Michael Sullivan

Millions of words have been written about Bitcoin, but I always felt like something was missing. I imagined a Bitcoin novel so thrilling I couldn't put it down. I imagined a story so emotionally captivating even someone with no interest in the orange coin would burn through it in a weekend. I imagined a book that explored how deeply intertwined the Bitcoin philosophy is with the American ethos. So I wrote it. After my first novel got me publicly canceled I wasn't sure I'd ever write again, but this technology filled me with so much hope for the future I couldn't stop myself from dedicating my life to this pursuit over the last three years. A lot of people are content to sit back and watch the world burn while Bitcoin wins. That ain't me. I build. I'm unwilling to watch the country I love slowly deteriorate without knowing I tried to make it a little bit better. I'm unwilling to be apathetic as we fail to communicate this optimistic message to so many people who desperately need it. I have faith we can do better. Despite all the nihilism, despite the institutional decay, and despite the rise of misguided violence towards the wealthy (bourgeoisie) class... I still have hope. I view Bitcoin as the bright orange sun rising over our nation's shores, illuminating a path to a more prosperous future. Anyway, this is all to say that my book just dropped. I think you're gonna love it. P.S. Writing a book is an isolating activity, but sharing this process with all of you over the last few years has meant the world to me 🧡 P.P.S. The link is in my bio.

@misraetel @YouTube But I was promised doom and gloom Mr. Mike? I thought societal collapse was imminent??

Give this a look! It might age interestingly! AI Won’t Cause Unemployment | Episode #142 youtu.be/QGZxQ8khNkA?si… via @YouTube

@EneaDenkt I would also argue that picking the number $50k (or any super round number that's highly scrutinized and talked about) probably does not bode well for the prediction.

People waiting for a 50k BTC bottom are objectively bad investors. Good investors don’t time perfect entries but manage risk well over the long term. What’s the risk of waiting for a 50k entry? The risk of missing allocation in the bottom zone of the only scarce asset that has ever existed. If you are waiting for the bottom and not DCAing, you either don’t understand what Bitcoin is or are a bad investor.

@DavidBranscum @OGBringFacts 51. Plot twist. You were the killer the whole time.

@OGBringFacts 52. The people are dead. They didn't leave the room.

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@Real_PizzAndy @AdamBLiv Duuuuuuude. She's beautiful!! I love the color of the wood on the back too. Very nice 😮

@SullyMichaelvan @AdamBLiv I waited all of 2020 for my Larrivee-OM9 and oh boy is is it nice. One Piece mahogany neck and the back grain is arrow straight. Such a stable and dynamic instrument

Bitcoin is going to $10 million The bears are idiots Stack sats

@LibertyBTC Very excited to keep exploring, I'm grateful for the support and positive interest man 🤝

@SullyMichaelvan Undeniably true. And its not like there will be less of this type of data over time... there will be more and more. Cool area to dive into.

Overwhelmingly grateful this morning. You can't hold Bitcoin for long durations of time without experiencing both euphoria and humility. Most of us start this journey with an incredible amount of excitement. The rabbit hole is deep, the ideas are intoxicating, and the orange coin feels inevitable. You make bold predictions and can't imagine a world where price goes down for long. But Bitcoin doesn't move up and to the right every day. Eventually, the price dumps. Moods shift. Conviction gets tested. And inevitably, you realize how much you still don't know. I've been wrong repeatedly over the years (and literally have the sentiment data to prove it), but IMO that's part of the process. The important thing is to use this pain to refine your worldview, learn, and continue growing. People like James and the @_checkonchain team have been instrumental in my own learning journey. I'm incredibly thankful for the opportunity to collaborate with them and share my work in this way. Hopefully it's as valuable to you as their work has been to me.

@lindeymagee @real_vijay @_Checkmatey_ @_checkonchain Banger thread, and a reminder that now is the precise time to be bullish (despite what our human instincts say).

@real_vijay @_Checkmatey_ @_checkonchain @SullyMichaelvan Great & relevant throwback!

Peak Apathy. My latest piece is out for @_checkonchain subscribers, and we have a special treat. Today I build ontop of a terrific work @SullyMichaelvan has done measuring Bitcoiner sentiment, and overlay where onchain data corroborates, or diverges. newsletter.checkonchain.com/p/peak-apathy

@David0039456153 Pumped to be part of it 🤝

@SullyMichaelvan Feels like a collab like this could only happen in the Bitcoin community.

@ToxicBTC21M That is a beautiful way to put it sir 🤝

@SullyMichaelvan Euphoria is the reward that is earned by building the calluses though humility and staying the course.

@BTCoptioneer I think this is one of the core "learning principles" that are required to get better at nearly anything. Doesn't always feel good, but sometimes it's what's required for growth.

@SullyMichaelvan "The important thing is to use this pain to refine your worldview, learn, and continue growing." Love it.

@UnHypnotizedBTC I can strongly empathize with this. I feel as though I have a firehouse of perpetual creativity flowing through me and not enough lifetimes to explore all of it. Good problem to have, but can be frustrating watching ideas stay underexplored.

I have the opposite of writers block… There is so much I want to compose and share with you and the world… At this point, if putting a microchip in my brain made it possible for me to basically have the thought, work it out in my mind, and then have it post to ask or post to my composition blank page. I might just do it lol

@CrisReed I concur with this math equation 🤝

@SullyMichaelvan Losing = experience Experience = leverage Leverage = Winning

1) I couldn't agree more and I think this is a brilliant way to think about it, the synergies between the data sets further reenforce how interesting all of this is. 2) Interesting you bring up psychology because I've been thinking about it a great deal lately. Each of these different mood states says something interesting about the market from a psychological perspective. For example, when people are angry (which the broader bitcoin market is now) they are more likely to look for any individual to blame for negative news. If things are optimistic, people are more likely to completely ignore the same kind of news. Very interesting dynamic and I think there's a lot unexplored here.

I think you're onto something with this work. Seriously. There's something here. The confluence with the on-chain work is undeniable. It reminds me of how the best works in Psychology integrate different approaches: behavioral, anatomical, pharmacological... if you can cross-confirm observations re: the same phenomena using multiple disciplines and approaches you can be confident you're approaching the "ground truth" of what's going on. You're bringing more lenses to bear on the same underlying thing. Lean in, man. You've found something @SullyMichaelvan

@BradleyRWolfe Thanks man, that means the world. When I first started doing this I wasn't sure if people would find it as interesting as I have personally (being quite nerdy and all). So I'm extra stoked that people are connecting with it and finding value in it.

@SullyMichaelvan Absolutely killing it with this new paradigm of Sentiment Data, Sully. Very informative stuff. Awesome to see Checkmate add it into his analysis!

@LibertyBTC @_Checkmatey_ @_checkonchain Thanks so much man. I've been over here on my own watching James' work and noticing how much coherence there is between the different data sets and methodologies. Finally getting to marry them a bit has been insanely cool to see for me as well.

@_Checkmatey_ @_checkonchain @SullyMichaelvan Love this collab. @SullyMichaelvan has found a solid, grounded framework for nailing down sentiment in a systematic way. Clearly this work pairs very well with on-chain. Would love to see this turn into a recurring collab similar to what @_Checkmatey_ does with Nik Bhatia.

@BenjaminStongMD It can be painful at times, but I think it's a really powerful growth process overall if we choose to embrace it and learn from it.

@SullyMichaelvan BTC sure does test the ego

@David0039456153 @_Checkmatey_ @_checkonchain S-tier meme game right here sir, well done 🤣

@_Checkmatey_ @_checkonchain @SullyMichaelvan Sully and Check.

@FoundersOnBTC @ableinch @SWC_Wiki I was on with @Digvijay_BTC and I believe that one will be airing shortly 🤝

@SullyMichaelvan @ableinch @SWC_Wiki Which podcast? I’d like to give that a listen.

Bitcoin is an bitch sometimes. Every single one of us came to this freedom enhancing technology with a certain vision of what this thing would be. Inevitably, eventually, we're forced to confront the fact that we've been wrong. I know this, because I've personally been wrong... repeatedly. About price. About adoption. About the world around us. In most people this emotion presents itself as anger. It comes out subtly, in the ways that we speak to those around us. It comes out in our language even if we attempt to mask it. IMO anger is one of the defining characteristics of the Bitcoin market right now. And I'm not just talking hypothetically here.... As part of the sentiment work I've been doing I literally measured smaller retail/pleb Bitcoin accounts language over time for how angry they spoke to one another (that's the chart below). TLDR: people aren't happy out there. This bottom line displays how angry the average bitcoiner is in their language usage over time. Green = More Angry Red = Less Angry So in this case, moving aggressively up and to the right is NOT a good thing. "Ok cool bro... you made some fancy charts that shows people are pissed... who cares." Well, I care. And I think you should to as there are lessons to be taken away from it, and perhaps a little bit of signal too. My top seven takeaways: 1) There's a lot more information embedded inside of your language choices than most people realize. 2) Many bitcoiners feel they were promised huge gains and now harbor some resentment about it. This is typical when expectations don't align with reality. Lesson in there. 3) It's not just poor price action, but the entire stock market, gold, and AI stocks pumping that are likely making bitcoiners extra frustrated with current conditions. 4) Anger is an incredibly powerful emotion... and not an inherently bad one. You and I cannot control Bitcoin but you can control yourself. We all have the ability to transmute negative emotion/energy into something positive if we so choose. 5) If you personally feel as though you're represented in this chart, don't just sit there and stare at the Bitcoin price. Build shit. Learn something. Work harder. Stack sats. 6) Anger sure as hell doesn't mark tops, and historically has been a great counter-signal. 7) Optimistic contrarians typically outperform angry conformists. That's all I got folks. Happy Thursday ✌️

@HermesLux @AdamBLiv Damn bro, you got some great taste! Not sure I've got the voice for that one though 😂

@AdamBLiv @SullyMichaelvan Also "In Hell I'll be in Good Company" by The Dead South

@HermesLux @AdamBLiv That's a straight banger right there 🔥

@SullyMichaelvan @AdamBLiv Try "Time in a Bottle" the both o' yuze.