Ha!  Well if we are showing our rigs... mine is blue.  

I designed my own stamping jig for the early attempts.  That's the one in the foreground (not including the blue thing, just the grey bit)  Then I found the STL files for the one you have, which is much better (the one in the background).  It was cool to see two people have about the same idea, but the execution on that one (particularly the notches) is just better.



On another note, I noticed you put your private key right in the picture... so You certainly don't want to send any money to: 1Mr4CVSN4L6xktZFHteWVyBWAGAiPLd8Su  !!!

I was relieved to see you had not funded it yet!  I suggest you start over, maybe with a different letter than "S" this time too!

Whomever he was, looks like the 4+ snipers would have finished him off if he happened to stand up after being broken into like 16 pieces.

ye is such a fucking badass

a pure artist 

and i could care less about the genre

he transcends

So... I am setting up a couple new lightning channels, and I need to move a few sats around since they are bigguns.

The bitcoin blockchain is so valuable people are paying 3 and 4 SATS per byte to make sure to get into the next, not full, block.

I paid over a thousand sats myself!



Don't ever fall for the "small fees" narrative.  The price to enter a transaction on the base layer is cheap now... and really?  It always will be cheap.  An absolute bargain for what you get.

But it ain't gonna be the bitcoin equivalent of 42 cents USD forever... that's for sure.

Woof!  For my other channel I did an even higher fee!



(and yeah... I know... but you gotta live a LITTLE.  And this is between only my two nodes. so kiss my butt, and yeah... that too was nice of me.  And I have one more word to say, well two... three!  Fucking Ring Signatures))

When I first started using Bitcoin there were MANY MANY things I did not understand and things took years to really become clear to me.

But the thing I understood perfectly from the beginning was the importance and value of self custody.  I was playing poker on shady sites that could fold up at the drop of a hat.  So I understood that when I deposited my money that it was at risk until I withdrew it.  So, naturally I only ever deposited what I intended to play with, and on good days I would still have something left to withdraw when I was ready to hit the sack.

In recent years I began to realize that would not be done by the masses.  They will be more comfortable with the custodial relationship with a bank.  

I have spend a silly amount of time trying to understand what that might mean for Bitcoin, in adoption as well as as an attack vector on the network.

I am still working it out.  But things are becoming more interesting quickly.

I did not foresee the world moving in a way that would FORCE the masses into understanding that self-custody issue that I was taught by a grey hat poker site.

I find this topic more interesting now than ever before.

The whole post is good.  But that line is particularly good to remember.

The scenario I keep fearing happening is this:

The "enemies" of the USA begin to lean into bitcoin thereby threatening the USD.
This is compounded by war springing up in various places.
Biden signs a very anti bitcoin EO, possibly as a surprise.

But the above really does sort of decrease the chances of that.

At the same time there is the current action being done in various WEF influenced western democracies as they shift even further into totalitarian lockdowns (Canada, NZ, Australia, and so on).  I would GUESS these folks do not like Bitcoin very much either as I think it threatens their systems.

In the past I would have discounted this heavily.  But under the current circumstances these people are showing the world that they have WAY more power than I used to think...

Teacher, what must I do to have eternal life?

This part tells you why:

Basically the same thing I said in a much more loquacious post...

I think we see a capitulation event and then we head up.

Way up.

Thank President Biden for crucifying Bitcoin.  He will legitimize it on a level we can only dream of.

Or maybe I've been dabbling in my D8 ticture too much?

Price musings as of 2/21/22

Well boy oh boy.  What a moment in history.  I feel like we are seeing the world unfold into something so different and in some ways frightening.  Bitcoin has reached a point most of us here have been talking about for a very long time.  Both the value of the asset, and the knowledge of it in the world.  We are in all kinds of uncharted territories in every sense.  Wars, rumors of wars.  Free nations pivoting hard to totalitarianism, and old enemies rattling their sabres after over 70 years of relative peace.

And bitcoin is "at the end of this cycle top".  At least that's what it looks like.  And not only that, but we are at an inflection point.  Where we are right now is often followed by one of three things.  A rally, a dead cat bounce on the way down 'till the next halving, or a capitulation event.

I think it is most likely the latter.  Bitcoin is going to take a sever hit here... perhaps an unfavorable executive order from the US government.  Or some sort of FUD or selling.  The most recent of these events have been DEC 2019,  March 2020 , oven as recent as this last summer:



These capitations are when our spirits are broken, or when the permabulls buy the hardest.  And then they are followed by a climb.

I think this is a real possibility right here.  But, of course, no one can know the future.  We could also be in the no mans land on early 2018 where we endured a long slow grind before finally having the capituation event.  Or it is possible we start back up from right here... but that seemed much more likely weeks ago.  At this point we have broken a lot of support...

Anyway.  I certainly hope we do not freeze the death in the coming bitcoin winter.  

But there is one thing I *WILL* put money on. That is we are in for a wild ride.  I just don't see two ways about that.  Something big is coming, I think.

Just want to nitpick here.  "The US" does NOT want this.  The current administration, yes, but there is a majority of us, for sure, who do NOT want this.  But I get what you are saying.

On a brighter note... THIS.  This is eventually cause a cascade, a virtuous cycle to kick off.  Will it be this time?

Maybe!  I'd give a 20% chance.  But it will eventually.

I have to admit I feel like the entire Ukraine event could be a slight of hand sort of "Look over here!! And pay no attention to the invasion of the country to your northern border by troops and police with their badges and insignia covered!  Really... that's just because of the evil truckers... oh and by the way we are going to make the emergency act permanent."

The Ukraine issue is extremely important, for sure.  But what is happening in Canada is at LEAST a DEFCON 3 level event as far as US national security goes.  The country to our north is undergoing a Communist revolution.

Unfortunately we may soon be dealing with both of these at the same time... throw in action in Taiwan, and well... the fuse is more than lit.

You know... I brought up the living generations in a previous post.  But there is one who is frighteningly absent now.  The generation that would see this for exactly what it is, and where it leads, because they would see history repeating itself.  Sadly these men and women are (nearly?) entirely dead.  And probably a lot are rolling over in their graves.

I am, needless to say, worried.  A lot.

Amazingly annoying oscillations recently (this is 15m candles)



I am wondering if maybe the Exec Order on the horizon is causing some of these dogfights...  hmm.

Keeping on topic as best i can in this regard... I think the atomic swap functionality with Monero is a special case sort of arrangement that has HUGE benefits for Bitcoin.

The tradeoffs that Monero makes to achieve the level of privacy it does are tradeoffs I think would be a mistake to add to the Bitcoin base layer even if there was a way it could be done, which I am also doubtful about.  An obfuscated base layer has complications that would likely make Bitcoin actually LOSE some of the features that the design choices that Satoshi wisely made.

Atomic swaps with the defacto privacy chain adds all the benefits Monero has without taking on any of the downsides.  Now... It is not impossible for a pegged side/drivechain to take the Monero tech and replicate it, as LIQUID has in small part by implementing (only) Confidential Transactions.  And in fact the people on the OTHER SIDE of the trade are the ones taking the risk as they can count on getting tainted coins eventually.

But if you need to do a transaction that has the absolute BEST CHANCE of being private then why would you take chances with anything else.  Like that the transaction privacy protects your life.  I honestly think this relationship will continue to be an advantage for both chains for a very long time.

I actually think a lot of the features being test-bedded on ETH and MATIC etc are going to come to a native Bitcoin sidechain like Liquid, and I think a (very) few other chains will interact with Bitcoin via atomic swaps without the ridiculous risk that comes with something like ETH.  Making bulletproof (no pun) atomic swaps between BTC/XMR is a isolated single purpose design.  I think these are the correct ways to go rather than the kitchen sink kinds of designs in the big block smart contract chains.

Also, I think Satoshi himself strongly supported the idea of a FEW utility blockchains as COMPLIMENTS to bitcoin making sense (going back to the Namecoin discussions).

I humbly submit to my batslappening, and will not continue this thread... but one last time... I think we are headed in some good directions with some of this tech...

Good to hear about the boomers and millennials... I mean, I know they are out there... I just have not spoken to any.  And they don't want to have to rely solely on the Xers.. What a ragtag bunch we are.

I will be up in the Blue Ridge in about a month for a few days.  A place very dear to my heart.  Home.

Yea, yeah.  I know.  I do try to respect this thread's bias (or basic thesis), and agree with it for the vast most part.  AND I think privacy in bitcoin is VERY IMPORTANT to fight for.  So I bring it up trying to speak as little for the one shitcoin I like... but of course that shitcoin comes up because well... it is doing something important.  Buy again, I try to avoid stirring that up in here very much, lol... I may have overstepped a little this time.  Ah well.

Keep playing the "my side good, your side bad" game to the very end if you want the plan that is unfolding to work.  The polarization of every kind of group has been building for decades, and it too is part of the plan to destroy the west.

The part that is really starting to worry me is the fact that so many Canadians (and Americans) are supporting this, and even more that the majority of people (everywhere) do not see that this is not about a protest.  This is a planned action.  A takeover.  And it is probably just the opening act of the plan in this hemisphere.

Joe Biden famously said that the second amendment does not protect you if you are fighting the Nuclear weapon wielding US military.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2021/06/23/remarks-by-president-biden-and-attorney-general-garland-on-gun-crime-prevention-strategy/

Well, Mr. "President".  You will need to send one of your jets to my home then.

Where he is wrong is the fact that some of us have decided that if it comes to it we will call that bet, and we will die fighting.   I am one of those.  I would rather be remembered by my descendants as someone who fought against the tyranny than as a coward that stood by as evil men tried to take control of the world.

I have begun preparing for this possibility, and will be as ready as possible.  My biggest hope is that there will be members of the military and police of western democracies who will also stand up.  That includes any of you three letter people reading this.  And I have no desire to die or even fight, but I will.  I also hope my state considers taking a stand if the time comes.

Currently, personally I have only met a very few of my GenX brethren that see it... the boomers are too busy trying to suck up as much new money as possible, and the Millennials and Zoomers are rolling out the red carpet for the communists.  Hopefully it is not just my nihilist generation that is left to save the west... lol.

Aww, jbreher is back for 5 minutes and you smack him!  C'mon...  at least let him get in ONE jab first.

You better!!!  You ended up with almost 0.15 of my BTC!

Which really just increased my incoming liquidity a significant portion on both nodes!  So it is all good! I am just messing.  In fact this was one of the realizations that helped me over the hump i think made you frustrated.

Individual channel balance is ONE thing... but overall NODE balance is another, and arguably more important.  Stagnant channels are what I have begun to look at with the horse eye... but on the other hand they are not really HURTING anything.  And I have had channels about the size of ours chronically end up on one side of the string, and then BOOM sweep back over on their own accord...

Anyway... I will keep looking at channel management over the next 18 months with a current eye to just letting the node manage itself for a while.  And I will let you know what I learn in 18m or whenever!