Bitcoin Forum

I'm here at the opening night of Bitcoin 2013.

Waiting line for my conference badge etc. About 100 people in this line. Program starts in 35 min.

 :D

Make sure to get a quarter from Josh

i l
GREAT!! need someone like you to make it interesting!

Not Worth The Commute Today.  Hopefully Make It For The Start Tommorow.

Sounds more intimate than last night. :)

Is there a video stream of the conference?

I would also like to know...

Radio stream at http://freetalklive.com

Just past by ripple, BFL, Trade Hill booths etc. I'll make my rounds later. Conference about to start.

Oh also we all got like a gift bag with a few cool things inside. I'll mention these in my next post.

Lots of people here. Enough chairs in the front area to sit about 500.

A packed house so far.  :D

I see that there is a bitcoin ATM there...put government money in, get BTC to your smart phone.

Sweet.

I'll definitely need to have a look at this.

YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm standing outside the conference and a guys is literally on the phone trying to convince a guy to bring strippers to come and hand out brochures. Not sure for what but when hearing it it sounded out of the ordinary.

He said to have them wear bikinis. I'm guessing this is for tomorrow?

Lol

Good opening night with Peter V and the Winklevoss twins.

Edit: I also forgot attendees get a bitcoin and litecoin gift cards along with a bitcoin tip card.  ;D

LOL BRILLANT FUKIN BRILLANT!

Now I am jealous I didn't go :( I guess now with Bitcoin ATMs come the Bitcoin strippers

Tonight Peter v announced he will be replaced as the exec director of the btc foundation. We will know in a week or two who will be his replacement.

Also the twins presentation was awesome. The posed the question:

"We have VoIP and Skype came along. Now we have Bitcoin, who will come along and do the same as Skype did?"

Is there any boxes of fans :D

Smoothie, we have to meet up before the conference ends.. You going to star treck? If you don't see this in time we should definitely coordinate a time tomorrow, there are a ton of people from the forums here! We had over 40 people at today's premeetup at the Marriott bar!

I am in the Marriott also. PM me and we can meet up. Star Trek sounds awesome!

Lol I didn't get a close enough look yet. Bit pay and BFL still sharing a booth. I'll update on this tomorrow when I stop by.

http://s20.postimg.org/7ox62nhxl/image.jpg (http://postimg.org/image/7ox62nhxl/)

http://s20.postimg.org/46l669h1l/image.jpg (http://postimg.org/image/46l669h1l/)

http://s20.postimg.org/zetr3l6rt/image.jpg (http://postimg.org/image/zetr3l6rt/)

http://s20.postimg.org/ohx0sk9e1/image.jpg (http://postimg.org/image/ohx0sk9e1/)

It seems that AVALON ASIC is part of the conference on sunday from 130 to 200. No mention of othe ASIC companies. I found this interesting.

AVALON does not have a booth. I presume they don't need funding nor publicity?

They have so much demand.  I guess, why even bother with this stuff?

Btw, thanks for the updates.  No one else is really posting anything.

That's what I was thinking. I'll be attending the Avalon session on Sunday.

BFL showing off their bitsafe.......

Hmmmm interesting

More people need to write their forum handles on their name tags.

Lol I'm not hard to spot.

Are walking around with a smoothie in your hand?

Something like that. Looks like there is quite a few interesting sessions for tomorrow. There is so much goin on that there is 4 or 5 topics being discussed in different rooms concurrently. I can't attend all so I have to choose the most interesting ones to me.

Until tomorrow...

BFL is there, saw Josh earlier. They have some ASICS on the stand hashing away along with a new 'bit safe'.

Unlike the London conference, I would guess that the bitcointalk forum members are actually in the *minority* at this conference. It's been a sea of change since the last conference. Bitcoin feels mainstream. Especially will the free vodka, hostesses and tons of normal looking people.

LOL what people on the forum aren't "normal looking"?

This guy looks pretty abnormal. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWj0sBBu-m8

(Posting to subscribe)

I saw this too...a sign for free vodka at the conference. They trying to get us drunk? Lol

Well good thing I don't drink alcohol...just mashed up fruits lol.

LMAO I just like how he is like "normal people" LOL I was watching the stream half those girls are hired to be there and the other half are dragged by the dudes that want to show off their chicks. "This is what bitcoin millionaire rolls with OH YAAAA"

One other thing that I forgot to mention is there appears to be a slew of non "bitcoiner" type people at this conference.

For example: as I was passing one of the booths a guy pulled out a gold foil covered chocolate bitcoin and proceeded to indicate that that was a bitcoin. And I responded politely no that's just chocolate covered in gold foil shaped liked a physical bitcoin.

We have new people. Very healthy thing for bitcoin.

They were giving these out at another booth. I took one.

*cough* *cough*

It's true. There are a ton of new people. More importantly there are actually women now- indeed many booths have bitcoin companies with diverse team members and many conference attendee's are also women. Very good sign things are in a good direction.

Now if only the men there would stop insisting that there need to be prostitutes, strippers and show girls in order to be "complete", this conference might not be a total flop.

A conference isn't a conference until your newfound best friend walks in on you getting the second half of a massage by Ms. Woo; only to ask if you have the keys because he left his bowl in your car.

Have fun guys. I'm jealous.

Well technically I only heard 1 man do this.

Yea I know, but having worked with a lot of the guys running booths there for 2 years now, I'm actually surprised there wasn't already a "Bitcoin beauty pageant" in the lineup.

That has been true in my experience, on the other hand I've meet plenty of people who are on the forums.

Great idea

Wish I could have gone.  Next year, hopefully.  I just got crazy busy with work over the past few weeks.  Bleh.  Would have been nice to shake hands with Smoothie.

Perhaps next time troll meets troll.

That wouldn't be complete without renting a large version of these costumes (http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/grownups/shows/nuzzle-and-scratch) first.

I snapped a quick pic of one of the units BFL had on display:

https://i.imgur.com/DxKQ6In.png

I agree you can be there too and wear them both lol

I am a little bit disappointed that there still isn't anything I can really *buy* at this conference. It seems like it would have been the perfect place to sell ASIC's, or specialized Bitcoin hardware (BFL has a hardware wallet on display) or any sort of Bitcoin stuff (I wanted to buy the ATM on the spot). I know I wasn't prepared with our Laser Engraved Diamonds, so I'm thinking making next conference we might see some real commerce going on.

definitely, next year needs to have a room dedicated as a market place for PRODUCTS

Seems like the only way to even get a whiff of an ASIC in 2013 is to invest in ASICMINER.

And considering the guy who runs ASICMINER is now making like a million dollars a week, it really makes you wonder how the hell we're almost halfway through 2013 and ASIC rigs are still only in the hands of very very few people.

Agreed. I'm surprised you can't buy casascius coins.

Probably has to do with the fact that he started wholesaling them exclusively now, and no one has gotten their shit together enough to establish a good enough dealership for the US market yet.

Their solution (marketed by their own social network Zurker (http://www.zurker.com/)): https://www.preferzen.com/
Did they even mention that one? Please someone approach them and ask them about it...

Gavin's state of the union was standing room only. Wow it is packed in here.

Bitcoin is for real folks.

http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTKpmbUykQRl7azj7szrmZs-Y3L-Yd-Tl3GGaFFIrjnf7QZXw5I<--- Normal Looking :)

Yep, wish I could be there to meet a lot of you guys. It's nice to be able to match a face and voice with the text I read here all the time. The 2011 Prague Conference was practically in my back yard and I missed out on that one too. I am really kicking myself for that. Crazy_Rabbit, was that you I heard interviewed on the radio yesterday? If you live in Prague, we should meet up sometime. I have been here all along and have yet to meet up with Slush or anyone else here. It's time for me to get more active in all this.

Smoothie, thanks for putting this thread up. I am eager to read more!

Day two was awesome.

Tons of topics and information. It's so big you can't attend all sessions.

What I keep having to be reminded is that bitcoin is an experiment and nothing is a sure thing.

Many of what is going on is uncharted waters. A roller coaster if you will.

Doing things right the first time is a good approach. Jeff G mentioned the development of bitcoin is extremely slow given it affects so many even with simple changes to the code.

Wait, weren't you the one who convinced some korean chick to post pics for bitcoins a while back? 

I did, and I will tomorrow as well.

smoothie, where u at boy?

i keep lookin' over my shoulder for a little fruit drink to poke me in the ass, much like over the last year.  :-*

You here at the conference?

I was expecting that some crazy person would start ranting and raving about government conspiracies or something during a Q&A at a developer session.

I was not disappointed. Mike Hearn was too patient.


Then there was someone that asked in two different sessions about what would happen if there were a bug in the protocol, and bitcoin collapsed, and the world came to an end, and, and, and, ...
Gavin's response was "You worry too much!"

I was there for both of those. The first was a guy sitting in the front row. The second was an Asian guy on the mic.

yep.  got my handle on my badge.

Cool. Let me know if you wanna meet up.

My username is on front and back of my shirt.  ;D

Well, it's not like anyone would want to meet the forum's Master Troll.

I mean, I might have to punch you in the nose.

But otoh,

I... Can't... Help... Myself...

PM sent!

Lol get ready to join the dark side mahahahaha...j/k  ;D

Reply sent!

hahahahaha :D

Excellent updates, thanks OP :) You get a +1 karma point ;)

Did anyone see Josh and ask him about the butterfly miners or Yifu on his Avalon Chip shipment?

Yep. They are pretty humble about how things turns out. Avalon labs guy is here too. Pretty funny guy, just casually taking over the world. :-)

So I walk into the tech session looking for the guy with turquoise shirt. You have two choices:

1. A short, wimpy, nerdy guy with a beard and thick black glasses. Classic geek.
2. A big, thick  handsome guy with a great tan and someone you wouldn't dare punch in the nose.

Which do you choose as smoothie?

Shouldn't this be a poll?

Edit: But my guess would be a big fat number two!

Build one and they will come.

Since it is smoothie after all .

Does anyone have a youtube of Gavin's speech?

I'd love to see some pictures of forum users as well (especially Smoothie :D).  Always good to put a face to the name.

Indeed I would be curious of the results of a poll lol

Alt chain panel was interesting:

Crazy rabbit and Coblee in my opinion did great. The FRC and ripple reps in my view did not. Lots of unanswered questions on their "currency" of choice.

FRC coin supply is in the hands of a few. Same for ripple.

Ripple is a company. It has a booth here at the conference. It claims it is decentralized and soon to be open sourced.

My main question to ripple supporters is what is to stop a government from going to their office(s) and shutting their system down?

They have been 'soon to be open sourced' since the beginning, I wonder for how long they can still convincingly use that statement.

I'm lookin' for ya too. :-) Heading to Yifu's talk at 1:30.

Done (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=210421.msg2203690#msg2203690).

Careful now.

I could be using reverse reverse psychology.

Turquoise shirt  ;)

Let's analyse the situation...


Suspect 1: Classic geek...

https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSTvonbzo10o7dbyVPMVB6pfacDzIQx0scyu8IQ6bgOEMPY-RsQGQ

http://images.buddytv.com/articles/beauty-and-the-geek/images/nate.jpg





Suspect 2: Typical brogrammer...

http://mjcdn.motherjones.com/preset_12/brogrammers_425x320.jpg

http://www.yorkstreetlabs.com/images/Brogramming-1.jpeg

http://www.stephenwooten.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/285487_10150242797041645_512296644_7553667_5306341_n.jpeg




Veredict: Smoothie probably is "Suspect 2"... Smoothie == Brotein Shake

 ;D

This seems about right:

http://s22.postimg.org/mfk6d2hhd/smoothie.png

Acutally, Ripple has way bigger problems than a danger of possible government raid.

What's bigger than having it be shut down ?

Reputation as a scammers have?

Lol

FEDs must be jealous now, even in their wildest wet dream they would not create something like XRP: no need to release data about total money in circulation, and distribution: Opencoin could just giveaway however many XRPs to whomever they like, and possibly no one will find out. And most importantly, the possibility to print more and create inflation without even being found. Maybe they just think "How about we take no action and see how much suckers' money this thing will siphon off, so that we may improve our Ponzi scheme in a similar way?"

The current structure does not appear to be securely sound.

I won't touch it with a 10 foot pole.

One thing I could not help notice in the booth layout on the conference map is that the BFL/BitPay booth reads as BitPay only. BFL was not listed on that booth on the conference map.

I found that odd.

ok, let me give you guys a hint:

https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRNreQYSyOtdIrXjC_h7GuWumQnpnOs-oXQKLT6udaw_X_jM1F6

Whudda thunk it would be so important what I look like. Lol

Conference was an absolute success despite some unnamed businesses at the conference failing to deliver anything of value. In my opinion.

Lots of development going on. Yifu and Avalon are leading the ASIC landscape very professionally. Lots of good news. New faces, more women involved, lots of press coverage.

Yeah.  I wouldn't touch it with my dick either.