) Guide for promoting sustainable palm oil
https://twitter.com/FoodNavigator/status/872467048009486336?s=20
Sustainability is meaningless, it’s time for a new enlightenment
Effectively, sustainability became the main ingredient of a “having your cake and eating it” ideology. The environment, and its ecological systems, were deemed to be sustained while equally economic development could continue apace.
But if sustainable development had delivered on its promise, humanity would now not be facing the crisis we call climate change.
Greenwashing solves nothing.
What was, and is, actually needed is the opposite of what has been promoted in order to try to maintain the economic status quo.
Dr Toni Fry, Griffith University ‘Sustainability is meaningless, it’s time for a new enlightenment, The Conversation.
Research into how to influence voluntary standards using expert knowledge
“The ability of developing countries, especially small-scale actors within them, to shape standard setting and management to their advantage depends not only on overcoming important structural differences…but also on more subtle games. These include promoting the enrolment of one expert group or kind of expert knowledge over another, using specific formats of negotiation, and legitimating particular modes of engagement over others.”
Voluntary standards, expert knowledge and the governance of sustainability networks. (2013), Ponte, S. & Cheyns, E. Glob. Netw. 13, 459–477
The Vice President of the European Parliament Heidi Hautala does not trust the RSPO’s false and weak promise of “sustainable” palm oil
She replies to my conversation on Twitter to advise of this…
Heidi Hautala, Vice-President of the European Parliament and part of the the Human Rights and Democracy panel and Eco-Management and Audit Scheme (EMAS)“No voluntary standards or industry schemes have done the job fully [of eliminating deforestation or human rights abuses]. That is why the game-changing EU CSDDD [Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive] is mandatory. Certification is a useful tool but will not liberate the company from its duty of due diligence”
~ Heidi Hautala, Vice-President of the European Parliament and part of the the Human Rights and Democracy panel and Eco-Management and Audit Scheme (EMAS)
https://twitter.com/HeidiHautala/status/1671422744683225088?s=20
Is it possible to design an eco-label without greenwashing?
In his book ‘Beyond Greenwash’ Hamish Van Der Ven somewhat naively sets out to answer that question.
Naive because embedded within capitalism is the drive towards exponential growth and the ecosystems and resources of our planet are finite – which makes it naive to think that we can continue to labour under the same system, yet expect a different result.
Still Van Der Ven has some valid insights to share here about how a eco-label could theoretically be designed to be free from greenwashing.
An eco-label without greenwashing has yet to materialise. This is because our current economic system does not consider ‘value’ to include: human rights, animal rights, the beauty of unspoiled nature and forests left intact – the only way the current system quantifies ‘value’ is financial growth. The virtue-signalling about doing the right thing and improving human rights, animal rights, environmental sustainability is greenwashing. If businesses DID care, these issues would have been sorted. Instead, they provide consumers with empty words and promises.
Is it transparent?
Dubious eco-labels keep everything offline or hidden behind pay walls; credible eco-labels make their information freely available online, including information around breaches of rules and regulations and their resolutions, governance and funding.
Is it independent?
- Consumers and procurement professionals should be wary of self-awarded ecolabels. Instead seek out ecolabels from a credible third-party organisation.
- There should also be independence between the organisation that sets the standard and the organization that audits compliance against its criteria. This is important for preventing a conflict of interest.
- Standard-setters generally receive revenues based on how widely their eco-labels are used. An eco-labeling organization that checks compliance against its own standard has an incentive to overlook non-compliances and set a lower bar for achievement.
Is it inclusive?
Do all stakeholders get a say in decision-making? If an eco-label promotes sustainable coffee production, then it should involve coffee farmers, scientists, processers, NGOs, and community members (amongst others) in standard-setting.
10 Tactics of Sustainable Palm Oil Greenwashing
Greenwashing Tactic #1: Hidden Trade Off
When a brand makes token changes while continuing with deforestation, ecocide or human rights abuses in another part of their business – this is ‘Hidden Trade Off’
For example, Nestle talks up satellite monitoring to stop palm oil deforestation. Yet…
Greenwashing Tactic #2: No Proof
Claiming a brand or commodity is green without any supporting evidence The RSPO promises to deliver this with their certification: 1. Improves the livelihoods of small holder farmers 2. Stops illegal indigenous land-grabbing and human rights abuses 3. Stops deforestation…
Greenwashing Tactic #3: Vagueness
Claiming a brand or commodity is ‘green’ or ‘sustainable’ based on broad generalisations, unclear language or vague statements Jump to section Greenwashing: Vagueness in Language Greenwashing: Vagueness in certification standards Reality: Auditing of RSPO a failure Quote: EIA: Who Watches…
Greenwashing Tactic #4: Fake Labels
Claiming a brand or commodity is green based on unreliable, ineffective endorsements or eco-labels such as the RSPO, Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) or FairTrade coffee and cocoa. Greenwashing: Fake Labels and fake certifications Ecolabels are designed to reassure consumers that…
Greenwashing Tactic #5: Irrelevance and Deflection
Claiming a brand, commodity or industry is green based on irrelevant information Jump to section Greenwashing: Irrelevant Topics Greenwashing: Colonial Racism Research: Palm oil greenwashing and its link to climate denialism Reality: RSPO Certification Doesn’t Stop Deforestation, Human Rights Abuses…
Greenwashing Tactic #6: The Lesser of Two Evils
Claiming that a brand, commodity or industry is greener than others in the same category, in order to excuse ecocide, deforestation, human rights and animal rights abuses. Jump to section Greenwashing: Lesser of Two Evils: Palm Oil Uses Less Land…
Telling outright lies over and over again to consumers until they are believed as truth Jump to section Greenwashing: Endangered species Reality: Endangered species Greenwashing: Human rights, land-grabbing and livelihoods for workers Reality: Human rights, land-grabbing and livelihoods for workers…
Greenwashing Tactic #8: Design & Words
Using design principles and greenwashing language in order to trigger emotional and unconscious responses in consumers Jump to section Greenwashing: Design Principles Greenwashing Design Example: Palm Done Right Greenwashing Design Example: WWF Palm Oil Scorecard 2021 Greenwashing with Words: Vegan…
Greenwashing Tactic #9: Partnerships, Sponsorships and Research Funding
Jump to section Orangutan Land Trust funded by rainforest destroying palm oil co. Kulim Malaysia Berhad Orangutan Land Trust funded by Agropalma: during decades-long destruction of the Amazon for palm oil Orangutan Land Trust and New Britain Palm Oil (NBPOL):…
Greenwashing Tactic #10: Gaslighting, Harassment, Stalking and Attempting to Discredit Critics
Attempting to humiliate, gaslight, discredit, harass and stalk any vocal critics of a brand, commodity or industry certification in order to scare individuals into silence and stop them from revealing corruption Greenwashing’s most insidious and darkest form is the attempt…
Ten Tactics of ‘Sustainable’ Palm Oil Greenwashing
There has never been a more urgent time for consumers to wake up to the devastation wrought by global supermarket brands for palm oil Jump to section 1. Greenwashing with Hidden Trade-Off 2. Greenwashing with No Proof 3. Greenwashing with…
Explore the series
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10Join the #Boycott4Wildlife and fight greenwashing and deforestation by using your wallet as a weapon!
Find out moreFurther reading on palm oil ecocide, greenwashing and deceptive marketing
- A Brief History of Consumer Culture, Dr. Kerryn Higgs, The MIT Press Reader. https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/a-brief-history-of-consumer-culture/
- A Deluge of Double-Speak (2017), Jason Bagley. Truth in Advertising. https://truthinadvertising.org/blog/a-deluge-of-doublespeak/
- Aggarwal, P. (2011). Greenwashing: The darker side of CSR. Indian Journal of Applied Research, 4(3), 61-66. https://www.worldwidejournals.com/indian-journal-of-applied-research-(IJAR)/article/greenwashing-the-darker-side-of-csr/MzMxMQ==/?is=1
- Anti-Corporate Activism and Collusion: The Contentious Politics of Palm Oil Expansion in Indonesia, (2022). Ward Berenschot, et. al., Geoforum, Volume 131, 2022, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2022.03.002
- Armour, C. (2021). Green Clean. Company Director Magazine. https://www.aicd.com.au/regulatory-compliance/regulations/investigation/green-clean.html
- Balanced Growth (2020), In: Leal Filho W., Azul A.M., Brandli L., özuyar P.G., Wall T. (eds) Responsible Consumption and Production. Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Springer, Cham
- Berenschot, W., Hospes, O., & Afrizal, A. (2023). Unequal access to justice: An evaluation of RSPO’s capacity to resolve palm oil conflicts in Indonesia. Agriculture and Human Values, 40, 291-304. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-022-10360-z
- Carlson, K. M., Heilmayr, R., Gibbs, H. K., Noojipady, P., et al. (2018). Effect of oil palm sustainability certification on deforestation and fire in Indonesia. PNAS, 115(1), 121-126. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1704728114
- Cazzolla Gatti, R., Liang, J., Velichevskaya, A., & Zhou, M. (2018). Sustainable palm oil may not be so sustainable. Science of The Total Environment, 652, 48-51. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30359800/
- Changing Times Media. (2019). Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil is ‘greenwashing’ labelled products, environmental investigation agency says. Changing Times Media. https://changingtimes.media/2019/11/03/roundtable-on-sustainable-palm-oil-is-greenwashing-labelled-products-environmental-protection-agency-says/
- Client Earth: The Greenwashing Files. https://www.clientearth.org/projects/the-greenwashing-files/
- Commodifying sustainability: Development, nature and politics in the palm oil industry (2019). World Development, Volume 121, September 2019, Pages 218-228. https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/wdevel/v121y2019icp218-228.html
- Contrasting communications of sustainability science in the media coverage of palm oil agriculture on tropical peatlands in Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore (2020). Liu, F. H. M., Ganesan, V., Smith, T. E. L. Environmental Science & Policy, 114. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/343772443_Contrasting_communications_of_sustainability_science_in_the_media_coverage_of_palm_oil_agriculture_on_tropical_peatlands_in_Indonesia_Malaysia_and_Singapore
- Cosimo, L. H. E., Masiero, M., Mammadova, A., & Pettenella, D. (2024). Voluntary sustainability standards to cope with the new European Union regulation on deforestation-free products: A gap analysis. Forest Policy and Economics, 164, 103235. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.forpol.2024.103235
- Dalton, J. (2018). No such thing as sustainable palm oil – ‘certified’ can destroy even more wildlife, say scientists. The Independent. https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/palm-oil-sustainable-certified-plantations-orangutans-indonesia-southeast-asia-greenwashing-purdue-a8674681.html
- Davis, S. J., Alexander, K., Moreno-Cruz, J., et al. (2023). Food without agriculture. Nature Sustainability. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-023-01241-2
- EIA International. (2022). Will palm oil watchdog rid itself of deforestation or continue to pretend its products are sustainable? EIA International. https://eia-international.org/news/will-palm-oil-watchdog-rid-itself-of-deforestation-or-continue-to-pretend-its-products-are-sustainable/
- Environmental Investigation Agency. (2019). Palm oil watchdog’s sustainability guarantee is still a destructive con. EIA International. https://eia-international.org/news/palm-oil-watchdogs-sustainability-guarantee-is-still-a-destructive-con/
- Federal Trade Commission. (n.d.). Green Guides. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/topics/truth-advertising/green-guides
- Fifteen environmental NGOs demand that sustainable palm oil watchdog does its job (2019). Rainforest Action Network. https://www.ran.org/press-releases/fifteen-environmental-ngos-demand-that-sustainable-palm-oil-watchdog-does-its-job/
- Friends of the Earth International. (2018). RSPO: 14 years of failure to eliminate violence and destruction from the industrial palm oil sector. Friends of the Earth International. https://www.foei.org/rspo-14-years-of-failure-to-eliminate-violence-and-destruction-from-the-industrial-palm-oil-sector/
- Lang, Chris and REDD Monitor. Sustainable palm oil? RSPO’s greenwashing and fraudulent audits exposed. The Ecologist. https://theecologist.org/2015/nov/19/sustainable-palm-oil-rspos-greenwashing-and-fraudulent-audits-exposed
- Gatti, L., Pizzetti, M., & Seele, P. (2021). Green lies and their effect on intention to invest. Journal of Business Research, 127, 376-387. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2021.01.028
- Global Witness. (2023). Amazon palm: Ecocide and human rights abuses. Global Witness. https://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/environmental-activists/amazon-palm/
- Global Witness. (2021). The True Price of Palm Oil. Global Witness. https://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/forests/true-price-palm-oil/
- Grain. (2021). Ten reasons why certification should not be promoted in the EU anti-deforestation regulation. Grain. https://grain.org/en/article/6856-ten-reasons-why-certification-should-not-be-promoted-in-the-eu-anti-deforestation-regulation
- Green Clean (2021). Armour, C. Company Director Magazine.
- Green marketing and the Australian Consumer Law (2011). Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. https://www.accc.gov.au/system/files/Green%20marketing%20and%20the%20ACL.pdf
- Greenwash and spin: palm oil lobby targets its critics (2011). Helan, A. Ecologist: Informed by Nature. https://theecologist.org/2011/jul/08/greenwash-and-spin-palm-oil-lobby-targets-its-critics
- Greenwashing: definition and examples. Selectra https://climate.selectra.com/en/environment/greenwashing#:~:text=Greenwashing%20is%20the%20practice%20of,its%20activities%20pollute%20the%20environment.
- Greenwashing of the Palm Oil Industry (2007). Mongabay. https://news.mongabay.com/2007/11/greenwashing-the-palm-oil-industry/
- Group Challenges Rainforest Alliance Earth-Friendly Seal of Approval (2015). Truth in Advertising. https://www.truthinadvertising.org/group-challenges-rainforest-alliance-earth-friendly-seal-of-approval
- Helan, A. (2011). Greenwash and spin: palm oil lobby targets its critics. Ecologist: Informed by Nature. https://theecologist.org/2011/feb/15/greenwash-and-spin-palm-oil-lobby-targets-its-critics
- Hewlett Packard. (2021). What is Greenwashing and How to Tell Which Companies are Truly Environmentally Responsible. Hewlett Packard. https://www.hp.com/us-en/shop/tech-takes/what-is-greenwashing-environmentally-responsible-companies
- Holzner, A., Rameli, N. I. A. M., Ruppert, N., & Widdig, A. (2024). Agricultural habitat use affects infant survivorship in an endangered macaque species. Current Biology. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38194972/
- How Cause-washing Deceives Consumers (2021). Truth in Advertising. https://truthinadvertising.org/resource/how-causewashing-deceives-consumers/
- International Labour Organization. (2020). Forced labor in the palm oil industry. ILO. https://www.ilo.org/topics/forced-labour-modern-slavery-and-human-trafficking
- Jauernig, J., Uhl, M., & Valentinov, V. (2021). The ethics of corporate hypocrisy: An experimental approach. Futures, 129, 102757. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.futures.2021.102757
- Kirby, D. (2015). Sustainable Palm Oil? Who Knows, Thanks to Derelict Auditors. Take Part. https://www.yahoo.com/news/sustainable-palm-oil-knows-thanks-derelict-auditors-200643980.html
- Li, T. M., & Semedi, P. (2021). Plantation life: Corporate occupation in Indonesia’s oil palm zone. Duke University Press. https://www.dukeupress.edu/plantation-life
- Liu, F. H. M., Ganesan, V., & Smith, T. E. L. (2020). Contrasting communications of sustainability science in the media coverage of palm oil agriculture on tropical peatlands in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore. Environmental Science & Policy, 114. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/343772443_Contrasting_communications_of_sustainability_science_in_the_media_coverage_of_palm_oil_agriculture_on_tropical_peatlands_in_Indonesia_Malaysia_and_Singapore
- Meemken, E. M., Barrett, C. B., Michelson, H. C., et al. (2021). Sustainability standards in global agrifood supply chains. Nature Food. https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-021-00299-2
- Miles, T. (2019). Study in WHO journal likens palm oil lobbying to tobacco and alcohol industries. Reuters. https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKCN1P21ZR/
- Nygaard, A. (2023). Is sustainable certification’s ability to combat greenwashing trustworthy? Frontiers in Sustainability, 4, Article 1188069. https://doi.org/10.3389/frsus.2023.1188069
- Oppong-Tawiah D, Webster J. Corporate Sustainability Communication as ‘Fake News’: Firms’ Greenwashing on Twitter. Sustainability. 2023; 15(8):6683. https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/8/6683
- Pabon, J. (2024). The great greenwashing: How brands, governments, and influencers are lying to you. Anansi International. https://www.vitalsource.com/products/the-great-greenwashing-john-pabon-v9781487012878
- Podnar, K., & Golob, U. (2024). Brands and activism: Ecosystem and paradoxes. Journal of Brand Management, 31, 95–107. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/s41262-024-00355-y
- Rainforest Action Network. (2019). Fifteen environmental NGOs demand that sustainable palm oil watchdog does its job. RAN. https://www.ran.org/press-releases/fifteen-environmental-ngos-demand-that-sustainable-palm-oil-watchdog-does-its-job/
- Renner, A., Zellweger, C., & Skinner, B. (2021). ‘Is there such a thing as sustainable palm oil? Satellite images show protected rainforest on fire’. Neue Zürcher Zeitung. https://www.nzz.ch/english/palm-oil-boom-threatens-protected-rainforest-in-indonesia-ld.1625490
- Saager, E. S., Iwamura, T., Jucker, T., & Murray, K. A. (2023). Deforestation for oil palm increases microclimate suitability for the development of the disease vector Aedes albopictus. Scientific Reports, 13(1), 9514. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-023-35452-6
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- Wicke, J. (2019). Sustainable palm oil or certified dispossession? NGOs within scalar struggles over the RSPO private governance standard. Bioeconomy & Inequalities: Working Paper No. 8. https://www.bioinequalities.uni-jena.de/sozbemedia/WorkingPaper8.pdf
- World Health Organisation. (2019). The palm oil industry and noncommunicable diseases. World Health Organisation Bulletin, 97, 118-128. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30728618/
- World Rainforest Movement. (2021, November 22). Why the RSPO facilitates land grabs for palm oil. https://wrm.org.uy/articles-from-the-wrm-bulletin/section1/why-the-rspo-facilitates-land-grabs-for-palm-oil/
- Zuckerman, J. (2021). The Time Has Come to Rein In the Global Scourge of Palm Oil. Yale Environment 360, Yale School of Environment. https://e360.yale.edu/features/the-time-has-come-to-rein-in-the-global-scourge-of-palm-oil
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Is Resin Printing Worth the Mess? Brutally Honest Breakdown for First-Timers
1,526 words, 8 minutes read time.
If you’ve been lurking in the shadows of 3D printing forums or scanning YouTube for the next big step in your printing game, chances are you’ve stumbled on resin printing. It’s that tantalizing tech that promises jaw-dropping detail, surfaces so smooth they make FDM prints look like sandpaper, and the kind of precision that makes miniatures and prototypes scream quality. But here’s the real talk: resin printing comes with a mess and a handful of headaches that many first-timers don’t see coming. So, is it worth diving into the resin pool, or should you stick to good ol’ filament? Let’s rip off the band-aid and get gritty on the truth of resin printing.
What Is Resin Printing? A Quick Overview
Before we dissect the good, the bad, and the ugly, it’s important to get clear on what resin printing actually is. Unlike FDM printers that melt and extrude plastic filament layer by layer, resin printers use a vat of liquid photopolymer resin cured by light. The most common types you’ll hear about are SLA (Stereolithography), MSLA (Masked Stereolithography), and DLP (Digital Light Processing). All use UV light to harden the resin in very thin, precise layers, which is why the level of detail you get is miles ahead of filament printing.
Resin printing is a fundamentally different beast—it’s more about light chemistry than hot plastic. That difference brings massive rewards in detail and finish, but also a totally different workflow that can feel like stepping into an alien lab if you’re used to FDM.
The Good: Why Resin Printing Rocks
Let’s start with the shine—resin printing delivers insane detail and surface smoothness that filament printers can’t touch. For guys who are into tabletop gaming, collectibles, or prototyping tiny mechanical parts, resin prints can capture the crisp edges and subtle curves you thought only existed in CAD renders. The resolution is typically measured in microns, not millimeters, which means you can pick out textures on a miniature’s armor or the intricate lattice on a prototype bracket with pinpoint accuracy.
Beyond beauty, resin prints can be incredibly strong and functional, depending on the resin you use. There are tough engineering resins, flexible ones, and even biocompatible varieties for dental or medical applications. This versatility means resin printing is carving out a solid place not just with hobbyists, but with businesses looking for rapid, high-fidelity prototyping without resorting to expensive CNC or injection molding.
Another bonus is how fast resin printers can spit out parts. Sure, you’re still building layer by layer, but curing a whole layer at once rather than tracing it with a nozzle often means speedier prints for small, detailed objects. When you want quality and speed in the same package, resin printing has your back.
The Bad: The Mess and Headaches of Resin Printing
Here’s where things get real. The downside to resin printing is all about the mess and the safety headaches that come with working with liquid resin. This stuff isn’t your run-of-the-mill filament spool you toss in and forget. Resin is a toxic, smelly chemical cocktail that demands respect and careful handling. Direct skin contact can cause irritation or allergic reactions, and the fumes aren’t something you want lingering in your man cave.
The post-processing is a chore you won’t escape. Once your print is done, you need to wash it, usually in isopropyl alcohol, to strip off uncured resin. Then, you have to cure it under UV light to harden it fully. This washing and curing routine isn’t just another step; it can take as long as the print itself and involves dealing with flammable liquids and sticky resin sludge.
Disposal is another headache. You can’t just pour leftover resin or used alcohol down the drain without risking environmental damage and local code violations. You’ll need to research how to properly cure and dispose of waste resin, which adds another layer of complexity for the newbie.
On top of that, the resin printer itself demands careful cleaning and maintenance. The vats and FEP films (the thin transparent layers at the bottom of resin trays) wear out and need replacing, and any spills can quickly turn your workspace into a nightmare. Without proper ventilation and protective gear like nitrile gloves and safety glasses, you’re flirting with respiratory irritation and skin problems.
Equipment and Setup: What You’ll Need to Manage the Mess
If you’re thinking resin printing sounds awesome but want to avoid turning your garage into a toxic swamp, prepping the right setup is non-negotiable. First up, safety gear isn’t optional — gloves, a respirator or mask rated for organic vapors, and eye protection are your frontline defense. You’ll also want a well-ventilated space or ideally, a dedicated room with a fume extractor. Trust me, the resin smell sticks around and gets old fast.
Next, post-processing tools like an ultrasonic cleaner or a good wash station can save you time and hassle. UV curing stations are essential to finish prints properly—while sunlight can do the job, it’s slow and inconsistent. Some budget printers come with UV lights built-in, but many require a separate device.
Your workspace should be easy to clean and resistant to resin spills. Plastic trays, disposable paper towels, and dedicated resin containers will save your sanity. The resin itself can be messy—be prepared for drips and splashes, especially when pouring and cleaning.
Maintenance and Ongoing Costs
Unlike filament printers where the ongoing costs are mostly filament and maybe a new nozzle now and then, resin printing carries a heavier price tag over time. Resin is more expensive per liter than filament, and waste from failed prints or washing can add up quickly. Consumables like replacement vats, FEP films, gloves, and isopropyl alcohol add to the tally.
Plus, the time cost isn’t trivial. Post-processing can double your total print time, especially if you’re meticulous about cleaning and curing. And neglecting maintenance or safety can lead to poor print quality or health issues.
First-Timer Tips: How to Survive and Thrive
If you’re still here and seriously thinking about dipping your toes into resin printing, here’s some hard-earned advice. Start small with cheap resins and basic printers before dropping serious cash. Never skip safety protocols—those gloves and goggles exist for a reason.
Plan your post-processing workflow before your first print. Set up a dedicated cleaning area, and always have proper waste disposal methods ready. Expect a learning curve; don’t get discouraged by early fails or messy spills. Clean resin off your tools and surfaces immediately; once it cures, it’s a nightmare to remove.
One of the biggest rookie mistakes is rushing prints or post-processing to save time. Resin printing rewards patience and precision. Follow manufacturer instructions closely, experiment with settings gradually, and join forums or communities to swap tips.
Is It Worth It? The Final Verdict
So, is resin printing worth the mess? The honest answer is: it depends. If you crave ultra-high detail, smooth surfaces, and can handle a bit of chemistry lab discipline, resin printing opens doors that filament can’t. Miniature painters, jewelers, model makers, and prototype developers will appreciate the leaps in quality and speed.
However, if you’re sensitive to chemicals, don’t want to invest in extra gear or spend significant time on post-processing, resin might not be your best first choice. FDM printing still rocks for durability, ease, and low cost.
The tech is evolving, and newer resins and machines are getting safer and less messy, but it’s still a commitment. Understanding the risks, costs, and workflow upfront will help you decide if this next-level tech deserves a spot in your printing arsenal.
Conclusion
Resin printing isn’t just a step up from filament; it’s a whole new game with different rules. It demands respect for the chemicals, time for cleanup, and patience to master. But the payoff—mind-blowing detail and finish—makes it an addiction for those who love pushing 3D printing’s limits.
If you’re ready to take the plunge or want to share your resin printing war stories, drop a comment below or reach out directly. And don’t forget to subscribe to our newsletter for more raw, honest 3D printing insights. This community’s all about keeping it real and getting the most out of our gear.
D. Bryan King
Sources
- All3DP: Resin 3D Printing Pros and Cons
- 3D Insider: What Is Resin 3D Printing?
- Formlabs: Resin vs FDM 3D Printing
- MakerBot: Resin 3D Printing Guide
- Creality: How to Clean a Resin 3D Printer
- MatterHackers: Safely Using Resin 3D Printers
- 3D Hubs: FDM vs Resin Printing
- Digital Trends: How Resin 3D Printing Works
- Prusa Printers: How to Clean Resin Prints
- Liebert Pub: Safety Considerations for Resin 3D Printing
- Hackaday: Resin 3D Printing – How Messy Is It?
- MakeUseOf: Is Resin 3D Printing Worth It?
- Tom’s Guide: Best Resin 3D Printers of 2024
- 3DPrint.com: Minimizing Resin Printing Mess
- YouTube: Resin 3D Printing Setup and Cleanup Tips
Disclaimer:
The views and opinions expressed in this post are solely those of the author. The information provided is based on personal research, experience, and understanding of the subject matter at the time of writing. Readers should consult relevant experts or authorities for specific guidance related to their unique situations.
Related Posts
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Destroying Autocracy – August 15, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
DA comes out on Thursday and is updated through the end of day on Friday. Then we start over. So take your time in perusing it and check back in over the weekend.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
There is some news about us this week. We are definitely retiring next year and sooner than expected. Once we move to Europe, I don’t want to spend 30 hours a week working on Symfony Station and Battalion. Producing short documentaries will be my main hobby.
But, I am willing to spend 10 hours weekly on The Programmer’s Fulcrum. It’s the future (and smaller) home for a fusion of Symfony Station and Battalion. Its tagline is Devs Defending Democracy.
For now its built with Ghost though WordPress is still in the running as a long-term site/newsletter/fediverse account solution. Sorry Drupal CMS you are dead in the water.
In any event, you can sign up now and for 2025 get an email with links and featured articles for each week’s Symfony Station Communiqué and Battalion “Destroying Autocracy” post. And you’ll be set with TPF after the fusing. I appreciate all of you.
Featured Item
The Sunday Times has an interview with my hero:
Meredith Whittaker, boss of WhatsApp rival Signal, says the UK’s Investigatory Powers Act could create a weakness that threatens users’ private data.
Signal boss: ‘disturbing’ laws show the UK doesn’t understand tech
Fuck Meta, and fuck What’s App.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
TechCrunch reports:
US government seized $1M from Russian ransomware gang
BleepingComputer reports:
North Korean Kimsuky hackers exposed in alleged data breach
TechCrunch reports:
Australian court finds Apple, Google abused app store market power
The Association for Progressive Communications reports:
Every Door on going from a map user to an open source map creator
Grenoble, France announces:
Access kit Open source software
Commons DB has:
Connecting the Commons: Shared Benefits for Wikimedia Commons and CommonsDB
The Center for Democracy and Technology shares:
Neutral
The Next Web reports:
Opinion: Europe can regulate its way to a better fintech future
Infrequently reports:
How Do Committees Fail To Invent?
Renée DiResta reports:
No Clapping Allowed: A Social Media Free Speech Debate Without the Usual Theater
Stateline reports:
More than half the states have issued AI guidance for schools
Dries Buytaert has:
Funding Open Source like public infrastructure
I disagree with 88.2% of Dries’ AI stance, but he’s 100% correct about this. 😉
The Evil Empire (AKA Autocracy) Strikes Back
The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:
Americans, Be Warned: Lessons From Reddit’s Chaotic UK Age Verification Rollout
Unfortunately, our fools will follow in their fools’ footsteps. And btw fuck Reddit.
The Register reports:
Wikimedia Foundation loses first court battle to swerve Online Safety Act regulation
404 Media reports:
Trump Is Launching an AI Search Engine Powered by Perplexity
If there was any doubt that c^nts attract c^nts, now you know. Especially Clownish ones who want to buy Chrome.
Feds Used Local Cop’s Password to Do Immigration Surveillance With Flock Cameras
LAPD Eyes ‘GeoSpy’, an AI Tool That Can Geolocate Photos in Seconds
Euractiv has:
Palantir is well on its way to conquering Europe
Pariah States
The Register reports:
Russia’s RomCom among those exploiting a WinRAR 0-day in highly-targeted attacks
TechCrunch reports:
Russian government hackers said to be behind US federal court filing system hack: Report
BleepingComputer reports:
Pro-Russian hackers blamed for water dam sabotage in Norway
Curly COMrades cyberspies hit govt orgs with custom malware
Dark Reading reports:
REvil Actor Accuses Russia of Planning 2021 Kaseya Attack
EuroNews reports:
Russia blocks calls via WhatsApp and Telegram as it tightens control over the internet
Signals, peeps.
Israel faces widespread condemnation after Al Jazeera correspondent killed in Gaza
TechPolicy reports:
Artificial Intelligence and the Orchestration of Palestinian Life and Death
Big Media
Poynter says:
And have.
The Racket reports:
Substack’s extremist ecosystem is flourishing
They are on Beehiiv, which like Ghost is a moral alternative to SubStack.
NiemanLab reports:
Can nonprofit news mix with local TV? A Pennsylvania partnership aims to find out
Local TV news is shit. But, this is interesting.
Seeking Alpha reports:
Companies find new avenues to drive up sessions as Google’s AI Search tools reduce web traffic
404 Media reports:
Trump Administration Outlines Plan to Throw Out an Agency’s FOIA Requests En Masse
Big Tech
The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:
Data Brokers Are Ignoring Privacy Law. We Deserve Better.
Ben Werdmuller reports on:
TechPolicy reports:
In an Age of Information Gatekeeping, Don’t Just Google It
Fuck Google.
TechPolicy reports:
‘Big Cloud’ is Building Power via Pervasive Investments
TechCrunch reports:
Leaked Meta AI rules show chatbots were allowed to have romantic chats with kids
How to Save the World asks:
Has the Internet Succumbed to the Tragedy of the Commons?
Platformer has:
Three big lessons from the GPT-5 backlash
Ars Technica reports:
LLMs’ “simulated reasoning” abilities are a “brittle mirage,” researchers find
AP reports:
Students have been called to the office — and even arrested — for AI surveillance false alarms
Cybersecurity/Privacy
The Register reports:
The inside story of the Telemessage saga, and how you can view the data
DEF CON hackers plug security holes in US water systems amid tsunami of threats
Deepfake detectors are slowly coming of age, at a time of dire need
Fediverse
Connected Places has:
Hopefully the link is fixed now.
IFTAS says:
The 2025 Fediverse Needs Assessment is Open: Have Your Say
Salvatore Noschese shares:
We Distribute reports:
Big Updates Are Coming to Loops
tchncs has:
We Distribute asks?
Is Meta Scraping the Fediverse for AI?
Did I say fuck Meta?
TechCrunch reports:
Threads now has more than 400 million monthly active users
Fuck Threads too.
Arxiv is:
Exploring Left-Wing Extremism on the Decentralized Web: An Analysis of Lemmygrad.ml
The proper term is Tankies not left-wing. And it’s why you should use Mbin or Piefed.
Paths & Patches has:
Third Spaces in the Fediverse: FediCon thoughts Part II
Newsmast unplugged: FediCon Part III
The Register reports:
Secure chat darling Matrix admits pair of ‘high severity’ protocol flaws need painful fixes
Slightly Federated Social Media
TBD
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS. Or even our future home in 2026, if you want a headstart.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#ActivityPub #AI #ATProto #Autocracy #BigJournalism #BigTech #Bluesky #Bonfire #Democracy #Fascism #Fediverse #Lemmy #Loops #Mastodon #Reddit #Signal #StopChina #StopIsrael #StopRedAmerica #StopRussia #SubStack #SupportUkraine #TechnoAnarchism #TechnoFeudalism #Telemessage #WhatsApp #Wikimedia
-
I quit my job to be able to develop #PsyLink, and the research & development cost me over 1000€ in materials so far.
Invest in a future with privacy-preserving open source neural interfaces now and keep the project alive! :) Any amount helps!
Liberapay: https://liberapay.com/psylink
Dash: XocV8MudehfcoLvCj2xwaCDKx3EDCbeuCf
Ethereum: 0x880C89B745e82230a1CdAe33EfeCf09011C37c89
#electronics #neuralinterface #diy #arduino #EMG #EEG #neuroscience #opensource #science
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The best thing Gates could invest in is saving/restoring US democracy.
The sitting administration, like the other world autocracies, is a petrostate with no interest in addressing Climate Change. In fact, it wants to undo progress to date and deny/hide Climate Science.
We The People will hopefully vote otherwise, but the machinery of voting by the time that happens will be compromised, and that's unlikely to fix the problem. At this point, the only votes that count are those of billionaires.
If the greedy billionaires line up behind profit at the expense of all else, and the less greedy billionaires fritter away their funds on issues that are individually important but that collectively sap any hope of a long-term future for humanity, we're just rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. Even if we cured cancer and solved myriad other societal ills, if the Climate Crisis isn't solved, society will melt down anyway and humans may well go extinct, so what was the point?
Also, unless he puts unexpected safeguards on things, I'll bet quite a bit of this goes to using or investing in AI, which at this point means a hugely more energy-intensive and fresh-water-consuming world at a time when we can least afford it. In effect, it's an investment in hastening the Climate problem.
I'm sure he'll put some of it into specific Climate efforts, but the thing is this: While it's useful to do some amount of research on climate, we know what we really have to do and are not doing it. A sustainable future means ramping down energy use and consumption-based economics.
The problem with research isn't that it might not produce some wonderful discovery, but that we don't know that it will, and we don't know the timeline. As such, we need to start in earnest doing things we DO know how to do and that we DO know the timeline for. He is not promising to do that.
I see no serious leadership on Climate here, just a giant hunk of monetary inertia on a path that is sinking humanity. I'd love it if someone could convince me otherwise, but I'm not optimistic. I certainly don't think it's the sort of thing where just "trusting the process" is enough.
#climate #ClimateCrisis #ClimateEmergency #democracy #autocracy #petrostate #capitalism #LateStageCapitalism #sustainability #science #ClimateScience #philanthropy #oligarchy #Gates #BillGates #GatesFoundation
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Hi friends Sam Dogen a financial advisor they say that in the year 2018 he was going to watch Soft Ball game with his friend Bob on a weekend there Bob had bought his new Tesla Model 3 car which was selling a lot in the market Bob was doing a lot of show off there that how does this car run
on autopilot he was driving his car with his I phone and was saying many interesting things like I heard this in news recently on 9th September a lady gave birth to a baby in Philadelphia in the front seat of Tesla and the delivery happened, when Tesla was running on auto pilot because of which,
that baby is also called as World’s First Tesla Baby so Bob was saying such interesting things to everyone Sam was shocked by listening to all these things he was shocked because that how did Bob a 31 year old pre school teacher had bought a $53,000 car which is obviously a lot of money
according to Sam it was their biggest financial mistake which he shouldn’t have done and at the same time, there was a hype about Tesla after listening to all those things, Sam drove that car one day he says that the experience of driving this was very different even he liked the Tesla Model
3 and even he wanted to buy that car but because this car was very costly to him and as he was a financial advisor, he didn’t want to do that mistake so as a financial advisor what he did was instead of buying this $53,000 car he started calculating it’s opportunity cost where he saw,
if he invest this much money of his Savings what can be better opportunity for him than this car then he started doing research about Tesla Company or Elon Musk’s company he started to realize about this company potential and finally after doing all these things he decided
that instead of buying a Tesla Model 3 of $53,000, will buy the Tesla Stocks worth $53,000 in October 2018 on the per share value of $298 bought the Tesla stocks and guess what after some time, these Tesla stocks reached $367 by doing this he had got a Profit of $11,500 and he
didn’t want to sell that and after 6 months, when there were some problems in the company because of a Tweet of Elon Musk, the stocks came down to $179 then their Profit of $11,500 converted to a loss of $20,000 but still he didn’t sell his stocks he was still now fast
forward after 2 years, where the entire world market crashed there Tesla stocks were rising then Sam thought, just like last time, these stock will fall one day then what Sam did was, at $888 per share value sold his 75% stock because he didn’t want to handle the volatility of this market due
to which he got a lot of Profit but ya the fact was, after some time Tesla stocks reached to $1,126 thinking of which Sam regretted but as it is said that Hindsight is always 20/20 after doing things we feel that we shouldn’t have done it, but anyways Sam had booked a good
Profit and then he was thinking how stupid Bob is even he should have bought the stocks instead of the car do you know the interesting part was Bob whom he was thinking is stupid he was investing a lot of his money in Tesla, from a long time because of which he had generated a lot
of Profit and with some part of the Profit he bought Tesla Model 3 look friends the things we should learn from this story is wealth is not like that as we think it is many time when you think people are less capable than you you think that they are financially
behind you well many time is is not necessary that they are behind you many times many people do well financially but since all their wealth is in their investment which we can’t see, so they won’t look rich many times and many times even if they look so, they look stupid which is not
always the case ya being financially free doesn’t mean that you have a lot of wealth which is visible to people by which you can live a luxurious life no but the meaning of being financially free is you live a comfortable life where you don’t worry about money where your money keeps you
safe and work for you now Author Jonathan Clements in their book From Here to Financial Happiness in this book they share 77 short lessons I will merge all those points and share with you 4 practical steps which will help you to be financially free as with that as I had gifted you
Shares of Google few weeks ago in this CashNews.co I will gift Tesla’s Shares how? well to know that keep watching the CashNews.co let’s come to lesson no. 1 which is No saving with Debt author says to start your financial freedom
journey first you have to do one thing that is clear all your Debts clear the Loan and this is the most basic rule of Finance that if you
have any kind of Debt specially bad Debt you cannot start your investing journey author says, some people start long term investing with their Debt where they will be paying their Debt and also doing some investment by this their
process of becoming financially free, slows down so author says first clear all your small Debts like mobile phone, laptop emi, car Loan and such things which you can finish early ya sometimes the big amounts like home Loan that can’t be easy
to clear, those are exceptions, keep them aside but clear your small Debts plus the author also says, to use Credit cards wisely because US Department of Labor had did a research on 7,900 citizens of age 20 to 40 by that we know that, those who were at high
Credit card Debt their stress was affecting their physical health overtime by which they faced many problems in daily life pain in joints and stiffness and were facing many problems you should know how you are using your Credit card for not only
your mental peace but also physical health many people don’t know that by using Credit cards the interest starts and it’s amount keeps increasing and there is a solution related to it, which you will know in 4th point but first remember that that clear all your
Debts as much as possible after that start your Savings journey properly Lesson no. 2 Financial safety net this might have even happened with you something needs repair in your home, like your phone is broken or your T.V is not turning on on there is a problem in
the engine of your car or bike like I remember my friend was saying, that the graphic card of his computer was spoilt the price was very high, at that time he didn’t had money to buy it so somehow he started working without graphic card at that time he didn’t had Credit
card and he didn’t want to borrow money from someone he he decided that next month when he gets Income he will buy the graphic card with that Income now look, many people are just like this if there is any problem, for it’s solution they use their
Credit card or depend on next salary if something happens they say, they will do it from next month do the EMI many times but author says, no one thinks what if their source of Income stops many people are salary based and their job is their main source of
Income there are only few people who have passive Income if their main source of Income dies of any reason job went or anything, even then, they will have a different source of Income on which they can depend on now as it was seen
during Covid time where many people lost their job and were destroyed completely so well what is it’s solution, the author says If you want to feel better about your none;">Finances today then you should spend more time thinking about what you are gonna pay for tomorrow which means basically author is saying us here we have to create an emergency fund you store your money, at a place where you can use it even after loosing your main source of
Income you cannot spend this money on any random things like for vacation, for buying a car or anything no here you have to create an emergency fund which should be the backup of your main Income source because of which, in case something happens and you loose your
job you will not get a new job until you can survive and be safe and how to do that, well to do that author says that you have to calculate your monthly expenses let’s say your monthly expenses is 20,000 rupees you should at least keep 1,20,000 rupees safe at side which is your emergency fund
if there is any problem, like covid, lock-down even then you will have a buffer time of 6 months where you can do many things, can find a job or create a new source of Revenue which will be very helpful for your survival and your respect Lesson no. 3 Invest conservatively and buy
stocks with caution to increase your wealth J Walk when they launched a website Priceline of discount offer in the early 2000’s by this their Net Worth reached $1.8 Billion in just one year and at the other side the world’s greatest investor Warren Buffet they had to
wait 55 years to earn their first Billion Dollars look there is how much difference but the thing is J Walk’s Income was not sustainable everyone knew that this dotcom bubble will burst and when that bubble burst, by end of October 2000 in just a few months, out of billions
of dollars of J walk only 33 Million Dollars were left and Warren Buffet were into the top 1% richest club of the world and are still today and for the coming many years, he will be in the top 1% list the reason behind this is, Warren Buffet, is investing from past 7 decades and he had rarely sold
his Shares so even the author says, if someone wants to be financially free so to invest your money Stock Market can be a very good place to you where you get not only returns, but the company pay you Dividends many times which means they share
some percent of their Profit to their share holders for example you might know that Warren Buffet is a major share holder of Coca Cola so the C.E.O of Coca Cola he gets the highest 16 Million Dollar salary per year on the other side, Warren Buffet by the Dividends
of Coca Cola earn 547 Million Dollars so you might have understood where to invest to become financially free author says when you think long term to invest in Stock Market you don’t need to understand any rocket science but the companies which you know about properly or
better use their products daily which you are using from many years, which you believe on you like those products it will be good for you to invest in such companies and one of the most successful Mutual Fund manager Peter Lynns, who had wrote many good books on investment even he says the same
thing you should invest in such companies whose products you use or you know better about them whose products you like and you believe on as many people use I phone eat Maggie, drink Coca Cola use Tesla Cars so it can be good for you to invest in such companies as it was proven in the starting
story and here you don’t need to see the daily fluctuations of the market in the Intelligent Investor, the mentor of Warren Buffet, Benjamin Graham, even they say in their book that we should not focus on the daily fluctuations of the market but you should just pick the good companies and
invest in that for long term this will give you very good returns in long run now look friends ya there are many Unicorns in India, which are doing very well and there are many companies in America which are giving exponential returns it can be easy to find them, because of their technological
innovations so we Indians should know about this opportunity that we can benefit from the opportunities of the growth outside so you can make this resolution this new year that you will globally diversify your Portfolio for better returns and safety in fact even before this new
year starts, any of your favorite company either Apple, Tesla, Google, Amazon or Netflix or whichever company you like, comment it down buy the Shares of that company and to start all things easily what we did was we have collaborated with IND Money and picked few free
Shares which you can get for free before to buy US stocks you had to bare many charges had to spend a lot of money but with the help of IND money you can get 0 account opening fees 0 maintenance fees and with the help of 0 Brokerage fees you can buy or sell US
stocks plus you get the best exchange rates here plus with the help of this app, you can track all your Investments all Investments you have did, whether is Mutual Funds, Stocks or text-decoration: none;">Crypto as I do the same by using this app so if you benefit from this and want to buy Tesla Stocks for free you just need to download IND money from the link given below and you will get few free Shares of Tesla in the reward section you will get a part
of that share only if you go with the link given below but if you download IND money directly from Play Store or App Store you need to enter the code while signing up which I am showing on screen SEEKENTESLA code you have to put that, then you will get those free stocks Point no 4 is Rugality leads
to better Finances look our physical health, mental health and relationships and overall in entire life, habits play the biggest role and this is an universal fact that good
habits makes good life financial success is nothing but the result of your good habits if you think logically if you want to be financially free you have to save money, you have to invest it but you have very less time so it is very important for you to save and invest money author says 90% people
can’t achieve financial freedom because of their bad habits their bad habits impact Savings a lot because people don’t think exponentially they always think linearly example what we think is, I am just eating one pizza, what will happen by that I am just eating one
burger today, what will happen with that with these small things, they make it a habit and start eating outside food order everyday some thing or the other from Zomato at least it happens every week and that becomes a habit because of which a particular amount Zomato gets every time goes to
different junk food companies money is also going plus all these things impact your health I saw a CashNews.co, there were two people both take different choice every day one person gets up early then the other gets up late one person eats junk food everyday the other person eats healthy all these
small choice which comes in front of us everyday our habits one person spends his money on useless things buys and eats useless things on the other hand the other person instead of eating unwanted things he saves it or eats healthy food and all these things of 1 day, 2 day, I month or 1 year
compounds it’s effect becomes so high that the person who had bad habits his health gets worse his money slowly decreases and his relationship life, everything comes to an end on the other side, who had made small habits those small habits brings improvement in his life slowly his
Savings and his Investments start giving him money his health helps him living a good life and in long term one person’s frugality changes his life completely on the other hand, the ignorance, his smoking, eating unhealthy will destroy his life so even you
have to understand this thing that the small decisions which you are taking everyday may be you won’t see it’s results today, tomorrow or even after a month but you will definitely see some difference in some years and that thing will hurt you in the long run so start living your life
frugally instead of spending on unwanted things, start saving start investing ya it might not help you to get rich in some time but definitely in long run, you can save money and make money so don’t keep linear thinking, keep exponential thinking how can you do all these things try not to
spend more than 50% of your Income and you have to invest 12% for long term for retirement and all if you do like this, you will benefit from it in long run I want to say you a bonus point, start working on different sources of Income start working on many
different sources of Income as much as possible if you just have one job then obviously that’s very risky thing you have to create sources of Income side by side which can give you Income at least a little this thing will help you to earn
money in long run and to be financially free if you want me to make a separate CashNews.co on this topic how can you make you r side Income, do comment and let me know if you are interested in buying free share of Tesla there is a link given in description from there you can
download IND money after downloading, you will see those Shares in the reward section if you are directly directing it from Play Store or App Store while signing up you have to enter a code SEEKENTESLA by this you will get the reward that’s all for now, thanks for watching
/>
Now that you’re fully informed, watch this amazing video on FROM HERE TO FINANCIAL HAPPINESS 💸 ENRICH YOUR LIFE IN 77 DAYS – FINANCE BOOK SUMMARY. With over 2074088 views, this video deepens your understanding of Finance.CashNews, your go-to portal for financial news and insights.
#FINANCIAL #HAPPINESS #ENRICH #LIFE #DAYS #FINANCE #BOOK #SUMMARY#1a73e8 #333 #BOOK #DAYS #ENRICH #finance #Financial #HAPPINESS #Life #SUMMARY
-
Help Is Not the Same as a Future
By Cliff Potts, CSO, and Editor-in-Chief of WPS News
Baybay City, Leyte, Philippines — May 15, 2026
The Difference No One Warns You About
There is a distinction that matters more than most people realize, and it is one America is very careful not to teach explicitly. Help and a future are not the same thing. One can exist without the other, and often does.
I learned that lesson most clearly in Minnesota.
After Illinois, help felt like progress. Assistance existed. People noticed. Systems responded. Compared to what I had known before, that alone felt like a step forward. It took time to understand that help, by itself, does not change trajectory. It only stabilizes the present.
A future requires something else entirely.
When Assistance Works as Designed
Minnesota’s support systems did what they were supposed to do. Food pantries were available. Churches stepped in with grocery vouchers. State assistance existed and was accessible. None of it was humiliating or hostile.
This matters, and it should not be minimized. Compared to many states, Minnesota treats need as a condition rather than a moral failing. That alone reduces suffering.
But systems designed to alleviate immediate hardship are not the same as systems designed to produce long-term mobility. One keeps you afloat. The other gives you a direction.
Minnesota offered flotation. It did not offer direction.
Stabilization Without Movement
Once basic needs are met, the next question is obvious: what comes next? That is where the silence returned.
Work was available, but it clustered in roles that did not lead anywhere else. Security work. Overnight shifts. Positions that absorbed time and energy without building leverage. These jobs kept people alive, but they did not help them move.
Labor economists have noted that many regional economies rely on what are effectively “containment jobs”—roles that stabilize labor markets without creating upward mobility (Autor, 2019). They are not meant to be ladders. They are meant to be endpoints.
If you enter one of those jobs from the outside, you tend to stay there.
The Ceiling You Don’t Hit—You Just Reach
In more openly stratified states, ceilings announce themselves. Wages stall. Housing becomes impossible. You are pushed out.
In Minnesota, the ceiling is quieter. You simply stop rising.
You receive help. You survive. You do not advance.
There is no dramatic rejection. No explicit denial. Just a gradual realization that nothing is opening further, no matter how steady your effort remains.
This is a subtler form of closure, and in some ways, it is more dangerous. It encourages patience where action might otherwise occur. It teaches people to wait.
Temporary Lives Become Permanent
When help replaces opportunity, lives become provisional. You do not plan long-term. You do not invest. You do not imagine permanence.
You tell yourself you are “getting through this period,” even when the period stretches into years.
Sociological research on precarity shows that long-term instability, even when buffered by assistance, erodes planning capacity and future orientation (Standing, 2011). People adapt to the absence of forward motion by shrinking their expectations.
That adaptation is rational. It is also corrosive.
Why Decency Is Not Enough
Minnesota is often held up as evidence that decency solves inequality. The logic is appealing: if systems are kind, outcomes will improve.
But kindness does not rewire labor markets. It does not dismantle closed networks. It does not create pathways where none exist.
Decency reduces harm. It does not redistribute access.
That is not a moral critique. It is a structural one.
The Emotional Cost of Waiting
There is a particular exhaustion that comes from being told, implicitly, that things are fine because you are being helped. Gratitude becomes an obligation. Frustration becomes inappropriate.
After all, the system is doing its part.
This dynamic silences critique. It frames dissatisfaction as ingratitude. It keeps people from naming the absence of a future because the present is tolerable.
I felt that pressure in Minnesota. I felt the need to justify leaving a place that had treated me decently—despite knowing I could not build a life there.
When Leaving Is the Only Honest Choice
Eventually, circumstances made the decision easier. My daughter returned to Texas. The reason I had come to Minnesota dissolved. What remained was a choice between staying static or moving on.
Leaving did not feel dramatic. It felt necessary.
That is often how exits happen in systems that offer help without futures. People do not flee. They drift away when they realize waiting will not change anything.
A National Pattern, Not a Local Failure
This essay is not an indictment of Minnesota alone. It describes a pattern visible across many “well-run” states and cities.
Assistance expands. Opportunity contracts. People survive longer without advancing further.
This is how inequality becomes normalized. Not through cruelty, but through containment.
Naming the Distinction Clearly
Help matters. It saves lives. It reduces suffering. It should exist everywhere.
But help is not a future.
A future requires access to networks, mobility, housing stability, and work that compounds rather than consumes time. Without those, assistance becomes a holding pattern.
Minnesota taught me that lesson clearly.
It showed me that survival and progress are not the same thing—and that confusing the two can cost you years.
References
Autor, D. (2019). Work of the past, work of the future. AEA Papers and Proceedings, 109, 1–32.
#AmericanClassSystem #classMobility #inequality #laborMarkets #Minnesota #precarity #socialAssistance #socialSafetyNet
Standing, G. (2011). The precariat: The new dangerous class. Bloomsbury Academic. -
Hi friends Sam Dogen a financial advisor they say that in the year 2018 he was going to watch Soft Ball game with his friend Bob on a weekend there Bob had bought his new Tesla Model 3 car which was selling a lot in the market Bob was doing a lot of show off there that how does this car run
on autopilot he was driving his car with his I phone and was saying many interesting things like I heard this in news recently on 9th September a lady gave birth to a baby in Philadelphia in the front seat of Tesla and the delivery happened, when Tesla was running on auto pilot because of which,
that baby is also called as World’s First Tesla Baby so Bob was saying such interesting things to everyone Sam was shocked by listening to all these things he was shocked because that how did Bob a 31 year old pre school teacher had bought a $53,000 car which is obviously a lot of money
according to Sam it was their biggest financial mistake which he shouldn’t have done and at the same time, there was a hype about Tesla after listening to all those things, Sam drove that car one day he says that the experience of driving this was very different even he liked the Tesla Model
3 and even he wanted to buy that car but because this car was very costly to him and as he was a financial advisor, he didn’t want to do that mistake so as a financial advisor what he did was instead of buying this $53,000 car he started calculating it’s opportunity cost where he saw,
if he invest this much money of his Savings what can be better opportunity for him than this car then he started doing research about Tesla Company or Elon Musk’s company he started to realize about this company potential and finally after doing all these things he decided
that instead of buying a Tesla Model 3 of $53,000, will buy the Tesla Stocks worth $53,000 in October 2018 on the per share value of $298 bought the Tesla stocks and guess what after some time, these Tesla stocks reached $367 by doing this he had got a Profit of $11,500 and he
didn’t want to sell that and after 6 months, when there were some problems in the company because of a Tweet of Elon Musk, the stocks came down to $179 then their Profit of $11,500 converted to a loss of $20,000 but still he didn’t sell his stocks he was still now fast
forward after 2 years, where the entire world market crashed there Tesla stocks were rising then Sam thought, just like last time, these stock will fall one day then what Sam did was, at $888 per share value sold his 75% stock because he didn’t want to handle the volatility of this market due
to which he got a lot of Profit but ya the fact was, after some time Tesla stocks reached to $1,126 thinking of which Sam regretted but as it is said that Hindsight is always 20/20 after doing things we feel that we shouldn’t have done it, but anyways Sam had booked a good
Profit and then he was thinking how stupid Bob is even he should have bought the stocks instead of the car do you know the interesting part was Bob whom he was thinking is stupid he was investing a lot of his money in Tesla, from a long time because of which he had generated a lot
of Profit and with some part of the Profit he bought Tesla Model 3 look friends the things we should learn from this story is wealth is not like that as we think it is many time when you think people are less capable than you you think that they are financially
behind you well many time is is not necessary that they are behind you many times many people do well financially but since all their wealth is in their investment which we can’t see, so they won’t look rich many times and many times even if they look so, they look stupid which is not
always the case ya being financially free doesn’t mean that you have a lot of wealth which is visible to people by which you can live a luxurious life no but the meaning of being financially free is you live a comfortable life where you don’t worry about money where your money keeps you
safe and work for you now Author Jonathan Clements in their book From Here to Financial Happiness in this book they share 77 short lessons I will merge all those points and share with you 4 practical steps which will help you to be financially free as with that as I had gifted you
Shares of Google few weeks ago in this CashNews.co I will gift Tesla’s Shares how? well to know that keep watching the CashNews.co let’s come to lesson no. 1 which is No saving with Debt author says to start your financial freedom
journey first you have to do one thing that is clear all your Debts clear the Loan and this is the most basic rule of Finance that if you
have any kind of Debt specially bad Debt you cannot start your investing journey author says, some people start long term investing with their Debt where they will be paying their Debt and also doing some investment by this their
process of becoming financially free, slows down so author says first clear all your small Debts like mobile phone, laptop emi, car Loan and such things which you can finish early ya sometimes the big amounts like home Loan that can’t be easy
to clear, those are exceptions, keep them aside but clear your small Debts plus the author also says, to use Credit cards wisely because US Department of Labor had did a research on 7,900 citizens of age 20 to 40 by that we know that, those who were at high
Credit card Debt their stress was affecting their physical health overtime by which they faced many problems in daily life pain in joints and stiffness and were facing many problems you should know how you are using your Credit card for not only
your mental peace but also physical health many people don’t know that by using Credit cards the interest starts and it’s amount keeps increasing and there is a solution related to it, which you will know in 4th point but first remember that that clear all your
Debts as much as possible after that start your Savings journey properly Lesson no. 2 Financial safety net this might have even happened with you something needs repair in your home, like your phone is broken or your T.V is not turning on on there is a problem in
the engine of your car or bike like I remember my friend was saying, that the graphic card of his computer was spoilt the price was very high, at that time he didn’t had money to buy it so somehow he started working without graphic card at that time he didn’t had Credit
card and he didn’t want to borrow money from someone he he decided that next month when he gets Income he will buy the graphic card with that Income now look, many people are just like this if there is any problem, for it’s solution they use their
Credit card or depend on next salary if something happens they say, they will do it from next month do the EMI many times but author says, no one thinks what if their source of Income stops many people are salary based and their job is their main source of
Income there are only few people who have passive Income if their main source of Income dies of any reason job went or anything, even then, they will have a different source of Income on which they can depend on now as it was seen
during Covid time where many people lost their job and were destroyed completely so well what is it’s solution, the author says If you want to feel better about your none;">Finances today then you should spend more time thinking about what you are gonna pay for tomorrow which means basically author is saying us here we have to create an emergency fund you store your money, at a place where you can use it even after loosing your main source of
Income you cannot spend this money on any random things like for vacation, for buying a car or anything no here you have to create an emergency fund which should be the backup of your main Income source because of which, in case something happens and you loose your
job you will not get a new job until you can survive and be safe and how to do that, well to do that author says that you have to calculate your monthly expenses let’s say your monthly expenses is 20,000 rupees you should at least keep 1,20,000 rupees safe at side which is your emergency fund
if there is any problem, like covid, lock-down even then you will have a buffer time of 6 months where you can do many things, can find a job or create a new source of Revenue which will be very helpful for your survival and your respect Lesson no. 3 Invest conservatively and buy
stocks with caution to increase your wealth J Walk when they launched a website Priceline of discount offer in the early 2000’s by this their Net Worth reached $1.8 Billion in just one year and at the other side the world’s greatest investor Warren Buffet they had to
wait 55 years to earn their first Billion Dollars look there is how much difference but the thing is J Walk’s Income was not sustainable everyone knew that this dotcom bubble will burst and when that bubble burst, by end of October 2000 in just a few months, out of billions
of dollars of J walk only 33 Million Dollars were left and Warren Buffet were into the top 1% richest club of the world and are still today and for the coming many years, he will be in the top 1% list the reason behind this is, Warren Buffet, is investing from past 7 decades and he had rarely sold
his Shares so even the author says, if someone wants to be financially free so to invest your money Stock Market can be a very good place to you where you get not only returns, but the company pay you Dividends many times which means they share
some percent of their Profit to their share holders for example you might know that Warren Buffet is a major share holder of Coca Cola so the C.E.O of Coca Cola he gets the highest 16 Million Dollar salary per year on the other side, Warren Buffet by the Dividends
of Coca Cola earn 547 Million Dollars so you might have understood where to invest to become financially free author says when you think long term to invest in Stock Market you don’t need to understand any rocket science but the companies which you know about properly or
better use their products daily which you are using from many years, which you believe on you like those products it will be good for you to invest in such companies and one of the most successful Mutual Fund manager Peter Lynns, who had wrote many good books on investment even he says the same
thing you should invest in such companies whose products you use or you know better about them whose products you like and you believe on as many people use I phone eat Maggie, drink Coca Cola use Tesla Cars so it can be good for you to invest in such companies as it was proven in the starting
story and here you don’t need to see the daily fluctuations of the market in the Intelligent Investor, the mentor of Warren Buffet, Benjamin Graham, even they say in their book that we should not focus on the daily fluctuations of the market but you should just pick the good companies and
invest in that for long term this will give you very good returns in long run now look friends ya there are many Unicorns in India, which are doing very well and there are many companies in America which are giving exponential returns it can be easy to find them, because of their technological
innovations so we Indians should know about this opportunity that we can benefit from the opportunities of the growth outside so you can make this resolution this new year that you will globally diversify your Portfolio for better returns and safety in fact even before this new
year starts, any of your favorite company either Apple, Tesla, Google, Amazon or Netflix or whichever company you like, comment it down buy the Shares of that company and to start all things easily what we did was we have collaborated with IND Money and picked few free
Shares which you can get for free before to buy US stocks you had to bare many charges had to spend a lot of money but with the help of IND money you can get 0 account opening fees 0 maintenance fees and with the help of 0 Brokerage fees you can buy or sell US
stocks plus you get the best exchange rates here plus with the help of this app, you can track all your Investments all Investments you have did, whether is Mutual Funds, Stocks or text-decoration: none;">Crypto as I do the same by using this app so if you benefit from this and want to buy Tesla Stocks for free you just need to download IND money from the link given below and you will get few free Shares of Tesla in the reward section you will get a part
of that share only if you go with the link given below but if you download IND money directly from Play Store or App Store you need to enter the code while signing up which I am showing on screen SEEKENTESLA code you have to put that, then you will get those free stocks Point no 4 is Rugality leads
to better Finances look our physical health, mental health and relationships and overall in entire life, habits play the biggest role and this is an universal fact that good
habits makes good life financial success is nothing but the result of your good habits if you think logically if you want to be financially free you have to save money, you have to invest it but you have very less time so it is very important for you to save and invest money author says 90% people
can’t achieve financial freedom because of their bad habits their bad habits impact Savings a lot because people don’t think exponentially they always think linearly example what we think is, I am just eating one pizza, what will happen by that I am just eating one
burger today, what will happen with that with these small things, they make it a habit and start eating outside food order everyday some thing or the other from Zomato at least it happens every week and that becomes a habit because of which a particular amount Zomato gets every time goes to
different junk food companies money is also going plus all these things impact your health I saw a CashNews.co, there were two people both take different choice every day one person gets up early then the other gets up late one person eats junk food everyday the other person eats healthy all these
small choice which comes in front of us everyday our habits one person spends his money on useless things buys and eats useless things on the other hand the other person instead of eating unwanted things he saves it or eats healthy food and all these things of 1 day, 2 day, I month or 1 year
compounds it’s effect becomes so high that the person who had bad habits his health gets worse his money slowly decreases and his relationship life, everything comes to an end on the other side, who had made small habits those small habits brings improvement in his life slowly his
Savings and his Investments start giving him money his health helps him living a good life and in long term one person’s frugality changes his life completely on the other hand, the ignorance, his smoking, eating unhealthy will destroy his life so even you
have to understand this thing that the small decisions which you are taking everyday may be you won’t see it’s results today, tomorrow or even after a month but you will definitely see some difference in some years and that thing will hurt you in the long run so start living your life
frugally instead of spending on unwanted things, start saving start investing ya it might not help you to get rich in some time but definitely in long run, you can save money and make money so don’t keep linear thinking, keep exponential thinking how can you do all these things try not to
spend more than 50% of your Income and you have to invest 12% for long term for retirement and all if you do like this, you will benefit from it in long run I want to say you a bonus point, start working on different sources of Income start working on many
different sources of Income as much as possible if you just have one job then obviously that’s very risky thing you have to create sources of Income side by side which can give you Income at least a little this thing will help you to earn
money in long run and to be financially free if you want me to make a separate CashNews.co on this topic how can you make you r side Income, do comment and let me know if you are interested in buying free share of Tesla there is a link given in description from there you can
download IND money after downloading, you will see those Shares in the reward section if you are directly directing it from Play Store or App Store while signing up you have to enter a code SEEKENTESLA by this you will get the reward that’s all for now, thanks for watching
/>
Now that you’re fully informed, watch this amazing video on FROM HERE TO FINANCIAL HAPPINESS 💸 ENRICH YOUR LIFE IN 77 DAYS – FINANCE BOOK SUMMARY. With over 2074088 views, this video deepens your understanding of Finance.CashNews, your go-to portal for financial news and insights.
#FINANCIAL #HAPPINESS #ENRICH #LIFE #DAYS #FINANCE #BOOK #SUMMARY#1a73e8 #333 #BOOK #DAYS #ENRICH #finance #Financial #HAPPINESS #Life #SUMMARY
-
Hi friends Sam Dogen a financial advisor they say that in the year 2018 he was going to watch Soft Ball game with his friend Bob on a weekend there Bob had bought his new Tesla Model 3 car which was selling a lot in the market Bob was doing a lot of show off there that how does this car run
on autopilot he was driving his car with his I phone and was saying many interesting things like I heard this in news recently on 9th September a lady gave birth to a baby in Philadelphia in the front seat of Tesla and the delivery happened, when Tesla was running on auto pilot because of which,
that baby is also called as World’s First Tesla Baby so Bob was saying such interesting things to everyone Sam was shocked by listening to all these things he was shocked because that how did Bob a 31 year old pre school teacher had bought a $53,000 car which is obviously a lot of money
according to Sam it was their biggest financial mistake which he shouldn’t have done and at the same time, there was a hype about Tesla after listening to all those things, Sam drove that car one day he says that the experience of driving this was very different even he liked the Tesla Model
3 and even he wanted to buy that car but because this car was very costly to him and as he was a financial advisor, he didn’t want to do that mistake so as a financial advisor what he did was instead of buying this $53,000 car he started calculating it’s opportunity cost where he saw,
if he invest this much money of his Savings what can be better opportunity for him than this car then he started doing research about Tesla Company or Elon Musk’s company he started to realize about this company potential and finally after doing all these things he decided
that instead of buying a Tesla Model 3 of $53,000, will buy the Tesla Stocks worth $53,000 in October 2018 on the per share value of $298 bought the Tesla stocks and guess what after some time, these Tesla stocks reached $367 by doing this he had got a Profit of $11,500 and he
didn’t want to sell that and after 6 months, when there were some problems in the company because of a Tweet of Elon Musk, the stocks came down to $179 then their Profit of $11,500 converted to a loss of $20,000 but still he didn’t sell his stocks he was still now fast
forward after 2 years, where the entire world market crashed there Tesla stocks were rising then Sam thought, just like last time, these stock will fall one day then what Sam did was, at $888 per share value sold his 75% stock because he didn’t want to handle the volatility of this market due
to which he got a lot of Profit but ya the fact was, after some time Tesla stocks reached to $1,126 thinking of which Sam regretted but as it is said that Hindsight is always 20/20 after doing things we feel that we shouldn’t have done it, but anyways Sam had booked a good
Profit and then he was thinking how stupid Bob is even he should have bought the stocks instead of the car do you know the interesting part was Bob whom he was thinking is stupid he was investing a lot of his money in Tesla, from a long time because of which he had generated a lot
of Profit and with some part of the Profit he bought Tesla Model 3 look friends the things we should learn from this story is wealth is not like that as we think it is many time when you think people are less capable than you you think that they are financially
behind you well many time is is not necessary that they are behind you many times many people do well financially but since all their wealth is in their investment which we can’t see, so they won’t look rich many times and many times even if they look so, they look stupid which is not
always the case ya being financially free doesn’t mean that you have a lot of wealth which is visible to people by which you can live a luxurious life no but the meaning of being financially free is you live a comfortable life where you don’t worry about money where your money keeps you
safe and work for you now Author Jonathan Clements in their book From Here to Financial Happiness in this book they share 77 short lessons I will merge all those points and share with you 4 practical steps which will help you to be financially free as with that as I had gifted you
Shares of Google few weeks ago in this CashNews.co I will gift Tesla’s Shares how? well to know that keep watching the CashNews.co let’s come to lesson no. 1 which is No saving with Debt author says to start your financial freedom
journey first you have to do one thing that is clear all your Debts clear the Loan and this is the most basic rule of Finance that if you
have any kind of Debt specially bad Debt you cannot start your investing journey author says, some people start long term investing with their Debt where they will be paying their Debt and also doing some investment by this their
process of becoming financially free, slows down so author says first clear all your small Debts like mobile phone, laptop emi, car Loan and such things which you can finish early ya sometimes the big amounts like home Loan that can’t be easy
to clear, those are exceptions, keep them aside but clear your small Debts plus the author also says, to use Credit cards wisely because US Department of Labor had did a research on 7,900 citizens of age 20 to 40 by that we know that, those who were at high
Credit card Debt their stress was affecting their physical health overtime by which they faced many problems in daily life pain in joints and stiffness and were facing many problems you should know how you are using your Credit card for not only
your mental peace but also physical health many people don’t know that by using Credit cards the interest starts and it’s amount keeps increasing and there is a solution related to it, which you will know in 4th point but first remember that that clear all your
Debts as much as possible after that start your Savings journey properly Lesson no. 2 Financial safety net this might have even happened with you something needs repair in your home, like your phone is broken or your T.V is not turning on on there is a problem in
the engine of your car or bike like I remember my friend was saying, that the graphic card of his computer was spoilt the price was very high, at that time he didn’t had money to buy it so somehow he started working without graphic card at that time he didn’t had Credit
card and he didn’t want to borrow money from someone he he decided that next month when he gets Income he will buy the graphic card with that Income now look, many people are just like this if there is any problem, for it’s solution they use their
Credit card or depend on next salary if something happens they say, they will do it from next month do the EMI many times but author says, no one thinks what if their source of Income stops many people are salary based and their job is their main source of
Income there are only few people who have passive Income if their main source of Income dies of any reason job went or anything, even then, they will have a different source of Income on which they can depend on now as it was seen
during Covid time where many people lost their job and were destroyed completely so well what is it’s solution, the author says If you want to feel better about your none;">Finances today then you should spend more time thinking about what you are gonna pay for tomorrow which means basically author is saying us here we have to create an emergency fund you store your money, at a place where you can use it even after loosing your main source of
Income you cannot spend this money on any random things like for vacation, for buying a car or anything no here you have to create an emergency fund which should be the backup of your main Income source because of which, in case something happens and you loose your
job you will not get a new job until you can survive and be safe and how to do that, well to do that author says that you have to calculate your monthly expenses let’s say your monthly expenses is 20,000 rupees you should at least keep 1,20,000 rupees safe at side which is your emergency fund
if there is any problem, like covid, lock-down even then you will have a buffer time of 6 months where you can do many things, can find a job or create a new source of Revenue which will be very helpful for your survival and your respect Lesson no. 3 Invest conservatively and buy
stocks with caution to increase your wealth J Walk when they launched a website Priceline of discount offer in the early 2000’s by this their Net Worth reached $1.8 Billion in just one year and at the other side the world’s greatest investor Warren Buffet they had to
wait 55 years to earn their first Billion Dollars look there is how much difference but the thing is J Walk’s Income was not sustainable everyone knew that this dotcom bubble will burst and when that bubble burst, by end of October 2000 in just a few months, out of billions
of dollars of J walk only 33 Million Dollars were left and Warren Buffet were into the top 1% richest club of the world and are still today and for the coming many years, he will be in the top 1% list the reason behind this is, Warren Buffet, is investing from past 7 decades and he had rarely sold
his Shares so even the author says, if someone wants to be financially free so to invest your money Stock Market can be a very good place to you where you get not only returns, but the company pay you Dividends many times which means they share
some percent of their Profit to their share holders for example you might know that Warren Buffet is a major share holder of Coca Cola so the C.E.O of Coca Cola he gets the highest 16 Million Dollar salary per year on the other side, Warren Buffet by the Dividends
of Coca Cola earn 547 Million Dollars so you might have understood where to invest to become financially free author says when you think long term to invest in Stock Market you don’t need to understand any rocket science but the companies which you know about properly or
better use their products daily which you are using from many years, which you believe on you like those products it will be good for you to invest in such companies and one of the most successful Mutual Fund manager Peter Lynns, who had wrote many good books on investment even he says the same
thing you should invest in such companies whose products you use or you know better about them whose products you like and you believe on as many people use I phone eat Maggie, drink Coca Cola use Tesla Cars so it can be good for you to invest in such companies as it was proven in the starting
story and here you don’t need to see the daily fluctuations of the market in the Intelligent Investor, the mentor of Warren Buffet, Benjamin Graham, even they say in their book that we should not focus on the daily fluctuations of the market but you should just pick the good companies and
invest in that for long term this will give you very good returns in long run now look friends ya there are many Unicorns in India, which are doing very well and there are many companies in America which are giving exponential returns it can be easy to find them, because of their technological
innovations so we Indians should know about this opportunity that we can benefit from the opportunities of the growth outside so you can make this resolution this new year that you will globally diversify your Portfolio for better returns and safety in fact even before this new
year starts, any of your favorite company either Apple, Tesla, Google, Amazon or Netflix or whichever company you like, comment it down buy the Shares of that company and to start all things easily what we did was we have collaborated with IND Money and picked few free
Shares which you can get for free before to buy US stocks you had to bare many charges had to spend a lot of money but with the help of IND money you can get 0 account opening fees 0 maintenance fees and with the help of 0 Brokerage fees you can buy or sell US
stocks plus you get the best exchange rates here plus with the help of this app, you can track all your Investments all Investments you have did, whether is Mutual Funds, Stocks or text-decoration: none;">Crypto as I do the same by using this app so if you benefit from this and want to buy Tesla Stocks for free you just need to download IND money from the link given below and you will get few free Shares of Tesla in the reward section you will get a part
of that share only if you go with the link given below but if you download IND money directly from Play Store or App Store you need to enter the code while signing up which I am showing on screen SEEKENTESLA code you have to put that, then you will get those free stocks Point no 4 is Rugality leads
to better Finances look our physical health, mental health and relationships and overall in entire life, habits play the biggest role and this is an universal fact that good
habits makes good life financial success is nothing but the result of your good habits if you think logically if you want to be financially free you have to save money, you have to invest it but you have very less time so it is very important for you to save and invest money author says 90% people
can’t achieve financial freedom because of their bad habits their bad habits impact Savings a lot because people don’t think exponentially they always think linearly example what we think is, I am just eating one pizza, what will happen by that I am just eating one
burger today, what will happen with that with these small things, they make it a habit and start eating outside food order everyday some thing or the other from Zomato at least it happens every week and that becomes a habit because of which a particular amount Zomato gets every time goes to
different junk food companies money is also going plus all these things impact your health I saw a CashNews.co, there were two people both take different choice every day one person gets up early then the other gets up late one person eats junk food everyday the other person eats healthy all these
small choice which comes in front of us everyday our habits one person spends his money on useless things buys and eats useless things on the other hand the other person instead of eating unwanted things he saves it or eats healthy food and all these things of 1 day, 2 day, I month or 1 year
compounds it’s effect becomes so high that the person who had bad habits his health gets worse his money slowly decreases and his relationship life, everything comes to an end on the other side, who had made small habits those small habits brings improvement in his life slowly his
Savings and his Investments start giving him money his health helps him living a good life and in long term one person’s frugality changes his life completely on the other hand, the ignorance, his smoking, eating unhealthy will destroy his life so even you
have to understand this thing that the small decisions which you are taking everyday may be you won’t see it’s results today, tomorrow or even after a month but you will definitely see some difference in some years and that thing will hurt you in the long run so start living your life
frugally instead of spending on unwanted things, start saving start investing ya it might not help you to get rich in some time but definitely in long run, you can save money and make money so don’t keep linear thinking, keep exponential thinking how can you do all these things try not to
spend more than 50% of your Income and you have to invest 12% for long term for retirement and all if you do like this, you will benefit from it in long run I want to say you a bonus point, start working on different sources of Income start working on many
different sources of Income as much as possible if you just have one job then obviously that’s very risky thing you have to create sources of Income side by side which can give you Income at least a little this thing will help you to earn
money in long run and to be financially free if you want me to make a separate CashNews.co on this topic how can you make you r side Income, do comment and let me know if you are interested in buying free share of Tesla there is a link given in description from there you can
download IND money after downloading, you will see those Shares in the reward section if you are directly directing it from Play Store or App Store while signing up you have to enter a code SEEKENTESLA by this you will get the reward that’s all for now, thanks for watching
/>
Now that you’re fully informed, watch this amazing video on FROM HERE TO FINANCIAL HAPPINESS 💸 ENRICH YOUR LIFE IN 77 DAYS – FINANCE BOOK SUMMARY. With over 2074088 views, this video deepens your understanding of Finance.CashNews, your go-to portal for financial news and insights.
#FINANCIAL #HAPPINESS #ENRICH #LIFE #DAYS #FINANCE #BOOK #SUMMARY#1a73e8 #333 #BOOK #DAYS #ENRICH #finance #Financial #HAPPINESS #Life #SUMMARY
-
Hi friends Sam Dogen a financial advisor they say that in the year 2018 he was going to watch Soft Ball game with his friend Bob on a weekend there Bob had bought his new Tesla Model 3 car which was selling a lot in the market Bob was doing a lot of show off there that how does this car run
on autopilot he was driving his car with his I phone and was saying many interesting things like I heard this in news recently on 9th September a lady gave birth to a baby in Philadelphia in the front seat of Tesla and the delivery happened, when Tesla was running on auto pilot because of which,
that baby is also called as World’s First Tesla Baby so Bob was saying such interesting things to everyone Sam was shocked by listening to all these things he was shocked because that how did Bob a 31 year old pre school teacher had bought a $53,000 car which is obviously a lot of money
according to Sam it was their biggest financial mistake which he shouldn’t have done and at the same time, there was a hype about Tesla after listening to all those things, Sam drove that car one day he says that the experience of driving this was very different even he liked the Tesla Model
3 and even he wanted to buy that car but because this car was very costly to him and as he was a financial advisor, he didn’t want to do that mistake so as a financial advisor what he did was instead of buying this $53,000 car he started calculating it’s opportunity cost where he saw,
if he invest this much money of his Savings what can be better opportunity for him than this car then he started doing research about Tesla Company or Elon Musk’s company he started to realize about this company potential and finally after doing all these things he decided
that instead of buying a Tesla Model 3 of $53,000, will buy the Tesla Stocks worth $53,000 in October 2018 on the per share value of $298 bought the Tesla stocks and guess what after some time, these Tesla stocks reached $367 by doing this he had got a Profit of $11,500 and he
didn’t want to sell that and after 6 months, when there were some problems in the company because of a Tweet of Elon Musk, the stocks came down to $179 then their Profit of $11,500 converted to a loss of $20,000 but still he didn’t sell his stocks he was still now fast
forward after 2 years, where the entire world market crashed there Tesla stocks were rising then Sam thought, just like last time, these stock will fall one day then what Sam did was, at $888 per share value sold his 75% stock because he didn’t want to handle the volatility of this market due
to which he got a lot of Profit but ya the fact was, after some time Tesla stocks reached to $1,126 thinking of which Sam regretted but as it is said that Hindsight is always 20/20 after doing things we feel that we shouldn’t have done it, but anyways Sam had booked a good
Profit and then he was thinking how stupid Bob is even he should have bought the stocks instead of the car do you know the interesting part was Bob whom he was thinking is stupid he was investing a lot of his money in Tesla, from a long time because of which he had generated a lot
of Profit and with some part of the Profit he bought Tesla Model 3 look friends the things we should learn from this story is wealth is not like that as we think it is many time when you think people are less capable than you you think that they are financially
behind you well many time is is not necessary that they are behind you many times many people do well financially but since all their wealth is in their investment which we can’t see, so they won’t look rich many times and many times even if they look so, they look stupid which is not
always the case ya being financially free doesn’t mean that you have a lot of wealth which is visible to people by which you can live a luxurious life no but the meaning of being financially free is you live a comfortable life where you don’t worry about money where your money keeps you
safe and work for you now Author Jonathan Clements in their book From Here to Financial Happiness in this book they share 77 short lessons I will merge all those points and share with you 4 practical steps which will help you to be financially free as with that as I had gifted you
Shares of Google few weeks ago in this CashNews.co I will gift Tesla’s Shares how? well to know that keep watching the CashNews.co let’s come to lesson no. 1 which is No saving with Debt author says to start your financial freedom
journey first you have to do one thing that is clear all your Debts clear the Loan and this is the most basic rule of Finance that if you
have any kind of Debt specially bad Debt you cannot start your investing journey author says, some people start long term investing with their Debt where they will be paying their Debt and also doing some investment by this their
process of becoming financially free, slows down so author says first clear all your small Debts like mobile phone, laptop emi, car Loan and such things which you can finish early ya sometimes the big amounts like home Loan that can’t be easy
to clear, those are exceptions, keep them aside but clear your small Debts plus the author also says, to use Credit cards wisely because US Department of Labor had did a research on 7,900 citizens of age 20 to 40 by that we know that, those who were at high
Credit card Debt their stress was affecting their physical health overtime by which they faced many problems in daily life pain in joints and stiffness and were facing many problems you should know how you are using your Credit card for not only
your mental peace but also physical health many people don’t know that by using Credit cards the interest starts and it’s amount keeps increasing and there is a solution related to it, which you will know in 4th point but first remember that that clear all your
Debts as much as possible after that start your Savings journey properly Lesson no. 2 Financial safety net this might have even happened with you something needs repair in your home, like your phone is broken or your T.V is not turning on on there is a problem in
the engine of your car or bike like I remember my friend was saying, that the graphic card of his computer was spoilt the price was very high, at that time he didn’t had money to buy it so somehow he started working without graphic card at that time he didn’t had Credit
card and he didn’t want to borrow money from someone he he decided that next month when he gets Income he will buy the graphic card with that Income now look, many people are just like this if there is any problem, for it’s solution they use their
Credit card or depend on next salary if something happens they say, they will do it from next month do the EMI many times but author says, no one thinks what if their source of Income stops many people are salary based and their job is their main source of
Income there are only few people who have passive Income if their main source of Income dies of any reason job went or anything, even then, they will have a different source of Income on which they can depend on now as it was seen
during Covid time where many people lost their job and were destroyed completely so well what is it’s solution, the author says If you want to feel better about your none;">Finances today then you should spend more time thinking about what you are gonna pay for tomorrow which means basically author is saying us here we have to create an emergency fund you store your money, at a place where you can use it even after loosing your main source of
Income you cannot spend this money on any random things like for vacation, for buying a car or anything no here you have to create an emergency fund which should be the backup of your main Income source because of which, in case something happens and you loose your
job you will not get a new job until you can survive and be safe and how to do that, well to do that author says that you have to calculate your monthly expenses let’s say your monthly expenses is 20,000 rupees you should at least keep 1,20,000 rupees safe at side which is your emergency fund
if there is any problem, like covid, lock-down even then you will have a buffer time of 6 months where you can do many things, can find a job or create a new source of Revenue which will be very helpful for your survival and your respect Lesson no. 3 Invest conservatively and buy
stocks with caution to increase your wealth J Walk when they launched a website Priceline of discount offer in the early 2000’s by this their Net Worth reached $1.8 Billion in just one year and at the other side the world’s greatest investor Warren Buffet they had to
wait 55 years to earn their first Billion Dollars look there is how much difference but the thing is J Walk’s Income was not sustainable everyone knew that this dotcom bubble will burst and when that bubble burst, by end of October 2000 in just a few months, out of billions
of dollars of J walk only 33 Million Dollars were left and Warren Buffet were into the top 1% richest club of the world and are still today and for the coming many years, he will be in the top 1% list the reason behind this is, Warren Buffet, is investing from past 7 decades and he had rarely sold
his Shares so even the author says, if someone wants to be financially free so to invest your money Stock Market can be a very good place to you where you get not only returns, but the company pay you Dividends many times which means they share
some percent of their Profit to their share holders for example you might know that Warren Buffet is a major share holder of Coca Cola so the C.E.O of Coca Cola he gets the highest 16 Million Dollar salary per year on the other side, Warren Buffet by the Dividends
of Coca Cola earn 547 Million Dollars so you might have understood where to invest to become financially free author says when you think long term to invest in Stock Market you don’t need to understand any rocket science but the companies which you know about properly or
better use their products daily which you are using from many years, which you believe on you like those products it will be good for you to invest in such companies and one of the most successful Mutual Fund manager Peter Lynns, who had wrote many good books on investment even he says the same
thing you should invest in such companies whose products you use or you know better about them whose products you like and you believe on as many people use I phone eat Maggie, drink Coca Cola use Tesla Cars so it can be good for you to invest in such companies as it was proven in the starting
story and here you don’t need to see the daily fluctuations of the market in the Intelligent Investor, the mentor of Warren Buffet, Benjamin Graham, even they say in their book that we should not focus on the daily fluctuations of the market but you should just pick the good companies and
invest in that for long term this will give you very good returns in long run now look friends ya there are many Unicorns in India, which are doing very well and there are many companies in America which are giving exponential returns it can be easy to find them, because of their technological
innovations so we Indians should know about this opportunity that we can benefit from the opportunities of the growth outside so you can make this resolution this new year that you will globally diversify your Portfolio for better returns and safety in fact even before this new
year starts, any of your favorite company either Apple, Tesla, Google, Amazon or Netflix or whichever company you like, comment it down buy the Shares of that company and to start all things easily what we did was we have collaborated with IND Money and picked few free
Shares which you can get for free before to buy US stocks you had to bare many charges had to spend a lot of money but with the help of IND money you can get 0 account opening fees 0 maintenance fees and with the help of 0 Brokerage fees you can buy or sell US
stocks plus you get the best exchange rates here plus with the help of this app, you can track all your Investments all Investments you have did, whether is Mutual Funds, Stocks or text-decoration: none;">Crypto as I do the same by using this app so if you benefit from this and want to buy Tesla Stocks for free you just need to download IND money from the link given below and you will get few free Shares of Tesla in the reward section you will get a part
of that share only if you go with the link given below but if you download IND money directly from Play Store or App Store you need to enter the code while signing up which I am showing on screen SEEKENTESLA code you have to put that, then you will get those free stocks Point no 4 is Rugality leads
to better Finances look our physical health, mental health and relationships and overall in entire life, habits play the biggest role and this is an universal fact that good
habits makes good life financial success is nothing but the result of your good habits if you think logically if you want to be financially free you have to save money, you have to invest it but you have very less time so it is very important for you to save and invest money author says 90% people
can’t achieve financial freedom because of their bad habits their bad habits impact Savings a lot because people don’t think exponentially they always think linearly example what we think is, I am just eating one pizza, what will happen by that I am just eating one
burger today, what will happen with that with these small things, they make it a habit and start eating outside food order everyday some thing or the other from Zomato at least it happens every week and that becomes a habit because of which a particular amount Zomato gets every time goes to
different junk food companies money is also going plus all these things impact your health I saw a CashNews.co, there were two people both take different choice every day one person gets up early then the other gets up late one person eats junk food everyday the other person eats healthy all these
small choice which comes in front of us everyday our habits one person spends his money on useless things buys and eats useless things on the other hand the other person instead of eating unwanted things he saves it or eats healthy food and all these things of 1 day, 2 day, I month or 1 year
compounds it’s effect becomes so high that the person who had bad habits his health gets worse his money slowly decreases and his relationship life, everything comes to an end on the other side, who had made small habits those small habits brings improvement in his life slowly his
Savings and his Investments start giving him money his health helps him living a good life and in long term one person’s frugality changes his life completely on the other hand, the ignorance, his smoking, eating unhealthy will destroy his life so even you
have to understand this thing that the small decisions which you are taking everyday may be you won’t see it’s results today, tomorrow or even after a month but you will definitely see some difference in some years and that thing will hurt you in the long run so start living your life
frugally instead of spending on unwanted things, start saving start investing ya it might not help you to get rich in some time but definitely in long run, you can save money and make money so don’t keep linear thinking, keep exponential thinking how can you do all these things try not to
spend more than 50% of your Income and you have to invest 12% for long term for retirement and all if you do like this, you will benefit from it in long run I want to say you a bonus point, start working on different sources of Income start working on many
different sources of Income as much as possible if you just have one job then obviously that’s very risky thing you have to create sources of Income side by side which can give you Income at least a little this thing will help you to earn
money in long run and to be financially free if you want me to make a separate CashNews.co on this topic how can you make you r side Income, do comment and let me know if you are interested in buying free share of Tesla there is a link given in description from there you can
download IND money after downloading, you will see those Shares in the reward section if you are directly directing it from Play Store or App Store while signing up you have to enter a code SEEKENTESLA by this you will get the reward that’s all for now, thanks for watching
/>
Now that you’re fully informed, watch this amazing video on FROM HERE TO FINANCIAL HAPPINESS 💸 ENRICH YOUR LIFE IN 77 DAYS – FINANCE BOOK SUMMARY. With over 2074088 views, this video deepens your understanding of Finance.CashNews, your go-to portal for financial news and insights.
#FINANCIAL #HAPPINESS #ENRICH #LIFE #DAYS #FINANCE #BOOK #SUMMARY#1a73e8 #333 #BOOK #DAYS #ENRICH #finance #Financial #HAPPINESS #Life #SUMMARY
-
Hi friends Sam Dogen a financial advisor they say that in the year 2018 he was going to watch Soft Ball game with his friend Bob on a weekend there Bob had bought his new Tesla Model 3 car which was selling a lot in the market Bob was doing a lot of show off there that how does this car run
on autopilot he was driving his car with his I phone and was saying many interesting things like I heard this in news recently on 9th September a lady gave birth to a baby in Philadelphia in the front seat of Tesla and the delivery happened, when Tesla was running on auto pilot because of which,
that baby is also called as World’s First Tesla Baby so Bob was saying such interesting things to everyone Sam was shocked by listening to all these things he was shocked because that how did Bob a 31 year old pre school teacher had bought a $53,000 car which is obviously a lot of money
according to Sam it was their biggest financial mistake which he shouldn’t have done and at the same time, there was a hype about Tesla after listening to all those things, Sam drove that car one day he says that the experience of driving this was very different even he liked the Tesla Model
3 and even he wanted to buy that car but because this car was very costly to him and as he was a financial advisor, he didn’t want to do that mistake so as a financial advisor what he did was instead of buying this $53,000 car he started calculating it’s opportunity cost where he saw,
if he invest this much money of his Savings what can be better opportunity for him than this car then he started doing research about Tesla Company or Elon Musk’s company he started to realize about this company potential and finally after doing all these things he decided
that instead of buying a Tesla Model 3 of $53,000, will buy the Tesla Stocks worth $53,000 in October 2018 on the per share value of $298 bought the Tesla stocks and guess what after some time, these Tesla stocks reached $367 by doing this he had got a Profit of $11,500 and he
didn’t want to sell that and after 6 months, when there were some problems in the company because of a Tweet of Elon Musk, the stocks came down to $179 then their Profit of $11,500 converted to a loss of $20,000 but still he didn’t sell his stocks he was still now fast
forward after 2 years, where the entire world market crashed there Tesla stocks were rising then Sam thought, just like last time, these stock will fall one day then what Sam did was, at $888 per share value sold his 75% stock because he didn’t want to handle the volatility of this market due
to which he got a lot of Profit but ya the fact was, after some time Tesla stocks reached to $1,126 thinking of which Sam regretted but as it is said that Hindsight is always 20/20 after doing things we feel that we shouldn’t have done it, but anyways Sam had booked a good
Profit and then he was thinking how stupid Bob is even he should have bought the stocks instead of the car do you know the interesting part was Bob whom he was thinking is stupid he was investing a lot of his money in Tesla, from a long time because of which he had generated a lot
of Profit and with some part of the Profit he bought Tesla Model 3 look friends the things we should learn from this story is wealth is not like that as we think it is many time when you think people are less capable than you you think that they are financially
behind you well many time is is not necessary that they are behind you many times many people do well financially but since all their wealth is in their investment which we can’t see, so they won’t look rich many times and many times even if they look so, they look stupid which is not
always the case ya being financially free doesn’t mean that you have a lot of wealth which is visible to people by which you can live a luxurious life no but the meaning of being financially free is you live a comfortable life where you don’t worry about money where your money keeps you
safe and work for you now Author Jonathan Clements in their book From Here to Financial Happiness in this book they share 77 short lessons I will merge all those points and share with you 4 practical steps which will help you to be financially free as with that as I had gifted you
Shares of Google few weeks ago in this CashNews.co I will gift Tesla’s Shares how? well to know that keep watching the CashNews.co let’s come to lesson no. 1 which is No saving with Debt author says to start your financial freedom
journey first you have to do one thing that is clear all your Debts clear the Loan and this is the most basic rule of Finance that if you
have any kind of Debt specially bad Debt you cannot start your investing journey author says, some people start long term investing with their Debt where they will be paying their Debt and also doing some investment by this their
process of becoming financially free, slows down so author says first clear all your small Debts like mobile phone, laptop emi, car Loan and such things which you can finish early ya sometimes the big amounts like home Loan that can’t be easy
to clear, those are exceptions, keep them aside but clear your small Debts plus the author also says, to use Credit cards wisely because US Department of Labor had did a research on 7,900 citizens of age 20 to 40 by that we know that, those who were at high
Credit card Debt their stress was affecting their physical health overtime by which they faced many problems in daily life pain in joints and stiffness and were facing many problems you should know how you are using your Credit card for not only
your mental peace but also physical health many people don’t know that by using Credit cards the interest starts and it’s amount keeps increasing and there is a solution related to it, which you will know in 4th point but first remember that that clear all your
Debts as much as possible after that start your Savings journey properly Lesson no. 2 Financial safety net this might have even happened with you something needs repair in your home, like your phone is broken or your T.V is not turning on on there is a problem in
the engine of your car or bike like I remember my friend was saying, that the graphic card of his computer was spoilt the price was very high, at that time he didn’t had money to buy it so somehow he started working without graphic card at that time he didn’t had Credit
card and he didn’t want to borrow money from someone he he decided that next month when he gets Income he will buy the graphic card with that Income now look, many people are just like this if there is any problem, for it’s solution they use their
Credit card or depend on next salary if something happens they say, they will do it from next month do the EMI many times but author says, no one thinks what if their source of Income stops many people are salary based and their job is their main source of
Income there are only few people who have passive Income if their main source of Income dies of any reason job went or anything, even then, they will have a different source of Income on which they can depend on now as it was seen
during Covid time where many people lost their job and were destroyed completely so well what is it’s solution, the author says If you want to feel better about your none;">Finances today then you should spend more time thinking about what you are gonna pay for tomorrow which means basically author is saying us here we have to create an emergency fund you store your money, at a place where you can use it even after loosing your main source of
Income you cannot spend this money on any random things like for vacation, for buying a car or anything no here you have to create an emergency fund which should be the backup of your main Income source because of which, in case something happens and you loose your
job you will not get a new job until you can survive and be safe and how to do that, well to do that author says that you have to calculate your monthly expenses let’s say your monthly expenses is 20,000 rupees you should at least keep 1,20,000 rupees safe at side which is your emergency fund
if there is any problem, like covid, lock-down even then you will have a buffer time of 6 months where you can do many things, can find a job or create a new source of Revenue which will be very helpful for your survival and your respect Lesson no. 3 Invest conservatively and buy
stocks with caution to increase your wealth J Walk when they launched a website Priceline of discount offer in the early 2000’s by this their Net Worth reached $1.8 Billion in just one year and at the other side the world’s greatest investor Warren Buffet they had to
wait 55 years to earn their first Billion Dollars look there is how much difference but the thing is J Walk’s Income was not sustainable everyone knew that this dotcom bubble will burst and when that bubble burst, by end of October 2000 in just a few months, out of billions
of dollars of J walk only 33 Million Dollars were left and Warren Buffet were into the top 1% richest club of the world and are still today and for the coming many years, he will be in the top 1% list the reason behind this is, Warren Buffet, is investing from past 7 decades and he had rarely sold
his Shares so even the author says, if someone wants to be financially free so to invest your money Stock Market can be a very good place to you where you get not only returns, but the company pay you Dividends many times which means they share
some percent of their Profit to their share holders for example you might know that Warren Buffet is a major share holder of Coca Cola so the C.E.O of Coca Cola he gets the highest 16 Million Dollar salary per year on the other side, Warren Buffet by the Dividends
of Coca Cola earn 547 Million Dollars so you might have understood where to invest to become financially free author says when you think long term to invest in Stock Market you don’t need to understand any rocket science but the companies which you know about properly or
better use their products daily which you are using from many years, which you believe on you like those products it will be good for you to invest in such companies and one of the most successful Mutual Fund manager Peter Lynns, who had wrote many good books on investment even he says the same
thing you should invest in such companies whose products you use or you know better about them whose products you like and you believe on as many people use I phone eat Maggie, drink Coca Cola use Tesla Cars so it can be good for you to invest in such companies as it was proven in the starting
story and here you don’t need to see the daily fluctuations of the market in the Intelligent Investor, the mentor of Warren Buffet, Benjamin Graham, even they say in their book that we should not focus on the daily fluctuations of the market but you should just pick the good companies and
invest in that for long term this will give you very good returns in long run now look friends ya there are many Unicorns in India, which are doing very well and there are many companies in America which are giving exponential returns it can be easy to find them, because of their technological
innovations so we Indians should know about this opportunity that we can benefit from the opportunities of the growth outside so you can make this resolution this new year that you will globally diversify your Portfolio for better returns and safety in fact even before this new
year starts, any of your favorite company either Apple, Tesla, Google, Amazon or Netflix or whichever company you like, comment it down buy the Shares of that company and to start all things easily what we did was we have collaborated with IND Money and picked few free
Shares which you can get for free before to buy US stocks you had to bare many charges had to spend a lot of money but with the help of IND money you can get 0 account opening fees 0 maintenance fees and with the help of 0 Brokerage fees you can buy or sell US
stocks plus you get the best exchange rates here plus with the help of this app, you can track all your Investments all Investments you have did, whether is Mutual Funds, Stocks or text-decoration: none;">Crypto as I do the same by using this app so if you benefit from this and want to buy Tesla Stocks for free you just need to download IND money from the link given below and you will get few free Shares of Tesla in the reward section you will get a part
of that share only if you go with the link given below but if you download IND money directly from Play Store or App Store you need to enter the code while signing up which I am showing on screen SEEKENTESLA code you have to put that, then you will get those free stocks Point no 4 is Rugality leads
to better Finances look our physical health, mental health and relationships and overall in entire life, habits play the biggest role and this is an universal fact that good
habits makes good life financial success is nothing but the result of your good habits if you think logically if you want to be financially free you have to save money, you have to invest it but you have very less time so it is very important for you to save and invest money author says 90% people
can’t achieve financial freedom because of their bad habits their bad habits impact Savings a lot because people don’t think exponentially they always think linearly example what we think is, I am just eating one pizza, what will happen by that I am just eating one
burger today, what will happen with that with these small things, they make it a habit and start eating outside food order everyday some thing or the other from Zomato at least it happens every week and that becomes a habit because of which a particular amount Zomato gets every time goes to
different junk food companies money is also going plus all these things impact your health I saw a CashNews.co, there were two people both take different choice every day one person gets up early then the other gets up late one person eats junk food everyday the other person eats healthy all these
small choice which comes in front of us everyday our habits one person spends his money on useless things buys and eats useless things on the other hand the other person instead of eating unwanted things he saves it or eats healthy food and all these things of 1 day, 2 day, I month or 1 year
compounds it’s effect becomes so high that the person who had bad habits his health gets worse his money slowly decreases and his relationship life, everything comes to an end on the other side, who had made small habits those small habits brings improvement in his life slowly his
Savings and his Investments start giving him money his health helps him living a good life and in long term one person’s frugality changes his life completely on the other hand, the ignorance, his smoking, eating unhealthy will destroy his life so even you
have to understand this thing that the small decisions which you are taking everyday may be you won’t see it’s results today, tomorrow or even after a month but you will definitely see some difference in some years and that thing will hurt you in the long run so start living your life
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Baume Before Mercier
The recently-announced sale of Baume & Mercier by Richemont to Italian distributor Damiani Group spurred me to research the history of that famous brand. Just as there was a LeCoultre before Jaeger, an Audemars before Piguet, and a Vacheron before Constantin, there was a Baume before Mercier. These unions often tell a story of greater transitions in the industry rather than simply consolidation of corporate control. And the story of the Baume family of Les Bois and London is particularly illuminating.
Long before Baume & Mercier was founded the Baume brothers of Les Bois built a watchmaking enterprise reaching London and beyond!Note: Baume & Mercier is an independent company founded in 1918 by William Baume. This Geneva-based retail and manufacturing company has no real connection to the historic company founded by his great grandfather, Louis-Joseph Baume, with whom we shall begin. His company, known as Frères Baume, was primarily focused on British market through a related company, Baume & Co of London. Even though William Baume worked for these family firms, Baume & Mercier was entirely independent and was locked out of the British market by Baume & Co for most of the 20th century.
The Baume Family of Les Bois
Louis-Joseph Baume (1783-1867) and his wife Agnès née Froidevaux (1786-1850) lived in the remote village of Les Bois, a French-speaking area along the current national border which was annexed into the German-dominated Canton of Berne in 1815. Baume was a farmer like most of his neighbors, but starting in 1834 he also produced watches at a home-based workshop. He would deliver these to La Chaux-de-Fonds, a rising center of watchmaking located an easy 2-hour walk southeast on the Jura plateau. He appears to have been found bankrupt in 1835. The Baume family lost their first five children, four of whom died as young children in 1816. But three daughters and four sons born later survived.
Victor Baume (1817-1887) and his brother Célestin Baume (1819-1880) organized a watchmaking company as “Baume frères” as soon as they reached the age of maturity in 18401. In 1848, when the Indicateur Davoine directory first includes Les Bois, it shows “Baume frères, fabricans d’horlogerie.” This listing also includes their brother, watchmaker Auguste Baume (1820-1859), and a gilding operation also called Baume frères perhaps run with their youngest brother, Eugène Baume (1822-1875).
Their father’s bankruptcy likely kept him from being officially involved, but he certainly continued to contribute to the efforts of his young sons. He died in 1867, having seen his sons build a flourishing watchmaking business, marry, and have children of their own.
Although the original establishment of the company is murky2, it is clear that the Baume family was at the center of watchmaking in Les Bois by the 1840s. Production of components was distributed across the region, with small workshops contributing individual components that were brought together as semi-finished watches to be disassembled, finished, adjusted, and reassembled for sale. The Baume brothers acted as wholesalers, gathering these watches for sale in La Chaux-de-Fonds and Neuchâtel. But the ambitious young men saw greater opportunity in the trade, leaving the village and even the country to make that happen.
An Early and Unusual Vertical Strategy
The hallmark of industrialized watchmaking is vertical integration: Starting in the late 19th century, manufactures like Longines, Omega, and Zénith attempted to consolidate production of as many components as possible under their control, either under the same roof or by purchasing supplier factories. This was a repudiation of the etablisseur tradition, which collected components produced by thousands of tiny workshops to produce a finished watch. Vertical integration was incredibly controversial, pitting traditional watchmaking fathers against their industrialist sons and even whole cities like Geneva and La Chaux-de-Fonds against upstarts like Bienne and Grenchen. This was a wholesale mindset shift that enabled 20th century industrial watchmaking.
This is why the Baume brothers are so interesting: They built a different kind of integrated company that embraced the workshop tradition while ensuring control and quality. And it connected rural Les Bois to La Chaux-de-Fonds, Geneva, and London! There are very few examples of such a far-reaching watchmaking enterprise, and certainly none this early.
Victor Baume (1817-1887) was the oldest surviving son and lead a sprawling network of businesses lead by his three younger brothersThe idea was straightforward but it was incredibly challenging. Each of the four Baume brothers established his own business focused on a key aspect of watchmaking:
- Since he was the oldest son, Victor Baume remained in Les Bois to run the company and source raw components from the workshops of the Jura
- Célestin Baume moved to England, focused on watch finishing and sales, leveraging the skilled watchmakers in Clerkenwell north of London
- Auguste Baume specialized in gilding movements and producing dials, first in Les Bois but soon moving to La Chaux-de-Fonds
- Eugène Baume ran a finishing and sales operation in Geneva, securing the finest watchmaking skills and commercial opportunities there
This dispersed watchmaking enterprise was active by the 1850s, when the Baume brothers were still under 40. Their presence in London and Geneva gave them an incredible understanding of the market, which was widely misunderstood by parochial competitors in the Vallée de Joux, Le Locle, and La Chaux-de-Fonds. And their effective use of the finest watchmakers in these cities allowed them to exploit the inexpensive and rough components produced in the Swiss Jura.
Focus on the English Market
The young Baume brothers faced a significant decision in the 1840s: Would they produce watches in the thinner French style or the robust English genre? Given that their home in the Swiss Jura was firmly in the French sphere of influence (harboring both Huguenots and French Catholics alongside revolutionaries opposed to German Berne) one would think it a simple choice. And since Les Bois was among the first Swiss firms to adopt the cylinder escapement and Lépine ebauche, their watches were better suited for the French market. But Victor Baume opted instead to build a bridge between Les Bois and London, and 25 year old Célestin Baume departed for London in 1844.
Clerkenwell was filled with watchmaking workshops in the 18th centuryBaume settled in Clerkenwell, which was a center for watchmakers in the 1850s. As was the case everywhere before the industrial revolution, British watchmakers worked in small workshops, performing specialized tasks to produce finished watches. But the watchmakers of Clerkenwell were far more skilled than their Swiss counterparts at this time, and they knew exactly what British buyers wanted. Célestin Baume quickly built a network of specialists that could turn the rough components of the Jura into high-quality English style watches.
The Baume brothers innovated beyond the classic English watch design, but always kept close enough to keep from alienating customers. The firm created the first watch to use the 3/4 plate design typical in Germany with their modern cylinder escapement. And as early as 1851 they created the first so-called “flat glass” cases, with a tall polished bezel housing a flat glass crystal. These soon became popular with English gentlemen and were widely copied.
The watches produced by the Baume brothers were in strong demand in London and the British Empire. It was said that wholesalers would descend on the Clerkenwell office as soon as a new batch was ready, carrying them throughout England, Scotland, and Ireland. Baume even had distributors carrying their watches to Australia and New Zealand as well as British ports in Asia.
A photograph of Hatton Garden in 1895As early as 1852 Célestin Baume had partnered in a retail operation located along the fashionable street of Hatton Garden. Baume & Lezard remained in operation until 1872, exposing the company’s products to buyers from around the British Empire. The company chose the block of buildings behind the Union Bank at Holborn Circle, situated alongside many other jewelers and watch retailers. This block remains the home of upscale jewelers today and was the home of the De Beers diamond company for a century.
In 1876, control of the London operation passed from Célestin Baume to his nephew, Arthur (about 1852-1936). Over nearly a half-century in Hatton Garden, Arthur Baume would become a fixture in London society, contributing to the so-called “Swiss Colony” as well as more conventional organizations like the Royal Geographical Society. Arthur’s connections allowed him to challenge the status quo of British watches, tempting fashionable gentlemen away from the old fashioned designs that had earned Baume & Company a place in the market.
In addition to selling watches produced by their own workshops in London and Switzerland, the Baume & Company showroom represented the Longines factory of Saint-Imier. The English considered the anchor or “Swiss lever” escapement to be unreliable, but the Longines watch was eventually able to overcome this reputation. Thus, the Baume Brothers not only met the needs of the British market but cracked it open for French and Swiss imports! The Baume Frères “Ironclad” pocket watch also caught on with the British sportsman thanks to its unusual oxidized steel case.
Another major new product to reach Switzerland through the Baume showroom was the so-called “Four-in-Hand” watch. This used a large 38-ligne movement and could be mounted on the dashboard of a “brougham, dog-cart, Raleigh cart, or similar vehicle.” Longines produced these clocks with 30-hour or 8-day movements as large as 60 lignes and they became a must-have accessory that lasted even into the time of the automobile.
Consolidation of Swiss Suppliers
While Célestin focused on his English customers, his brothers continued to organize and centralize their supplier relationships.
The third brother, Auguste Baume focused on gilding (“dorage”) in the first half of the 1850s but was listed alongside Baume frères in Les Bois as a “negociant et fabricant” in the second half of the decade. About 1856, Auguste moved to La Chaux-de-Fonds to tap into the network of suppliers there, but this effort was cut short: He died on May 29 1859 at just 38 years of age. Still, the Baume family maintained its ties to suppliers in La Chaux-de-Fonds, and would move the operation to the city in the 20th century.
The Baume workshop in Geneva was located in the long block of buildings across the yard from the railroad station shown in this 1860s illustrationYoungest brother Eugène Baume was a skilled assembler of watches in Les Bois before moving to Geneva in 1859. He spent his life connecting the Baume family to the skilled makers of complicated watches and suppliers of gold cases there. His watch finishing operation was located on the right bank in Geneva, moving one block from Rue du Pradier 3 to rue du Mont-Blanc 20 by 1866. Eugène’s life was cut short on February 24, 1875, ending the official presence of the Frères Baume in Geneva.
The marriages of the Baume siblings created deeper connections: Their spouses included a Chapuis, two Jobins, two Girardins, and a Piquerez, all familiar names in watchmaking. There are many records showing contributions by the Jobin family in particular3 to the growing Baume enterprise, jointly opening a steam-powered watch case factory in Le Noirmont and Les Bois.
The 1857 Industrie-Ausstellung in Berne is remembered as the first true national expositionIn 1857 the Frères Baume exhibited at the Swiss Trade and Industrial Exhibition in Berne. This was a predecessor to the familiar Swiss Industries Fair in Basel (later called BaselWorld) as well as the famous series of national expositions, which continue to this day. The company sent 59 watches (21 in silver and 38 in gold), “all exquisitely crafted and valued at over 7,000 francs; they were produced by Messrs. Baume in the style of the watches they manufacture for the English market, where the firm successfully sells its products to great advantage.” The company was criticized for the crudeness of its display (it was the first-ever such expo after all), as well as the fact that none of its successful English-style watches were included. But this is no surprise, since the company was already producing different watches in Les Bois, Geneva, and London, and this exhibit only reflected local products from the Jura region. Considering how young the company was, this global scope was truly revolutionary.
Fragmentation of the Baume Family
Perhaps it is unsurprising that this far-reaching and interconnected network of companies did not last. Control of the Baume family business fell solely to Victor’s sons, since Auguste and Eugène lacked heirs, and Célestin’s son Alexandre died tragically in Alsace in 1894.
Alcide and Virgile Baume replaced Victor and his brothers as the namesake “frères Baume” in the 1883 FOSC survey of Swiss businesses, though Victor Baume retained his power of attorney until his death in September of 1887. Alcide, Virgile, and Mélina Baume inherited the Swiss properties of their father Victor three years earlier; middle brother Arthur Baume is left out, as he had become a British citizen and taken over the London firm of Baume & Co in 1876.
The Les Bois factory was offered for sale in August of 1889 as the firm became more reliant on suppliers in La Chaux-de-Fonds and Geneva24 year old Virgile Baume aligned himself with the London branch in 1885, moving to Geneva to re-establish Baume & Co there after the death of his uncle Eugène a decade earlier. He was removed from the Les Bois operation in 1892, with his older brother Alcide Baume becoming the sole “successeur de Baume frères.” Alcide also took over the Le Noirmont watch case factory formerly called Baume & Jobin. But Alcide was increasingly focused on supplier companies outside Les Bois. In August 1889 he offered the company’s brand new factory, including its 8 horsepower steam power plant, for sale. He simply no longer needed manufacturing in the village of his birth.
Everything seemed to be going well for Alcide Baume, who married Alexine Chapuis and welcomed twin sons Jämes and Alexandre in 1882, followed by Rachel in 1884, William in 1885, Jeanne in 1887, and Marguerite in 1892. But Alcide’s family would never be as close as their predecessors. Alexine died on September 8, 1893, leaving business-focused Alcide with six young children. They were raised at boarding schools4, as their father and uncles had been, but with no home in Les Bois to welcome them.
Jeanneret and Mosimann
With Jämes Baume intent on becoming a dentist, Alcide Baume sent his twin Alexandre to London in 1904 to learn about the family’s British business. It is likely that Alexandre worked at Baume & Co in Hatton Garden alongside another Swiss apprentice three years older, Paul-César Jeanneret. Alexandre must have impressed his uncle Arthur, as he remained in London and took over the British operation in 1923.
Paul-C. Jeanneret was sent back to La Chaux-de-Fonds a few months after Alexandre arrived to establish a better supply network for Baume & Co. This operation was acquired in 1909, becoming an official subsidiary of the British firm.
With the historic Baume family workshop in Les Bois now closed, the remaining corporate structure was merged into an established firm in La Chaux-de-Fonds in 1911. Ulrich Mosimann established a watch workshop in La Chaux-de-Fonds in 1876, the same year Arthur took over Baume & Co in London. He was likely a supplier of the British branch, either directly or through Victor and Alcide Baume in Les Bois. His sons, Paul and Albert Mosimann, took over the company as Mosimann frères following his death in 1889 and incorporated it as Mosimann & Cie six years later. Paul Mosimann became increasingly important in politics and in the Swiss watch industry, becoming mayor of La Chaux-de-Fonds and a National Councilor and president of the Chambre Suisse de l’Horlogerie, leaving him little time for his family firm.
Following their 1911 acquisition of the Baume family watchmaking business, Mosimann & Cie became their true successor. Their Mildia brand was acquired by Schwarz-Etienne in 1976 and closed in 2004.When Paul Mosimann left Mosimann & Cie in 1911, the former firm of Alcide Baume in Les Bois was absorbed into it, with Alcide’s son William Baume joining Albert Mosimann as owner.
The three successor companies (Baume & Co of London and La Chaux-de-Fonds and Mosimann & Cie) must have been very close indeed: They used the same trademarks, with confusing overlapping registrations for “Baume Watch”, “Baume”, and the “B & Co” hallmark found on British and Swiss movements alike. Following the death of Alcide Baume on May 20, 1916 the La Chaux-de-Fonds businesses even shared the same office at Rue du Nord 1165. Jeanneret left the company in 1913 to focus on greater ambitions, becoming the head of the Syndicat des Fabricants Suisses de Montres Or and founding the Information Horlogère Suisse, a clearinghouse of industry statistics. He was replaced by young William Baume, son of Alcide and brother of Alexandre.
Baume & Mercier, Baume & Company, and Baume
Following the death of his father, with his brother ensconced in London and the historic Baume family companies now under the ownership of the Mosimann family, William Baume looked elsewhere. He had met a dashing salesman at the Geneva showroom of Haas Neveux while on a business trip in 1912. Baume decided to take his inheritance and invest it in a new partnership with Paul Tcherednitchenko-dit-Mercier in 1918. Thus, the Geneva firm of Baume et Mercier was born.
Baume & Mercier was located on the Grand Quai next to the famous Hotel Metropole in GenevaIn 1923, after nearly 50 years in control, Arthur Baume passed control of Baume & Company in London to his nephew, William brother, Alexandre Baume. He continued to grow the business there, soon coming into competition with his brother’s Baume & Mercier. Baume & Company was able to prevent the Geneva upstart from using the family name in the British market, especially after William was forced out during the Great Depression. Alexandre was succeeded in 1946 by his own son, Louis-C. Baume, who continued the firm until the 1960s.
Following his 1934 departure from his namesake firm of Baume & Mercier, William Baume opened a retail jewelry store in Geneva. The Baume showroom, located directly across the street from the famous department store Grand Passage, represented the great Swiss watch brands: Zénith, Tissot, Omega, Longines, and even Baume & Mercier! The business was continued by Baume’s own sons well into the 1970s.
William Baume became a retail jeweler after being forced out of Baume & Mercier during the Great DepressionThe Grail Watch Perspective
The most impressive accomplishment of the Baume family was how quickly they built a global watchmaking business, and how early they were to the idea of vertical integration. Even before industrialization and factories, Victor Baume and his brothers understood the importance of controlling the supply chain and the value of reaching all the way to the customer. Despite being constrained by the nature of watchmaking in the 19th century, both in Switzerland and in England, which was limited to small workshops and suppliers, the Baume brothers built a remarkable enterprise.
The wide reach of the Baume family watchmaking business made it incredibly difficult to research. There is very little primary source information, and I am far more adept when it comes to Swiss history than British archives. Thankfully, David Boettcher beat me to it with a thorough look at Baume & Company in England, and I suggest looking at his excellent article! I have far more to say on this subject, and hope to write a follow-on article about “Baume After Mercier” in the future.
Notes
- It is often said that Victor and Célestin Baume organized a watchmaking company in 1834, but this must have been their father, since Victor (the oldest) was just 17 years of age and could not legally or practically form a company at this point. For decades, Baume & Mercier advertising has shown a date of 1830, but this does not correspond with anything in historic records. Incredibly, even William Baume included “Horloger depuis 1830” in his advertisements in the 1940s!
- In 2010, Baume & Mercier posted a series of 16 diary entries alleged to be written by Victor Baume and his grandson, William. Although it is filled with anachronisms and inaccuracies, it contains some interesting details on the family and makes for an enjoyable read. But the connection between the Baume family and Baume & Mercier is vastly over-stated in modern times.
- The Jobin and Baume families did not always get along: Aurèle Jobin clashed with his cousin Arthur Baume shortly after he moved to London to take over Baume & Co in 1876. This lead to a public confrontation when Alcide Baume sent Aurèle’s private apology to Le Jura for publication!
- Even 18 moth old Marguerite was sent to boarding school: The 2010 diary, which appears better-sourced when it comes to William’s entries, claims that Marguerite was raised at a boarding school in Vienna. It also claims she sat on the lap of Habsburg Emperor Franz Joseph, an odd and specific recollection.
- Despite housing two companies, and being on the block below the famous Montbrillant factory, the building at Rue du Nord 116 was not very large or notable. I was unable to find a good photo, let alone any indication of the occupants.
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Don’t have a menty b about this bloggy p
An open linguistic question was raised recently on Bluesky by Darach Ó Séaghdha: What do we call those cutesie slang phrases that have become productive in the UK lately, like genny lec for ‘general election’ and menty b for ‘mental breakdown’?
In response I wrote a short thread, which I already disagree with. So I’ll pick up the discussion here on Sentence first, where there’s more room, it’s easier to find, and it’s probably less ephemeral than on social media.
We can show this linguistic fad as having two main stereotyped patterns or formulas, which overlap morphologically. For type 1, we take a word or short phrase, clip (i.e., truncate, abbreviate) the first stressed syllable, add a y-suffix, and reduce the next word or stressed syllable to its initial letter:
mental breakdown → menty b
nervous breakdown → nervy b
a hundred percent → hundy p
tomato ketchup → tommy k
sauvignon blanc → savvy b
ChatGPT → chatty g
lockdown → locky d
pandemic → panny d
Clapham Junction → Clappy JFor type 2, we clip the first stressed syllable, add a y-suffix (same as type 1 so far), clip the next word or stressed syllable, and, optionally, add an s-suffix:
general election → genny lec/lex
cost of living / cost-of-living crisis → cozzy/cozzie livs
platinum jubilee → platty jubes/joobs
king’s coronation → corrie nash
bank holiday → banny hols
state funeral → statey funesYou may not have seen or heard any of these. They’re still fairly restricted demographically, and are perhaps more spoken than written – and written only in very informal contexts – but if you search for them you’ll find examples.
I’m sure a linguist could formulate them better, but you get the idea. There’s minor variation, but there are clear core patterns. And a phrase can sometimes fit either type: panny dems and platty j also work and indeed are in use. How fun or satisfying they are to say is likely also a factor.
When a phrase can’t go either way, it may be because the result is semantically opaque or ambiguous, e.g., menty breaks suggests mental break(s) more than mental breakdown. Type 1s seem not to favour initial letters with zero onset (i.e., starting with a vowel sound): no cozzy ells or statey effs. But the sample size is small, so that may not hold up.
‘Have you heard the phrase “genny lec”?’ BBC vox pop, 2 July 2024
So what exactly is this phenomenon?
It’s slang and wordplay, for starters – but of a specific kind. The repeated formula (multiple clipping + y– or s-suffixation) made me wonder at first if it’s a snowclone – a kind of phrasal template that’s customizable for reuse (X is the new Y; X 2.0). But a snowclone needs to be a cliché first, and that’s not the case here.
The formula is productive, though – you can coin these phrases at will, as @matthewcba does in a TikTok video with the comically improbable mitty circs ‘mitigating circumstances’. (The video also includes simple clippings like Ab Fab and profesh.)
In the UK Independent in August 2024, Madeline Sherratt referred to the pattern as ‘cringe lingua’ and cited slang expert Tony Thorne’s belief that it
derives from the online “hun” generation – a subculture lampooned on Mumsnet that runs rampant with the frivolous and facetious use of “gorg” and “mwah” when typing furiously on WhatsApp – an etymological by-product of the “live, laugh, love” philosophy.
It extends to the humble “jackie p” (jacket potato) with a squirt of “tommy k” (tomato ketchup) on top – a money-saving meal when everything is so “spenny” (expensive) . . .
Such phrases are attributed to this broadly millennial subculture, which involves making silly jokes online. Those who subscribe to it, Thorne says, tend to be white, young, and upper-working-class to lower-middle-class women.
He said: “The online phrases such as ‘platty jubes’ and ‘savvy b’ mock the formal language that oppresses us, and we see this with young people when they move into the world of work and professionalism.”
Hun culture is something I was only marginally aware of. But I’m not surprised the fashion is driven by young women, given their place at the vanguard of so much linguistic innovation. The examples I’ve listed are all relatively new, as far as I know, but there are plenty of forerunners from various domains, including personal names.
Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis was popularly known as Jackie O. Mickey D’s (Maccy D’s, etc.) for McDonald’s emerged in the 1970s as US Black and campus slang. An Aussie was reported on Bluesky to have called Christmas decorations ‘Chrissie Decs’ in the 1990s. Sunny Delight rebranded as SunnyD decades ago. Okey-doke has been dated to the 1930s. I’m sure you can think of others.
The recent wave of phrases are from a particular, interrelated set of sources, say the linguists who’ve researched them. Christian Ilbury confirmed to me that some are from or are associated with hun culture in the UK; his 2022 paper ‘U Ok Hun?: The digital commodification of white woman style’ includes examples of the type discussed here, including cocky t’s ‘cocktails’.
Pavel Iosad told me that his colleague Patrick Honeybone
has studied a version of pattern 2 in Liverpool (truncation + y-suffixation + some segmental effects, eg Sefton Park > Sevvy) and he dubbed it (Scouse) diddification, which I think is a glorious name that we should adopt.
Honeybone also refers to the process as ‘diddificating truncation’, alluding again to P. Diddy, and provides a one-page summary here. At first I thought another rapper, Cardi B, fitted the pattern, but that name is a reworking of Bacardi.
The UK may be the hotspot of this slang, but Australians, as we’ve seen, are also on board. They do love their clippings and hypocorisms. Cozzie livs was Macquarie Dictionary’s word of the year in 2023, and I recently saw an Australian call the tennis player Elena Rybakina ‘Lenny Baks’, a great example that shows the name’s stress pattern.
Some people find these phrases twee, stupid, or insensitive. Even the Financial Times said that cozzie livs ‘only compounds the misery’ of the cost-of-living crisis. Some of the phrases may aim, in part, to make light of difficult or stressful subjects, to dull or reclaim their power. This is a specialty of slang. But they won’t win everyone over, and that, too, is as it should be.
In January 2023, Serena Smith’s ‘investy g’ for Dazed magazine tied them to a literary tradition of creative silliness, citing Edward Lear and Lewis Carroll. Sincere use of these phrases ‘misses a crucial element’, she wrote; ‘the cringiness, the tackiness, the ridiculousness is part of the fun’.
I neither love nor loathe them. I’d never used them, even ironically, until this blog post, this bloggy p, but I find them interesting as wordplay. I’d love to hear ideas for what to call them, how else they might be categorized, or how they relate to patterns already formally described or informally conceived (e.g., as a subset of hun lingo).
Suggestions in the replies to Gretchen McCulloch’s post on Bluesky include childish abbreviations or chilly abs, nicky Ns or nicky ens (for ‘nicknames’), clippy comps, and extended hypocoristics. Of these I like Erik Wennstrom’s clippy comps best. A clipped compound could be psyops or sitcom, but clippy comps shows more precisely (because self-referentially) what it refers to. Clippy c’s could be used for type 1.
Another route is to use a popular or prototypical example to refer synecdochically to the set, much as Brianne Hughes uses cutthroats or cutthroat compounds as shorthand for agentive and instrumental exocentric verb-noun (V-N) compounds. This would give us menty b compounds, genny lec phrases, or some such term.
Don’t have a nervy b about it, but if the slang sticks around and there’s a good term for it, it might eventually end up in an esteemed dictionary like Merry Dubs or the Oxy D.
A viral tweet in January 2023 from Depop Drama, now DM Drama, that helped popularize “cozzie livs”.
#affixation #BritishSlang #clippings #cozzieLivs #etymology #gennyLec #gennyLex #humour #hun #hunCulture #hypocorisms #language #linguistics #mentyB #phrases #plattyJoobs #slang #wordplay -
Collatzeral Damage: Bitwise and Proof Foolish
Let’s talk about the Collatz Conjecture, which is like mathematicians’ original version of this programmer joke:
Except the number of mathematician hours wasted is much larger, possibly too large for uint32_t to hold it.The Collatz conjecture is an infamous trap for the young and ambitious. Despite its simple construction, it has evaded proofs and general solutions for nearly a century. Veritasium made a video about this conjecture, which I recommend:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=094y1Z2wpJg
The Collatz conjecture involves a recursive function that contains one branch: If a number is odd, multiply it by 3 then add 1. If it is even, divide it by 2.
The conjecture states that repeating this operation will eventually reach 1 for all positive integers.
Quick observation:
- Even numbers take you closer to your goal of reaching your goal (reaching 0).
- Odd numbers take you further away from your goal.
You can write recursive code that implements the Collatz function like so:
function collatz(num) { console.log(num); if (num === 1) { return; } return (num % 2 === 1) ? collatz((3 * num) + 1) : collatz(num >> 1);}If the Collatz conjecture is false, there is some integer for which the
returnstatement will never be reached.We don’t know if the conjecture is true or not.
We do know that it has held up for a hell of a lot of positive integers (from a human perspective), and have yet to find a counterexample, but we don’t know if it’s necessarily true for all positive integers.
What if there’s actually a cycle somewhere (similar to what I discussed in the context of hash functions)?
That mathematicians don’t know the answer isn’t really interesting for the readers of this blog, but why the answer is so elusive (despite the intuitive simple construction of the function central to the Collatz conjecture) is something I think we can say something interesting about.
AJBut first, let’s talk about a class of cryptographic algorithm that serves as the building block for several types of hash functions and stream ciphers used across the Internet today.
Important
I am taking a lot of liberties in this blog post, and I am prioritizing clarity over technical precision.
Readers will be better served by cross-referencing this entertainment-focused blog post with the work of actual mathematicians.
And for the pedants in the audience: if something seems imprecise, it’s probably because I made a trade-off to help a wider audience gain a basic intuition.
Add, Rotate, XOR (ARX)
ARX is a category of cryptography algorithms that is used to build various cryptography building blocks. The SHA-2 family of hash functions and the ChaCha stream cipher both an ARX construction (and both are used in a lot of Internet traffic).
Let’s focus on ChaCha for the moment, focusing on the reference implementation that ships with libsodium:
#define U32C(v) (v##U)#define U32V(v) ((uint32_t)(v) &U32C(0xFFFFFFFF))#define ROTATE(v, c) (ROTL32(v, c))#define XOR(v, w) ((v) ^ (w))#define PLUS(v, w) (U32V((v) + (w)))#define PLUSONE(v) (PLUS((v), 1))#define QUARTERROUND(a, b, c, d) \ a = PLUS(a, b); \ d = ROTATE(XOR(d, a), 16); \ c = PLUS(c, d); \ b = ROTATE(XOR(b, c), 12); \ a = PLUS(a, b); \ d = ROTATE(XOR(d, a), 8); \ c = PLUS(c, d); \ b = ROTATE(XOR(b, c), 7);
At the core of ChaCha is the quarter round function. This is applied on alternating columns and diagonals of the input state until the desired number of rounds has been completed.
for (i = 20; i > 0; i -= 2) { QUARTERROUND(x0, x4, x8, x12) QUARTERROUND(x1, x5, x9, x13) QUARTERROUND(x2, x6, x10, x14) QUARTERROUND(x3, x7, x11, x15) QUARTERROUND(x0, x5, x10, x15) QUARTERROUND(x1, x6, x11, x12) QUARTERROUND(x2, x7, x8, x13) QUARTERROUND(x3, x4, x9, x14)}After all rounds are complete, the initial state is added to the output. This 512-bit state includes the key (which consists of up to 256 bits), nonce, and some constant values. Because half of the input bytes are your secret key, an attacker without knowledge of the key cannot invert the calculation.
ChaCha is an improvement of another stream cipher from the same family as the eSTREAM finalist, Salsa20. ChaCha improved the diffusion per round and performance. This makes ChaCha less susceptible to cryptanalysis, even in extremely reduced-round variants (e.g., ChaCha8 vs ChaCha20).
As interesting as all that is, the important bits to know is that the ChaCha update emphasized improving diffusion.
What does that mean, exactly?
Art: HarubakiWhat is Diffusion?
Diffusion is a measurement of how much the output state changes when each bit differs in the input state.
This is important for making it difficult to statistically analyze the relationship between the input and outputs of a cryptographic function.
ARX Diffusion
ARX consists of three operations: Rotation (sliding bits around like a flywheel), addition, and eXclusive OR (also known as XOR).
Comparing Salsa20 and ChaCha’s quarter round, using the notation from the source code on Wikipedia, you see:
Salsa20 Quarter Round
b ^= (a + d) <<< 7;c ^= (b + a) <<< 9;d ^= (c + b) <<< 13;a ^= (d + c) <<< 18;
Addition then rotation then XOR.
ChaCha Quarter Round
a += b; d ^= a; d <<<= 16;c += d; b ^= c; b <<<= 12;a += b; d ^= a; d <<<= 8;c += d; b ^= c; b <<<= 7;
Addition then XOR then rotation.
Each step of the quarter round function still involves addition, rotation, and XOR, but their usage is different. (Also, they just update values directly rather than involving an extra temporary value to implicitly occupy a stack register.)
And it’s subtle, but if you play with these different quarter rounds with slightly different inputs, you can see how the diffusion is improved with the second construction in fewer numbers of rounds.
“Why does diffusion matter?”
Bit diffusion in ARX constructions is one of the ways that ciphers ensure their output remains indistinguishable from a random oracle.
If you’ve ever looked at a cryptographic hash function before, or heard about the “avalanche effect“, that’s precisely what we want out of these ARX constructions.
“So what?”
As some of you might remember from your studies, XOR is just addition without carry (mod 2).
If you repeat your same experimentation but only use one operation (AR or RX), you’ll find that your diffusion is poor.
This is because addition is an abstraction that hides a very important feature that’s often taken for granted.
CMYKatCarry Propagation
Let’s say, for a learning exercise, you wanted to build integer addition entirely out of bitwise operators: AND, OR, NOT, XOR, and the left and right bit shift operators.
As already mentioned above, XOR is just addition without carry. So that part’s easy:
def add_bits_no_carry(x, y): return x ^ y
How about carrying values to the next place? Well, consider the following table:
XYCalculated Carry Value000100010111That third column sure looks like an “AND” operator, does it not?
Great, but what if you had a carry value from the previous step?
Well, now you have to implement two half-adders: One to handle the input carry value with one input, and the other to handle the other input and produce the next output carry value.
def half_adder(x, y): return [x ^ y, x & y]def add_bits(x, y, c_in): [a, b] = half_adder(x, y) [d, e] = half_adder(a, c_in) return [d, b ^ e]
If you feel lost, this hardware tutorial explains it with diagrams.
The main thing I want you to take away is that addition is much more complicated than XOR because of carry propagation.
Original sticker made by CMYKat
(Poor edits made my me)On Computation and Information Theory
We use XOR to mix data (which could be plaintext, or could be all zeroes) with pseudo-random bytes, since it’s perfectly hiding so long as the bytes we’re mixing them with is unknown. This is the intuition underlying one-time pads and modern stream ciphers (including the ones we’re discussing).
In the context of ARX, because some operations (addition) propagate carries and others don’t (XOR), when you combine these steps with rotating the bits in-place, it becomes very easy to mix the output bits in a short number of rounds of operations. Cryptographers measure how well bits are mixed across a large number of inputs and reject designs that don’t perform well (generally speaking).
But a direct consequence of the hidden complexity of addition with carry is that the state you’re operating within is larger than the output. This means that some information is used (carried over from previous bits or limbs) that is not revealed directly in the output bit(s).
It’s easy to add two numbers together, but if you don’t know either of the numbers, it’s impossible to know the other (unless, of course, a side-channel leaks enough information to deduce one of them).
“That’s neat and all, but what does it imply?”
Don’t worry, I’m going somewhere with this.
CMYKatTuring the Page
Let’s briefly talk about Turing machines.
The relevant Wikipedia article covers them adequately well. For everyone else, another Veritasium video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HeQX2HjkcNo
A Turing machine is a mathematical model for computation.
The basic idea is that you have a tape of symbols, a head that reads from the tape, and an internal state that determines the next move.
We don’t need too formal of a treatment here. I’m not exactly trying to prove the halting problem is undecidable.
A dumb joke I like to tell my computer science friends:
I’ve solved the Halting problem! It’s called: “the heat death of the universe,” at which point the program fucking halts!
But do put a pin in this, because it will come up towards the end.
CMYKatBitwise Collatz Functions
Above, I wrote a bit of code that implements the Collatz function, but I was a bit lazy about it.
In truth, you don’t need multiplication or the modulo operator. You can, instead, use bitwise operations and one addition.
- The modulo 2 check can be replaced by a bitwise AND mask with 1. Odd values will return 1, even will return 0.
- When the least significant bit is 0:
Dividing by 2 is the same as right-shifting by 1. - When the least significant bit is 1:
Multiplying by 3 then adding 1 can be rewritten as the following steps:- Left shift by 1 (2n)
- Set the lower bit to 1 (+1), using bitwise OR
- Add the original number (+n)
Thus, our function instead looks like:
function collatz(num) { console.log(num); if (num === 1) { return; } return (num & 1) ? collatz(((num << 1) | 1) + num) : collatz(num >> 1);}That is to say, you can implement most of the Collatz function with bitwise operators, and only need one addition (with carries) in the end.
Suddenly, the discussion above about carry propagation might seem a lot more relevant!
Art by AJSmall Example
Imagine you encode a number as a binary string. For example, 257.
When you work through the algorithm sketched out above, you end up doing this:
n == 0001_0000_0001 2*n == 0010_0000_0010 # left shift by 1 2*n + 1 == 0010_0000_0011 # bitwise OR with 1 add: 0001_0000_0001 # n 0010_0000_0011 # 2n + 1 # This is where carry propagation comes in! result: 0011_0000_0100
When you perform the 3n+1 branch of the Collatz function the way I constructed it, that last addition of n will propagate carries.
And that carry propagation is where the trouble starts.
Since the (3n+1) branch is only ever invoked with odd values for n, you can guarantee that the next step will be followed by at least one division by 2 (since 3n+1 is even for any odd n).
This allows you look ahead two steps at a time, but there is no easy way to predict how many back-to-back (3n+1)/2 two-steps you will encounter from a given value. Instead, you have to actually perform the calculation and see what happens.
AJCollatz Machines
The input and output of the Collatz function is an integer of arbitrary size. The behavior branches depending on the least significant bit of the input.
You can think of the least significant bit as the “head” of a machine similar to a Turing machine.
However, instead of moving the head along a tape, the Collatz function does one of two things:
- Moves the symbols on the tape one space to the right (somewhat familiar territory for Turing Machines).
- Rewrites all of the symbols on the tape to the left of the head, according to some algorithm. This algorithm makes the tape longer.
As we observed previously, the carry propagation implicit to addition makes the bits diffuse in a way that’s hard to generalize faster than simply performing the addition and seeing what results from it.
Proving that this Collatz machine halts for all positive inputs would also prove the Collatz Conjecture. But as we saw with proper Turing Machines, this might not be possible.
Pedants on the /r/math subreddit were quick to point out that this isn’t necessarily true, but the goal of this blog post was not to state a technically precise truth, but to explore the Collatz conjecture from a different angle.
The important disclaimer at the top isn’t some cop-out boilerplate I slap on everything I write to absolve me of any retribution for my mistakes. It’s actually important for everyone to read and understand it.
The entire point of this blog is “hey, here’s a neat idea to think about” not “here’s a universal truth about mathematics I discovered”. For that, I would have written an actual paper, not a furry blog. Unfortunately, I have no new insights to offer on anything, nor will I probably ever.
I recommend reading the comment I linked at the start of this quoted section, as it’s grounded in a more formal mathematics understanding than this blog post.
Is It Unsolvable?
With all this in mind, in the general case, the Collatz Conjecture may very well one day prove to be as undecidable as the Halting Problem.
Or, maybe someone will find a cycle within the integer space that fails to ever reach 1.
Art: CMYKatAs it stands right now, there have been a lot of interesting approaches to try to solve it. The first Veritasium video linked above talked about some of these ideas.
Maybe we need new mathematic tools first. Or perhaps the Langlands project will uncover a relationship between unrelated areas of mathematical research that already exist today that will yield an answer to this nearly century-old conjecture.
Either way, I hope you find this topic… mildly interesting. Enough to appreciate the problem, not so much that you think you can solve it yourself.
Art: AJStay safe, don’t drink and derive, and happy hacking.
#CollatzConjecture #define #HaltingProblem #mathematics #TuringMachines
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How Indie Video Killed The Spotify Star
By @limebar
In January 2024, I became aware of the Fediverse music subculture phenomenon called Jamuary. It challenges music makers to create one complete track per day during the entire month of January. It is a bonkers idea. But I gave it a shot, ended up making 18 tracks, and something interesting happened along the way…
I have several different processes that I use to make music. One of them involves using video sources. I previously created a few tracks this way and created a Peertube account to showcase them. I like working with video and audio together, so for Jamuary I decided to make a video for each track as well, because why not make a difficult challenge even harder? Nuts.
Peertube is great, Owncast is great, but it is still difficult to discover things I like, and it was apparent that people were not finding my videos either, despite shameless self-promotion on Mastodon. I decided to create a couple of playlists (FediVisuals and FediVisuals Live) but these are equally hard to find. Maintaining them is hopeless because discovery is hard in the first place! Nevertheless, in the process, I learned that there are many awesome musical artists on fedi who are also making amazing music videos!
My love for music videos was reawakened.
You see, I was around when MTV went on the air and I remember how influential music videos were for me as a teen. I don’t think it is crazy to say that without MTV, new wave wouldn’t have happened and most of the weird stuff I saw on 120 Minutes would never have played anywhere — Wax Trax owes as much to that show as they do to John Hughes 80s films. So I have nostalgia for music videos — because this was a time for great music discovery in my life.
Music discovery!
At its peak, Radio Free Fedi did a series of Owncast live performance trains that really showcased the A/V talent on fedi. When RFF shut down, I was happy that The Indie Beat, fueled by Bandwagon, sprang to life and carried the torch. They even have an Owncast server, but like most Owncast instances, it was dark much of the time.
All of the above made me want to light that server up with a 24×7 stream of music videos.
I reached out to @mizkirsten to ask if she would be interested in hosting a 24×7 music video channel. She was all for it but had no time to make it happen. While she’d researched and landed on Azuracast for TIBR, she didn’t have the spoons to search for the best video streaming solution. So I decided to dig into it myself.
I’d never done anything like this before, but I got a lot of help on fedi: Phil Nelson (@philnelson) of RetroStrange TV explained how it worked and offered advice, as did Andrew Roach (@ajroach42) of New Ellijay TV. I considered OBS Studio but that didn’t seem right for this because I wanted a hands-free, headless streamer running in the cloud, and I knew I couldn’t spend much time babysitting it. And while ffmpeg can stream video to Owncast, it would require major effort to make it robust for 24×7 hands-off streaming.
The answer came from Luka Prin/ce Lucija (@luka) of BeYourOwnPlatform some months prior. They’d suggested LiquidSoap for another project, but I didn’t want to invest the energy at the time to learn this strange technology, an OCAML-based scripting language of the functional programming variety — somewhat outside my comfort zone. I quickly learned that this tool was made to solve 24×7 broadcasting problems and that the community around it was very helpful. If you get your head around functional programming, it can be quite powerful.
Once I’d proven this could work on my home PC, everything quickly started to come together. I knew that Sam (@ethicalrevolution) and sknob (@sknob) were interested in showcasing NHAM videos. I learned from the Lorenzo’s Music podcast (@lorenzosmusic) that Roberta Fidora (@RobertaFidora), who makes great music videos, wanted an Animation showcase. I knew that Meljoann (@meljoann) was trying to promote artist discovery broadly, made great music videos, and had acquired technical skills from working with the Gravitons collective. I knew Keith (@keefmarshall) made great music, had strong tech skills, and supported dozens of artists via the bonkwave community. Similarly, I knew AxWax (@axwax) was an awesome music maker with strong technical skills. So Roberta pulled us all together in a Matrix room, along with Kirsten, where I was able to showcase the script and get technical help and review. I bought a test VPS and used Ax’s Owncast server for testing while building the script and the structure.
Along the way, I decided to document this on Codeberg so others could replicate it, because I’d found several complete examples of LiquidSoap code for radio stations, but not for TV stations. My secondary goal is to see more Owncast servers lighting up with 24×7 programming.
So, if you are an artist who would like to get your music videos on the air — or an animator who wants their work in rotation — see below!
We are building a 24×7 music video and animation channel for The Indie Beat and we need you!
This will be a consent-driven channel promoting indie musical artists from across the Fediverse, as well as animators who want to share their animation art (and who knows what else in the future?).
We will have a large chunk of airtime devoted to random play across styles and genres, as well as a few dedicated program slots for music in the electronic, jazz, ambient, pop, and rock families.
We will also have slots for NHAM, curated by Sam (@ethicalrevolution), and an Animation Array slot, curated by Roberta Fidora (@RobertaFidora).
There is no cost or pay to artists. Each video will display artist info including a QR code on-screen back to the artist’s chosen link. Videos will air by artist consent only and can be taken back down by request. Opt-in, opt-out, at will.
If you’d like to get your music and video art on the air at The Indie Beat’s federated Owncast server, keep reading!
How to submit videos for airplay on The Indie Beat TV:
We need and accept:
– Original music videos (no covers)
– Animations for the Animation Array program
– Short form eye-candy videos (~10s — these play periodically between music videos)
– Short station ID videos/jingles (~10s — these play periodically between music videos, see below for suggested script)If you already have videos showcased on NHAM and have given consent to air on TIB TV it is not necessary to upload the videos again.
We do not accept any illegal, copyright-infringing, or explicitly NSFW material.
Please no “AI” or learning model-generated materials. If you use smart tools in your process, that is fine, as long as the final work is predominately human-made. Not really interested in generated materials.
We prefer not to air simple “visualizer” type music videos, unless they are artfully edited or otherwise human-crafted in some way.
We prefer music videos in the 15-second to 15-minute range as general guideline. However, very long videos will not be included in the hour-long programs as they would dominate program airtime — they would instead go into normal random play under the “anything goes” hours of programming.
Exceptions to these loose rules may be made based on perplexing intangibilities like taste and intuition. The curators are human.
Submitted materials must be MP4 videos with 1080p max resolution, but streaming goes out at 720p and 3000 kbps currently.
NOTE: Only submit original rendered video files. Do NOT submit MP4 files re-downloaded from Peertube or other platforms. Generally, these files will not work.
Submitted MP4 videos must include these metadata tags, which will be shown on-screen including a QR code to the artist’s website:
– artist
– title
– album
– website
– cover artYou can use a tool like Picard (or MP3Tag) to add these. If you need help, we can do it. Cover art is not displayed currently but will be in the future.
Submissions should be made using this form, also available on Roberta Fidora’s site, and right here:
More things you might be wondering about
Artists retain all rights to submitted materials: no rights, fee, or commission is claimed except non-exclusive right to air the material on the channel until the artist opts out.
Submissions may or may not get airtime, no guarantees. We may take videos in and out of rotation based on how much material we gather and due to limited storage and airtime.
Artists are not charged or paid. Artists receive exposure via onscreen metadata and QR code link. The entire effort is non-commercial and consent-driven. We may ask for community support to pay for servers, storage, bandwidth, etc., but we are volunteering our time and will never keep donations as “pay”. All donated money goes back into The Indie Beat channels.
Suggestion for station identification wording (but be as creative as you like): “You are watching The Indie Beat Television with videos by independent artists from across the fediverse. Find us online at the indie beat dot fm.”
Suggestion for show title wording: “You are watching The Indie Beat Television and this is the POP hour.” Use Pop, Rock, Electronic, Ambient, Jazz, etc.
– We plan to have slots for live performances if you want to do a show! Once we launch, you’ll contact @mizkirsten to request a time slot.
– We plan to have a few regularly recurring live programs. Watch for schedule updates at https://live.theindiebeat.fm/ and follow @streamer on the Fediverse (turn on notifications).
– We plan to support short promotional videos for new releases.
– We plan to support short promotional videos for other indie arts projects from around the fediverse that we hope to co-promote. More to come.
We look forward to receiving your submissions!
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European vs. American Investors: Two Worlds, Two Mindsets
Over the past weeks, I had the opportunity to attend two major events shaping my entrepreneurial perspective: the Venture Days in Luxembourg and the Web Summit in Lisbon. Both were intense, inspiring and at times overwhelming, especially because I was wearing all the hats at once.
Building a solid business plan, compelling a pitch deck, developing the software, managing stakeholders and potential customers, while simultaneously running a fast-growing open-source project is challenging. But these events gave me invaluable insights into how differently European and American investors think and why this has such a deep impact on how we must communicate.
European Investors
Pragmatic. Detail-driven. Break-even focused.
In Luxembourg and other European settings, conversations consistently revolved around questions such as:
- How fast can you reach break-even?
- Show me the exact numbers, prices and sources.
- How precisely is the market researched?
- What is the unit economics structure?
European investors tend to value stability, caution and predictability. They expect detailed business plans where every calculation is documented in depth. Market research, pricing models, competitive matrices and break-even analyses carry significant weight.
What is often missing is ambition.
The desire to change the world is frequently overshadowed by a culture centered around minimizing risk. Radical innovation becomes rare. Founders are encouraged to think small, stay safe and avoid big leaps. As a result, Europe produces far fewer breakthrough technologies.American Investors
Vision first. Details later.
The conversations I had with American investors, both in Luxembourg and Lisbon, felt dramatically different.
Their core interests centered around questions such as:
- How do you dominate the global market?
- What is the story and the movement you are building?
- How big can this become?
- What is the monopoly you are aiming for?
American-style investors think in terms of global market power, narrative, category creation and world-changing potential. They want to invest in huge visions and massive outcomes, even if the roadmap is not fully defined yet.
For them, communication must be bold, visionary and transformative.
This Creates a Communication Challenge
Switching between these mindsets is not easy. You cannot pitch the same story in Germany as you would in Silicon Valley.
That’s why I created a communication matrix that highlights the differences between the “German/European Approach” and the “American Approach”. It helps me stay conscious about how to communicate depending on the audience and their cultural expectations.
Pitching is not just about the product — it is about the mindset of the listener.
Why We Are Building Infinito.Nexus
Infinito.Nexus aims to become the universal platform for rapidly building sovereign IT infrastructure. Organizations should be able to operate an essentially unlimited number of SaaS applications behind a single SSO layer, fully sovereign, on any servers or providers they choose, without being exposed to monopoly pressure or external control.
Our vision extends to hardware. Laptops, servers and even smartphones will be delivered preconfigured, ready to use the very next day, and immediately integrated into a sovereign infrastructure. The platform becomes the foundation for sovereign IT by combining automated deployment, full application integration and ready-to-use hardware into one seamless ecosystem.
Different Expectations in the US and Europe
US investors respond strongly to the transformative scale of this vision. For them, we explicitly highlight that Infinito.Nexus aims to become the dominant platform for sovereign IT deployments worldwide. This may sound paradoxical in the context of sovereignty, yet it is entirely compatible. Everything remains open source and users remain free to host wherever they want, but they naturally stay with us because of convenience, automation and usability. The logic is identical to how people today choose Netflix instead of downloading movies or Spotify instead of pirating music. Convenience creates loyalty.
For US investors, we emphasize that this convenience-driven retention enables us to secure long-term platform dominance. In addition, we guarantee enterprise-level SLAs and large-scale managed deployment services when the infrastructure is provisioned through our platform, which further strengthens trust at the enterprise level and reinforces our strategic position.
European investors think differently. They place higher value on predictable steps, measurable risk management and immediate practical value. While they understand the long-term vision, they expect a grounded and incremental approach that fits the realities of the European market.
Adapting the European Narrative
For the European context we present a slower and more conservative scaling strategy. Instead of focusing immediately on global automation, we begin with B2B delivery teams that manually roll out sovereign environments for startups and technologically open young companies. This lowers perceived risk but increases operational cost and reduces speed, and it creates exposure to competitors who scale more aggressively. Nevertheless, this approach aligns with the European preference for reliability, trust-building and controlled expansion.
In addition, the European narrative places a much stronger emphasis on consulting. Unlike in the US narrative, where consulting is downplayed due to poor scalability, in Europe consulting is both expected and necessary. It gives us the ability to tailor environments more deeply to customer needs, particularly for complex ERP and CRM integrations that require significant customization. Consulting also reinforces the perception of reliability and competence, which is essential for conservative investors.
A Unified Perspective
Both narratives describe the same product and the same mission. The US approach highlights global market leadership, platform dominance supported by convenience retention and enterprise-level services. The European approach emphasizes concrete value, trust-building, customization and predictable growth. The difference is not in the substance of the platform, but in how the story is framed so each audience sees exactly why Infinito.Nexus fits their worldview and investment culture.
#americanInvestors #breakEvenAnalysis #businessPlan #cloudDeployment #digitalSovereignty #entrepreneurship #europeanInvestors #founderInsights #fundingStrategy #globalScaling #infinitoNexus #innovationMindset #investmentCulture #investorCommunication #itInfrastructureMarketplace #openSource #pitchStrategy #saasAutomation #sovereignCloud #startupEurope #startupFinancing #startupUsa #techEcosystem #unitEconomics #ventureCapital #ventureDaysLuxembourg #webSummitLisbon
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European vs. American Investors: Two Worlds, Two Mindsets
Over the past weeks, I had the opportunity to attend two major events shaping my entrepreneurial perspective: the Venture Days in Luxembourg and the Web Summit in Lisbon. Both were intense, inspiring and at times overwhelming, especially because I was wearing all the hats at once.
Building a solid business plan, compelling a pitch deck, developing the software, managing stakeholders and potential customers, while simultaneously running a fast-growing open-source project is challenging. But these events gave me invaluable insights into how differently European and American investors think and why this has such a deep impact on how we must communicate.
European Investors
Pragmatic. Detail-driven. Break-even focused.
In Luxembourg and other European settings, conversations consistently revolved around questions such as:
- How fast can you reach break-even?
- Show me the exact numbers, prices and sources.
- How precisely is the market researched?
- What is the unit economics structure?
European investors tend to value stability, caution and predictability. They expect detailed business plans where every calculation is documented in depth. Market research, pricing models, competitive matrices and break-even analyses carry significant weight.
What is often missing is ambition.
The desire to change the world is frequently overshadowed by a culture centered around minimizing risk. Radical innovation becomes rare. Founders are encouraged to think small, stay safe and avoid big leaps. As a result, Europe produces far fewer breakthrough technologies.American Investors
Vision first. Details later.
The conversations I had with American investors, both in Luxembourg and Lisbon, felt dramatically different.
Their core interests centered around questions such as:
- How do you dominate the global market?
- What is the story and the movement you are building?
- How big can this become?
- What is the monopoly you are aiming for?
American-style investors think in terms of global market power, narrative, category creation and world-changing potential. They want to invest in huge visions and massive outcomes, even if the roadmap is not fully defined yet.
For them, communication must be bold, visionary and transformative.
This Creates a Communication Challenge
Switching between these mindsets is not easy. You cannot pitch the same story in Germany as you would in Silicon Valley.
That’s why I created a communication matrix that highlights the differences between the “German/European Approach” and the “American Approach”. It helps me stay conscious about how to communicate depending on the audience and their cultural expectations.
Pitching is not just about the product — it is about the mindset of the listener.
Why We Are Building Infinito.Nexus
Infinito.Nexus aims to become the universal platform for rapidly building sovereign IT infrastructure. Organizations should be able to operate an essentially unlimited number of SaaS applications behind a single SSO layer, fully sovereign, on any servers or providers they choose, without being exposed to monopoly pressure or external control.
Our vision extends to hardware. Laptops, servers and even smartphones will be delivered preconfigured, ready to use the very next day, and immediately integrated into a sovereign infrastructure. The platform becomes the foundation for sovereign IT by combining automated deployment, full application integration and ready-to-use hardware into one seamless ecosystem.
Different Expectations in the US and Europe
US investors respond strongly to the transformative scale of this vision. For them, we explicitly highlight that Infinito.Nexus aims to become the dominant platform for sovereign IT deployments worldwide. This may sound paradoxical in the context of sovereignty, yet it is entirely compatible. Everything remains open source and users remain free to host wherever they want, but they naturally stay with us because of convenience, automation and usability. The logic is identical to how people today choose Netflix instead of downloading movies or Spotify instead of pirating music. Convenience creates loyalty.
For US investors, we emphasize that this convenience-driven retention enables us to secure long-term platform dominance. In addition, we guarantee enterprise-level SLAs and large-scale managed deployment services when the infrastructure is provisioned through our platform, which further strengthens trust at the enterprise level and reinforces our strategic position.
European investors think differently. They place higher value on predictable steps, measurable risk management and immediate practical value. While they understand the long-term vision, they expect a grounded and incremental approach that fits the realities of the European market.
Adapting the European Narrative
For the European context we present a slower and more conservative scaling strategy. Instead of focusing immediately on global automation, we begin with B2B delivery teams that manually roll out sovereign environments for startups and technologically open young companies. This lowers perceived risk but increases operational cost and reduces speed, and it creates exposure to competitors who scale more aggressively. Nevertheless, this approach aligns with the European preference for reliability, trust-building and controlled expansion.
In addition, the European narrative places a much stronger emphasis on consulting. Unlike in the US narrative, where consulting is downplayed due to poor scalability, in Europe consulting is both expected and necessary. It gives us the ability to tailor environments more deeply to customer needs, particularly for complex ERP and CRM integrations that require significant customization. Consulting also reinforces the perception of reliability and competence, which is essential for conservative investors.
A Unified Perspective
Both narratives describe the same product and the same mission. The US approach highlights global market leadership, platform dominance supported by convenience retention and enterprise-level services. The European approach emphasizes concrete value, trust-building, customization and predictable growth. The difference is not in the substance of the platform, but in how the story is framed so each audience sees exactly why Infinito.Nexus fits their worldview and investment culture.
#AmericanInvestors #breakEvenAnalysis #businessPlan #cloudDeployment #DigitalSovereignty #entrepreneurship #EuropeanInvestors #founderInsights #fundingStrategy #globalScaling #InfinitoNexus #innovationMindset #investmentCulture #investorCommunication #ITInfrastructureMarketplace #OpenSource #pitchStrategy #SaaSAutomation #sovereignCloud #startupEurope #startupFinancing #startupUSA #techEcosystem #unitEconomics #ventureCapital #VentureDaysLuxembourg #WebSummitLisbon -
European vs. American Investors: Two Worlds, Two Mindsets
Over the past weeks, I had the opportunity to attend two major events shaping my entrepreneurial perspective: the Venture Days in Luxembourg and the Web Summit in Lisbon. Both were intense, inspiring and at times overwhelming, especially because I was wearing all the hats at once.
Building a solid business plan, compelling a pitch deck, developing the software, managing stakeholders and potential customers, while simultaneously running a fast-growing open-source project is challenging. But these events gave me invaluable insights into how differently European and American investors think and why this has such a deep impact on how we must communicate.
European Investors
Pragmatic. Detail-driven. Break-even focused.
In Luxembourg and other European settings, conversations consistently revolved around questions such as:
- How fast can you reach break-even?
- Show me the exact numbers, prices and sources.
- How precisely is the market researched?
- What is the unit economics structure?
European investors tend to value stability, caution and predictability. They expect detailed business plans where every calculation is documented in depth. Market research, pricing models, competitive matrices and break-even analyses carry significant weight.
What is often missing is ambition.
The desire to change the world is frequently overshadowed by a culture centered around minimizing risk. Radical innovation becomes rare. Founders are encouraged to think small, stay safe and avoid big leaps. As a result, Europe produces far fewer breakthrough technologies.American Investors
Vision first. Details later.
The conversations I had with American investors, both in Luxembourg and Lisbon, felt dramatically different.
Their core interests centered around questions such as:
- How do you dominate the global market?
- What is the story and the movement you are building?
- How big can this become?
- What is the monopoly you are aiming for?
American-style investors think in terms of global market power, narrative, category creation and world-changing potential. They want to invest in huge visions and massive outcomes, even if the roadmap is not fully defined yet.
For them, communication must be bold, visionary and transformative.
This Creates a Communication Challenge
Switching between these mindsets is not easy. You cannot pitch the same story in Germany as you would in Silicon Valley.
That’s why I created a communication matrix that highlights the differences between the “German/European Approach” and the “American Approach”. It helps me stay conscious about how to communicate depending on the audience and their cultural expectations.
Pitching is not just about the product — it is about the mindset of the listener.
Why We Are Building Infinito.Nexus
Infinito.Nexus aims to become the universal platform for rapidly building sovereign IT infrastructure. Organizations should be able to operate an essentially unlimited number of SaaS applications behind a single SSO layer, fully sovereign, on any servers or providers they choose, without being exposed to monopoly pressure or external control.
Our vision extends to hardware. Laptops, servers and even smartphones will be delivered preconfigured, ready to use the very next day, and immediately integrated into a sovereign infrastructure. The platform becomes the foundation for sovereign IT by combining automated deployment, full application integration and ready-to-use hardware into one seamless ecosystem.
Different Expectations in the US and Europe
US investors respond strongly to the transformative scale of this vision. For them, we explicitly highlight that Infinito.Nexus aims to become the dominant platform for sovereign IT deployments worldwide. This may sound paradoxical in the context of sovereignty, yet it is entirely compatible. Everything remains open source and users remain free to host wherever they want, but they naturally stay with us because of convenience, automation and usability. The logic is identical to how people today choose Netflix instead of downloading movies or Spotify instead of pirating music. Convenience creates loyalty.
For US investors, we emphasize that this convenience-driven retention enables us to secure long-term platform dominance. In addition, we guarantee enterprise-level SLAs and large-scale managed deployment services when the infrastructure is provisioned through our platform, which further strengthens trust at the enterprise level and reinforces our strategic position.
European investors think differently. They place higher value on predictable steps, measurable risk management and immediate practical value. While they understand the long-term vision, they expect a grounded and incremental approach that fits the realities of the European market.
Adapting the European Narrative
For the European context we present a slower and more conservative scaling strategy. Instead of focusing immediately on global automation, we begin with B2B delivery teams that manually roll out sovereign environments for startups and technologically open young companies. This lowers perceived risk but increases operational cost and reduces speed, and it creates exposure to competitors who scale more aggressively. Nevertheless, this approach aligns with the European preference for reliability, trust-building and controlled expansion.
In addition, the European narrative places a much stronger emphasis on consulting. Unlike in the US narrative, where consulting is downplayed due to poor scalability, in Europe consulting is both expected and necessary. It gives us the ability to tailor environments more deeply to customer needs, particularly for complex ERP and CRM integrations that require significant customization. Consulting also reinforces the perception of reliability and competence, which is essential for conservative investors.
A Unified Perspective
Both narratives describe the same product and the same mission. The US approach highlights global market leadership, platform dominance supported by convenience retention and enterprise-level services. The European approach emphasizes concrete value, trust-building, customization and predictable growth. The difference is not in the substance of the platform, but in how the story is framed so each audience sees exactly why Infinito.Nexus fits their worldview and investment culture.
#AmericanInvestors #breakEvenAnalysis #businessPlan #cloudDeployment #DigitalSovereignty #entrepreneurship #EuropeanInvestors #founderInsights #fundingStrategy #globalScaling #InfinitoNexus #innovationMindset #investmentCulture #investorCommunication #ITInfrastructureMarketplace #OpenSource #pitchStrategy #SaaSAutomation #sovereignCloud #startupEurope #startupFinancing #startupUSA #techEcosystem #unitEconomics #ventureCapital #VentureDaysLuxembourg #WebSummitLisbon -
Seattle is the first test city for a new bike lane barrier made of recycled tires
The pitch is great: Let’s take a car culture waste product that would otherwise be burned and instead turn it into a barrier to protect the lives of people biking. That’s the concept behind Pretred’s new Paceline barriers, which were designed with bike lanes in mind initially in response to Seattle’s trouble acquiring enough pre-cast concrete barriers for SDOT’s ongoing “even better bike lanes” project. The company used the SDOT order as the impetus to invest in the design and tooling to create these Paceline barriers, which are now for sale to any place that wants them.
Pretred Sales Manager Matt Dunn told Seattle Bike Blog that the Paceline barriers are now “the only U.S.-made bike lane barrier that is more significant than a curb and less significant than a full wall.” The project was personal for Dunn, who was hit by a car while riding his bike. “I wish these barriers would have been there when that happened,” he said, noting, “We’re all cyclists in this office.”
Dunn credited Cascade Bicycle Club Executive Director Lee Lambert with connecting SDOT and Pretred. The department had purchased as many of the precast concrete barriers as were available, but it still wasn’t enough. If Pretred can produce a barrier that is competitive with concrete, that would be a win for all North American cities because it would mean more supply and more competition in the market. Concrete creation also requires a lot of energy and is a major source of greenhouse gas emissions. Burning tires also releases a lot of greenhouse gasses. Pretred sells itself as a more environmentally-friendly option both for creating barriers and for recycling tires. The company started in 2020 selling what they call Colorado barriers, which can be used either in place of a Jersey barrier or as a base to support weight.
When fully rebuilding a road engineers can include curbs and barriers from the start, such as the new bike lanes along the waterfront. We cannot wait for full roadway rebuild projects to build out our city’s bike network, so we need tools for medium-term bike lane installs for the time between now and the street’s next major repaving project. Sometimes referred to as “Toronto barriers” for some reason, pre-cast concrete barriers are an excellent option for creating a significant barrier on an existing road surface. The Toronto-style barriers are shorter and skinnier than a highway-style Jersey barrier but provide significantly more deterrence than plastic reflective posts. Cities like Seattle need a barrier that protects bike lanes from motor vehicles without making streets look and feel like highways, and this is a tricky balance. DOTs would also like to avoid the need for constant maintenance.
The new tire-based barriers are a different take on the concept. The come in segments two feet long that link together. The 80-pound segments are lighter than concrete, making them easier to install and to move by hand if necessary, but this also means they are easier for motor vehicles to displace. They lie somewhere between a parking stop and a Toronto barrier, which could be the sweet spot cities are looking for if they can prove durable and effective under the strains of city streets. The material cost is about $24 per foot plus additional costs for the end treatments of each connected segment, Dunn said. Agencies can install posts on the blocks for either signage or additional reflectors, though SDOT did not do so as part of this project. Some reflective plastic posts might not be a bad idea, especially on curves and end points where strikes are more likely, though each block does have front and rear reflectors.
When struck, the tire barrier segments may get gouged but hopefully will be less likely to fully crack and fail. If they do fail, crews should be able to use regular work vehicles and tools to replace the damaged segments more quickly and easily. Concrete barriers are so heavy that they require a forklift or similar piece of machinery to move and install, which could lead to longer waits for repairs as we saw with the bike lane on the Airport Way bridge near Georgetown recently. The barrier was struck (and did its job!), but a section was left sticking into the bike lane for a while before crews could repair it.
The tire-based barriers may not leave as much damage on any vehicles that strike it, but they also should not be as difficult to repair. We don’t need to imagine what this would look like because the test segment has already experienced its first major strike. I went down to Campus Parkway to check it out and found a section under the bridge that clearly got hit by something significant. Not sure if it was a car, truck or bus, though the level of damage makes me think it could have been something more on the bigger side. Bolts were bent and multiple barriers seemed to split at the bolt-mounting point. One barrier section was totally destroyed and was sitting on the roadside. In all, five or six of the segments were damaged. But because of their size and weight, they were not left blocking the bike lane in the meantime, which is nice.
Environmental benefits and concerns
The U.S. wears out a hell of a lot of tires, which are notoriously difficult to dispose of. When burned, they produce a relatively low amount of heat for a long time. That’s why tire fires can last so long. They also release a lot of nasty stuff into the air.
There have been many attempts to find other creative and profitable uses for tire waste, including using tire crumbs as part of an artificial athletic or playground surface. The EPA, CDC and CPSC have been studying the possible health impacts of these surfaces, though there don’t seem to be any clear conclusions yet (though we know it’s bad for kids to eat them). Tires contain a lot of harmful chemicals, researchers just don’t know the extent that using tires in play surfaces might lead to harmful exposure. Meanwhile, researchers at UW have identified a tire chemical — 6PPD-quinone — that is likely a major cause coho salmon population decline. The chemical gets into waterways through wear and tear from cars and trucks driving on roadways.
I asked Dunn if these tire-based barriers might contribute to the problem of tire chemicals in waterways, and he said the blocks are designed to keep tire chemicals contained within them. However, as with any tire those elements could be released if they are broken or crushed. The blocks are made of about 90% tire “crumb,” then Pretred uses polyurethane to encapsulate it and hold it together. When they are just sitting there getting rained on, they are designed not to release tire chemicals into the runoff, he said.
#SEAbikes #Seattle
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Mozilla building an AI ‘rebel alliance’ to take on OpenAI, Anthropic – CNBC
Mark Surman, president of Mozilla Foundation, speaks at The Wall Street Journal’s Future of Everything Festival in New York City, U.S., May 22, 2024. Andrew Kelly | ReutersMozilla is building an AI ‘rebel alliance’ to take on industry heavyweights OpenAI, Anthropic
Published Tue, Jan 27 202612:00 PM EST, Updated Tue, Jan 27 20265:53 PM EST
By Ashley Capoot@/in/ashley-capoot/
Key Points
- Mozilla is focused on deploying its roughly $1.4 billion worth of reserves to support “mission driven” organizations, according to a new report.
- The nonprofit, also the parent of Firefox, is investing in artificial intelligence startups that are working on safety and governance issues in AI.
- It’s an uphill climb as Mozilla is going up against massive players like OpenAI and Anthropic as well as the Trump administration, which has loudly criticized what it calls “woke AI.”
Mark Surman, president of Mozilla Foundation, speaks at The Wall Street Journal’s Future of Everything Festival in New York City, U.S., May 22, 2024. Andrew Kelly | Reuters
From his small, snow-covered farm outside Toronto, home to cats and a dog, and soon some donkeys, Mark Surman has been laying the groundwork for a fierce battle with the world’s leading artificial intelligence companies, located about 2,300 miles away in the San Francisco area.
The bespectacled 56-year-old is president of Mozilla, a nonprofit organization best known for its Firefox browser and a pledge to keep the internet open and accessible to all. Having taken on Microsoft in the browser market in the early 2000s, and Apple and Google in the years that followed, Mozilla is right at home playing the role of underdog.
These days, Surman is preoccupied with the tech industry’s influence over the next big thing: AI. And it’s too big of a challenge for Mozilla to tackle on its own.
Surman is building what he’s described as “a rebel alliance of sorts,” using a phrase that’s long been part of Mozilla’s lexicon. In this case, the alliance is a loose network of tech startups, developers and public interest technologists committed to making AI more open and trustworthy and to checking the power of industry heavyweights like OpenAI and Anthropic.
“It’s that spirit that a bunch of people are banding together to create something good in the world and take on this thing that threatens us,” Surman told CNBC in an interview. “It’s super corny, but people totally get it.”
In practice, Mozilla is focused on deploying its roughly $1.4 billion worth of reserves to support “mission driven” tech businesses and nonprofits, including its own, according to a report the organization released Tuesday. It’s pursuing investments that promote AI transparency, and can potentially act as a counterforce to companies that are growing at historic rates with limited guardrails.
Financially, Mozilla is at a massive disadvantage. In 2022, it launched a venture capital fund called Mozilla Ventures and pledged to invest an initial $35 million in early-stage companies. It’s now exploring raising additional funds.
Mozilla’s cash pile is dwarfed by OpenAI, which has raised more than $60 billion from investors across the globe, and its rival Anthropic, which has raised more than $30 billion, according to PitchBook. Tech megacaps like Google and Meta are also sparing no expense, shelling out billions of dollars to hire AI researchers and tens of billions a year to build out massive data centers.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman attends an event to pitch AI for businesses in Tokyo, Feb. 3, 2025.
Kim Kyung-hoon | ReutersMozilla represents a growing swath of the AI industry that’s afraid of what OpenAI has become and the power that it now wields.
When OpenAI was founded as a nonprofit AI lab in 2015, its stated goal was to “advance digital intelligence in the way that is most likely to benefit humanity as a whole, unconstrained by a need to generate financial return.”
But in the decade that followed, OpenAI turned into a commercial entity with astronomical growth rates, transformed largely by the launch of ChatGPT in late 2022.
OpenAI now sports a $500 billion valuation, and completed a recapitalization in October that cemented its future as a for-profit business under the umbrella of a nonprofit. It’s a structure that resembles Mozilla, but the similarities end there.
Only a few of OpenAI’s co-founders, including CEO Sam Altman, remain at the company, and a number of early employees who left have been sharply critical of what they broadly describe as a focus on growth at the expense of safety.
Among the loudest critics is co-founder Elon Musk, who departed in 2018, started a competitor called xAI in 2023, and then sued OpenAI and Altman for alleged breach of contract and financial damages. OpenAI has dismissed Musk’s efforts as part of a “campaign of harassment,” and the case is expected to head to trial in April.
OpenAI didn’t provide a comment, and xAI returned CNBC’s request for comment with an automated response.
Anthropic was founded in 2021 by a group of former OpenAI executives and researchers who disagreed with the company’s direction. But, even as it’s taken a more pro-safety stance in AI development, Anthropic has been racing alongside AI commercially, commanding a $350 billion valuation.
Multiple battles at once
Mozilla’s uphill battle is even steeper because of the position of the Trump administration, which is determined to stay ahead of China in the global AI race and has been quick to lash out at companies, states and lawmakers that are perceived as potential threats to that agenda.
David Sacks, the venture capitalist serving as the administration’s AI and crypto czar, accused Anthropic of supporting “woke AI” in October due to its approach on regulation. President Donald Trump in December signed an executive order for a single regulatory framework for AI, establishing a litigation task force to challenge state AI laws, namely those led by Democratic lawmakers.
An Anthropic spokesperson declined to comment, but directed CNBC to a blog post from CEO Dario Amodei in October. Amodei wrote in the post that Anthropic had increased its revenue run rate from $1 billion to $7 billion in nine months, “and we’ve managed to do this while deploying AI thoughtfully and responsibly.”
David O. Sacks, chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, speaks to President Donald Trump next to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick as Trump signs an executive order on AI in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, Dec. 11, 2025. Al Drago | ReutersSurman remains undeterred, and says Mozilla will be able to help “do for AI what we did for the web.”
“There is an alternative that’s real and is emerging, and it’s a lot of small pieces that add up to that alternative,” Surman said. “The people in it are hungry to look where there’s weak spots in the current market and take advantage of them.”
Mozilla has long viewed itself as a rebel.
In the 2024 “State of Mozilla” report, Surman used the phrase “rebel alliance” to describe the coalition of players that helped disrupt Microsoft’s dominance over the web. In 2020, Mozilla published a report titled “Mozilla & the Rebel Alliance,” which was dedicated to the organization’s alliance of “tens of thousands of people around the globe who believe in Mozilla.”
Even so, Surman said it took some time to convince his colleagues that the moniker applied to the AI era.
That process actually started long before generative AI took off. In 2019, Surman shifted the philanthropic and advocacy efforts of the Mozilla Foundation to focus on “trustworthy AI.”
By the spring of 2023, Mozilla had launched its venture firm and its own AI company, Mozilla.ai. The following year, Surman said Mozilla’s leadership agreed that keeping AI “trustworthy and open” was a fight worth picking.
While its biggest priority remains growing and investing in Firefox, investing in the rebel alliance is “at the heart of who Mozilla is today,” according to the report on Tuesday. Supporting startups is central to that strategy.
Mozilla Ventures has invested in more than 55 companies to date, including dozens of AI startups, with more deals to come in 2026.
Trail, a German startup that offers an AI governance solution for regulated enterprises, raised a pre-seed round in 2024, with participation from Mozilla.
Anna Spitznagel, who co-founded the company the prior year, said Trail and Mozilla are exploring ways to collaborate more closely, like by building an open-source framework. Mozilla has supported open-source technology since its origin in 1998.
But Spitznagel isn’t completely sold on Surman’s rebel alliance concept. She said it’s a “fun analogy” and wants to be aligned with the movement to enable trustworthy AI, but also wants in on the broader AI transformation.
“Rebel is a word that for me, personally, it has the wrong association,” Spitznagel said in an interview. “I do think about [AI] a bit differently, but I also want to be part of the revolution that actually enables us to deploy AI and not hinder it.”
Tony Salomone and Ali Asaria, co-founders of Mozilla portfolio company Transformer Lab, said they’re similarly on the fence.
“I’m not going to lie, I sometimes talk that way to get people kind of excited or engaged in our way of thinking,” Salomone said.
Founded in 2024, Transformer Lab is building open-source tools that developers can use to build, train and evaluate advanced AI models. The company has yet to publicly disclose any funding and, as of November, had fewer than 10 employees, mostly based in Canada.
Asaria said rebel alliance isn’t a term he’s used, but that there is an ecosystem of smaller AI companies that keep in touch and regularly cross paths at conferences and other events.
“There’s definitely a group of folks who are interested in this idea of trying to be sustainable companies that can have an impact on the industry and have an appreciation for AI, but don’t want to see just a few big companies win,” Asaria said.
‘Taking a lot of shortcuts’
When it comes to the big companies in AI, Surman cautioned that a “winner-takes-all” mentality still lurks behind their open-source efforts. He said their contributions to open-source communities are welcome, but that those same companies will “eat you if you’re not careful.”
It’s an issue that resonates with Oumi CEO Manos Koukoumidis. Backed by Mozilla, Oumi operates an open-source platform that researchers and engineers can use to train, fine-tune, evaluate and deploy AI models. Koukoumidis previously spent around a decade working in AI at Microsoft, Facebook and most recently Google, where he became disillusioned with the future he was building.
While all the big tech companies contribute to a variety of open-source projects, some of which they manage, Koukoumidis said the bigger objective at the “tech mammoths” is dominance. In terms of safety, he is “very confident that they’re taking a lot of shortcuts.”
Koukoumidis and Surman agree that a much larger community of researchers and entrepreneurs should be collaborating to advance AI, which is one of the goals of Oumi.
“Even the couple thousand people that are at OpenAI, Anthropic or anywhere else, because they’re operating in a silo, they’re not enough to advance this technology sufficiently, safely, cost efficiently, sustainably,” Koukoumidis said in an interview. “What’s happening right now, it’s complete insanity. We’re wasting billions, tens of billions, hundreds of billions.”
JOSEP LAGO | AFP | Getty ImagesEditor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.
Continue/Read Original Article Here: Mozilla building an AI ‘rebel alliance’ to take on OpenAI, Anthropic
Tags: AI, Anthropic, Apple, Billion Reserves, Browsers, Canada, CNBC, Firefox, Google, Mark Surman, OpenAI, Rebel Alliance, San Francisco, Toronto
#AI #Anthropic #Apple #BillionReserves #Browsers #Canada #CNBC #Firefox #Google #MarkSurman #OpenAI #RebelAlliance #SanFrancisco #Toronto -
Freelance Designers Can’t Compete With a $20/Month AI Subscription—Here’s What Actually Works Now
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Something broke quietly in the freelance design market around 2023. Not dramatically, not overnight—just a slow, steady thinning of the middle. The logo jobs dried up. The social media packages got cheaper. The “quick brand refresh” clients started asking if AI couldn’t just handle it. By 2025, that thinning had become a collapse. And in 2026, anyone still charging mid-range rates for mid-range deliverables is fighting a battle they already lost.
This isn’t a think piece about automation anxiety. It’s a clear-eyed look at what the freelance design market collapse actually means—who it’s hitting hardest, why the middle specifically is disappearing, and what designers can realistically do right now to run a profitable creative business. The answers are more concrete than most career advice lets on.
Let’s start with the data that should make you uncomfortable.
What Does the Data Actually Tell Us About the Freelance Design Market in 2026?
Research published by the Brookings Institution found that freelancers in AI-exposed roles experienced a 2% decline in contracts and a 5% drop in earnings following the release of new AI tools in 2022. Those numbers sound modest. But combined with platform-level data, they reveal a structural shift, not a temporary dip.
A Harvard and Imperial College study tracked two million freelance job postings across 61 countries. Within eight months of ChatGPT’s launch, freelance graphic design work shrank 17%. Writing fell 30%, and software development fell 21%. The Vollna Upwork Market Report confirmed writing projects dropped 32% year-over-year in 2025—the steepest decline of any category. Entry-level project availability on Upwork collapsed from 15% to below 9%.
Perhaps the most telling number: the Ramp “Payrolls to Prompts” study from February 2026 found that more than half of businesses spending on freelance platforms in 2022 had stopped entirely by 2025. Freelance marketplace spending as a share of company budgets fell from 0.66% to 0.14%. Meanwhile, AI model spending rose from zero to 2.85%.
Clients didn’t stop needing creative work. They stopped paying freelancers to do the parts AI can now handle.
The Mid-Level Squeeze: A New Framework for Understanding What Disappeared
Here is the framework I call the Creative Compression Model. Think of the freelance design market as three tiers:
The Commodity Tier covers basic logo variations, social media templates, simple brochures, product mockups, and entry-level brand assets. This tier is now almost entirely owned by AI. Canva, Adobe Firefly, Midjourney, and DALL·E produce output here that is genuinely good enough for the clients who used to pay $200–$800 for this work. Those clients aren’t coming back.
The Strategy Tier covers brand identity systems, campaign architecture, UX design, creative direction, and design consulting. This tier is still firmly human-led. Clients here are paying for judgment, not just output. They’re paying for someone who can read a brand problem and build a visual answer — not someone who can execute a request.
The Vanishing Middle is where most mid-level freelancers lived. Competent, professional, reliable — delivering work that looked great but wasn’t particularly strategic. These designers charged $1,500 for a brand package, $500 for a landing page, and $300 for a social media kit. Their clients were small businesses, marketing managers at mid-sized companies, and startups.
That client profile has a $20/month Midjourney subscription now. And it produces output that their previous designer could not meaningfully distinguish from.
Why Experienced Designers Are Feeling This Most
Here’s what makes the Creative Compression Model counterintuitive. The Brookings research found that the negative effects of AI were especially pronounced among experienced freelancers offering higher-priced, higher-quality services. That’s not a typo.
Why? Because experienced mid-level designers built their positioning around quality of execution. They were better at Photoshop than their clients. They delivered cleaner files, sharper logos, and more polished layouts. That used to be their competitive advantage.
AI compressed the quality gap. Suddenly, a decent Midjourney prompt produces something that looks almost as polished. The experienced designer’s edge—refined execution—got commoditized overnight. Meanwhile, the truly strategic designers, the ones who sold their thinking rather than their craft, were unaffected.
This creates what I call the Expertise Inversion Trap: the more a designer invests in mastering execution tools, the more vulnerable they become to AI disruption. The designers with less technical polish but more strategic thinking survived better.
Think about that for a moment. A decade of Illustrator mastery became less defensible than two years of brand strategy consulting experience. That’s the uncomfortable truth the industry hasn’t fully processed yet.
What Creatives Are Actually Complaining About Right Now
Spend twenty minutes in any design community—Reddit, Dribbble’s forums, LinkedIn comment threads—and you see the same complaints in 2026:
“Clients keep asking me to just ‘tweak the AI output.'” This is the new race to the bottom. Instead of hiring a designer to create, clients generate something mediocre with AI, then want to pay a designer $50 to polish it. The creative work becomes a correction service. Compensation and creative authority both collapse simultaneously.
“My rates haven’t moved in two years, but my pipeline has halved.” This reflects exactly what the data shows — not just lower rates, but fewer projects. The math is brutal: a 20% rate cut plus a 30% reduction in project volume means earning less than half what you made three years ago, for essentially the same quality of work.
“I don’t know what to charge anymore.” This is the identity crisis underneath the economic one. Designers built their pricing around time and output. When AI can generate the output in seconds, the old pricing logic breaks. There’s no good replacement framework yet—and that ambiguity is paralyzing.
The Envato State of AI in Creative Work 2026 report, surveying 1,780 creative professionals, found that graphic designers and illustrators face uncomfortable questions about their craft, value, and what happens when “good enough” becomes instant. That’s a precise description. The problem isn’t that AI is better. The problem is that “good enough” became free.
The Freelance Design Market Collapse Is Not Uniform—Here’s Where Work Still Exists
The freelance economy isn’t disappearing. It’s bifurcating. Commodity work is contracting sharply, while specialist, strategic, and AI-augmented work is growing.
There are real signals of what still commands value. AI-specialized freelancers command 25–60% higher rates than general practitioners in the same field, according to Upwork AI research from 2025–2026. Upwork reported that AI-related freelance work crossed $300 million in annualized value by late 2025. Career coaching demand grew 74% year-over-year. White paper specialists commanded $6,000 or more per month.
The ceiling is rising. The floor is collapsing. The middle—the place most freelance designers called home—no longer exists the way it did.
The Five Positions That Still Work for Freelance Designers in 2026
These are not aspirational categories. They’re the observable positions where independent designers still build sustainable businesses right now.
1. The Brand Strategist-Designer
This person doesn’t sell logo packages. They sell brand architecture and ask uncomfortable questions about positioning, audience, and competitive differentiation before touching any visual tool. Furthermore, they charge for the thinking, and the design is the output of the thinking—not the product itself. AI cannot replicate this because AI doesn’t have business insight, client history, or the ability to challenge a client’s assumptions productively.2. The AI-Augmented Production Engine
This designer embraced AI tools completely and reoriented their business around speed and volume at the high end. A freelance graphic designer specializing in branding for small businesses who integrated Midjourney, Adobe Firefly, and Canva Magic into their workflow can now generate 20 to 30 visual concepts in the time it used to take to produce three or four. They don’t charge less — they deliver more. Their competitive advantage is responsiveness and iteration speed that agencies can’t match.3. The Niche Domain Specialist
This designer operates at the intersection of design and a specific industry. Medical device UX. Legal branding. FinTech data visualization. Pharmaceutical packaging. Specialists in well-defined niches—fintech copywriting, medical UX design, and DevOps documentation—command premiums that AI tools cannot easily undercut. The regulatory knowledge, the industry relationships, and the specialized visual vocabulary create a moat that broad AI training data can’t replicate.4. The Creative Director for Hire
This is the consultant model. Companies have in-house teams or access to AI tools. What they often lack is the strategic oversight to use them well. The creative director for hire sets the visual direction, establishes quality standards, reviews AI-generated output, and coaches internal teams. They’re not executing—they’re directing. This is a high-value position that requires years of experience but minimal ongoing production time.5. The Experience Designer
This designer works on physical touchpoints, spatial experiences, or highly complex interactive systems where AI output requires extensive human curation. Retail environments, exhibition design, complex UX flows for enterprise software, motion design systems for broadcast. Large-scale applications, multi-site corporate architectures, and custom platforms require expert judgment that no automation replaces.How to Reposition Your Freelance Design Business Right Now
Knowing the five viable positions is one thing. Getting from “I do logos and brand packages” to one of those positions is a different challenge. Here’s a practical framework I call the Value Ascent Protocol — four steps to move up the creative value chain before the middle collapses completely under you.
Step 1: Conduct a Ruthless Output Audit
List every deliverable you sold in the last two years. For each one, ask a single question: could a competent person with a $20/month AI subscription produce something functionally similar for a price-sensitive client? Be honest. If the answer is yes, that deliverable is compromised. You may still sell it—but you can’t anchor your business on it. This is uncomfortable, but it’s the starting point.
Step 2: Identify Your Latent Strategic Value
Most mid-level designers have more strategic capability than they’re currently selling. You probably know a lot about your clients’ industries. Furthermore, you probably have opinions about brand positioning that you keep to yourself because no one asked. And you probably have pattern recognition from seeing dozens of similar businesses that a client with six weeks of brand experience doesn’t have.
That knowledge is currently trapped inside projects where you’re being paid for execution. Surface it. Document it. Find the insight layer underneath your craft. That’s what you’re actually selling now.
Step 3: Rebuild Your Pricing Around Outcomes, Not Hours
Value-based pricing is replacing hourly billing as AI helps freelancers deliver outcomes faster. If you redesigned a client’s brand and their sales conversion improved, that result has value. If you built a visual identity system that helped them raise funding, that has value. Price against those outcomes. Hourly rates and deliverable packages both anchor you to time and output—the exact dimensions where AI destroys your competitive position.
Step 4: Shrink Your Client List, Deepen Your Relationships
The designers still thriving in 2026 tend to have fewer clients, not more. Deeper relationships. Retainer arrangements. Ongoing advisory roles. The freelancers winning in 2026 are the best at building and maintaining relationships. A client who trusts you as a strategic partner doesn’t price-compare against Midjourney. A client who hired you for a logo package absolutely does.
The AI Integration Question: Use It or Lose Ground
Here’s the position I hold, clearly and without hedging: if you’re not using AI tools in your design workflow in 2026, you are voluntarily operating at a speed and cost disadvantage. That’s not a sustainable choice for most freelancers.
The Freelancer Kompass 2026 report found that 84% of freelancers now regularly use AI tools, up from 41% three years ago. The designers who adopted early now earn 40–60% more per hour than they did before AI arrived, according to Upwork data. Not because AI does their work for them, but because they complete the same quality of work in significantly less time and pass that efficiency to clients as responsiveness and breadth of concepts.
At the same time, there’s a genuine risk in the opposite direction. There’s a legitimate concern that freelancers who lean too heavily on AI tools may allow foundational skills to atrophy. A designer who no longer ideates without AI prompts may find themselves less capable when AI tools fail, change, or become inaccessible.
Use AI to generate the base layer, use your judgment to determine whether it’s right, and use your craft to make it excellent. That three-part sequence keeps you in control of the work—and keeps AI as the tool, not the creative authority.
The Disclosure Problem No One Is Talking About Honestly
More than half of all creatives have used AI in client work without disclosing it. Among agency owners specifically, only 28% always tell clients when they use AI. This is an industry-wide ethical ambiguity that’s going to crystallize into either a transparency norm or a regulatory requirement over the next few years.
My recommendation: get ahead of it. Build AI disclosure into your process now, framed not as a confession but as a workflow description. “I use AI tools to accelerate early concept development, then apply my expertise to refine and direct the final output” is a true and professional statement. It positions you as technically sophisticated, not as someone who replaced their skills with a subscription.
What the Freelance Design Market Looks Like in 2028: A Forward Prediction
Making predictions in a technology transition this fast is risky. But some directional signals are clear enough to state with reasonable confidence.
The Commodity Tier disappears almost entirely. By 2028, the few remaining clients for basic logo and template work will use AI directly. No intermediary. The designers who survive in volume-based models will be those running AI-augmented studios that compete on speed and quantity at a price point human-only designers can’t reach.
The Strategy Tier consolidates upward. Fewer designers will do this work, but they’ll earn more per engagement. The barrier to entry will be portfolio depth and documented business outcomes, not technical craft. Senior designers who transition to brand consulting in the next 18 months will be well-positioned.
A new category emerges: the AI Creative Director. This role doesn’t exist as a defined freelance position yet, but it’s forming. Companies building internal AI workflows need experienced creative professionals to supervise output quality, maintain brand consistency, and train internal teams on prompt strategy and visual direction. This is a high-leverage advisory role that will become increasingly valuable as AI adoption in marketing organizations accelerates.
The pipeline problem becomes a crisis. If newcomers don’t get entry-level gigs, how do they gain experience to become senior? This is the question the industry hasn’t answered. The entry-level work that used to train the next generation of designers is gone. In 2028, this will show up as a talent shortage at the senior level—precisely when senior creative judgment is most needed to direct AI systems.
Human-made design becomes a premium signal. As one industry observer noted, AI design may become functional but forgettable—like stock photography. Human-made design will then become the new sought-after thing. There’s historical precedent here. Hand-lettering had no commercial value when digital fonts were a novelty. Today, it commands significant premiums precisely because it’s rare and demonstrably human.
The Honest Summary for Working Designers Right Now
You cannot compete with a $20/month AI subscription on commodity deliverables. That’s not an opinion—it’s a market reality confirmed by platform data, academic research, and the lived experience of thousands of designers who’ve watched their middle-market clients quietly disappear.
But here’s what’s also true: AI cannot replicate the kind of creative professional who thinks before they execute, who understands a client’s business problem before picking up a visual tool, and who can take responsibility for a strategic creative decision. That person has never been more valuable.
The freelance design market didn’t collapse. The execution-only freelance design market collapsed. The strategy-first, expertise-led, outcome-oriented design business is alive. It just requires a different way of showing up—and a willingness to stop competing in a market that no longer rewards what you used to be good at.
That’s uncomfortable. It’s also an opportunity, if you move now rather than waiting for the bottom to stabilize.
Common Questions About Freelance Designers and the AI Market Disruption
Is the freelance design market really collapsing, or is this just hype?
The data is real and consistent across multiple sources. Graphic design work on major freelance platforms shrank 17% within eight months of ChatGPT’s launch. Entry-level project availability on Upwork fell from 15% to under 9% by 2025. More than half of the businesses that spent on freelance platforms in 2022 had stopped entirely by 2025. This is a structural market shift, not a temporary contraction. The collapse is concentrated in the commodity and mid-level tier of the market, not the strategic tier.
Can I still make a living as a freelance graphic designer in 2026?
Yes, but the path has changed significantly. Designers who position themselves as strategic partners, niche domain specialists, or AI-augmented creative directors are building sustainable businesses. Designers who continue selling execution-based, deliverable-focused packages at mid-range rates are facing sustained income pressure. The practical shift involves moving from selling outputs to selling expertise, outcomes, and ongoing advisory relationships.
Should I be using AI tools in my design work?
Yes. The Freelancer Kompass 2026 report found that 84% of freelancers now use AI tools regularly. Designers who integrated AI early earn 40–60% more per hour than before AI arrived, primarily because they deliver more concepts faster, without compromising quality. The risk is over-reliance: using AI for ideation without maintaining independent creative judgment. Use AI to accelerate the process, not to replace the thinking.
What design niches are most resistant to AI disruption?
Brand strategy consulting, complex UX design for regulated industries (healthcare, finance, legal), exhibition and spatial design, creative direction for content teams, and multi-touchpoint experience design all require a level of judgment, domain expertise, and client relationship management that AI tools cannot currently replicate. These niches also tend to command significantly higher day rates than commodity design work.
How should I reprice my services in the AI era?
Stop anchoring prices to time or deliverable type. Both frameworks favor AI comparison, and you will lose that comparison. Instead, price against documented outcomes: brand clarity, conversion improvement, funding success, and market differentiation. If you haven’t been tracking the business impact of your design work, start now. In 2026, a portfolio of results is more valuable than a portfolio of executions.
What is the “Expertise Inversion Trap” in freelance design?
The Expertise Inversion Trap describes the counterintuitive finding that designers who invested most heavily in execution mastery—refined Illustrator skills, Photoshop polish, and production precision—became more vulnerable to AI disruption, while designers with stronger strategic and conceptual skills were less affected. AI compressed the quality gap at the execution level, making technical mastery less defensible as a competitive advantage. The designers who survive longest are those who sell their thinking, not their craft.
Is the freelance design market collapse different for experienced designers vs. beginners?
Yes, in a counterintuitive way. Brookings Institution research found the negative earnings effects were most pronounced among experienced freelancers offering higher-priced services — because their edge was execution quality, which AI commoditized. Beginners, paradoxically, face a pipeline problem: the entry-level work that would have built their skills no longer exists, making it harder to accumulate the experience needed to compete at the strategic level. Both groups face significant pressure, but for structurally different reasons.
What is the “Value Ascent Protocol” for freelance designers?
The Value Ascent Protocol is a four-step repositioning framework for mid-level freelance designers navigating market disruption. Step one: conduct a ruthless output audit to identify which deliverables are now AI-replicable. Step two: identify the latent strategic knowledge inside your current work. Step three: rebuild pricing around client outcomes rather than hours or deliverables. Step four: shrink your client list and deepen relationships toward retainer and advisory arrangements. The goal is to move from the vanishing middle tier of the market to the strategy tier, where AI cannot compete.
Check out other interesting topics on AI and design here at WE AND THE COLOR.
#ai #business #design #designBusiness #freelance -
Critical evidence gaps in the Lancet Countdown on health and climate change
The 2024 report of the Lancet Countdown on health and climate change “reveals the health threats of climate change have reached record-breaking levels” and provides “the most up-to-date assessment of the links between health and climate change”.
Yet its treatment of experiential knowledge – particularly the direct observations and understanding developed by frontline health workers and communities – reveals both progress and persistent gaps in how major global health assessments value different forms of knowing.
The fundamental tension appears right at the start.
The report notes a significant challenge: “A global scarcity of internationally standardised data hinders the capacity to optimally monitor the observed health impacts of climate change and evaluate the health-protective effect of implemented interventions.”
This framing privileges standardized, quantifiable data over other forms of knowledge.
Yet paradoxically, the report recognizes that “health workers are already intimate witnesses to the impacts of climate change on the health of the communities they serve, possessing valuable knowledge that should inform both science and policy.”
This recognition of frontline experience as a valid source of knowledge is significant, even if not fully integrated into the report’s methodology.
Health workers’ experiences are not merely anecdotal but represent a crucial form of evidence gathering and early warning that conventional research methods cannot match.
When a nurse in Bangladesh notices changing patterns of heat-related illness in specific neighborhoods, or when a community health worker in Kenya observes shifts in disease transmission seasons, they are detecting signals that might take epidemiological studies decades to formally document.
Can we afford to wait?
As the report acknowledges that we face “record-breaking threats to their wellbeing, health, and survival from the rapidly changing climate,” why wait for traditional longitudinal studies to validate what health workers are already seeing?
Explore the value of health workers’ experiential knowledge: Jones, I., Mbuh, C., Sadki, R., Eller, K., Rhoda, D., 2023. On the frontline of climate change and health: A health worker eyewitness report. The Geneva Learning Foundation. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.10204660
Their observations, if their significance and value were fully recognized, could provide vital early insights into emerging health threats and guide rapid, life-saving adaptations.
This is especially critical given the report’s call to alarm that climate change impacts are “increasingly claiming lives and livelihoods worldwide” and that “delays in climate change mitigation and adaptation have intensified these impacts.”
The humanitarian imperative to act quickly makes health workers’ experiential knowledge not just valuable but essential – they are the canaries in the coal mine of our climate crisis, and their insights could help bridge critical evidence gaps while more traditional research catches up.
The report’s most thoughtful engagement with alternative forms of knowledge comes in its treatment of Indigenous knowledge systems.
A panel titled “Indigenous knowledge for a healthy future” explicitly acknowledges that “Indigenous peoples maintain deep connections with the natural environment that are important for the social, livelihood, cultural, and spiritual practices that underpin their health and wellbeing.”
More importantly, it recognizes that “Indigenous knowledge has been shown to be the key to protect Indigenous health in times of health emergencies when official health systems and governments are unable to provide assistance to Indigenous communities.”
However, the report also acknowledges that “Indigenous medicine and worldviews are rarely considered within health care or health risk preparedness and response.”
This gap between recognizing the value of Indigenous knowledge and actually incorporating it into health systems and policies reflects a broader challenge.
A crucial observation comes in the report’s data discussion: available data are “rarely disaggregated by relevant groups (eg, gender, age, indigeneity, ethnicity, and socioeconomic level)” and “Indigenous knowledge is often overlooked, and Indigenous populations are seldom taken into consideration in the production and reporting of evidence and data.”
This gap in representation means that crucial experiential knowledge is systematically excluded from our understanding of climate change’s health impacts.
Perhaps most tellingly, while the report calls for “improved data” to evaluate progress on international commitments, it focuses primarily on standardized quantitative metrics rather than developing new frameworks that could better integrate experiential knowledge.
This reveals an underlying epistemological bias – while experiential knowledge is acknowledged as valuable, the report’s methodology remains firmly grounded in traditional scientific approaches.
Looking forward, truly leveraging experiential knowledge in understanding climate change’s health impacts will require more than just acknowledgment.
It will require developing new methodological frameworks that can systematically incorporate and validate different forms of knowing, while ensuring that frontline voices – whether from health workers, Indigenous communities, or other groups with direct experience – are centered rather than marginalized in our understanding of this global crisis.
For the Lancet Countdown to fully live up to its mission of tracking progress on health and climate change, future reports will need to more fundamentally rethink how they recognize, validate, and incorporate experiential knowledge.
The seeds of this transformation are present in the 2024 report.
Doing so is both necessary to improve science and consistent with The Lancet Countdown’s commitment to “operate an open and iterative process of indicator improvement, welcoming proposals for new indicators… from the world’s most vulnerable countries”.
References
- Romanello, M., et al., 2024. The 2024 report of the Lancet Countdown on health and climate change: facing record-breaking threats from delayed action. The Lancet 404, 1847–1896. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(24)01822-1
- Jones, I., Mbuh, C., Sadki, R., Eller, K., Rhoda, D., 2023. On the frontline of climate change and health: A health worker eyewitness report. The Geneva Learning Foundation. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.10204660
- Jones, I., Mbuh, C., Sadki, R., Steed, I., 2024. Climate change and health: Health workers on climate, community, and the urgent need for action. The Geneva Learning Foundation. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.11194918
- Sadki, R., 2025. WHO Global Conference on Climate and Health: New pathways to overcome structural barriers blocking effective climate and health action. https://doi.org/10.59350/redasadki.21322
- Sadki, R., 2025. Climate change and health: a new peer learning programme by and for health workers from the most climate-vulnerable countries. https://doi.org/10.59350/redasadki.21339
- Sadki, R., 2024. Knowing-in-action: Bridging the theory-practice divide in global health. https://doi.org/10.59350/4evj5-vm802
- Sadki, R., 2024. Strengthening primary health care in a changing climate. https://doi.org/10.59350/5s2zf-s6879
- Sadki, R., 2024. World Health Summit: to rebuild trust in global health, invest in health workers as community leaders. https://doi.org/10.59350/343na-80712
- Sadki, R., 2024. The cost of inaction: Quantifying the impact of climate change on health. https://doi.org/10.59350/gn95w-jpt34
- Sanchez, J.J. et al. (2025) ‘The climate crisis and human health: identifying grand challenges through participatory research’, The Lancet Global Health, p. S2214109X25000038. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/S2214-109X(25)00003-8.
Image: The Geneva Learning Foundation Collection © 2024
#climateAndHealth #COP29 #CriticalEvidenceGapsInTheLancetCountdownOnHealthAndClimateChange #epistemology #experientialKnowledge #IndigenousKnowledge #localKnowledge #quantitativeData
-
Critical evidence gaps in the Lancet Countdown on health and climate change
The 2024 report of the Lancet Countdown on health and climate change “reveals the health threats of climate change have reached record-breaking levels” and provides “the most up-to-date assessment of the links between health and climate change”.
Yet its treatment of experiential knowledge – particularly the direct observations and understanding developed by frontline health workers and communities – reveals both progress and persistent gaps in how major global health assessments value different forms of knowing.
The fundamental tension appears right at the start.
The report notes a significant challenge: “A global scarcity of internationally standardised data hinders the capacity to optimally monitor the observed health impacts of climate change and evaluate the health-protective effect of implemented interventions.”
This framing privileges standardized, quantifiable data over other forms of knowledge.
Yet paradoxically, the report recognizes that “health workers are already intimate witnesses to the impacts of climate change on the health of the communities they serve, possessing valuable knowledge that should inform both science and policy.”
This recognition of frontline experience as a valid source of knowledge is significant, even if not fully integrated into the report’s methodology.
Health workers’ experiences are not merely anecdotal but represent a crucial form of evidence gathering and early warning that conventional research methods cannot match.
When a nurse in Bangladesh notices changing patterns of heat-related illness in specific neighborhoods, or when a community health worker in Kenya observes shifts in disease transmission seasons, they are detecting signals that might take epidemiological studies decades to formally document.
Can we afford to wait?
As the report acknowledges that we face “record-breaking threats to their wellbeing, health, and survival from the rapidly changing climate,” why wait for traditional longitudinal studies to validate what health workers are already seeing?
Explore the value of health workers’ experiential knowledge: Jones, I., Mbuh, C., Sadki, R., Eller, K., Rhoda, D., 2023. On the frontline of climate change and health: A health worker eyewitness report. The Geneva Learning Foundation. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.10204660
Their observations, if their significance and value were fully recognized, could provide vital early insights into emerging health threats and guide rapid, life-saving adaptations.
This is especially critical given the report’s call to alarm that climate change impacts are “increasingly claiming lives and livelihoods worldwide” and that “delays in climate change mitigation and adaptation have intensified these impacts.”
The humanitarian imperative to act quickly makes health workers’ experiential knowledge not just valuable but essential – they are the canaries in the coal mine of our climate crisis, and their insights could help bridge critical evidence gaps while more traditional research catches up.
The report’s most thoughtful engagement with alternative forms of knowledge comes in its treatment of Indigenous knowledge systems.
A panel titled “Indigenous knowledge for a healthy future” explicitly acknowledges that “Indigenous peoples maintain deep connections with the natural environment that are important for the social, livelihood, cultural, and spiritual practices that underpin their health and wellbeing.”
More importantly, it recognizes that “Indigenous knowledge has been shown to be the key to protect Indigenous health in times of health emergencies when official health systems and governments are unable to provide assistance to Indigenous communities.”
However, the report also acknowledges that “Indigenous medicine and worldviews are rarely considered within health care or health risk preparedness and response.”
This gap between recognizing the value of Indigenous knowledge and actually incorporating it into health systems and policies reflects a broader challenge.
A crucial observation comes in the report’s data discussion: available data are “rarely disaggregated by relevant groups (eg, gender, age, indigeneity, ethnicity, and socioeconomic level)” and “Indigenous knowledge is often overlooked, and Indigenous populations are seldom taken into consideration in the production and reporting of evidence and data.”
This gap in representation means that crucial experiential knowledge is systematically excluded from our understanding of climate change’s health impacts.
Perhaps most tellingly, while the report calls for “improved data” to evaluate progress on international commitments, it focuses primarily on standardized quantitative metrics rather than developing new frameworks that could better integrate experiential knowledge.
This reveals an underlying epistemological bias – while experiential knowledge is acknowledged as valuable, the report’s methodology remains firmly grounded in traditional scientific approaches.
Looking forward, truly leveraging experiential knowledge in understanding climate change’s health impacts will require more than just acknowledgment.
It will require developing new methodological frameworks that can systematically incorporate and validate different forms of knowing, while ensuring that frontline voices – whether from health workers, Indigenous communities, or other groups with direct experience – are centered rather than marginalized in our understanding of this global crisis.
For the Lancet Countdown to fully live up to its mission of tracking progress on health and climate change, future reports will need to more fundamentally rethink how they recognize, validate, and incorporate experiential knowledge.
The seeds of this transformation are present in the 2024 report.
Doing so is both necessary to improve science and consistent with The Lancet Countdown’s commitment to “operate an open and iterative process of indicator improvement, welcoming proposals for new indicators… from the world’s most vulnerable countries”.
References
- Romanello, M., et al., 2024. The 2024 report of the Lancet Countdown on health and climate change: facing record-breaking threats from delayed action. The Lancet 404, 1847–1896. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(24)01822-1
- Jones, I., Mbuh, C., Sadki, R., Eller, K., Rhoda, D., 2023. On the frontline of climate change and health: A health worker eyewitness report. The Geneva Learning Foundation. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.10204660
- Jones, I., Mbuh, C., Sadki, R., Steed, I., 2024. Climate change and health: Health workers on climate, community, and the urgent need for action. The Geneva Learning Foundation. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.11194918
- Sadki, R., 2025. WHO Global Conference on Climate and Health: New pathways to overcome structural barriers blocking effective climate and health action. https://doi.org/10.59350/redasadki.21322
- Sadki, R., 2025. Climate change and health: a new peer learning programme by and for health workers from the most climate-vulnerable countries. https://doi.org/10.59350/redasadki.21339
- Sadki, R., 2024. Knowing-in-action: Bridging the theory-practice divide in global health. https://doi.org/10.59350/4evj5-vm802
- Sadki, R., 2024. Strengthening primary health care in a changing climate. https://doi.org/10.59350/5s2zf-s6879
- Sadki, R., 2024. World Health Summit: to rebuild trust in global health, invest in health workers as community leaders. https://doi.org/10.59350/343na-80712
- Sadki, R., 2024. The cost of inaction: Quantifying the impact of climate change on health. https://doi.org/10.59350/gn95w-jpt34
- Sanchez, J.J. et al. (2025) ‘The climate crisis and human health: identifying grand challenges through participatory research’, The Lancet Global Health, p. S2214109X25000038. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/S2214-109X(25)00003-8.
Image: The Geneva Learning Foundation Collection © 2024
#climateAndHealth #COP29 #CriticalEvidenceGapsInTheLancetCountdownOnHealthAndClimateChange #epistemology #experientialKnowledge #IndigenousKnowledge #localKnowledge #quantitativeData