I wouldn't put too much faith in bitcoin's anonymity, because if any government decided they wanted to seize their citizens' coins, I'd imagine they'd find a way to trace who owns what (at least for a lot of people, and especially those who use exchanges like Coinbase).  Hopefully it'll never come to that, because OP is indeed correct that the gold confiscation that happened shows you how much power the government has.  I mean, hey....they make the laws, and it would just take the stroke of a pen to make us all outlaws.

You live in France if I'm not mistaken, so I don't know how it is over there with government and people's faith in it, but here in the US I'd say there are tons of people who don't trust our government--and they're right not to.  There are so many examples of politicians and other government workers perpetrating all sorts of misdeeds (in addition to all the bullshit policies that have been enacted) that I don't understand how anyone could trust them.

I don't think I was ever taught about the gold seizure of 1933 when I was a kid in school.  Those are the types of things that don't make it into standard textbooks of American history unfortunately.  Hell, I'd much prefer that subjects like that weren't even taught in grammar and high schools in the US.  What's the point of memorizing all of the US presidents, anyway?

That's where the Coming Soon^TM on the Youtube channel comes from (I think).  At this point it's just a running gag that's not all that funny, because I've been hearing about that software for what must be years now.  I know Theymos has a lot of money and resources at his disposal, so I'm pretty sure he could get the ball rolling if he really wanted to.

But as I've written quite a few times before, I'm happy with the design of the forum as it is and it functions well for what it is, which is a discussion forum without any frills.  I happen to agree with the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" sentiment, so that New Forum Software^{Coming Soon} can stay on the shelf indefinitely for all I care.  

If I were a recent donor hoping to get a new version of bitcointalk released, I might be a little peeved, but all of those early donors weren't donating bitcoin for that purpose (as far as I know).

I'm not sure either Lauda or TMAN left the forum because of that reason; TMAN just kind of disappeared, and Lauda, well....who knows?  But I agree that nutildah is an asset to the forum, and I'd hate to lose him.  However, this was just a ban for a week, and given that nutildah kept ignoring the mods about his thread being in the wrong section (regardless of anyone's argument about whether that interpretation is correct), it's fair.  Bruno was temp banned a while back for consecuposting if I'm not mistaken, and he was certainly a valuable member of the community.  That tells me that very few members (I hate to say nobody) are above the rules.

I think nutildah did get a bit of special consideration here, as he was warned multiple times before he got temp-banned.  Other members who don't have a reputation, or who are shitposters, or who have negative trust might have been banned much sooner.  I can't say that's 100% true of course, but I don't think the mods were quick with the ban hammer as far as nutildah goes.

Yep, and I also understand it from both sides, which makes it hard for me to place blame in this situation.  Fortunately all nutildah got was a 7-day ban, and hopefully that'll give him some time to cool off--and I also hope he doesn't return with a grudge.

And you should--at least on forums that would have anything to do with betting, crypto, or have members who'd be interested in a site like 1xbit.com.  Unfortunately, everyone here is well aware that they're scammy as hell.  You're probably not going to return, but if you do, you ought to search in the Scam Accusation section for "1xbit" and you'll see all their victims prior to them scamming you.  Wish you'd done a thorough due diligence check on them before placing your first bet, because if you had I have no doubt you'd have come across a few threads from bitcointalk.

Any amount scammed stings, but it looks like you were betting relatively small amounts.  There's probably no comfort in that, but I think other people have gotten ripped off for much more than you did.  So yeah, spread the word that 1xbit is to be avoided like the bubonic plague, syphilis, rabid bats, and radioactive cockroaches.  I know you know what I mean.

I haven't done a Google search on them lately, but last time I did the first page of results didn't show any real red flags.  I'm not sure how that can be changed; I'd be willing to bet that 1xbitch is using some kind of SEO service (or doing it themselves) to keep all the bad stuff at the bottom of searches.

Six, seven months?  It's not that far away, though the weather in my area would suggest differently.  And given that we're talking about the government, which moves slower than ice-cold molasses, it's almost the blink of an eye.

That's definitely true--and I don't expect the US government to let itself go bankrupt and thus become the laughingstock of the world.  There are so many tricks those idiots in Washington can pull in order to avert that possibility, though I hope they don't plan on starting a world war or something like that.  I'm not sure how much of a warmonger Joe Biden is, because he seems to be more like the "Uncle Joe" type, who likes to give away money and so forth, but that doesn't mean he isn't as devious as any other US politician.  You'd kind of have to be to have survived as long as he has in US politics, you know?

That was one of my first thoughts, though it does make me wonder why a pronouncement like this would even be made if the US wasn't in trouble and could count on an easy solution like printing more money--which is part of what got us into this situation in the first place.  All the stimulus checks and other forms of free money that the Federal and state government have been giving out might have stimulated the economy, but just look at where inflation is at the moment.  It makes me wonder who the hell is monitoring all of this and if they need a new pair of glasses.

Jesus....who knows?  It could be any of them, though I'd be betraying my ignorance about the origins of some of the altcoins out there if I were to guess--Ripple is the first one that comes to mind, followed by Tether.

By the way, here and there for the last few years I've been posting my thoughts about whence bitcoin was suddenly unleashed upon the world, and government agencies have been in my mind whenever I've posted about that.  It just seems extremely unbelievable that a human being could fly so far under the radar while creating something as huge as bitcoin that no one, not even any of the law enforcement or intelligence agencies around the world have been able to identify him.  And you bet there would be a lot of interest in doing so, even if it was only from the IRS.

The alternatives are that 1) Satoshi isn't a single person, but someone working for a government (probably the US), or 2) The government has already gotten to whoever Satoshi is and has recruited him for whatever cryptography projects they could buy him off for.  I suppose there are other alternatives, but those seem the most likely to me.  Granted, I wasn't around in the early days and didn't see Satoshi's posts or know any of the original people involved, so my perspective is completely skewed--and obviously I know I could be wrong about my theories.

But don't any of you think it's weird that Satoshi apparently couldn't be traced, that he vanished without a trace while still leaving what's presumably a digital trail behind that should lead investigators to him?  Oh, by the way Hydrogen: I'm not surprised whatsoever that the CIA is involved with cryptocurrency. 

Huh.  I didn't know Gen Zs were strictly US citizens.  Is that even true?

And what's up with that second statement about diversity?  It's really got nothing to do with the poll, and the injection of identity politics into a financial article really, really seems icky to me.  Is there nothing in the media nowadays that isn't laced with this crap?

Good; that means that as they grow older they're probably likely to become anti-government and more skeptical about the things they were brainwashed with as youths.  At least I hope that's the case, because if it isn't we're in some serious trouble.

Now here's the thing about those Gen Zs thinking they can become millionaires by dabbling in crypto:  Some of them really are getting extremely wealthy by taking those risks the article talked about and investing in not only dogecoin but all sorts of altcoins and experimenting with oddball stuff like NFTs and such.  So it's not as if they're out of their minds by believing in crypto as a cure for their financial woes, because when doge hit its ATH you know a bunch of people had to have just gotten rich.

One thing I'm hoping for is that when the Gen Zs grow up and become our future politicians, they retain their fondness for cryptocurrency and don't try to regulate it to death (if that hasn't happened by the time the new generation gets elected to positions of power).  I also think it's a great thing that youngsters have such a positive view about crypto.  I don't understand that whole "pro-government" stance that I quoted above (if it's true), because part of the reason bitcoin is so valuable is because of all the damage governments have done to fiat currency and the world economy in general.

Jesus, all of these similar scam sites, and the EvoMiners site is still up after all these months!  Are they still using the original site to pull off these scams or what? 

Looking at their page, anyone would think they're completely legitimate.  They've got an address and phone number displayed--has anyone tried to call them or has anyone looked into who the resident is at La Rue le Gros, St. Saviour, Jersey, JE2 7QP, United Kingdom (the address on their site)?

One thing that definitely sticks out like a scammer's sore thumb is this:



Maybe it's commonplace for reviews like that to have what look like stock photos attached to them, but headshots like that look like they belong in the ANN thread of an ICO scam under the "team" section.  Anyway, I just stumbled upon this thread and I'm sorry you all got scammed by these dirtbags.  I can't blame anyone for falling for it, because on its face it totally looks like a legitimate business.  Yikes.

Since there's already an open scam accusation against these guys (which you linked to yourself), is this thread necessary?

As far as 4444sport's "attitude" goes, I'd say if they're deleting posts made by people who are making legitimate complaints about withdrawal delays and whatnot, that doesn't speak well for them.  That's exactly what you'd expect a scam site to do, and it's happened many times before. 

I'm not a gambler, so I'd never heard of 4444sport or even AdkinsBET before (though the latter does ring a bell in my head).  It sounds like they could be under the same management/ownership.  If that's true, then I'd say people ought to steer clear of them based on the trust page of the AdkinsBET account.  There are so many crypto casinos out there that aren't scams, so why would someone choose to go with a new, unproven, and possibly scammy one?

Same here, and with the exception of a handful of members, I think we're a dying breed on the forum.  Fortunately there have been some new members that, regardless of their motivation for being here, have been excellent contributors to bitcointalk.  So even if someone is here strictly for the money, that doesn't mean they fall into the typical bounty-hunting, shitposter, zero-value class.

I've grown attached to this forum over the years, so there's no way I'd give it up just because signature campaigns went away--which doesn't seem to be an option in Theymos's mind in any case.  But I bet there would be a massive efflux of members if that happened, and that makes me wonder what would happen to the merit system and my role as a merit source.  There wouldn't be any incentive for members to rank up aside from status, which means there probably wouldn't be any threads about how to earn merits or even as much general interest in doing so.

And that's just one consideration; I think this place would look completely different if campaigns and bounties were suddenly outlawed.  It was an active forum prior to the first campaign, but I think that was due to bitcoin being a very new thing.  Now that it's matured quite a bit and given the fact that many members are here just to participate in bounties/campaigns, I'd expect bitcointalk to become almost a ghost town.  Hopefully that won't be tested anytime soon.

Don't know if you're paranoid or not (since I don't know you IRL), but you're not in a parallel universe that I know of.  Yes, this has been discussed before but I think it's been at least 5 months since we had a thread like this.  Maybe a little less; I lose track of time when it comes to this forum.

Yeah well, that thread I just missed entirely.  As much as I'm a Meta hound, I just didn't take much interest in a milestone like that and wasn't following that particular thread.  How was I to know that it would have led me here?  I don't have 500 eyeballs and as many neurons as a dolphin you know.  I'm just a neurologically limited bag of donks, even if I did merit the OP of the Three millionth account thread. 

So wait a sec....how long has the Merit Cycling Club been a thing?

Skarais has been a member of the forum for over 4 years now, has a decent reputation, and I have no doubt he knows what a merit-worthy post is.  I've long thought that we need more merit sources in the local boards, and since the Indonesian one is (or was) a very active one I think Theymos really ought to give him a shot--so I support his application.

Uh....this thread is just about one day old, so as ETFbitcoin has suggested, be patient.  I'd also point out that Skarais's OP got a lot of merits so far, so you could count those as support without members actually writing posts in support of his application.  And why shouldn't he bother to help his fellow Indonesians out?  I think there's a merit source who's gone missing in that section (though I could be thinking of another one), and if that's the case that merit source needs to be replaced IMO.

Good luck, Skarais.  I don't see any problem at all with your application; the only hindrance I see is Theymos's decision as to whether he wants to increase the number of merit sources right now.  He made some new ones not too long ago, and I don't know whether he's going to tap any new members to be sources for now.  Hopefully he will, because as I said I think your local board needs at least one.

If I had to guess, I'd say you're correct on that one.  Foxpup is like a robot with the timing and yet (I think) I know he's not using a bot to make them.  Anyone who boozed it up to the point of it becoming a habit wouldn't even run a campaign like he does, much less be as consistent with the payouts as he is. 

In some people, true.  But Foxpup is Foxpup and I'm not even sure if he/she/it would even identify as a person--and I respect that. 

Let the purpose of the Cycling Club remain a mystery to the uninitiated, I say.

Bounty hunters (in general) care about the merit system to the extent that it allows them to rank up, and that's about it.  I seriously doubt any of them care about what anybody else is writing, because they're not paid to read or hand out merits--and the vast majority of them are here for the sole purpose of getting paid.  There are exceptions, of course, but what I just described is the rule.  And OP, you've pretty much presented good supporting evidence for that.

Bitcoin-paying sig campaigns are harder to get into than bounties, which seem to accept any member who applies (including alt accounts).  So it stands to reason that members who write the best posts and are invested in the forum are going to flock to campaigns instead of bounties.  Plus they tend to be members who've been on the forum for a while and know that the tokens that bounties pay out are usually complete shit, and that's in addition to the risk of not getting paid at all.

Well that's been discussed ad nauseam over the years, and I'm fresh out of ideas.  Theymos could probably come up with solutions, but I think he's satisfied that the merit system has reduced shitposts significantly since its inception (and it has).

LOL....I may steal that one for use in real life; hope you don't mind--and since you won't know anyway, thanks for the borrowed wittiness.

Man, I missed this thread because I have Services on ignore.  Can someone here please give me a seriously concise TL;DR about what this discussion is about?  I'd be meritably grateful, if you know what I mean and I'd even be willing to go full furry fuzzjob if that's what you'd prefer.  Sounds like my kind of thread up in this joint.

Oh wow, that's interesting!  I don't recall that discussion about the Merit Cycling Club whatsoever, and though I haven't scanned through that entire thread yet, I don't believe I posted in it.  I didn't realize there were such questions being asked about Foxpup's club or even that Three Millionth User had popped up there.  In fact, I don't even remember anything posted by him/her.

It is very strange that the actual 3,000,000th member registered on this forum would have that name, no?  I suspect that's not a coincidence at all but was done by Theymos or someone who has influence with him.  It could just be someone who was watching closely and had damn good timing, but somehow I doubt that.

Probably, but I bet it won't be until there's another milestone as far as registered members go.  Three Millionth User has got to be someone's alt account and given that they haven't posted much since registering, I suspect that the primary account is too busy.

Edit:  I now know why I missed LoyceV's thread--I have that section on ignore.  Fortunately the thread is still running for some reason, so I'm going to un-ignore it and see about posting in it ASAP.  Thanks for linking to it, OP.

Yeah, well it's a good thing you realized it now and not later, after you would have sent them more funds that you'd likely never have seen again.  Asking for money in order to withdraw is probably in the top ten methods scammers have (with variations on the theme) and use most frequently.

Lol.  I'm not into social media sites or whatever it is that Tinder has to offer, so I've never visited their site or used the app, but I'd bet money that you're correct that the "girls" on there (at least the ones who are apparently giving out links to crypto exchanges) are really humans with dickandballs, XY chromosomes, bearded faces, and yada yada.  Guaranteed.

OP, if you're going to use crypto exchanges, don't fall for these tricks.  I don't know how old you are, but you really ought to know better than this.

Oh, snap!  That's not a good thing, is it?  But I could almost figure that out in my head just by looking at my position for last month, because I was relatively lazy as a merit source and yet still came in at #8. 

Gonna try my best to bust out the merit hose and spray it in a bunch of directions this month, though I'm probably not off to a great start.  Once again, I appreciate you updating this thread.

Yeh, must be WO.  The only other gang I know of these days is Foxpup's Cycling Club but that gang doesn't match the hats.

Lol....are you actually offering those services or just posting a hypothetical scenario for whatever reason?  If you've found a way to do the above, then my guess would be that you've found a serious bug that might be of interest to Theymos.  I'm not a programmer or hacker, so I never was interested in that bug bounty (or paid much attention to what it was all about), but it sounds like something you might profit from rather than doing those scummy things.

I'd be very interested to see if OP is able to do what he's apparently claiming he can do.  I don't know if he's just blowing smoke or what.

That's interesting--I hadn't read anything about that before, but as you said the article is from July, so I doubt that's responsible for the massive drop we've seen in the past 24 hours.  Maybe there's some info about that or something else that hasn't hit the press yet but got leaked to some whales....that's the only thing I can think of aside from this just being a general selloff. 

And yikes, what a selloff this has been so far.  I've certainly seen bitcoin do some crazy things, but it's been a while since it's been down $10k within a matter of days.  Usually I don't worry about what's causing price swings like this, but I am curious about this one because there's been no bullish or bearish news besides the COVID stuff.