Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP.

[cypherdoc]

DAO is under attack again

https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/4ot3z8/dao_is_under_attack_again/
[doublepost=1466354846][/doublepost]wow, the desperation is palpable:

[doublepost=1466355356][/doublepost]the most interesting comment is the one about Kleiman taking so many BTC with him to the grave:

 

[IMALLIN]

Cypherdoc, your post on the other page is one of the best posts I've read here. I was just having a debate the other day about bitcoin vs ethereum. Imo the ethereum people fail to see the most important fact here and that's bitcoin as the best money known to man so far. Ethereum is something else. Maybe something good and it could perhaps also function as money but ethereums main focus is smart contracts and not money. Kind of comparing apples to oranges imo.

 

[VeritasSapere]

@IMALLIN I think the main focus behind Ethereum is smart contracts because Bitcoin has already figured out how to do money, which Ethereum has completely included, while building new innovations on top of this base. I suppose I struggle to see Bitcoin as the best money known to man so far solely because of this blocksize limit. Since this blocksize limit detracts from Bitcoins ability to be the best possible sound money. Bitcoin might have been the best a few years ago but now it does seem to have more competition, as long as the network remains restricted I would not consider it to be the best form of money. I would consider some of the alternatives to be better money solely because they are cheaper, faster and more reliable. Again this is solely because of the blocksize limit, I would change my tune if that was changed.

I might come across like a bit of a altcoin evangelist right now, just so you know my biggest single holding is still Bitcoin. I just want to strike some fear or doubt in the hearts of the Bitcoin maximalists, I know I am preaching to the choir here but I know some of the small blockist are listening, and they should recognize that Bitcoin does have competition, simply ignoring or underestimating that competition is not the best way to react to such market pressure. Bitcoin can be obsolesced and outcompeted regardless of the love we might have for the project.

 

[AdrianX]

if you step back and survey the landscape, you will see that Bitcoin's Sound Money function has won. for me, the technical price chart says it all. the breakout from 200 is extremely positive and determinate. if we were to have failed as a tech, it should've occurred then during that 3 yr bear period of intense blocksize blockade. instead, we are arching higher with penetration of the significant 470-500 price barriers that have now become support and are free floating in space ready to launch higher. this tells me that Maxwellianism will be washed away soon enough.

and i made this point before as evidence; hodlers have clearly been the winners (most appreciation/return) of investing strategies/choices in my multi-bucket theory of investing in the Bitcoin space consisting of merchants, mining, hodling, & services. price/hodling is now filling it's bucket back up to where it needs to be to balance out the other options in the space. in fact, it should be the predominant bucket for many years in order to drag along the other buckets into the global economy. it's still amazing how early we are. if you ask the avg person on the street about Bitcoin, they will not have heard of it. if you ask the avg person in the know who has heard of it, they will not have invested or done anything about it. IOW, we're just getting started.

the Ethereum debacle is highly illuminating for me. smart contracting is extremely complex and it was predicted that there would be problems. Bitcoin and crypto for me means Sound Money. that's where the problem is and that's what needs to be solved first and foremost. Bitcoin has always been a poison dart pointed at the heart of central banking. smart contracting can remain in the purview of Wall St afaic. they will need the business anyways so as not to cause severe disruption in the world today. they will just need to transact in Bitcoin though.

"most ppl investing in cryptocurrencies will lose money" is a necessary condition to launch Bitcoin higher. not everyone can come along for the ride. nor should they and nor should the skeptics deserve to. most ppl need to lose and Ethereum has made me prescient (along with many other failures). misunderstanding what we're doing here will cause great losses. the volatility in the price chart is a reflection of this misunderstanding and skepticism and is necessary to shake out the weak hands. this is a transfer of wealth from perpetual bailout recipients to those who adhere to the fairness of Sound Money.

the ride has just begun.
[doublepost=1466347638,1466346993][/doublepost]Extraordinary:

[doublepost=1466347863][/doublepost]i probably should add another bucket to my choices: failed projects.

which is probably the biggest of all; only as a huge sink hole for lost capital. very necessary though.
[doublepost=1466348319][/doublepost]LBC in Kenya is revealing and noteworthy. this is the home of M-Pesa, the first successful national digital fiat currency that i'm aware of. M-Pesa was a critical piece of evidence back in 2011 for me in determining the likelihood of Bitcoin's success. if they're converting to Bitcoin, look the hell out:

Just cluttering up this thread with quotes I want to double "like" this one being one.

 

[jbreher]

Presently Bitcoin has a one megabyte blocksize limit. Whereas Ethereum has an adaptive blocksize.

Therefore Ethereum is scalable today and Bitcoin is not. This is why the Core developers today are saying that Bitcoin can not scale, whereas the Ethereum developers are saying that their project can scale.

If that is the argument, I consider Etherium doubly-doomed.

I get that an adaptive maxblocksize can remove an artificial obstacle to scaling. However, it is insufficient to consider that as an Etherium scalability advantage for the long term. Eventually, Bitcoin's artificial limit will be increased (sooner rather than later if Core gets the hell outta the way). But at some point, system capacity will be limited by the fundamental capacity of the Internet. At that point, Bitcoin will have a great advantage over Etherium for the simple fact that the blockchain is not burdened with contract data.

The Etherium plan (I believe this is as of yet not designed to specification, correct?) is to shard. Bitcoin can probably handle sharding, as each shard's state need not manipulate the state of other shards. But Etherium, with its smart contracts, would seem to be broken by this model. If contracts depend on the results of other contracts, what is to stop cyclic cross-shard recursion? Again, at first blush, this seems insoluble.

 

[cypherdoc]

Cypherdoc, your post on the other page is one of the best posts I've read here. I was just having a debate the other day about bitcoin vs ethereum. Imo the ethereum people fail to see the most important fact here and that's bitcoin as the best money known to man so far. Ethereum is something else. Maybe something good and it could perhaps also function as money but ethereums main focus is smart contracts and not money. Kind of comparing apples to oranges imo.

funny thing is, those are the exact same statements i made back when this thread started in Aug/2011. some things never change, i guess

 

[jbreher]

DAO is under attack again

https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/4ot3z8/dao_is_under_attack_again/

I chortled:

The idea : I will do the hack too, tonight !!! and get my money back!! The exploit is online and we just have to test.. like this guy (the second attacker).

Cause if we wait noboby will help us! We put money in a sort of rape machine!
​

Sorry. I know the situation sux for many. But that's one funny comment.

 

[IMALLIN]

@VeritasSapere Yes bitcoin scaling is problematic at the moment. But it also has the biggest network effect by far making it the superior crypto currency atm. Yes there may be others that could do the job better, like Monero but these coins struggle with actually catching up with bitcoins superior network effect. The network effect probably being one of the most important when it comes to gaining acceptance as money. Also bitcoin has a cap at 21M units. As far as I understand Ethereums cap is up for discussion something that is highly concerning if you want to see this as a superior form of money.

Also I'd like to add that Bitcoin may be the only crypto currency that one can consider money atm. What can you purchase with ETH? The Altcoins hold speculative value (like shares in a startup company) but they don't actually function as money (yet?)

 

[jbreher]

After evaluation, I don't think I have a problem with Etherium's inflation model. Well, other than it being indeterminate at this point. But it is strictly limited even in its indeterminism. If I understand correctly, inflation is hardcapped at a certain number of Ethers per year? On a percentage basis, this would tend asymptotically to 0%.

Even a constant rate of inflation might be tolerable. A known rate can be factored precisely into business planning.

The evil in the current fiat system is that the rate of inflation is subject to capricious avarice. Well, that and the fact that the inflation benefits insiders at the expense of the less-moneyed. OK, yeah, that latter bit is the bigger evil.

 

[VeritasSapere]

@jbreher I agree that with the artificial limit out of the way Bitcoin is indeed more scalable when compared to Ethereum because of this contract data.

I tend to be more optimistic in regards to scaling, there is indeed a limit we can hit in regards to our technology and internet capacity. It is true that under the same transaction volume Ethereum would hit this limit much earlier. However I tend to agree with Gavin Andresen that technological progress is more likely to stay ahead of the adoption curve.

Part of me wishes that I shared your confidence about the blocksize limit being removed within Bitcoin. I still think that Bitcoins governance model might be fundamentally flawed, or conversely it will function correctly and follow the economic majority within Bitcoin who will have became a niche group that still do not want Bitcoin to scale, or at the very least succeed in preventing it from scaling. In the time that this takes to play out Bitcoin could already lose its dominant position remaining a relatively small niche currency while the alternatives rise to fulfill the vision of Satoshi.

I have talked to small blockist who have literally told me that they would be happy having their expensive, slow and unreliable Bitcoin that the masses would not want to use, as long as they can have their "pure" manifestation of Bitcoin for their small niche group of "cypherpunks". They say this is a technical fact but it is obviously ideology, I can see through that at least. They have told me that even if Bitcoin dropped to under number twenty in the market cap that they would still not lose "faith" and would be happy that they have their "pure" niche currency for their peculiar ideology.

@IMALLIN The network effect can be overtaken, and cryptocurrency is highly interoperable, I can go to any store that accepts Bitcoin and pay with Dash and Ethereum for example. Considering that Dash and Ethereum are both faster, cheaper and more reliable, from a consumer point of few at least they do seem like better forms of currency.

The inflation rate of Ethereum has been decided upon. The same amount of Ethereum will be created ever year into perpetuity. Allowing for extremely low inflation rates over the long term.

 

[awemany]

So guys, this thought just occured to me whilst arguing on reddit (and I said as much there):

Why the heck don't we wait with SegWit until Litecoin has implemented and tested it?

After all, the Litecoin dev was very keen on keeping Bitcoin blocksize small (while he's replacing Litecoin's with a dynamic, open limit...).

So he should want to be the guinea pig to test this ...

I think we should argue that SegWit gets a couple of months of testing (at least) on Litecoin before it gets implemented for Bitcoin.

EDIT: Just made a reddit submission: https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/4oujk3/segwit_should_be_tested_on_litecoin_first/

 

[VeritasSapere]

"Scrapping ledgers and starting over every time a new protocol is invented would be madness. It would defeat the entire purpose of money which is to preserve a record of value given but not yet received. It'd be sort of like deleting all of your files every time you upgrade your operating system or buy a new computer."

This seems like an inaccurate analogy to me, the ledger is still preserved even if some people choose to switch ledgers. It is not like we are scrapping the old ledger either. When I buy a new computer I transfer my files over to the new computer, I do not delete them. This does not seem that different to simply transferring value over to a new protocol, or in the case of this analogy I can still keep both computers running, and transfer the files as I need to over to the new computer, maybe one of the computers is better at doing certain things compared to the other, taking this analogy even further we can even network these computers, in regards to this analogy this can refer to the interoperability of cryptocurrencies, where in some cases this could even be mutually beneficial.

I am also a strong believer in the free competition of cryptocurrency. This is an important tenant for people to truly achieve financial freedom, you might agree with the economic policy of Bitcoin but others might not, the ability to switch ledgers seems like a crucial aspect in order for people to truly have that freedom of choice.

 

[cypherdoc]

@VeritasSapere

"This seems like an inaccurate analogy to me, the ledger is still preserved even if some people choose to switch ledgers."

I hope you're not suggesting this occurs when one switches from Bitcoin to ethereum ? because that isn't even remotely what happens.

 

[VeritasSapere]

@cypherdoc The Bitcoin ledger will never cease to exist, I am certain of that. When I choose to transfer value from Bitcoin to Ethereum. The record of this transaction still exist within the Bitcoin ledger. I have simply chosen not to store as much value in that particular ledger and store it in a different ledger instead, both ledgers are still preserved in this case. The Bitcoin ledger continues to exist regardless of my participation in it.

I think maybe the issue here is that you are seeing it in very absolute terms, either one ledger or another ledger. I am not saying that everyone will move to Ethereum and that this will "preserve" the Bitcoin ledger, that would indeed be inaccurate. What I am saying here is that as people freely move between the ledgers of their choice that the old ledgers do continue to exist. Therefore it is inaccurate to say that switching between ledgers is the same as "Scrapping ledgers and starting over every time a new protocol is invented" that would indeed be madness, but that is not what I am suggesting here at all. In the scenario I have used here as an example the record of value is preserved, and it is not undermined by people switching ledgers whenever they choose to do so.

 

[cypherdoc]

@VeritasSapere

But of course. Any one person's tx won't effect Bitcoin. But that's not what are talking about here. We're talking about aggregate movements of the community of users. Bitcoin value will lose out if ethereum were to take over to the extent you're promoting.

 

[VeritasSapere]

@cypherdoc We are in agreement then, I do not think such a aggregate movement of the community of present users is likely to happen, when I discuss these alternative cryptocurrencies overtaking Bitcoin it will more likely be because of new people coming in, not necessarily Bitcoin users themselves switching ledgers. The majority of the world has not adopted cryptocurrency yet, the question for me is more what cryptocurrency will these other six billion people in this world choose to adopt.

Though if some of the alternative cryptocurrencies do become more dominant over Bitcoin then of course it would impact the value of Bitcoin, however I think that is something we should accept either way, it is just up to the free choice of individuals of where they choose to store their value after all. I would not blame people for being wary of Bitcoin considering the current situation, it is easier for me to hold Bitcoin because I spend most of my time learning about cryptocurrency. This knowledge makes me much more confident, but most people do not have that luxury at least not the extend that I do focusing on this field full time.

I did not think I was promoting the take over of Ethereum over Bitcoin, more like predicting it as one of the possible scenarios that could possibly occur. Maybe I see it more as a warning towards Bitcoin to get their act together, it might not seem like it but I am still rooting for Bitcoin.

 

[Zarathustra]

Additional ledgers have inflationary effects (= decreasing value of the first ledger); it has similar effects as increasing the 21 million limit. Like tar sand reduced the value of crude oil.

 

[VeritasSapere]

@Zarathustra I have never been very convinced by this argument. They are separate currencies, they do not inflate each other, in the same way that the Zimbabwe dollar has not inflated the US dollar and the Euro for instance.

It definitely does water down the market capitalizations a bit though, if these alternatives did not exist there would certainly be more value in Bitcoin today, however I consider this freedom and competition overall to be a positive thing for cryptocurrency as a whole. Another example might be silver and gold. If a large silver deposit is found it certainly does not inflate the supply of gold because they are separate, it might take value away from gold if more people invest in silver. But that is not the same as actually inflating the supply of gold. In the same sense, Ethereum and Bitcoin are separate currencies they do not inflate each other.

 

[satoshis_sockpuppet]

You are the first one I met having good arguments to defend Ethereum.

One of the things I found quite remarkable, this is due to the scripting language though, is that when you load the Mist wallet you can set up a wallet contract, which allows for multisignature and daily withdraw limits and a bunch of other features all with a few clicks within an easy to use GUI. As far as I understand it this just does not exist yet within Bitcoin at least not with such ease of use, and I do consider this a significant feature allowing normal users to have a far higher degree of security.

There is apparently a plus in Ethereum in the end user experience with the GUI and standard features. But I still think the underlying technology isn't superior.
Things like a daily withdrawal limit of single users shouldn't be scripted into the blockchain imho. This can and should be done with client side code.
I just discussed the withdrawal limit with a friend and I think something like cascaded timelocked Bitcoins (plus a second key to unlock all keys if necessary, stored somewhere safe) with the surplus getting timelocked again after one day automatically by your client might be a good way to do that safely. An unsafer way would be a third party signing which is straightforward an acceptable as well imho.

Apart from the technical aspect I think the withdrawal limit is a nice wallet feature for end users and a smart idea to include by ETH devs.

he proof of work algorithm is highly ASIC resistant, taking up a lot of memory, while the innovation of "uncles" within mining allows for a more fair mining environment, where miners are not disadvantaged because of latency, solving one of the problems of mining centralization.

I don't think that's necessarily an advantage and as you know I'm very much a fan of forking the PoW of Bitcoin. And I wouldn't call Litecoin technically superior although it is more ASIC resistant and has faster block times. The uncle stuff is pretty new to me and I have to read further on this..

Ethereum has implemented an adaptive blocksize which is something Bitcoin has so far been unable to do.

Imho the only reason Ethereum got so far and really a political problem, not a technical one.

It seems that if Ethereum does move to proof of stake, that the proof of stake system that the Ethereum team has designed is extremely innovative, a revolution in proof of stake really.

I don't think much of PoS and I think it's a very risky idea which is still uncertain to happen in Ethereum at this point.

Ethereum is an extremely innovative project

Hm I think it's mostly Bitcoin + Turing complete scripting + a lot of momentum.


--

Something more about PoS:
At the current point, if a big enough number of Bitcoiners decided the miners aren't acting in their interest or there is a major bug in the mining algorithm they can do (relatively straightforward) a PoW fork and keep the existing ledger without much problem.
If you have PoS isn't this quite impossible? You had to handpick adresses you don't trust and blacklist them in your fork.
[doublepost=1466369024][/doublepost]And another point: I don't think much of this "friendly blockchain" stuff.
The "friendly coexistence" paradigm by many Ehtereum users is a trojan horse imho. There is no place for multiple big blockchains. There will always be smaller coins for special purposes and small communities but I'm a Bitcoin maximalist and we should have 95% Bitcoin market dominance.
[doublepost=1466369356][/doublepost]ROFL

Apparently the Litecoin guys, followers of one of the strongest small block advocates Charlie Lee, don't want any of that SW stuff for their chain.


Ah. You can't make that up.

"Thank's but no thanks." lol

And while their leader was busy preventing scaling in Bitcoin they adapt the Bitpay scheme..
[doublepost=1466369795,1466368856][/doublepost]lol they are really getting frightened, looks like @awemany found a weak spot.

https://np.reddit.com/r/litecoin/comments/4ouyb2/folks_from_rbtc_propose_to_test_segwit_with/d4fqsp0

 

[Zarathustra]

@Zarathustra Another example might be silver and gold. If a large silver deposit is found it certainly does not inflate the supply of gold because they are separate, it might take value away from gold if more people invest in silver. But that is not the same as actually inflating the supply of gold. In the same sense, Ethereum and Bitcoin are separate currencies they do not inflate each other.

Gold and gold 2.0 is not the same too, and gold 2.0 does not inflate the supply of gold, but it inflates the total supply of gold (traditional gold plus gold 2.0) and therefore reduces the value of traditional gold.

Remember: Gold collapsing - Bitcoin up!