Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP.

[freetrader]

https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/47f0b0/f2pool_testing_classic/d0d29c4
Luke-jr:

"The original draft called for a hardfork after segwit with no mention of the details (and discussion was explicitly that there might not be a block size increase). Bitmain and F2Pool insisted that a block size increase be included, and the debate on what those numbers should be took from probably 8 PM to 3 AM, partly because F2Pool wanted extremely large limits, and Matt didn't want to commit to specific numbers until we had a chance to do some maths to determine what would work best. But without this agreement, I don't expect we'd all be focussing on a hardfork at all in such a short timeframe following SegWit."

I didn't even see a commitment to specific numbers in the HK agreement.
Peter Todd:
Peter Todd and Luke-jr are the two publicly visible guys present in HK who signed up to implement the HF code. Cory Fields and Matt Corallo stayed in the background, even though Luke-jr hints that they will assist on the HF code.

18:26 Luke-Jr zveda: Cory Fields, Matt Corallo, Peter Todd, and I will produce HF code, yes.

Both Luke-jr and Todd came out critical of the agreement straight afterwards on social media.
They were even discussing things like POW change, difficulty adjustment and the 21M coin limit on the developer mailing list, probably in an attempt to keep the miners in line with the unfavorable agreement.

I fully trust (and expect) Peter and Luke-jr to veto their own code from being merged in Core. They are conveniently "independent of Blockstream" of course, when needed. And if they don't do it, some of the other full-time Blockstream employees will - after all, they usually ensure that Core "consensus" aligns very much with Blockstream's interests.

 

[bluemoon]

So from the quote above, Luke-jr has it that it was Bitmain/Antpool and F2Pool that insisted on a block size increase.

F2Pool kicked up a fuss afterwards about Adam signing as an individual and said Blockstream wasn't to be trusted. F2Pool has also processed some Classic blocks.

And Antpool's Jihan Wu has enquired here whether BU is a "Core-compatible" client.

I'm not sure Blockstream can afford to refuse including a block size increase in Core and risk either F2Pool or Antpool rejecting SW.

But then apart from KnC, have any miners yet called Blockstream's bluff?

 

[Erdogan]

Enough to block SW:

https://coin.dance/blocks/classicZ

Unless they change the trigger rule.

 

[8up]

https://np.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/4aeepk/a_response_to_oleg_andreevs_bitcoin_maximalism/

very interesting read.

 

[satoshis_sockpuppet]

7 % Classic Blocks and Classic is in front for Slushs voting.
There is hope.

 

[Justus Ranvier]

@8up

Confidence in Bitcoin's ability to strike directly at the core of the establishment, at money, rather than evolving in a truly disruptive way by supporting more unassuming use cases, is anchored in a nearly-religious conviction by many Bitcoiners that, in free markets, "good money always drives out the bad", and that bitcoin is the best money ever invented. Many Bitcoiners actively anticipate an imminent fiat apocalypse, which will be quickly followed by the Second Coming of commodity money in the form of bitcoin.

That bit of trolling detracts from the quality of the piece.

A better criticism would be to point out the deficiencies in many definitions of "good money", and the degree to which people like Oleg are ignoring basic principles of the free market economics, in particular that the customers of products and services are the ones who decide which properties are good and which ones are not.

Whoever was in charge of the psyop that started spreading the "democracy" and "mob rule" meme deserves a promotion. They got pretty much every so-called free market advocate to completely reverse their principles and declare that Bitcoin could be successful as a voluntarily-adopted currency without any regard for the preferences of its customers.

That psyop was even more successful than the "digital gold" meme that got everybody to ignore the degree to which gold has utterly failed as sound money due precisely to the fact that people stopped using it as currency and started trading paper gold substitutes instead, which can be infinitely inflated.

On our current trajectory, all the digital goldbugs are going to get exactly what they've been asking for.

It may be the case that we're going to have to wait another generation to get sound money, after all the 90s cypherpunks are dead. After a generation of them demonstrating their total lack of understanding of how to develop usable encryption products, they are demanding the opportunity to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory one more time by demonstrating their lack of understanding of how to develop usable sound money.

And an entire cohort of people who should know better are letting them go along with it to indulge their desire for hero worship or something.

 

[cypherdoc]

We're always going to be in the minority by definition as more and more people are getting into Bitcoin. It's inevitable. Which makes our job even harder at defending the sound money aspect as why we got into it. It's easier for later adopters to say something is wrong with Bitcoin if they are losing money at some frivolous side project.

And core devs are no exception.

 

[Christoph Bergmann]

Heard it on reddit:

"In a decentralized bitcoin, block space is scarce. It's not set by the core developers or anyone, it's set by reality. If you take away block space scarcity, what you get is no longer a decentralized bitcoin."

We have a new dogma. Block space needs not just to be finite, but scarce, for Bitcoin to be decental. So the good news is, that after years of a centralistic bitcoin our beloved virtual currency finally becomes a bad, but decentralized transaction system.

The group-thinking is so deep that I think we'll never return to sanity. People are literally brainwashed.

 

[VeritasSapere]

This is why I am starting to think that the best chance we have of having being part of a real cryptocurrency which reflects the principles of sound money is through the alternative cryptocurrencies.

Having a singular dominant cryptocurrency might not be the path forward if the majority within Bitcoin presently does not want sound money. The alternative cryptocurrencies at least do have very focused communities and are very clear on their vision and path forward. Instead of everyone attempting to push their own vision onto a single cryptocurrency, it makes sense that there should be several dominant cryptocurrencies reflecting different peoples ideologies and beliefs.

Not that I think BlockStreamCoin could even become one of the dominant cryptocurrencies of the future, however the small blockists would still have their obscure, limited and centrally controlled cryptocurrency, I suspect some might even be happy with such an outcome according to their own peculiar ideologies.

Even though Bitcoin seems to be diverging from the origanol vision of Satoshi. This vision will survive through the alternative cryptocurrencies no matter what happens to Bitcoin. The alternative cryptocurrencies are an extension of the ethos of freedom and decentralization inherent within Bitcoin itself.

 

[Zarathustra]

@8up

It may be the case that we're going to have to wait another generation to get sound money, after all the 90s cypherpunks are dead. After a generation of them demonstrating their total lack of understanding of how to develop usable encryption products, they are demanding the opportunity to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory one more time by demonstrating their lack of understanding of how to develop usable sound money.

Sound money is the dream of the Austrians. They will wait another 5'000 years. There is no such thing. Money is debt/tribute.

http://www.miprox.de/Wirtschaft_allgemein/Martin-Symp.pdf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt:_The_First_5000_Years

 

[freetrader]

Just pointing out this arena for fights over the soundness of Austrian economics

https://bitco.in/forum/threads/the-flawed-foundations-of-austrian-economics.993/

 

[Justus Ranvier]

The group-thinking is so deep that I think we'll never return to sanity. People are literally brainwashed.

No kidding.

it's set by reality

If you take away block space scarcity

Those two statements can not be true at the same time. If scarcity is a property of reality (it is) then it's not possible to "take it away".

This is the classic "tell the truth, then follow it up with a lie while everyone's distracted" tactic.

Block space is scarce because our computers still made of matter, still occupy space, and because time still only flows in one direction.

Because block space is scarce for reasons of physics, there's absolutely no need to add additional protocol restrictions to "make it scarce" because reality takes care of that for us.

 

[Norway]

Full blocks and 10k transactions in mempool. Are we heading for a new congestion?
https://tradeblock.com/bitcoin

I hope we are. And I want the price to tank. The faster and more extreme, the better. Because the miners have to feel the pain of going along with Cores plan.

I want the crisis to be like removing a band aid. Painful, but quick.

After the fork to Classic, BU can take the limelight it deserves and the price go to moon.

 

[sickpig]

Is it me or the mere fact that gmax is partecipating to thread like this one (ToominCoin aka "Bitcoin_Classic" #R3KT) is quite telling?

Is he completely out of touch or what? On the post linked above he is lamenting the fact that classic activation threshold will take into account only miners.

But isn't this the exact same group of actors taken into account while computing SegWit soft-fork activation threshold?

To add insult to injury, SegWit soft-fork is an order of magnitude more complex than classic HF. In fact SegWit specification is actually spanned into 4 differnt BIPs.

 

[freetrader]

If the price drops through significant layers of support while the blocks are congested, this will be really bad for those who are leveraged. The situation will no doubt get worse quickly from thereon as people panic and try to head for exits, but the resulting stampede will claim many victims.

Remember then who blocked the stream.

 

[Norway]

@freetrader
There are always two sides of the trade.
Miners (and leveraged long traders) are probably most vulnerable to a price drop.
The miners need to see that they are voting for the wrong candidate and change their mind.

 

[satoshis_sockpuppet]

Even though Bitcoin seems to be diverging from the origanol vision of Satoshi. This vision will survive through the alternative cryptocurrencies no matter what happens to Bitcoin. The alternative cryptocurrencies are an extension of the ethos of freedom and decentralization inherent within Bitcoin itself.

Hm. I don't like changing my money like my underwear.

Genesis forks are the answer.

And btw. I think Bitcoin still has everything we need (except the great schism..).
None of the altcoins has a real competitive advantage over Bitcoin imho.

 

[VeritasSapere]

@sickpig Try and point that out to them on that thread and I bet you would get waves of hate and ad hominem attacks thrown at you, they are still attacking me ten pages later. I end up responding to everything in a very rational way, which takes me a while. Then a few pages later they repeat the same things I just disproved, part of why I am spending less time on that forum now and focusing on other things.

Here you go a clear example of them clearly ignoring the facts:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1330553.msg14274804#msg14274804
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1330553.msg14327236#msg14327236
[doublepost=1459277553][/doublepost]

Hm. I don't like changing my money like my underwear.

Genesis forks are the answer.

And btw. I think Bitcoin still has everything we need (except the great schism..).
None of the altcoins has a real competitive advantage over Bitcoin imho.

I agree that Genesis forks and altcoins are the answer, since a genesis fork with a changed PoW algorithm is by definition an altcoin as well.

You might want to ask the question what competitive advantage would such a genesis fork really have against the altcoins? Especially considering that the problems that Bitcoin is experiencing now might have already been solved in these alternative cryptocurrencies. I think that incentivized full nodes, self funding blockchains and more complex and clearly defined voting mechanisms could be the answer to these potential fundamental flaws in the governance of Bitcoin.

In the case of a genesis fork that maintains the same PoW algorithm, at least it regains the advantage of an already more developed ASIC mining industry. Also allowing it to become the longest chain again since I am sure the miners will switch chains if the value moves over to the alternative chain. Though I do not see this break being this clean, it will splinter, several genesis forks and several dominant cryptocurrencies will most likely rise and absorb much of the value that will have otherwise have gone into a singular Bitcoin.

 

[johnyj]

this is where Lau keeps mixing up 50 & 75% discounts as if

so basically, either the explanation AJTowns gave me for how the discount is calculated is wrong or Lau is wrong. i'll go with AJ.

I watched this video for 5 minutes and shut it. It is full of error and obviously this Dr. does not understand what he is talking about, so he constantly change numbers based on the question

The real question is, who authorized them to implement such discount (in an effort to benefit LN and centralized wallet service providers)

 

[Norway]

@johnyj
Yes, who is a good question.
Gavin Andresen also asked who decided the one year hard fork grace period for the Hong Kong roundtable agreement.