Personally, ife quitting guarantees that the friend will effectively drop his gambling addiction and push for rehabilitation and recovery then I’m all for it. Just puzzled over the idea of how me quitting could help the addicted friend to recover from gambling addiction when at this point he needs less of a support and more of real assistance from professionals in this field. That means him getting the treatment he needs and deserves is even more important than the moral support that us quitting would contribute into his situation. If anything I feel like our quitting to the gambling schedules that we do on a weekly basis (based on your story) is less of a help to your friend who’s addicted to gambling and more of a way to fool ourselves into thinking that we’re absolved of the guilt of letting in our friend into the gambling world.

So yeah, I can see the plan’s success in theory but rarely do we have friends that are ideal as what we envision in our studies so to account for the margin of reality.

Personally don't see having a steady income stream as a prerequisite for you to be a good and responsible gambler, but what you do have to keep in mind is that you don't spend your money dedicated for living expenses or any money budgeted towards a certain avenue that's not gambling for that particular matter. I've seen people be budget-kings and queens when it comes to how responsible they are with their money but soon as gambling comes into the equation they become absolute retards and dry their whole month's budgets in a single gambling spree. And keep in mind that this also includes those that earn handsome amounts of money too, so it's not about how much money you have or how steady your income stream is.

As long as you dedicate a specific amount of money for gambling that you follow to a T you should be good. It's good to have a steady income to cordially support this consistently but if you're someone who's not that really particular with gambling, you wouldn't really be expecting yourself to gamble that much so a monthly budget's not that necessary in a sense. The only thing is that you should always dedicate a specific amount you don't go over to when you gamble, and you religiously follow this regimen. That's more important than having a good-paying job to support your gambling addiction.

You gotta take into consideration that your grandma's probably known about hand-cranked slots all her life and comparing flat-virtual slots against something that you've known all your life you probably would choose the former any day too. Not to mention the fact that there's just something about personal experience beyond the phone screen that gets people going which is probably the reason why even us Gen Zs prefer real-lie experiences over virtual equivalents.

In any case, I do have a good example of someone I tried introducing into virtual gamble, which is my aunt (she's not that old but she's pushing 50 by now so still considerably older than me). She's good with cards and is used to playing Tong-its which if I'm not mistaken is a variation of the poker system, tong-its being one of the most played card games amongst card players here in the Philippines. I introduced her to virtual Chinese Poker and Tong-its games that do not ask for real-money wagers first as a means to have some family bonding along with my cousins, until she asked me if there's versions of Tong-its and Chinese Pokers that involve betting digital cash and winning it as well. I gave her good examples and taught her how to navigate through the whole ordeal and while I'm not particularly sure about her gambling disposition, I could safely say that I was able to introduce her into virtual gambling, which she says she plays when work's slow and she's bored.

Well there are psychological studies confirming age to be a definitive factor to just how susceptible someone could be against abusing indulgences like sex or gambling. With younger audiences, including those who just turned 18+ being the most affected and most vulnerable to this exploit. This is apart from the legislative laws and ordinances placed by your local government to protect children and younger people from becoming affected by gambling addiction.

With that being said, of course gamblers don't need to have to fall under a particular age category to be considered a gambler in the first place. It doesn't work that way, but it's only because laws have been effective so far at preventing kids and teenagers from blowing away their lunch money on slots and gambling. Otherwise this is going to be a societal problem of magnanimous scale should it happen. Already falling of a massive tangent right here but the main point I'm trying to make is that there doesn't need to be a specific age for someone to be considered a gambler, however, it is generally accepted that you have to be within the legal age bracket of 21 years old, 18 years old for some countries, before you could even begin to decide if you want to gamble. This is to ensure that you're legally liable to protect and subject yourself to gambling without the proper supervision of your parents/guardian, cause practically during these age brackets you're considered by the government as a full-on adult that doesn't depend upon their parents anymore.

Yes and No (I think)

The thing is that I self-diagnosed myself as a chronic gambler albeit perhaps even an addicted gambler during the height of the pandemic. I lost so much money gambling during those times and I realized that it's become a problem when I can't even buy decent food for myself after a gambling session. Since then I quitted gambling cold turkey and have recently returned to the gambling scene a year ago. So far, I feel like there are still remnants of my old gambling behavior manifesting itself when I gamble, but not so far as to cause me concern thinking I'm slowly becoming addicted to gambling again.

One of these past behavior's my tendency to gamble high-stakes when I play. I rarely play low-ball, as I believe I'll just lose as much when I gamble in teeny-tiny bits, with the returns even lesser since my wager's not that big in the first place. Soon as I quitted gambling I still find myself betting a little bit bigger than the average gambler, only thing being the fact that I'm no longer driven by profit, but instead by the fact that it's more exhilarating and perhaps even challenging for me to gamble when I play bigger bets as compared to when I gamble small-time.

Reason why I think it's still there waiting to manifest is because I never really lost a couple of my past gambling behavior, only difference now being the fact that I could control them and not succumb to the urges. However, since I can control them better now more than ever, I don't think I'm that susceptible to gambling addiction anymore unlike in the past.

You have kinda so-so examples perhaps due to your skewed concepts of gambling and "gambling what you can afford to lose" but these are okay I guess. The only thing that you have to keep in mind is that you don't go over your financial capacity when you gamble. And to find out whether you're gambling beyond your means you should ask yourself these questions before you place any bet:

• What do I gain from this?: Assess what's in it for you when you gamble. What are you really gambling for, how do you think you can sustainably gamble with that directive/purpose for gambling in mind.
• How capable am I of gambling?: Assess your financial capacity before you start to gamble and that also includes assessing how expensive the game of your choice is. Are you a low-income earner? Is the game/casino you want to play with a little over the board or economical, etc.
• How many games of this/these can I lose before I become broke? A good way to assess if gambling's really for you is checking just how much losses could you incur before you start thinking about cooking gruel for the whole month's meal plan. The lesser losses, the more you couldn't afford to gamble.

And lastly;

• Where am I getting the money to gamble?: Practically the most important question you should ask yourself before you even decide to gamble. Ask yourself if where you're getting the money to gamble. Are you getting it out of your paycheck? Are you still dependent upon your parent's allowances, etc.

Soon as you get sound answers to these questions, you yourself would be able to assess whether you deserve to gamble or not. No big rocket science bullshit.

Some religions are very particular when it comes to indulgences and the way you act upon it. Hinduism and Buddhism in particular incur divine and grave punishments upon others who have committed their lives to indulgence and ease, either in this life or the next. Islam and quite recently Christianism (cause way back then you can buy your sins out lol), do have these divine punishments per se but compared to the former whose threats/repercussions span multiple lifetimes, due to the nature of these religion's afterlife system they incur the punishments upon you or your soul for all eternity, so not exactly a better choice either.

Because of these threats against the soul or your future you're practically barred from having fun or responding upon these urges. Act upon them now and expect that when you die, your future incarnation or your soul's gonna suffer one way or another. So while the threat's not that concrete and sometimes even ridiculous, devout believers will definitely choose living a just and content life rather than gamble.

I consider myself as a non-religious person, once an insufferable bitch about that either. But since I dropped Reddit out of my life I found that you don't really have to make fun of other people's belief system nor how they practice it just to feel good about yourself. And I think that applies as well with gambling. I personally gamble, I gamble a little overboard compared to the average player even, but you wouldn't see me on the internet making fun of those who can't gamble as much as me, or do not gamble at all by virtue of religion. It's what they believe in, it's what they think is right. I can't shit on that, and honestly if it stops them from being subjected to gambling addiction even, I'd take that as a massive win!

I say pick both when you have the capability, and if you don't have the means to do both, choose which one's more suitable based on your current financial situation and future prospects.

Thing is that saving has its perks as well. Including the fact that you could easily rely upon it in situations wherein you would need money ASAP. Investments wouldn't be the venture to depend upon for this one as you would either need to sell them first to liquidate their value, or you can't take the assets out since you're using them for passive profit anyway. Savings on the other hand while not necessarily reliable when it comes to producing profits, are there for you when the skies turn gray and you need instant cash to use. Which is why for those capable of funding both anyway, might as well do so instead of choosing one over the other.

For those financially incapable of funding both an investment venture and a savings account at the same time, I say choose one or the other instead. But gauge what you need at the moment, and what you think you'd need in the foreseeable future. Do you have a close family member that needs surgery money, do you have a massive purchase looking to close in the soonest time possible? Perhaps a savings account is more suited for you. On the other hand, if you're looking to instead increase your capacity for profits, while still having all the time in the world to finish a 9-5 and have a life, investment ventures such as house-flipping or crypto is going to be more along your avenue.

It's all about looking at your strengths and capabilities to capitalize on them.

Banks have reserve money for situations like these. Although of course a user wouldn't be able to get the money out of their savings accounts from the get-go as paperwork and processing days would need to be taken into consideration. But it's not gonna be used to track the people to which they lent your money onto.

Banks could lose money when they start to lose money in their investment ventures. As you know banks finance houses, cars, and basically every commodity that could generate income long as it's not perishable. When a debtor, someone who owes them money fails to pay for let's say, the house that they gave him to finance for, they have the ability to repossess said property and either put it up for sale or rent it out to other people. This is called a foreclosure of a property. Now, in very rare occasions when a bank couldn't find suitable, well-paying buyers nor capable customers who are interested in their offerings, their investments will slowly depreciate in value until they are worthless. This is but one of the most common (yet still rare) ways that a bank could lose their "money". But the thing is that for instances like these the government usually buys out whatever property they are at a loss on and gives them money in return, sometimes the government doesn't even take the property and just gives them money all because banks are an essential part of the capitalistic system.

I wouldn't really call this a mistake because back then I was poor as shit and solely relies upon my crypto payments from a previous odd job, but here goes.

Back in 2018-2020 I was working for this guy as a community moderator and his resident copywriter, who would provide me payments in cold, hard BTC. Given the fact that I had no job back then as I got laid off on my old work I had to depend upon crypto and bitcoin throughout those years. If I hadn't lazed my ass off and actually looked for a job while I keep the odd job that I have with this particular person so I can keep getting a foot on the crypto door, I would've had a pretty sizable addition to my crypto portfolio but instead I used it to fund my living expenses, which still isn't bad cause at the end of the day I didn't use the money for anything stupid but every now and again I wake up in a cold sweat thinking about how much my portfolio would've grown had I kept those bitcoins intact and not spent when the coin's just around 10k.

A costly mistake I suppose, but then again it's one that allowed me to open my eyes to just how powerful this industry is. I was able to fund myself and not die of starvation for 3 years approximately, while some of us here use and see crypto as an investment venture, which isn't so bad either. Not particularly negative, but goddamn do I wish I still kept those coins lol.

Jesus fucking Christ this guy could've just given up with trying to prove that he's Satoshi Nakamoto and we would've been okay with it (well not really cause we'd roast and cook the fuck outta him for a while but it's gonna die down unlike what we're doing to him right now) But he keeps on making himself look like a massive clown in front of the jury and in front of the people. Like at this point you would've guessed he's already given up on trying to quell the haters but NOO, he's out for blood as a court ruling's gonna change how we look at his ugly mug.

You guys are both getting off on a tangent right here. The discussion's all about whether the clown is Satoshi or not (which let's be real here, he's not man) and we got Mr. 95% CSW believer right here trynna prove something. Whether he got his doctorate or not doesn't matter. What matters is that he doesn't even own a single satoshi until 2013 as most sources state and as franky iterated which is a telltale sign that he's not Satoshi. Like I'm so surprised that even after all the metaphorical pants-shitting that CSW Faketoshi has done in the past up until now (including the fact that his panel's using his mental impairment as an angle to gain the court's sympathy which is a massive wtf for me) you'd think he's not gonna garner anymore delulu believers but here we got HmmMAA contradicting his very own statements. C'mon folks.

What if, and hear me on this one, Shrinkflation never left???

In the Philippines where I live, the term never died and is being actively used for everything that is goods and has noticeably gone down in size. I personally see it in indulgences like chocolate bars and candies while our goods here have sneakily reduced the size of their products while retaining the same price point to evade controversy. Personally there is benefits to shrinkflation compared to outright increasing the price. This is especially evident in third-world countries like the Philippines where the citizens are expected to not really be able to buy stuff at full price, that's why we have microstores here in the first place that sells items by the piece (pack of instant ramen per piece, sugar by the cup, etc.) to supplant the inability of the general public to buy these stuff in bulk or in full price. In an economic setting like that companies and providers couldn't really jack their prices up to retain the same quantity of contents in a product so to circumvent this and still be able to provide the public with their products, they are forced to shrink their product's sizes.

It's never good to have to work with inflation as nobody's winning in this game except the 1 percenters, but the thing is that in situations like these where you are forced to adapt you really have to do so or else you're going to be cooked.

There's a discussion to be had about the authenticity and honesty behind KYC, as while it is used by scammers and hackers and can then be discerned as "illegal" or "useless" even, corporations and legitimate companies need KYC to make sure that you are who you say you are, governments do this all the time, casinos and exchanges do these to validate a person's identity, there's nuances to KYC and it's not just outright useless just cause it's being used by scammers.

The same can't be said about promotion of KYC for bitcoin however, and not because bitcoin's against scammers or injustice, matter of fact for years it's one of the most sought-after currencies by scammers due to how anonymous it makes them, but the reason why KYC just doesn't fit the bitcoin narrative is because it was advertised from the get-go as a "secure, anonymous peer-to-peer electronic cash system" and taking the anonymous part of the statement defeats the whole purpose of what made bitcoin the cryptocurrency it is right now.

As for OP's propagandistic 95% claim of CSW's eligibility as the real Satoshi, let me just tell you that he's not. You would think that the real SN would know about the inner workings of his own brainchild but this clown you're 95% sure is Satoshi can't even remotely do something of the likes. So yeah as far as legitimacy goes he's not going to be Satoshi Nakamoto, nor do we need to debate about who he is or if he wipes his ass upwards or downwards.

Bitcoin is to remain anonymous until we don't want to deal with it anymore. Case closed. No one's gonna be Satoshi beside the main guy himself. Let him have his peace.

Either this is a poor breakdown of how you win games as a gambler or the casino you're playing with's fucking with you. But I'm gonna wager on the notion that you're basically thinking of this poorly. Matter of fact regardless of how much you win or lose it's not gonna add up to whether you're betting on big amounts or small ones. It's pure coincidence, and if it weren't it's probably due to the fact that you're able to bet more when you place smaller wagers compared to big bets which are one-time big-time.

I can say this 100% certainty as it happens to my games as well, especially back in the days when I was still very stingy with my bets. I seldom bet small nowadays but looking back I find that I win more when I bet small compared to when I bet big, but I crossed it out as me just having this stupid heuristic of winning more when I bet small due to the fact that I was able to play more compared to when I bet bigger amounts. So yeah, thinking logically it would make sense and it's not like you're going to be wrong, but to attribute it to anything other than mathematics and real life kicking you in the shin is just a massive L on your part. Casinos would run out of business if they start fooling their customers. They knew that much. So every advantage they have they inform the people about it.

I think, as great and practical you think you are you have to understand that this is something your wife is looking for. I reckon you guys already have this panned out and to bail on her at the last minute all because you wanted to be the husband who’s thinking of always profiting is going to damage your relationship with her trust me.

Dunno if you know of this yet but you probably do since you guys wouldn’t be married without it but there’s this thing called compromise,where you have to take the other person’s feelings into consideration with everything that you plan and do. And should an impasse arrive you have to be willing to give up some of your access and ease for the person to keep the relationship strong. Bitcoin is going to be bitcoin the next year, this one important event in your married lives isn’t. Enjoy it and give your wife something real nice this time cause she’s really looking forward to it based on how you protray her anger is .

Remember mate, money’s going to be money tomorrow. You guys however have limited times here on this blue-trap bubble. Make the most out of it while you’re still together and worry about savings and money when you cross the bridge.

No one’s gonna beat you up in this forum for having shitty grammar. Long as you have the basic understanding of how to construct english sentences most of us here would make do of the rest and decipher whatever you wrote. And as long as it’s coherent to the most basic degree and it’s not chicken scratch we’re going to understand what you’re saying, trust me. So for newbies out there, rather than rely on AI to help you with constructing posts94 comments, try posting using your own methods first. I reckon it would be exceptionally better for you as it allows you to express yourself through your own way and it builds mastery as well.

That being said, I don’t think Blackhat’s wrong for suggesting the use of AI in such a minor degree. But the thing is there’s a massive slippery slope that could lead users into eventually using AI for posting here, since it has been human nature to abuse what very little power they are given from the moment they get it.

My verdict and opinion remains in favor of banning the use of AI in this forum. It’s disingenuous, it stops you from formulatin your own opinions, and it’s exceptionally harmful for newbies up to full members here cause it’s not like you’re going to read whatever shitpost the AI made once it’s done.

Nope. Most Simple Machines Forum sites have a basic cross-platform functionality and if bitcointalk were to ban the usage of other sites/promotion of other forums in here that would be a complete removal of a nifty feature that would’ve helped bitcointalk to reach other sites and potential users all because we don’t want to “promote” other sites.

Plus bitcointalk’s literally referred to as the advertiser forum for people and projects who want to get into advertising and increasing brand audience. The ban on mixers while necessary is already bad enough against its brand presence, barring access to crypto forums that allow promotion of brands that are barred from this site is going to cause even more problems for bitcointalk trust me.

Lastly, there is no real reason for theymos and the folks to ban the usage of crypto forums besides themselves. It’s already the number 1 site to go for when you’re thinking of getting into the crypto world. It has cemented itself in its top spot so there’s no undermining or sabotage that would happen that could change anything.

I can vouch for the legitimacy of some of these sites. Particularly Bybit and OKX which are honest to God crypto exchanges with P2P options granted to its users. The rest of the list I have no idea anymore and couldn’t really say anything about their legitimacy, since this is the first time I’ve heard of them (except phemex which if I’m not mistaken is an up and coming crypto exchange hailing from India.

As a matter of fact since Binance is slated to be discontinued for  usage in the Philippines a lot of my folks are looking at Bybit and OKX as great alternatives for the crypto exchange giant which says a lot about how honest these sites are considering they are already being used by crypto users in my country as we transition into a new crypto norm.

Good on you for actually asking around about some important questions as a crypto newbie. It’s quite easy to be so negligent about these things especially when Trustpilot exist but if you could realize just how easily manipulated Trustpilot could be you’d never ask it for anything to do with checking something’s legitimacy. Anyway I think I’m going off on a tangent here already and I’m kinda rambling nonsense at this point. Just always ask around here for any questions you got and we’ll be here to help you.

You're right on the money with some of these pointers. Especially those that has to do with the fact that OP thinks he can just issue economic changes like that out of the blue like dude you're not gonna change the market for the better for issuing Schrutebucks or Stanley Nickels let's be real here.

And while the poor people definitely deserve some break from their lives it's not gonna be up to the government to make them rich people. Let that sink in. We live in a capitalistic society where the government will give you just enough leniency to discover the next best thing since sliced bread and the rest is gonna be up to you. You can't expect your national government to just give you a wad of money and a thank you card. That's a massive recipe for disaster. They did that in the US during the pandemic and even now when most countries have recovered they still couldn't pay their shit. Imagine how it would go even if they do that as a staple provision to the poor people. The world's economy's gonna be in shambles my friend.

The poor people deserve better treatment and solutions to their hierarchal problems, that's true. and if I may I gotta say they are getting the short end of the stick all this time with the fact that they are abused by the upperclass despite the fact that they comprise the entire blue-collar sector. But it's not gonna be through what OP thinks. Those are fucking illegal.

Could be huge and you're definitely onto something with this 401k retirement fund powered by the crypto titan, but the thing is that since this is an ETF, how secure are you that you're getting your money's worth. I mean, what are the pros and cons that you're looking at cause as far as I know, buying bitcoin outright from users or getting it straight from the people is still a better concept for investments against a paper telling you that you own x amount of bitcoins with nothing to show for it.

At the end of the day you could've done the same thing with buying bitcoin outright and investing through DCA strategy, eventually you'll still get the same amount of money (in theory) and the only thing that you'd really have to worry about is losing your money through belligerent usage or hacking, and perhaps crashes when you're just about to cash it all out. But I reckon you'd deal with the same sets of problems in ETFs as you would've with buying the real thing out, with the teeny tiny added benefit of getting the peace of mind that you can blame someone else besides yourself when it happens.

I see bitcoin ETFs as a sustainable way to really get the whole bitcoin bull run machine running, but I don't see it being very useful to us who are already in the crypto space to begin with. Matter of fact I see it as a way to get those boomers and their coveted millions from destroying the planet and the economy to invest in this technology and possibly give the Gen Zs a chance at life for once.