Notes for April 8th 2023
- Substack has been hammered by a change to Twitter that removes the ability to RT or spread word on Tweets containing Substack links. This is because Substack is allegedly building their own "micro-blogging" service. Which makes sense, given their product suite and user base. But this move from Twitter is 1) pathetic & 2) not even remotely in the spirit of the "world's townhall." Elon's team are acting like a dog backed into a corner, and lashing out as a result. The irony is that I had no idea Substack was working on such a thing, and am now intrigued!
- I've been thinking a lot about the crisis facing my city, Dublin, around housing. My wife & I are incredibly lucky to have the means to have bought our home a number of years ago. Even more profound, our home is the home that she grew up in. But I wonder what market my children will enter. Hopefully, by then, the wild speculative investing on property dies down or is outright made illegal. Land is not, and should not, be an asset class. Land is, by it's very nature, not productive. But it's really telling that my city is plagued by atrocious -- genuinely atrocious -- leadership. Both Dublin City Council and the elected officials in charge of the country are woefully inept here. We've re-elected the same clowns for so long and they present themselves as opposition when it comes to tough topics like housing. No solutions presented, nothing discussed in the open. They are so obviously pandering to the investors and builders.
- My two brothers are struggling to buy. My brother in law sold his apartment to move to a more suitable house for his future. And over the last year, while living at home with his mother, he's been stuck in a hellscape of aggressive markets driven by shockingly unprofessional real estate agents, lack of commitment from sellers and people, after agreeing on a sale, going quiet before returning to say they're not selling. The market is trash.
- This week I took the bus a few times. I typically don't, as I would prefer to cycle, but circumstances (read as: pints) forced a shift. The new TFI Live app shows a different time to the “Real time Ireland” one. Which gives credence to my assertion that the real-time bus times are just being driven by a random number generator. That said, the bus was pleasant and easy. Transferring between two routes was weirdly seamless. So this will likely just improve over time as the new systems ("Bus Connects") roll out in my area. However, it might be worth nothing that I deliberately didn't commute at normal commuter hours. I avoided the morning chaos by working at home before going to the office, skipping the silly morning traffic.\
- My absolutely scientific measurement of using my windshield suggests there’s way more wildlife along the M7 from Limerick to Dublin than the M9 from Waterford to Dublin.