Trade the charts!

Let the comments from the last post be a lesson to us all - there is a reason we trade the charts and don't make predictions!

Sorry to those who commented - if it makes you feel better, I expected more from it too!

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Facebook sets IPO price at $38 a share

Any bets on what it will open at, or the high of the first 30 minutes of trading? Closest answer gets the satisfaction of being the closest answer! Read the article here.

There have been a lot of good trades and discussion in the "comments" of the last few posts - I have not had time to cull through them and post charts, but I'll try to get a few up tomorrow or Saturday.

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More on Instagram

Following up on yesterday's post, this graph is simply amazing. Under 10 employees and 30 million users. New world.



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Facebook buys Instagram

Oh sweet irony - Kodak files for bankruptcy in January, and Instagram is bought for a billion dollars in April. I know their businesses aren't the same, but it is still an interesting statement on old world vs. new world (I'm pretty sure Instagram isn't even two years old).

I can see a bunch of Kodak Executives sitting around the boardroom, perplexed, asking each other "So they built this app for the iPhone, and just sold the company for a billion dollars?"

Facebook buying Instagram for $1 billion in cash and stock

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Face the Facts: We Are All Headed For an iDisorder

This is a follow-up to my post last week about smartphones.

"It should come as no surprise that we are all hopelessly addicted to our devices, particularly our smartphones. Why shouldn’t we be? We are now able to carry a powerful computer around 24/7 in our pocket or purse. The new “WWW” really means “Whatever, Wherever, Whenever.” And we are all succumbing to its draw. Just look at any restaurant table and you will see phones sitting next to forks and knives. It is normal to see someone pick up a smartphone, tap tap tap and put it back down while in the middle of talking. Is this healthy or are we all headed down a slippery slope toward what I call an “iDisorder.”

An iDisorder is where you exhibit signs and symptoms of a psychiatric disorder such as OCD, narcissism, addiction or even ADHD, which are manifested through your use — or overuse — of technology. Whether our use of technology makes us exhibit these signs or simply exacerbates our natural tendencies is an open question, but the fact is we are all acting as though we are potentially diagnosable."

I'm not sure if people agree, disagree, or ignore because they see these signs in themselves. For me personally, I'm a bit concerned and becoming more aware of my lack of awareness!

Read the rest here.

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A Smartphone Future? But Not Yet

A compelling article on what smartphones may be doing to us:

Nicholas Carr, author of “The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains,” argues in the book that because of the brain’s neuroplasticity, Web surfing rewires people to be more adept at perfunctory multitasking, but diminishes the ability to sustain focus and think interpretatively.

Smartphones are especially pernicious because they “increase the ease of access to the Internet far beyond anything we’ve had with laptops,” Mr. Carr said in an interview over his land line (he also owns a dumbphone, as do the other family members). “You see a similar type of compulsive behavior” to computer-assisted Web surfing, “but it can go on continuously from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to sleep.”

Such constant online status, Mr. Carr said, means that “we stop having opportunities to be alone with our thoughts, something that used to come naturally.”

“Anytime we have a spare second,” he said, “we feel compelled to check what’s going on outside of us.”

I am an avid iPhone owner and user, but these concerns have bothered me for a while. Read the rest here.

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Yesterday was Goldman, today its Google!

"Why I left Google" - an interesting piece from a former employee on the negative impact that Google+ has had on the company (in his opinion, of course). My favorite quote:

"As it turned out, sharing was not broken. Sharing was working fine and dandy, Google just wasn’t part of it. People were sharing all around us and seemed quite happy. A user exodus from Facebook never materialized. I couldn’t even get my own teenage daughter to look at Google+ twice, “social isn’t a product,” she told me after I gave her a demo, “social is people and the people are on Facebook.” Google was the rich kid who, after having discovered he wasn’t invited to the party, built his own party in retaliation. The fact that no one came to Google’s party became the elephant in the room."

Here is an article about the post, and the actual post itself.

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Is The Cloud Finally Catching Up With Mighty Oracle?

Somewhat related to the article I posted last week, "The End Of ERP". This is a good discussion on Oracle, including how their cloud strategy (or lack of) could impact their earnings.

Read the entire article here.

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The End Of ERP

For those of you with a background in the enterprise software world, this is an interesting article from Forbes discussing why the big boys like Oracle and SAP are going to have to adapt their business model for new customer demands (ie, subscription based "cloud" services). I'm not sure I agree completely, as there is a pretty wide variance between the demands of individual and smaller groups of consumers vs. large corporate entities, but it is food for thought.

The End Of ERP

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R.I.P. Steve Jobs

And thank you. Not much more needs to be said than that.



Steve Jobs - 1955-2011.

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Apple has more cash reserves than the US government

"Also, with a $75.9 billion balance, Apple is obviously doing really well in the “cash reserves” department, but it sounds even better when you hear the U.S. Treasury Department say that the government now has a total operating balance of $73.8 billion."

And, its the world's top smartphone vendor.

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Away for a few days

I an involved in a non-profit, and it is requiring a lot of my time outside of trading hours this week. Posting may be somewhat sparse, but feel free to discuss trades in comments.

And for all you Blogger users, here is a cool video about new and coming changes.



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Blogs wane?

Interesting article on the state of blogs, and their "competition" with Facebook and Twitter. I've often wondered if Facebook would be a better format for Trader-X...it would most-likely allow for a wider audience and more/easier collaboration, but the flexibility of posting content would be diminished.

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Is blogging dying?

Interesting stats from the latest Pew study:

"Compared to last year’s report, most of the activities Pew Internet has covered in its report have increased in popularity in all age groups, especially social networking, which is hardly surprising given Facebook’s stellar growth to 500 million users and beyond. Interestingly enough, blogging is not one of them, as only half as many online teens blog compared to 2006, while users aged 18-33 also blog less than before.

Overall, virtual worlds and blogging aren’t very popular in any age group, which probably indicates that tools such as Facebook and Twitter – which also enables users to express themselves online – have substituted blogging for many users. E-mail, on the other hand, has become nearly ubiquitous, even among adults aged 74 or over."

Source

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1/12 of the world is on Facebook

And last month, 25% of America's Internet page views were on Facebook. Amazing, and staggering. This is a good article to read.

Mark Zuckerberg: Person of the Year 2010



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Mark Cuban on Success and Motivation

I am not a fan of Mark Cuban a lot of the time, but I respect his business acumen and success.

Over on his blog he made multiple posts on "Success and Motivation", and they are well worth reading. Not just for the Michael Dell and Bill Gates stories - but for a look at how he built his business with and from nothing, and for valuable insights that can be applied to whatever you undertake in life.

As he says, "you only have to be right once."

Grab a beer, sit down and relax, and give it a read.

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Technology updates

Browser Wars

I have been a huge Firefox fan for years, and still am. But I finally broke down and tested Google Chrome. I like it a lot. I don't know that I will abandon Firefox, but after the first day I find myself using Chrome the majority of the time. I love the look and feel and the speed is blazing. Have you tried it yet?


Tumblr

Jon over at "Five Rules For Life" introduced me to a new [free] site/tool/sharing thing called Tumblr. Tumblr is great - it is kind of like blogging, only much, much, much simpler. Most people use it to share things they find on the Internet with others. I am playing around with it as a possible replacement for my links on the lower right sidebar ("THINGS ON THE INTERNETS THAT CAUGHT MY EYE"). I haven't decided yet, but it is a really cool tool. Check out Jon's Tumblr stream here (I stole a few things for my links):

http://jdandre.tumblr.com/

edit - Brian points out (in "Comments") that the Tumblr sites also have an RSS feed so you can subscribe to them in Google Reader...I missed that the first time I looked.


I will post charts over the weekend because I have a lot of personal things to do today and tomorrow outside of market hours. Enjoy the rest of your week.

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Wednesday roundup - 121708

As mentioned last week, my posting will be more sporadic than usual for the rest of the year.

Today I traded VRSN on the 15-minute chart. There were two long entries - one below the ORH which carried more risk (offsetting bars), and one above the ORH that was a textbook break and pullback to test resistance as support (resistance becomes support after the break).

I entered on a break of the bars noted, and closed my positions at the Fibonacci extension (FE).




Finally, I saw this on Pradeep's blog, and I thought it was entertaining so I wanted to share it:



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The iPhone rules

RIMM continues to plummet after lowering earnings guidance this morning. Looking at the chart, you might mistake it for a bank, broker, or an insurance company! From ~$150 earlier this year to the mid-$30s today. What a disaster.



They just released their new touch-screen BlackBerry which was meant to compete with the iPhone - the only problem is it received TERRIBLE reviews. Here is just one.

I will be watching RIMM for possible setups today - while I am downloading new applications for my iPhone, of course.

edit - here is another review aptly titled "The Votes Are In: BlackBerry Storm Sucks".

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Cool stuff for a Monday

David from The T.A.D. Principle (check out their blog during the week for motivational quotes!) turned me onto a cool site - Memiary.

If you have ever wanted to keep a "diary" or record of events, this is the site for you. It is simple, quick, and easy to use - just enter up to five things you did for the day and in the future you can look back on any given day to see what happened. It is a great way to catalog memories, thoughts, and events. And best of all, it is free! Try it out.


And fans of Family Guy and Wall Street will love this:




Finally, there are a lot of questions in the "comments" section that can be answered by clicking on "WELCOME, LINKS TO KEY POSTS, RESOURCES" at the top of every page. Check it out.

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