And I'd love to welcome all the loyal subscribers to the Independent Investor live stream here. It's Friday. It's nine o'clock. It's time to kick off and really emphasize a really monumental week for me, some of which I'm going to share some of the every now and then I have the opportunity to realize the goal of the channel and that's to empower one investor at a time and you know, very rarely I have reciprocation where things come full circle for me and my eyes are really wide open. The vast majority of the time I feel like I operate on an island. I feel like we're probably fighting a futile battle against an informatable and undefeatable enemy and that is the institutions that would have all the control on the dialogue, have all of the control on the narrative, all of the influences that would have you think contrary to what you're predestined to think of as an individual. I don't mean to throw a whole lot of philosophy at you, but we're trying to move people to a place where they can find their own personal potential. That's really what this thing is all about and I totally understand that there's people out there that are going to have a really hard time by that finding their personal best. I think sometimes in my interaction with people and I had one in particular interaction this week that I'm not going to share details on, but I have the very rare opportunity of having people sense the realism on the channel and they should, it's very real. It's not in any way showcased at all. I think the people who engage with me via my Viper group, they understand their opportunity to sit across from me and talk to me one on one, like I'm speaking with you guys now. Unscripted is a lot like this experience that I throw down on every Friday and it's amazing to understand where people come from. I get caught up in the whole Hylian drama. I get caught up in the stock market not moving for the last three years. I get caught up in those things and investing is a funny thing. It's investing as one of those things you get involved with and you have high hopes and you might have high expectations and you might build that perfect portfolio for yourself and boom boom you got the independent investor in your channel over here man and you got a couple other channels that are real good.  You want to set that sucker in motion and as perfect as that plan is put into motion and you believe wholeheartedly with what you're doing.  Now I really want you to think about that. To really make this thing make sense for you guys you have to internalize it. You have to part of your life. You have to make it part of your life's discipline. Maybe buy into this idea that I resonate with in that people spend too much money to be a good applicator and a good stock market investor and just a wholeheartedly good person you have to find some level of plateau where you're happy. Find out what it is from the baseline makes you happy in life. Aspire to that place and everything else is surplus. It's what we do with that surplus is the powerful message on the channel and I tell you what I was inspired this week. I really was. I was inspired.  The stock market has all but run off a lot of interest on YouTube in coming on and talking about what a lot of people would consider to be a very very scary topic and one that doesn't garner a lot of interest now with the volatility in the stock market for a five days this week we're actually down. Love to report to you guys week over week I would have reported a $71,163 amount in my TSP. We increased $1,072,107 as of this evening's clip and we're up eight and a half percent in the TSP. Now the very strategy that was deployed over that is one that 100% of people can actually do. I funded it through the downturn. It is one that I do not try to buy and sell markets. I dollar cost average the markets. Now the BlackRock CEO on today CMBC was a wonderful interview where he actually proposed for the first time in 2023 that we may potentially go out of 2023 without a recession and I applauded those efforts. I don't understand group think anymore. I'm 45 years old. The older I get the more I resonate with the idea and the importance of thinking independently, thinking on your feet. Do not buy into consensus or group think whatsoever. Look we can look at things and we can agree on certain concepts and we can agree on certain things. We can disagree on certain things but blind following is not something I have a whole lot of patience for. And when it comes down to something as important as personal finance I think all too often blind followership in personal finance is the rampant disease that plagues unfortunately retail investors. Because for some reason the recipe is ripe for disaster in retail investing. When you look to seek out sources of information only to be misled into a scheme that is just too good to be true but too tempting to pass up on. For the fear of missing out on set opportunity people are all too often tempted and let us stray for those shortcuts. And the allure of easy money is a very very tempting proposition for a lot of vulnerable in the retail community. I think that has to stop. There is an influx of commercials by my favorite fund manager out there. I would like to punch him in the face. I think it would be awesome because I think he is just about as close to evil as you can possibly get. It is Ken Fisher. I have made fun of Ken Fisher throughout the entire totality of my entire YouTube career. And I will continue to do so.  Where there is a Ken Fisher out there there are thousands of others that take a bite out of that approach of patronizing people and giving them some image of retirement and suggesting somehow that they have the magic secret sauce to get you to the promised land where look I would rather see you fail as opposed to fail at the hands of a fund manager who is being made rich by cherry picking portfolios of over $500,000 and outright says it. If you don't have a portfolio of over 500,000 you can't talk to Ken Fisher. He only wants to deal with the affluent of all investors out there. I would presume that a vast majority of those people based on the statistics that would suggest that if you are within the 500,000 or above club I would want to go deeper below the surface and understand how you accumulated that money and how you intend on preserving that capital and keeping that capital throughout the generations by opting for a plan like Ken Fisher's program. Where when they do better you do better or when you do better they do better. Actually it's when you do better we do better. Pay attention to the mannerisms of Mr. Ken Fisher the biggest prick on TV it's unbelievable to see these fruit cakes. I'm one of those guys that footstomp the Bill of Rights in the United States of America. I'm broadcasting this evening from New York City. It's a very very powerful city. I am indeed a pilgrim in an unholy land. I'm not home here. However it does provide me the routes to the independent investor channel. I'm here going on six years running. I'll drink to that. Love to welcome everybody to the group. I am a visitor to your households every Friday at nine o'clock to throw down on themes that may be somewhat controversial to you. I may say things that you either agree or don't agree with no problem.   I don't really care where you come from rich or poor. I will provide you no credit beyond giving you an acknowledgement to the very seeking of education and maybe perspective that you must have in this application for financial savvy and I don't think there's any anything that comes close to the paramount of you controlling your own money, controlling your own destiny. You want to have that ideal retirement down the line? I'll show you how to do it. I'll show you some of the things that I deploy every single day. I'll show you some of the attributes, some of the life practices that it takes.  I don't do that. I watch around the landscape and most of YouTube and social media in general makes me sick. I think it's absolutely idiotic. I despise social media. So define irony. I run a pretty successful project here on the Independent Investor Channel. What sets me apart from a lot of people is that I do it my way and if you don't like my way, you can take the train. It's totally fine. I have no problem with that. There's no love lost.  It doesn't bother me whatsoever because where I will reach those very few, there will be the masses in roads that live their entire life naive to the fact that they missed out by acknowledging one very simple fact, especially in this country. We are a privileged nation and to take control of that privilege and not bastardize it and in a lot of cases just give it the F away to somebody else who's looking to capitalize on your being naive. This is a wake up call for the retail community and it is a losing battle that I continue to fight but I win on an individual basis for those very, very few who seek out their opportunity through the channel, who frequent the channel, who have deployed the message and every now and then I get that very powerful reciprocation back to me in a very, very simple statement back to me saying thank you. I appreciate it and then the explanation is given to me how somebody whose society would just deem an utter failure based on the fact that they don't come from privilege, they don't come from opportunity, okay? They don't buy into this institutional idea that you have to follow in line like a Hindu cow and just follow the rogues of people and invest in the stock market the same way that everybody else does. No, no, my friends, the more individual that you can apply your strategy, the better off you'll be, the more you resonate with the idea that sometimes preserving capital and avoiding those big catastrophic downturns, downturns in your wealth building strategy is probably just as important as it is to gain those incremental wins here and there to eke out those year over year performance rates of return that we are so eager to go after. Like I had said, the TSP is up eight and eight and a half percent. I'm up a thousand week over week here. I have no idea where that came from. I did not focus on it one time during the week. I was focused on a thousand other things. That is something that general hardworking normal, whatever the hell that means anymore, people who are looking to earn a living are welcome to come into my channel and talk to talk with me because I talk turkey better than anybody else. There is no doubt in anybody's mind when they come into a Friday live stream pour themselves a cocktail, wrap with the independent investor channel that my week was consumed the same way that yours is consumed.  I'm not one of those people who call myself in line with the rap race. I've been in times in my life where I've had no money.  There was a time when I needed to change what was going on. If I wanted to go to the ATM and not worry about the source that I was drawing upon I had to change certain things. I had to change my philosophy about money. Nothing changed as far as my wanting money.  I'm not willing to change my philosophy about spending.  I have better things to do with my time. I would rather live my life naive than to entertain the idea that this blue collar bastard might have a few things to say to people in a way of financial literacy that is prudent insofar as I'm not selling you a program. Like I said you can listen you cannot listen it doesn't bother me one single bit. These are things that I do I've amassed a fortune. I grumbled 10,000. I shared this with you guys last week. We held true this week. We're sitting at just shy of a half a million dollars of net worth and I would presume based on the statistics that I review that there's a lot of people out there where I contend that a lot of people at my age should have accumulated based on the opportunity and barring a few mistakes. Some level of net worth the real the sheer reality is that that's not happening that's not happening it's not happening okay you can sit here and tell me all day I'm wrong I'm not I'm right okay people have just got to adhere to a few things and I'll tell you what sitting on a half a million dollars is a hell of a lot more fun than sitting on 25,000 dollars of debt call me an asshole it's totally fine totally fine I have amassed this based on nothing short of just sheer free will that's it a perspective to suggest that I wanted to do and I did the ability to take what most people think is impossible and turn it into reality well I end up making myself a self-made millionaire I have no doubt in my mind why because 30 years ago I had the same mentality in my mind that I would put myself on a track to do that and when I put myself on that track I was sitting on you know less than 10,000 dollars of wealth here I sit on 500,000 dollars has the game changed am I subject to change am I subject to throw in the towel on my routine because I've incurred a couple of rough years in the stock market I will give you a perspective that is long-standing I will give you a perspective that is a root and a thread that will be present your entire life it's not something that you engage with and then digress from it's not something that you digress in and then retract from it's not something that you exercise for a while and then you put it on the shelf for a while I know it's it's something that is internal to how it is that you operate where does your loyalty lie why is it that you do what you do who are you looking to support are you trying to achieve a an end that is impossible right I don't know where this program's going to go I have no idea I have no idea all I did was put a plan in motion 20 years ago 25 years ago and here in acknowledging the plan that we've put ourselves on we have the potential of staring down the potential for some some sizable wealth and again when I when I look at the statistics and I look at the people who households have been unable to accumulate a level of wealth even close to indicative of what they should have accumulated over that time given said salary and given said opportunity guys it absolutely makes sense for me to come on and talk for the few seconds that I do every single Friday on this topic a lot of people would say man Ryan it's incredible what you talk about every Friday not really not really I'm just one voice a failing voice at that a failing voice what I mean by that is we will lose in this efforts in that if we do Garner some partial wins and get through empowering one investor at a time it will represent the minute minority and acute representation sample of those people that fit with the message and understand that personal empowerment is possible and it's only possible with the right perspective guys I'd like to welcome you to the Friday livestream I will be getting to comments please leave any investing comments that you have for the group here always real always unscripted here on the Friday livestream appreciate you guys be back get just a moment and we're probably a hell of a lot stronger together HM investor places some products there for the community here is investing easy it can be what I declare to you guys with regard to the TSP and for you guys who are not familiar I'm a government employee I have access to the TSP just like a lot of people out there BlackRock blew the numbers out today that's why I own some BlackRock shares I own 10 shares and for those of you guys who have been sleeping on the moon it's $700 a share so it's not a small position by any means for a small fry like myself but BlackRock is whipping some ass they blew the numbers away top and bottom line it was a great quarter for BlackRock stock soared today during the market as well as after hours after the report came public but is investing easy what I'm really trying to do is fight the systemic idea that regular people can't invest and a lot of those personal barriers are placed on themselves in that they think that somehow they have to outthink the I'll think the strategy come up with some strategy on their own or you know parlay a strategy from some source that seems credible credible and put it into motion only to cross the fingers and hope for the best okay HM investor is kind of putting a a code or a matrix right here in front of us for all of us to enjoy and I appreciate it because there's actually a lot of work here VTI I own VX US I own some US excuse me some international European in the TSP but I don't I don't own VX US FTC the FAEN SCHD I own I don't own the subsequent to Charles Schwab offerings the triple Q's I do own triple QM triple QJ I own TQQQ which is triple levered to the upside JEPI I don't own VB I do VEA I do VWO I used to own I don't own it anymore JEPQ I don't own VOO is one of my absolute favorites it's a flagship account as far as I'm concerned at just owning the S&P 500 VT the value all good ETFs I totally agree with that HM thank you for sharing on the playback somebody could kind of look at that and say god dang what do I invest in you know and and with a little bit of where with all a little bit of knowledge you don't have to buy all of these an investor could probably be just fine if you followed JL Collins somebody that I bring a lot of new investors attention to if you do Google JL Collins he'll talk about the importance of VTI he speaks about the equivalent to VTI he just mentions the index fund rather than the ETF it's exactly the same fund there is no difference whatsoever there are just a few strategic aesthetic differences between VTI and the comparable index fund through Vanguard but really good really good lesson good way to kind of segue because a lot of people come to me and they're like you know how do how do I invest right and it's like I always tackle this from now I tackle it from an individual perspective and it's super important for the member who was able to sit with me and my Viper group I mean we talked for gosh close to an hour and it was so enjoyable it's enjoyable for me it's one of the most enjoyable things that I do you know get a little bit of a little bit of return and value through the channel through the Viper group through the independent investor group.com you guys can kick over there you're welcome at the front page of the website on the YouTube independent investor through YouTube you can link to any of my properties it's kind of cool actually link over there you don't have to sign up for anything but just check out what I've done it's actually pretty cool I'm proud but the project is pretty much done there might be a few additional pieces one that I'm kind of working on and I've been kind of off the grid a little bit as far as my newsletter goes I would still like to infuse that potential on the channel it's just that I don't have a lot of time to engage in continuing to layer up on a project that you know a lot of people are kind of off right now and I think it's a real mistake I think for times like this and I think when I had the reciprocation from people like I had this week I mean it was very motivating to me to to sit down with this individual of the Viper group and share our collective thoughts because we had the exact same thesis on you know where things are and where where we had both been and where potentially we were going and what we were going to do about it in at present you know I might be in too aggressive I might too spread out am I over diversified you know where would we look look next what's the next opportunity in the market and just fascinating conversation to maybe understand that I'm not necessarily on an island there are people out there that that really do kind of really resonate with this blue collar type of in the trenches approach and what makes sense and look don't make no mistake I'm not looking to turn away people who who make money okay that's not something that needs to be embarrassed about it's something that needs to be embraced leveraged and and profited from all too often I find that people who actually do make money or especially those that have made large sums of money cannot keep that money themselves and if they do end up keeping it they end up passing it on to children that end up pissing away to the tune of 60 percent and then and then that the next generation to the tune of 90 percent so in other words when seven figures kicks over to the next generation 60 percent of those will in time lose that wealth that has been passed on to them generationally now if the immediate generation doesn't piss away that money it's a 90 percent failure rate to that money that rolls to the second generation in this example it would be grandchildren so if you think that you're going to give your children and their grandchildren and their grandchildren's grandchildren a legacy you might want to start with the education piece because if you just bestow them a bunch of money they will piss it away too and you can come back and you can say Ryan you asshole my grandchildren would never do that yes your grandchildren will do it too they'll piss it away because they never learned how to preserve capital they never learned the true value of money okay and it's very very important to understand that the statistics just are the way they are they should scare the hell out of you again I come back to the project and why I do this every week and and why my motivation never deviates it's because I'm scared enough for you now I'm making moves for me but I'm scared enough for you and here's why you're not scared enough for yourself okay now if that scares you or it wakes you up or you take it like I've just punched you in the face great because I did I just punched you because you need to wake up and perhaps maybe you have a little bit of the naive syndrome in thinking that it can't happen to you it can happen to you all day all right this country and this economy and especially this global tension that is going on is changing every single day now I think over time we'll be just fine I do but if you're going to succumb to the shifts and the short term injects in the stock market you don't stand a chance you'll lose you will lose your human being just like me you must condition your mind to make sure that you're in it for the long haul no matter what no matter what I have validated that for myself only look to share that with you guys and there's people who are out there and you know they may have their $10,000 of hard earned capital in the market and they are incurring their first little downturn and maybe they're off 20% or more and that $2,000 hurts it hurts it's not fun okay this is the retail community here I understand there is no emotion in investing however in retail investing emotion is rampant it's rampant so we have to invest in the face of understanding that these are hard earned dollars this 100 share position that you put in highly on or you put into Palantir or you put into your due diligence in your portfolio is your 100 shares bought and paid for with hard earned dollars it's different than the institutions who have multi-millions to throw at different positions it's different than the institutions who have you know advocates that they can throw at a proxy fight on a stock that they don't feel like is performing up the par right does the little guy really have a voice do they not sure I throw that stuff out there on Twitter and guess who gets attacked this guy like I'm being overbearing I'm being the asshole right maybe I am maybe I am maybe you're absolutely right and I'm absolutely wrong I totally get it but at the end of the day this game is about money okay and your guys are going to find out one way or the other that this game is a lot more about the bottom line and a lot less about being right or wrong all right I see a couple folks in the group here I wanted to make an acknowledge and I'll just I'll grab the first comment I see here from Moki anyway best way to stick in the Wall Street is index funds I know Moki has probably helped a ton a ton of people out there there's a few channels out there as a matter of fact it's been a long long time coming and it just dawned on me that I owe Moki a featured channel spot this evening Moki finance will be added to my featured channel list on the independent investor channel that is going to happen there's a few advocates out there of of talking about investing the correct way and it affects people okay so when you push that information Moki does a good job of actually sharing the story that's actually impacted his life specifically but I like those opportunities through social media where the efforts are duplicated over and over again tenfold okay and Moki's doing a good job on the project man it's good to see you my brother great to see you the beat goes on that it up that I'm right hey I love the project this is one of my very most favorite things that I do on social media in a landscape that honestly I am demotivated to make three stock videos I cannot find myself the motivation to do it I am true to my word if if where I enjoyed it in the past I do not enjoy that type of behavior right now the live stream is fantastic I could do this product every single night and it's one of those things that I could do with ease if if I thought that I needed to engage in that level of devotion and I had the opportunity because my evenings are very sacred to me with regard to my decompression and social media is not a decompression okay guys like when I come on and I do my live stream I'm fired up okay it takes me at least 45 minutes to decompress after I've delivered a message that I have to be locked in on I have to be locked in okay and people even my mom and dad I was talking to them tonight they're like what are you talking about tonight on the live stream I was like I don't know it doesn't matter I'll find my groove when I hit it okay because there's so many different ways that we need to be able to push this out to reach a certain conglomerate over here one week a certain conglomerate over here and over the long term we want to reach as many people as we possibly can you want to thank me great I'll be the first to thank you okay thank you for just giving yourself that effin chance to look into the mirror and avoid regret down the line I'm telling you there's a lot of people on this earth that deal with a whole lot of scary shit in their life and would being financially secure help I'm not going to presume that well why not put it into into work and why not operate with a little bit more ferocity why not operate along your program with a little bit more rigor with a little bit more hate to use the military term sense of urgency but dang it has credence it has credence what are you waiting for I've been doing this since I was 15 okay some of you guys get started late no problem I'm not here to judge I'm not your father okay but if you're having trouble finding some motivation to understand the sense of urgency behind this thing because later on down the line the money piece will be power all right for guys like this the money piece means opportunity to different investing avenues you might want to do this this this and this how the hell do you expect to do that if you haven't put the pieces in place to make those moves and I'm here to tell you if you haven't put those pieces into place you ain't making those moves I see a lot of people trying to make moves now and they're not financially literate certainly and they do not have the fitness enough to engage in some of those high-level investment opportunities you have to start somewhere and my friends for a lot of people it's moving from non-investor the couch investor or the couch non-investor to something in way of participating in our domestic large cap markets I'm a big fan of index funds I'm a big fan of ETFs I own ETFs I own index funds and if I look at my portfolio and I'm giving you guys the pulse without some sort of cherry on the top or some sort of jaded positive perspective on it I am up eight and a half percent of the TSP this year I am up and in a market like this where every pundit that comes on every single one at one after the next talks about a looming recession and today was the very first time that I've I've seen a CEO and might mind you a CEO that people listen to with black rock and gave a fundamental premise to suggest that with the infrastructure bill with the inflation reduction act no matter what side of the aisle you feel on it that is stimulus that will move into the economy it's hard to imagine us deep diving into a recession especially coming off of a 2022 that was a down 20% year back to back years typically do not fall in succession down years and I don't I don't typically buy into some of those faux pas about the stock market it just is what it is okay we typically don't have a follow-on situation but his point was with all of that stimulus going in to the market in way of infrastructure and the even the commodity excuse me yeah the the materials and everything that's going to be needed the labor the jobs that are going to be created by both of those very large trillion dollar packages that were passed just late last year and into this year it's hard to imagine the cross current between those entering into the market and all of these pundits that are just rest assured that we're going to enter into a recession it's it's the word of the day recession or recession nobody talked about overvalued in the s and p 500 three years ago do you do you often wonder at all somebody I read a report today on twitter talking about jp morgan and their quarterly earnings that are expected this time around when the banks report next week and they're talking about a credit crunch with these banks and they're turning out record record historic profits at the banks the banks are freaking fine we're just manifesting this crisis so we can have something to talk about to make ourselves feel better I feel good all the time why because the only one I listen to with regard to my strategic erection with regard to my money is me is me and I know this guy feels the same way all right it's great to see you Matt thanks for coming on man give you a little air time anyway Matt comes on the channel quite often actually he was my most recent visitor as well I've had Moki and Matt both of these guys are channel creators there's also another channel creator in here I want to give a shot out I believe it was the first comment to the evening I believe he's a channel creator as well so I want to make sure that we're fair with our our shout outs anyway I'm happy to do it I don't care I don't care I do this channel for the for the good of the order that's for sure I got freemans in the house all right great to hear the ice cubes are back in the straight shooting has never left I don't know maybe you know rub some people wrong I don't know I don't really care the older I get the less I care that's for sure I was a lot more careful in my 30s in my 40s I just don't give a shit I don't care there's a lot of people who kind of relate with that idea you know it's just you see things and it just pisses you off like you know everybody has to be for one specific person or one specific side of a specific global conflict and it's like really do you know the internals of what's actually going on over there I mean guys if you study it I think you'll find that the situation is a lot deeper than just following a twitter feed and putting up a certain color of flag and pledging your allegiance while you're sitting here in your privileged high horse in the United States of America thinking you know what you're talking about you don't you're full of shit shut the fuck up until you know what you're talking about that that's what I advise okay if you don't know what you're talking about just focus on yourself okay well we've got all these rogues of people over here standing up for the cause really I'd suggest looking into the cause before you fly your flag of allegiance with that specific cause learn to think a little more dynamically think on your feet okay question everything question everything be greedy be selfish that selfish is a bad attribute no it's not it's perfectly it's the attribute that will get you through nowadays by just looking at number one because I'll tell you what when it's time for others that you have relied on your entire life to take care of you later on in life you want to know who's going to come to your rescue nobody absolutely nobody okay and that is the sheer reality of it when I talk about a sense of urgency I can tell you a thousand different reasons as to why you need to have that urgency as of yesterday and I apologize for the motivational Vince Lombardi speech this evening but sometimes some people in a lot of different ways need this level of cattle prod right up the ass to wake them up to let them understand that the time is right now to get started on some level of fiscal discipline okay if you spend too much stop spending so much okay you don't need all the crap you buy I've said this many many times how many storage sheds can you purchase how high can you stack your crap to the ceiling okay before you're happy do you realize that you're actually not happy two people who have all kinds of crap they're a freaking disaster I hate hoarding it's stupid all right as far as the physical things that I own most of the physical things that I actually do own I actually have value I actually have value but the rest of the trinkets and crap that we can buy off of you know Amazon and and and and all the other crap that we think we have to have dollar stores they drive me up a wall I can't stand them I know I know I've touched the cord with you they're like that bang or I don't be touching my dollar stores man I love my dollar stores I hate them it's good have a drink what's on y'all's mind let me have it I see some new comments man I'll get to it in just a moment that was a busy week this week no doubt about it all in a good week you guys would have been proud of me had some amazing breakthroughs at work pretty awesome we're making we're making progress that's for sure we're motivating the masses man making a difference leave with our leave with our head held high every single day we can actually look and we can actually be proud of the body of work that we've turned in we've got about 15 minutes left of the live stream I cannot believe it I look forward to this every single Friday and it goes by so quick and I talk so fast and when I glance up and I see I only have 15 minutes left it just amazes me I dub it the fast to 60 minutes on YouTube and that's exactly how I feel as the green does those questions everything a shut up and be the victim of authority well stated man great to see you that clincher 16s in the house man very cool this was the other channel creator here right here investing in entrepreneurship I saw that he's got a few followers man do me a softy as far as the independent investor community I know everybody's pretty loyal to these new channels kick over embolden those subscriber counts up and help these guys in their guys or gals in their respective projects I'm glad to endorse happy to do it then dollar stores keep people poor yeah I don't the stocks don't get me wrong I know they're a big favorite of a lot of people that's for sure you know if I you know dollar general and dollar tree they're well run businesses that for sure I would own both businesses they're actually quite good stocks I just I don't like when my ass goes inside of them okay I don't like them I hate them just do not like them I know people are out there like okay Ryan it you will draw the line right there man you need get it into the dollar store category all right that's the families that's the family's vacation every Saturday to go walk up and down the aisles dollar stores oh I've done it too man trust me like I said man I'm when I'm when I say blue collar I mean blue collar all right I'm not joking no recession here in Spokane prices are up yeah Ken's Ken's talking about it's it it seems like only the wealthier living in the United States anymore it should also piss you off if there's a calling there's 60 people in the live stream tonight that's great you know if I was in a small hotel auditorium and I had 60 people to talk to I'd be super stoked on that that's the way I approach this project really do give you something to think about man you know if there's just one thing that you can improve upon and look to embolden the situation within the four walls and the roof of your household that's what I'm all about and if you can come back to me and say man I watched this random live stream by this guy and he just talked about cattle prods and he talked about hair on fire and he talked about some crazy crazy stuff and you know threw a few curse words out there he was pretty pretty scathing you know but motivated me to wake up in a certain couple categories you know he said that we spend too much and I asked myself do I spend too much and then I looked at the credit card bill and I was like well I'm in debt nine grand maybe I should look to clean that up and segue those dollars into something a little bit more productive for my life that's what I'm talking about I'm not going to promise you millions okay I'm just going to go out on a limb and suggest that most of you guys maybe even myself included I've got a pretty good head start on you probably won't make your millions and that's totally fine we're not talking about making an impact that way we're talking about a quality of life that is it transcends the ages okay if you're able to accumulate four hundred and fifty thousand dollars over the course of your life and you're able to educate your generations up because you are able to really understand and resonate with those good habits and how you apply your fiscal discipline no problem don't look to the government to provide that to you it's the complete opposite of what individuals are charged with doing what would what would happen to you if you didn't pay your taxes right the IRS would come after you okay what would happen if you didn't pay your credit card debt to the credit card companies right you'd get reported okay right so on an individual household basis we're held to much more of a standard than our government who can just continually just print whatever money they need and just continue to run up the debt until infinite and and and it's one of those things that the disconnect between the two are are have never been so clear in my mind that it's probably the biggest systemic risk to the market now I think to your point I think real estate will adjust down hopefully but I tell you what I'm looking at houses right now that are not worth the prices and the sticker prices that are that are being affixed to them and I'm in New York City and I'm reading reports here that people are leaving the city in roads I can't blame them I can't blame them you know taxes get so far out of control in certain states you know where people think that that money is going to something good and it ends up elevating to 12 to 14 thousand dollars you know just to own a home in New Jersey which is right next door to where I live it doesn't equate man it doesn't equate when you can move to Tennessee and spend you know 1200 to 1400 dollars a year in taxes now that might be a little bit low but look at the extremes there you're talking about 10x the tax to live here in New Jersey and I'm here to tell you it's not it's not 10 times as nice as Tennessee okay it's not it's not 10 times as nice as North Carolina it's not 10 times as close as nice as as Idaho it's not 10 times as nice as Montana Wyoming New Hampshire you know I can go on and on and on you see my point mm-hmm someone's got a shake there's nothing else I take some comfort in it's knowing that I participate in financial markets in a way that diversifies me away from only having cash right if I could own some precious metal I would I spoke last week about accumulating some alternative investments and I don't know if that was taken very well by some people or not I really don't care but if you're paying attention to the landscape right now our government is getting even more involved in what it is that they are suggesting or even requiring that me and you do or don't do day to day you can feel however you want about that all right the very nature of my channel is independent okay I don't have political acknowledgement on either side I think most people in this country are pretty neutral to be honest with you I don't play the whole if you think one way you have to be Republican or you think one way and you have to be Democrat I don't think that way because I don't think the vast majority of this country thinks that way why because they're busy working and earning a living but I think there's a lot of people out there Democrats or Republican that don't really like being told what to do with their time and how to live their life especially if they're a law abiding citizen and they do pay their tax whether it be 12,000 in New Jersey or 1200 or 1400 in Tennessee neither one of those two want to be told what to do and I just think we're in an interesting time in history where I'm monitoring the landscape closely I am absolutely a participant in financial markets I have to listen every single day with regard to my personal portfolio and question whether or not I am subjecting those dollars to a potential recession in 2023 right and again back to the BlackRock CEO who came out today and suggested that there's a potential for not having a recession I felt that all year I would go so far as to say I don't think we're going to have a recession I don't earnings job growth the stimulus to his point in way of the infrastructure bill and the inflation reduction act again you can have your political alliances wherever you feel I'm just merely suggesting that those are infusions to the broader economy and it's difficult to imagine that we're going to somehow suffer with the average medium what's the aggregate medium household in this country I don't know and I take a stab I'll bet you the aggregate median home price in this country is anywhere between three seventy five and four hundred and fifty thousand dollars that's aggregate medium and everything that I'm seeing that that is worth any level of acknowledgement to being a favorable suburb is much much higher than five seventy five upwards of six hundred and fifty to seven hundred and fifty thousand and that's for a mid a mid tier regular nice home yes but absolutely not worth six hundred and fifty thousand dollars and I'm telling you what the real estate in this country I've been saying this for many many many months is being run up by people who cannot get over the greed situation the realtors are buying into it and the hedge funds are buying it all the same want to try to buy a house off a realtor.com anymore you're getting the picked over scraps that have fallen from the table my friends you absolutely are the good properties in this country they don't come to public markets anymore they don't come to realtor they don't come to truly a zillow they don't come to those markets because there's too many hedge funds out there with too much money that will pay cash on the dollar no matter what the seller is asking to bring that under the envelope of the hedge funds portfolio the real estate portfolio and they're willing to pay whatever because they have figured out here as of late that real estate is the only thing that tried and true appreciates and value something that over the last 80 years private households have generated wealth on and it's now turned corporate okay but you don't think that the independent investor channel has merit now hell I just told you I'm fighting a losing battle we will lose this battle the middle class is disappearing it is going to be gone what side of the spectrum do you expect to be on when that middle class is carved out and you're looking at a real estate market and you're on the on the side of the fence that would have you reach the the the the sheer and utter acknowledgement that you can't afford $575,000 you can't do it because you've failed to separate your income or leverage your income to a place where you can actually put some financial wealth aside for yourself anybody can do it I was proven that this week I might have strayed away from or started to allow a little bit of doubt to creep in not for me but for people in general that was all reaffirmed this week I absolutely had a phenomenal one-on-one meeting it was 60 minutes of a zoom meeting with one of the viper groups it was absolutely one of the most inspirational stories and and for for sake of ambiguity I will not share the particulars of the story all I will tell you is those stories are out there and you can write your own story as this individual did for themselves they wrote their own story and you can do it and and it really just starts with a willingness to do and that is it that is it and some of the things that you have to put in place can start to really prove it to yourself and understanding you know how you can get to that end Dave it's good to see you my brother it's great to see I was working at 1.5 million not excited not behind for that incredible man that's certainly a pocket market but I wish you all the best man and you know maybe you need to splurge a little bit you've earned it you know it's those people that maybe aren't even as fortunate as us I mean I'm making concession now Dave I'm making concession personally here in New York City and if people knew my situation now they would be like wow wow you know you give me the net worth that this guy has and I'm living in New Jersey in a $750,000 house that's just it I mean you guys know and pulse in on what I share with the group on what I'm working with I don't think it's that much in today's society especially in you know a very unique market like New York City now I'm a player in Tennessee I'm a player in South Dakota Dave right I'm certainly not a player in Hawaii but it's glad to hear that the trip went well for you and thanks for stopping in man it's have some fun out there visit Hanoma Bay for me man I missed that spot it's been a long long time since me and the wife have been out there but yeah and I love that place out there it's beautiful I'm super happy for you thanks for stopping by my friend and good luck with that um that's a lot of coin of course your parent but you're buying in paradise man remember that all right and you can probably splurge a little bit because you know you work hard and you you have earned it you have absolutely earned it and again it just goes back to my point when I brought Matt money on the scene and said look if you're going to if you're going to set yourself up for those potential life decisions down the line you have to make decisions now that are going to lend lend themselves to those opportunities down the line be a forward thinker I made the comment to my wife tonight you've known me for a while I don't think in the past I think in the future I'm always trying to align where I'll be in five to ten years and the reason why we are here in the current juncture is because I envisioned it to be that 10 15 years ago all right it is absolutely impossible for you to end up somewhere if you cannot if you cannot imagine yourself in that place all right just to watch Johnny Depp okay watch Johnny Depp and blow so same thing all right imagine yourself in a better place and and you'll realize the power of the mind and that you can understand that the perspective is the most powerful element of your your wealth building evolution it has nothing to do with the influences influences will lead you astray Ken Fisher will lead you astray no matter how much that silver spoon feels to you because you are sitting on that 500 thousand dollars of wealth that they're fishing for okay it's nothing to be proud of in way of pulling that spoon out your ass and showing it to mr. Fisher it still smells like shit okay it's nothing special and if you're not careful you'll lose it all at the expense of a much much larger machine that is at work and play in 2023 that would sap the retail and community for all their worth and way of fees this also came out in way of the meeting that I had this week man you got to watch out and what Moki talked about tonight with the index funds it's one of those ways to participate in financial markets own the same home depots and proctors and J&Js that we all own but you're owning it as low of an expense as you can possibly get and maximizing your opportunity and you're maximizing it for you okay passive investing in those passive products you're the only one that can benefit from it okay now I don't mind a vanguard makes a few points of expense a few basis points of expense by offering the product because I can't just go out in my backyard and build an index fund I can't do that vanguard has done that for you trawl Schwab has done that for you okay state street has done that for you fidelity has done it for you I don't care where you go okay but we want to keep those expenses low all right because at the end of the day the number one person that we're looking to advocate for on the independent investor channel live stream it's not to boost me up okay it's not to come in and waste each other's time it is to come in and talk about as serious of an issues that I see going on in today's society right now and you will either be the benefactor from it or the victim of those influences guys I appreciate you tuning in on this Friday's live stream it was a good one I feel like the content came through nicely I hope you feel the same we will be back next Friday on schedule as well so stay tuned for that set your calendars look for the notification if you're not subscribed to the channel you freaking miss them out subscribe to the channel I'll send you a bill just kidding subscribe to the channel cost you nothing and the information that you get from this I am absolutely convinced is absolutely worth any amount of time that you're willing to devote to this craft and I would cordially invite you to do just that guys thank you so much for tuning into the live stream and we'll catch you next Friday and be well enjoy the rest of your weekend and we will see you next week


Hello everyone and thanks for coming. This talk is a nowhere rushed whatsoever. So please excuse any slightly uncoordinated bits in this talk. We're just trying to figure out who's going to start this talk off and it turns out it's probably me now, isn't it? So as ever with the Badge Talk, we're starting out with a quote from Johnty that we entirely ignored. So this is tilde mark 4 or how we, I can't see my slides. Hang on. There we go. Or how we manufactured a replacement Nokia 3310 motherboard-ish. So early 2017, we all went to Nottingham for Badge Team Meetup. Ostensibly we were sorting out badges from the previous year and we kind of, hang on, that slide's not gone on. Where's that slide not gone? Hey, there we go. I'm going to stand here so I can see.  Turns out the easiest way to give everyone a pager is to get some GSM modules. And if you're already giving people GSM modules, you kind of want to just make it into a mobile phone and, yeah, oops. So, you know, that happened. So we did a lot of software and then we realized, oh, hang on, we've not done any hardware yet. So we got to April this year, realized that, oh, we should probably design something so we can actually have a Badge instead of some software. So, Matt quickly hacked this together. It kind of worked. Kind of worked. It mostly worked, didn't it? Yeah, EF1 worked. It was square. We decided probably don't give things to people that are square. So what do we have here? Next. So this one we manufactured it. Took three minutes and 30s to make. Took half an hour to fix the machine again afterwards. We spoke to some of our sponsors. They said, can you make it look more like an Engage and less like a 3310? So at this point, we were still kind of going for the replacement 3310 motherboard just to annoy Johnty. So this is the initial EMF2 prototype plan. We kind of went a bit more Engagey with it. We essentially stole the design from the old, from the previous year's Badge and modified it and, you know, went a bit more mobile phony. This is, so Matt has other Matt, primary Matt, I don't know. Which one of you is Matt A and Matt B? That's a good point. Okay. You get to be Matt A. Do you want to talk about the EMF2 design thing? No? Yes. Yeah, I can sit down. Matt B had done this nice square board that got us the schematic and the layout and all the pins and connections and it was like, right, we need something that looks like a Badge. Something that looks like an Engage. And so this was night zero.  Yeah. Four nights, solid nights of design work. And after about seven or eight nights, I finally got to, yeah, to that. So yes, this was very rushed and quick. Halfway through doing this, our sponsor's TI turned around to us and said that the nice, simple square modular Wi-Fi chip package would not be available because it's brand new silicon. They couldn't manufacture enough for us. So we had to go for the much more complex design, which is where we had to completely rearrange the board to get the Wi-Fi on. Yes. So that was, this was knocked out in about three weeks. And then we sent off and had five PCBs. You didn't get the PCB? No. We had five PCBs manufactured in the UK. I built them at home on my desk with my tweezers and then put them on my oven on my hot plate to cook the first ones we hadn't built. And then we were like the next two weeks, we were testing, trying to write code to test all the bits of the hardware and then redesigned it. And then it was, we did, we got the final design done on the 29th of July. We, 29th of June, I finally sent the final design over to China to start fabrication and then spent three weeks arguing about panelization and layout. Ask me about that afterwards. So some specs on the badge. So a lot of Texas Instruments, huge thanks to them for all their support. This year is the MSP brand new processor from them, which we've ported MicroPython to with their help. And Kim will probably tell us lots about that. But yes, we've crammed lots in there. The chip itself is a 128 pin chip. We used all 128 pins plus a 16 pin port expander to connect all your buttons up. And yes, it was, there are things on there. Some of you might have noticed the headset jack footprint in between the grove headers. That was done in the last 30 minutes before we sent it to China. I think this might work. We'll test it when I get some boards. It didn't work. We didn't place it. Yeah. I'll talk a little bit about the MicroPython development. One of the things that's interesting on that is the MSP432. That was released around about March this year. You'll note that we started working on it January last year. We'd worked with TI, had a great design. Unfortunately, then in order for them to be able to sell it for a sponsorship, we needed to work with their latest API, which was a year after we started porting MicroPython. Thankfully, they did a port for us. So thank you so much for them. But it did to lay us. We planned ahead, but we're still delayed. The NeoPixels, they work. They didn't work an hour before John Z had his badge on stage. At least this time it was just software. It's been fantastic doing MicroPython again because once again we've had so many people being able to bring in apps and stuff. So I know we've got a lot of badges out. I think Matt wants to talk a little bit about what we've been doing in terms of the App Store. Most of the Python work is Marek's or not Matt. So, Marek? Is that already the next one? Okay. So I kind of joined in after all the hardware is done because I have absolutely no clue about hardware. MicroPython means that everyone can just write a Python script and it runs on those badges. And we thought, yeah, we can probably improve on last with App Store. We can improve the review process. So we moved everything to GitHub to just stream the whole process. And so far it has, what was it the last count? 43 PRs have been merged. And probably by the time I come back to the tent, there will be 20 new ones. So please keep it up and thank you so much for all the work you've done so far. I highlight a few of the apps that have made it into Master so far. And I was going to run through them and you can find all of them on the badge store and you can install them and then they will be yours. So we have at least five different home screens. I've pictured three of them. I've seen more when I was walking around yesterday. So if you made other ones, please push them, yes? Okay. We have, and I have no idea why, two different completely independent dating apps. And someone has started to work on these really early. And I have no idea where this is all coming from. So thank you for that. We have, well, obvious. We have to have a snake. We have to have a breakout. Thanks for the person who made the breakout. I'm sure there's quite a lot of improvements we can do to snake as well. I've heard it as a snake too. So we get on it. Sound. So we have a speaker. And this time it's actually working reasonably well. So given that we also had 12 buttons, we had to make a synth with it as well. As you can see, it's still very minimal. So please improve on it. There's also another app and I have no idea how it works, but it looks pretty. Also, there are some random EMF-related apps, most notably one that tells you which beer is currently on, which is very important. And one that gives you the current webcam feel over the campsite. And there's lots of other, like, random arty stuff. And I can just reiterate, please push all your changes because other ones might be interested in sharing it. At this point, Johnty? Right. Building the badges is extremely hard, obviously. We can't do this without support responses. It would be so ludicrously expensive to try and do this without the manufacturer's support in the first place. This year, we've managed to keep it down to a smaller number of responses than usual because technos instruments have been so good to us, along with HCD doing the assembly.  And then they volunteered to do it again. You do remember what happened, don't you? But they're lovely and they did and it was actually worse this time, so I think maybe next year. So we'll see what happens. So MathWorks again supported us and were great. Private Internet Access were great. But the majority of the sponsorship that mattered for the badge in terms of hardware was technos instruments, HCD, hologram, who gave everyone the IoT SIM cards, which after you leave site, you can activate those and they'll work anywhere in the world, which is kind of cool. And low microsystems who did just a ludicrous amount of work for the GSM network. We didn't really expect that. We kind of want to do a GSM network and maybe we can cobble something together and we'll talk to them. And then they went, well, we'll just build you some base stations and we'll do all the things. We were like, what? Why are you doing this? We'll apply you for the license from Ofcom and everything. I don't understand why you're being so nice. But they were wonderful and we can't thank them enough. And everyone who's been involved in this sponsor-wise, they've been so good to us and they've dealt with the fact that we're a little bit hard to work with sometimes. And we're hoping in the future we get to work with them again. So thank you to all the sponsors. If any of the companies are here, I would actually like to meet you afterwards. It's been really great. And I mean, that's all I really need to say about the sponsorship. It's all worked quite well. I'm going to hand off to Sam to actually talk about how the GSM network stuff was done, which is ludicrous. Thank you. So yeah, I have no slides really prepared. I hope there's one that says GSM network. It's full of content. And it goes, there we go. But at least it's not sponsored. So yeah, I kind of had lunch with John T. in March sometime. And I bought him lunch, actually, I think you remember. And then I ended up agreeing to do something. I don't quite know how that works, but surely you should have bought me lunch. He kind of said, I want to build a GSM network because I want to put GSM on the badge, but I don't want to tell anyone about it. But if I'm going to give everybody a GSM badge, I need a network that will, in theory, cope with it or at least not break Vodafone. So our main aim was to try and build something that could support the badges and not cause problems to the real world. So we, yeah, as line microsystems provided some hardware and some expertise and their little SDR radios, I have a background in building networks. I'm going to do some more talk about the actual network and how we did it in the in for the knock talk later. But really, just to touch a bit on the badge, I don't think, did you guys talk about any of the problems we've had up with GSM? Not yet. Shall I? A little bit. Cool. So as you probably know, it hasn't worked particularly well with GSM.  And this has a very low tech modification, which you may be able to see. But basically, I've bent my antenna around 90 degrees. And what it seems to be was the antenna on the board causing interference with the buttons. And this is hardware that these guys know far more about than I do. But fundamentally, when the thing started transmitting, GSM is a bit more sort of RF noisy than sort of Wi-Fi and things. And especially with these little antennas, like these devices, you know, I've worked in a carrier for a few years, and we had like labs of people testing phones, even when Nokia would produce what you would think was a production ready phone, we would spend six weeks with it in labs in like radio RF chambers, analyzing how it behaves with our network and stuff. And we had like Alistair had one on his desk at home. So it was a slightly more lower budget level of RF testing. But we've learned some stuff on that, I think. The good news is that I think there is a firmware fix which will improve things, which may be able to be updated to people who have updated badges, which should reduce the problem, but actually bending your antenna a little bit, if you're careful, seems to help. So it's hackable. This one is actually on the GSM network. So the GSM network has generally been working. It's been patchy, but I've had a phone attached for most of the time. And I think I'm here, I was literally rebooting the base station when I came inside the desk there. So should we, should we, should we chance a live demo of calling a badge? This is gonna, yeah, what, what could, what could go wrong? It's other end of the phone. I'm not sure if the calls up, but anyway, it rang and I answered the call. I think the call still up. You can, you can hear me through there. Can you hear me? Okay. I think I may be the I suspect I have the volume turned down on the badge somewhere probably the speaker volume in the app. But yeah, building a phone is really hard. It turns out I kind of knew this and still, well, yeah. But yeah, I'll talk a little bit more about the network and how we work to the deck and all the kind of infrastructure stuff in the, in the knock talk. But yeah, a few notes, you might have realized that we have a sign on the badge tent saying there are currently no badges, which is because yesterday when we were handing them out. So many people come so many wanted badges that we just emptied all our boxes and they were gone. Like, whoa, what happened? So we had a much higher pickup of people who came and actually wanted badges this year from 2016, which kind of screwed our calculations. We also had a slightly higher failure rate on the badges we got out of production. So those two things combined led to a shortage. We have managed to coax a few back into life and we will be starting handing a few of them. I'm not trying to get any hopes up too high here, a few of them out later on. So regularly, if you walk past a batch tent, like have a look whether we're open, we can't promise any current time strat now. So a couple of things about the availability and why we have so few badges. The failure rate this year has been large to put it to put it politely. This is a mix of things. It was is not the assembly plant's fault in any way. We were much later than we need to be. They had to do a bit of a rush job to get it done in time. Some of that is just things arriving from China really late. Some of it is just component availability. Some of it is the fact that half the components were on very small reels. They had to patch all the reels together. Every time they did it, they had to cut some of the reels off which had components on it. Every single time they did this, we lost badges because we wouldn't have enough components to finish them. Then it has just been nightmarish. What is our actual failure rate so far? I think we plan for 15% and it was something quite a lot larger than that. But also the badges were just so expensive to make this year. We could not afford to make more than 2,500. We have sold 2,500 tickets. We knew there was going to be a dropout on this. Normally we have about 70 to 80% pickup on the badges anyway. That will be fine. What can possibly go wrong? Then everyone really wants bad phones. It just hasn't worked out quite how we expected. It never does. This whole event has not worked out how we expected. Everyone seems to say it isn't bad, so that's good. Other than that, we are going to repair badges. We are going to try and get as many made as we can. We are going to do a second run of the badges, but with the remaining components that we have and the remaining boards, we are going to do another 250 or so, which hopefully should be enough for everyone who didn't get one that really wants one. I had a chat to Ian Softley, the director of hackers earlier on. He is going to be very lovely and he is going to autograph all of the broken badges. If you would like an autographed badge by Ian Softley, we will be able to provide you those as well, which makes it probably more valuable than the badges anyway. We will swap those for a working one if you want. I think I want a broken one more than a working one now. We are going to do our best after the event to deal with this, but we are all going to be pretty broken for about the next month. We have a history of we will do this in the weeks after the event and it never happens. I guarantee it will not happen a few weeks after the event. In probably October time, we will deal with this and make sure everyone gets badges that wants them. I hope everyone is understanding about that. It is mostly out of our control. It was just down to manufacturing problems. 2016 badges, what do we need to talk about? We have 125-ish 2016 badges, which are for sale if you want one from 2016. They work, yes, apart from the neopixels. Where are we selling them? Yeah, so ladies this afternoon, come to the badge tent. First come, first served. 30 pounds cash only. I'm just going to note that the cash back is now working in the bar again after someone has stopped d-dossing our network. You are now able to get cash to buy a badge. Is that everything we need to talk about because Q&A?  Could you all please stand up if you're in here? Amy for doing the book Lent, which looks amazing. Everything was last minute, everything was a bit rushed. They were people who are not quite happy. You all did it very well and I can't thank you enough. So, questions? When are we going to do this again and where? When are we going to do this again and where? Do you mean just the badge or the whole event? The whole thing? We'll talk about that later. At the moment the answer is never and I'm going to retire. EMF will be continuing, don't worry, but we'll talk about that in the closing ceremony. So, if we can concentrate to badge questions that would be easier for now. There are only other badge questions coming from the audience. There's one there and there is one there and one here. I was wondering what's the best thing you've seen someone do a badge, either a previous one or this year or what's the most inventive or uses the most components out of one? Someone in 2016 wrote a geolocation app that figured out where based on access point IDs and signal strength, triangulated your position. Alistair again, stop being so good, triangulated where you were on site and then would show you the now and next talks in the right stage. All right, so someone took your app and made it even better. Shoulders and giants and all that. And then also the person who won the competition last year, James, is James here? Floppy, is he around? He wrote a complete 3D renderer for the badge, which was amazing. That was really cool and he did it in a day in Python. It's been ported. Yeah, so there was a working 3D renderer, which is kind of cool. And then in 2014, someone wrote an entire operating system, which was kind of amazing. And they just emailed it to me as it file. Oh, it's on GitHub now. There you go. You see, he's here as well. And I can't remember what else has happened. Yeah, the dating apps are cooler for a bit creepy. We would like to know who the people are who've written those. So if you can come say hi, that'd be great. Because I mean, how serious are you? We need to know. Yeah, more questions? What features have you always really wanted for the badge, but haven't been able to do? Which of those do you think might happen in 2020? Assuming there isn't any apps in 2020? The feature we would really like to add for 2020 is it working at the beginning of the event. Honestly, I don't know. We would need to talk about it. The GSM thing was kind of aiming a little bit high. The fact that we pulled it off at all is remarkable. There's been talk of GPS every single time. There's been e-paper several times, which we're not doing e-paper. It just breaks really easily. It's a terrible idea for a badge. An FPGA has been talked about. We don't know. Ideas very much welcome, actually. We're looking for ideas for the next badge. The next badge, I think we're probably going to go quite a lot simpler and hopefully with a sort of a bit of a theme to it that works solidly, mostly so we can actually finish it on time. Yeah, but then I got excited. I think maybe I need to not be involved soon. Yeah, other questions? Yeah, it kind of follows on from that. How about a badge hackathon about scheduled for about two months before EMF camp? So everyone who's interested in getting interesting apps going in advance and that gives you two months extra deadline slack for getting the badge working anyway. Two months ago, I was still designing the PCB. We had maybe two prototypes in existence. I had a green EMF prototype in the badge tent on the help desk and it's disappeared. I think someone's walked away with it. I would like it back, please. It's only one of two in existence. More questions, I think? Just as a follow on from that, we are going to try and do stuff earlier. One of the things actually in talking features, we would love to have a development environment that emulates the badge before the site. We thought we might manage to do that this time, but so much stuff changed later on. It didn't happen. If anyone would like to work with us on that, that would be super cool. We are likely to stick with MicroPython. So if anyone would like to help build a badge emulator, that would be amazing. It would really help with this for the future. I'm sure one of you wants to do this, but perhaps the person who wrote the operating system. Next. More questions? Can we get touch screen next time? Can you say that again? We didn't hear it. Can we get a touch screen next time? So the 2016 badge came with the non-touch screen and you can actually get the touch screen version and put it on there. We did actually up until we ran out of pins and I needed to steal them back. We did allocate the touch screen pins on this badge, but we put so many buttons on there and so many other things. I just needed another four pins to ADC, so we had to pull that off. I like the buttons. The square buttons. This is one of the fantastic support from the Shenzhen Sources. Those square buttons, I had originally found them at 28 per button, which would have made them about £3.50 per badge for buttons and the Shenzhen Sources got it down to £74, which is why you've got these nice square soft buttons rather than the cheap tax switches. Norbert from Allnet? Just a massive shout out to Norbert from Allnet.de. They're a Shenzhen Component Sources and they did the badge for Shah, the camp in the Netherlands last year as well. They've been incredible. We basically just email and go like, we want these weird things and then it makes it happen. My favourite thing was stuff being run around in taxis in Shenzhen to make sure it got shipped in time, things like that. They're so good. I ended up in Shenzhen by accident earlier in the year and just for a couple of days and I went out there and I was like, maybe I can do some stuff for the badge and I got there and I was like, oh wow, that was naive. It is infeasible to do anything there without having someone on the ground and they are amazing. Any electronics made, we cannot recommend them enough. They can also sort out PCB production and all sorts of things. They've been wonderful to us and they basically have just done it for us because they wanted to. They were so nice. Allnet.de, I think. You want Norbert, he is wonderful. Tell him that we say hi. One of the fun ones on that is, has anyone tried to buy surface mount capacitors lately? There's a global shortage. Yeah, us trying to source the sheer amount of capacitors we needed would have been impossible without someone in Shenzhen who was able to go and walk down the street and get them from three different vendors. But yeah, more questions? You've given us lots of things to work with on this badge. Thank you very much.  You put the shitty add-on connector but I haven't seen any so far. I've not seen anyone do anything with that. That was a last-minute thing. It was like, again, it was like there was a tweet on the day I was about to send the designs off to China. And someone tweeted at me and says, is there going to be this connector on there? And it was like, and Johnny was like, can we fit this connector on? And I'm like, ah. Actually, at the time I think I was in a van on the way to Manchester to collect a vending machine. For nothing, I was like, I'm trying to panellise this and add this connector on there. There's a new version, isn't there? SA02 or something with extra pins. Someone make an adapter. We haven't actually implemented any of the software side of shitty add-ons, so someone else needs to do that. But yeah, so it's ITC, but you'll have to do all of the actual protocol thing. The pinout hasn't changed between version one and two, so you can make it work. Got time for one more very quick question, if anyone's got one. Nope, we all good? Excellent. Oh, right over there, quick, quick, quick, fast. Better be a question, not a comment. You said you did want to knock out 3310 clone this year. What would you not like next year? Possibly just not a badge at all, because then we'd have to do all the work. Yeah, we don't know, really. Oh, it's really hard to say. I think there's been so much gone into this. This team has been incredible. They've worked really, really hard for a very long time. I full credit to Matt as well for, frankly, not sleeping for like two weeks to get the PCB design done, and I think we need to... Yeah, oh yeah, we've got to mention that. There was a problem with the PCB production, and I woke up about half past nine in the morning and got to my email, and there was an email from HDD, Gina, HDD, who's wonderful, just going, somebody needs to be here at the production plant today, within the next few hours, or this isn't happening. And Matt, who lives in Nottingham, just ran out of the house, got on a train, and went straight there and was there all day to sort it out. And it's been that kind of operation the entire time. It's just been frantic. So like with many things in this event, the fact that it's happened at all is kind of remarkable. So yeah, full credit to everyone. I don't think we've got time for any more questions, but can we get a round of applause for the badge team? And we have a lot more stories about this badge, some of which we rather weren't recorded. So if you want to hear them, pop by the bar later on and find us, and we'll be able to tell you all sorts of things that happened. It's been emotional.  We are going to keep shipping firmware updates to them. All of it will be going into upstream MicroPython as well. TI is doing loads of great work for that. So hopefully for the next camp, we will have the GSM network again. I suspect and you can bring them all back and they will work flawlessly in theory. But we say that about the badges every time. So who knows? Anyway, thank you all for coming and we'll see you around site.


It's now time for a member's statements, the member for Bruce Gray, Owens Island. Thank you very much Mr. Speaker. September is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. I, along with my colleagues here in the legislature, am wearing the gold ribbon pin in support of every family and child affected by this life-threatening illness. As the number one cause of disease-related death for children ages 1 to 14, we need to stand united to conquer childhood cancer. The fight against childhood cancer should never be fought alone. That is what the Gold Ribbon Campaign is about. I myself wear this gold ribbon today in honour of two people. First is Kona Higgins, the son of dear family friends. Kona was in the process of moving to Canada from the UK when he sadly passed away from cancer at the age of 17. The other is in memory of Brendan Rourke, a young man from my riding of Bruce Gray, Owens Island and to recognise the tireless advocacy work of his father, Neil Rourke, who in collaboration with an international network of parent groups and survivor networks is raising funds and awareness for young girls and boys whose childhoods have been regretfully cut short. Three weeks ago Neil, along with three young cancer survivors, rang the opening bell at the Toronto Stock Exchange to mark the beginning of Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. Neil, along with volunteers from the Childhood Cancer International and the Big Book of Care campaigns are reminding us to do more so we can build a future free from cancer. That is to build on the progress achieved at all levels of society and to make new drug research possible so we can ensure a brighter and healthier future for all of our children. That means government, industry, hospitals, research institutes and individual and corporate donors. As such I respectfully ask all of us to commit to working tirelessly to ensure we give our children and youth every opportunity to grow and thrive and live in a world that is free from cancer in all its forms. It is my hope that we will soon, for the dream of my hero Terry Fox, find a cure for all cancers, somewhere the hurting must stop. Thank you Speaker. Thank you Speaker. Today I proudly rise to speak of a 24 year old young woman who is standing up in life to make a difference. Her name is Adrian Newport. As a child, Adrian had to wear a bright blue helmet to go to school because she would bash her head on walls and doors in a way of dealing with her frustrations that was misunderstood by many. At a young age she barricaded herself in her home and attempted to burn it down. Consequently she was arrested and charged for her actions. She spent time in a psychiatric ward and other institutions where she was restrained sedated on numerous occasions. Adrian wrote a book co-authored by John A. McCurdy, the light that guides my way. She outlines her challenges and sheds light on what it's like to live with fetal alcohol syndrome disorder FASD for short. Adrian was born with FASD along with cerebral palsy. Despite her unfair circumstances at birth, improper care for her needs and this treatment since a young age, Adrian has accepted her challenges. She has persevered and she is succeeding. Adrian has been working part-time in the administration office at Ry Gal Supports for Community Living. She is grateful for the staff and the supports of people like Donna Mercatio, the Executive Director. She has also earned a community integration certificate from Mohawk College. Her dream is to have a full-time job as a counsellor, a social worker or even a politician so that she can continue to raise awareness about FASD. I'm grateful that I've had the opportunity to meet Adrian and I enjoyed reading her book detailing her life journey. I strongly suggest this read. Thank you, Speaker. Thank you. Further Member States, the member from Kitchener Centre. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This past weekend, the Waterloo chapter of the Muslim Association of Canada invited our community to take part in an event called Embrace Syria, which is part of a larger national campaign to bring Syrian refugees to our country. And last night there was a very well-attended rally at Kitchener City Hall to raise awareness of the Syrian refugee crisis. Our Mayor Barry Verbanovic spoke at the gathering announcing that our council has committed $10,000 to the Mennonite Central Committee as it responds to this unprecedented humanitarian crisis. I'm proud to add that our government recently committed $10.5 million in aid to the resettlement of 10,000 refugees by the end of 2016. Mr. Speaker, despite the impulse to see immigrants as a burden to society, this is a notion that is profoundly mistaken. As the daughter of immigrants, I can say with confidence that immigrants built this country, they contribute to the economic prosperity of Ontario and they make our communities more vibrant. We are taking action in Ontario to help Syrian refugees, but we need a federal partner to address our current refugee resettlement policy. We hope that they heed Ontario's call to bring more refugees to Canada by the end of the year. Ontarians care, and I'm heartened to know that the people of my community Kitchener Centre do too. Thank you. Thank you, Speaker. Today is an incredibly distressing day in my writing, especially for those people who rely on health services provided at the North Bay Regional Health Centre. Today, a further 158 full-time staff at our hospital learned that their jobs are being cut by this government, and more than half of those employees were nurses. This is in addition to the 197 front-line healthcare workers already cut at this hospital. Again, the majority of them were nurses. Speaker, that's 350 front-line healthcare workers that are gone. The Liberal government is also closing 30 beds in North Bay in addition to the 30 beds they already closed at this five-year-old hospital. This is not only devastating to the front-line healthcare workers, but more so for their patients who are now rightfully concerned about access to health care they need and deserve. Just this week we heard that hospital cuts in Ottawa have led to rising readmission rates negating any supposed savings and negatively impacting access to quality care. The Liberal government has clearly put self-interest ahead of the health care of Northerners. This much I want to make clear. We, the people of Nipissing, will not stand for this.  Thank you. Thank you, Speaker. I'd like to take a few seconds and talk about an issue of my riding throughout the North, bears. And I'd like to read one Facebook message I got from one of my constituents and I think it'll explain the problem. Hi, John. Just a note to let you know Bearwise is about a bear that has been hanging around my house for about a month now. Let me tell you it's a big joke and that program should be scrapped and save the taxpayers a ton of money. I live at 72 First Street, Englehart. There are a few reasons why it cannot be shot. One, because I live in town. I understand that one. But Bearwise says it's because I have a veggie garden and raspberries growing in my yard so I have a food source for it. Does not make sense to me. Are we not supposed to grow our own food anymore? And that's the issue this government's missing. We have people who can't use their backyards who have to keep their kids inside, who are losing their lives and their livelihoods. No, their lives aren't being threatened and you can't call 911 every time you have a bear in your yard. But these bears are in town. Twenty years ago the MNR used to do something more than helpful hints. And actually now people are forced to take matters in their own hands and believe you me. That's not managing wildlife because bears are shot every day because they're being treated like vermin instead of game animals which they actually are. Thank you Speaker. Thank you Mr. Mayor. Thank you Mr. Speaker. My first complete one since being elected. It was a special time to be able to travel all around my riding to meet with community members, attend events and help individuals through meetings in my office. I was just honored to participate on a daily basis in the lives of the people of Ottawa Orleans. Here are some highlights. I had the pleasure to speak to students at a few schools about what we do as public representative. It was, I was also very proud to attend the graduation of the grade 12 students at Sir Wilford Laurier High School. In June, month for seniors, I also went to a festival to celebrate those people. Barbecue at Petrie Island on the Ottawa River took place in August. It was a most memorable event.  Overall, a merveilleurité passé à rencontrer. It was a great summer while I was talking to people in my community. Thank you. I want to update the house on the progress being made towards the construction of the Highway 6 Morrison bypass. On many occasions in recent years, I have called attention to the need for a highway bypass around the community of Morrison in the Township of Puslench. Anyone who drives this route regularly knows that there is a traffic bottleneck through Morrison which is often kilometers long. Mayor Dennis Lever in the Council of the Township of Puslench, the County of Wellington, and the Morrison bypass coalition have made a strong economic case for the Morrison bypass. I want to thank them for their effective efforts. On June the 23rd at a meeting my office arranged, we spoke with the Minister of Transportation here at Queens Park to further impress upon him the worsening congestion problem and the urgency of dealing with it. The Minister committed to visiting Puslench Township. True to his word, exactly a month later on July the 23rd the Minister came to Wellington Houghton Hills. I was glad to welcome him to our area. Today I call upon the Minister to continue his best efforts urging his colleagues on the government side to support this project as well. The Morrison bypass has been talked about for a generation. The time for talk is over. The very first item on the Legislature's order paper for private members' motions calls upon the Minister to place the Highway 6 Morrison bypass on the Ministry's 5-year plan for new construction, the southern highways program. Once again I urge him to do so. Thank you very much Mr. Speaker. Thank you for your member's statements. The member from Eglinton Lawrence. Thank you Mr. Speaker. Shana Tovah. I rise today to commemorate Rosh Hashanah in my running bag in Lawrence and across this great province many members of the Jewish faith celebrate Rosh Hashanah the past few days. This past Sunday evening marked Rosh Hashanah the Jewish New Year. Rosh Hashanah means head of the year and is observed by two days beginning on the first day of the Jewish year. There is a ten day period of pendence and following Rosh Hashanah which ends with Yom Kippur a day of fasting and atonement. During Rosh Hashanah the Jewish people ask God for forgiveness for the things we have done wrong during the past year. It also is a time to remind one's self not to repeat these mistakes in the coming year. In this way Rosh Hashanah is a holiday that helps us to become better people and move forward. Rosh Hashanah is marked in shul by the blowing of the shofar hollowed out ram's horn. The blowing of the shofar is meant to wake up the soul and turn its attention to the important task of repentance. Sweet foods such as apples, dipped in honey, shala and pomegranates are eaten to symbolize the hope for a sweet new year. Rosh Hashanah is a time to remember the path on the past year as we move into the next. I want to wish the entire Jewish community in my riding and across Ontario a very happy and meaningful Rosh Hashanah to all my friends and constituents. Shana Tovah. Thank you. Mr. Speaker better late than ever as they say. Mr. Speaker I'm very pleased to rise in the legislature this afternoon to hear with you about the taste of the Kingsway Festival in my riding of Etobicoke Lakeshore. Every September over three memorable days of celebration along Bloor Street we shut down the street and invite families friends and neighbours from Etobicoke and beyond to gather at this popular event. And true to form this year the 18th annual festival took place again with a little bit of rain but it didn't dampen anyone's spirits. The show went on with something for everyone, great music, wonderful food, singing dancing, shopping, three stages of continuous live entertainment. The street was alive with over 200 exhibitors and local vendors and tens of thousands of people going through the children's midway and of course enjoying the Scotiabank dog show. An added bonus to these attendees was that they don't have to drive there. They can walk there or take public transit as many events in our city benefit from having the TTC nearby. The Kingsway is a vital component of my community of Etobicoke Lakeshore, a unique neighbourhood of over 250 businesses that has been rated one of the city's top destinations. Mr. Speaker I invite you and all other members of the legislature to come out to taste of the Kingsway next year and enjoy a great event. I thank all members for their statements.


When it comes to getting medication from the manufacturer to the physicians and patients, Africa is facing a severe problem with counterfeit drugs. The costs associated with the use of counterfeit medicines to individuals, families and health systems are staggering. Every year, more than 122,000 African children under the age of five lose their lives as a result of counterfeit anti-malarial alone. What if we could track, trace and authenticate the drugs at each stage of their journey from the pharma company all the way to the patient? That's exactly what researchers at the IBM Lab in Haifa, Israel are doing. We're using blockchain technology to introduce traceability and trackability into the supply chain. Using blockchain, we can make sure there's a verifiable provenance of what is delivered by whom, to whom, when and where. Within the pharma supply chain, we're setting up a trusted network that allows the different parties to store information knowing that only authorized members can see it and the information can't be altered once it's been entered. Specifically for pharmaceutical orders, we can verify that the authentic drugs are handed over to an authorized party at each transfer point, ensure compliance with the proper conditions for transportation and asset transfer, and we can also make sure that a joint verified ledger of all transactions is available at all times. This means provenance of each and every drug in the supply chain. Any party in the network can see the status of where the drugs are and who has them. This solution from IBM Research includes the mobile interface and the permissioned blockchain backend that gives each certified and authorized party in the network a way to initiate action, finish their transaction, track its progress and verify that it was done correctly. Let's look at an example of how this would work. This is Dr. Messia. She needs tuberculosis vaccines for her patients. Dr. Messia already checked the prices at the local pharmacies and decided to order from ABC Pharma. She knows that if she arranges delivery from the pharmacy using blockchain, she'll have more confidence that the drugs are authentic and also get a better price. At ABC Pharma in Kenya, Imani received an order from Dr. Messia in Kourou asking for three BCG ampels. The order is registered in the blockchain. Imani prepares the delivery for Dr. Messia in Kourou and scans the QR codes and serial numbers of the vaccines for the blockchain. The order is ready to go and the next step involves selecting the delivery carrier. From the list of possible carriers available in the blockchain system, Imani selects Solomon, who has a good reputation score and is not overloaded with orders today. Solomon is motivated to supply a high quality service because his reputation score is calculated based on the ratings he receives. This reputation score helps him get more business from other hospitals and clinics. He heads to ABC Pharma where he meets Imani. When he arrives, Solomon authenticates to the blockchain system. Imani initializes the delivery transfer and then Solomon checks the serial numbers of the vaccines and accepts the delivery. All this is recorded and the transaction is appended to the blockchain ledger after verifying that both Imani and Solomon are physically at the ABC Pharma premises. Solomon heads out. The BCG vaccines are stored in a refrigerated box equipped with temperature sensors. The sensors send a reading every 60 seconds and any alarms are saved in the blockchain. Solomon arrives in Kourou and heads to Dr. Messiah's clinic. Dr. Messiah greets Solomon and they both examine the delivery. Dr. Messiah received an SMS earlier with the tracking code. Together they authenticate using the blockchain. Dr. Messiah verifies the tracking code number of the delivery and scans in and verifies the vaccines using a QR code scanner. She also verifies via blockchain that there were no alerts regarding the temperature during transport. Dr. Messiah accepts the delivery, Solomon accepts the delivery transfer and the transfer is appended to the blockchain which now shows the vaccines at the Kourou location. Solomon's reputation score and number of open deliveries are updated and Dr. Messiah can continue keeping her patients healthy. Back at ABC Pharma, Imani examines the status of today's blockchain transactions. Happily, all went well with the transfer to Dr. Messiah. This innovative blockchain solution from IBM Research offers new benefits. It reduces the loss from counterfeit drugs, offers shorter lead times of cycles from pharma to patient and introduces a non-repudiation process with provenance and trackability for fast resolution of any conflicts. Contact us at IBM Research to get your customized solution.