>Ive had plenty of friends that decided this platform just wasnt for them.

This I see as a bit of an alignment problem. When Facebook was "Hot or Not", it wasn't for many people either. over time it evolved. 

Branching out is difficult I think, so I have never tried. I focus my attention and energy here and if it does what it could through SMTs, it will also count as branching out :)

>because regardless of how they came to get that big stake theyve held it when they could have sold it for much more.

Something many forget. The other thing is that if the big stake dumped they wouldn't have crushed the price very fast when the others were selling.

>My parents always talked down on investing and that delay has cost future me some money. 

This is part of the mindset issue for many things. We learn young what is "right and wrong" to build habits upon, even if the source of the lesson doesn't have much of a clue.