Days like today (and yesterday) can feel terrible, the market is plunging in percentage terms, and it seems that nothing will stop the slide.
It is important in these situations to consider the wider context. Change the scale on those price charts on coinmarketcap, so that you are looking at years rather than hour-to-hour. Breath deeply. Relax. Trade if you can and if you're good at it, otherwise buckle up and hold on. The trend is still upwards. This is just yet another bump in the road.

In a sense, yes, but 'too little too late' implies that there were actions the US could have taken that would have constituted sufficient reparation, when that's actually not the case. When people have suffered psychological and physical torment, had their livelihoods and reputations destroyed, been separated from their families, when people have died... there is no sufficient reparation. Throwing money at it or saying sorry does nothing except perhaps alleviate the weight of guilt on the conscience of the perpetrators. What needs to happen is that lessons need to be learned so that nothing similar happens in the future. The current demonisation of muslims and - thanks to Trump - those evil Mexicans, suggests that lessons have not been learned at all.

As an aside, you might be interested in reading about the life of Frank Emi, who was one of the people incarcerated, and a key member of the Heart Mountain Fair Play Committee, who fought the draft. That's right - those Japanese Americans who were imprisoned as potential traitors were in 1943 forced to take a loyalty questionnaire and then drafted into military service, and expected to fight and die for the country that had treated them as traitors and stripped away their rights! This makes the fact that Emi was forced to sell his family business at around 6c to the dollar at the time of internment seem relatively inconsequential...

I think the chance of the US not getting their way here is close to 0%. It's a show trial. The US has suffered reputational damage at his hands, and they will want to make an example of him. It was perhaps a little foolish of him to enter a country that is on favourable terms with the US. Contrast Assange's movements with those of Edward Snowden.


Any interaction between the US and the UK will be one-sided, be it an extradition treaty or a trade deal. This is inevitable given the disparities in power and influence between the two countries. The US is a global superpower. The UK is not. Simply, the UK does as it is told.
If we look at the 'Special Relationship' that exists between the two countries, then the US benefits as the UK is in a strategically important location as the gateway to Europe, in both trade and defence, and the UK is also useful as a military ally so that any US adventurism in say the middle-east seems a tiny bit less unilateral. As for how the UK benefits, well, that's a little more difficult to determine. Perhaps we are first in the queue for any scraps that fall from the US table, perhaps not. This is one reason why Brexit was a bad idea. The UK outside Europe is stripped of much of its negotiating power, and absolutely at the mercy of US interests.

I've had something similar. The suggestions, not the dysfunction.
We're having our kitchen renovated, and were discussing lighting - actually discussing vocally; we had sent no texts nor made any phone or computer searches. We don't have Amazon Echo or Google Home or any of that crap.
... And then my wife went on her phone and was suddenly bombarded with ads for kitchen lights.


Actually, I think it will. Try to run your OS from a floppy, and it will be a disaster. Sorry

I think there's a distinction to be made here. Assange is an outsider, Trump positions himself so that he looks like an outsider.

I posted a bit about this in another thread:

I think there's an explanation, yes. The second chart does show flights from China to Italy. And whilst it's a sensible precaution to block the direct flights, they didn't actually do this until after there were confirmed cases in Italy (30 Jan).

Hey! I'm not meriting anti-Chinese stuff, I'm meriting people who are complaining that everyone surveils us. The Chinese state may be bad, but it's Facebook that's my mortal enemy. There, I've said it.

... And if you edit this so it says "I really care if people are spying on me", then I'll merit you, too. Go on. Do it. One word to delete.


Seriously though, the monetising of us poor users is getting absurd now, and it's really impacting our experience. It's not just nefarious behind-the-scenes behavioural analysis and nudging us to act (or indeed vote) in a certain way, it's now right out in the open and in our faces.

I had a rant about it a while ago.

I think you're in the UK, same as me, so we're both supposedly protected by GDPR and particularly the 'active consent' element. But websites are treating the law with open contempt. You can click once to 'accept all' cookies and trackers, but have to make many many clicks through different sub-menus to opt out - the exact opposite of how it is legally supposed to work. Anyway, I'm ranting again, sorry. Have a look at the thread if you're interested. But please, do care about these companies spying on us. They're not just subverting the web, they're subverting democracy.

We're coming around to April Fool's Day 01 April again. It's 5th anniversary time for the thread!!!

Are we doing anything special? I think someone should bake a cake, and then take it out of the oven before it's fully cooked, so that it goes flat.
Any other (better) ideas?

Number of tests is a valid point. Obviously countries with zero tests have zero confirmed cases irrespective of how many people actually have the virus.
I wonder if there's a correlation between number of tests and number of flights in from China? I'd like to see some data.

nCov started in China. Cases in other countries have spread from China.

If there are zero cases in Africa, the most obvious explanation surely is that there are relatively few people (and therefore relatively few infected people) moving from China to Africa.
Look at the distribution by country (first chart below, as of today).

What you see is a lot of cases in countries close to China, and some cases in countries that have a lot of international travellers. The USA has over 50 cases, Mexico has none. Both countries have over 100m inhabitants. Are Mexicans somehow immune? Or is there more travel between China-US than between China-Mexico?

Compare the nCov cases chart (first below) with the list of China Air international destinations (second below). The parallels are striking.


https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/geographical-distribution-2019-ncov-cases



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_China_Airlines_destinations

First I would argue that this H&S ruling isn't directed specifically at McDonalds, but is applicable much more widely. Whilst a big multinational such as McDonalds probably already has processes in place to ensure that any work is carried out safely, and a team dedicated to H&S, the likelihood is that for much smaller businesses and independent traders the standards can be much lower, and legislative intervention is needed to ensure that the public are reasonably protected. McDonalds installing a speaker can be very different to a random shopkeeper with a screwdriver and a penchant for DIY trying to wedge something in above a doorway.

Second I would say that because H&S standards are so broadly applicable, it is easy to find individual cases that seem absurd. The general trend however is a different matter. In the UK, the Health and Safety at Work Act (1974) is the basis for current H&S, and is an important milestone. Let's look at recent trends:

Number of fatal injuries to employees
(RIDDOR and earlier reporting legislation, Great Britain)



Rate of self-reported workplace non-fatal injury
(LFS, Great Britain; estimated rate per 100,000 workers)



Rate of employer-reported non-fatal injury
(RIDDOR, Great Britain; rate per 100,000 employees)

https://www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/history/index.htm


The first chart is the most illustrative of the overall pattern, as it covers the full period from introduction of the Act, and shows a very clear trend. However, if we look at the other charts, particularly employer-reported non-fatals, we can see that the pattern is still, even now in the age of 'health and safety gone mad', a reduction year-on-year.

So I would argue that whilst certain individual instances of H&S requirements may appear ridiculous, and whilst I'm sure the industry has its share of petty jobsworths who delight in enforcing regulations, H&S as viewed overall is still tremendously important and does improve health and does improve safety.

Yes, get me to start it for you. There's a decent chance of no replies... 

Democracy 2020
"Disruption" as forced technological determinism

There are parallels here with the UK. I would concur that the DNC will do everything they can to stop Sanders, as the Labour party in the UK did everything they could to stop Corbyn becoming leader. I would say the rise of a Sanders-like politician to electoral victory fairly soon is inevitable - but whether or not this will be in the US is a different question.

The rise of globalisation and the legacy of inequality from the Reagan/Thatcher years is at the root of all this. There is a huge and growing underclass of disenfranchised, alienated voters, who over the last few decades have watched the wealth of their nations grow, whilst they themselves have not shared in the benefits.

This has led to a pervasive disenchantment with mainstream politics. "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world." Politics is cyclic, and for the moment centrism is dead. Centrists are those who in the eyes of the disenchanted 'got us where we are today'. The moment is ripe for outsider politicians who rail against the state to sweep into power. You might expect at this point that a socialist-orientated politician would surge to victory on a platform of reducing inequality and reining in the excesses of tax-evading billionaires. This has not happened, for a number of reasons, including the long shadow cast by the fall of communism. The main reason however is that our societies are plutocratic, with a thin veneer of democracy laid over the top: the rich control the media, and it is straightforward for them to demonise socialist-leaning politicians as communists, anti-semites, terrorist-sympathisers, etc etc ad nauseam.

So this brings us to the victories of right-wing populists, Trump of course, but replicated in a lot of places, Johnson now in the UK, Modi, Duterte, Bolsonaro...

The centre has been flatly rejected; the alternatives - in these countries at least - are hard-left or hard-right. The right is in power. But they can't go on forever. Trump can't go on forever, Modi with his outright Hindu nationalism can't go on forever. We will reach a tipping point when the electorate realise that these new populists don't represent their interests. At that time, whether it happens first in the US or elsewhere, we will see a socialist win an election... and I believe the effect will then spread.

In answer to the original question then - I believe that Bernie or someone like him will win soon, and the effect will spread across nations. In the US a lot obviously hinges on the opposition of the DNC. If he can get past them, then he is probably the only one who can defeat Trump. A lot of people in a lot of countries are watching on, hoping that the US can take the lead here.

"Exciting times" brings to mind the Chinese curse of living in interesting times.

Lost coins on the chain will indeed be vulnerable to QCs as these are the ones that won't be moved to quantum-safe addresses following a bitcoin upgrade. Making these coins available for theft by QCs could be terrible for bitcoin's price, but more so for faith in crypto as a whole, similarly if anything not moved was burned to prevent theft by QCs. There's no easy answer here.

Nearly a year on from the thread starting, and we are back in that same price range. The crucial difference I believe is that we have more upwards momentum this time. The support seems solid, and we look good for another launch through $10k, which I believe will hold. Remember always to look not just at the current price, but how we arrived at that price.

Thank you. I'm glad some people can see it!

In a similar vein, in 2019 Amazon donated $8m to help fight homelessness in Seattle ($5m) and its other headquarters city in Virginia ($3m). Great! So generous!
However... the previous year, Seattle tried to raise a new tax against large businesses in order to fight homelessness. The tax would have raised $48m per year. But fierce opposition from Amazon, including threatening to move its staff out of the city, forced Seattle to back down and cancel the plan.

So Amazon directly caused an overall loss of $43m for fighting homelessness in Seattle, rising to $48m in subsequent years unless Amazon 'kindly' donate to drop it back to $43m again.

Yes, true for all asymmetric cryptography, which can be broken by a QC running Shor's algorithm. Symmetric cryptography on the other hand is far less vulnerable, AES256 for example is quantum-proof against the best attack (Grover).

To break bitcoin's ECDSA it would take 2¹²⁸ operations on a "normal" computer to derive a private key, whereas for a quantum computer running Shor that drops to a much more manageable 128³.
But for symmetric cryptography, the attack vector has to be different, and the exponent only drops by 1/2, so something that would take 2¹²⁸ operations on a normal computer still takes 2⁶⁴ on a QC. And if we do move up to AES256, that's still 2¹²⁸ on a QC... the same number of operations to break ECDSA classically right now.


Whilst IBM have certainly made some impressive advancements, I am somewhat skeptical and believe that their achievements have been overstated. Media articles tend to be full of breathless hyperbole and are overly simplistic, as if 'number of qubits' is all there is to it, when clearly this is just a headline figure. I'll believe that IBM have achieved something truly special once they can prove that they have robust error correction. 53 qubits is not the same as 53 fault-tolerant qubits. Decoherence is a huge obstacle in quantum computing, and if IBM are leading people to believe that simply throwing more qubits at it will solve everything, then they are being at best very disingenuous.

Indeed. Bezos is one of the few top US billionaires who haven't signed the Giving Pledge (a commitment by the world's wealthiest individuals and families to dedicate the majority of their wealth to giving back).
But his ex-wife signed it... maybe that's why they got divorced? 

As opposed to authorised access? When Google was questioned by senators, Susan Molinari (VP for Policy) admitted that Google lets app developers access Gmail inboxes and read through users' personal mail. In one example, a third party marketing company called Return Path read literally thousands of unredacted personal emails. This is a bit over a year old, and Google said they would tighten things up, but tech companies say a lot of stuff and tend to ride ahead of the law... does anyone seriously think that a company that provides services "for free" is really not one where users and their data are being monetised?


Absolutely true, I agree 100%. Personally, as a westerner living in a western country, I would rather be spied upon by China than the US/UK/Five Eyes. If I lived in China, the opposite would be true and I'd be trying to ditch my Huawei instead.

Impeaching Trump was a stupid move from the Dems. He was always going to be acquitted by the Senate anyway, that was zero surprise to anyone.
Trump as a politician fits exactly the mould of the populist demagogues that now seem to be sweeping to power everywhere from India to Brazil. His entire position is as an outsider railing against the injustices and corruption of the state. Why the Dems ever thought that employing the weaponry of the state against Trump was a good idea or could ever be effective is beyond me. Everyone who thought he was corrupt now already thought so before the impeachment. Everyone who thought he was innocent - or at least not legally guilty - before still thinks so now. What the impeachment did was to further entrench his current support, and then win him new supporters, given that his technical acquittal by a partisan senate can very easily be spun into a vindication by impartial champions of justice.

Stupid move by the Democrats really, and one which does strongly suggest that they don't have even the merest understanding of the nature of Trump's power. Indeed they do look out of touch, which again could lead voters to Trump. Don't know what (if anything) they were thinking.