Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP.

[Zangelbert Bingledack]

Is there a way to see the moderated comments on Reddit?

https://uneddit.com/

But it's not working on that thread at the moment.

 

[freetrader]

Now that it is obvious that Bitcoin will not be replaced by an altcoin

I think I wouldn't consider it obvious at all.

Most people on the street either haven't heard of it or if they have, think it's some sort of recurring scam.

I think a major technical mishap or even concerted assault by mass media at the bidding of deep pockets could likely assault Bitcoin's reputation and price to an extent that could prove fatal for the industries built around it so far. A new name could yet win over the public's mind. I hope I'm wrong, unless Bitcoin is co-opted. We'll see what kind of defenses will work in that regard.

 

[rocks]

I think a major technical mishap or even concerted assault by mass media at the bidding of deep pockets could likely assault Bitcoin's reputation and price to an extent that could prove fatal for the industries built around it so far.

If blockstream's vision was the leading vision for bitcoin 3-4 years ago, I do not think I would have become involved in the project and likely would have saw it as a dead end.

The only (potentially) saving factor today is your comment above. There has been so much investment at this point in building on top of the Bitcoin ledger, that I can not believe there will not be a fight to preserve Satoshi's original vision. Just think of all of the exchanges, merchant services and wallet companies out their. All of them go under if Bitcoin goes under. For some of us Bitcoin crashing would be an investment loss, for these people it would also be the loss of their company and past 3 years of work.

There have been hints of things to come, but they do need to happen at some point for there to be a path forward.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, one of the problems with Bitcoin's user based consensus mechanism is there is no "election date" for people to choose a new path. This makes it very difficult to change course as everyone who wants to change direction has to agree on the exact time frame to do so.

A merchant led fork coupled with a core freeze would provide both a fixed time frame for an election and also a fair vote with no side gaining significant support just by being the default...

 

[bitsko]

Node #13 up and running.

 

[Zangelbert Bingledack]

Daniel Kraft is lead dev of Namecoin

Thanks. Here's the list of Core devs signed on to Greg's capacity increase proposal as it now stands, with their known affiliations and considerations I know of with regard to not understanding Bitcoin well economically.

The idea is that anyone who seriously develops on an altcoin is probably missing fundamental economic understanding. In the case of Freicoin (Mark Friedenback and Jorge Timón), for example, these two Core devs seem to believe an deflationary currency is bad, along with the Keynesian notion that spending must be encouraged.

• Adam Back [Blockstream CEO] Missed the whole thing despite inventing Hashcash, entered at the 2013 bubble peak
• Alex Morcos [Chaincode, CoinCenter]
• Ben Davenport [BitGo]
• Ben Gorlick [Blockstream]
• Bram Cohen [BitTorrent]
• Bryan Bishop [LedgerX, mailing list mod ("kanzure")]
• BtcDrak [mailing list mod] Viacoin dev
• Charlie Lee [Coinbase] Litecoin founder
• Christian Decker [duplex Lightning Network]
• Cory Fields [MIT]
• Craig Watkins [bitcoin.org]
• Daniel Involved with Ethereum and Mastercoin?
• Daniel Kraft Namecoin lead dev
• David A. Harding [21.co, bitcoin.org]
• David Vorick [Nebulous Labs] Siacoin dev
• Dev Random [gitian.org] Ethereum dev
• DexX7 [Omnilayer] Mastercoin dev
• Douglas Huff
• Eric Lombrozo [Ciphrex/mSigna] Involved with Ethereum and Ripple?
• Glenn H Tarbox
• Gregory Maxwell [former(??) Core committer, Blockstream CTO] Long-time Bitcoin bear
• Gregory Sanders [Blockstream]
• James Hilliard
• Johnathan Corgan [Corgan Labs]
• Johnson Lau
• Jonas Schnelli [Core committer(?)]
• Jouke Hofman [Bitonic]
• Lawrence Nahum [GreenAddress]
• Luke Dashjr [Elegius pool]
• Mark Friedenbach [Blockstream] Freicoin co-dev
• Marshall Long [FinalHash pool]
• Eric Martindale
• Marco Falke
• Matt Corallo [Blockstream]
• Midnight Magic Namecoin dev
• Michael Ford [Hectare]
• Nicolas Bacca [Ledger Wallet]
• Nicolas Dorier
• Obi Nwosu [Coinfloor]
• Patrick Strateman [formerly Intersango, now Blockstream]
• Pavel Janik
• Pieter Wuille [Core committer, Blockstream]
• Randy Waterhouse
• Rodolfo Novak [Coinkite]
• Suhas Daftuar [Chaincode]
• Theymos [/r/Bitcoin head mod, bitcointalk.org and bitcoin.org owner]
• Thomas Kerin [BitWasp] Namecoin dev
• Wang Chun [F2Pool] IXcoin dev
• Warren Togami [Blockstream] Litecoin dev
• Wladimir J. van der Laan [MIT, Core committer/maintainer]

Conspicuously absent:

• Jeff Garzik [Core committer]
• Peter Todd Viacoin dev
• Rusty Russell [Blockstream] (or maybe he is not a Core dev?)
  
• Jorge Timón [Blockstream] Freicoin co-dev
• Gavin Andresen [MIT, Core committer(?)]

Note: Just because someone contributed a bit of code to an altcoin project doesn't necessarily mean they subscribe to the whole altcoin thing, and that's all I mean by "dev" in some cases above. Charitably, they could be waiting for a spinoff or sidechain and contributing in the meantime. But it does serve as a lead. Actual statements that show clear lack of understanding should be required before declaring someone economically lacking in ways relevant to Bitcoin.

More information welcome, feel free to copy and extend elsewhere (I'd prefer without attribution; note that some of this info may be wrong).

EDIT: Someone's reddit thread here.

 

[cypherdoc]

@Zangelbert Bingledack

Ben Davenport-Bitgo
Bram Cohen-Tor
Glenn Willen-Blockstream
Alex Morcos-chaincode.com
Wang Chun-f2pool
Marshall Long-Finalhash pool
Christian Decker-Duplex Lightning network

 

[Aquent]

Bitcoin Unlimited is released! Thanks to all who helped and provided inspiration!

@awemany and I (@theZerg) have independently built the source code and verified that the output is the same. You can see our Bitcoin-client signatures and file hashes if you click on the fingerprint.

http://www.bitcoinunlimited.info/software

If anyone wants to encourage this, feel free to donate at the same address (1zerg12nRXZ41Pw4tfCTqgtdiJx6D1We3). These donations will pay for the hosting and an obsolete miner (its 65 Ghash) I bought so I could test mining and get some testnet coins without begging.

But more important than donations: RUN A BITCOIN UNLIMITED NODE! Do it NOW! We need to show core how their strategy is not working.

You CAN run it on your home PC/network, use the traffic shaping in the unlimited options dialog box to dial back the bandwidth used during the day...
[doublepost=1450837281][/doublepost]@throwaway lol, wow that was fast! Click the fingerprint!

Congratulations @theZerg @awemany and everyone else who worked on bringing this release. I have been busy with other things so haven't had the opportunity to keep up with bitcoin unlimited. Now with positions made absolutely clear I guess we can all have more time to focus on providing the freedom giving alternative.

They can keep censoring and banning and what have you, but every reasonable mind knows by now that their cripple coin is bullshit, so, our energy is better spent creating.

I was wondering if we have a whitepaper sort of thing for bitcoin unlimited, or some sort of documentation? Furthermore I am wondering if you guys think it is a good idea to write a message to the bitcoin mailing list presenting the ideas of bitcoin unlimited (or as I may call it ubitcoin - what you think of that btw?) in a focused manner to explain how it allows for consensus to be achieved through the individual choice of node operators.

As an addition, I was wondering if it is possible to tell what choice the majority of nodes have made if we assume they all are running bitcoin unlimited? Perhaps there could be some sort of requirement for them to communicate their blocksize to all?

The aim with such mailing list post would not be to persuade blockstream, but to present the idea to the wider audience of developers who may so be inspired to come and contribute. Of course Gollum may censor it, but then he would only be shooting himself in the foot if he does so.

 

[cypherdoc]

i've been reading up on the Juniper Systems cryptographic backdoor, all the while thinking about Maxwell and his employment there. it's a fascinating story. i have to say, altho there is no direct evidence linking him to the event, the fact that he did work there during that time and suddenly dropped off the github commit list the very same day, or the day after, this debacle came out last week, is highly coincidental. i also worry about how it could relate to his libsec home brew and it's implications for Bitcoin:

you can listen to a podcast about Juniper here (nothing about Bitcoin or Maxwell): https://twit.tv/shows/security-now/episodes/539?autostart=false

and Matthew Green's blog:

http://blog.cryptographyengineering.com/

 

[awemany]

@cypherdoc: Bram Cohen is Bittorrent, not Tor? Or did he recently get involved in Tor?

EDIT: Typo.

 

[cypherdoc]

ah, of course you're right. i'm not in the industry

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bram_Cohen

 

[awemany]

So, did anyone post the BU release news to the dark place (/r/Bitcoin) yet?

Is BU also an Altcoin according to their definition?

 

[Justus Ranvier]

The only (potentially) saving factor today is your comment above. There has been so much investment at this point in building on top of the Bitcoin ledger, that I can not believe there will not be a fight to preserve Satoshi's original vision. Just think of all of the exchanges, merchant services and wallet companies out their. All of them go under if Bitcoin goes under. For some of us Bitcoin crashing would be an investment loss, for these people it would also be the loss of their company and past 3 years of work.

21 has more cash backing them than Blockstream. Is Balaji Srinivasan is on board with small blocks?

 

[luigi1111]

the fixed supply schedule is meant to resonate with the gold bugs; which it does very well. i should know. i was big one. that's b/c it was real money for thousands of years. so in my view, it's not *only* about predictability. i'd posit that instead of an asymptotic supply curve like Bitcoin, a linear issuance curve would not be as successful.

Right, I'm pretty much in agreement with this (and the rest of your post). There needs to be some incentive for early adopters; greed is most obvious one. This does kinda go back to my "it's all in the numbers" statement. I do agree with the below quote as being a much easier thing to get across to the "uninitiated" (which we all were at some point).

@luigi1111
Unfortunately, it's a lot easier to convince people to trust "setting in stone" than to trust the market (even though they do this with the 51% attack anyway, as well as more fundamental things like whether they will have access to food next week...).

 

[awemany]

@Justus Ranvier :

Something went wrong with the quote, rocks became me somehow...

Regarding 21.co: This David Harding guy (presumably the one with his very-close-to-face photo shot as the image in a lot of submissions on the legacy reddit) seems to be employed there?

https://21.co/learn/the-blockchain/#pre-work

Isn't he also the guy who's doing admin on bitcoin.org?
Wasn't he involved in some edit pro-small-blocks that people were upset about?

So many people in this space, it is confusing.

Not saying that what David Harding thinks is 21.co's official stance.

They must really like big blocks, considering that they want to enable micropayments. I can't see how they'll not eventually vote for BIP101 at least.

EDIT: Oh and I think we have a confusing amount of Toms, Hardings and Jorges in 'the scene' now...

 

[albin]

Groupthink is a powerful force to get a bunch of names on paper, but the euphoria of feeling like they defeated an evil adversary just by signing a document is a short-lived honeymoon. I'm stocking up on popcorn for, when lacking an adversary character-assassinated to cartoonish levels, members of the Core faction start eating each other alive.

 

[cypherdoc]

21 has more cash backing them than Blockstream. Is Balaji Srinivasan is on board with small blocks?

their pool promotes BIP100 but now that that's off the table they should take it down.
[doublepost=1450904960,1450904331][/doublepost]

@Justus Ranvier :

Something went wrong with the quote, rocks became me somehow...

Regarding 21.co: This David Harding guy (presumably the one with his very-close-to-face photo shot as the image in a lot of submissions on the legacy reddit) seems to be employed there?

https://21.co/learn/the-blockchain/#pre-work

Isn't he also the guy who's doing admin on bitcoin.org?
Wasn't he involved in some edit pro-small-blocks that people were upset about?

So many people in this space, it is confusing.

Not saying that what David Harding thinks is 21.co's official stance.

They must really like big blocks, considering that they want to enable micropayments. I can't see how they'll not eventually vote for BIP101 at least.

EDIT: Oh and I think we have a confusing amount of Toms, Hardings and Jorges in 'the scene' now...

David Harding is that guy who wrote up the anti-XT manifesto put up on bitcoin.org that basically said any implementation not Core is an altcoin not to be trusted. he is a small blockist in the Maxwell camp. Tom Harding is dgenr8, an XT dev who has helped Hearn quite a bit and seems to be a decent guy. he hangs out here too rarely.

David Harding was hired to write the 21co tutorial docs, which are quite good, along with Saivann a core dev loyalist who was one of the censors of Ver & Matonis in 2013 during the PressCenter.org debacle. everything i've seen of him is him being a dick.

yeah, you'd think 21co would be in favor of big blocks but since 100 is scrapped, that option for them is gone.

 

[Peter R]

I was wondering if we have a whitepaper sort of thing for bitcoin unlimited, or some sort of documentation?

Not that I know of. Personally, I'd prefer to see some visuals that explain how BU is different, rather than a paper.

Furthermore I am wondering if you guys think it is a good idea to write a message to the bitcoin mailing list presenting the ideas of bitcoin unlimited (or as I may call it ubitcoin - what you think of that btw?) in a focused manner to explain how it allows for consensus to be achieved through the individual choice of node operators.

This was the topic of the debate I was having with Maxwell when he unsubscribed from the mailing list. The thought leaders over there such as Back and Maxwell have already said that this idea is "illogical" and that it simply doesn't work. I think it would be better to ignore them, let them continue their self-imposed retreat into censored irrelevancy, and hope the good devs over there "see the light" on their own accord.

I think what would be most helpful is coming up with good content that people want to share so that it gets lots of views. It would be great if Coindesk ran a story on BU too.

As an addition, I was wondering if it is possible to tell what choice the majority of nodes have made if we assume they all are running bitcoin unlimited? Perhaps there could be some sort of requirement for them to communicate their blocksize to all?

Yes, there are lots of things we could do in this regard. I view this as "signalling" such that node operators and miners can get a better sense where consensus lies, rather than by trial-and-error.

 

[cypherdoc]

didn't @theZerg say he was releasing a BU whitepaper soon?

 

[lunar]

It would be great if Coindesk ran a story on BU too.

I've seen hardly any news on coindesk about the blocksize issue apart from the announcements, and some coverage on the sycophantic scaling conference. A quick search also reveals virtually nothing on XT either. I can only conclude it is yet another captured news feed? /speculation

 

[_mr_e]

Possibly a stupid question but... I've been wondering about BU and nodes ability to set their max relay size. This is supposed to give nodes more of a vote in the max size by making larger blocks slower to propagate right? But miners have an incentive to mine larger blocks then the nodes may want because they collect more fees.

So what is to stop the miners from forming a sort of private network where they relay blocks directly between each other, bypassing nodes individual settings, forcing them to accept blocks due to their block height acceptance rules?

As another thought along those lines, what stops say, the top three miners from getting together broadcasting blocks between each other before the rest of the network, giving them a slight advantage over the rest of the network on starting the next block?