Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP.

[Justus Ranvier]

He said they pretty much use vanilla configuration (let alone code) because of fear of being incompatible somehow and losing revenue.

Part of the reason they do that is because of an intensive multi-year long FUD campaign against alternative implementations.

 

[solex]

@rocks Gavin mentions the weird beastie which is the "anyone can pay" in his write-up.
This soft-fork is very radical for non-upgraded nodes who become very much in the dark about everything going on except the final UTXO set.

 

[cypherdoc]

@molecular

that won't last long. if there's efficiencies to be had, they will be exploited. we're probably witnessing just the first version of large mining pools that are picking the low hanging fruit of rewards. with time, efficiencies will need to be exploited as tx fees gain priority and probably most of the ignorant miners located in disadvantaged areas (like China behind the GFC) are going to get disintermediated.

there's so much Western fiat money sitting on the sidelines waiting for an as yet unidentified opportunity in Bitcoin. imo, there are some huge opportunities located in the West that will heavily leverage BW opportunities given the opportunity with just some code (hard forked bigger blocks). and those opportunities mesh exceeding well with the push towards much greater user adoption worldwide which will greatly enhance Bitcoin monetary velocity, depth & volume. those will go hand in hand with a huge ramp in the price as the investment community realizes that Bitcoin can indeed grow.

it's just a matter of time.

 

[rocks]

@rocks Gavin mentions the weird beastie which is the "anyone can pay" in his write-up.
This soft-fork is very radical for non-upgraded nodes who become very much in the dark about everything going on except the final UTXO set.

OK thanks. This seems to have some serious drawbacks even if SW coins can transfer back to the main chain.

First, older full nodes no longer can validate the network. They are no longer providing security and are essentially leeching BW. This means that when SW launches, if only a few nodes upgrade then the security model is very weak because only a few nodes are performing real validations.

Second, is miners need to upgrade first. Imagine if miners are slow to upgrade but several users start to use SW right away. Now you have users using SW, but miners running older clients that perform no validation work. That is pretty bad.

Third, this seems to bloat the block chain for full validation. Tell me what is a smaller amount of data:
1) Standard UTXO -> Transaction A to UTXO A -> Transaction B to UTXO B
2) Standard UTXO -> SW Transaction A to SW stored coin -> SW Transaction to UTXO B

If #2 is larger than #1, then from a full verification scaling solution SW is worse off. It would be better to simply let the main chain be larger and stay with path #1 with standard transactions

Fourth, and most important, is if this is a solution designed to allow Chinese miners with >50% of hash power to keep mining 1MB blocks and thus not validate SW transactions, then we have a long-term situation where the majority of hash power is not validating SW blocks. That seems very very bad IMHO.

 

[Justus Ranvier]

Fourth, and most important, is if this is a solution designed to allow Chinese miners with >50% of hash power to keep mining 1MB blocks and thus not validate SW transactions, then we have a long-term situation where the majority of hash power is not validating SW blocks. That seems very very bad IMHO.

If SW includes fraud proofs, then there is no stable long term situation where a majority of the hashing power does not validate blocks.

Fraud proofs make it easy for the entire network (including light clients) to reject invalid blocks regardless of how much hash power supports the invalid chain.

Once fraud proofs are implemented and widely recognized in the network, miners won't be able to afford the risk of not validating their blocks.

If somebody tricks them into building on an invalid block, they'll lose a lot of money extending a chain that none of the exchanges or wallets or payment processors recognize as valid.

 

[sickpig]

Did you really think you weren't already?

I don't think it's necessary but I just want to underline that usually on this forum on avg we have more guests rather than members.

That said I would like to take this opportunity to say hi to all the shy BCT users that spent time here lurking.

 

[cypherdoc]

@Peter R

another verification regarding bloated mempools and SPV mining:

 

[Zarathustra]

Our Zerg is unbelievable. We should be proud to have this lead developer.

No wonder his quotes have been destined to be on top of r/btc the whole day.

 

[cypherdoc]

(in the latter case an un-upgraded node is fooled into thinking "anyone can pay").

How does that node prevent fraudulent TX's?

 

[rocks]

Great job digging into this Motherboard.

http://motherboard.vice.com/read/satoshis-pgp-keys-are-probably-backdated-and-point-to-a-hoax

"But there’s one really big problem with the case for Craig S. Wright as Satoshi: at least one of the key pieces of evidence appears to be fake. The “Satoshi” PGP keys associated with the Wired and Gizmodo stories were probably generated after 2009 and uploaded after 2011.

We say keys, because there are two entirely different keys implicated by Wired and by Gizmodo. And neither of them check out.

There is only one PGP key that is truly known to be associated with Satoshi Nakamoto. We’ll call this the Original Key.

Before we continue, we should note that the PGP keys are just one piece of the puzzle. When asked for comment, Gizmodo editor Katie Drummond said that the keys “are just one (relatively small) data point among many others, including in-person interviews and on-the-record corroboration.”

But the keys are important because they’re not just plain suspicious, there’s evidence of active, intentional deception with respect to the keys. "

Satoshi's signatures are the only item that can really prove his existence. Anyone trying to fake being Satoshi would have to try and make it look as if they had his key. Here it looks as if Wright was trying to generate keys that might fool people, but of course it is easy to disprove. Wright could be Satoshi and he created these fake keys to try and throw people off if anyone ever got too close to finding him. The reality is no one will even know who Satoshi is until he decides himself to go public....

 

[Kupsi]

GBTC hit a high of $72.5 today for roughtly $760 per BTC.

The twins need to get that ETF out.

I also don't understand why GBTC is allowing this premium. They could easily buy coins on the open market, create GBTC shares from those coins and sell those GBTC shares for a huge premium. That's what most closed end funds do when there is a large premium on the underlying asset.

They are not allowed to do it. Only shares older than one year can be sold on the OTC Market.

 

[albin]

So I've been trying extremely hard to figure out exactly how segwit could possibly be overtly a scalability technology, and the only thing I can come up with is that if you just propagate the transactions block, then the node only needs the signatures it hasn't seen yet via normal tx propagation.

Sort of a poor man's thin blocks / IBLT right out of the box?

Is that possibly why it's suddenly ok to go up to 4 MB total or whatever it is? But if that's the case, then why are better relay technologies part of the story?

 

[Justus Ranvier]

If fraud proofs are actually implemented as part of SW, then the fraud proof for MAX_BLOCK_SIZE consensus rule violations is fairly complex.

Simplifies the proof system substantially to eliminate the maximum block size as a consensus rule.

 

[albin]

Corollary question: why aren't small block / 1 MB is too much adherents freaking out and losing their minds that basically what amounts to an immediate bump to maybe 4MB depending on the kinds of signatures is being proposed to take effect ASAP?

 

[rocks]

They are not allowed to do it. Only shares older than one year can be sold on the OTC Market.

That is the lock up period for investors who purchase shares of the trust, not for the trust itself.

Most closed-end have lock up periods similar to this. The reason is unlike open-ended funds where market makers can buy and sell the underlying asset into the fund to keep the price aligned to the NAV, closed end funds are at risk of the price dropping below the NAV. To counter this risk, lock-up periods are used to slow selling pressure of the closed-end fund.

However if there is a premium, closed end funds are free to purchase the underlying and create new shares of the fund.

A good example of this is Sprott's physical gold trust, which is a closed end fund. There was a period of time where the trust was selling at a significant premium to physical gold and GLD, and gold bugs thought this would continue because the fund owned real gold, not paper GLD junk.

Well Sprott then did the obvious and bought tons (literally tons) of new gold, created new shares and sold these shares in the market, this happened a few times until supply was brought in line with demand and the premium completely disappeared.

It would be crazy for a closed-end fund to not allow themselves to take advantage of a premium and create new shares. If the one year period applies to the fund itself, and not to just individual investors, then the trust was setup wrong.

TL;DR Closed end funds usually are able to create new shares by purchasing the underlying asset to manage periods with high premium. This is how supply is brought in line to demand. If GBTC was setup correctly then the fund shouldn't be subject to the 1 year lock up period.

 

[cypherdoc]

Corollary question: why aren't small block / 1 MB is too much adherents freaking out and losing their minds that basically what amounts to an immediate bump to maybe 4MB depending on the kinds of signatures is being proposed to take effect ASAP?

Because it's never been about the blocksize?
[doublepost=1449709650,1449708883][/doublepost]

Corollary question: why aren't small block / 1 MB is too much adherents freaking out and losing their minds that basically what amounts to an immediate bump to maybe 4MB depending on the kinds of signatures is being proposed to take effect ASAP?

what about running behind Tor?

 

[Justus Ranvier]

Good advice: https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/3w5fv1/unhappy_with_core_want_to_make_a_meaningful/

 

[cypherdoc]

junk bonds still sick:

Sotheby's still dropping:

[doublepost=1449711809,1449710648][/doublepost]i think the argument to be made to the Chinese miners so that they support much larger blocks on the order of 101 or BU is that the value of their coins will skyrocket.

i don't believe for a moment that they don't have meaningful stores of saved coins from either mining or as personal investment. they know the potential value of a fixed supply currency and have been around during the previous bubbles and thus know the huge appreciation to be gained if one can only hodl. there is so much fiat yuan floating around that i'm sure they have access to significant investment sources that would allow such accumulation. while certainly some miners run on a shoestring budget, i think they are in the minority.

an acknowledgement by anyone trying to persuade them of this should be that their business model will have to change. either develop work arounds to the GFC, punch holes thru it via relay nodes, or lobby the gvt to permit special transit for their data. improve their infrastructure, lay faster and more direct fiber, anything to compete with the ROW mining that has to grow to further decentralize the network and grow the userbase. yes, these are concessions but they need to understand that this is for the greater good of the network and most assuredly would ramp the price and the value of their coins. they need to understand that having their 60% of the hashing power subject to shutdown and seizure by their gvt is holding back the price and growth of Bitcoin in general. one mining pool seizure would cause irreparable reputational damage to Bitcoin and the price. i refuse to believe that those guys on the mining panel could not be made to understand this with patient explanation and interpretation. with education they can change their mindset and be made to understand the economics and game theory behind Bitcoin mining.

there is a certain inevitability to 101 or BU that we all understand. they need to understand that the ROW will not be held back . their is too much Western fiat sitting on the sidelines waiting to enter Bitcoin and mining at higher level BW's is the next logical step that will bring Bitcoin to the masses/unbanked at very cheap tx fee levels. mining is going to spread and if the Chinese want to stay in the game then they must be educated how to best take advantage of it. accumulating coins now would be one way with infrastructure improvements another way. getting their gvt onboard in anticipation of this evolution would be very helpful for them. they should want this to perhaps maintain their lead.

bottom line is the further Bitcoin spreads amongst the ppl of the world the more valuable it will become with price being a reflection of this utility and demand. which will be huge.

 

[Kupsi]

That is the lock up period for investors who purchase shares of the trust, not for the trust itself.

Most closed-end have lock up periods similar to this. The reason is unlike open-ended funds where market makers can buy and sell the underlying asset into the fund to keep the price aligned to the NAV, closed end funds are at risk of the price dropping below the NAV. To counter this risk, lock-up periods are used to slow selling pressure of the closed-end fund.

However if there is a premium, closed end funds are free to purchase the underlying and create new shares of the fund.

A good example of this is Sprott's physical gold trust, which is a closed end fund. There was a period of time where the trust was selling at a significant premium to physical gold and GLD, and gold bugs thought this would continue because the fund owned real gold, not paper GLD junk.

Well Sprott then did the obvious and bought tons (literally tons) of new gold, created new shares and sold these shares in the market, this happened a few times until supply was brought in line with demand and the premium completely disappeared.

It would be crazy for a closed-end fund to not allow themselves to take advantage of a premium and create new shares. If the one year period applies to the fund itself, and not to just individual investors, then the trust was setup wrong.

TL;DR Closed end funds usually are able to create new shares by purchasing the underlying asset to manage periods with high premium. This is how supply is brought in line to demand. If GBTC was setup correctly then the fund shouldn't be subject to the 1 year lock up period.

The Bitcoin Investment Trust isn't approved by the SEC.

...the BIT has taken a backdoor route to public listing. By exploiting a rule that allows holders of a private fund to sell their shares publicly after a 12-month lockup period and completing a less arduous approval process with the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority...

http://www.wsj.com/articles/bitcoin-investment-trust-gets-finras-ok-to-become-public-bitcoin-fund-1425242094

 

[rocks]

@Kupsi
Thanks, didn't realize they took that path.

Well now we know the consequences of skipping SEC approval with a popular asset, no ability to create the supply needed to meet market demand resulting in a massive premium.