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re: anti-virus declaring a Trojans. I just downloaded the cgminer-2.4.3-Win2.zip -Jesse
It's in the FAQ portion on page 1: (You're safe) Q: Is this a virus? A: Cgminer is being packaged with other trojan scripts and some antivirus software is falsely accusing cgminer.exe as being the actual virus, rather than whatever it is being packaged with. If you installed cgminer yourself, then you do not have a virus on your computer. Complain to your antivirus software company. Understood. (And I had read the FAQ, but thanks. ![Smiley](https://bitcointalk.org/Smileys/default/smiley.gif) ) I mentioned it here because I downloaded it from the official pristine location, linked in the topmost post. If the official version accidentally packaged up a trojan version of a 3rd party library (libpdcurses) it seemed worth mentioning. -Jesse
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re: anti-virus declaring a Trojans.
I just downloaded the cgminer-2.4.3-Win2.zip
I use AVG anti-virus, and it said that libpdcurses.dll contained a Key Logger Trojan.
On the one hand, I suspect it is a false positive. On the other hand I don't mind getting a new copy of a library from a trusted source just to be safe.
-Jesse
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Reality Check:- Emma Woodhouse --> Satoshi Nakamoto
- handsome, clever, and rich, --> notably anonymous, innovative, and enigmatically shy,
- with a comfortable home and happy disposition, --> with impellent drive of abounding alacrity,
- seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; --> promulgated to abrogate the Achilles' heels of fiat currency;
- and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world --> and had endured untold years hopscotching to secure cyberspace,
- with very little to distress or vex her. --> ordained to supplant the unitarily-commissioned global currency reserves.
re: Reality CheckExcellent question. (If "reality" is reasonable to apply to this prim rose path. ) Line 1 : the subject Line 2 : personal attributes of the subject Line 3 : continued attributes of the subject Line 4 On Emma's side : describes a nebulous attribute of the subject On Satoshi's side : describes an action taken by an unknown actor about the subject Line 5 On Emma's side : describes the span of time and domain pertinent to the subject. On Satoshi's side : describes the span of time and an action taken by the subject for a goal in a domain. Line 6 On Emma's side : describes the conditions the subject encountered. On Satoshi's side : describes in more details the goal required of the subject by an unknown actor. So, the semantic structure has drifted a bit. -Jesse
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Satoshi Nakamoto, handsome, extremely brilliant, and rich, with an unknown home of happy hashes, plotted to demolish some of the worst shortcomings of Fiat; and had endured over many years on the Internets with very little to distress or vaporize Blueseed. [/quote] Satoshi Nakamoto, handsome, extremely brilliant, and rich, with an unknown home of happy hashes, plotted to demolish some of the worst shortcomings of Fiat; and had endured over many years on the Internets intending very little to distress or vaporize Blueseed. There! That's the right paragraph. -Jesse
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Huzzah! We have a reason!
Huzzah! We have a season! Oops. Sorry. Wrong paragraph. ![Smiley](https://bitcointalk.org/Smileys/default/smiley.gif)
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Boing-Boing is a site that hosts lots of "grid-computing" or "cloud-computing" projects. Basically anything that can be divvied into small work chunks and passed out to a bazzilion personal computers to have the work done in parallel. typically everyone's computer is an unpaid volunteer. Eh? Are you sure you are speaking about BOINC and about https://boinc.berkeley.edu/ wich is totally unrelated to this "boing boing" thing? Darn it all, you are correct. I saw "Boing" and read "Boinc". <expression type="facial" category="grin" style="sheepish" /> -Jesse EDIT: As far as I can tell, there are no Boin c projects dedicated to the mining of bitcoins. Though some teams do declare that they accept donations in BTC. There is one It's a sub-project of GPUGRID http://www.gpugrid.net/and is called Donate@Home http://www.donateathome.org/ Basically you mine for them (and it's Boinc, not Boink ![Cheesy](https://bitcointalk.org/Smileys/default/cheesy.gif) ) Edit: i wonder if they know about the Butterfly Labs ASIC ![Cheesy](https://bitcointalk.org/Smileys/default/cheesy.gif) How to make their project useless ![Cheesy](https://bitcointalk.org/Smileys/default/cheesy.gif) Ah! I had not checked for "sub-projects", only those listed at the top level of Boin c's project list. Interesting that GPUGRID does not list Donate@Home as one of their sub-projects. Well, not directly. If you go to their "Donations" page, it is quietly mentioned. Also interesting that at Boin c it is only mentioned in a forum. I guess sub-projects are second class citizens. ![Smiley](https://bitcointalk.org/Smileys/default/smiley.gif) -Jesse
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“I’m no one,” he screamed once again, “But I’m going to a legend! I’ll… I’ll be the man to conquer the skies themselves!”
Small typo: But I’m going to be a legend! ... Of the Boy Who Swallowed A Fallen Star.
Excellent hook to the opening. And it qualifies as the first of the (minimum of) three challenges a "hero" must pass to accomplish the quest. I refer to Joseph Campbell's "Hero's Journey". -Jesse
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I'm a big fan of epic poetry so the opening followed the Aeneid's invocation.
I read somewhere that an "epic adventure" was always in three volumes. ![Wink](https://bitcointalk.org/Smileys/default/wink.gif) -Jesse PS: The "somewhere" was the last page of "The River of Dancing Gods" by Jack Chalker. The publisher (of the first edition) was most careful to avoid mentioning on the outside of the book that it was volume one of a series. I usually wait until I have all of a series (that I expect to be good enough I'll want to just plough through and read it all in one sitting) before I start reading the first volume. Chalker got me, as he intended. ![Smiley](https://bitcointalk.org/Smileys/default/smiley.gif)
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I can pretty much assume that the math functions in my computer are honest, as the souless machine has no vested interest in any particular outcome. Humans do, and that is the root of the problem with fiat currencies. Sure, they're great in theory, but in practice they require levels of integrity and wisdom from people in the positions of power that cannot (logicly) be maintained over generations.
If you are unwilling to assume that the human beings are honest enough, Then why would you assume that the math functions in your computer are honest? Wasn't the software written by human beings? Open Source Software is not a panacea. You either have to read and understand all the code yourself. Or you have to _trust_ someone else who did. ( or the community of many who did ) re: the souless machine has no vested interest in any particular outcome.The soulless machine has exactly the interest in a particular outcome that someone programmed it to have. If that were not so, then there would be no debate about electronic voting machines being used to subvert an election. re: Humans do, and that is the root of the problem with fiat currencies.If the very Human "love of (fiat) money" is the root of all evil, then how is the "love of bitcoin money" any different? -Jesse
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A company spends currency in order to reap even more currency. True, they do not "have" the original items of currency, but they don't care, they have more total value of other items of currency. If they don't get more (on average over time) then they go bankrupt. But what is the mechanism by which that happens? What you're talking about it the system in which people can use their money to buy political favors and coercively funnel other people's towards themselves. That's how wealth accumulates to the those at the top but it's a function of the State, not the currency. Actually, I was talking about normal business practices of spending currency to: * produce something * convince Consumers to buy product * make a profit doing it -Jesse
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What you're talking about it the system in which people can use their money to buy political favors and coercively funnel other people's towards themselves. That's how wealth accumulates to the those at the top but it's a function of the State, not the currency.
I disagree that it is a function of the State (or even of the State's Fiat Currency). I believe it is a function of Human Corruptibility. If a politician were offered 1M to make a decision a particular way, it doesn't matter if it is in USD or EURO or BTC. What matters is the character of the politician. Without the ability of a central bank to print an unlimited amount of Bitcoins this wealth transfer mechanism is far less effective. If the early adopters want to hold on to their share of Bitcoins they must either never spend them, and thus never have an effect on the economy or they must somehow produce a value equal to or greater than they consume. If they can't manage to produce enough value their share of the Bitcoins will inevitably decline.
As I understand it, (which is still a raw Newbie level of understanding in may ways) as the total number of bitcoins approaches maximum, ans as the "deflationary" aspect kicks in, the quantities transferred for a particular commodity could dropfrom 1BTC to 0.001 BTC to 0.000001 BTC etc. If the bottom rungs of the economy need to deal with nano-BTC to be meaningful, it will likely mean that some small number of individuals (or more likely corporations) are the only ones for whom 1 BTC is still meaningful. It doesn't mean that they do not spend. It means that don't need to spend as much this year as last year for the same thing. It means that there are a limited number of players who can offer anything to them worth 1K BTC or 1M BTC. Whether such a deflationary economy will be good for Bitcoin or not, I have no idea. Whether such a deflationary economy will be good for the average human in this planetary system or not, I have no idea. Whether it will even turn out exactly that way, I have no idea. Whether trying something different than what has always failed before is a good idea or not, ..., I think so. -Jesse
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Even still, I think it's fair to say that an overwhelming percentage of Bitcoins are distributed among a relatively few number of people. It doesn't matter whether this is due to the risk that early adopters took. If Bitcoin becomes mainstream, it is likely that this disproportionate distribution of BTC wealth will continue to perpetuate itself. What does that mean in practical terms? Either they spend those coins or they don't. If they spend them then the don't have them any more. If they don't spend them they aren't consuming any products or services in the Bitcoin economy. Where exactly is the problem? re: "If they spend them then the don't have them any more."A company spends currency in order to reap even more currency. True, they do not "have" the original items of currency, but they don't care, they have more total value of other items of currency. If they don't get more (on average over time) then they go bankrupt. The Typical End Consumer spends to consume, true; but does not typically spend to produce. The Consumer typically trades "their time at work" for some currency (whether Fiat or Bitcoin or whatever). The rate are which such a Consumer can acquire BTC is limited to their ability to work. ( e.g., there are only 24 hours in a day ) The rate at which a Rich individual can spend currency to produce currency in not limited in the same way. ( e.g., the more currency I have, the more I can use to produce more currency ) re: Where exactly is the problem?It isn't a "problem" but an "observation". In the Bitcoin economy, as in every other economy so far known, "The Rich Get Richer" (faster than anyone behind them). In this early phase where not all BTC have been mined, then it is determined by who can afford to throw the most CPU/GPU power at mining. Eventually, when all bitcoins have been mined, that aspect goes away. The Bitcoin Economy will still be subject to normal economic flows. -Jesse
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Boing-Boing is a site that hosts lots of "grid-computing" or "cloud-computing" projects. Basically anything that can be divvied into small work chunks and passed out to a bazzilion personal computers to have the work done in parallel. typically everyone's computer is an unpaid volunteer. Eh? Are you sure you are speaking about BOINC and about https://boinc.berkeley.edu/ wich is totally unrelated to this "boing boing" thing? Darn it all, you are correct. I saw "Boing" and read "Boinc". <expression type="facial" category="grin" style="sheepish" /> -Jesse EDIT: As far as I can tell, there are no Boink projects dedicated to the mining of bitcoins. Though some teams do declare that they accept donations in BTC.
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What I meant by "Real Money" is that it is backed by some physical commodity that has some kind of intrinsic value, like gold. One could argue if gold actually has any "intrinsic value". Agreed: a moot point. If people say that dollars are backed by gold (which it isn't as you state correctly, but suppose it were) then what does that mean, really? What is gold backed by?
Physical Reality - as opposed to Computer Modeled Reality, where most modern Currencies live. If people accept that gold doesn't need to be backed by anything, or can act as a means of backing other things, then I don't see why the same wouldn't hold for bitcoins.
Philisophically, I agree there is no fundamental difference. You might have a harder time, however, those who have not already, at least in part, become Bitcoin Enthusiasts. It is only a small percentage of humanity that thinks much about the philosophy they use to view the world. Well, technically, bitcoin also is "created" at the press of a button. Yeah, but (and I know you know this, but I just wanna clarify this to everybody) there's no difference for a bank to create one million, or ten million, or one billion. Money isn't even printed anymore. They just store a random number in a computer, and that amount of dollars suddenly came into existence. Magic. Hopefully not random! ![Smiley](https://bitcointalk.org/Smileys/default/smiley.gif) Hopefully it is the amount they decided to create. Bitcoin cannot be created at will. Unlike fiat currency (or gold!)
If you know how to create gold .... ![Smiley](https://bitcointalk.org/Smileys/default/smiley.gif) ... the exact amount of bitcoins in existence is known and public for everybody, and can be predicted for the foreseeable future.
That phrase "the exact amount of bitcoins in existence" can be taken two ways: * the maximum number that are mathematically possible to ever exist * the exact number that have been "mined" and moved into the economy Both are known, public, and predictable. What interests speculators is the rate (and the stability of the rate) that mining moves BTC into the economy. Which brings to my mind a tangential question about the "creation" of a new economically active bitcoin. I have not looked at the source code yet, but the question raised is of the fesability of tweaking the generation code. (without Bitcoin Client noticing, or what would be the point) As I understand it, a bitcoin is: * a properly check-summed encoding of ... * a properly calculated hash of ... * a properly generated term in ... * a really scary cryptographic equation series. And, as I understand it, the job of Bitcoin Client is to: * validate the encoding and check-summing of the hash. * validate the transaction chain * * since the creation of this particular bitcoin * * if not all the way back to the Bitcoin Epoch(tm) beginning. Which suggests that the "transaction of creation" (if that is a proper phrase) must contain enough information to verify that the data used to create the hash did in fact come from the scary cryptographic equation series. And that this "transaction of creation" is still in the transaction chain so the client can verify it and all following transaction (that involve the bitcoin in question). So the question becomes: * Is it mathematically feasible to build a "transaction of creation", that passes current tests for validity, using less CPU power than the standard mining process? I suspect the answer is "No" to the best ability of the cryptologists and programmers behind Bitcoin, else there would be no Bitcoin. ( : I seem to have drifted far from my original topic. : ) -Jesse
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DAG NAB IT!
My session timed out while I was typing my response and the entire thing got lost.
I had done "Preview" many times, but that did not (apparently) save a copy anywhere in the system.
Sigh.
I will attempt to recreate my thought process, but I will remember to Ctrl-A Ctrl-C before I click "Post" from now on.
-Jesse
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Post is over a year old... True, the event is long over, but I was using the quotes/transcripts as a starting point for discussion in this thread. The differences (especially for us Newbies) between the Bitcoin economic system and other economies is not intuitively clear. -Jesse
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The rich (in Real Money) can afford the computer systems to dedicate to mining to become richer (in BitCoin).
Right now the miner's profitability is at a higher level than it has been but let's say that this level is a constant for the purposes of this discussion. So Bob the miner spends ... Very nice example! It is a good example. But it only looks at Bob. Not at the differences between Bob and Alice (The Rich). In your example, the out of pocket expense for Bob is under $2K for that first year. ( $1000 + ($2.61 * 365.25 days in a year) ) (before he can sell the PC and recoup some of that expense) Bob's mined income for the year is about 219 BTC. (0.6 BTC / day * 365.25 days in a year) That comes to about $9/BTC. If Bob does get $800 for his old rig, the final cost is about $5/BTC; the profit you calculated. Bob will only make a profit at all if he can sell the old rig for more than: $510. (a good probability, but no guarantees in this economy. that's one of the risks Bob is taking.) HOWEVER, and I think it is a big "however", that initial outlay of $1953 is a larger percentage of Bob's expendable income that it is of Alice's. If you look at the same percentage of "expendable income" (or "investment capital" as Alice likes to call it) then the rig Alice gets is much more powerful than Bob's rig. Alice's rig will likely produce at better than 1.4Ghash/s. My contention is that for the same "percentage of expendable capital" Alice will harvest BTC at a higher rate than Bob will. ( and, therefore, at a better profit margin ) And therefore, my conclusion of: for the same level of personal pain, "the Rich get richer" than the non-Rich. -Jesse
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You can multi quote, you know. I do now. ;-)
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@Kazimer, banks can create [Fiat Currency] by the billions at the press of a button. Well, technically, bitcoin also is "created" at the press of a button. It just takes lots of computer time to finish reacting to that button push. Analogous to (but likely longer than) the printing time it take for the Fiat system to react to the button push. -Jesse
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@Kazimer, @realnowhereman, I stand corrected on the "hard/easy to counterfeit" aspect of "Fiat Currency". Even if I wasn't trying to talk about "Fiat Currency". Gold, though, is still pretty hard to counterfeit. ![Smiley](https://bitcointalk.org/Smileys/default/smiley.gif) It isn't used as a direct currency much these days. -Jesse
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