The mathematics is complicated - it takes quite a bit of knowledge to actually understand the whole process. If you want to start out I would suggest reading about ECDSA (as nearly all cryptography is based on that at the moment) and this article will give you a good insight to start with - http://arstechnica.com/security/2013/10/a-relatively-easy-to-understand-primer-on-elliptic-curve-cryptography/3/.

As to your second question, it's already been answered above - that address is considered valid (as the miner's do not care whether someone has the private key) but in all probability someone doesn't have it so it cannot be spent.

Did you even read the OP? Because to me it doesn't sound like you did. Maidak ain't complaining about the profitability of mining - he's arguing that Bitcoin is becoming increasingly centralised as a result of large mining conglomerates and that merchant acceptance hasn't improved as significantly as expected.

Best is completely subjective and opinionated. There is no best - choose one which suits your needs more appropriately than the others.

And this is the problem with most people in Bitcoin. They don't see it from what it was designed to do - become the primary payment system used around the world. Instead we compare it to fiat as a measure of its value and become hyped up about it as the price increases. Basically it means systemically people are focused on making a quick buck rather than actually seeing this as a means of moving forward.

Wait are posts made in the Auctions sub uneditable/undeletable by the user who made it? Because that's what I'm inferring you're talking about from your suggestion.

I'm not sure you'll actually be able to find one. The only book that has decent limits was Bitbook and it closed down a while back. I generally don't like to advise fiat-related stuff but have you looked at some of the bigger fiat bookies (ie pinnacle) - they generally have higher limits.

It can't really be 'reduced' without the consensus of the nodes and the miners. If you're talking about setting a lower fee than you should according to the reference implementation then that's not really true as it is quite likely to hobble your confirmation times. Trust me sending 0 fee transactions is not the smartest thing to do - if you can't afford 5c (0.5c once reference is adopted) than you really shouldn't be wasting the effort of the network with your tx.

FTFY.

Realistically, from a Bitcoiner's perspective I can see why you'd want merchant acceptance - but from Riot's view I can't see a reason at all to accept Bitcoin transactions.

Common Sense. I'm sorry for those who don't have much as they can't buy it off the shelf in a nice retail box.

Seriously though, no amount of software is going to help you if you don't have common sense. I've heard of many security pros who don't bother with antivirus suites and the likes because they don't go around running random scripts, downloading and executing unknown executables on an admin account and so fourth.

Pretty sure you don't. Someone on DefaultTrust needs to manually add you to the white box (found here - https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=trust). Basically DefaultTrust is a user (created by theymos IIRC) which has a list of people it trusts. Anyone who they trust gets added onto the next level and so fourth. You can have a trust depth of up to 3 (so you trust people DefaultTrust trusts, people trusted by them, and finally people trusted by the latter).

However, in general people who are get a lot of positives will eventually be added by someone on DefaultTrust sheerly because someone on the list trusts them enough to put them there. But you could have 1 mill positives and still not be on DefaultTrust.

Is this promotion still available?

Nice site - looks really swish and professional.

EDIT: Completed a 0.1 BTC bet on Gold from 1Light1BN9Lu38Jab9iqVmJXt4Rc66WAoB. Would appreciate the 0.1 to that address. Thanks.

It would be much better to just run Electrum on an airgapped computer and use your Master Public Key to create a view only on an Electrum connected to the internet (then sign your txs offline). Otherwise if you ever need to send funds you'll have to install Electrum again add the seed and broadcast the transaction by connecting to the net (which isn't really cold storage anymore) and then uninstalling again. Are you committing the 12 words to memory - or are you keeping paper copies as well (possibly at least one in a fireproof safe/bank safe deposit box)?

Not exactly, having positive trust doesn't mean that your negative trusts will be red to everyone (only to yourself). For you to actually make someone red you'd have to be on the DefaultTrust list and that comes by people manually adding you to their list rather than giving you positive trust.

Why are you even trying? Let's think about this logically:

1) You are a completely new user
2) You have no trust
3) You're not posting any collateral
4) You're offering an 'investment' scheme which offers impossible returns (65% a month is impossible - compounded that 40,000% a year)
5) You have no proof that you are offering a legitimate service
6) You have no proof you even own any BTC
7) Finally, if you can make 65% a month why would you need BTC - trading is easier in fiat

So yeah, please don't insult the intelligence of some of us here - we ain't that stupid 

Please note that I didn't specifically refer to you as a degenerate - merely my perception that whales seem to be degens.

That certainly is a unique proposal, I've never heard of an escrow willing to take all the risk. If the deal goes through, hope there isn't any wishy-washy business by the OP at least for your sake.


True, but it isn't that hard to log in from a different IP and then make the payment and then claim your account was hacked. I don't think they'd bat an eye at preventing what they see as fraud and theft.

Just a question - how exactly does escrow help when you're dealing with a PayPal transaction that can easily be reversed after the Bitcoins are released? Unless you're planning to hold them for the time necessary to prevent any chargebacks escrow doesn't really work in this instance.

Sure, since truth is a perception and there is no great universal truth hence every single person could claim their religion as moral.


In response to this, if you're a believer of one of the longer running faith's (ie Christianity) I'm doubtful there would be evidence to indicate anything like that - but we can safely assume that all humans throughout all time points have made mistakes based on a flawed understanding/perception.

If you are using Blockchain.info please use 2FA - in the event that someone gets into your email and has the necessary information to log in, the only thing stopping them is 2FA. If you are keeping you're wallet on that same email address, use 2FA for that email address as well if possible. Better to be safe than sorry.

You'll effectively make an altcoin with your own chain as Bitcoin's blockchain will not be affected by the changes you implement on your own edition as it won't have acceptance from the nodes and miners.