I loved playing video games!!! I’d sit in my hutch, sprawled all over my old school grey Nintendo. I could sit there for hours, trying to level up Mario, prevent the little doggy from laughing at me in Duck Hunt or race another lap in Al Unser Jr.
But to say I was any good at video games, nah, I’m terrible when it came to one vs one games.
When Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat and Madden Football became big hits, I tended to a 90% or greater loss rate when I played any other human capable of pressing buttons.
My high school friend and I had a two hour lunch period. With an open lunch permit that semester, we’d take his white thunderbird to his house down the street and power on the old Nintendo 64 and battle it out.
I have to tell you, my friend Jared is elite at video games. He’d play in leagues back then that would garner monetary and prize rewards. I know because he’d give me gifts that he didn’t use. I remember getting introduced to one of the greatest PC games that hooked me to lose an entire night of sleep to finish… Half Life.
But back onto the subject of our lunches. Well one day, we decided to play a game he excelled at. Madden ‘98. The Vikings were playing the Atlanta Falcons that weekend for the NFC championship. ‘Let’s emulate the game!’ I could never beat Jared at this game.
It made complete sense for me to play as the Atlanta Falcons. Our beloved Minnesota Vikings at that time had prolific names like Randy Moss, Cris Carter, John Randle and Robert Smith. In Madden 98, that team was unstoppable.
But for some reason or another during that lunch period, karma was coming down to forewarn us. I had somehow managed to only be down by two points. Drive down the field and could punch in for a game winning field goal. I was possessed. For the first time ever I was about to beat Jared, and realize a nightmare for the Purple Vikings. I had lined up the crosshairs perfectly in the game. There was no way this was going to miss. And just at that moment to unleash my video game kicker…
Blip
White and black spekked all over the screen.
I looked over and the power had unplugged from the console. ‘Ooops’ is all Jared had to say.
That feeling of betrayal, helplessness and being cheated embedded itself to my soul. I was mad and angry. But there was no ability to change the course. How could he have done that to me? I played by the rules, and just on the verge of having the advantage, the game gets taken away.
And this same story is happening all around us. And I think we will have our day when the power cord, console and buttons are completely removed from the ability of the players.
Right now, Gamestop stock is up 300% just this week. And the drama is still happening at the time of this writing. Financial institutions like Robinhood will only allow selling of Gamestop but no buying, while other institutions and exchanges continue to pause trading or prevent users from logging in.
A super duper quick synopsis. The reason why so much controversy surrounds this Video Game stock is because of the high volume of manipulated short selling interest by highly funded hedge funds. On reddit, retail investors found a way to exploit a weakness in the market where these hedge funds are completely over-levered on their bets. By teaming up as a bunch of retailers to buy more and more of the stock, that increases the price of the stock, which in turn puts pressure on the hedge funds who are selling short the stock to have to re-purchase their shares at a higher price which drives the price of the stock even higher. In the term of the markets this is called a short squeeze.
My biggest issue is the ability of the financial institutions to halt trading, force selling and protect the hedge funds because they are bleeding money. It’s like the power getting unplugged from the console. Turning off the game, just when you’re about to lose is not a fair capitalist system.
And in the dental industry, we have to live with that fact playing the game as the dental insurance industry sees fit. Thank you everyone who sent me a reply about that article several weeks ago, that seemed to resonate with a lot of you thrivers in here.
But there is a solution to all of this corporate governance.
DECENTRALIZATION
We need decentralized dental insurance more than ever. Just the other day, my partner placed an implant on a patient with insurance, and the claim came back denying because they said he had put the implant to close to the tooth based on the periapical. How in the bageezus can you make an assumption from a 2D shot when you’re missing the most critical 3rd dimension of the real world. The CBCT guide my partner has, clearly put that implant in a safe position 2.7mm away from the closest point.
Why would a decentralized insurance work better for the dental industry?
The way insurance has been setup in the dental world allows them to pull the power plug on every dental practice. They create the rules to the game, move the goalposts and payoff all the referees. The dental insurance game is rigged.
In first principles thinking, what is a dental insurance company? It’s a pool of money to help guarantee a payment for an uncertain future dental event, when the correct parameters are met, should be paid out until the policy holders maximum.
It’s quite simple in concept. But human nature is to take more when possible. But if you could pre-program the prerequisites for claims, build in an AI to protect and learn from nefarious claims while creating a product that is more efficient and a better user experience for all parties. Everyone wins. EVERYONE.
Because this is predominately software driven, decisions are made with no human bias. Claims are either paid out or they aren’t. Obviously a department for rejected claims will still exist to help with fringe or gray cases. But the number of humans needed to aid the program can be reduced.
Patients will always know where they stand in accordance with their maximum and their out of pocket costs because claims are paid out immediately or not. The database can be easily accessed via blockchain and verified directly instead of through a web portal or making a phone call.
Dental practices don’t need staff solely dedicated to recouping any claims. You won’t need to write a narrative or prove anything unless it’s such a weird case that the AI or algorithm can’t make the decision. But the rules of the game will be transparent because the coding has to be made available for everyone to see.
A higher maximum benefit can be given out to patients because of the efficiencies gained by less staffing. Plus there would be more transparency about the percentage of the premiums given out, that can be predetermined in the algorithm against the number of policyholders and participants, readjusted on a minute to minute basis.
This is truly a revolutionary way to begin thinking about insurance. Take the power cord away from the bias, the greedy and unjust. Put trust in a decentralized manner, and watch what real truths come out then.
Cheers,
Lam