Has anyone run the analysis to figure out if BTC moving through this market participant has an average level of taint?  I mean, another thing which happened fairly recently is that a decent size haul was made at the expense of Bitcoinica after all.

I like it, though it would be genuinely more interesting if the slightly more recent data were more opened up.  This is not so much 'cherry picking' as it is related to the mechanics of our visual apparatus.

If I knew where to get a reasonable set of feeds, I'd hack out a gnuplot formula to make reasonably pretty graphs.

CD: You are the one who made this a 'gold vs. Bitcoin' thing where very few of those mistaken for 'PM bugs' on this thread seem to hold that opinion.  Cry me a river.

Wave:  Stick around please.  If you make logical arguments that are not patently myopic or self serving, history seems to indicate that they well considered and very likely will spark a lively and useful exploration.

Sure anyone could start one (for now) but if the increasingly aggressive forum moderators don't like it it'll be burried.

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FTR, I remain relatively impressed with the 'moderation in moderation' on the forum though there does seem to be the beginnings of a shift toward increasing censorship of unpopular lines of thought.

I'm not to concerned.  The way I have it figured, the US will do anything necessary to keep the USDX down and they have a variety of tools at their disposal.  I figure that the application of these tools will likely be good for gold.  Possibly also even better for Bitcoin.

I actually don't rule out the rationality of sitting on more USD in times like this than I otherwise would like to (where the 'otherwise' is near zero.)  One way or another though I would and will do my best to make sure I've to got access to a speedy and reliable way to dump ballast.

         ... sequence is not being observed recently for whatever reason.

The presently observed pattern had been predicted however.  Along with theories about why it may be so.

Shit, that's better than the spread used to be if I recall correctly from when I was playing around with the system.  What's not to love!?!

I suspect that we'll look back on things to this point and see that the bubble was starting to be able to be classified as one somewhere in this neighborhood.

I think that what we have is the gold starting from an abnormally depressed state.  I think it's starting to dawn on people that the ZIRP policies and general rigged nature of most of the other markets nullify the traditional arguments about gold being a liability in terms of wealth preservation.

One reason I don't think we've reached the point where the bubble pops (if history even shows that we are in one yet) is that it's still kind of a weirdo who has his dick-skinners on the phyzzz (though not nearly so much as one who holds BTC...)

I do expect that we'll have a bubble in Au at some point, and I'll try to sell every ounce when I believe it's going to pop.  (OK, I'll probably hold onto a few since they make good gifts.)


The targeting for what mainstream stuff I see seems to be at imbeciles who can (and sometimes do) pay double the spot price, or those who will buy ETFs.  Even some of the Glenn Beck watching mouth-breathers are probably starting to break even by this time so sometimes the money a fool parted with comes back to smack him I guess.


Fine by me.  Gold would have to more than half before it fails to do what I ask which is to preserve my purchasing power.  But I'm lucky...or something...


I figure I can get both rather easily if I have some gold, and getting there packing the gold would be a lot more feasible than packing food and water.  But hopefully we won't find out.

I think that you'll not find many people who will suggest being 'all in' PM's here.  This is a Bitcoin forum after all.  I'm very interested in anything with no counter-party risk, and Bitcoin fits this bill well in addition to it's other fascinating and powerful properties.  In my mind and in my portfolio, however, gold and property are very much my 'investment grade' assets while Bitcoin is very much on the speculative end of the spectrum.

Unlike a lot of people, it seems, I have some serious technical concerns about Bitcoin's implementation.  On the other hand, I put a lot more value on simply having private keys controlling representation in the block chain so it's a wash I guess.  Again, however, I have to view BTC as highly speculative.

Rickards was saying with an air of certainty to not worry about the Euro, but that was 6 months or so ago.  And I never have convinced myself of exactly who/what he is.  Clearly he's a very smart and highly informed guy though.

Very recently Sinclair has proposed a counta-thesis that the Euro may not have as dark a future as conventional consensus seems to think.  Relative to the USD at any rate.

'Interesting times' is a bit cliche at this point.  'Desperate times?'  Dunno.  Could be.  I would not rule it out.

ROTFL!  Or my all-time favorite complements of chodpaba: "I think I pee'd a little."

C'mon Wave...lighten up.  It's all in good fun.  Us bugs are so silly in our own ways that it should not be a challenge to return the favor.  I promise I'll enjoy it just as much.

General Comment: USDX: now @ 82.40.  Gulp!

Another Score:  5/25/12
          year ago    now       delta mult
BTC     7.30         5.15       + 0.71
Gold    1528         1574      + 1.03

--------------------------
ref (for future updates):
http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/mtgoxUSD#czsg2011-05-08zeg2011-05-08ztgSzm1g10zm2g25zv  (change date)
http://www.kitco.com/charts/livegold.html  (hist cgi at bottom)
mult=now/year_ago

day           ya-btc  btc  mult    ya-Au  Au    mult
2012-05-25  7.30  5.15  0.71    1528  1574  1.03
2012-05-24  7.10  5.14  0.72    1514  1558  1.03
2012-05-23  7.10  5.13  0.72    1515  1562  1.03
2012-05-22  6.30  5.09  0.81    1512  1560  1.03
2012-05-21  5.90  5.10  0.86    1514  1590  1.05
2012-05-18  7.50  5.12  0.68    1497  1592  1.06    
2012-05-17  7.80  5.09  0.65    1480  1574  1.06            
2012-05-16  7.40  5.09  0.69    1495  1533  1.03
2012-05-15  6.80  5.03  0.74    1492  1545  1.04
2012-05-14  8.50  5.00  0.59    1495  1555  1.04
2012-05-12  5.40  4.95  0.92    1505  1580  1.05
2012-05-11  5.00  4.95  0.99    1505  1580  1.05
2012-05-10  3.82  4.90  1.28    1510  1593  1.05
2012-05-09  3.75  5.03  1.34    1510  1590  1.05
2012-05-08  3.64  5.03  1.38    1497  1605  1.07

The Three Marketeers unite!  "Muppet armies:  Let's roll."

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Someone needs update the rather amusing picture of the three Bitcoin Consultancy bozos which popped up yesterday.

Just like I (maybe we?) suspected, a need for liquidity would produce a drop-out in Au prices but then the interested big buyers (probably Sino-much) would put a floor under things.

I did not really expect the floor to be so vanishing personally.  I guess competition for the phyzzz continues to grow.  If I had dumped Au and just now glanced at the Au vs. USDX charts, I would be sitting in a warm pool of urine about now.

The amount of value I left with Bitcoinica was chosen to be so such that I would have the option to not even try to get it back if/when they lost or chose to pocket it.  That was after I won some value in the post-$2 rise and gave most of my winnings to charity.

As I suspected as a very real possibility, Bitcoinica lost the money.  I don't think they simply decided to pocket it, but will probably never know.  I don't have to care much and am choosing to exercise the option of forgetting about it...with a bit of a chuckle about being 'burnt' even.

It's worth note that they never had anything on me (to steal or lose to a criminal) beyond a one-time-use username and password, some Bitcoin addresses, and some IP addresses in their logs from whence I used their UI.  This also was not an accident.

Hacking into computers to steal BTC is theft and is criminal.  The trouble is how society values the loss.  A lot of participants in the Bitcoin economy, myself included, think of Bitcoin as a way to undermine (or at least protect oneself against) the certain corrupt aspects of our current societal structures.  But most justice systems don't share the view that the fiat monetary system as corrupt and shaky, and thus don't place that much value in Bitcoin.  Probably never heard of it in fact.  And they really do have legitimate work to prioritize.  Upshot:  Theft of Bitcoin is simply not as serious a crime in practice as it is in theory, and 'in practice' is where the rubber meets the road for a lot of us.

Now, harassement is a crime and extortion is a more serious one and physical violence more serious yet.  One can throw the other details (like "but Your Honor, he stole my BTC") out the window.  The criminal justice system will and should take an active interest in such things.  I only hope that this situation remains valid for as long as possible.

An NDA is amongst a class of thing which are worth having on one's side if one has a reasonable expectation of being able to utilize the services of a justice system.  That is to say, I'm open to the suggestion that they are useless in Bitcoin-land (and like Bitcoin that much more for it.)

I personally would not request an NDA for an interview unless I felt I needed one (which is plausible if I had a promising candidate who I wanted to try to interest...in something besides the easy-to-clean tile in the bathroom...)  But it's probably normally company policy.  One way or another, if an interview candidate was giving me grief at that phase of things, I don't even have to summarize how the rest of the interview would go:

  "Thanks for stopping by.  Have an Odwalla for the road."

This is just an idea that I dredged from my memory in an inopportune forum post.  I'm just transcribing and expanding on it here.

As a bit of background, my own (rather unpopular) view of the differences between Bitcoin and most other instruments are known to some.  In a nutshell, I consider any BTC I send to a vendor, exchange, bucket-shop, on-line wallet services, or whatever to be 'their' BTC.  I can only hope they give it back if appropriate, but I don't make financial transactions based on 'hope', and especially not with random Bitcoin enthusiasts who, at this point, I trust as little as almost any group I can think of.  Legal tender laws protect my USD-based business and not my BTC-based business, and that's exactly the way I like it.

All this is to say that I happily buy stuff with pay-pal, visa, etc all the time.  I've had to flex my muscle deploying charge-backs more often than I like when some flaky ass-wipe didn't come through.  There is no way I'm just going to send someone some BTC and hope for the best.  I would love to use Bitcoin more to buy real things, and that is the driving force behind this idea.

My conception of this idea is not that it is going to make anyone any money, but if it functions as I would hope it could bring people into the economy on the buy-side.  So, to the extent that there would be development and maintenance costs, sellers might find it particularly worthwhile to shoulder them.  I envision it as a pretty light system without many operational expenses.


The idea:  An 'Arbitration Guild' where pretty much everyone who participates is in transactions is a member (unless they are kicked out.)

---

Simple purchase - good case

 - Transactions normally take the form of the buying party sending BTC to a system which divides it into several parts and locks it with multiple keys.

 - When both parties of a transaction are satisfied, all keys are sent to the seller who grabs the BTC.  Done (except to piddle with some sort of a feedback and ratings system.)

---

Simple purchase - dispute

 - If a dispute is called, a random selection of 'arbitrators' is called from the (large) pool.

 - there would be utter anonymity about who the arbitrators are, and attempting to break that  that get's one kicked out of the guild.

 - evidence, arguments, etc be they presented by the belligerents or called for by the arbitrators are in the public domain.

 - when the arbitrators have made their decision, the keys to the divided up blocks of BTC are released for the winner(s) to collect.  In this respect, the arbitration is binding.

 - because the evidence is public, a person who makes what are considered by general consensus to be uniformly poor decisions as an arbitrator could be kicked out of the guild.

 - because any arbitration would involve probably at least three arbitrators, a disruptive asshole would be less likely to cause financial harm as a result of mischief.

---

For other types of services, the basic framework can support most escrow-like arrangements (which is in fact what is described above anyway.)

---

One of the keys to this solution is that there is very little reason to act like a scum-bag even for those who's nature is conducive to doing so.  It's simply not going to gain them very much.

Another nicety is that the existence of disputes, the evidence, and the resolution is all in the public domain for research in deciding who to do business with.

I expect the compensation for the participants to be mainly:

 - they can leverage the solution in times of need

 - by being a member of the Guild in good standing, others gain confidence in doing business with them.

I expect that if the system works well it will drastically reduce the likelihood of successful theft or fraud and thus drastically reduce the incidence of attempts.  This is, in my opinion, one of the keys to success in the e-bay/pay-pal empire, and even there I have to deal with dirt-bags more often than I would expect.  I shudder to think of what my experience would be in Bitcoin-land without such a mechanism.

Obviously there is a lot to think about in design.  I don't have the time and interest at this point so I am just throwing these ideas out (with no claim on them whatsoever.)  Others might have had similar ideas but I do not remember them and did not find any in some scans of the forum though the search functions are pretty primitive.

Edit(s): minor tunings of the text.

No.  That's why I phrased things as I did.

But if everything else but Bitcoin is going to hell and Bitcoin is going to rocket, what exactly is your advice?  I have not heard you strongly suggest to sitting on a lot of cash in USD form even if some of your theories seem to indicate that that will rocket as well.


I brag it up at every opportunity.  Personally I highly value a good troll.  A high-quality troll by necessity contains a kernel of truth...that's why it irritates people.


I see.  Often times people neglect to take a stand because they are chicken-shit

Actually about the only thing I have against your service is that I think it is questionable to place a high bet (as a percentage of net worth) on Bitcoin at this time and I think you are irresponsible for promoting this.  I'm not going to pay your fee to find out if your subscribers get different advice than what I feel you expound on in public.  I think you are very probably dead wrong about the safe harbor nature of gold and I honestly don't want to see third parties suffer for it though I really should not care.

To the extent that I attempt to irritate you publicly it is a reflection of what I feel you do to us 'gold bugs.'  I actually enjoy your jabs...especially the ones which land...and I enjoy dishing them out.  Cuz I'm a troll

One of the primary reasons I call myself a 'Socialist' is that it pisses me off that a long-running PR blitz has labeled certain political classifications with an unfair and derogatory connotation...and pisses me off even more that it's as effective as it is.  All that proves to me is that it is relatively easy to corral and herd a bunch of mouth-breathing retards.

I actually subscribe to a lot of the principles of which Libertarians claim as their own.  Every time I've been tempted to call myself a Libertarian, I hear some professed one open his yap on the internet or read some absurd screed like you've pointed to and it quashes any inclination I might have for another few years.

That does not seem particularly counter-intuitive to me.  Sounds like a damn good idea which would probably work well in instance where two honest actors simply want a conclusion.  That probably covers a high percentage of disputes, particularly in business-land.

It bring back a flash of an idea I had some time ago.  Trying to dredge up the core aspects:

 - Overview:  an 'arbitration guild'

 - members serve as randomly selected arbitrators.
 - compensation is exclusively that they can use the service in their own disputes.
 - complete and enforced anonymity of arbitrators.
 - judgement binding in that the winner gets the key to locked bitcoin caches.
 - evidence presented publicly for peer review (of the arbitrator's performance mostly.  Very unlike judge.me and potentially a show-stopper for a lot of people's use cases.)

The idea would be that the guild would function fairly and would bestow credibility on it's members and confidence in doing business with them in addition to providing a valuable service for the members own needs if they are unfortunate enough to need them.

I do _not_ claim any ownership of these ideas.  If anyone wants to run with some of them I'd be delighted since I would appreciate such a service myself (if reasonably well implemented.)