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why did Jed McCaleb sell mtgox right at the wrong time? he gave away a gold mine. oops, sorry. a Bitcoin mine.
he says it's b/c it was for security reasons. no. it's b/c he didn't understand the potential of Bitcoin.
now you expect me to believe in Ripple? especially when he and the other founders are holding back 50 Billion XRP's for themselves?
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I am just sitting here with my ripples. Not knowing what the hell they are for  Like a G+ user and their ghost town of friends. Trade debt? With who!? I think you must be mistaking me with another nerd who has friends  since they didn't cost you anything, you should just throw them in a drawer somewhere and forget about them for 10 years. if they happen to go up in value then you win. if not, no harm done.oh wait. if you don't circulate them, then how will they go up in value? |
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i have alot of clients who happen to be estate attorneys. we often talk about their work.
of course they're biased but the universal theme is that families should have an estate plan in place. i believe them and have one in place for my family. when it comes down to dividing the inheritance amongst siblings all kinds of problems can crop up which can tear apart relationships. i certainly can believe it myself as when my parents passed away, i had a sibling who kept asking/justifying for more and more b/c he was in an inferior financial situation to the rest of us.
bottom line, no matter how much you think you can trust a good friend to perform on an IOU at one point in time, there can certainly come a later point in time (IOU's have time related counterparty risk) where that trust may no longer apply due to changing circumstances. there needs to be a well defined plan in place to mediate disputes. and it has to be legal.
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Yet again with the cyclical thing! Then why not just use bitcoins!? What is the advantage of having to add a layer of abstraction on top of my bitcoins other than offloading transactions from the blockchain? And I will still need to wire people my usd if I use this to trade usd, and we all know that bitcoin stomps that system into the ground! I agree that the case for using Ripple to pay in Bitcoins is not very strong. Ripple makes more sense as a way to make fiat currencies act more like Bitcoins. However, there are a few reasons: 1) Ripple has faster transactions. 2) Ripple allows you to pay in dollars even if the recipient wants Bitcoins. 3) Ripple allows you to receive dollars even if you are paid in Bitcoins. 4) Ripple offers the ability to use community credit to borrow or lend Bitcoins. As I said, the case is not very strong. One nice thing though -- every merchant who accepts Ripple will be another merchant you can pay in Bitcoins. Once Bitcoin inbound gateways are set up, you'll be able to take a merchant's Ripple payment information, get a Bitcoin amount and account to pay from the gateway, and then the gateway will deliver the Ripple payment once you make the Bitcoin payment. The interface is so bad that I do not even know how to loan any type of money, bitcoin or otherwise, to anyone! We're not promoting Ripple as a lending platform. ... lol what? Direct from the wiki: Alice announces to the room: "I owe Bob $100." I understood that this is a poor analogy, but this is exactly what I am talking about. This kind of explanation is only leading to more confusion and misunderstanding. Your wiki is about as clear as a mudpuddle. I agree, it's very unclear. When I say we're not promoting Ripple as a lending platform, I mean by the common sense definition of lending. Technically, it is lending. For example, when you have $500 in the bank, technically you have loaned the bank $500. But we don't think of it as lending. For you to have the Ripple equivalent of $500 in the bank, a gateway must announce that it owes you $500. But that's not a lending platform. Joel, when are you going to realize that you can't just keep throwing out all these claims without explaining the details/mechanisms behind them. Those of us who have looked at the cursory information so far provided have not been impressed. Xion is right, you'd better step up your game quick or you won't get another chance. |
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So it's a credit system. How will it manage interest rates? Or iare you just assumed to lend money without compensation?
You can lend under any terms you want. Ripple doesn't compel any particular terms. The actual agreements are outside the scope of the system. Gateways typically lend against 100% collateral, which makes it pointless to charge interest. If I hold $100 of your money and loan you $100, there's no reason for me to charge you interest because that interest equals the interest on the $100 I hold. That's the best way to build a payment system. But Ripple fully supports other terms. You could charge someone interest instead of holding cash as collateral. You could charge an issue fee and make it settle on demand. You could allow the balance to float in either direction for mutual paying convenience and not settle. Whatever. Ultimately, we don't know what model will win out or whether different lending models will co-exist for different circumstances. You want to know what I think? Scam or not, your system desperately needs help. I have spent hours trying to understand why I would ever use your system. As far as I can tell, there is literally no reason for me to use your system over btcjam.com or bitcoin-otc.com. In fact there is less of a reason because you seem to be hellbent on making your system as complex to use as possible, and you seem to have a chokehold on a majority of the xrp. Is this the truth? How in the world would I know!? You don't address any of these things on the wiki or your website. You can loan other people money through the net, so what? Why in the world would I buy xrp? They seem to have no value, even as a debt trading instrument. I understood bitcoin right away after reading their wiki and I was able to resolve all of my questions without having to ask for the help of others. Your system is explained in circles. Ripple is good because you can trade debt! Trading debt is valuable. So because trading debt is valuable, Ripple is valuable. QUICK, BUY RIPPLES BEFORE YOU UNDERSTAND! Wut!? I have been watching quietly for months, and I haven't seen a single person give a good explanation as to why people should use/buy ripples. Not here, not on reddit, not on your forum, not on your website, and not on your wiki. Where in the heck are you hiding the positive aspects of this system? I am starting to think people are purposefully withholding information. Heck, at least the litecoin people make sense! Someone wanted to try and compete with bitcoin and get into a cryptocurrency early to be like the early adopters of bitcoin. Good for them. Is there some key piece of information which has passed me by? Because by all means, please share. The interface is so bad that I do not even know how to loan any type of money, bitcoin or otherwise, to anyone! The thing which boggles my mind the most is that lots of energy seems to be being put forth to get people to use the system, but no energy is being put forth to explain the system to the masses! Just use it. xrp are valuable. The system will change the way debt is exchanged. It is revolutionary. What in billions of blue blistering barnacles is revolutionary!? No one seems to know! No one can explain! Am I the only one who is massively confused by this system!? I was interested because someone told me that Ripple might help take the load off the blockchain in the near future. Sounds great! Now what? Am I paranoid about Ripple? Hell no, I am frustrated as all heck by it! /rant I apologize to all who have been caught in the crossfire. This has been bugging me for days. Very well said. I concur. I usually catch on quickly to concepts when explained well. Ripple is not. And what I do understand I don't like. |
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Whats this I hear about destroying XRP's after usage?
Quite convenient for the founders.
I'll also ask again. How many have ever been betrayed by a family member? Answer, more than you think.
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Ripple certainly looks interesting...but its no bitcoin. It looks like a fairly difficult thing to get off the ground anyway. Which is I guess why they're trying to use this community and bitcoin in general as a launching pad.
Sounds right to me. |
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Proudhon was an early adopter of my ignore list.
if you mean he made it onto your ignore list, then so did i. |
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proudhon, aren't you still holding some BTC in your offline wallets?
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i have a concern.
it has to do with CoinLab acting as an exchange AND as a broker for moneyed interests. namely the Wall St guys who want to buy $1M blocks of BTC.
seems to me there might be a conflict of interest in buying that amount of BTC for big clients who might be willing to slip in a higher fee either on top of the table or under the table to obtain the very best price perhaps gotten thru an orchestrated dip?
this would come at the expense of the smaller free marketing buyers and sellers who can't or won't pay the extra fee to do so. or they might not even understand that that's an option.
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just watched this talk by doug casey: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryD5lqRM-Tw (I think it was posted here but can't find the post). Watch that video (especially the 2ndish part about getting yourself and your wealth out of the country). Then look my avatar straight in the eye and say: "Bitcoin is in a bubble". just what does your avatar mean? |
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talk about feeding the troll! geez, what am i after taking the brunt of his trolling back in Fall 2011? chopped liver?  proudhon must be smarter than we're all giving him credit for! |
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i'm quite sure he was referring to me. alot of idiots were calling me a "bagholder" in Nov 2011:
Admitting you are right a few months ago has served me well. Thankfully there have been enough bag holders resisting the obvious.
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Yeah if we were to get these guys on board, it would be massive, they are also great salesmen. As the goldbug community gets converted, Sprott will also fall in line, I'm sure. Rick Rule is one of the smartest/erudite/successful goldbugs on the planet, his position on Bitcoin has and will evolve just like it's starting to do with the Mises guys and James Turk.
Great video. I had a pretty in-depth discussion with Rick Rule, along with a separate discussion with Peter Schiff, and others, last Saturday at the investment conference in Palm Springs. Great to see this coming along. I thought you said you sorta scared Schiff in that he didn't want you to make him look like a fool. Schiff is pretty computer/tech illiterate but obviously an economic giant. Do you think he'll ever come around to understanding the value of BTC or is he too wedded to his PM busines?. Maybe you can get on his show (if you are who I think you are) and discuss BTC now that it made a new all time high. we don't need schiff. he can miss the train choo choo |
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you don't hear James Turk mentioning it all in any of the many interviews he's given since interviewing Felix de la Cova either. they are fighting it. and no wonder, they are all deeply entwined in the gold trade. and/or a 350million market cap and steady bull market doesn't have much appeal for rick rule that's too bad for him; this is precisely the type of market he should be looking to frontrun. |
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I thought you said you sorta scared Schiff in that he didn't want you to make him look like a fool. Schiff is pretty computer/tech illiterate but obviously an economic giant. Do you think he'll ever come around to understanding the value of BTC or is he too wedded to his PM busines?. Maybe you can get on his show (if you are who I think you are) and discuss BTC now that it made a new all time high.
Now, you've gone too far. I'm a Peter Schiff fan, but I don't think he is anything close to an "economic giant". He knows his stuff and he is solidly grounded in the libertarian philosophy and Austrian economics, but his most important attribute is that he won't shut up  . I think he is unfortunately somewhat blinded his ego, and he is going to miss something as a result of that blindness, and make a dumb mistake. I've been listening to Schiff for years and wholeheartedly agree about his ego and verbosity. I can get past his personality though because of his vast knowledge of the economy and his ability to explain its workings in a clear and simple way. He is brilliant. He has a broad knowledge base spanning macroeconomics, government policy, constitutional and American history, and technical analysis. He doesn't use notes or teleprompters and can debate anyone anytime. He got one of the Social Security trustee to admit it was a ponzi scheme for cryin' out loud ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITMEZImvNio). He also shows some humility and admits that he knows the endgame (a currency crisis) but finds it difficult to predict the endgame. Honestly, I know "economic giant" seems a bit outlandish but who out there is any better? give me a break. i used to like him too but he had a great opportunity with Bitcoin but totally missed it. i think he's too invested in the gold/silver community to extract himself, much like all the others mentioned above: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTr_hTC90oQSchiff is tech illiterate and therefore I can't blame him for being skeptical and not on board yet. I called into his show a few weeks ago to try and sell him on BTC but to no avail. Just because he doesn't accept BTC yet doesn't negate everything else he has done in the economic realm. Which other economists out there do you think are better? Schiff is not an economist. he's a money manager. who do i consider better? any economist who takes Bitcoin seriously and i don't believe i really know of any except for George Selgin. otherwise most economists who think like Austrians believe solely in gold. this is an idea i have been fighting for a long while now. |
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you don't hear James Turk mentioning it all in any of the many interviews he's given since interviewing Felix de la Cova either. they are fighting it. and no wonder, they are all deeply entwined in the gold trade. |
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so my question is, can i easily download an iphone app from blockchain.info for an iphone user to send him some coin from my android as a demo? or does he have to create a blockchain.info account before this can happen making it an impractical demonstration?
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the other thing to consider is what if Bitcoin was meant to become the world's next reserve currency to be used to settle daily trade imbalances like we had with the gold standard? perhaps that is it's most optimum and efficient usage and might be served by the block size staying right where it is. That would be suicide for Bitcoin. The Napsters and Megauploads of the world get shut down while Bittorrent successfully resists all efforts to stop it. The only protection Bitcoin has is growth and widespread, diversified usage. i'm not saying that central banks would be the only ones using Bitcoin. after all, even individuals used gold under the gold standard. |
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thank you for this. thus, i would suggest making any changes to block size only if absolutely necessary. I don't think many here is suggesting we do a hard fork unless absolutely necessary. Thing is, it's very likely to become necessary at some point. It isn't necessary now, or in a while yet, but we anticipate it will be in the future. It really doesn't matter even if Bitcoin doesn't become the jack of all trades (which I think it won't because the blockchain structure is just too heavy for doing everything), it's just that the usage of it in any mainstream capacity will become fairly impossible for anything other than the transfer of very large amounts, unless this is eventually changed. 7 transactions per second is simply not enough. It's extremely important for people to stop looking at this like we either have Bitcoin as this very rigid and inflexible system that can store value well, or we "try to scale it infinitely and risk safe value storage". The real issue is anything but that. There is a clear middle ground which is what we should aim for. Bitcoin is not suitable for all possible transaction types that people have need for but it can do more than 7 transactions a second, and it needs to do more than that. Otherwise we will at some point hit a brick wall in Bitcoin adoption. the way i view this is that by arguing that we need to increase block size in anticipation of a large growth in tx's, you are in essence making a "market prediction". right now, as the price continues to escalate it is easy to see why you might assume this. but what if the US starts to have economic problems like Europe? what if we follow in the footsteps of Japan and have a prolonged deflationary episode lasting many years? the # tx's might never get to the size you envision. the other thing to consider is what if Bitcoin was meant to become the world's next reserve currency to be used to settle daily trade imbalances like we had with the gold standard? perhaps that is it's most optimum and efficient usage and might be served by the block size staying right where it is. |
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