HODLing — an acronym that means "hold on for dear life" — is built on the long-term optimism that has been the driving force behind technological advancements that have forced us into modernity. It's time to take that embrace of crypto culture a step further. We should make HODLing the default American position on all technology.
Americans tend to be optimistic on general terms, but that quickly gives way to pessimism in the specific. Just a decade ago, 78% said they would not eat lab-grown meat. Today? The number has nearly flipped, with 60% now indicating a willingness to try it.
Another example of Americans being generally optimistic about technology, but pessimistic about long-term effects is the widespread belief that self-driving vehicles will become commercially available within their lifetime. One 2021 survey by the Pew Research Center found that 63% of Americans believe that fully self-driving cars will be common within the next 50 years, but they are hesitant about actually riding in one.
And Americans have always had some nagging pessimism about the future. In 1930, economist John Maynard Keynes worried about a new disease he termed “technological unemployment” that plague our future. Nearly 100 years later we have yet to see it happen. Have Americans shed themselves of such fears? Not at all. More than two-thirds of Americans view automation as a bad thing.
But innovation almost always faces skepticism and criticism. Louis Anslow, my colleague at the Abundance Institute and curator of the Pessimists Archive, has spent years cataloging historical examples of groundbreaking ideas being dismissed, from the lightbulb to the bicycle to the airplane.
Yet, innovators like the Wright Brothers persisted, epitomizing the HODL spirit. Despite initial doubts about the feasibility of flight, they remained steadfast. In 1903, The New York Times estimated that it would be 1 to maybe 10 million years to achieve flight. Nine weeks later, the Wrights took to the skies.
Similarly, in the early 2000s, Amazon and Jeff Bezos faced intense scrutiny and skepticism. While Amazon’s stock was trading around $50, the USA Today said, “Amazon.com will never again approach its early 2000 share price of nearly $600, and there’s no guarantee the company will make a profit anytime soon.” Others were far less kind. Malcolm Berko claimed that "unless shareholders get rid of Bezos and the buffoons in the boardroom, those clowns may add a new chapter to the books sold by AMZN called Chapter 11. This company is a joke and so is its leadership.”
