LOL. So they've broken ECDSA (or at least secp256k1) and SHA-256? No, I don't think so, this isn't a made for TV movie.
They don't need to break anything. If I understood the crypto design correctly, they only need to have their computers working collectively to produce an identical but longer proof-of-work which honest nodes would then endorse. I'm almost certain they started producing it much earlier than now so they'd be ready to launch it once there's a political decision. They'll also probably blame it on Iran, Anonymous, or Al-Qaeda for the lulz. The only thing they can do with a longer chain is double spend their own coins or prevent the transactions of others from confirming (as long as their chain is always the longest, harder than it sounds). In order to spend other people's coins you would have to break the ecliptic curve digital signing algorithm, or specifically curve secp256k1. How easy it is to hypothesize about Bitcoin's susceptibility to attack without even understanding how it works. |
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I think we can all agree that the NSA already has its fake chain ready to launch at any moment if they deemed Bitcoin a serious danger to the US economy. They probably started working on it from day one, even. It would be identical to the real one except that it's a couple of blocks longer. Those couple of blocks rip everyone from their coins. End of story. Hahaha... I think we can all agree that your predictions have not been all that accurate so far. Is it the CIA or NSA that has this technology available? In another thread you claimed it was the CIA. Perhaps all of the TLAs are collaborating on this project? Why would they duplicate the block chain? It makes no sense to do so, they would just dedicate all of their computing power to the NEXT block, and then the one after that, etc. How would they transfer everyone's money to their account? That would require a break in ECDSA or at least secp256k1, which is possible but highly unlikely (IMO). So, any more bullshit claims? |
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OMG, this thread is still going...
I'm starting to think this is a deliberate action to weaken the faith of some people (read: n00bz) in Bitcoin.
Since CIA already admitted its interest in Bitcoin, this is a likely scenario.
Of course, it is not going to be successful. Market verifies everything. People can discuss all the time and even write essays, but the market will verify their claims.
We don't need The CIA doesn't need to post anything to ruin the project. They have I'm sure they have a fake proof-of-work ready to launch whenever they feel Bitcoin has grown too dangerous. One extra block at that chain's end transferring everybody's money into the CIA account is all what's needed for a clean game over. LOL. So they've broken ECDSA (or at least secp256k1) and SHA-256? No, I don't think so, this isn't a made for TV movie. |
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There doesn't seem to be any problem requiring that users have the latest version at present....
You are confused. There is no such requirement. Plenty of clients remain on 0.3.19, and you can still find clients from earlier versions. I'm not confused, the requirement is implicitly made by having hard coded values. I obviously didn't make that clear. Tell me, now that bitcoins are approaching $20 how these 0.3.19 clients send me 19 cents without a 100% fee? They set their transaction fee to 0.00 BTC and then send you a transaction. It may take a while to confirm, but you'll receive it. Tell me, other than with Bitcoin, how can you send $0.19 to someone electronically without paying a 100% fee? |
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Any progress on this? Seems to be one of the most important outstanding issues.
I am waiting for permission from my employer before I proceed. Nearly have it, but bureaucracy bureaucracy. you need your employer to work on a private project? wtf? I think she works for Google, and is planning on working on this project during her 20% time. |
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As with everything, it should be up for the parents/children to decide when they are mature enough to experiment with mind altering substances. I firmly believe that the parents should be able to provide a safe setting for their children to do so (if they feel it is appropriate) without risking going to jail.
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I moot a counter-argument for the sake of debate. (I'm generally in favour of guns)
I have gun, you have gun. The first to shoot wins. Therefore the first to abandon the reasoned debate for violence wins.
I don't think that's very civilised.
That's assuming that person won't settle for reason but forcing the other person to their bidding. Anyways, the first person that shoots would probably be shot by others. Through his action, he makes a morality judgement: it is acceptable to use violence if reason fails. I see no way that he could claim that it does not apply to others against himself. |
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Thank you for your answer. I really appreciate that.
I think that the micro-transactions-market is an important niche where Bitcoin can really get a foot in and wiggle itself into the larger-sized wallets of consumers around the world.
We sell virtual in-game items for $0.50 and up because various parties want a piece of that pie (and I mean you Facebook). It would be a great to be able offer items at a prices as low as $0,005.
So getting this transaction fee down is something I will be watching very closely. I think you may be better off issuing your own credits which are backed by bitcoin. For instance, you would allow people to buy GameCoins at a rate of 1 BTC per GC. Then they can spend their GC on items within your game. This allows you to get all the benefit of Bitcoin, but you only have to perform a tiny fraction of the number of transactions, and they will be of larger values (receiving to and withdrawing from a game account). |
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But the price as it is now is artificially inflated. That's your opinion. Other people think the price is fair, and they buy. As I currently see it, this stuff is probably only good for illicit trades, and that is bad. Bitcoin is as useful for licit trade as it is for illicit ones. Having the power to destroy the bitcoin economy in the hands of the few just won't make for a long term viable system. Who are "they"? For what reason would they want to "destroy the bitcoin economy"? How would they do so? For now it is a novelty and that is generating a ton of interest. Your opinion that it is a novelty does not make it so. Obviously lots of people have an opinion to the contrary. But once people start realizing how there are several absolute power houses out there that can control the economy on a whim Again... who are they, what can they do, and why do they want to do it? I think people will begin to lose faith in the system (other than the aforementioned illicit traders). Unless your catastrophe involves threatening violence against bitcoin users, it's usefulness will be the same for licit and illicit goods alike. Without a mass sell-off of these BTC assets, the early adopters will always control a huge percentage of a strictly limited, deflationary money pool. That simply isn't healthy for a functioning currency and will retard its use.
Ah, the early adopters. You want them to crash the market by dumping their saved bitcoin. Do you understand how markets or rational actors work? |
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It's a private company, with capitalist inversors (it's for profit) and all that... it's just that they do projects for the government.
The profit would not exist without government coercion and its request for services. That's true, but whenever there's a private prison, the state is transfering part of their monopoly of violence (you have very limited rights as prisoner) to that private prison company. Therefore, as for the definition of state as monopoly of violence, you are breaking the state apart. As i'm not an anarchist, I firmly believe in the state having the monopoly of violence (therefore existing). Can't you see that allowing private entities to compete against the government (not subsidized by it) in what are normally considered to be state functions (law and law enforcement) would lead to a decrease in price and and increase in service quality? Why is it different than any other competitive industry? |
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The only reason healthcare is so expensive in the US is because everyone's so dang sue-happy. If we didn't have absurd judgments awarding hundreds of millions for a mistake in the surgery room, healthcare costs would be much more reasonable.
There are many reasons for the price of health care in the United States. I will list some... - Health insurance tied to employment
- State mandated coverage
- Unable to purchase insurance across state lines
- Medical licensure laws
- Widespread use of insurance for routine visits
Those are just the few I can think of off the top of my head. THe only reason is that it's not socialized/universal. Health care, roads, prisons, public education, army, police, firemen... all of them must be run by the State and paid with our taxes. Because maybe it won't make many millionaires, but it's the most efficient way for most of the people. You really believe that socializing the health care industry would make it cheaper? Doing so fixes none of the problems I've outlined above. It will indeed most likely get more expensive, except we'd now be paying for it in taxes, regardless of our usage. |
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That would be true, if this were a ponzi scheme.
Supporters of the current design lose the debate either way. If the price.. 1. Keeps rising forever, then it's a Ponzi scheme which will collapse at some point. 2. Keeps rising sharply then falling sharply forever, then it's an unstable currency subject to severe manipulation and speculation. I'm still begging for one argument against my proposed stable-price system. 3. Rises to a point of equilibrium, and is used as an easily stored and transmitted gold-like asset. Over time, the purchasing power of Bitcoin will increase at a rate equal to the rate of the growth of it's economy. People will accept that even though their paycheck may be decreasing denominated in bitcoin, the amount of goods and services they can buy stays the same or increases. In addition, massive amounts of debt are no longer needed, as people can easily defer consumption and save, which benefits them in the future and provides the necessary capital for investment in infrastructure. |
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Let them assume what they wish. In the end, we'll be the wealthy ones.
You're not supposed to say that explicitly, Atlas. You're supposed to pretend that "deflation is fine" or that "it will all balance out in the end". You've just broken every Ponzi rule by declaring your sinister intentions out loud. What he is expressing is his strong feeling that Bitcoin will succeed. He is saying "we'll be the wealthy ones as opposed to the others who did not invest". This is not at the expense of any individual, as others who buy at higher prices are doing so because they value the Bitcoin concept. It is in fact a valuable service to take risk by buying now to sell at a higher price later, when it is seen as less risky. |
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The only reason healthcare is so expensive in the US is because everyone's so dang sue-happy. If we didn't have absurd judgments awarding hundreds of millions for a mistake in the surgery room, healthcare costs would be much more reasonable.
There are many reasons for the price of health care in the United States. I will list some... - Health insurance tied to employment
- State mandated coverage
- Unable to purchase insurance across state lines
- Medical licensure laws
- Widespread use of insurance for routine visits
Those are just the few I can think of off the top of my head. |
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Of course I could. That why the code is open source and anyone can inspect it.
I still have yet to post the promised update, I wasn't sure if anyone was still interested in this.
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I agree with the assessment that a fixed supply of money that does not increase with a size of the economy is a bad economic design that will lead to over-speculation and a a series of busts/booms (volatility). This much should be obvious to anyone that has marginal economic intuition and has witnessed an asset bubble during his lifetime (tech stocks, real estate, tulips etc.). Tech stocks and real estate bubbles were fueled by artificially low credit created by the Federal Reserve, in addition to artificially low lending standards created by the government regulatory and law making bodies. It seems to me that without these types of interventions, market forces would allow businesses to more quickly react to the change in individuals preference for saving or spending, which would limit the size of such booms and busts and ultimately lead to a more stable and productive society. |
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hope to do business again soon  Isn't that "hope you lose" in poker speak?  Kidding, congrats on the successful trade. |
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I was just discussing with a friend the idea of a Bitcoin bank that existed solely in cipherspace. In order to establish trust and hedge against risk, the bank could create an account accessible by some majority of investors in case of fraud, theft, or data loss. Perhaps this could be done with a multi-signed transaction? It seems like OpenTransactions provides the perfect toolset to do this on top of Bitcoin. I'm pretty sure I've seen discussion on ways for some entity to prove that it is holding full reserves. |
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Ok, yeah, that clicked. I think you're right. The goal is to maximally secure the most block chains with the least effort.
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Originally from the northeast, single mom worked two jobs, self educated, hadn't even though about politics until a few years ago, at which point I rapidly progressed through liberalism and libertarianism. My current social philosophy is anarchism, more specifically a voluntarism/anarchism without adjectives.
Also, not sure what you mean by "daddy type", but I don't get along with my dad's side of the family.
Nice try, but I think you're overconfident in your abilities.
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