Well - it seems a lot of people do think this is a *real issue* but what further action is maybe for you mods to decide.

What I think most people like me would like to see is less *pointless posts* that are made just for getting sig rewards.

So let's forget about EvilPanda and focus on the *real issue* - we are seeing a huge amount of *useless posts* in every board because people can *make money from that*.

That is the real issue that needs to be fixed (otherwise this forum is going to end up being not worth reading at all).

Even the tech topics are spammed with *rubbish* from people trying to earn money from their sigs (am sure Gavin and others are not impressed).

I noticed that even I was stupid enough to respond to a *supposed newbie* about how Bitcoin works only to notice later that their sig has PrimeDice in it (so they were just posting an old many times answered question to get paid). BTW Danny Hamilton also replied (so not it's not just me wasting time on this stuff).

The problem is *shit posts* (the sigs being sponsored is what has led to it).

Do you not see the *connection* between these two things?

Thanks for this input and for stopping the campaign that has led to so many stupid posts being made in every board on the forum. Let's just hope others don't follow your original path (if the forum isn't going to do anything to prevent it).

The work you do is appreciated but still I see "pointless post after pointless post" that are basically no better than the old +1's generally with PrimeDice in their sig (the number one sponsor of useless posts on this forum IMO).

Maybe the sponsor should be banned (then they might be more picky about who they let post for them)?

Perhaps also sigs could be limited to not appear in any "useful boards" (that way they useless posters can just post in useless boards such as Lending).

Haha - about 90% of all posts on this forum appear to be exactly that!

Can probably live with that limitation.


That is pretty bad (especially if people doing that to spot possible scammers) although I rarely actually use this function (so can probably also with live that).


I don't use that useless link except if I click it by mistake (I use Watchlist) so I think I'm "good to go".

Thanks for the help.

Okay - I've found that and now ignored numerous boards - what are the "additional side effects" though?

To understand things a little better you need to understand that transactions involve UTXOs (unspent transaction outputs) from previous transactions (including "coinbase" transactions when a miner gets rewarded) and that these cannot be "split" (thus the need for "change addresses").

So when you receive a tx you need to check that *all* the UTXOs it is using "have not been used before". Now as this is done one tx at a time the 2nd tx the node sees will be rejected (note that it can *never* receive "two at once" as they are effectively serialised).

Of course this is just the low-level mechanism to prevent an *actual* double spend - the "double-spending problem" is usually referring to *double spend attempts* (which can successfully get you goods or services if vendors don't wait for confirmations). The solution to this is the "blockchain concept" itself (and the "proof of work" algorithm at its core in Bitcoin).

Maybe I need to work out how you can stop seeing those posts from the "Show unread posts since last visit" then. Instructions?

Agreed - I do like his idea a lot.

True - I should probably do that but I always like to see what is new just in case it of interest.

Well - that exact stat is not known to me - but nearly every single loan request that I've read about is from a (wannabe) scammer (and I see at least 20 per day if not more).

Again the "fungibility" issue doesn't really come into it unless we start talking about *choose your favourite colour* lists.

I hadn't noticed Luke's proposal before and maybe it isn't a bad idea - but you don't think something like "stealth" is actually a *better solution* all around?

From what I have observed 99% of all "loan requests" are just from anonymous people hoping to scam (and if they are "awarded loans" they are 99% likely to be from their own sockies to try and let them convince others to loan them more later).

There are already well known "loaners" who are prepared to take risks after working out how the borrower satisfies their requirements so why do we still want to allow "scammers and beggars" to post on this forum (i.e. what good does it actually serve)?

I personally would rather just see posts from "loaners" rather than from "borrowers" (with "loaners" able to post "borrowers" details if they decide to make a loan - although even that would need to be moderated IMO to stop *false reps*).

Good luck with that but I somehow don't see it happening any time soon but in the meantime it is of course a good idea to educate people about "smarter and safer" ways to do Bitcoin transactions.

Also I think that ideas along the lines of "stealth addresses" might hold more promise for the dealing with the issues of traceability.

True - but that is not how Bitcoin works (and not how *everyone was taught it works*) so that argument doesn't really work for me sorry.

Oh - okay - yes I remember that horrible stuff.

In any case - in general I would always use new address for each tx but I have found that for some things (such as not at home and don't have my own computer but need to receive funds for a face to face trade for example) a firstbits can be handy (I really have used this in the past back when blockchain.info supported firstbits).

Certainly I would not want people to ever use stupid black/white/orange lists.

In terms of "scaring off newbies" I think that one should educate them "one step at a time" and not expect them to be able to do "best practice" from the get-go.

And I likewise do value your opinion but I just find the extreme position a bit "hard to swallow" (in particular when we are hoping for more adoption of Bitcoin).

Certainly I do understand the issues of privacy (and potentially security) but I don't quite see how "fungibility" gets into this. Just because an address has been used doesn't make the funds "less spendable" (unless you guys are wanting to make it so - in which case you are the ones destroying fungibility IMO).

@DannyHamilton and @BurtW I think your "black and white" view of things here doesn't reflect *the real world*.

If a newbie was given an address by Danny for Escrow and wrote it down and then thought he'd lost it so asked for another one but then accidentally ended up pasting in the first address seemingly Danny is now going to "burn his funds on principle".

IMO that is just silly and won't help the adoption of Bitcoin at all (and would likely end Danny's Escrow service).

Sorry guys - but the world isn't black and white and you don't get to make the rules "just because you think a perfect world should work your way".

In the real world people make mistakes and we all do our best to ensure that no-one is getting hurt needlessly (and I know this from the actual experience of nearly losing 100 BTC through a stupid mistake which luckily a pool decided to refund mostly back to me).