It's a pity, and it illustrates the need for exchanges to have a reliable and understanding banking partner that will stand up for bitcoin users. I think these guys can present an excellent solution to the problem (which appears to be a problem that all exchanges and several business are facing): https://www.havelockinvestments.com/fund.php?symbol=CFIG |
|
|
|
|
I have been doing some thinking, and I have a question.
Let's set up a hypothetical scenario: First, let's assume that this venture is legit (personally, I'm content that it is). Second, let's assume it turns out to be a resounding success and helps BTC really take flight -- and consequently the value of one BTC increases dramatically.
Given that hypothetical scenario: would the potential investor be better off keeping his coins and waiting for the increased value (essentially getting a free ride), or would the potential investor be better off risking his coins buying shares now? In either case, the potential investor wins, but if he simply holds his coins he can win -- but without taking the extra risk.
If this venture is successful, will the rewards from investing exceed the rewards from just holding the coins? Will the exchanges pay fees in USD or BTC, and in what form will the profit be forwarded to the investors?
[Did that make any sense at all?]
|
|
|
|
It's difficult to resist the temptation to guess which bank this effort is springing out from. There's one in particular I think that stands out, but I don't want to spoil anything for those behind this effort. On the other hand, it would make quite an epic "I told you so" afterwards, so here's the SHA256 of my guess so I can return later and tell you all "I told you so": 4077551e3b5f3b040b3015bd521109e5101450047eb43f8f1865744e103c0d8d.  |
|
|
|
Havelock Investments do have our personal information and company address on file. We have been closely working with them over the past few months
on the different options of bringing our services forward to the Bitcoin community.
May I suggest sharing your details with one of the more trusted forum members (say, John K.)? If a "senior" forum member vouches for the authenticity of your information, I think that would please many potential investors and alleviate some of the fears expressed here. These forums are riddled with scams and broken dreams, but there is a small set of forum members who have always proven to be trustworthy. From following reddit the last few months, I knew this was coming - I actually believe this is legit and a great thing for bitcoin. Best of luck in your exciting venture! |
|
|
|
Doesn't help that everybody and their grandma is launching their own ASIC line in the near future, then. BFL and Avalon have proven to be fuckups, but every time a new company comes to market (KNC, BitFury, HashFast, Cointerra), you're betting that company will fail to take any market share. It's an unenviable position.
So the fuck what? There were 4 companies last year starting to develop asics. One failed completely, and two others still can't ship for shit a year later, regardless of taking in millions of dollars. By the time some other serious competitors actually do arise (if it happens), AM will be on 2nd or 3rd gen tech and have much more mature infrastructure (resellers, etc). There is room for more players in the ASIC market. In the end, I expect the production costs to determine "the winner(s)" in the ASIC market, and I think AM can achieve the lower production costs than the competitors: low labor costs, no need for external financing, excellent logistics, proven supply+distribution-chain (and products), established reputation, perfect location, etc. TLDR; AM has an excellent market position, competitors will need to work their asses off to dislodge FC. |
|
|
|
As friedcat didn't provide any explanation so far, we definitely need to ask this question "officially" at the next question round (I know it's not offical, but still convey a certain weight). We have been talking about this issue for a while on this thread, and several of us insisted that the main problem is for the reputation of AM. The fear or hate that rise in some people mind simply by AM having 20% of the hash power must not be underestimated, any reason that can rationaly support this unrational feeling must be avoided at all cost. The small number of transaction is such a reason. So now the question went outside this thread, and for me this issue has become therfore the most important concern, more than any delay of blades or whatever short-term stuff. I'm almost certain they could fix the issue in 20 minutes by just editing the config-file of their bitcoin client to connect to a few of the well-known supernodes. That should easily fill the blocks with transactions, and also propagate their blocks quickly so as avoid orphans. |
|
|
|
I believe I should be given the power to temporary ban people for 3 days for not following guideline, especially after not fixing their shit after I give a nasty reply and a nasty PM.
Hear, hear! +1 kiba, I consider myself your biggest fan, and I fully support your war on the chaos and disorganization that those scumbags bring to the press section! Where do I vote? [kiba 4 prezdent!] |
|
|
|
So what would be needed to remove the possiblity for the site operator to defraud the investors, would be an verifiable external source of entropy over which the site operator has no control and that all participants can verify independently.
You actually need a LOT more than that. Getting a provable source of entropy isn't actually the real difficult part. The hard part is means by which dooglus can use that source to process rolls AND can prove that the details of the bet weren't changed after he obtained the random number. What you seem to miss is that distinction - and it's massive. Here's the rough flow of what should happen : Player makes a bet Dooglus obtains verifiable random number Result of bet is calculated. How do you ensure that the right random number is applied to an unchanged bet? Without massively slowing down the system it's very hard to do. But if you can't guarantee that the bet processed is the one intended before the result was calculated then suddenly NOTHING is secure any more. Dooglus could cheat players by getting 10 random numbers then working out which combination of applying them to 10 pending bets gave the house the most. Or he could cheat investors by betting himself, working out the result then changing the bet size (or even odds) dependent on what the result was. We'd be worse off than we already are. Conceptually the solution is easy - bets are logged in public first then some combination of a hash of the bet details + a timestamp used to generate the seed for a random number. But putting that concept into practice is harder than it might sound - you have to deal with things like what if the external source becomes unavailable (do bets hang or are they cancelled? can he selectly choose not to receive results if he doesn't like them?). And you also then have to find a random source where it's verifiable which output is produced from which input - but where such results can't be obtained in advance (which means real-time sampling of entropy based on the time-stamp element). It's using a sledgehammer to crack a walnut. The solution already exists - if you don't believe he'll act in good faith then don't invest. Every investment without a fixed rate of return has the potential for the issuer to act in bad faith and cheat investors subtly. There's no reason why this one should be any different. I read your post a several times, and it seems you are talking about being provably fair for the bettors. And I have a certain understanding of that concept: apply a hash function on the server-side secret and send to the client, combine the server-side secret with some client-side input then process the bet according to commonly agreed rules. When the server-side secret is revealed, the client can verify that the rules were followed. I find that quite straight-forward. My problem is a slightly different one, since JD has three parties: player, investor and operator. The operator is in this case the site/dooglus and acts as a mediator between the bank (investors) and the player. The player gets to have "provably fair" gaming. But what would it take to give the investors the same "provably fair" investing? The operator, who knows the server-side secret, can pretend he is a player and make bets against the investors -- and win every time! How can that, theoretically, be prevented? And the most sensible answer so far is to link the outcome of the bet to the outcome of an unpredictable future event which is not known or knowable by any of the three parties involved. The more I think about it, linking the outcomes to future blocks in the bitcoin blockchain actually solves the problem -- but would simply be way too slow for the players! Edit: By the way, I'm not saying that I don't trust dooglus (because I believe dooglus is one of the most honorable members of the forum). I'm saying that *proof* is better than *trust*. |
|
|
|
Why don't you just use as a salt for each roll a random # generated by http://www.random.org/ or another true random generator site (this one uses atmospheric noise I believe)? Wouldn't that close any loophole for the operator or someone who has compromised the site and can see the server seeds to cheat? I'm not familiar with everything random.org has to offer. But is it probably fair? Is there any way I can prove to the player that the seed that made them lose was fairly chosen by random.org, and not carefully calculated by JD to make them lose? It wouldn't change anything unless random.org were told the bet in advance, recorded it and disclosed it - as otherwise you could change what you bet once you knew the result from them. And if they recorded the bet BEFORE revealing the random number then suddenly we have to start trusting that THEY aren't betting and exploiting it. Beyond a certain point investors just have to trust - not just in this but in many investments. How do investors know mining companies who have a machine break down didn't swap a good one for a bust one of their own? How do investors know an investment/trading funs isn't creaming off cash by buying/selling from alt accounts? etc. At a certain stage people have to stop worrying about things that are only detectable from statistical analysis after the fact. Short of having a 24/7 live video feed it's hard to stop or detect a lot of types of fraud. You have to either be willing to assume some degree of good faith or just not invest. Before dooglus invented provably fair, we just played Dice Games and hoped for the best. Now that JD came out we understand how useful that was. In this thread we tried to find a RNG that the owner can't manipulate, but if it's not possible then that's fine. It's not like investors will go to a competitor who has it. First of all: dooglus is the inventor of provably fair? That's damn cool. So what would be needed to remove the possiblity for the site operator to defraud the investors, would be an verifiable external source of entropy over which the site operator has no control and that all participants can verify independently. If the bitcoin blockchain generated blocks more rapidly, I suppose that could be used. Or maybe not, because the operator could still discover a block then place a huge bet (knowing all the secrets) right before submitting the block to the network. Maybe using a block a certain number of steps ahead of the current block - the site operator would have to discover and withhold all blocks between now and then, and then place the bet and immediately broadcast all the blocks before any other node found a block. It would make it more difficult for the site operator to cheat, but bets would no longer be "instant", so I guess the whole game would lose appeal. Anyway, it's a really interesting problem (but if the inventor of provably fair hasn't found a solution, what chance do I have?) - sorry for derailing the thread.  |
|
|
|
|
Another question, open for anyone informed to answer:
I understand perfectly well how the game is provably fair for the player. But is it provably fair for the investor, and if so, how?
How can it be proven that the honorable dooglus, who has access to the server-side secrets, can not simply make bets and win every time, thereby robbing investors?
I'm not suggesting dooglus would ever do such a thing - I just wanted to know if there is any way to *prove* that he is not? (Or perhaps I have misunderstood the concept and it may not even be possible?)
|
|
|
|
Maybe we should increase the house edge to 2%? Or maybe we can have a high rollers table - with a higher house edge for larger bets?
Or maybe just advertise widely that someone just won $1 million on the site, and that it was paid out by dooglus with no fuss whatsoever. That will probably bring in a lot of new players, which will win the house more in the long run! I do not believe he won USD $1,000,000. It was more like USD $250,000. The reason the withdraw was so large is because he came in with a large bankroll... he needed it to wait out the variance, and keep betting, till he got to where he was. In that case, I apologise for my misinterpretation. But I stick to the conclusion: great advertising opportunity! |
|
|
|
Maybe we should increase the house edge to 2%? Or maybe we can have a high rollers table - with a higher house edge for larger bets?
Or maybe just advertise widely that someone just won $1 million on the site, and that it was paid out by dooglus with no fuss whatsoever. That will probably bring in a lot of new players, which will win the house more in the long run! |
|
|
|
|
I say advertise the *shit* out of the recent gambling wins that guy made - nothing brings in more people than stories about someone who won big and "beat the house"!
|
|
|
|
Just went to Taobao website.
Pre-order.
New 5 Ghash/s mini blade. 9.88 BTC. 35 watt.
New 10 Ghash/s blade. 18.88 BTC. 70 watt.
Are those power consumption figures real? They represent one hell of a drop. I seem to remember the Blade was 83 watt, and now it is suddenly 70 watt? Way to go, friedcat and friends!  Edit: Never mind, the original one is listed as 70-75 W on the lowest voltage in the sales thread. In either case, I stick to my "WTG!" |
|
|
|
Where is the 10th of July announcement?
This was posted on the 10th. I've checked friedcat posts and did not see any announcement yesterday. He did not announce anything yesterday, it was assumed he was going to. I am hoping we hear something today I don't know who started the rumor of "an announcement to be made 10th of July", but it certainly was never said by friedcat himself. Only thing he has mentioned, is that hardware will be in stock "in the beginning of July". That deadline seems to be running out, but it also seems like he has delivered on the promise without actually making an announcement here, because the USB miners are already in stock. He might be waiting for the Blades to make an announcement. Or perhaps decided that announcements are for chumps, and he'll just deal directly with the distributors without making announcements to his fan club in here. |
|
|
|
|
Browsing the webpage of the bank, I must say it looks like a really cutting-edge and innovative bank.
Do they accept customers outside of Germany?
|
|
|
|
He might want to consider using a price of at least $1900.00 for a Jalapeno because that is what it costs currently to get your hands on one through the secondary market.
Interesting. That means a Jalapeņo delivered immediately is actually around 25 BTC, which means that the new AM Mini-Blade will be much, much cheaper. What do you think about that, Mabsark? |
|
|
|
|
New back-of-the-envelope calculation:
200TH order delivered, imagine all is sold as 10GH units. That's 20k units, at 18 BTC per unit, makes 360k BTC. So a rough estimate of the value of the 200TH order is 0.9 BTC per share.
Have more orders been placed with the fab?
|
|
|
|
My thoughts: there is absolutely no reason to believe that you are right in any way whatsoever. Your proposition doesn't even make much sense to me.
If you can show me a compelling example (with numbers) of a situation in which throttling is a good strategy, I may re-evaluate. Because I can't think of any situation in which it makes sense.
Time will tell, though I don't see how the last 3 weeks could have been so consistent without some sort of purposeful intent. I don't claim to understand or necessarily agree with the throttling, only that I think it is occurring. I'm not good at mathing, but someone on Reddit just posted that AM dividends will be .043 this week... http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1hzjoq/asicminer_dividend_to_reach_004btc_for_first_time/That would imply hardware sales of around 12400 BTC, and since they are only selling USB miners currently, it would mean somewhere between 12400 and 14000 USB miners would have been sold the last week. I know they are popular and they are really starting to catch on, but I highly doubt they have sold that many in the last week. |
|
|
|
I've been holding my tongue for a while now, but I think it's finally time to speak up and enlighten the crowd. I think Friedcat and Co. are purposefully targeting weekly hash mining revenue as to produce a semi-consistant weekly dividend while also keeping total network hash-rate low as to spur hardware sales.
They have shown that they are capable of hashing > than 60TH. I believe we are in for a large hardware sale week and they have been throttling back to manage the dividend.
If we get an abnormally large hardware sale portion that brings us to around .019/.02 per share in dividends then I will be convinced.
I'm not insinuating that this is a bad practice, on the contrary, it actually takes quite a bit of the guesswork out of valuating my position. I just wanted to get the communities thoughts on the matter.
My thoughts: there is absolutely no reason to believe that you are right in any way whatsoever. Your proposition doesn't even make much sense to me. If you can show me a compelling example (with numbers) of a situation in which throttling is a good strategy, I may re-evaluate. Because I can't think of any situation in which it makes sense. |
|
|
|
|
Show Posts
