Going going gone, page-483

I think that to be fair it has been very hard to be a holder on this forum. I'll give you some examples:

- Alex turned up around Christmas 2015 and within two months made around 2000 posts on this forum. Many of his contributions were good and sound however many were repetitive and aimed at inspiring fear among holders. He was essentially protecting his (short) position just as there have been many bulls that have sought to protect their long
position. What I'm saying is that reading negative posts day in and day out with the same points repeated with the accent being on you are going to lose your money is difficult. Don't get me wrong, Alex was on the right side of the trade and I don't bear him any ill will, but the point stands that it is difficult for a holder to read through a period like that.

- A million and one 'bystanders' (non-holders) have turned up at various times with many knowing little or nothing about the business. I remember one example in 2015 where some poster pointed to the Nowicki Carbone acquisition making some ill-informed point that there may have been something fraudulent about it (because he/she didn't understand how to read accounts). Grant set the poster right but the fact that the post was made in the first place speaks to the social media culture where everyone has to have an opinion on just about everything in order to be valid as a human being. There have been too many examples where this kind of stuff happens and again to read it as a holder is difficult.

- Some posters have come on to the forum and have openly taken great pleasure in the misfortune of others. I don't believe in karma or anything else but that kind of thing just leaves me completely cold. I simply don't understand why people engage in that behaviour other than to state the obvious that this whole internet thing allows people to behave in ways that they would never dream of behaving in if they were in your company.

- Many on the sell side have been fairly smug as well. Look at colour of money. Hardly self effacing. There have been many like him.

- Then you have the disgruntled. Prankster got over 20 thumbs up the other day for saying:

'f u SGH and all that work for this company, hope god lets you into heaven for fking everyone up'

Really? So all this is on some paralegal working somewhere just as much as it is on people who make decisions at board level and senior management within the company. That's before taking responsibility for your own actions and your own involvement in buying and/or selling this company. As a holder I find something like that very difficult to read.

I'm not at all saying that the buy side have been angels because they haven't but I think that context is important. Look at Grant, on many occasions his posts have been very bearish but he is rarely attacked. Why? He treats others with respect, stays on point, doesn't continually repeat himself and always without fail is prepared to put his opinions forward with facts - he's a outstanding poster. Many others aren't though and it shouldn't be surprising that sometimes holders lose patience and react the way they do.

That's how I see it anyway. All the best Sohei.