It is wrong to say that all of the old players were passionate about cricket and they never cared for money. And at the same time, it is also not right to paint the current players as money-minded. Cricket is a profession just like any other. If the players earn good amounts of money, then it will allow them to concentrate on the sport without having to worry about anything else. The older generation players were not as lucky as the current ones, since the salaries were very low back then. But I haven't noticed any lack of loyalty or enthusiasm among the current players. Current players such as Virat Kohli and Steve Smith are as enthusiastic about cricket, as anyone else ever was in the past.

And now coming to the unfair advantage given to the batsmen, I believe that it was the rule of the nature. Cricket needs to change with changing times. People are no longer interested in low-scoring matches which can last for 4-5 days. They want quick action with fireworks from the batsmen. If cricket doesn't change, then the fans will dump the sport and may shift somewhere else.

The BCCI is planning to conduct the ODI series (against South Africa) in the UAE right after the IPL. They need the government permission for that. As I said earlier, I have suspicion that the Indian government may be a bit skeptical about allowing the Indian national team to play at Sharjah, but then the prospect of earning good amounts of tax revenue should swing their decision.

China's claim on the territory owned by neighboring countries are not based on historic facts. They have territorial disputes with almost all of their neighbors. In some cases (Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Russia.etc), the neighbors gave in to the demand by China and ceded territory that was previously under their control. Examples are:

1. Pakistan: Ceded the Shaksgam Tract (7,000 sq.km) to China in 1963, although it was a part of the princely state of Jammu & Kashmir
2. Russia: Ceded the Damansky island, Bolshoy Ussuriysky Island and several hundred smaller riverine islands to China in 2008, although they were under the control of the USSR previously.  
3. Kazakhstan: Ceded almost 1,000 sq.km of land to China in 1995
4. Kyrgyzstan: Ceded Uzengi-Kush region to China in 2009
5. Tajikistan: Ceded 1,322 sq.km of land in Pamir to China in 2002

Now the other neighbors may not be that comfortable with ceding their territory to China, which in my opinion is understandable.

And here, I should say that Trump is doing a lot to support those countries which are suffering from the Chinese bullying.

You believe that 20% is too high? Within the United States, long-term capital gains tax rate is 23.8% (It was 15% during the Bush era, then Obama made it 20% and later added a 3.8% medicare tax on it). When compared to the tax rates in other countries, I would say that the tax slab proposed by the South Korean government is very much reasonable. I do oppose capital gains tax, as in my opinion it amounts to double taxation. But most of the governments do have this tax and therefore we need to live with it.

No. The bill was not even finalized. In short, the proposal was not put in to a bill. The person who came up with this proposal (Subhash Chandra Garg, the then Finance Secretary of India) was fired even before he could finalize it (he was fired for incidents unrelated to cryptocurrency). Right now, there is no ban on cryptocurrency in India. However, there is a ban on the usage of cryptocurrency as legal tender.

Please do.

I started my journey with cryptocurrency more than 7.5 years ago. I have seen all sorts of scamming and cheating going on in the cryptocurrency market and I regard McAfee as one of the most articulate scammers. I know a huge number of people who lost their money after investing in the projects which were promoted by this loser. It is important to educate new users about what he did earlier.

For those noobs who don't know who John McAfee is:

1. John McAfee is the person who promoted scam projects such as SimmitriToken and Zombie Coin
2. He charged ~20% of the total supply of the ICO, in exchange for the promotion
3. In other cases, he charged $105,000 for each tweet he made to promote the scam ICOs
4. He is suspected of involvement of the murder of Gregory Faull in Belize
5. McAfee fled to Guatemala, in order to avoid arrest by Belizean authorities

I don't think that the government has any intention to ban cryptocurrencies. Because the last time someone suggested that, he was fired. Subhash Chandra Garg (the then Finance Secretary of India) wanted the government to make trade/mining/possession of cryptocurrencies a criminal offense. He suggested jail terms of up to 10 years for anyone found to be holding cryptocurrency. Just a few weeks after he made this stupid suggestion, he was kicked out from his job by the government and replaced by Rajiv Kumar. Now this guy (Subhash Chandra Garg) is holding press meetings and conferences, demanding that the government should ban cryptocurrency. And from what I have heard, no one takes this loser seriously anymore.

This issue may not exist in an ideal democracy. But today, democracy has deviated from the core principles. The main aim of democracy was to give equal rights to everyone. What happens in democracy today is that groups which have the numerical superiority and bargaining power can dominate the governments and thereby the policy decisions. These blocs force the political parties to accede to their unfair demands. This in turn negatively impacts the minority groups, who don't have the same level of bargaining power.

The biggest disadvantage with democracy is that if a particular group increases its population, then it will get more power. The groups which are having stable populations will witness a declining hold on the governments. I can give numerous examples, such as the Balkans, Lebanon and Malaysia.

In a dictatorship, this situation is avoided. In China, the Han ethnic group is having a very low population growth, and yet they haven't witnessed a decline in their bargaining power. Some of the minorities such as Uighurs and Kazakhs are increasing in number. But since there is no democracy in China, these people are unable to convert their increasing population to an increase in bargaining power.

First of all, South Korea is one of the few countries that have fully legalized and regulated the cryptocurrency trading. The situation there is much better, when compared to other countries such as China and India, where the cryptocurrency users have to undergo all sorts of harassment and vilification. The 20% tax rate is quite decent in my opinion. Even in the United States, the long-term capital gains tax is somewhere in the vicinity of 20% (it used to be 15%, but then Obama increased it in 2013).

Do you remember what happened in 2016? Back then no one expected Trump to win, but he managed to beat Hillary. The polls underestimated his support, especially in the rust-belt states. And this time, you are assuming that the COVID 19 pandemic is working to the advantage of Biden. I am not very sure about this. The Trump supporters are ideologically motivated and they will go out to vote no matter how worse the condition is. The same can't be said about Biden supporters. If the turnout is low, it is going to be advantageous for Trump.

Don't get your hopes high too soon. The BCCI still needs permission from the government to conduct the tournament in UAE.

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/sports/cricket/ipl/top-stories/ipl-in-uae-bcci-awaits-government-nod/articleshow/77098742.cms


As long as the Indian government sits on the approval, there will be no surety. I understand that there is a recent controversy surrounding UAE, related to gold smuggling to India using diplomatic channels. So there is a real chance that the government will refuse the permission.

Another issue is the proposed ODI series between India and South Africa, immediately after the IPL. The government approval is needed for this as well.

There is no depth in Irish cricket. The Irish cricket team is a combined team representing two different countries (the Republic of Ireland, and Northern Ireland). In both the countries, cricket can be regarded as a minor sport. The first class structure is in the infancy and two of the four provinces doesn't even have first class teams (Connacht and Munster).

There is some cricketing talent in Ireland, but then the ultimate dream of every Irish cricketer is to play for England. Those who are really good (such as Eoin Morgan) play for England on a continuous basis. Those who are not that good (such as Boyd Rankin and Ed Joyce) return to Ireland once they are kicked out of the England squad. If they continue to lose their best players, how can they compete against the best teams? You can say that it's just one or two players. But these are their best players. Imagine an Irish team with Eoin Morgan as the captain. They could have offered a lot of resistance even to the big-3 teams.

Yes. I have no doubt that every year a number of unarmed civilians get killed in unjustified shootings by the policemen, but the vast majority were necessary. Whenever someone gets killed by the cops, the media goes ballistic. The news is pasted in the front page of all the major dailies. In many cases, the policemen are forced to do this, to defend themselves. But the media will never give this detail. Even if someone is shot dead by policemen while committing an armed robbery or hostage taking, the media will paint it in such a way, to put the blame on the cops.

Now there is another set of killings that will never find any place on the first page of the newspapers and tabloids. That is the deaths of policemen while they are on active duty. As per the latest stats from the FBI, 106 officers were killed while being on duty in 2018. The average age of the killed officers was 37 years. You will never find any protest rally or media campaign condemning these deaths.

Did anyone noticed this news:

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/delhi/delhis-sero-prevalence-study-finds-23-48-per-cent-people-affected-by-covid-19/articleshow/77085162.cms


A study which was conducted in the Indian capital concluded that almost one-fourth of the population was "exposed" to the Coronavirus, as evident from the prevalence of IgG antibodies. That means that somewhere between 4 and 5 million people were "exposed". As per the officials, the number of Coronavirus patients stand at ~125,000 for Delhi.

Now I am confused about these two figures. As per the authorities, 125,000 are infected and some 4-5 million are exposed.

What is the difference between these two?

Does that mean that virus entered the bodies of 4-5 million people, and out of them only 125,000 got the disease?

Do you realize that the hack occurred as a result of mistakes made by the Twitter employees? From what I have heard, some of the employees had their admin access compromised by the hackers. This allowed the criminals to reset the passwords for a large number of Twitter accounts, including those owned by people such as Elon Musk and Bill Gates. It is really unfair to blame Elon for the mistake of someone else.

4 months back, some of the criminals tried a similar scam. I immediately posted about it in the Scam Accusations sub-forum. You can find the thread here:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5234450.msg54070831

Back then, they failed to hack the twitter account. What they did was that a fake Twitter account was created with the same DP and background and then they made scam posts using that account below the tweets from the real account. Back then also, they had targeted the Twitter profile of Elon Musk.

An example is here:


Note the fake tweet (made by @elonmmusk) and the real tweet (@elonmusk).

A lot of users got fooled because if you are not paying attention, then you may not be able to differentiate between @elonmmusk and @elonmusk. And note that the fake tweet received more than a thousand likes and retweets within a few hours.

That was the most logical thing to do. But I was surprised at the ease with which Stokes scored his runs. He made 78 runs from just 57 balls, at a strike rate of 136.84. It is like having a strike rate of 270 in a T20 match. The West Indians tried their best, by bowling consecutive wides/bouncers and keeping Joe Root on strike. But despite all that, Stokes managed to score close to 10 runs per over. He almost singlehandedly propelled England to a win, in a match that could have ended up as a draw under normal circumstances.

Let me ask you a question. Let's take the example of an individual, who is suspected to be suffering from TDR-TB (Totally drug-resistant tuberculosis). The doctors ask him to undergo home isolation, and advise him to come out of his house only in emergency situations if he wears a mask. They make this advise, because TDR-TB is a highly contagious and dangerous disease.

Now the individual refuses to do so. He says that he has the right to travel. He want to go to a park (without a mask). In this case are you still going to support him?

I will support someone's right for not wearing a mask, if he can produce a lab result showing that he is not infected from COVID 19. The only condition is that the lab result should be less than 24 hours old. Here the individual is not causing any risk to the others. If he gets the infection, it is entirely another topic.

No point in voting for this fight, as the dates are not finalized. A few months back, Bob Arum hinted that this fight may not happen in 2020. Also, I heard that there are disagreements regarding the purse. For the third fight, as per the contract the purse needs to be split 60-40 in favor of Fury, but Wilder is rumored to be unhappy about it.

In case the fight happens, then I hope that they will be able to take the PPV revenue to the $100 million mark. Revenues from the second fight (in 2019) was not very high. I heard that there were 800,000 PPV buys within the United States, at $79.99 apiece.