Haha..This was an awesome post and could have gone to a lot of other conclusions.
ROFL @ "It was the next biggest thing, you fucking idiot". Not just shitcoins and ICOs but also Blockchain Logistics, Blockchain Bananas and Shrimps, Big Data and AI on blockchain...!!LOL..and of course, smart contracts.

I just want to say that this little guy who bought a fraction of a BTC in 2017-18 maybe an idiot but not the "fucking idiot" that the true hodler/ whale is. Its the people who keep propagating stuff about hyperbitcoinization and sortta lead the new guy to "believe" and hold on to their bags. The real BTC whales are themselves "trading" and moving the market in ICO's, IEO's etc. Who does all these pumps and dumps where the starry-eyed new bag-hodlers lose money?

Why would any bitcoin holder decide to simply "donate" 1 BTC per person??! This is not 2010 anymore. The early adopters are already among the "Wealthy Elite". They have as much incentive in "spreading the love" as any other philanthropist has in distributing their wealth. Nobody does that.

What people like you and me have to realize now that you have to work your asses off and choose to be paid in BTC instead of Fiat. Then you have to choose to not spend that BTC for your daily needs but hold them in the hope that it will moon. This, in my opinion, is a very optimistic scenario.
Pierre Rochard is one of those early adopters who suggested that bitcoin will change the definition of money. It will become Money replacing US Dollar as the de-facto reserve currency.  This scenario seems to be getting harder to achieve because Governments are now actively engaging to take the narrative in the direction of "Govt backed cryptocurrency". The whole "Libra hearing" drama is just the background to this.

I don't know why but nobody seems to be talking about this. At least, none of the people who seem to be the wealthy evangelists are saying anything about it on twitter or other social media. The only people who are risking themselves shouting about it from the rooftops, are ridiculed and considered crackpots. McAfee for example.

So the optimism and Sig campaign compulsions notwithstanding, I don't think we are going anywhere when it comes to real adoption and usage of BTC as of now. People are simply lording over their niches and fiefs with no guidance towards the future.

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Valid question. But well, Lets not talk about it because...meh, It'll rise anyway..There is the halving. /s
Welcome to the cult!

The concerns about mining profitability are generally addressed by quoting two things.
1. Adoption will rise sufficiently so that the number of transactions are huge  (Using LN), and the settlement fees will be sufficient to keep miners going.
2. The price of bitcoin will rise ridiculously so that even fractional BTC earned from the coinbase transaction will have sufficient value.

All depends on adoption, for which people are working very hard on "Twitter". The other hope is that the technology becomes important enough to be used everywhere for which people have been searching for use-cases for half a decade without much success.

By "country", if you mean the sovereign government of a country then the first thing you should appreciate is that cryptos don't use Govt sanction. Sure, they can make things difficult for the common people by branding them "illegal" but being peer-to-peer, it only matters whether you and i value it enough to use it to trade for a good or service.

As far as legality is concerned several countries accept them as legal or have defined them as commodities etc. This includes USA, Japan, Korea, Malta, Venezuela, Russia and several EU and East European countries. The Venezuelan Govt. even tried raising its own cryptocurrency called Petro Coin. China has announced its intention to actively work on Govt backed crypto and blockchain finance. Yet, these "Govt." intiatives are generally looked at with skepticism due to their centralized nature.

That makes things look much better for the truly decentralized, people's crytpo, Bitcoin.

This isn't just a problem with those social media platforms. Even the forum enforces conformity. For example, everyone just keeps praising and keeps saying good things about the Lightning Network despite the fact that LN is still not finding any users and is becoming over-engineered all the time.
There is desperate lack of genuine criticism even here at the forum because most of the older members wearing the sigs aren't discussing technical details but just commenting on the validity of LN at all times. These people have no idea that how actually bitcoin will scale. The ideas that get thrown around now simply do not have the same weight as they are more philosophical than technical.

That is where the answer to JetsCash's question is. If you want to bring the mojo back, you have to make it worthwhile for the devs to contribute. Most of the earliest devs are on payroll with Blockstream or other organizations. Nothing wrong in that. The lesson is that people who actually benefited from the forum should contribute to projects that aim to further bitcoin adoption.

Form a hierarchy of committed and technically sound people to guide projects. The funding should come from people who have benefited from being early adopters. Most of that crowd has moved out of the forum and are busy with their businesses etc. like Cobra pointed out. Find the champions.

Some people on LBC expressly mention not to put crypto related remarks for the transaction. It maybe the case as teosanru pointed out that private banks mag not be keeping such a tab.
It'd be useful if you can share which banks you have been using that don't seem to have an issue with this. If a few other people have the same experiences, then these apprehensions about "banks freezing accounts on mention of crypto" can be put to rest.

Greetings Hhampuz

Applying for Sr. Spot

Bitcointalk username: amishmanish
Bitcointalk profile URL: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=1107844
Current no.of posts: 771
Amount of earned merit in the last 120 days: 50
BTC Address: bc1q58fyah8t0k3qz8u66g33ryl3x6d4n809p8hckf

Will change signature if accepted. Thank you!

Hey guys. Sorry I wasnt able to reply earlier as i am not really at my full capacity mentally to contribute to a topic of this nature. I have had an idea in mind for sometime.

So the main issue we are having right now is the lack of decent activity, both in terms of discussion as well as real usage of bitcoin and crytpo in general.
I think we can link the anniversary celebration to solve this issue. We don't have enough new blood and not enough champions to motivate them or nudge them along. Most people have horrible post histories. They are simply not here for anything technical or even mercantile. They are here only for bounties. This may not be such a bad scenario if people actually engaged with the Alt-coins in terms of technology too.
Apart from bounties, there are following things that people can engage in:

1. Signature Campaigns:  The problem here is that the entry point to getting entry into the club of decent signatures on the forum is quite high. You need significant contribuiton and involvement in the froum while the opportunities keeps shrinking.

2. Mining: The entry point to mining is upwards of 1 Lac INR. So that is a big issue. Yet, We can try and get a few newbies interested in the technical stuff they can do with it. I would love sharing my experience of Ethereum mining on a 5-GPU rig including buying and  installation etc.
Here one thing we can attempt is to ask some people who have access to cheaper GPU's to supply them on low costs as compared to the Indian market. See if we can get some kind of market going on.

3. Raffle: The simplest easiest way seem to be gambling or raffle. First explain what a raffle is. You can only participate if you have decent contribution to the India-sub in the next say, 1 month.We can ask @legendster to manage that campaign. Once again, we need to have enough people to giveaway freely. Not just BTC but anything else of value that you think you may have in terms of alt-coins/ hardware etc.

Personally, I'd like to sponsor a tech competition of some kind and I have a Raspberry Pi to giveaway for that. I'll try making a post for that at some time.

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I go through people's profiles and PM them at times to get them interested. Here are a few of the people we can try to get interested and if they engage, I am sure it'll be our pleasure to make sure that they have enough merit in return for thoughtful contributions. Just contact these people.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=390080 sureshnsnet

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=931885 denharsh

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=2658168 harpreetkaur

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=1045345 ajtin (alt-section)

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=2562897 propectorr

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=2592128 sykt62

It was really cool to see @Darkstar_ offer free escrow. We have the necessary people. Decide on a date. Get newbies interested. Lets have a bunch of competitions.

Thats my 2 cents. I have been pretty sick and a bit depressed lately, lol but i am hoping to get out of it soon.Lets decide on a date for the celebration giving enough time to spread the word. I am sure we can make something out of it..

The reactions from Madam FM clearly seem to be based  on what she heard from the presentation. Caution when it comes to their effect on monetary policies. The obvious fun part is the cringe from IMF on calling it "Stable currency". They don't want that name. Reason being that it puts a question mark on the validity of their own "currency". Like, If crypto is named "stable currency", what was it that we were peddling till now??

Yet, the statement about ease of use, cost savings as well as financial inclusion gives some hope and speaks of the fact that Nirmala Ma'am is fast realizing that the crypto issue isn't going anywhere. Its an overall positive.
The major thing missing from her understanding seems to be the technological aspect of it and the opportunities it can bring the developer and freelancer community.

Very true Erikaui. Sadly this really seems to be the case with the present Govt. They have played the populist politics very well to gain an unprecedented presence in both houses. Yet, it is getting more and more evident that they just don't have the expertise when it comes to policy making or implementation.

Also, I think the delay in SC is also attributable to the other massive hearing going on right now on the Ayodhya matter.

JSRAW commented on this thread asking for a new Indian mod that You and me sound like carbon copies..!!

I have the exact same reasons for choosing cryptotalk signature. Making posts for the sake of fulfilling minimum requirements can be gruesome to your own self-respect..LOL..I truly appreciate that you have gained a diverse participation at the forum. I found myself getting limited after a certain time due to lack of enthusiasm and time to devote on the forum.
The things you are doing are encouraging and I think if Theymos ever decides to pick a mod for the Indian sub, you'd be a fine choice.

PS: We really must do something about sounding so similar..!! 

The simplest way to view bitcoin is that its like "Money in the Bank" where you are also the bank owner. Its security, interest rate, asset management depends on your own self.

Learning about it means taking Financial responsibility.
Earning from it means moving towards Financial Freedom.

If you want your money to also be a store of value, then your bank needs to work its ass off. Build products, Earn interest (What most old Hodlers do), Invest into innovation (What alt-coins were supposed to be until they thought they could compete with BTC) etc. etc.

It seems like very little is happening on these fronts. The next halving will take place in Aug 2020. By 2022, the mining reward will have fallen to 3.125 BTC. If the fee market doesn't evolve by that time, it wouldn't remain any of these things anymore. What happens after that is anyone's guess.

This should be first in that a foreign exchange will try to set up an arm in India. As a cryptocurrency exchange, it'll be unclear that which regulators they are going to talk to.
This much should have been sorted out till now but the powers are too busy playing bigger games than doing the grunt work of figuring out how to treat cryptocurrency, whether they should come under SEBI or RBI guidelines.

It is a sad situation which explains why India has again slid down the rankings in terms of being business-friendly. If nothing else, exchanges that adhere to KYC norms should have had no problem in carrying out business. Yet, even they had to shut shop after the blanket ban by RBI.
Bithumb will have to contend with RBI Act, BR Act, FEMA Act etc etc. The best thing about being a foreign entity though is the cosmetic advantage that they can get due to thie present Governments obsession with being seen as a bigger global player.

Our PM-jee  love rubbing shoulders with the International community so the interest from a foreign exchange maybe the bit we need for politicians to take note.

I waited to see how the campaign goes under yahoo for a few days. Then I decided to go for it because of their pay per post system without any minimum requirement. It has been almost a year since I got into any signature campaign for longer than a week because almost all of them need you to be active in Gambling, which I am not and which I have not been able to will myself to despite trying.

So even though, i'd consider myself a non-spammer, I decided to wear the signature. A lot of people give the "Money on the table" argument and after much consternation, i decided to give up too. In my defense, this time around, this campaign is for another forum. Would this be considered counter-marketing? If we consider it to be a competition on forum hegemony then probably, but in the wider interest of bitcoin and cryptocurrencies, having another widely used forum shouldn't be all that bad.

Senior members who ranked up with merit have now become a dime a dozen..lol..I think I was among the relatively quicker ones to reach Senior. It has been uphill since. I wish more people followed Theymos' advice though.

Could you please share where are you quoting these prices for an 8GB GPU from? Are those brand-new with warranty or used ones?? It'd be really helpful if you can tell about your experience of using these low priced hardware (if its used).
Anybody else reading this who knows about the supplies, do share.

Ethereum was supposed to be better at "Dapps" and being the "World computer". It is the originator of those ideas that seemed so beautiful with the slick website and the 3-D logo of Ethereum. Then there was Vitalik Buterin who fulfilled the need for the prodigious Teen founder (Right from his geeky looks to the old USSR'esque name). It was hard to not fall for the promises of ERC-20..!!

Too bad that all the scam devs copied the idea of a whitepaper + website and Russian sounding team. To top it all, now they want to fork to Proof-of-Stake. I think the devolution is complete so very few can argue that Ethereum is better.
 

Purely from the perspective of a consumer, what can cryptocurrencies do that Fiat cannot? If the intention is to transfer value and pay for/ buy goods and services, then fiat serves as well as cryptocurrencies.

I wonder why are we even still asking such questions when the biggest crypto like BTC is little more than a curiosity. It is a niche for hobbyists and technologists. The volatility is a milking cow for traders and whales. As far as buying/ selling products is concerned, it is limited to places where the Governments haven't yet taken a stand. Like in certain SE Asian countries like Phillipines, Thailand, Indonesia and Eastern Europe.

To be fair, It is serving its purpose of peer-to-peer electronic cash for the online community to some extent. Yet, the plans for world domination will have to wait till the time everyone is occupied with Dice games and gambling..LOL.

Haha..This was good..The language is very similar to the Uttarakhand dialect in our parts.

I liked the fun part in this shayari though. The guy is promising that I will give any gift and get you the sun and the start. Then he goes on to say that if these "lies" are not enough then I can speak a few more words if you want..LOL..
Keep sharing..

Considering the arguments, the petitioners have made a good case. Yet, the court has now taken the stand that they must "respond". The exchanges have not yet gotten any such response since Justice Nariman directed RBI to do so. (Or maybe privately they have).

The next hearing will only make sense once RBI has responded to the suggestions provided by the exchanges. A lot also depends on the way things are seen in media and how much traction they gain. Do retweet the posts by Nischal Shetty, WazirX founder at his twitter handle @NischalShetty

That is i think the basic issue rather than just the lack of merit sources.

Right now, we simply don't have sufficiently diversified activity that would justify the size of our population, much like the Olympics. Much of it is due to the legal uncertainty. We do not have too many of the developer kind visiting the forum and talking about mining, mining pools, potential use cases, developer activity etc.
I don't think that the mods are interested till we sort this out and get more people interested in this sort of thing AND to find sufficient incentive for them to be a part of the Indian community. Thanks for your offer legendster. Will get back to you.


Right Heisenberg. The thing is that there aren't even enough people joining up and being active in the Indian sub to get to at least Member (10 merits). Most of the people posting frequently are the same motley group. This needs to change. Lets bump our heads together so see if we can do something about it.

Thanks for your completely unnecessary shitpost on a 4 month old topic that contributes nothing to the discussion.

I mean seriously, if you want to randomly bump posts in diverse section, at least say something that wouldn't be so obviously seen as Signature compulsion.

On a serious note, I hope @jaykavathe would be back here. I was hoping we could get something going here.