Hereis a classic example of how a thread goes to shit.. This topic started with a good discussion and we were just latching on to how the age of fundamental discoveries and inventions seems to have passed us by. How these discoveries don't seem as exciting as those from the giants of the past.

Suddenly, You guys come in and start talking about God and how bitcoin will make us rich??? Whyy??   Whhhhyyy would you do that?? This topic has so much juice. There is so much content that a simple google search can give and you could comment meaningfully. Want to add something about the transistor and Bell Labs i referred to? Or about Charles Babbage and how he made the first mechanical calculation machine? Or even about any of the technologies that you find interesting yourselves? There is so much you could easily add to such a topic!

But You choose not to. You will just come in,spout some f***ing nonsense about God, and bitcoin being very useful, increase your post count and before you are done, you have spoiled a good topic for the rest of us. Seriously guys, Please try to put some miniuscle effort in your posts. Avoid posting mindless shit like this. You will never learn anything from the forum and will only contribute to lowering it's level. This may fulfill your short term goals but this is not good for anyone in the long term.

---

Just quoting some of the posts I am talking about below. Please try and put some effort in contributing to the topics rather than such pointless bunch of words. Thanks!

Man! It breaks my heart to accept this but yes, you are right. BJP has been co-opting almost every institution of repute by putting their own cronies in positions of authority. Granted that Congress did this in their time too but at least they had an inclusive vision to feed the public. This ensured that the general atmosphere in the country wasn't so vitriolic.

The Judge Loya case you refer will be a shameful blot forever on us. The way they paraded that poor, scared son of a bitch in front of media to provide a clean chit to "Big Uncle" was unbelievable. In any other place, this would have created a furore of cross questioning on witness manipulation. Instead, the news quietly died down. It is pretty clear that BJP is ruling with a heavy hand on media and all kinds of freedom. All in the name of patriotism. For a young man unemployed/ underemployed for years, nothing gets the blood boiling more than a few cheap calls to "akhandta, asmita, sanskriti" and all that. Harping onto these makes the youth feel empowered and willing to act, like they really mean something in this whole circle jerk of politicians and businesses working to keep them in the cycle of subservience.

If we are talking hardware, William Shockley and John Bardeen of bell labs too deserve a mention for the first transistor. The device that eventually enabled all logic devices.

Although as Hydrogen so ruefully pointed out earlier, It gets me every time to imagine how those early innovators would have worked.
Today it is all about snazzy IDE's with tools and pre-built libraries ready to be exploited to make the next idea come to fruition. But like you pointed out, it does look like we no longer have that age of fundamental discoveries and inventions.. When ENIAC would have been built with its thousands of vacuum tubes occupying several hundred square feet. Those people really were giants.

How those people built on the capabilities of the first machines to gradually reach to the first microprocessors. How they would have programmed the instruction set for the first microprocessors in real bits and bytes, making them come to life. The ALU, I/O, 8 KB of EEPROM and a few LED's interacting to create the first illusion of a response from the machine!! Such wonders they would have been. Gradually all of that complexity got abstracted away from bits to mnemonics to programming languages and now to function blocks based IDE's..

It is admirable that we are making programming more and more accessible but i frankly feel bad that the fundamentals are no longer as accessible as they would have been back in the days.. And that we never got to be a part of it..LOL..

People aren't really that foolish to fall for scam after scam. BCash has been derided enough in the general cryptocurrency circles because of their unnecessary attacks on bitcoin. People who really care about decentralization and the potential of crypto understand the damage that Roger Ver's deceptions and slimy marketing tactics have caused.

The problem is that the media needs figureheads. Someone they can interview and call an expert. Most of the people who cut their teeth in the early days of bitcoin were not the narcissistic, attention-seeking types. Those true cypherpunks and libertarians love their privacy. That leaves conmen like Roger Ver or the fake Satoshi Craig Wright to peddle their nonsense for the masses. Who then go on bitcoin.com and buy BCash in the name of bitcoin.

BCash could have been a simple fork by itself but their insistence on "we are the real bitcoin" is stupid. They have a circle-jerk of people who tip each other pennies, call Roger Jesus and present the Whitepaper as some sort of bible that is sacrosanct. That is too much like 15th century church control to me. So no, thank you. I prefer sticking with people who talk in balanced, informed manner rather than those who make passionate appeals to emotions all the time.

These people have tried to damage the biggest experiment on financial freedom in history. All for what?? For their silly argument that "If the blocksize would have been increased, just imagine what the price of bitcoin would have been?". All their arguments ultimately rest on this. Of course, once you confront them, they'll change the narrative.

---

My suggestion to BCashers or it's sympathisers. Leave bitcoin the fuck alone. It is bigger than your collective egos.

Stop being part of slimy marketing tactics by repeating that "Bitcoin Cash is the nearest implementation of the whitepaper". For fuck's sake, there are a hundred more.

Stop being part of fake achievements by telling people that it is fast and cheap when it is so only because their is too much space on the chain due to low usage. Every blockchain behaves that way.

Stop playing the blame game on censorship and using the conspiracy theories on blockstream to try to prop up your investment. Use BCash all you want for it's merits but stop trying to bask in the reflected glory and damage bitcoin at the same time.

I do agree that regulations for the sake of clarity and confidence to merchants is important. What I don't like is this tone about "cryptocurrencies being an important FinTech innovation". It seems that they intentionally want to downplay the importance and capability of bitcoin as a safe and fast method of trustless transaction.
Governments can easily clarify regarding regulations but they seem to intentionally delay any clarity on the situation. As more governments make their stance clear as to whether they want to brand bitcoin as illegal or not, hopefully it should create a domino effect of adoption or rejection.
It does feel like we are on the cusp of change. Or maybe it has always seemed like that for bitcoin..lol..Maybe some old member can shine some light on this.

Some form of welfare state/ Leftist ideology isn't such a bad idea. Provided it's not so opaque and unaccountable in terms of delivery and execution.
It is difficult for a full blown capitalist state to be the ideal state too. The poorest in society can't be left to their own accord or on the philanthropic leanings of the rich people. That too has always failed to provide a solution. Better managed budgets which are not fed by an unending supply of free money should be an option for this.

Exactly. It is so simple that all these budget allocations are supposed to come from a prudently managed system of tax collection and spending. Politicians on the other hand have their own agendas. They all like to tout new schemes and freebies. Some of them want to allocate defence/ infrastructure expenditures to cater to their respective business lobbies.

And there is always the ever serving central banks willing to provide leverage. This triad of Central Banks, Politicians and Big businesses ultimately feeds off of the middle classes. The taxpayers who spend their whole lives chasing success, and all this while, they are told by the people in power why they need success.

You need success so you can have enough authority and power to remain safe, because well, law & order cannot do that.
You need success so you can save and not die in penury, because well, after half your life of service, pension funds cannot do that.
You need success so you don't die because of a disease mis-diagnosed at a cheap hospital, because well, public healthcare cannot be as good.
You need success so you can send your kids to the best schools, because well, public education can't be good enough.

The middle classes chase success relentlessly because the politicians fail to deliver on law&order, healthcare, education and elderly care. Things that are their responsibilities but they will rather cosy up with the businessman who contributes the most fund. Money is allocated in the name of these responsibilities only to be siphoned off to these rich friends. It's a simple yet effective, iron-clad system. We need a better society and a better allocation of resources. That is why we need bitcoin to succeed.

By 2140, Most small transactions should have migrated to using some variation of a second-layer solution like LN. Most on-chain settlements would be bigger transactions for which the parties will be willing to pay a good amount as fees for confirmations.

If sufficient distribution and decentralization could be ensured, we would have moved to a more open and free market with little scope for political motives determining availability of economic opportunities to people and countries. People would be much freer to monetize their skills if they choose to from any corner of the world. People would also be free to do more good for the poor. We will probably have a sharing economy.

Mining hardware would be advanced enough for anyone to contribute to the network without worrying about breaking even. The selfish motive would be replaced by a different understanding of what money is.

Bitcoin.com is owned by that slimy marketer Roger Ver. They want BCash to be called bitcoin. They did it on bitcoin.com until a lawsuit was filed. Now the BCash group is still dicey because they have been unable to make coinmarketcap call BTC as Bitcoin Core (which is the client and not the coin itself).

I won't be surprised if they continue their marketing campaign meant to confuse newbies into thinking that BCash is bitcoin. And that is the one they should buy instead of the real bitcoin that goes by the ticker BTC. This website is just meant to serve that purpose. Nothing else.

It's amazing how confident of themselves the elites always are. They see everything as a new way to have more control and power. Calling cryptocurrencies Financial technology is a similar manipulative attempt. The intention is to portray bitcoin/ crypto as just another evolutionary step to the zero-accountability banking practices that banking cartels have always been free to follow.

Bitcoin and crytpocurrencies are not evolutionary but revolutionary. This will also decide how successful the alt-coins will really be. Attaching the buzzword "blockchain" doesn't make a product crypto. There is decentralization and trustlessness as the most important elements. Like in bitcoin, people are not dependent on banks to exchange value between each other. There goes the control on "who gets the money and who doesn't".

When taken to a global scale, these small groups of peer-to-peer traders, merchants and users have the ability to support a parallel economy by itself. This is where the banks need to get their act together by being more responsible in terms of enabling equitable growth and distribution of wealth. These sly attempts at labelling crypto as "financial innovations" means that the banks have no intention of changing their age old practice of supporting the hegemonous aspirations of governments and powerful individuals.

People have bitcoin as a way to assert their freedom from this circle of control. It depends on us whether we choose to help it grow or become a victim of our own greed, again. So stop looking up to the banks, IMF etc. to give you your freedom. We don't serve them. They exist because of us. Bitcoin doesn't need their approval to be chosen as a mode of exchange or store of value.

It interesting to see how Gold is viewed in the west versus how it is viewed in eastern countries like India. Here it's more of a necessity than just an interest. During marriages, considerable amount of gold is spent for jewellery for the bride as well as groom. It's similar to the diamond engagement ring trend in west on which you guys too spend a bomb.

Keeping this in mind, the demand for gold is always going to be there in eastern cultures. It's psychological and social requirement is so ingrained that even the poorest of the poor try to give away some form of gold during marriages. It is a study topic in itself that how much of this fetish for gold has kept generation of Indian poor trapped in a cycle of poverty as they spend their life's savings for pleasing the society. Even then, there are cases where brides get harassed, abused and at times killed because of the demand for more.

There can't be an outright 'rule' against cryptocurrency. At least not a countrywide ban in most democracies. That will be against the spirit of freedom of choice and profession that democracies tout as their specialties. Using bitcoin to transact anonymously will still be limited to peer to peer transfers only. This is something that nobody should have a problem with. It is much harder than you think to contain the power of a user-generated and user-validated currency.

You are falling for the government arguments of painting bitcoin with the "money-laundering, criminal activities" button. Crime and evil will always be there. With bitcoin or without bitcoin. Do you think drug dealers and traffickers will stop operating if they can no longer use bitcoin??

I appreciate your concern but you have it totally backwards if you think solution is to enable a way to "track" the usage of crypto by some trusted/responsible officials or organization. This is not what bitcoin is about. You already have fiat for that.

The choice that crypto gives you is to make a p2p transaction to whomever you want in the world without having to go through the hoops of currency exchanges. It allows countries to come out of a perpetual cycle of debt and misery by loosening the control that the trio of Central banks, Wealthy businesses and Politicians have over the working classes. I'd suggest you to read more on these aspects than falling for the bank/ authorities created FUD (Fear, Uncertainty Doubt)

That is very creative of you. Congratulations but you will need to be better and more objective for being taken seriously. If this is an attempt to create unnecessary FUD, then sorry, try again. If this is a genuine thought then please use better analogies and comparisons.

For example, What the *&#$(insert expletive) is "destructive energy" compared to "Potential Energy"?? This is a pretty silly argument. Quite simply, Bitcoin is a revolution. It allows you to exchange value without going through a trusted third party in a non-physical manner, over long distances without the burden of having to carry it. Just imagine how many highwaymen robberies in medieval England would have been saved if kings didn't have to send bullion with huge armies and knights??!!

That is the power of bitcoin. It has the potential to obviate war. That is why governments and bankers are having such a hard time wrapping their head around it.

SegWit has the added advantage of fixing Transaction malleability which was also one of the requirements for deployment of LN. At the end of the scaling debate, bitcoin chose the way of innovation rather than the straight forward way of risking centralization.
LN enables micro transactions to be moved off-chain while maintaining decentralization. Opponents of the technology want to paint this as centralization but a network where anyone can join is much less centralized than one which has a high entry-barrier.

The whole point of LN and SegWit was to keep the entry barrier as low as possible. This is the reason that you can run an LN node from even a Raspberry Pi.

Lot of people think that adoption has already taken place and all that bitcoin should do now is to keep milking that adoption. This when not even 10% of the population is using BTC for transactions. The stance of core developers to risk growth to ensure continued development has been questioned by many. Despite the naysayers, SegWit is now widely adopted and LN is already running on mainnet. With the community getting engaged in the innovation and the network building, this is still the community project that bitcoin was always supposed to be.

Whatever you all. Do as you please and believe whatever you want to.

You have resorted to the "You are wearing a Sig so your opinion doesn't count" line. So it's no use arguing any longer.

I have no interest in getting any "boot-licking" merits. Thankfully, i have garnered a few without resorting to that. You could say though that I have a bias to judge people like Lauda, actmyname, Pharmacist etc. more favorably compared to others. This is after seeing the post history, references left for scammers and the moderation done by them. It'll be clear to anyone (except those who had their accounts suffer) that there actions have been for the good of the forum.

aTriz's scam doesn't bound Lauda or ALU to take the fall for it. You probably think they should take the fall for it. That is the only thing they have refused to do. Other than that Lauda has negged the aTriz account and it's gone for what it was worth. Do you have any evidence of this complicity except the "because they weren't quick to condemn" argument?

Which part is "Utter non-sense"?? This..?? People who are prejudiced because their accounts were damaged or because they didn't get the attention/ respect they think they deserve, may not think the same.
In the bold part above, you do agree that people have a score to settle here. Again, nobody is denying that a scam has happened.That is why aTriz has lost his credibility. Now when you stretch that to include "as will those who turned a blind eye", it just becomes a witch hunt devoid of solid evidence and only based on what you think is right. If you have evidence, let people see it.


Maybe you are right, maybe I am right. You are the one insinuating about more skeletons so maybe you should try gathering evidence. Without that, these are just opinions and we are all free to have one. BTW, Gone are the days when people were going to trust 4100 BTC to a single entity on Bitcointalk so TF level long con, well, this ain't gonna be one.

And yes, One thing we do agree on:

People insinuating against a particular feline entity that took it upon itself to be the sword of vengeance against spammers is nothing new. The same pattern repeats in this thread. "concern trolling for vengeance," is exactly what they do. Its pathetic seeing everyone trying to take a bite whenever the opportunity presents itself. People suddenly change their "Joined Twitter" "Great Project" ways to become some sort of forum vigilantes. Like endlasuresh as an example.

aTriz deciding to ignore the "1 BTC raised" issue with bitblisscoin represents his own dishonesty. Infact, he is the one who implicated himself by accepting this in the first place. OgNasty and QS then jumped in as they couldn't let go this juicy opportunity to make Lauda and ALU look bad. They started their usual to-and-fro arguments with one insinuating and the other confirming. The pattern just can't be missed..
There is some hard to follow, old feud between them with Lauda being part of some "extortion scam"; OgNasty being called out for his mismanagement of Nasty Fans; being told that he lives in a shack; QS as usual the hard to understand shadowy figure negged to max for alt-peddling and self-escrows and then OgNasty deciding to support him. It is so confusing and convoluted that you will find it hard to follow the past. Most of the level headed members side with Lauda on this and their past actions for moderating the forum too justify this choice.

---

Why do all the idiots and trolls who invest in ICO's in hope of flipping for gains think they can hold managers responsible for their funds?? In the screenshot of snakey's post above, He says "I invested 7000$ after seeing it endorsed by ALU". What kind of stupidity is this? When has ALU claimed to check the credentials of the ICO devs?? All they can lay claim to is that the manager won't run away with your "stakes" or "escrowed BTC" meant for bounty distributions. (Like a lot of scammy managers were doing at one time).

If some idiot decides to invest 7k USD because ALU purportedly supported / endorsed the ICO, then they would have invested a lot more in their earlier ICOs too. And flipped them for gains. ICO investing is a perilous thing. You gain some, you lose some. He invested because he wanted to see his money get doubled. Little else.

The other purpose of this thread to get aTriz negged is fulfilled. Why else is this still going on?? Lock it already.
But wait, Looks like there are more vultures joining in. Pathetic!

The discussion will get sidetracked if we are not on the same page about the basics I guess..LOL..It is not a common misconception regarding banks keeping reserves. Maybe not in their own cash vault but in any banking system, there is a certain reserve that banks maintain with their respective central banks. This is part of the checks and balances on the banking system. If the banks are only acting as a central point of trust and doling out huge amounts to corporates and businesses as loans (without underlying reserves like you claim) then it is a perfect recipe for never-ending disasters.

Those of us who are on the other side of this debate see this whole "growth driven, necessity of monetary controls" as the smokescreen behind which the "invisible hands" play out their script with ease. Keeping income disparities intact and increasing and telling everyone that running constantly is your only option.
The crisis weren't just triggered by the Gold standard. There were wars and instability to account for. I suggest you take a look at this discussion here to see it from the other side.

The craziness of ICOs can be judged from the fact that most of them are based out of East European countries or Russia. Vitalik Buterin may have started it all with the best of intentions but his brethren seem to have no interest in being part of an honorable vision. The lax regulations and law & order in these countries must be the reason that the scammers get away with relative ease. After this, only those people invest in ICOs who hope to flip those tokens for easy gains as soon as they are listed. The supposed promise of bringing VC-level opportunity to small investors is still a pipe dream.

That may well be the reason. The authorities realize that these scam ICOs are a self goal on the cryptocurrencies. What is ironic is that the people who are quick to question the "worthiness of corrupt politicians to rule us" are the first one to find ways to scam others as well as look upto the government to save them rather than taking responsibility and being vigilant themselves.

I think the most important part is where the article describes setting up of an educational institute.

This is a sign of mature acceptance and not just a passing decision to accommodate the idea. It is commendable that the Govt of Philippines is willing to invite new comers as well as create technical knowhow and trained manpower in the field of blockchain. Any such university will also have to take care of the Mathematics, Computer Science and cryptography parts. This can be a truly multi-disciplinary institute. Last i heard, their badass, almost Don like president Duterte was busy cleaning the streets from the scourge of drugs. And now this forward looking step.

It can now only be hoped that the people, officials and particularly the youth will make good use of this acceptance rather than just putting their life savings into questionable investments and seeing them getting drained to scammers in east European countries.!!

Philippines is also among one of the important developing economies of Asia. If this accepting approach yields results, the rest of the developing economies in the region will follow suit.