KmikeyM

Q: "What's all this food business?"

A: "Exactly."

Cartoonist Hugh McLeod said, "Business is socializing with purpose" and what better way to socialize than with food and drink? (Answer: None.)

The Money Blog project, an exploration of the myths of internet riches, aims to use the stylings of multi-level marketing to create a system of actual wealth multiplication. Not the mansion-and-Ferrari riches promised by the peddlers of off-brand viagra and late night infomercials, but instead the slow and steady increase in value that comes from putting time and energy into a cherished venture.

About a year ago Judah and I introduced some key concepts from The Money Blog Video Series. This tongue-in-cheek deconstruction of ideas on wealth creation has been simmering for about a year.

After a detour tracking a betting scheme in which I lost a fair amount of money, Judah and I have started working together again on presenting the next steps in our Money Blog system and that involves new Key Concepts of socialization and purposeful interactions (AKA projects).

We've all heard the way to a man's heart is through his stomach. At Money Blog, we believe the way to a man's wallet is through his heart, and therefore also his stomach. All business is the food business.

I'm always excited to find new ways to ingest stimulants and Energy Gel has such a futuristic name that I knew I was destined to like it. However, the problem with Energy Gel comes not from the Energy, but from the Gel. The Gel is, as one expects, gelatinous. This is not a nice feeling and even after three types of Gel I was still left with little desire to stimulate myself this way.

CLIF SHOT MOCHA ENERGY GEL

90% Organic - Entirely Natural is a weird selling point. I'm eating ENERGY GEL that has a built in Litter Leash, am I really worried about organic foods? The CLIF SHOT was like eating coffee mud. It wasn't as bad as I expected, but the thickness made it difficult to drink quickly.

HAMMER GEL ESPRESSO

It's so hard to know what to call these things. The total package reads, "Rapid Energy Fuel, HAMMER NUTRITION ENDURANCE FUELS HAMMER GEL ESPRESSO Contains 50mg caffeine Made With Natural Ingredients." What? The HAMMER ESPRESSO flavor was a little better than the CLIF SHOT, but it had the same putty-like consistency. When I say the flavor was a little better, I mean only a little. I wouldn't really choose one over the other, except that the HAMMER packaging is so ugly.

DOUBLE LATTE FLAVOR POWERBAR GEL REFUEL

I was sorting of dreading my third attempt. Coffee is so good, so why does ENERGY GEL have to be so bad? I should have trusted my instincts. This was horrible. A white running snot-like consistency that tasted like an overly sweetened Starboo milk coffee drink. Terrible taste with an even worse mouth feel. I almost didn't finish it and later I felt sort of queasy.

Observatory - 8115 SE Stark St (map)

The veggie burger is made of quinoa and mushroom served with vegan cheese and a side of French-styled potato fries for $8. Plenty of toppings and a side dish of both ketchup and veganaise.

"A melted cheddar or american-style vegan cheese."
"Is it Daiya? I thought it might be Tofutti?"
"Inclusion of both vegenaise and ketchup really displays an intimacy with the vegan palate."
"The patty has a 'crunch', a really great texture."
"Patty seems fried."
"The bun is incredible."
"This bun is similar to the Brown Chicken Brown Cow [steamed bun]."
"Homemade grilled bun."
"Can't taste quinoa, more of a wild rice mushroom vibe..."
"Rules."
"Love this burger."
"This is the best we'll eat today."

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Laurelthirst - 2958 NE Glisan (map)

The veggie burger is a sunflower seed and walnut based patty with lettuce, tomato, and dijon for $7. No vegan cheese is kind of a bummer, but they also have a spicy veggie burger which has chipotle and corn in it. Severed with salad, chips, or soup.

"Patty is falling apart."
"Very much a hippie burger."
"The mouth-feel is so grainy."
"The spice is cool."
"Super flat patty."
"The regular burger I don't like as much. A little lifeless."
"Boring. Bland."
"Would be satisfied if out at a bar and needed food but wouldn't seek out."

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Violetta - 877 SW Taylor (map)

Violetta's polenta & mushroom burger is served with butter lettuce, pickled red onions, "10 hour tomatoes" and a basil-pine nut vinaigrette. It's $6.50 and fries are ordered separately (and you should get the white truffle fries!).

"Too salty."
"I will come here again and get this food."
"Amazing fries. Forgettable burger."
"More of a 'gourmet sandwich'."
"Salt killed it for me."
"Crumbly patty."
"Truffle fries are outstanding. Incredible."
"FRIES ARE SO GOOD."

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Blitz Crew: Claire, Jona, Jac, Steve, and Mike (not-pictured)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

KmikeyM.com Collects On Wager Insurance

Portland, OR -- Today KmikeyM.com was paid $500 in exchange for covering $250.00 of a wager between K. Michael Merrill and Marcus Estes regarding the direction of the Dow Jones Industrial Average over the course of the last year. Estes, a financial pessimist known for his 2008 talk 'What Is Money Now!?' (http://bit.ly/c4jYLI), bet Merrill, a financial optimist who has taken himself public (http://kmikeym.com), that the DJIA would be lower on July 1st, 2010 than it was on July 1st, 2009.

It was March 6th, 2009 that the Dow hit a 12-year low and Merrill and Estes started to discuss the future of American economics. Estes was convinced crumbling of modern finance was but the first sign of a vast contraction of our economic system. Merrill, while agreeing that the world's fiat-currency debt-based economy was inherently flawed, believed that the "end times" were not imminent and the optimism of American society would result in more booms before the ultimate bust.

Estes was confident the rise following the March 6th low point was not sustainable. Merrill believed that the rising Dow was a result of foolish American optimism, and that the Dow Jones Industrial Average would continue to rise based on the will of the people to ignore the flaws of their economic system. Hands were shaken on July 2nd, 2009 when the Dow closed at 8280.74 with Estes taking the position of the bear and Merrill riding atop the bull.

However, the wager was clearly a risky move and Merrill brought the bet to the shareholders of KmikeyM.com. He offered his shareholders the opportunity to be on the hook for 1/2 of the loss, but stand to gain all the winnings. The offer was not universally accepted. It passed with only 56% support and shareholders expressed concerns like, "It sets a dangerous precedent." and "I don't want company money used for gambling." and also "I think in the long run this is a money/respect LOSER for K5M." Eventually a majority were convinced this was a worthwhile project and today that gamble has clearly paid off.

"Insurance is a key concept in the development of civilization," Merrill stated in his original argument. He later added, "As they say, it takes money to make money."

Estes countered with, "You're an idiot, and you're going to die poor." And then handed over $500 in cash.

K. Mike Merrill is a publicly traded person with a fully functional exchange at www.KmikeyM.com where shareholders have a literal stake in his future.

Marcus Estes is a speaker, software developer, and media advisor. His upcoming lecture series, "HTML For Savages" combines post-apocolypitic survival skills and basic internet knowledge

The Dow Jones Industrial Average is an index that shows how 30 large, publicly owned companies based in the United States have traded during a standard trading session in the stock market.

Contact:
K. Michael Merrill
Publicly Traded Person
503-380-2727
kmikeym@kmikeym.com
www.KmikeyM.com

Via Oregon Business:

There are now 461 mobile carts registered in Multnomah County, a 25% increase since 2008.

Brett Burmeister, editor of FoodcartsPortland.com...

In April 2009, she opened Nong's Khao Man Gai food cart using all of the $10,000 she'd saved since arriving in the U.S. plus $8,000 charged to a credit card. A majority of the funds went toward building the custom cart.

Mercy Corps Northwest is one local lender that's worked with cart owners -- 10 to 15 of them the past year. The nonprofit offers loans between $500 and $50,000 to low-income small businesses along with a matching-funds savings program. Sarah Castagnola, program officer at Mercy Corps Northwest, says more cart owners could benefit from loan programs and business training.

Via Under The Table:

The traditional set up [for credit cards] requires either a purchase or rental of the credit card machine (apprx $500 to buy or a monthly fee), a $15-$19/month wireless fee, a $40-$50 service fee to use their company and a percentage of each sale. So we'd be close to $100 a month, not counting the cost of the machine.

Mercy Corps NW IDA Grants

If you don't follow my tumblr blog I don't blame you. It's a pretty stream-of-web-consciousness flow of what I'm thinking, reading, and seeing. But occasionally I'll do a little original writing there when the content doesn't seem to fit elsewhere. I just posted a few thoughts about Personal Synergy that was initially an email I wrote but I expanded and generalized it into a broader manifesto about the advantages of being small is acting big.

My entry into the Republican Party has been slow. I find some of my fellow Republicans to be loud and very quick in their reactions. Thinking about this "fight or flight" response I wrote another entry in my Diary of a New Republican called It's All Your Fault. (I look forward to writing more practical political pieces as I become more educated about the GOP.)

I have hazy memories of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in 1989. I was twelve and living in Alaska and it was a very big deal. With the recent Deepwater Horizon oil spill there have been a lot of references to the Exxon disaster. As I watching BP's stock drop as investors fled for safer waters I wondered what the effect of the Exxon Valdez spill was for Exxon.

Um. Wow. That isn't really what I was expecting. Let's zoom in on that a little bit:

No, wait... that's not the spill. That's from the start of 1988 to the end of 1988*. The Exxon Valdez happened March 24th, 1989. So the effect of that spill was not very significant. The aspect I am interested in is what sort of profit could have been made if one invested at the lowest point after the spill? April 14th the cost was $10.50 per share, and if you missed that then you got another shot on May 5th when it dropped again to $10.563. The price peaked later that year on Dec 22nd at $12.656 (but today is worth $62.34, with a one-time high of $95.00 on Dec 28, 2007).

A big part of the reason Exxon was able to do so well was they didn't pay much for the spill.

So how does that compare to BP? Initially the drop in stock price for BP seems much more dramatic than Exxon, but back in March of last year they dropped to $35.32, so the current price isn't that bad. It's a drop from a recent high of 61.64 on Jan 15th, 2010. But the drop last year was from a high of $75.07.

The question, from an investors point of view, is how optimistic are we on the future of British Petroleum? While the destruction is incredibly terrible I don't think that BP is in the same place as a company like Enron, which was built on flawed ideas (okay, that assumption is arguable if you read Buckminster Fuller, but in a practical sense the world wants oil and companies providing that make money). With the idea that BP will "bounce back" eventually (remember that it took Exxon 18 years to hit their high) I think it makes financial sense to buy BP stock at around $30 a share.

Yesterday I purchased 50 shares for $30.58. Today I sold 25 of those shares for $31.78, meaning I profited $30.00 from BP during the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. I still hold 25 shares which I don't plan to sell until the price of BP reaches at least $60 a share, which I optimistically expect will happen sometime during 2010/2011.

The folksy adage of "Buy Low, Sell High" makes no mention of the circumstances regarding the low. In order for a price to be low it means there are more sellers than buyers and that the popular opinion is pessimistic and negative about the company. Disasters like Deepwater Horizon poison the reputation of a company, but investors have short memories (at most three months).

As a Republican who cares about the environment my proposal is that non-profits fighting the spill should invest in BP in order to capitalize on their eventual success and use those funds to fight a long term battle as well as raise their voice as shareholders of the company.

*What happened in '88? Why can't I find any information about this online?

Have you ever played poker with play money? How about pennies? That's not poker. It can still be a fun little card game, but poker is a game of real risks, and when you remove the significance of the risks the game loses an essential element. Likewise "investing" in the market and tracking the results is not actually investing. When you are playing with your own money you will find yourself being a lot less risky. When the market drops and your play portfolio loses a couple thousand, that's a bummer. When the market drops and you lose a couple thousand of your retirement, that's a big fucking deal.

I like to make bets because it forces me to place a value on my certainty. We might argue about who played Michael Kellam in "3 Men and a Baby" and I might be pretty damn sure it's Ted Danson, but how much am I really willing to risk on that? $20? $50? $100? If you tell me you want to bet $500, that changes things and I start to think to myself, "Wait, was it Tom Selleck? No.. he was Peter Mitchell. It wasn't Steve Guttenberg was it? I thought he was Jack something... shit."

Without betting there is nothing ventured and nothing gained. Why state your opinion unless you're willing to back it up? Not to say all bets have to be based on money, but it's usually much easier to collect than some elaborate act of humiliation. The idea that money acts as a barometer of certainty is reflected with the KmikeyM stock exchange. With real money on the line the participants are more likely to become actively engaged and really represent what options they feel are in the best interest of their investment.

Something like the recently launched Empire Avenue lures people in by modeling a financial transaction. They allow anyone to "go public" and then encourage people to "invest" in each other, using the rising stock price as an indicator of social influence which they can then sell to advertisers. But by using fake money they remove any reason to actually care about your investment. It's a silly little game based on an interesting idea, but the impact of the game is diluted because there is no actual risk.

When I play a poker game with fake money I'll go for every long shot hand because it's fun to play that way and the money isn't real. Likewise, with fake money I'll invest in crazy penny stocks and try to double my money because I'm not actually risking anything. What happens in a game like Empire Avenue if you go bankrupt? As more people join and get funds to invest isn't the currency being devalued? It's not that I wish any ill-will on Empire Avenue, it's just that I find virtual currency to be boring, especially when it's locked within a closed system. (I've done a fair amount of playing with virtual currency.)

Money represents the time and energy we spent earning it. It's scary to think of losing 10 hours of hard work on a stupid bet about movie trivia, just as it's thrilling to win money because you happen to have memorized the IMDB page for Steve Guttenberg. Virtual money represents nothing. It's just an artificially created point system within a simulated environment. Of course if that system opens up and allows an exchange of real money for the virtual money, then that's a different deal. But most of time these sorts of exchanges are one way. They allow you to spend real money to buy more fake poker chips, but you can never cash out your winnings.

If you think about a loss of a bet as a loss of the time you spent earning that money, then how can you spend time "earning" fake money in an artificial environment? The goal can't be the money earned, it has to be because the game is fun. It's got to be Grand Theft Auto not the Hollywood Stock Exchange*. It's the same problem with prediction markets. I like the concept, but all you stand to earn is the loss of time you invested.

*I heard the creators of HSX.com are trying to become a real exchange. That would be very awesome!

I've started a new blog. It's called Diary of New Republican and it's a recording of my thoughts and ideas as I transition to my new political party. Originally I was going to post that material here, but I fear that I may suffer from a bout of "Regarding-itis" in this new endeavor and so I thought a new location was more appropriate. Comments are currently off on the new blog, but I may change that in the future if feedback becomes an essential party of the blog.

Today Mike Merrill and Greg Borenstein spent the morning touring the financial neighborhood of New York. They stopped at the Federal Reserve, the famous "Charging Bull" statue, and the New York Stock Exchange as well as other historic places of financial interest.

Other exchanges Mike Merrill has visited include the former site of the Pacific Coast Stock Exchange in San Francisco, the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, the Tokyo Stock Exchange, and the former site of the Paris Stock Exchange, the Bourse de Paris.
Mike and Greg are continuing their work with the KmikeyM Redesign Summit and we're excited to share the results soon.