Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP.

[freetrader]

He gave the decimal representation of the hex value 0x20000002

 

[cypherdoc]

Sergio on new OP codes :

 

[JVWVU]

http://www.scribd.com/doc/306521425/Appeal-to-Authority-a-Failure-of-Trust

Was motherboards 's Satoshi PGP story wrong..

 

[cypherdoc]

i like it. alot. remember; 2 equal tranches @5.95 & 6.05 or 6.0 average in:

silver collapsing as well:

remember, i also said i think BOTH pm's and stocks could roll over here. that would put tremendous pressure on Bitcoin as a safe haven despite all the Blockstream shenanigans:

in fact, if you're a bear, you gotta wonder just why and how the Bitcoin price has been so stable and still in a huge bull triangle given the recent Blockstream turmoil/corruption AND given the relatively huge recovery BOTH in stocks and pm's. if those rollover AND we get a rejection of SW this month, the Bitcoin price is poised to rocket. note the persistent rise in the 200 DMA:

[doublepost=1459520012,1459518882][/doublepost]lol, gaudamit.

my brokerage is down. never_fails. i was gonna put on my DXD short again

 

[Justus Ranvier]

Just so I know for the future - a news site calling itself 'bitcoinmagazine' trashing Bitcoin in the worst possible way?

Welcome to 4th generation warfare. That's how it works.

Blockstream who by the way seems to be retreating into the fold of Hyperledger.

That's not a retreat - that's the original plan.

Remember that Blockstream was founded to get sidechains into Bitcoin, and their primary purpose was to be a testbed for features, and they never promised that those new features were going to be added to Bitcoin.

Segwit turned out to be a double benefit for them, besides fixing the malleability problem that really only affects them, it also paralyses Bitcoin development by forcing everybody in the space to waste resources unnecessarily rewriting all transaction-processing software.

 

[cypherdoc]

Ok, got it. I think.

At the coffee shop; will see if I got hit @18.85.
[doublepost=1459521662,1459520967][/doublepost]a distinct lack of April Fool's Day humor on Reddit compared to years past.

the blocksize debate has taken it's toll. and it's bounty from the Moon hopefuls. most likely the bottom is in.

 

[bluemoon]

http://www.scribd.com/doc/306521425/Appeal-to-Authority-a-Failure-of-Trust

Was motherboards 's Satoshi PGP story wrong..

The paper runs to 19 pages and is mostly a step by step demonstration that Greg was wrong to dismiss the Satoshi cryptographic keys on the basis of dating.

I do not have a Windows computer so have not tried to repeat the proof in the paper. It looks convincing to me.

From p.16:

This exercise has taken the reader through the creation of a 3072-bit RSA PGP key using GnuPG 1.4.7 as it was compiled into a Microsoft Windows binary in 2007, thereby disproving the claims made in the Motherboard article. From this we can only conclude that the perpetrators of that misinformation did not understand the workings of PGP sufficiently to implement a different hash algorithm that was, as we have clearly demonstrated, readily deployed over a year before the release of the version used in the creation of the disputed keys. We hope that the foregoing explanation will go some way towards their education.

Maxwell states that his copy of the key log is definitive, however he has not supplied any timestamped supporting evidence to validate this assertion. We may either conclude that Gregory Maxwell understood what he was asserting and has intentionally misled the community in stating that the PGP keys referenced had been backdated, or that a Bitcoin core developer did not understand the workings of PGP sufficiently. Bitcoin was designed to allow for validation and proof in places where trust was being abused. It was created to ensure that trust authority alone is not sufficient.​

There follows a section on "centralisation", p.17:

There is an inherent warning in the foregoing discussion with regard to the growing power of individuals who may not fully grasp the full potential of the Blockchain but who nevertheless have a disproportionate level of influence. A case in point is the current dispute regarding the size of the Blockchain. It is not the increase in size of the Blockchain that is leading towards centralisation, it is the creation of an unintended scarcity. In limiting the size of the Block, the issue of control and the use of the protocol is centralised to a limited number of developers. The Bitcoin protocol was designed to be the primary protocol in the same manner that IPv4 and soon IPv6 are the primary networking protocols. It may be that changes to Bitcoin lead to forks in the future just as IPv4 is migrating towards IPv6, but the core of the Internet remains based on a single set of protocols. The core of this system is an RFC or “request for comment” system and not a fixed standard.

The result is that we have multiple protocol stacks across the Internet that are interacting. This is the plan for Bitcoin and the Blockchain. The bitcoin core protocol was never designed to be a single implementation maintain by a small cabal acting to restrain the heretics. In restricting the Blocksize, the end is the creation of a centralised management body. This can only result in a centralised control function that was never intended for Bitcoin. Satoshi was removed from the community to stop this from occurring. Too many people started to look to Satoshi as a figurehead and controller. Rather than experimenting and creating new systems within Bitcoin, many people started to expect to be led. In the absence, the experiment has not led to an ecosystem of experimentation and research, of trial and failure, but one of dogma and rhetoric.

Several core developers, including Gregory Maxwell have assumed a mantle of control. This is centralisation. It is not companies that we need to ensure do not violate our trust, but individuals. All companies, all governments and all of society consists of individuals and the interactions they create. In the past, these ideas were discussed extensively with Mike Hearn and others who saw the need for the Blockchain to be unconstrained. Gregory Maxwell has been an avid supporter in limiting Blocksize [note 3]. The arguments as to the technical validity of this change are political and act against the core principles of Bitcoin. The retention of limits on Block size consolidates power into the hands of a few individuals. This is the definition of centralisation.

The Internet was not a controlled system. Many applied for and received the equivalent of a standard in implementing an RFC, but at the same time, the development of new Internet Protocols occurred prior to the writing of an RFC. Many RFCs came to be written years after the protocol was widely adopted. This is what Bitcoin was designed for. Not for cautious stagnation as the banks have allowed themselves to enter, but for change and growth. Bitcoin was not created to have a single core team developing. It was developed in a manner that would allow anyone to create their own version. Each version would compete and could lead to forks, but this is a desired outcome. Where a fork is created it will either lead to a new set of protocols, or it will be rejected. Only the new forms of transactions are truly at risk and their introduction can be planned without the requirements for a central governing body.​

The philosophy outlined is not a million miles away from much of the discussion here.

 

[albin]

@cypherdoc

There's even outright hostility against April fool's. I tried something I thought was reasonably non-annoying and somewhat outside the box and its interestingly like a 50/50 up/down battle.

We've come a long way from the glory days of the CEO of Bitcoin banning China!

 

[freetrader]

The paper runs to 19 pages

If anyone has a non-scribd mirror of this PDF, a link would be most welcome. I don't feel like creating an account there.

 

[cypherdoc]

The paper runs to 19 pages and is mostly a step by step demonstration that Greg was wrong to dismiss the Satoshi cryptographic keys on the basis of dating.

I do not have a Windows computer so have not tried to repeat the proof in the paper. It looks convincing to me.

From p.16:

This exercise has taken the reader through the creation of a 3072-bit RSA PGP key using GnuPG 1.4.7 as it was compiled into a Microsoft Windows binary in 2007, thereby disproving the claims made in the Motherboard article. From this we can only conclude that the perpetrators of that misinformation did not understand the workings of PGP sufficiently to implement a different hash algorithm that was, as we have clearly demonstrated, readily deployed over a year before the release of the version used in the creation of the disputed keys. We hope that the foregoing explanation will go some way towards their education.

Maxwell states that his copy of the key log is definitive, however he has not supplied any timestamped supporting evidence to validate this assertion. We may either conclude that Gregory Maxwell understood what he was asserting and has intentionally misled the community in stating that the PGP keys referenced had been backdated, or that a Bitcoin core developer did not understand the workings of PGP sufficiently. Bitcoin was designed to allow for validation and proof in places where trust was being abused. It was created to ensure that trust authority alone is not sufficient.​

There follows a section on "centralisation", p.17:

There is an inherent warning in the foregoing discussion with regard to the growing power of individuals who may not fully grasp the full potential of the Blockchain but who nevertheless have a disproportionate level of influence. A case in point is the current dispute regarding the size of the Blockchain. It is not the increase in size of the Blockchain that is leading towards centralisation, it is the creation of an unintended scarcity. In limiting the size of the Block, the issue of control and the use of the protocol is centralised to a limited number of developers. The Bitcoin protocol was designed to be the primary protocol in the same manner that IPv4 and soon IPv6 are the primary networking protocols. It may be that changes to Bitcoin lead to forks in the future just as IPv4 is migrating towards IPv6, but the core of the Internet remains based on a single set of protocols. The core of this system is an RFC or “request for comment” system and not a fixed standard.

The result is that we have multiple protocol stacks across the Internet that are interacting. This is the plan for Bitcoin and the Blockchain. The bitcoin core protocol was never designed to be a single implementation maintain by a small cabal acting to restrain the heretics. In restricting the Blocksize, the end is the creation of a centralised management body. This can only result in a centralised control function that was never intended for Bitcoin. Satoshi was removed from the community to stop this from occurring. Too many people started to look to Satoshi as a figurehead and controller. Rather than experimenting and creating new systems within Bitcoin, many people started to expect to be led. In the absence, the experiment has not led to an ecosystem of experimentation and research, of trial and failure, but one of dogma and rhetoric.

Several core developers, including Gregory Maxwell have assumed a mantle of control. This is centralisation. It is not companies that we need to ensure do not violate our trust, but individuals. All companies, all governments and all of society consists of individuals and the interactions they create. In the past, these ideas were discussed extensively with Mike Hearn and others who saw the need for the Blockchain to be unconstrained. Gregory Maxwell has been an avid supporter in limiting Blocksize [note 3]. The arguments as to the technical validity of this change are political and act against the core principles of Bitcoin. The retention of limits on Block size consolidates power into the hands of a few individuals. This is the definition of centralisation.

The Internet was not a controlled system. Many applied for and received the equivalent of a standard in implementing an RFC, but at the same time, the development of new Internet Protocols occurred prior to the writing of an RFC. Many RFCs came to be written years after the protocol was widely adopted. This is what Bitcoin was designed for. Not for cautious stagnation as the banks have allowed themselves to enter, but for change and growth. Bitcoin was not created to have a single core team developing. It was developed in a manner that would allow anyone to create their own version. Each version would compete and could lead to forks, but this is a desired outcome. Where a fork is created it will either lead to a new set of protocols, or it will be rejected. Only the new forms of transactions are truly at risk and their introduction can be planned without the requirements for a central governing body.​

The philosophy outlined is not a million miles away from much of the discussion here.

that's beautiful. the ultimate and true smackdown of a corrupt core dev who, when push came to shove, chose Blockstream over Bitcoin:

 

[cypherdoc]

That's hex^H^H^Hbinary
100000000000000000000000000010 , the second bit from right (bit 1) is set.
Those are 30 bits there, topmost is 1, or rather, the 3 high bits are 001.

From https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/blob/master/bip-0009.mediawiki#Specification:

Bit flags
Blocks in the STARTED state get an nVersion whose bit position bit is set to 1. The top 3 bits of such blocks must be 001, so the range of actually possible nVersion values is [0x20000000...0x3FFFFFFF], inclusive.

simple question that i've never bothered to understand. what does the "0x" stand for (i assume 00) in "0x20000000"? and why is it used?

 

[freetrader]

It's the notation for hexadecimal constants that was popularized by the C programming language.
I'm going to shamelessly quote from StackOverflow because it's a good historical description:

In the 60's, the prevalent programming number systems were decimal and octal — mainframes had 12, 24 or 36 bits per byte, which is nicely divisible by 3 = log2(8).

The BCPL language used the syntax 8 1234 for octal numbers. When Ken Thompson created B from BCPL, he used the 0 prefix instead. This is great because

1. an integer constant now always consists of a single token,
2. the parser can still tell right away it's got a constant,
3. the parser can immediately tell the base (0 is the same in both bases),
4. it's mathematically sane (00005 == 05), and
5. no precious special characters are needed (as in #123).

When C was created from B, the need for hexadecimal numbers arose (the PDP-11 had 16-bit words) and all of the points above were still valid. Since octals were still needed for other machines, 0x was arbitrarily chosen (00 was probably ruled out as awkward).

 

[adamstgbit]

simple question that i've never bothered to understand. what does the "0x" stand for (i assume 00) in "0x20000000"? and why is it used?

its just syntax for writing a HEX number
0x20000000 == 536870912
or
100000000000000000000000000000
in binary.

we have 32 flags (bits) to play with

set the first 8 flags to true with 0xFF
set the last 8 flags to true with 0xFF000000

HEX is the preferred way of playing with bits its much harder to see what bits will be set using decimal values

 

[cypherdoc]

i only now got around to listening to this. it's a great listen from 2 former Barbadian (?) CB's about reserve currencies, their purpose, how they're used, and how Bitcoin could fit in. with talk like this, Bitcoin's future is bright. it gives me hope Blockstream's days are numbered:

https://epicenterbitcoin.com/podcast/121/

 

[sickpig]

gmaxwell is really starting to annoy me.

he again posted on "ToominCoin aka Bitcoin_Classic"#R3KT" infamous thread.

Do you think he took the occasion to clarify the incredible amount innacurancies spreaded in such very thread?

Obviously he didn't, instead he wasted is precious time offending people saying that @adamstgbit is stupid and he should have to study more. Of course he used his notorious passive aggressive style rather than using a more direct way.

Do you think that he explained why he think Adam is wrong? Obviously he did not.

what a moron. moronic attitude

 

[cypherdoc]

i only now got around to listening to this. it's a great listen from 2 former Barbadian (?) CB's about reserve currencies, their purpose, how they're used, and how Bitcoin could fit in. with talk like this, Bitcoin's future is bright. it gives me hope Blockstream's days are numbered:

https://epicenterbitcoin.com/podcast/121/

Still listening but a great part is on speculative attacks. If you listen particularly carefully, you'll understand the importance of depth of liquidity in defending against such attacks. And therefore why Bitcoin as a settlement layer today is a joke of massive proportion.

 

[Lee Adams]

1. Soft forks makes it easy to do centralized control (you only need to collude with major mining pools and you can implement anything with a soft fork).

Well the good news is that's not true currently as they need 95% uptake to activate it and Classic has a veto.

2. The transaction malleability is not a real problem

It does limit the functionality and programmable money nature of bitcoin, but it does seem to be mostly about LN.

3. LN is prepaid card model, and it has been abandoned by telecom operators years ago

I'm not sure. I see it a bit like Direct Debit in the UK. I imagine that I might even use it.

4. Segwit soft fork changed bitcoin

As did all the previous soft forks/patches. Yes it needs time to be tested and Classic is the quickest bandaid we have at them moment, but segwit is not going to be activated until the Classic team lifts its veto on it.

So far I have never seen anyone expect Pieter fully understand what segwit is

Now this is just wrong. Developers who (according to GitHub) generated more than 90% of all commits to Bitcoin Core in 2015 understand it and have signed off on it. @Gavin Andresen, Jeff Garzic and Andreas Antonopoulos understand it. Even I have a fairly good understanding of it now. It really isn't rocket science and the change is no more complex than bitcoin is anyway.

6. Centralization of knowledge to Pieter would make him the single point of failure, if he disappear then bitcoin is screwed, that's just too large risk

Maybe you are thinking about libsecp256k1 and Greg? Too late.

 

[cypherdoc]

@Lee Adams

is BIP9 activated yet? certainly BIP 141 (SW) hasn't yet committed to BIP9 either way, so i wouldn't be so confident.

there's a tendency to capitulate and toss the simple 2MB HF solution aside as if there is something wrong with it given how long this debate has gone on and the intransigence of the other side. but you need to understand the ppl you're dealing with and the money (fiat) they stand to make if they are successful which is the perspective i brought to the table starting April 2014 way before this blocksize debate even started.

you need to step back and compare what we're talking about to truly assess risk. changing a constant vs >2000 LOC which change Bitcoin economics and introduce a truckload of multiple variables all of which introduce there own incentive structure. i'm not going to bother enumerating them all once again as they are littered throughout this thread.

sure SW seems clever and might even work but b/c of the influence of a corporate for-profit at the helm of core dev might cap Bitcoin's appreciation in the thousands of dollars per vs the hundreds of thousand per w/o them centrally manipulating things.

personally watching those ppl you mention above who supposedly "understand" SW, i'm doubtful about several of them as i've pointed out here in this thread. i don't even claim to fully understand it and i've been plowing through it continuously since December. there is precious little accurate information other than what i've been able to dig out on my own. how can the communty fully understand something this complicated when it's only been 3 mo? as opposed to the blocksize debate which has gone on for years? pwuille truly has retreated into a cave about this and i think he's being terribly irresponsible in that regard. i used to think more highly of him but now think he's terribly monetarily captured by Blockstream. go ahead and think positively about SW but i'm sure the CB's of the world aren't going to want to capitulate to a new master named Blockstream.

 

[cypherdoc]

so small blockists think Bitcoin can replace the dollar as a reserve currency and settlement layer? really? we tend to speak of Bitcoin relative to gold as a replacement but it really is the dollar that is the true measure. what relative market penetration does Bitcoin have in relation to the dollar? answer: pitifully puny. and yet these clowns want to build all these offchain layers upon such a foundation of sand? consider the volatility in price just i could create on the mainchain by attacking it. there would be a ripple effect upwards to LN & SC's of massive proportions as a result. some stable monetary system that would be.

not only does money have to be simple; it has to be predictable. by changing the scripting language to a BIP9/SW process, you're fundamentally asking for a boatload of SF op code applications that change Bitcoin economics. the devs won't be able to help themselves. it's in their nature. after all, they'd like to make money and by destroying the principles on which early adopters invested, namely Bitcoin as a SOV and p2p currency that was expected to scale worldwide, these new poachers will be able to steal value from those principles and channel inflationary profit to themselves.

mark my words.

 

[Norway]

I have been talking here lately why I think Core's alterations of the code is not needed.

I'll repeat myself now, but introducing a new term: Application Programming Interface (API).

As far as I understand, Blockstream are putting almost all their effort in making an API to bitcoin. And they are doing this by changing the bitcoin code. (Locking up funds in time in different ways etc.)

They don't believe in bitcon's ability to scale on chain, so they make unnecessary tools for other hypothetical non existing systems to solve the scaling issue. (Or, more likely: Just stall the bitcoin revolution. With a fake motivation.)

But the API is good enough as it is today. Any computer system can access and handle bitcoin.

The difficult part is to write that other system. And is has to be trusted, just like bitcoin. (Lightning Network will never ride trust free on the back of bitcoin. You need to trust the Lightning Network on it's own merits/concept/code.)

I'm sitting alone at my chair, drinking home made piña colada.