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这十种原因会阻碍你看懂加密货币投资
7小时前 来源:OneToken 351
十大原因让你无法瞥见加密之光
文/Lou Kerner,加密技术风投策略顾问公司 CryptoOracle.io 合伙人;CryptoMondays 联合创始人
译/Lynn Lee
我觉得我是在 2017 年 6 月 29 日,才真正理解加密货币这个世界。那种感觉就是,我看到了加密之光。
实际上,2013 到 2014 年间,我用了一年时间钻研加密领域知识。别人认为我是专家,甚至连《华尔街日报》在关于比特币的报道中,都称我为华尔街比特币专家。但那时的我,还没有看到加密之光。我没有实践,我的好奇心不够,我的思维还不够开放。
见到「加密之光」,那是一种犹如宗教信仰般的体验。感觉就好像自己能够预知未来:在未来,加密技术会成为人类历史的重要组成。于是我停下手头所有的工作,把时间精力百分百专注在加密领域。我带着满腔热血开始撰写关于加密技术的文章,也希望能全面了解这个领域正在发生的一切。
我曾有无数次试图想在聊天中帮对方弄清楚什么是「加密世界」的经历。可是,在我试图帮助的这群人中,只有一小部分人看到了我所说的「光」。所以我得出了这样的总结:你无法向别人展示加密之光。每个人都必须以他们自己的方式,用他们各自人生的观察「棱镜」去发现它。
到底是什么让我们无法瞥见加密之光?我总结了以下十大原因,或许你也被它们挡住了视线。
一、加密技术的复杂性
加密技术是我所接触过的信息量最密集又最难理解的一个领域。它是全新的领域,甚至都还没有一个系统的命名方法来完整描述到底什么是「加密技术」。去中心化也是个新概念,更不用说「工作量证明 PoW」、「权益证明 PoS」和「挖矿」这些新鲜词了。
通常我会用两种方式去描述这种复杂性。
第一,我会让大家对比骰子游戏来看。当有人说骰子的概率太复杂难以搞懂,我就会让他们看看围在骰子桌旁的人,我会问他们,是否觉得自己的智商能达到这些人的平均水平。虽然骰子游戏也很复杂,但既然桌边的玩家都能弄清楚,那它就不是什么高不可攀的科学,加密技术同样也是如此。其二,我会告诉人们说,虽然要弄懂加密技术并不容易,但回报是非常丰厚的。
难道他们都比你聪明?
二、大家都有厌学/厌工心理
要想了解加密技术,你就需要大量阅读相关知识。刚起步的时候,很多你都看不懂,你得一个字、一个词地学起。据我统计 ,这个初步了解过程至少需要 20 个小时左右,我还见过有些人花了近 200 个小时。总而言之,这是一个需要耗费精力的学习过程,但很多人都不愿投入。
三、太成功者,看不到光
以前我看到的是鸭子,后来看到了兔子
在我看到加密之光之前,我看到的世界其实还只是凤毛麟角而已。而在我看见加密之光后,我感觉以前的自己就像是一匹被蒙上眼罩的马,而现在看到的世界是如此不同。
我这种感受就是典型的格式塔心理学体现。注:格式塔心理学是视觉心理学领域的一个学派,其观点是:人的视觉是具有整体化、简化处理图形倾向的,当一个不完整的图形出现在人的视觉当中时,人的视觉思维会倾向于自动将其补全使其变成一个完整的常见整体图形。
要想看到加密之光,你就必须对新事物抱有开放的思维。你需要同时观望左右,即便直视前方会比较省事。当一个人越成功,就越不容易改变他看待世界的方式,也越缺少观望左右的兴趣。所以说,成功会让你更不容易看到加密之光。
四、认为只有国家政府才能发行货币
想要让人们对比特币算法的信任程度多过于对他们政府的信任,这并不容易。不过,不论大家看法如何,不可否认的一点是:数字货币作为一种支付方式已经越来越被人们所接受。
五、大部分人根本不关心
许多人看不到加密之光的最普遍原因,是因为他们压根就没兴趣。Blockchain Capital 去年底展开的一项投票调查结果显示,大部分美国人未持有加密货币的首要原因就是「没有需要/没有兴趣」。
六、没有好奇心
加密货币的迅猛发展是不容忽视的事实,就市值增长来说,比特币的市值增速是史上之最。你对此漠不关心的唯一的原因就是:你不是个有好奇心的人。
七、加密货币太不稳定/风险太高
大家都说加密货币太不稳定或风险太高,但垃圾债券刚开始交易的时候也是一样。当时除了垃圾债券的发明者 Drexel Burnham 银行之外,其它所有银行都说垃圾债券就是「垃圾」,因为极不稳定,风险很高,他们绝不会碰。
但随着时间推移,加密货币的不稳定性已经减小,并还有继续稳定下来的趋势,这是新资产类别常常都会面临的问题。
八、认为是骗局
提到加密货币,很多人的第一联想仍然是网络交易黑市「丝绸之路」。还有许多成功商业人士对加密货币冷嘲热讽的态度也是影响因素之一。巴菲特不久前还称比特币是「老鼠药」。不过,巴菲特的跟随者们没意识到的是,关于加密货币他就从未没说过什么令人信服的话。
九、年纪太大
我最近见到了82岁高龄的家得宝金融专家 Ken Langone,当我问到他是否关注过比特币时,他带着嘲笑的口吻回答说:「我只投资我了解的东西。」我说以他的年纪还可以再学,但他拒绝我的态度就好像我是要拉他进邪教组织似的。我猜我可能也确实表现得太过急切吧。
Ken Langone在他人生的某个年龄阶段一定也是个充满了好奇心,只是现在他年事已高,没兴趣去学习「新招」了。
十、加密之光还不够亮
其实,即便是既有好奇心又勤于做研究的人,也不容易看到加密之光,因为这道光还不够亮。很多人都还从未真正与区块链进行实在的互动,大部分人甚至还从未见过有人真正把加密币当作货币来用。
但加密货币之光正日渐明亮起来,每一天,都有更多的人看到它的光芒;每一天,都有更多人放弃他们在麦肯锡或高盛的工作转投加密货币领域;每一天,加密货币社区都在不断打造和改善相关的科技。我相信通过普及知识,摒弃偏见,不断创新,加密之光会像天空中的阳光那样光芒四射,让所有人都能看到,也让这个世界变得更好。
The Top 10 Reasons People Can’t See The Crypto Light
On June 29th, 2017, I saw the Crypto light. It was a religious experience. It felt like I could see the future, a future in which Crypto was the biggest thing to happen in the history of humanity. I had the luxury of stopping everything else I was doing, and focusing 100% of my time on Crypto. I started feverishly writing about Crypto to better understand what was going on (e.g. Five More Thoughts on Crypto After Another Five Months Down The Rabbit Hole).
I’ve had countless conversations trying to help others understand Crypto. Yet only a tiny percentage of people I’ve tried to help, have ended up seeing the light. As a result, I’ve concluded that you can’t show people the Crypto light. Everyone has to see the light via their own path, through the unique prism through which they view life.
I appreciate it’s hard to see the Crypto light. I looked at Crypto for a year in 2013/2014. I looked hard enough that the WSJ wrote a story on Bitcoin calling me Wall Street’s Bitcoin expert. But I didn’t see the light. I didn’t do the work. I wasn’t curious enough. My mind wasn’t open enough.
Here are the 10 biggest reasons that people still struggle to see the Crypto light:
1. Crypto Is Still So Complicated
Crypto is the densest thing I’ve tried to understand. It’s brand new, so even the nomenclature used to describe Crypto isn’t fully formed. Decentralization is a new concept, let alone proof of work, proof of stake, or mining.
I address the complexity in two ways. The first way is how I got people to learn craps. When people say craps is too complex to learn, I ask them to look at the people at a craps table and ask them if they feel as smart as the average person around the table. Even though craps is complicated, all the people around the table figured it out. Craps isn’t rocket science. Neither is Crypto.
Are These People Smarter Than You?
The second way I address the complexity is to tell people that while it’s hard work to learn about Crypto, the payoff is enormous.
2. People Don’t Like To Work/Study
To learn about Crypto, you have to read a lot. At first, you won’t understand much of what you read. So you have to work to understand the meaning of individual words or phrases. I’ve seen it accomplished in as little as 20 hours or so. I’ve seen others take closer to 200 hours. Either way, it’s a lot of work, and it turns out, most most people aren’t up for that.
3. Some People Are Too Successful To See The Light
Before I saw the light, I could see the world, but I was only seeing a partial view of the world. After I saw the Crypto light it felt like I’d been a horse with blinders on, and the new world I saw was something very different than what I had seen before. I’d had what’s called a Gestalt Shift.
I Used To Think This Was A Duck…Then I Saw A Rabbit
In order to see the Crypto light, you have to be open to new ideas. You have to want to look to the right or left, even if looking straight ahead has paid off big time. Yet the more successful that people are, the less likely they are to change how they look at the world. The less likely they are to have an interest in looking left or right and seeing what’s there. Being successful makes it less likely you’ll see the Crypto light.
4. The Belief That Only Governments Issue Currency
It’s hard to get people to appreciate that they are better off believing in an algorithm, like the one that runs Bitcoin, than their own government. Even Wikipedia says “… .Currencies in this sense are defined by governments”.
Now government backed currency is certainly dominant today, trading about $5.1 trillion a day, or roughly 200X the $25 billion traded daily in digital currency. But digital currency is a thing, and will be increasingly accepted as a means of payment, regardless of what people think.
5. Most People Don’t Care
The most prevalent reason people don’t see the light is because they have no interest in it. In a recent poll, “There is no need, or they are disinterested” was the #1 reason people cited for not owning cryptocurrency.
6. Not Curious
It’s hard not to realize there’s something going on. Bitcoin is the fastest growing thing in the history of the world in terms of market cap. Bitcoin is worth over $150 billion, and another $300 billion in Crypto value has been created over the last few years. The only reason to not care about that, is simply because you’re not a curious person.
7. Crypto Is Too Volatile/Too Risky
People say that Crypto is too volatile or too risky for them to be interested in it. So were junk bonds when they first started trading. Other than Drexel Burnham, which invented junk bonds, every other investment bank at the time said junk bonds were garbage that they would never deal with. And they often pointed to volatility as a sign that junk bonds were to risky and would never be a thing. Over time, Crypto’s volatility has lessened, and will continue to do so. That’s what happens with new asset classes.
8. It’s A Scam
It doesn’t help that a lot of people still think of Silk Road when they think about Crypto. That concern is compounded by the fact that some of the most successful business people in the world continuously deride Crypto. Just a few days ago, Warren Buffet called Bitcoin “...rat poison squared”. But naysayers, like Dimon or Buffet has never done the work. People who follow Buffet don’t realize that he’s never said a cogent thing about Crypto. They don’t realize that people like Dimon might just be talking their own books. Interestingly, almost twice as many men as women think Crypto’s a scam.
9. Too Old
I recently met Ken Langone, the 82 year old financier of Home Depot. I asked him if he’d looked in to Bitcoin/Crypto. He laughed derisively, and said “I only invests in things I understand”. I said he wasn’t to old to learn. He shrugged me off as if I was trying to get him to join a cult, and maybe I was. Now I don’t know Ken Langone, but I assume he was a curious guy at some point in his life. But now he’s too old to care about learning a new trick
Now I’m pretty old (56), and I know many people older than me that have seen the Crypto light. But there is a high correlation with age and the disinterest in seeing the Crypto light.
10. The Crypto Light Is Still Pretty Dim
Even for people who are curious and do the work, it’s still hard to see the light, because it’s still dim. Most people have never knowingly interacted with the blockchain. Most have never even met someone who’s used Crypto as a currency. Most people have no context in which to begin to place Crypto.
But the Crypto light is getting brighter every day. Every day, more people see the light. Every day more people are leaving their jobs at McKinsey and Goldman and going all in on Crypto. Everyday, the Crypto community is building and improving Crypto related tech.
Even though this list above can seem pretty dire, I’m confident that the Crypto light will continue to get brighter, and at some point, like the sun in the sky, it will be clearly visible for all to see.
Until then, we’ll continue to build the industry brick by brick. We’ll continue to educate those that haven’t seen the Crypto light. We’ll continue to take the derision of highly respected people who haven’t done thee work. We’ll continue to innovate. And most importantly, we’ll continue to leverage Crypto to make the world a better place for billions of people less fortunate than us.
Everything else will take care of itself. |
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