It’s the little things that sometimes make a difference. When I was teaching standardized test math so many years ago, I noticed as I was drawing problems on the board, all the little habits that I had picked up. Habits which make solving problems easier, habits which reduce the chance for error.
I think some of this (probably sometimes annoying) attention to detail had carried over to Sprint Planning meetings[1].
Planning Poker is a method for a group to converge on a time estimate for a task or group of tasks. There are a number of ways to do this. The ‘canonical’ way we were taught to do this was to use Fibonacci-numbered cards (1,2,3,,5,Eureka!). This involved a discussion of the task(s) to estimate until everyone had a reasonable idea of their complexity, then each person would choose a number estimate, all of which would be revealed simultaneously, to hopefully reduce bias. The discussion before estimation would not include estimates of how long things were estimated to take, to also try to reduce bias.
While we were running our planning meetings, I noticed that we would start to slip away from this ideal, perhaps because certain things were not important, perhaps because we didn’t see that certain things were important. For example:
We moved from cards to apps, and then to fingers. Using apps for estimation is less annoying than finding the cards each time, but fingers are even faster to find. I/we tried to get around the bias effect by having everyone display their fingers at once, and that worked reasonably well. Even making each person think about their estimate before display can help a lot with reducing the impact of what others might think of them.
One thing I tried which never really caught on when other people were running the meeting was saying ‘A,B,C’ instead of ‘1,2,3’, with the idea that it would be less biasing on the numbers people were choosing. (This may have mostly been an impression of mine, as the moving of the estimate from a mental number to a number of fingers may cement it in a slightly different mental state…)
If one is not careful, and perhaps somewhat impatient in meetings[2], one can start suggesting estimates before they are voted on. It can take considerable discipline and practice to not do this.
Another thing I noticed was how difficult JIRA was to use when one is not practiced in it, especially in a room with many people watching. Something that any experienced[3] demo-giver would know like the back of PowerPoint’s hand.
That’s all I have for now. For more minutiae, tune in tomorrow!
[1]For those of you who have not had the pleasure, these are the meetings at the start of an iteration, where the team sits down in a room, estimates a bunch of priority-ranked tasks, and decides (generally by consensus) how many of them they will commit to getting done in the next two weeks. Like all meetings, they can be good or bad, and the meeting chair (I feel) can make a large difference.
[2]I am probably as guilty of this as anyone. I would recommend Randy Pausch’s ‘Time Management‘ for those who feel similarly.
Q10: Negative rates, and how they affect Berkshire:
Charlie:
1/4 to -1/4 is not very different. Both are ‘painful’ interest rates for investing $60 billion
Charlie Munger looks like a sea turtle.
Charlie seems to drink a lot of Coke, don’t know if Warren does, but that could just because Warren is the one talking most of the time.
Q11: BNSF Decline in commodity prices, and how that might change how much freight is shipped
“We don’t mark up and down our wholly-owned businesses based on motions in the stock market.”
Q12:Harry Potter(?!?) question? (The question asker compared the situation to Hogwarts, etc…)
How should children look at stocks when time horizons for ‘investing’ so short, and IPOs are making so much money?
(On IPOs)
‘If they want to do mathematically unsound things and one of them gets lucky and they put the one that’s lucky on television…’
Think of stocks as a business you own…
Charlie:
‘American business will do fine’
‘But not the average client of a stockbroker.’
‘The stockbroker will do fine’
Q13: NV lobbying against solar (rooftops) where the utility was forced to pay the increased rate to the homeowner instead of the government?
‘Who pays the subsidy’ is the issue… (‘A political question’)
‘If society is the one benefiting, then society should pick up the tab.’
Q14: Low oil prices influence BRK more now (because of various effects on various subsidiaries)?
Warren:
‘We don’t think we can predict the price of commodities.’
Charlie:
‘I’m even more ignorant than you are.’
Q15: Would philanthropic establishment of new universities help with the cost of tuition, possibly by supply/demand?
Charlie:
‘If you expect financial efficiency in american higher education, you’re howling at the wind’
‘Glory of civilization’ (universities)
‘Monopoly and bureaucracy’ (description of universities)
We (USA) spend a lot of money on higher education. Being cheap is not our issue.
Charlie:
‘I’ve made all the enemies I can afford.’
Q16: On effects of Donald Trump on Berkshire
‘That won’t be the main problem’
Charlie:
‘I’m afraid to get into this area.’
Warren:
‘Business in this country has done extremely well for 200 years.’
Returns on tangible equity have not suffered while those on fixed income have suffered.
GDP/capita has gone up in real terms
‘System works very well in terms of output per capita, as far as distribution (inequality), there are often more issues.’
‘Charlie, give something pessimistic to balance me out.’
Charlie:
‘I don’t think the future is necessarily going to be as good as the past, but it doesn’t need to be.’
‘You’re making free choices that you couldn’t 20 years ago.’
Q17: Norfolk Southern/CP failed merger fallout?
BNSF: Certain tests needed to be passed before a large railroad merger would happen (good for public interest, good for shareholders, etc…). That merger may have been good for the shareholders, but did not meet the overall criteria. Next round of mergers will occur when population makes transportation more scarce.
Q18: How do you feel about investment banks not being able to make as much money?
After 2008-9, regulations to increase capital requirements, particularly on larger banks….
‘You can change the math of banking and profitability of banking by changing capital requirements.’
100% capital requirement means not very profitable, 1% capital requirements causes huge problems
Investment banking not a thing we invest in.
Charlie:
‘Generally, we fear the genre more than we love it.’
Q19: Activist investor targeting if BRK trades at a discount to intrinsic value?
Defend by size, and by having money to buy shares at less than intrinsic value.
‘The numbers involved would be staggering.’
Mid-America does better by not being split up.
1973-1974 very good companies selling at a steep discount to what they’re worth… (When stocks at a discount, money is hard to come by)
Charlie:
We don’t worry about this and others do, they can get attacked by hostile takeovers/etc, and we can’t
‘…and you want a strong ally, how many people would you pick in preference to BRK?’
Q20: Leasing?
Train cars… Bank has lower cost of funds than we do
‘A trillion dollars, at 10 basis points’
Aircraft leasing not interesting…
‘We’re well located now, but I don’t think we have new opportunities.’
Q21: Which competitor would you take out and why
Charlie:
‘I don’t think we have to answer this one.’
‘Widening the moat’ is the goal.
‘Not trying to target competitors, just trying to do the best everywhere.’
Warren:
‘Spoken like an anti-trust lawyer’
Q22: Sequoia, and Valeant position
The guy we trusted and recommended passed away in 2005.
The manager involved is no longer in charge.
‘If you have a manager, and doesn’t have integrity, make sure they’re dumb and lazy.’
‘Pattern recognition is very important in evaluation of humans and business.’
‘Frequently come to a bad end, but frequently looks good in the short term.’
Charlie:
‘Valeant of course was a sewer.’ (And they deserved what they got.)
Protege Partners Wager Results (longbets.org)
Hedge funds of funds vs. S&P500 index funds
‘That might sound like a terrible result for the hedge funds, but it’s not a terrible result for the hedge fund managers.’
‘180 million dollars a year, merely for breathing.’ (If Berkshire compensated 2&20.)
‘They can’t believe that they can’t hire someone to make them more money than average.’
‘Consultants can’t change too much year to year, because it looks like they don’t know what they’re doing.’
‘Charlie, do you have anything to add to my sermon?’
‘A tiny group of people.’ (Who can manage money consistently better)
‘Far far far more money made on Wall Street by sales abilities than investment abilities.’
I’ve been following Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffet’s annual ‘Letters to Shareholders‘ for a number of years now. Amongst other things, he avoided the 1999-2001 tech bubble, and predicted the crash of 2007-08. We were lucky enough to go see him in ‘person’ at the Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting last year. This year, we decided to watch his Q&A on livestream (through Yahoo! Finance). Below are some of my thoughts as the meeting progressed. The format is various people (analysts, journalists, and audience member, in that order) ask questions in rotation until time runs out. This goes from about 9:30 until 3:30 Central, with Warren Buffet and Charlie Munger (his longtime business partner) holding court.
So again, we see the two (very) old friends up on the screen.
Warren Buffet and Charlie Munger, Berkshire Hathaway Q&A 2016
Q1: Going from low capital high earnings businesses to high capital moderate earnings businesses (regulated like rail and utilities).
The question asked why Berkshire moved from purchasing companies with low capital requirements and high income to purchasing companies with high capital requirements and moderate income.
The fundamental answer has to do with the size of opportunities available vs. the size of the conglomerate as a whole. (You can read all about it in the shareholder letters.)
Pithy remarks on the subject:
“Increasing capital acts as an anchor on earnings.”
This one I think was a Charlie-ism:
“When our circumstances changed, we changed our minds.”
Q2: Precision Cast, and the huge multiple premium paid
Under Berkshire, Helped make their main asset (the CEO) & made him more productive to the company.
Running a public company distracting vs. being under Berkshire.
“Buy a business that an idiot could manage, because eventually an idiot will have to.”
Q3: What would you do differently?
Warren said he’s ‘doing exactly what [they] like to do with the people [they] love’.
“It’s more fun to do things as a partnership.”
And a Charlie-ism:
“[Learning slowly] is a blessing too. At 92, I still have a lot of ignorance to work on.”
Q4: Munich and Swiss Re divestment
Business is less attractive for the next 10 years, because of low interest rates.
“Supply has gone up but demand has not gone up.”
“Reinsurance is easy to establish a disguised operation in a friendly tax jurisdiction. Couple that with low returns on float…”
Q5: Geico getting ‘whooped’ by Progressive Direct. Why?
Buffet: Diversion to number of car deaths/100M. From 1930 15/100M to 1/100M recently. (40,000)
‘Last year, for the first time, there was more driving, and more distracted driving’
‘Made a bet many years ago on the Geico model over the Progressive model.’
Charlie:
‘I don’t think we have to worry about a competitor having a good quarter.’
Q6: Direct sales -> Search, Push to Pull marketing…
Need to always think about the powerful trend (Amazon) when we make decisions.
‘Doesn’t worry us with Precision Cast.’
‘We were slow on the Internet.’ ‘Mobile and whatever.’
Internet still has much to change…
‘Thought of ourselves as having capital to allocate’, so makes it easier to pivot industries.
‘Amazon has a real advantage, 100s of millions of happy customers.’
Charlie
‘We failed so thoroughly at retail when we were young…[laughter]’ (so not likely to try retail again, and has helped guard them against that particular type of hubris)
Q7: Negative health effects of Coke products, why do you keep dodging the question?
[they dodged the question again]
184k deaths per year…’Declined to invest in cigarettes, why should be proud to own Coke?’
‘I’m about 1/4 coca cola. I’m not sure which quarter, I don’t know if we want to pursue that question.’
‘1.9 billion 8 oz servings per day.’ (Since 1886)
Dodged the question. ‘You have the choice of consuming more than you use.’ Talked about how Coca Cola is not the sole problem.
‘[small town with a constant population] Every time a girl had a baby, a guy had to leave town.’
‘If you want to change your longevity, you should have a sex change.’
Charlie:
‘We ought to almost have a law (I’m sounding like Donald Trump), that you have to say the benefits along with the detriments.’
Q8: Coal vs. renewables
Is your goal to get to 100% renewables?
‘We cannot make changes that are not approved by the Public Utility Commissions.’
‘Iowa’s been marvelous at encouraging renewables.’
In Iowa, we can offer lower rates because of it.
(2.3c/kWh federal tax credit)
‘Benefits of reducing carbon emissions are worldwide…’
‘A benefit that accrues to the world.’
Pay a lot of tax, so worth it to make a lot of investments
Iowa has gotten server farms because of cheaper electricity (from wind)
Vs. more expensive public Nebraska power…
Charlie:
‘If the whole rest of the world were behaving as we do, it would be a better world.’
‘I want to conserve the hydrocarbons’, for chemical feedstock…’I’m in their camp, for different reasons.’
Q9: Derivatives:
How do you value the banks you own?
‘If you asked me to describe the derivative position of the BoA…’
‘The great danger in derivatives is discontuinities’
WWI closed the stock market for many months
1987 almost did, but went on the next day
If marked to market and collateralized, most of the problems are okay…
Large quantities and collateral requirements are the most dangerous…
Kuwait went to a six-month stock settlement process, and caused all kinds of problems because of lack of certainty of ownership.
‘If you took the 50 largest banks, we wouldn’t look at [investing in] 45 of them.’
Charlie:
‘We’re in the awkward position of making 20B from those derivatives.’
‘We would have preferred if those derivatives had been illegal to buy. It would have been better for the country.’
One comment Buffet made which received less attention than it should have is about the issue with having an effective oligarchy amongst auditing firms. The specific issue was that the same person from an auditing firm could be rating or valuating the same derivative from both sides of the deal, and they could easily be rating or valuating it differently…
Continuing our adversaries series, we’re looking at DS9 season four. We’ve seen a number of different patterns season to season, with season one being ‘Q and Prime Directive’, season two being ‘Cardassians and Introspection’, and season three being ‘Dominion, Time/Planar travel, and Introspection’.
The standout this season was internal conflict, whether it’s Bashir vs. O’Brien, or Worf vs. his brother, season four was a study in character stories and internal dilemmas. The writers continued to use the Dominion for the plurality of the high-powered adversary plots, while eschewing almost entirely low-powered external adversaries.
Almost like the calm before the storm, the self introspection before the galaxy erupts into war.
1 (Klingons)
2 (frozen in time)
-1 (Bashir vs. O’Brien)
-1 (Kira vs. Dukat vs. Dukat)
-1 (Dax vs. Dax)
2 (Time Travel)
2 (Two Jem’Hadar ships and a gas giant)
-1 (Worf vs. Kor vs. Worf vs. Kor)
2 (Holodeck)
-1 (Earth and fear)
-1 (Earth and fear, part II)
-1 (Odo & Kira)
2 (freighter vs. Klingon ship)
-1 (Worf & Kurn)
-1 (Quark and the union)
0 (Bajoran politics)
1 (Klingon courtroom drama)
-1 (O’Brien suffers)
1 (Defiant vs. Mirror)
0 (alien & Lwaxana’s lover)
-1 (Sisko)
1 (crew + Jem’Hadar vs. Jem’Hadar)
2 (Dominion disease)
0 (one Ferengi)
2 (The Great Link)
Continuing our adversaries series, we’re continuing with DS9. Today we’ll see if season three follows in the footsteps of season one, season two, or something else entirely.
As usual, moderate to severe spoilers below.
S3:
High: 8 (3 Dominion)
Equal: 6
Low: 3
Self: 9
Note that all of the times that the Dominion appeared during season three, they were presented in an overpowering way, with even one changeling being equal in power to the Defiant’s crew.
Season three is a different mix again from seasons one and two. Season one focused on high- and low-powered (‘Q and Prime Directive’) adversaries. Season two focused on self and equal (mostly Cardassian) adversaries.
This seems to be because DS9 meets with the other major powers much more often than the TNG crew, possibly because TNG is more exploratory, and DS9 is more interested in politics.
It’ll be interesting to see how the remaining seasons compare, especially once the Dominion War starts in earnest.
(0 is less powerful, 1 is about the same, 2 is more powerful, -1 is self)
Season two is a marked departure from ‘Q and Prime Directive’ mix from season one. A plurality of episodes are dealing with the Cardassians, usually in an equal[1] adversary role. We also see an overall plurality of ‘Self’ episodes, as the writers now have enough space[2] to start exploring the characters in some more depth.
Perhaps most interestingly, there are only three stories with extremely powerful adversaries, and two of those are because a small number of crewmembers are up against an entire colony or civilization (The other is the Dominion, but that’ll be a story for a later season).
On a slightly different note, S suggested the following scenario, as an exercise for the reader:
“Riker and Dukat are on Earth, during the early 21st century. They are trying to order a Blizzard at Dairy Queen, but the teenager behind the counter tells them no. Who is the adversary, and what is their power level?”
(0 is less powerful, 1 is about the same, 2 is more powerful, -1 is self)
1 (Cardassians)
1 (Cardassians, and the Bajoran ‘Circle’ has “more firearms than a Galaxy-class starship.”
1 (same as previous two, three-parter)
1 (same number of people as the crew, even though the plot was contrived)
1 (Cardassian politics)
-1 (Bashir, Melora, and low-gravity Ability)
1 (Ferengi negotiating story)
-1 (Odo flashes back and meets Kira, Dukat, and Quark)
-1 (Sisko meets someone…or does he?)
-1 (Resettling gamma quadrant refugees away from Bajor)
0 (con-artist, and ‘luck’)
-1 (Odo and his ‘father’)
2 (less powerful civilization, but trapped and left for dead)
-1 (O’Brien)
0 (colonists/trap)
-1 (character stories, hologram generator)
0 (prime directive story)
1 (Cardassian ship)
0 (40 guards, they have a ship)
0 (Maquis)
0 (Maquis, part II)
-1 (Garak)
2 (mirror universe)
-1 (Bajoran politics)
1 (Cardassia)
2 (3 Jem Hadar ships outmatch one Galaxy-class)
[1]There is considerable analysis suggesting that the Federation/Cardassian war was vary one-sided, at least in space. In the context of this analysis though, starting a new war with Cardassia would create far more problems than it would solve, and therefore the Cardassians get an ‘equal’ ranking.
But what is ‘Dada Science’? Namespace being what it is, there are already twoothers with a claim to the phrase.
For me, it’s all about helping people get to that space between meaning, where their minds are just a little more open to the possibilities. I quite enjoy being put in that state. Terry Pratchett might have likened it to ‘Thlabber‘, ” a recognised scientific term used by wizards to describe the precise instant during any magical transformation where, after a period of feeling elongated, stretched, altered, or reduced to a single point in the space-time continuum, things have just returned to normal and the subject is feeling the first hints of relief and disorientation.”
Perhaps the space is not created by the stretching, but by the reaction and recovery to the stretching.
WARNING: SOME OF THE LINKS BELOW MAY LEAD TO NSFW OR TRIGGERING THINGS STOP YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED STOP
Some of you may be familiar with the ‘Stupid Hackathon‘, which I believe was started by Amelia Winger-Bearskin and Sam Lavigne at ITP in New York a few years ago.
Setting aside the issues of privilege and the General Malaise required to make such an event work, I wanted to talk about a similar event happening in Toronto in late May:
The categories (APOLOGIES FOR YELLING STOP THEY WERE ALSO YELLING ON THE SITE STOP):
MARGINALLY IMPROVED FOOD DELIVERY
– Is this the purchasing of food on margin? Speculating on food ‘Futures’? Or ‘Presents’?
– Is this finally the incarnation of AirHamAndCheese.com, the sharing economy startup[2] for fractional sandwich ownership? Only time will tell.
– Is this anything like ‘The Food Lift‘?
REDUCTIONIST BOLTZMANN MACHINES
– How many neurons are required for full reductionism?
– What happens when you only have one neuron? Does it talk to itself?
– If it can talk to itself in multiple ways, is that still turing-complete?
– Do you get one of these by taking the PCA of your Restricted Boltzmann Machine and dropping the 90% least used neurons?
EMOJIANAL INTELLIGENCE
– I think I know what they mean here, and I’m not talking about this topic here.
QUICKTIME FOR PEGASI
– Is this about a phase-cloaking video display?
– Perhaps hacking a 6502-based console to run video?
– Perhaps a squadron flying horses in a hurry?
– Thinking about it, what would you need in video for a flying horse? Some type of HUD? Probably something very light.
MILLENIAL FALCONS
– I was looking at our new condo building, and what looked like a Red-tailed Hawk was perched on top. I hope we can become friends. They can live to 25 years old in the wild, so it might have been a millenial.
– How would you feed a stooping bird? Would you put food out on a flexible holder a few feet out halfway up a very tall building? Gotta practice that stoop somehow…
MAYBE PUT SOME SENSORS ON IT I GUESS CAN I HAVE MONEY NOW
– See ‘The Internet of Thins‘
VIRTUAL FEALTY
– Cue ‘Second Life’ references.
– You could talk about player organizations within MMORPGs, but what could you build to actually (not) help them?
– This topic is a pyramid scheme.
PENTACOPTERS
– For starfish, of course.
– Or this guy.
A FUCKING FITNESS TRACKER
– I feel like this would require a considerable amount of calibration for each user
– Alternatively, this could be a hide-and-seek game
Over lunch today, I was talking with A & D, and they raised a couple of (unrelated) questions[1].
1. Yesterday, we had talked about the line between ‘Art’ and ‘Making’. But what about the line between ‘Art’ and ‘Destruction’? Auto-destructive art a reasonably recent example[2], but think about sculpture. In general, sculptures made from stone are just very (sometimes very very) finely controlled destruction.
Is it the intentionality? You could write an essay about the meaning of it, then hit a cube of concrete once with a sledgehammer and call it art. In the right context, that could be very provocative. So, where’s the line? Is it someone trying to make ‘Art’? Is it someone trying to create an emotional response? Because I would argue there are plenty of people who have destroyed things to create an emotional response[3], but that is not art. Is it destruction with the intent to help someone by creating an emotional response? Destroying a prized but hurtful possession can be helpful, but I would argue it is not art. So where’s the line?
2. On a more minor note, they also mentioned the line between graffiti and art. I would argue that a simple tag (especially tagging a mural) is not art. Often, it is vandalism. But when you draw an entire mural of your tag, with shading and curlicues, I would argue that that is art. It may be ‘pop-art’, it is likely still vandalism, but is still art.
So, where is the line here? Is it percentage art vs. percentage vandalism? Is it intentionality? Is it the amount of time spent? In the words of the immortal Duke Nukem, ‘Where is it?’
To me, reading the list of presentations, it feels like a software/design/digital/’creatives’ conference, and I’d always heard good things about it.
One of the presentations earlier today was about ‘Future Arcades‘, about how arcades and interactive installations can learn from each other. They even showed pictures of S3FA’s Riskee Ball! Yay! (Although, there was no attribution[2]. Boo!)
This naturally sparked a discussion about attribution, and how important it is. Whether people should be happy that their art/installation/etc is getting out there, or should be insisting on attribution and making sure people do so.
Moving back to the title of this post, the more interesting[3] (for me) conversation was about the placement of the line between ‘Making’ and ‘Art'[4]. S mentioned that while we were designing and building Mirror Blaze, she always thought of it as a ‘Fire Installation’ more than ‘Art’. I had always referred to the group as ‘a fire art collective’, at which point most people asked if we spun poi. Some people in the group say that we build ‘Big Dumb Fire Art’.
So, how do you reconcile these views? I’ve always like the “I don’t know art, but I know what I like” statement, that like many things, you’ll know it when you see it. A common theme seems to be that there needs to be significant personal time and work invested by the artist(s) involved[5]. S suggests that intention of ‘Emotional Impact’ is what makes something ‘Art’ for her. (I’m the kind of person that takes great enjoyment in finding faces in everyday objects[6], so I guess that’s where the intentionality comes in.)
We also briefly touched on the line[7] between ‘Art’ and ‘Illustration’, but agreed that ’emotional intentionality’ also applied.
A note about ‘Art’ vs. ‘art’. I use the term ‘Art’ to refer to ‘what people generally think art is’, with all the associated baggage and politics that comes along with social pressures and millennia of history. Personally, I see art as whatever someone calls art, because at that point, they’re asking you to think and/or feel about the definition of art, if nothing else. I think there are also a number of things not described as art that qualify, but that’s another post.
[1]It always feels better to use peoples’ own ‘about’ statements.
[2]Maybe it’s my background in academia, where attribution is everything. Maybe it’s the fact that I seem to be good at Google, so it seems easy to me.
[3]Although I clearly had ‘feelings’ about attribution. Interesting the things you find in yourself while writing.
[4]I had originally had ‘Building’ here instead of ‘Making’. There’s a subtle difference, but ‘Making’ seems to be term more often used, and feels like it speaks better to what we do. (Even though there’s a *lot* of building. 😀 )
[5]I also feel like a lot of ‘Art’ presupposes one ‘Artist’, even if they have apprentices or other helpers.
[6]While researching this post, I came across this gem.
