Too Negative?
This blog is useless -- at least to me -- if I can't call it the way I see it.
I keep falling back on my knowledge of bubbles.
1.) Bubbles don't reinflate. Sometimes there is a dead cat bounce, but you have to recognize it for what it is.
2.) What's left after every bubble is the core reason the product exists, without the speculation and the hype. The more valuable the core reason, the more people keep buying. With pogs, Beanie Babies and Pokemon, the core interest turned out to be minimal. With sports cards, it turned out to be much, much smaller. With comics and magic, there turned out to be enough readers and players to keep my store alive.
3.) You can't believe what people say. Either the promoters or the believers.
4.) Once the fall starts, other than the dead cat bounce, there is a long and inexorable decline (sometimes a short and brutal decline).
What do we have left in Bend? We have a desirable place to live. We don't have much industry. We have too many houses, and way too much retail. There is a tourism and retirement industry. So there is a core interest that will keep the town alive. But strip away the excess and the speculation, and we have a pretty big fall still to absorb.
I think we are in a long and inexorable decline, like a python tightening. The frog is the hot water. I was waiting to see how this would play out, and I'm getting the sense that it will be slow, so slow that there will be plenty of plausible deniability. There will be plenty of twists and turns, and it will never be obvious.
That's why it important to pay attention to previous patterns of booms and busts, and not get caught up in the day to day details. This is going to play out over a 3 to 5 year span, long after most people quit paying attention. Like a long march, some people will drop out, some will join, and to the casual observer the line of marchers doesn't change, but to the actual participants, it's a trudge.
Those that are paying attention, who have patience and forbearance, and most of all, keep their focus, will survive. Eventually, they will even thrive.
This blog is useless -- at least to me -- if I can't call it the way I see it.
I keep falling back on my knowledge of bubbles.
1.) Bubbles don't reinflate. Sometimes there is a dead cat bounce, but you have to recognize it for what it is.
2.) What's left after every bubble is the core reason the product exists, without the speculation and the hype. The more valuable the core reason, the more people keep buying. With pogs, Beanie Babies and Pokemon, the core interest turned out to be minimal. With sports cards, it turned out to be much, much smaller. With comics and magic, there turned out to be enough readers and players to keep my store alive.
3.) You can't believe what people say. Either the promoters or the believers.
4.) Once the fall starts, other than the dead cat bounce, there is a long and inexorable decline (sometimes a short and brutal decline).
What do we have left in Bend? We have a desirable place to live. We don't have much industry. We have too many houses, and way too much retail. There is a tourism and retirement industry. So there is a core interest that will keep the town alive. But strip away the excess and the speculation, and we have a pretty big fall still to absorb.
I think we are in a long and inexorable decline, like a python tightening. The frog is the hot water. I was waiting to see how this would play out, and I'm getting the sense that it will be slow, so slow that there will be plenty of plausible deniability. There will be plenty of twists and turns, and it will never be obvious.
That's why it important to pay attention to previous patterns of booms and busts, and not get caught up in the day to day details. This is going to play out over a 3 to 5 year span, long after most people quit paying attention. Like a long march, some people will drop out, some will join, and to the casual observer the line of marchers doesn't change, but to the actual participants, it's a trudge.
Those that are paying attention, who have patience and forbearance, and most of all, keep their focus, will survive. Eventually, they will even thrive.