This is the sort of stuff that could be done via a Bitcoin podcast. Get in contact with Bitcoin businesses, and see if they would like to answer a few questions about their operation, as well as the difficulties of accepting Bitcoin for a service. It would be a great way to promote Bitcoin, and I think would be a hit if done correctly.

It would likely be along the lines of; our business is for privacy reasons, and therefore we are not encouraging illegal activity, and we don't have the resources or the required data to investigate whether users are misusing their service. They would likely need to make the comparison with cash, and how criminals use cash just as much as Bitcoin, and cash is hard to track when its exchanging hands. As far as I'm aware though, most people using mixers are for privacy reasons, and not for buying illegal goods or laundering money.

I think hes just an attention whore, and loves the Bitcoin community to be talking about him like hes actually relevant, because he likely seems Bitcoin as revolutionary, or something special right, and he wants to be a part of that history. Unfortunately, it seems he doesn't care what he's known for, as long as hes included in its history. Everyone knows of him, and everyone is sick of him, but due to this exposure he still gets headlines, and it feeds into his addiction for publicity. That's at least the impression I get from it, because its literally something new every week.

Well of course, its a human that's reviewing the cases, and therefore there will always be the issue of being subjective. There might be a individual reason for distributing merit, but its fairly common sense to see if someone is abusing their merit distribution or giving merit as a way of "liking" someones comment rather than giving it because its a quality post. However, the admins (or perhaps just theymos) have far more data that they can evaluate than the average user, and therefore they can piece together a strong case of why someone should be a merit source, and why they shouldn't. Plus, being subjective isn't always a bad thing. theymos probably has a good idea of how he would like merit sources to distribute their merit, as of my assumption he was the one to implement the merit system, and therefore he definitely has some sort of view of how it should work.

There quite possibly may have been cases especially in the local section where users were given the merit source title without looking at their merit spending in great details, possibly because they're one of the most active users within their local section, but I'd say that the vast majority if not all are evaluated on how much they've spent, where they spend it, as well as how much they give per post.

Its similar to how the admins select users to become staff. They look at the data that is available to them, and then approach them. Unfortunately, the fact of the matter is without gaining merit yourself, and distributing it there is no way of determining whether a user would be a good judge of quality posts, because as we all know just because a user is a good poster, doesn't mean they are a user suitable as a merit source. This doesn't necessarily mean they have a zero percent chance of becoming a merit source, it just might make it harder for them to be selected if there are other candidates with merit spending in similar sections of the forum.

If you don't want to rely on a third party at ALL then you'll need to code everything yourself. Such as; The wallet, block explorer, and then you would still need to rely on connecting to the main chain of Bitcoin. So, in theory you would still be collecting data from a third party as a whole since the Bitcoin network is based on verifying data through multiple nodes working together to check the integrity of the network. You could run your own node, and connect to that to collect the data to avoid some of the issues for this.

However, despite the consensus of third party = bad, most of the time its just convenient to use a third party.

I see your point, but equally you would hope to expect that developers are aiming to make a unique website for the companies brand. Unique designs only really cost more because there's more work going into them, and the design phase can be longer. However, if they are not using preexisting code or a white label software, then the amount of coding will be of similar amounts. The only thing which would contribute substantially would be getting the design phase down, and conveying the wants of the brand to the developers. Of course, this is avoided if the brand behind the site just asks for copy x site.

Judging by the "we" that theymos uses, its quite likely that Cyrus, and theymos decide on who is made a merit source. That at least would be my assumption. Alternatively, global moderators might be pitching it, but I would say the most likely is theymos, and then cyrus. Especially, since they're likely the only ones with access to important statistics of users such as logged in time, time spent within sections, and amount of posts read in particular sections. I imagine they use either the data I've listed or some sort of data along with checking merit distribution, and the "quality" of the merit distribution.

From a spam exposure point of view, the bump changes have had a massive impact. I've said this a few times, but there are still a lot of spam going on behind the scenes, which is made evident every once, and a while when someone stumbles upon it, and reports it. However, the vast majority of users browsing the altcoin section aren't seeing it anymore, and usually better projects in terms of legitimate projects which aren't paying for bumping services or creating false activity within their thread are getting more exposure.

Okay, so just because a person has created an exchange does not automatically mean that its trustworthy. Anyone, can make an exchange, and there's even various white label software out there now. Before, using an exchange you need to ideally do extensive research on the people who are behind the exchange, because they may well be the same people you are trading with on this forum.

Regulated, and registered exchanges are usually the ones to go through, as they're often governed by laws, and other regulations, but ideally you should be taking a look at the customer reviews that people have made, and even then that's not always a good conclusion as there's various bias' that people can inject in their views, and reviews of the service.

I'd follow the advice below. Building a basic block explorer will demostrate that you understand most core concepts of Bitcoin, a spv wallet will back up your credentials even more by diving into the security of cryptocurrency. An exchange is probably something I would consider very last on your resume. If you want to have a good resume, its best to start from the foundations, and then continue build from there an exchange is not touching on a lot of cryptocurrency foundations that are probably good to understand if you're specializing in cryptocurrency programming. 

If you're aiming at the commercial route of building exchanges, I would still advise getting some basic wallet, and block explorer out there. Technically, if you're developing an exchange you'll be needing some functionality of a wallet, and some functionality of a block explorer for the exchange to function.

To answer the question without giving the details required. There's a limit once new blocks have stopped being generated, and depending on your predictions of Bitcoin that could vary greatly.


Theoretically, once you get a certain amount of confirmations it will be theoretically impossible to change anything, so adding on another 1000 won't effect it too much beyond a certain point. What others have said, considering confirmations as block depth is a better way of thinking about it.

Its situational, and not always how active the moderator normally is. For example, there's currently a situation which is going on outside Bitcointalk, and I imagine a lot of the moderators are effected by that. Work has either been non existent for a lot of people during the pandemic, but personally I've seen a huge increase due to being considered a key worker. So, I think its fair to say that a few moderators will be a little less responsive, and some reports will remain unhandled for a little longer than usual.

Of course, there's then other things that can come up in ones life which can reduced their activity for an extended period of time. Unfortunately, this can't be avoided in the majority of the cases, and if its temporary then an extra moderator might not be justified. 

It is odd, because moderators can tick multiple posts, and delete them. We are operating on a older version of SMF, and although its been heavily modified its still missing a few quality to life things that you would probably expect in modern software.  

There ya go, o_e_l_e_o puts it in better English than I ever could. The issue with being Welsh is you speak Wenglish rather that English. I think my assumption was correct judging on o_e_l_e_o response too. It makes sense in my head anyway, as for a report to be marked good or bad it needs to be at least handled. If its disappeared from the report queue due to expiring then it won't technically be handled even if the post itself was deleted down the line.

Most unhandled reports would have at least been seen by a staff member though. I'd say its pretty rare for a report to go missed these days unless its in a section where there's no dedicated moderator, and especially so if its a local section. Sometimes the best way of handling a report is leaving it unhandled. Its neither good nor bad, and this can vary widely depending on the staff member reviewing it.

Interesting, if that's the case I'm not entirely sure what causes the unhandled, but deleted scenario. I'll try to figure out the root cause for this. Are you sure that these reports were removed from the report queue though? Unless, I'm missing understanding your statement.

My idea was;

1. User reports post
2. Report is not handled for more than 2 weeks
3. Report disappears in report queue
4. Post is either reported again, and deleted or just deleted outright for whatever reason
5. The report made by the initial user still remains unhandled, but shows up as a striked through entry in their report history

I haven't experimented with this, but I'm guessing this is either because the report was removed from the report queue after a certain amount of time (I believe 2 weeks), and then was deleted by a moderator after that fact it caused the report to still show up in your report history because it goes back 30 days, but reports that haven't been handled in the report queue are removed before 30 days.

Again, I haven't exactly experimented with this, and I haven't confirmed the 2 week period.

As far as I can remember (I haven't looked at that page in a long while) it only shows reports up to 30 days. I might be wrong on that exact number, but it doesn't show your entire history of reports. This would make sense if those reports were reported on the 16 of April, as its now the 22nd of May (Pizza day!).

This is something that I should look at putting in my reporting effectively guide once  I update it.

No worries! A lot of the users on the Discord server are first time users of it. Its quite simple, and easy to get the hang of. Will be nice to have you on board

That's a win win in my eyes. You get a delicious pizza, and potentially more Bitcoin in the family. Smart.

My personal favourite so far. Looks like you've cooked it to perfection if only you did deliveries

Privacy is important, however its extremely difficult to retain privacy in every aspect, and in almost all instances a compromise has to be made. I definitely am not a fan of rigorous KYC procedures which are generally not needed in most cases, but I'd actually prefer to be using a licensed gambling site, with KYC in place (as that's usually a requirement for licensed gambling sites) because of the guarantees that are usually put in place, and having someone accountable if anything were to go wrong.

I'd disagree. Those that are not requesting KYC are sometimes breaking the law, and therefore are not licensed to be operating unless they operate in a country which does not require licensing. Even then though, the majority of countries which don't require licensing can't provide a service to countries which require a gambling site to be licensed.

Having said that, most countries are operating in these countries that don't require licensing. However, the point is KYC doesn't always mean its bad. There's perfectly legitimate reasons why KYC is needed. Although, I do disagree how in depth some KYC is, but in some countries like the UK its absolutely necessary to be able to run any legitimate gambling business.

Returning to the original point; I don't think its a bad PR move to request KYC, and license your gambling business. I actually, would prefer myself to be using a licensed gambling business because they at least have to abide by rules of the gambling commission, and sometimes have to guarantee certain if something goes wrong. Unlicensed sites have no guarantees, and can just shut up without having anyone accountable.

Remember, to factor in other costs such as building, venting, maintenance and time for managing all of the miners. Electricity costs is just one of the factors to consider.  Mining has just become a little less desirable to get into with the recent halving event, but its still, and always will be profitable. Generally, if you're going to take it seriously, and have the capital to invest into it then going with a lot of miners would be the better option for long term profitability. Then you need to consider ways of keeping the warehouse/housing cool. You can always use a Bitcoin mining difficulty calculator, and figure out a comfortable amount of profit for you, and then determine how many miners would be needed to achieve that.

Unfortunately we can't give much information, because only you know the amount of space you have, the amount of starting capital you have, and how much time you want to invest into this project. Its not as simple as buying the miners turning them on, and earning profit. If you're not familiar with the process of setting up miners, then it can take some time to setup, and then there's maintenance if anything goes wrong, keeping the building cool to make sure everything is running as smooth as possible as well as extending the longevity of the miners. Write up a floor plan, and determine whether or not you can get wired internet connections to the devices to run them at max efficiency as a wifi connection especially if its in a remote location could be problematic.

- Determine your starting capital
- How many miners can you fit in the building
- What temperature is the building on average (do you need advanced cooling?)
- Figure out the profitability of one miner via calculating the difficulty, cost, and hash rate

Search engine trends, and keywords of these trends are highly coveted. This isn't exclusive to Bitcoin or cryptocurrency related names, but for everything. Short keywords the most highly coveted, especially if they are somewhat memorable. It isn't a given that cryptocurrency domains are worth their registration price though. For example, totallyawesomebitcoin would be a horrible domain name, and wouldn't be worth anything.

You might get lucky though, sometimes you'll come across a business which needs that exact domain name, and that's when you're able to get much higher prices due to the demand.

You'll likely have to go to the branch itself, and explain what sort of trades you've been involved in, and they'll bring up any issues there, and then. As mentioned, its probably due to the fact that someone has been using stolen funds to purchase your Bitcoin. Unfortunately, this isn't your fault, and they'll probably just want to check how this happened, and have "closed" the account as a precaution. I imagine they've simply just locked the account, until they can verify you are who you say you are, and that there was legitimate business reasons for the stolen funds entering your bank account.

They may require you to open a business account as depending on their polices frequently trading cryptocurrencies or any currencies for that matter would likely fall into the business category. You shouldn't have any issues with getting the account opened again as long as you can verify the information they require.