Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP.

[cypherdoc]

note specifically how the USD is NOT rallying like all the pundits are saying like Kyle Bass despite the wide spread asset sales. that does not bode well and matches my prediction that we instead will see a paradoxical fall in the USD once it becomes clear that the Fed will have to postpone interest rate rises and instead restart QE. all crises are slightly different and this is what i feel will be different this time vs 2008. but, in fact, given what we know to be the potential of Bitcoin, this difference will be looked back on as a HUGE difference in terms of consequences for the world of currency and quite possibly the future of a world reserve currency.
[doublepost=1453311547][/doublepost]the black hole of swirling gvt debt continues to suck everything into it. that's too bad. this is the one negative externality that could thrwart Bitcoin's rise; bigger gvt. ideally, in the far future when we get past this ridiculous concept of massive gvt debt as a safe haven, Bitcoin can knuckle down on this relatively abhorent behavior; depending on gvt's to tax the shit out of their citizens. one can hope:

[doublepost=1453311764][/doublepost]there's just too many ugly plunging charts to post here but these are a few of the more significant:

sometimes junk is just junk:

i never even bothered to look at the retail #'s. altho i've heard they were bad:

financials. couldn't happen to a bunch of nicer folks:

[doublepost=1453311973,1453311203][/doublepost]sold the remaining 40% of DXD @ 25.30

 

[AdrianX]

Count Rampula!

brg444 called it, implied an agreement has been reached for consensus:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=178336.msg13613151#msg13613151

EDIT: He's talking about this from Wang Chun of F2Pool? Of course this could just be a reversal from the dip; we'll see how far it goes.

Mmm btg444 rather dishonest, being a small block proponent and telling everyone why we shouldn't increase the block size.

Then admitting its a very positive (bullish) move when a big miner agrees to increase the limit.

Oh well. Coins moving to stronger hands.

 

[rocks]

this looks like a good short term solution to the On^2 sigops attack everyone is FUD'ing about. it can be modified in the far future if necessary and will also stop gap until/if we add SW to Classic:

https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/commit/97e5b55c6fabf5deb57be13bdd8f8b9c90d21570

The fact that this problem has been know for so long, but none of the very simple and easy solutions were implemented, shows that core is either completely incapable of basic project management or is intentionally not addressing scaling challenges. I can understand maxwell and team not wanting to put effort behind things like sub-chains, but leaving stupid stuff like this in shows they are not serious enough to be bitcoin's maintainers.

Edit: After watching all of the FUD core has put out on this, I think after Classic fixes it with the very simple transaction size limit, it should be highlighted loud and clear Classic does not suffer from a large transaction attack, while Core does. It would be possible to issue 1MB transactions that stall the core client for a period of time, but not Classic.

This Classic fix also introduces an incompatibility between Classic and core even before 2MB activation. A block with a large transaction would be accepted by core but rejected by Classic. I wouldn't be surprised if someone tries to use this early on to disrupt the system.

 

[Inca]

Looks like opening a leveraged long in the 380's was a good guess.

Where do equities become fair value? Who knows with the PPT and central bankers holding up the markets day after day..

 

[cliff]

@rocks - I agree with your observations, but I don't know how much to reasonably infer from the lack of progress on seemingly predicable and easy solutions. In my own job, its very, very easy to get distracted by the cool theoretical stuff and lose track of the of the very boring housekeeping things that have hidden value. With developing work, I can imagine it being same and therefore I empathize a bit. For example, I could imagine it being very doable to create a platform to safely fork the protocol whenever there is agreement to do so - seems like this could eliminate a lot of fear and uncertainty about the process - but being not that exciting given how rarely it might be used. In that sense, having a project manager/task master (whatever this role means - maybe its also distributed like the devs) who gets the big picture might be very valuable. I used to be a hobby marathon/long-distance runner. The key to running races like that - or any serious athletic endeavor IMHO - is the ability 1) to visualize the finish and 2) to do whatever it takes to push through the crap and pessimism/self-doubt/challenges/crap telling you the goal is impossible or to take a different approach to get there. Its about mindset. Seems like [more] folks in this space might benefit from learning about similar perspectives (whatever side of any issue they're on).

 

[solex]

@rocks
It took me a long time to come to the conclusion that simple scaling improvements are not being done because it reduces the push to off-chain solutions. Gavin's 100KB tx limit is an executive decision that would have had months of Core Dev wrangling. I have not checked the code, but I expect it to kick in for blocks >1MB otherwise, i agree, it opens an attack vector.

 

[cypherdoc]

tbh, the sigops might not even be a real game theory attack. the only example we have is f2pool's 1MB tx that took 25 sec to validate. they were doing it for the good of the community in reducing the UTXO set.

what attacker can reasonably pull this off? they'd have to be a solo miner of reasonable size to get a block like this in. at some verification time beyond 5 min, as a guess, the risk of orphaning starts to escalate rapidly. why didn't we see something like this when avg blocksize was down around 100-200kB?
[doublepost=1453315667][/doublepost]Jamie Dimon fighting the good fight. i didn't post about the failings of ApplePay the other day but i should have. that's a big deal for Bitcoin:

 

[Richy_T]

If anyone's wondering when we'll reach capacity, it's now basically.

https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/41urgx/block_size_distribution_over_seven_days/

There appears to be some attempt to bury that post (or maybe it's just not a good post )

 

[Justus Ranvier]

"Democracy" should be reached through the means of multiple alternative and competing implementations.

There are multiple reasons we want to see this outcome.

The argument against alternate implementations which jdillon got started in 2013 isn't wrong per se, it's just not the whole truth.

If you want a network with the least amount of disruption caused by consensus-breaking software bugs, then there are two ways to achieve it:

• The dominant implementation must have close to 100% market share
• The dominant implementation must have close to 0% market share.

Halfway between the former and the latter is the point of greatest risk, where an consensus bug could be accidentally or deliberately triggered to have the maximum impact.

If the goal is to get to the latter state, then the way to minimize the risk is to minimize the time where the network is evenly split between two implementations.

 

[cypherdoc]

our very own @sickpig is getting famous:

https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/41uu0j/if_everything_goes_well_the_earliest_a_block_size/

 

[YarkoL]

Pieter Wuille has called the PoW change proposal ridiculous - https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/41vqbo/bitcoindev_pieter_wuillle_its_ridiculous_to/
(I don't know how you do that fancy embedded reddit link)

It looks like core devs are divided into moderates and "jihadists". I think sipa and Jonas Schelli and Wladimir are in the first camp, and Todd, Greg and LukeJr in the latter.

 

[Aquent]

You know, at times this whole debate feels too intractable, the two sides so convinced in their ways that any resolution with such super high thresholds of 75% seem impossible. I worry they might paralise us once again and by paralisis gain the utter and complete transformation of bitcoin from an open ledger into a walled garden.

In the end it doesn't matter, the spirit of man will triumph, but in the short term we will be set back so many years. Testing times. Testing times for bitcoin.
[doublepost=1453321823,1453321223][/doublepost]"Pieter Wuille has called the PoW change proposal ridiculous - https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/41vqbo/bitcoindev_pieter_wuillle_its_ridiculous_to/"

Pieter is golden. He doesn't know it, but in many ways he stands far taller than many/most core devs. He is the only person who I have a genuine feeling that all he wants is to do what is right, what is principled, with no self interest based on ego or money and I find him to be a person who operates on a principled basis and is considerate and of course fully reasonable.

Unfortunate to say, but he does seem a bit timid, however, I hope he reconsiders his change of mind in 2013 and fully analyses the situation once again to see that the genius of satoshi which he recognised at the time still stands for nothing whatever has changed since 2013 and satoshi's insight remains as utterly true and utterly genius as in 2013.

 

[rocks]

@rocks
Gavin's 100KB tx limit is an executive decision that would have had months of Core Dev wrangling.

Reminds me of the period when Gavin was in charge and obvious improvements towards Satoshi's vision were continuously added. Glad to see if Classic happens that will continue.

Mike Hearn had a great post several months ago where he made the point that open source projects are best run when a single leader makes executive decisions, this keeps the project from stalling into a squabbling contest and keeps the project marching towards a single vision. The risk is if the vision of the leader does not match the user base. When that happens either the market forks and finds a new leader, or the project splits into separate projects with different goals and different users and contributors.

When Gavin passed control to Pieter Bitcoin never lost having a single leader, but the vision changed to something against Satoshi's vision. Worse those that took over refused to communicate they changed the vision and thought they could just sweep it under the rug and no one would notice. Then when people started to notice they condoned Thermos' censorship and kept trying to hid that they were changing Bitcoin's vision.

This obviously can not and would not work. If they really wanted to change the vision, then they should have spent the past year communicating that vision and trying to convince people to follow it. This path might have looked more risky to them because there was a good change people would reject it, but in actually it was the best option they had and they didn't try it. Trying to sweep a vision change under the rug for a project involving people's money was always doomed

 

[cliff]

I have a noobish question on LN, but I want to check my understanding on it (please go easy). Is this a fair analogy: LN is sorta like a p2p altcoin exchange where all altcoins are pegged to btc and where users can convert BTC back and forth between various alts via channels for various reasons (I can fill in the assumptions I'm glossing over with question if necessary)?

 

[rocks]

Pieter Wuille has called the PoW change proposal ridiculous - https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/41vqbo/bitcoindev_pieter_wuillle_its_ridiculous_to/
(I don't know how you do that fancy embedded reddit link)

It looks like core devs are divided into moderates and "jihadists". I think sipa and Jonas Schelli and Wladimir are in the first camp, and Todd, Greg and LukeJr in the latter.

I am not sure about this, the moderates IMHO have already dropped core and joined Classic. They tried again and again and again to discuss the issue and compromise. These compromises were met with attacks and banishment. sipa and Wladimir took part in this in my view, I don't think they are moderates but wishy washy followers of whoever seems to be in charge, when Greg seemed to be in charge they followed and condoned his path.

sipa and Wladimir bet their reputations on the vision Greg and the "jihadists" tried to sneak past the entire ecosystem. This will not be forgotten and I question if their reputations will ever recover. Sure they might continue to contribute, but it will be under someone else's direction. Wasn't Wladimir an active censor of the mailing list or dev channel? I can not and will not ever find that to be acceptable.

 

[cypherdoc]

You know, at times this whole debate feels too intractable, the two sides so convinced in their ways that any resolution with such super high thresholds of 75% seem impossible. I worry they might paralise us once again and by paralisis gain the utter and complete transformation of bitcoin from an open ledger into a walled garden.

In the end it doesn't matter, the spirit of man will triumph, but in the short term we will be set back so many years. Testing times. Testing times for bitcoin.
[doublepost=1453321823,1453321223][/doublepost]"Pieter Wuille has called the PoW change proposal ridiculous - https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/41vqbo/bitcoindev_pieter_wuillle_its_ridiculous_to/"

Pieter is golden. He doesn't know it, but in many ways he stands far taller than many/most core devs. He is the only person who I have a genuine feeling that all he wants is to do what is right, what is principled, with no self interest based on ego or money and I find him to be a person who operates on a principled basis and is considerate and of course fully reasonable.

Unfortunate to say, but he does seem a bit timid, however, I hope he reconsiders his change of mind in 2013 and fully analyses the situation once again to see that the genius of satoshi which he recognised at the time still stands for nothing whatever has changed since 2013 and satoshi's insight remains as utterly true and utterly genius as in 2013.

"<Luke-Jr> if the miners attempt to hardfork, against the consensus of the community/economy, the the community/economy may very well change PoW to overrule the miners' defection/betrayal*"

Luke is so far out of touch, he actually thinks the economic majority is on the side of miniblocks.
[doublepost=1453322941][/doublepost]

Trying to sweep a vision change under the rug for a project involving people's money was always doomed

that's just it. they don't respect money. nor the principles thereof.

namely, money as a SOV. when's the last time you've seen them discuss this on IRC or dev mail? i mean really discuss it as a motivating factor regarding Governing Dynamics?

 

[YarkoL]

@rocks
True, but now that situation has escalated, there may appear some fracture in their ranks.
Jonas Schnelli at least appears to me as relatively reasonable in his interview.

 

[cypherdoc]

@YarkoL

from that article:

"Is not that a blacklisting?

Hmm, yes, something like that. A blacklisting banishes only nodes that misbehave. With 0.12 you can effectively ban nodes via the IP address."

why then does Mike catch all his flack from Core about his Tor filtering?

 

[albin]

Is it maybe worth rewinding on alot of the conventional wisdom that's completely taken hold of the mainstream just over the last six months?

For example, why is Lightning Network the default official reference client-endorsed winner for layer-2 functionality? I'm by no means any kind of expert on the subject, but what about for example voting pools such as OT, and the robust stuff that could be built on top of that, like blinded Chaumian cash-type signatures?

 

[YarkoL]

@cypherdoc
Misbehaving nodes identified by IP have been banned (rejected connection) in earlier versions too. 0.12-rc seems to have enhanced and refactored this functionality considerably, so you can ban nodes manually too for example. I have looked at this only superficially, but it doesn't seem to be anything sensational, although it does raise eyebrows when it comes up in the article like that.