4 ms·

Ah, is it once again time to calculate the value of my worst investment ever, a second-generation iPod 10GB... You see, as a student I had a bit of Apple stock

by pavlov 3y ago

Ah, is it once again time to calculate the value of my worst investment ever, a second-generation iPod 10GB... You see, as a student I had a bit of Apple stock bought sometime around 2001. The next year I sold those shares for a tidy 50% profit (so I thought!) and spent all the money on a brand new iPod. Only 500 euros for thousands of songs in your pocket and blazing FireWire upload speeds, amazing! At roughly 600x appreciation accounting for stock splits, looks like those shares would be worth over $300k today.

oblio 3y ago
Meh, I had a bunch of Adobe shares bought at $24 and I sold them at $85 (didn't need the money). They were $600 4 years later. Shit happens.
cptaj 3y ago
There's a million other opportunities you missed because you can't see into the future. Same for everybody else. Don't worry about it.
ethbr0 3y ago
Absent the stock sale, how long would it have taken you to afford an iPod with only surplus funds? (i.e. saving $166 euros more, sacrificing nothing else) And what would you value the music listening happiness of that timespan at? Maybe it was a good investment! Music is pretty nice, and the iPod was great.
- pavlov 3y ago
  I honestly tend to agree. At that time, an hour each day of personally selected music probably made me happier than holding on to some stock whose real upside started many years later. (There was plenty of time for me to buy AAPL again later but I mostly didn't.)
saiya-jin 3y ago
And imagine if you bought tons of bitcoin for 0.1$ and sold for 60k... we all have been there, no point torturing yourself. Life has other qualities, and money will only get you so far even these days
not_your_vase 3y ago
Maybe your iPod purchase was the trigger for the butterfly-effect that made Apple to be a $3T company. Would you have not bought that iPod, possibly you would sit on some worthless Apple penny stocks (and you'd have no iPod).

by pavlov 3y ago

oblio 3y ago

Meh, I had a bunch of Adobe shares bought at $24 and I sold them at $85 (didn't need the money). They were $600 4 years later. Shit happens.

cptaj 3y ago

There's a million other opportunities you missed because you can't see into the future. Same for everybody else. Don't worry about it.

ethbr0 3y ago

Absent the stock sale, how long would it have taken you to afford an iPod with only surplus funds? (i.e. saving $166 euros more, sacrificing nothing else) And what would you value the music listening happiness of that timespan at? Maybe it was a good investment! Music is pretty nice, and the iPod was great.

pavlov 3y ago
I honestly tend to agree. At that time, an hour each day of personally selected music probably made me happier than holding on to some stock whose real upside started many years later. (There was plenty of time for me to buy AAPL again later but I mostly didn't.)

saiya-jin 3y ago

And imagine if you bought tons of bitcoin for 0.1$ and sold for 60k... we all have been there, no point torturing yourself. Life has other qualities, and money will only get you so far even these days

not_your_vase 3y ago

Maybe your iPod purchase was the trigger for the butterfly-effect that made Apple to be a $3T company. Would you have not bought that iPod, possibly you would sit on some worthless Apple penny stocks (and you'd have no iPod).