Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP.

VeritasSapere

Active Member
Nov 16, 2015
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Regarding the current community split, I see a lot of parallels between what is happening today in Bitcoin and what happened in the US post revolution. During and immediately after the revolution the founding fathers and other leaders saw themselves as united on a single direction and in near full agreement with each other.

But fairly soon afterwards huge ideological differences emerged which were irrevocable and split them. In the end they HATED each other, Burr and Hamilton went to kill each other with pistols at dawn, at least 5 other sets did the same. They also refused to see the others side and insisted their views were right. There was a case where Madison (I think it was him) argued in front of the supreme court on what a section of the constitution that he wrote meant, but the supreme court disagreed and said "you are wrong, what you wrote means something else". (Similar to what Greg and Peter are doing with Satoshi's writings today)

The thing that kept this hatred and irrevocable differences from spilling out of control was the democratic process they started (maybe not even fully understanding it), which forced an election and decision point every few years on a new direction. This process forced revolutions to be peaceful events that then most people accepted.

We see Bitcoin as a democratic entity that everyone can influence and set direction. And this was Satoshi's vision with distributed mining, P2P nodes, etc.

The problem is there is no set decision point built into Bitcoin that enables voting. Yes everyone can mine and accept or reject blocks, but without a set date to decide as an election does, it is near impossible to bring everyone together at the same time to change direction. For example if I decide to run a miner and mine 2MB blocks today, I would be kicked out and ignored. So I won't do this unless I know that at least 51% other miners are going to start doing the same thing at the same time. Without a set date for a decision point the current direction will be taken until it breaks.

If the major exchanges, merchants, etc. announce a BIP101 hard fork, it becomes an election and forces a set date to have that election. It will in effect be the first election Bitcoin has had. The problem I think XT had is it tried to do this but it had no date set and no decision point to rally around.

What is interesting about Bitcoin is post election both sides can continue on their own, the system can not force you to join the majority (unlike democracies). Greg and Luke can continue working on a 1MB by themselves if they want.

So:
1) We shouldn't be too worried that everyone is fucking mad (and it seams everyone on all sides are getting there). That is a part of a democratic decision making process (which Greg is trying to stop). The fact that so many people are so mad is a good thing, it means that many people today want Bitcoin to work. That is winning IMHO.
2) I believe we need to think about how Bitcoin can make the election processes easier. This is going to be the first time so there are no mechanisms for it. After it's done it should be made easier for the next time.
You make good points here. I was going to wait a bit longer before saying this, but I think that if major companies do not rally behind a block size increase through an alternative client implementation and we do not gain significantly more momentum after January then we should just fork the network our selfs, regardless of the majority. I know this is a very controversial and scary thing to say, but this might just become necessary in the future. At least this way we will have both chains in the market and people will be able to make this choice for themselves. I still think it is to early for such a radical move so I will not mention it again until this actually becomes a necessary course of action.
 
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Inca

Moderator
Staff member
Aug 28, 2015
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1,679
I think there is a mighty power struggle going on behind the scenes to save Core.

Gavin has dropped hints and now Jeff has made his position clear. Within 24 hours Maxwell drops commit rights. Smells like revolution to me.
 
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Peter R

Well-Known Member
Aug 28, 2015
1,398
5,595
@awemany @Peter R

i'd say what's interesting is the friendly tone @Peter R is getting in his r/bitcoin Metcalfe's Law thread from even the staunchest of miniblockists like BitcoinKnowledge (Trace), brg444, pb1x, & eragmus. :)

all behold the lifting of the Maxwell cloud!
I know, right?! My post is now at the top of /r/bitcoin and it still hasn't been deleted. Maybe this is a sign that the war is coming to an end...
 

cypherdoc

Well-Known Member
Aug 26, 2015
5,257
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even if Maxwell is playing some sort of insidious game, i think today's events are significantly positive for big blockists.

as noted above in my comment about @Peter R's reddit thread, sentiment seems to be changing with Peter being just one indicator. their great leader Maxwell is apparently, in their eyes, down and out.

maybe.
 

yrral86

Active Member
Sep 4, 2015
148
271
@VeritasSapere : I thought they stopped fracking months ago already?


It is interesting how few attention Greg resigning his commit privileges gets. Almost as if everyone expects such a move from him?
I don't know how the rate of new wells has changed, but all the wells near me are still pumping.
 

awemany

Well-Known Member
Aug 19, 2015
1,387
5,054
I don't know how the rate of new wells has changed, but all the wells near me are still pumping.
Are you in North Dakota or 'somewhere up there'?
[doublepost=1450384452][/doublepost]@Justus Ranvier : So I wanted to eventually call you 'The Bitcoin dog' :)

But now I see that on the committer page, jgarzik copied you and became a dog, too.
 

VeritasSapere

Active Member
Nov 16, 2015
511
1,266
I don't know how the rate of new wells has changed, but all the wells near me are still pumping.
As far as I understand fracking accounts for a significant amount of the oil production today, which is a big change compared to a decade ago.
 

solex

Moderator
Staff member
Aug 22, 2015
1,558
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@awemany

Justus has long been the John Connor of Bitcoin!
 

Zangelbert Bingledack

Well-Known Member
Aug 29, 2015
1,485
5,585
There must be some mechanism in place so that people eventually get it - or Bitcoin is doomed, don't you think?
Yeah, that mechanism is investment.

As an example, the altcoin and "blockchain" world is a cornucopia of distractions taking advantage of almost every pitfall in understanding it is possible to make with regard to Bitcoin. Misapprehend just one aspect of Bitcoin, and boom you lost money on an altcoin. Boom you just lost money on a misguided blockchain project. Boom you lost money investing in Blockstream, missing out on the gains in BTC price growth you could have had.

You can see it even today in the subreddits: "Welp, this situation looks insurmountable so I sold all my bitcoins." Failed to understand antifragility? Boom you just lost money. Too jumpy? Lose money. Too beholden to authority figures? Lose money. Fail to understand how decentralized governance will have to work? Lose money.

And once fork arbitrage or similar market-based decision mechanism becomes a thing, the process becomes even more direct and granular as people will actually win or lose money on specific judgments about code changes. The mechanism can then truly be said to be tantamount to a prediction market, with all the legendary accuracy and ability to crystallize the wisdom of crowds that entails.

Over time, as elaborated here, the market will vest more and more wealth (and therefore control) in those who get it and get all of it. And less and less control with those who fail to get it, or fail to get all of it. And the bar gets higher and higher, cypherdoc's "most people will lose money in this space" gets more and more true. Can you ride this bull?
 
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cypherdoc

Well-Known Member
Aug 26, 2015
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But now I see that on the committer page, jgarzik copied you and became a dog, too.
wait a minute.

that's JR's dog!
[doublepost=1450386031,1450385142][/doublepost]Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP.

setting up for the plunge:


[doublepost=1450386180][/doublepost]ouch.

$DJT gives up almost 2 of the last 3d of gains. look the hell out:

 

Zangelbert Bingledack

Well-Known Member
Aug 29, 2015
1,485
5,585
Random thought: only one Blockstream guy on the Core committers now (sipa / Pieter Wuille), right? Well with infinite veto power that's all they need, so why take the extra PR hit of having two BS guys on there? "You can't call it Blockstream Core now, there's only one BS guy but two MIT guys!"

If, judging from Pieter's odd response during question time at the Scaling Conference, he has been fully consensified on top of also being paid a salary by Blockstream, Greg's "departure" might be a brilliant "hey see how much I matter" move that doubles as appearing to make Greg look out of the picture while he actually controls things from behind the scenes through Pieter.

The Puppetmaster.

I don't know enough about Pieter to know if this is viable, though. He seems like a good guy, but I don't have any priors for his ability to stay independent, unlike Jeff and Luke. /fun conspiracy mode
 
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rocks

Active Member
Sep 24, 2015
586
2,284
Random thought: only one Blockstream guy on the Core committers now (sipa / Pieter Wuille), right? Well with infinite veto power that's all they need, so why take the extra PR hit of having two BS guys on there? "You can't call it Blockstream Core now, there's only one BS guy but two MIT guys!"

If, judging from Pieter's odd response during question time at the Scaling Conference, he has been fully consensified on top of also being paid a salary by Blockstream, Greg's "departure" might be a brilliant "hey see how much I matter" move that doubles as appearing to make Greg look out of the picture while he actually controls things from behind the scenes through Pieter.

The Puppetmaster.

I don't know enough about Pieter to know if this is viable, though. He seems like a good guy, but I don't have any priors for his ability to stay independent, unlike Jeff and Luke. /fun conspiracy mode
Completely agree with this.
 
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awemany

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Aug 19, 2015
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@Zangelbert Bingledack , @rocks:

It is already working. He's getting human sympathy now. As I said, he knows how to manipulate people.

I have just been called mercilessly cold on reddit. LOL.

I am not and I will not trample on him and laugh in his face if he admits defeat and pulls back completely from the blocksize debate and Core decision making. But that did in no way happen yet!

He is still my very special enemy.

And this is just another chess move.
 

cypherdoc

Well-Known Member
Aug 26, 2015
5,257
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@Zangelbert Bingledack

i don't think so.

not having Maxwell's huge mouth trolling all the forums, dev lists, and IRC is a major hit to swaying general sentiment. Pieter is incapable of doing so on his own. just look at Reddit today. the double hit of btcdrak and gmax out has quieted the miniblockists trolling almost completely. at least today.

what i think is more likely is that his BS investors probably finally got so tired of the negative publicity generated by gmax that they are the one's who may have pulled the plug on him.
 

rocks

Active Member
Sep 24, 2015
586
2,284
Bitcoin Chief Architects
Satoshi Nakamoto: 2008 (whitepaper) - Dec 2010
Gavin Andresen: Dec 2010 - April 2014
Wladimir van der Laan: April 2014 - Dec 2015
Jeff Garzik: Dec 2015 - ?
The problem with this is while Satoshi and Gavin were able to just roll out changes during your time periods, Wladimir remains a block. Even with Greg supposedly dropping commit access, as long as Wladimir can veto then no one else is in control. Since with the blocksize debate "do nothing" means "force a new artificial cap into Bitcoin", anyone with veto rights has the ability to force a new fee market.

I think the other committers will have to just implement BIP101 as a controversial change over others objections. Perhaps this is the "big thing" being hinted at. Not a full new client fork, but a not 100% dev consensus change. There are pros and cons to this.

But frankly I don't like how everything is in the dark and it feel that decisions are being made behind closed doors either way. I understand why that is the case, this is politics after all. But I don't like it.

I guess the one redeeming thing with Bitcoin is the decisions made behind closed doors in the end are forced to be visible for all. The same can not be said for any government of central bank today....
 

theZerg

Moderator
Staff member
Aug 28, 2015
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2,327
If I could blindly speculate it would be that somebody close to Blockstream probably finally communicated to them what a complete and total PR disaster this has been. Probably the VCs as they have the influence to do so and the sensitivity to these issues. We may seen a seasoned CEO take over the titular Blockstream lead very soon (or that might have been the dichotomy presented -- leave Bitcoin commit access or get a CEO)...

And now Blockstream can just claim "we're just another Bitcoin company... we don't have any more influence than any other"... and still block commits.

Its too little months too late for me. However, at the same time it removes my #1 issue which is that Blockstream should recuse itself from direct influence on this issue since it has a conflict of interest.
 

cypherdoc

Well-Known Member
Aug 26, 2015
5,257
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wow, quite the affirmation of all i've believed beginning over two years ago:

"I had a long chat with him (from my real personae) over many hours over a night quite a few months back, it became readily apparent what his intentions were, it actually made me a bit sick to my stomach (thankfully I also knew that there would be massive resistance).


I remember the human in him, unfortunately this is the part that got twisted somewhere along the way. And I say this because he used to have a very different viewpoint towards block size and centralized control.


So, no, I won't remember the human in him. I will remember his generosity and commitment to what he believed in before his ideology changed. But maybe it never changed, maybe he ingratiated himself for the long game, I don't know. I do think his attitude changed over the years, and I do think that it coincidentally coincided with the emergence of blockstream."


 
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