Sunday, August 14, 2011

Patience Can be Boring, but It Doesn't Cost Much

The NASCAR race at the Watkins Glen Road Track was rained out today. I love watching that race as the NASCAR guys have to take all kinds of turns and not just drive in circles. It is on tomorrow morning at 10am, bummer.

Patience Can be Boring, but It Doesn't Cost Much
I went over both market index charts and about 30 single names this evening. Not much is jumping out at me, a few good looks here or there. This week should answer some questions about the Thursday/Friday rebound days and whether they will have staying power.

It gets boring being on the sidelines. It's more fun to be placing trades and making moves. You have to know your own style here; a daytrader may be having the best few weeks of his/her year while a swing trader either has been chopped up a bit or has been in cash watching the drama.

Patience can be boring, but it doesn't cost much. Getting involved in a volatile tape that still has a real chance of breaking down is just going to cause frustration. Going short right here has headline, FED, and face ripper rally risks.

ChessNwine notes tonight:
"Better to be boring than an Idiot."
True.

Tony of Macro Story has a good run down of big picture items tonight, why not take a look at what is facing the markets:
Macro View August 15, 2011

The tug of war between bulls and bears has been a tough go. Reminds me of a scene from the film "Once Bitten" where Jim Carrey's character is torn between his high school sweetheart (in white) and the dark vampire (in black, played by Lauren Hutton):

Nice. Which one would you go with?

Free Courses on How to Help Robots Take Over the World
Sharp eyed reader Watchtower alerted me to a disturbing development in my personal war against the coming machine age.

Just look at this (via Mish):
Stanford Offers Free Robotics and Artificial Courses; 10,000 Already Sign Up
Here is the deal:
Stanford has been offering portions of its robotics coursework online for a few years now, but professors Sebastian Thrun and Peter Norvig are kicking things up a notch (okay, lots of notches) with next semester's CS221: Introduction to Artificial Intelligence. For the first time, you can take this course, along with several hundred Stanford undergrads, without having to fill out an application, pay tuition, or live in a dorm.
Enrollment is over 56 thousand right now.

So what's the problem? Usually cutting edge breakthroughs come in the controlled atmosphere of a University or a technology company proving ground. Now an untold number of eager and energetic maniac will have Stanford University AI and robotics training? Anyone see the problem here?

The machines are upping the ante here by multiplexing their advancement across multiple users. The rate of progress will likely go up geometrically now! Well played robos, well played. We are all doomed.

Have a good night.

3 comments:

Watchtower said...

It's the rise of the machines baby, the rise of the machines.



My friends 66 SS Chevelle was a 396 big block that he bought for a pittance back in 1981 when we were still in high school.
Him and his dad promptly pulled it and put in a 427 cu in that they rebuilt together.

And yeah, a lot of Van Halen came out of that 8 track player and it's crappy speakers : )

EconomicDisconnect said...

'Atomic Punk' played loud over the sound of a 427 BB. Heaven isn't too far away....

Cary said...

Hi, I must confess, I love NASCAR racing like you, however, I also love my wife who doesn’t. That is why we started our website http://nascarwidows.com to make sure she has alternative activities to go to or is doing something fun that she likes and enjoys while I’m watching or attending the races. She loves spas, pedicures, shopping, and socializing with other women in the same circumstances. We believe that no woman should be a victim of the NASCAR racing season. Women should have a reason to be excited for race day too! We help the NASCAR widows in this cause by providing a healthy alternative to watching the races. So the bottom line is that I get more opportunities to watch the races which make me happy too. Cary