It's all about the hashing power backed by Bitcoin Core and the security it provides to the whole network. The more hashing power you have, the more secure the network is. Mike and his gang cannot afford to launch a new coin with only 15% of the hashing power backing it, they would rather fight for the whole cake. 

It takes time to build a reputation for a new coin and also to establish a secure network with loads of hashing power. Mike wants to push the Lightning network on a established network <The Bitcoin Blockchain> for it to grow quicker, not start from the bottom and fight with 1000's of other Alt coins to get to the top.

When the internet started back in the days, pornography was one of the driving forces behind it. We can deny it all we want, but pornography has been a large part of every internet technology that was developed after that.
The porn industry takes a huge part of the internet bandwidth we use each day.

I have read the white paper a few times and it makes no mention about this, but Satoshi might have envisioned this too, when he thought of this. <Micro payments will serve the porn industry well, when people use it for pay-per-view>

Whilst we are fighting each other, the competitors <BankCoins> are gaining ground. I like your suggestion a lot, but it's going to take a lot of time to reach consensus, if we take that route. We need something where decisions can be made very quickly, to adapt to problems that might need urgent attention.

This in-fighting is causing a lot of harm to Bitcoin and the rate at which it would have grown, if everyone just concentrated on the same thing. Now we see two groups fighting for changes to make core developers rich and famous. <Power struggles>

All odds seems to be stacked against XT to win this battle and the voting. They might have thought that they have the support but when it comes down to money, things get a lot trickier than what they initially calculated on.
The political incentive to do this is also not very strong, because most Chinese are against domination from the USA.

The thing is most of them seems to support 8 mb block sizes, and I was under the impression that Bitcoin Core did
not want to go that route now. 

Well, we see the same thing happening with this Bitcoin Core and XT split. More hashing power going to waste on a worthless fork. The price will drop very quickly, once people see the outcome of this whole audacious plan from the XT side.

It would be better for all of us, if they could just reconcile their differences and settle on a 8mb block.   

I do both, when I invest in a gambling site. Lot's of these sites offer the chance for everyone to invest in them. You get a share in the winnings and take a loss, when they lose. It's a very high risk investment, because you never know who you are investing in, but the rewards can be high too, if they do not run.

I like high risk, high yield investments but you have to take calculated risks in betting on more reputable operations with a good track record.  

Believe me, they have done the math and they know their business. Some of that, they will get back in fee’s and it’s also a company marketing expense with some tax incentives.

They already support the government by adhering to all the AML and KYC regulations you have to pass before you can register on their site.  

For that reason, I am out! <Dragon's Den> ^Blink blink^

I think, they might have missed the boat on this one. A little bit late for this kind of action in a area where things has been stabilized already. The people might be frustrated by their banks and they might start to shift to BTC as a alternative, but a 1000 ATM's are a bit risky for such a small country.

Those ATM's would be more affective in developing areas like, Africa / India / Argentina where there are more unbanked people and a bigger market for micro transactions.   

I have been saying this for a long time. Let them think Bitcoin is anonymous and then when they least expect it, catch them with their hands in the cookie jar.

If you want to do the crime, you must be willing to do the time. 
We do not need these kind of people in our community, and the more of them getting caught, sends out a message to the others wanting to use Bitcoin for illegal activities. ^hmm^

First introduced to it, by a friend in about 2012, and I thought he was crazy. 

Mine was the 7th of September 2013 - It was a Saturday and I was watching Youtube video's out of boredom on the internet. I saw some young guy explaining Bitcoin mining and bragging how much money he was earning. Google followed and I started to research this wonderful and disruptive technology. I bought some Bitcoins that same day.

It was only about a year after that, when I stumbled onto this forum, and I joined.  

How dedicated are these developers, if Gavin did not work on Bitcoin for nearly 2 years, and Mike worked on "The Lightning Project" to win a $40 000 bounty from Oliver and also developed a competing fork for Bitcoin?

We should have a dedicated team of people, who work on Bitcoin 100% of their time. Not as a little side project.
Wladimir seems to carry on at his own pace, and is willing to kick the can down the road, as he put it.

Nobody is really 100% committed to making Bitcoin work. In my opinion these guys are being paid to sabotage and slow down Bitcoin.  ^hmf^

 

I have 5 wallets with them. < 2 x Honeypots to trigger the warnings / 1 x test wallet / 1 x permanent for small amounts >
The fact that it's not bogged down with all the regulations, make it so much easier to use it. I use my Trezor for the serious stuff, and the rest is all stuffed away safely in cold storage.

It's good to set a perimeter warning grid, to see if you are being monitored or if someone is trying to hack you. 

I did not expect anything less from those two guys. In my opinion they are secretly working for the US Government to destroy Bitcoin and to replace it with a fork that would serve their masters.  They say this is done to protect the network against DoSS attacks, but it can just as easily be used to block and filter whole nations from accessing the network.

It’s all about control and manipulation.

About a year ago I was stuck in a country with my wallet stolen. I hooked up with a guy on Localbitcoin and I sold a few bitcoins for fiat. I was able to survive for a couple of days on fiat I converted from the BTC.

The flight back to my country was booken with Bitcoin, so I had no problem getting back.
Unfortunately the country I visited, did not have a lot of places that accepted Bitcoin as a payment method, so I was stuck with fiat for the rest of the time.

I have to say without BTC my stay there would have been terrible. When I got home, I hugged my Trezor. 

I like it when the people sell, with any small bump in the road. We getting rid of the speculators and we pick up some cheap coins.
Let them panic, so that we may profit. We have seen this many times before and we will still see it for many years to come. 
This developer war to see who has the biggest support, is just a smoke screen for the real explosion to come in 2016.

I also do not like the little communication coming from the Core def team, but I prefer that over the rubbish being communicated from the Mike|Gavin team to promote a GovFork. These guys are going to plough into the gate so hard and it's going to hurt their reputation in the Bitcoin community for years to come.

Gavin should never have teamed up with Mike. He is way to unstable and would take Gavin down with him, when his fork fail. ^hmf^

When you do this, you become a ambassador for Bitcoin adoption. Every shop you visit or every hotel or Motel you ask for Bitcoin becomes a advertisement for the currency to be adopted. We need large groups of people around the world, willing to do the same.

When a tour bus stop in a city and every 5th guy starts asking about Bitcoin payment, these merchants will start to wonder, if they missed out on something.

When you travel the world, you have time to talk to people and also to educate them on the pro’s and con’s  of Bitcoin adoption. Who will lay the foundation for the next Bitcoin World tour?

Wow that is a strong statement to make. We do not live in a world where only men are allowed to think. I say this, but I know in some Muslim countries, women have no rights. I would just love it, if it was a women or a group of women, who came up with this idea.

Satoshi being a women in a man's world, would most certainly have failed. Why? Because of this kind of opinions.
There are many women behind successful men and they would have had a terrible time, trying to raise the kids and feed the family and still come up with wonderful ideas at the end of the day.

There are millions of successful mother's out there, who has done both. My wife is one of them. 

Truth be told, I think faster transaction confirmation would solve the possible most people associate with Bitcoin.
This is better for users and for smaller merchants. I do not want to sacrifice affordability for speed, but if it means that it would increase adoption and the price, I would say GO FOR IT and give us faster tps. ^heh^

This is why we do not want to be part of the BitcoinXT group. The developer wants to be a dictator <His own words> and some of the people who supports this, wants to force their opinion and will onto other people. We can make up our own minds. Thank you.

Do not hide behind a shill account meono and then talk smack like a child. We will just add you to our ignore list and then we do not hear your name calling anymore. Discuss this like a adult, and we will take you seriously.

We will use r/Bitcoin at our own discretion, until we feel it's not serving the goal it's intended.