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bryanl

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  1. re: "Makes me feel like I know what I'm doing, but probably very lucky." the Casinos depend upon this ... just enough jackpots to keep people feeling lucky (reinforced by a lot of noise with each one, too!) It is the appeal of the VC funds as well - just a few make it big, enough to make it attractive and keep folks investing. Those angel investors who make a go of it deal with the fact that most investments are sunk and the learn to put a great deal of effort into what it takes to make an entrepreneurial effort succeed so they can 'count cards' as it were to come out ahead in the long run. As illustrated here, it is easy to get hornswoggled by tales of riches and success. Take care you don't get suckered and fully understand that risks and rewards are related.
  2. sounds sooooo simple, doesn't it! but think about it: if it were so simple, everyone would be in the Warren Buffet class. very few are so there must be something not so simple there. Then consider the idea that those who gained the most during the California gold rush were the merchants, not the gold miners. With stocks, it is the folks managing the trades and transactions (e.g. Wall Street) that most consistently make a profit because they sell a service and don't gamble on unknowns. The pension funds are also worth considering. They buy the services of the smartest people they can find to "buy low, sell high" and generally do get an overall rate of return better than most index funds ... but nothing like returns even 20% or higher as suggested in some comments. The Facebook IPO is a reminder of the heyday of the VC craze back ten or fifteen years ago. Talk about buying low with a promise of immediate large gains! The problem is that many of the companies going public were more like Solyndra than Google or Microsoft or, maybe, Facebook. Short term? Good luck. Too often it is like the lottery with the odds against you. Long term? You can spread out the risk for better odds. You will need a model of some sort. You will need some way to determine when "low" is not going to go "lower" and when "high" is high enough. Your model can be random and depend upon economic growth as the basis. It can be based on existing successes in an index fund which, again, depends mostly upon overall economic growth. It can be based on fads (like Tesla) hoping they will grow out of the 'fad' phase. The benefits tend to go with the risks. What you do (or should) know is that investing in stocks is investing in the potential for making wealth, making something out of nothing. That is growth. By investing, you hope to share in that growth. The capital investment is only one of the ingredients in that recipe. The other ingredients, market, people, and government, all have their influence on the wealth creation as well and it is those 'other ingredients' that make things 'not so simple' and the investment of capital an activity where massive gains are not assured. What can be assured is that, if an economy grows, your investments likely will as well if you spread them out a bit to spread the risks. So they question "are you still in?" is really a question about whether or not the world is going down the tubes or will the problems be fixed and lessons be learned and the miracle of the last 150 years continue?
  3. re: "He was more than interesting in my book, and suffered at the hands of JP Morgan withdrawing support, as well as Edison etc." -- ditto on that! Tesla was a fascinating iconoclast up there in many respects with Howard Hughes -- not too many in that club (that we know about, anyway).
  4. re: "The world would be much different had he won out over Edison." -- say what? He did win over Edison with Westinghouse's backing and that is why the primary grid we use today is AC. As for the wireless power distribution and papers and whatnot - you musta' been watching that show on the History Channel It was quite a tussle between Tesla and Marconi over radio, too. I think Tesla got some traction on that as well. If you think patent issues are a big deal today in regards to high tech investments (back on topic!), Tesla and Edison and Marconi and other high tech entrepreneurs of their day can provide some good lessons in just how difficult it can be to pick winners and why venture capital is so risky. Tesla's departure from Edison's lab also has some good lessons about employee intellectual property and employee nondisclosure agreements and trade secrets that are quite like the issues many software companies face these days. In the capital markets, we have some really rough waters right now. That provides opportunity for a select few. For most of us, though, we either sink or keep bailing while hoping for better weather. I'm afraid it's likely to take a while.
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