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I just completed an additional donation of 1028.71 XMR. PM sent.
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Couldn't this be fixed in about 5 minutes?
I would think so. The more interesting question here is the "Darkcoin Deanonymizer". There are several possibilities here: 1) This is pure FUD. 2) The OP actually sets up the "Darkcoin Deanonymizer" and it works. 3) The OP provides the exploit to the Darkcoin developers and they provide a fix that preserves Darkcoin anonymity. 4) The OP provides the exploit to the Darkcoin developers and they cannot provide a fix that preserves Darkcoin anonymity. Care to bet on "odd" or "even" above? |
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I view issues as catastrophic dysfunction of the development process, catastrophic failure of fungibility, catastrophic loss of decentralization (arguably has already happened, though likely is not irreparable quite yet), or even catastrophic damage to the brand (and entirely cultural and not technical issue) as being the sorts of failures that could lead to a somewhat different cryptocurrency becoming dominant.
Yes. There could easily be a situation where different governments start blacklisting coins and trying to become gatekeepers. This might happen somewhat slowly at first and then more quickly if bitcoin is seen as a threat in countries with weaker currencies. Slowly, and then perhaps increasingly quickly, speculators and users will start rebalancing their money into unblacklistable crypos. This might not result in bitcoin losing its #1 spot, but it will result in a crippling of bitcoin. And it may mean that an unblacklistable coin increases 10x in value. This is distinct from the privacy niche. That is closely related to the fungibility crisis hedge scenario. The fungibility crisis is only possible in jurisdictions deriving from English common law. Those are the jurisdictions, coincidentally, where private currencies are generally accepted and acknowledged by the legal system. The threat you describe is already manifest, IIRC, under the military dictatorship in Thailand. Actually the biggest risk here to fungibility may be from private sector players attempting to recover stolen XBT using the courts. Fungibility is actually far more important than privacy as a selling point of XMR for this reason. |
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I have tried to sort out what applies regarding Bitcoin and VAT in Sweden and since some of the rules regarding VAT are harmonized within EU I thought that I'd share this in order to get some feedback from other EU citizens. These are my conclusions (I'm not an expert in this field so feel free to point out any errors or terms that I use incorrectly): * Finansinspektionen ("Financial Services Authority"?) in Sweden tell me that they do not consider Bitcoin a currency. * The Swedish Tax Agency tell me that I should treat Bitcoin as an "electronic service". Everything that is delivered electronically is considered a "service" instead of a "commodity", there are a few differences in taxation but I don't think that's what's important here. What's important is that since Bitcoin is not considered a currency a purchase with bitcoins will be considered barter. In barter, one should look each transaction separately so that if e.g. a customer (private individual) buys a table from a company and pays with bitcoins these 2 transactions should be considered: 1. The customer bought a table from the company 2. The company bought some bitcoins from the customer I the first transaction VAT is added by the company and recorded as output VAT. In the second transaction there is no VAT since the purchase is from a private individual. Later when the company wants to get rid of the bitcoins this will be considered a sale of bitcoins (regardless of whether they are exchanged for some currency or if something is bought using them) and then VAT should be added to the sale and recorded as output VAT. From what I can understand this is a bit problematic. It will be hard for the company to exchange the bitcoins since they must add VAT (in Sweden this is 25%) to the "sale". No private individual will buy at that price since they can buy from eachother with no VAT. Some other company could possibly buy them since they can deduct the VAT but at some point some company will have to return the bitcoins to an individual. Have other people in the EU reached similar conclusions? If my conclusions are correct it is a pretty big obstacle in getting merchants to start accepting Bitcoin. For Swedish readers, I have started a similar topic in Swedish at bitcoin.se. There is a very critical flaw in this argument especially in the case of Sweden. The "private individual" is no longer a consumer but is in fact a business that is selling Bitcoin and has to register for VAT. Sweden has in fact one of the lowest minimum thresholds for VAT/GST registration in the OECD http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/12/12/34674438.xls at 30000 SEK or approx 840 BTC at current rates! In a Bitcoin only economy every transaction would have equally compensating input and output VAT credits and equal amounts of VAT charged by each party effectively negating the VAT. The bottom line if that if the tax authorities choose to treat Bitcoin as a "digital service" they have essentially created a huge loophole for VAT avoidance simply by registering for VAT and then using Bitcoin for every transaction. The Australian Tax Authorities have opened the door to wide scale avoidance and evasion of the GST as I pointed out back in 2012. Taxes such as GST and VAT will simply not work if the medium of exchange is subject to the tax. Sometimes the best way to teach a bureaucracy a stiff lesson is to strictly follow the letter of the law. |
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Yes. It can be summarized in one word: Derivatives. Yes, as the arguments against POS are accepted as defeated, we must invent newer and even less relevant but more convoluted arguments to protect proof of waste. Rather than call Proof of Stake, Proof of Scam, I will instead let Conrad Black make the case. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conrad_Black |
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Do you have any arguments that actually don't also apply to bitcoin?
Yes. It can be summarized in one word: Derivatives. The issue here is that stake does not equal exposure and it is very easy to have a large stake and zero or negative exposure. The reason this has not yet become an issue with POS coins is that none of them have evolved to the point where a significant derivatives market has developed, even to the degree that exists today with Bitcoin and Litecoin. It is today possible to control 10000 USD worth of XBT or 5000 USD worth of LTC with 500 USD margin. I leave it to the reader to determine how much EUR, or gold one can control with 500 USD in margin at a typical FX broker. My take remains that POS can only work in a highly regulated market and even there, if the regulators are not on the ball we get the near financial disaster that occurred in 2008. After all the typical large wall street bank is ultimately governed by proof of stake. It is called one share = one vote. Edit: Size of derivatives markets: http://www.bis.org/statistics/derstats.htm |
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I must say in one way I was surprised by the sudden upward move in the price. The last thing I was expecting was a web wallet, which by the way is a phenomenal initiative. The reality however is that this kind of thing is not surprising at all. One simply cannot expect a highly competent development team quietly working on the fundamentals for months too not produce results. It is only a matter of time. This is a classic long term buy/hold.
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When it comes to software the only software that can be trusted is Free Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS) from a reputable source. For example GNU/Linux. A distant second is propriety software that was fully paid for and is targeted at business users. Any propriety software targeted at consumers is very high risk and if it is also gratis then it is virtually guaranteed to contain malware and / or adware.
When it comes Chrome, it is propriety on both Microsoft Windows and OS X. Chromium on GNU/Linux is FLOSS big difference. The problem is that Google allows add supported extensions, very bad, so unless the Chrome extension is FLOSS and from a non commercial source I say stay well away. Mozilla Firefox (or a Firefox clone on GNU/Linux) is way safer. Even there one has to be very careful with propriety extensions.
Just because the vast majority of users use propriety software from companies that have made espionage deals with, and / or provided exclusive access to the source code to, agencies such as the NSA (United States) the FSB (Russia) or the PLA (China) does not mean one can have a secure computer running GNU/Linux with a very minimal risk to one Bitcoins even if the computer is regularly used online.
I have not had a single satoshi stolen from me by malware, even though I keep my Bitcoins on computers that are regularly used online, and have been using Bitcoin since 2011. The secret is FLOSS.
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I wonder why anyone cares anymore about the organizations that are so obviously against the benefit of mankind. In my game, you can only play as long as you are not busted. An organization that is only a nuisance, is just that - a nuisance. And not worthy of our respect anymore. Imagine the world where we'd still live if all the previous tyrants still exercised their power.
Nah. Just ignore them. Let them play with the willing subjects, world is full of them, sadly.
People care because regulatory risk can have a very significant impact of the value of an asset regardless of one feels about the merit or lack thereof of the regulation and / or the regulator One needs to get back to basics here. The fundamental advantage of currencies such as XBT and XMR is that they eliminate the need for a third party in transactions. This makes regulation of the now non existent third parties both impossible and unnecessary. The fundamental difference with DRK is that it is dependent on a limited number of third parties, the masternodes. The masternodes are limited in number by the requirement that they maintain a minimum capitalization of 1000 DRK. This alone, when one considers that there is a finite amount of DRK in the 16 million to 22 million range, ensures that the number of masternodes is limited to a few thousand at most, making them an easy target for regulators. For a comparison of the regulatory risk involved here: There are easily more banks in the world than DRK masternodes.No amount of ignoring the regulators will address the reality that the regulatory risk for DRK is orders of magnitude higher than for XMR because of the intrinsic designs of DRK and XMR just like the regulatory risk of a bank is orders of magnitude higher than that of XBT. |
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monero stealthbomber   There is a very important lesson here. The allies won World War II. So it is not a given that the new and innovative technology wins in every case. The real question here becomes is the new and innovative technology capable of holding out in the face of the onslaught from the mature time tested technology long enough to win the endgame? hehe, very nice. Yes they did a lot, also the V2, but nothing could help. maybe they just focused on the wrong things at the wrong time? monero brings the right technology at the right time i think, thats why in our case, the answer seems to be yes  we are only here because of the endgame, the real one i mean Yes. There is of course another World War II example where superior technology won over the mature time tested technology. That of course was the Battle of Britain in 1940. The first major defeat of the axis powers and many would say a crucial turning point in World War II. There the new and innovative technology was radar, combined with a very innovative command and control system for fighter aircraft. The Germans completely ignored the British radar installations. In that case the side with the new and innovative technology, the British Empire and Commonwealth, held on alone against apparently overwhelming, momentum, resource and material odds and won the endgame. The key lesson here for the side with the superior technology is to be able to hang tight and not get over extended. Britain was able to hang tight in 1940, while Germany was not able to hang tight in 1945. Edit: The above is why my total XMR sales since I started buying XMR in July, including dev fund donations and MEW membership, amount to less than 2.5% of my current XMR holdings. I am holding and / or averaging down in this market. |
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monero stealthbomber There is a very important lesson here. The allies won World War II. So it is not a given that the new and innovative technology wins in every case. The real question here becomes is the new and innovative technology capable of holding out in the face of the onslaught from the mature time tested technology long enough to win the endgame? Edit: A trader playing this kind of long game needs to be able to hold out in the face of very strong adversity in order to win. If the trader is overextended and cannot hold on then loss becomes certain, and someone else wins the long game. Again who has the stealth bomber now? |
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I enjoyed the post.
The one thing that doesn't add up to me is that darkcoin is significantly higher than Monero still. Comparing Monero to bit coin days. There wasn't a precursor to bitcoin that tried to do the same thing in an inferior way that had a higher market cap.
Anybody want to take a stab at explaining how they think darkcoin still being significantly higher fits into this equation?
Attempt: Most of the cryptocurrency community wants to make a quick buck, that wasn't the case back then. Darkcoin and its low barrier to entry, shiny marketing speaks well to them. Bitcoin didn't have back then such lazy people around not even wishing to dig further to fundamentals. There were quick buck examples back then. The perfect example was pirateat40. His scheme for a while in late 2011, actually made some sense. Borrow XBT at 7% compound interest per week. Sell XBT for USD. Here is the key: Watch XBT drop in value at a rate greater than 7% compound interest per week in terms of USD. Instant profit! What could possibly go wrong? The rest is history. Edit: As for Darkcoin. Comparing Darkcoin to Monero is like comparing a propeller driven fighter aircraft to a jet fighter in early 1945. The short term advantage belongs to the mature time tested technology (Darkcoin, propeller driven fighter aircraft) the long term advantage belongs to new innovative technology (Monero, jet fighter aircraft). |
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Yeah, the "point of maximum pain" is already reached, and many have (not) taken it and sold. The others are seeing their old coins as a sunken cost and making new plans for new acquisitions at levels they previously could not imagine.
Like I did not think in June that the 0.0015 wall would ever be needed to rise, much less that it would fill.
I'm sorry ... I disagree. I know you've been optimistic all the way down from .004 but I just think the emission, anon coin bear market, the large botnets who run the majority of the mining ... it could prop up for a month or two for current investors getting more. But then continue downward to .001 or less. I think what we're seeing is one whale buying other whales sell orders. The miners will continue to overcome those small fry people who are accumulating with the emission curve for a few more months (IMO). If / when they run out of ammo before getting more people on board I think we could see a massive dump down into the 0007 - 0009 range. Maybe I'm dreaming ... but if that happens I'll be picking more up. For now my real world fiat needs are getting taken care of. Ah, actually we agree. I referred "the point of maximum pain" as emotionally, not that the lowest price had been reached. What I mean is that (imo) hardly anyone is emotionally attached to the uptrend anymore, and could not (and would not) feel any worse if it goes to 0.001, even though the (as big) slides from 0.0045->0.003, 0.003->0.002 or 0.00225->0.0015 felt very nasty. Now if it indeed drops to 0.00075, I don't believe people will feel like jumping the bridge, which they definitely would have felt at 0.004 if presented with 0.002 (and when it did happen). When price is not going our way, we stick to the fundamentals. Everyone would like GUI, DB, and emission to be fixed, but while they aren't, there is still no viable alternative in the privacy coin segment. If there was, then Monero would have a hard time. Now that the price is having a hard time is just something we have to take as a fact, and act accordingly, buy, sell or hold. Unlike in previous times, there is now great money to be made in Monero. Percentage moves are large and volume is there. Situation is good for those who have any assets outside their XMR bag currently. I gotcha. Yes I rode Vertcoin from $1.05 down to $.20 when I jumped out on a pump. Then followed them down to $.05. So I can see what you're saying. I think there will be another stubborn painpoint around .001 but I could be wrong. The GOOD news is that Vertcoin has like 5X total coin supply and does not a whole hell of a lot except stay GPU friendly (which it's not even that right now). XMR total coins released are like 1/5th of what Vert will release in total - so XMR is only twice as much as Vert for the same % of the market cap. The privacy, active devs, coming GUI, non instamine, etc makes me think it should really be worth 4 - 5 times Vert's value at the very least. Not sure if Vert needs to drop to .01 or XMR needs to go up... As someone who started to purchase Bitcoin at over 5 USD three years ago and watched it drop to 2 USD I find a certain deja vu regarding my current Monero position. Back in late 2011 early 2012 I kept buying Bitcoin and averaged down. This time with Monero is was also buy and average down. Now if I am correct with Monero with my buy / hold / average down strategy it would not be the first time nor the second time where I have purchased an asset, watched it drop by over 50% held and / or averaged down for huge gains down the road. If one believes that the long term fundamentals are sound then there is a lot to be said for looking at the bear, especially one that is starting to look very tired, straight in the eye and either holding or averaging down. When it comes to Monero the long term fundamentals are sound regardless of the emission rate being left as is or slowed down. |
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Looking at the amount of votes for both coins (DRK & XMR), why not add both? It seems like they both have a big community.
+1 Edit: ... and consider adding crypto-currency prices as something to bet on. |
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If a truly anonymous virtual cash is even possible, it will be the only thing to keep us slightly free from the surveillance industrial complex. With cameras and biometric analytics everywhere, nobody is free from predatorial opportunists.
I can't see why it wouldn't be possible, but maybe this is one thing where bitcoin may fail as it is not really anonymous so are we wasting our time if this along with other things like the blocksize will become problems in the future?. Bitcoin can be anonymous if you are an expert. It will take some work to make them so for laymen. That's what Amir Taaki is working on. Yes but without an increase in the blocksize, Dark Wallet will make things worse. If one has to choose between between large mining firms and large transaction clearing firms the choice of large mining firms is clear. Large transaction firms are nothing but a bank, credit card processor or payment service such as PayPal by another name. They can, are and will be easily regulated. Bitcoin mining on the other hand is very hard to regulate if at all. Furthermore the critical part, hashing is actually far more decentralized. Let us keep in mind that obsolete Bitcoin mining equipment can make an excellent space heater in the winter, and no centralized mega Bitcoin mine can compete with that! Amir Taaki is doing a great disservice by advocating that anyone but the very rich should be using a centralized "off chain solution", when using Bitcoin, by opposing an increase in the blocksize limit. |
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He is dead wrong on the blocksize issue. There are enough people "living in squats" around the world to break the back of Bitcoin in no time if even a very small fraction of them were to use Bitcoin with the current max blocksize limit. If one then adds Dark Wallet to the mix the max blocksize issue becomes far worse since Dark Wallet will significantly increase transaction size.
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TacoTime, what do you consider "some crazy dramatic change to the emissions curve."?
suddenly slowing emission to 1/2 or 1/4. in 10 years i bet we'll have people sitting around saying bitcoin was a horrendous instamine, etc, etc. which it is as well. monero just has a faster timescale. there was a time when you could get xmr and btc cheaply, relative to what it is now. it's preprogrammed to be that way. ours is pretty fair too. at this point, cryptocurrencies aren't that new, everyone in tech knows about them, and the onus is on them to read the CN whitepaper and understand what's going on. A sudden change in the emission rate say 1/2 or 1/4 from one block to the next would break the social contract of a smooth emission curve in Monero so I would be opposed to that. One the other a gradual change in the emission rate over say a 90 day period would not and I would support it. The critical difference is that in the latter case the market is given the proper time to adjust, while in the former case it is not. I made my argument here: https://forum.monero.cc/19/voting/90/d-v-round-2-xmr-emission-and-related-issues?page=&noscroll=1#post-385 |
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Why is Robocoin processing transactions? This needs to be solely the responsibility of the local operator who then needs to be compliant with the relevant regulations at her location.. The real problem here is that Robocoin is trying to control everything in order to collect fees from each transaction by using propriety software and DRM. The proper solution is for the local operators to take control of their machines away from Robocoin, by breaking the DRM and "jail-braking" them. They are then in a position to comply with the KNC/AMC regulations as they apply at the location where the machine is installed.
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Replace Microsoft Windows with GNU/Linux.
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