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Thank you Hal for everything you have done for both this community and the world. No one knew what would become of the Bitcoin and we still don't know. It's a grand experiment. I hope that I can live up to the example you have set for all of us. And I hope that the Bitcoin outlives us all.
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I get that you don't like BFL. I honestly haven't spent a huge amount of time thinking about the inner workings of the company. I order a 300 dollar piece of hardware in March. I'll see if it is delivered. If not, then we'll have a class action and the CEO will return to prison for fraud. He overpromised. Round 1 is over. As for the difficulty calculations, you don't know the impact the GPU miners turning off their rigs alongside the price increases the bitcoin experiences will have. I agree the difficulty will go up. But it is a mistake to say no money will come.
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Step 1: Some lobbyist will convince a member of congress that Bitcoin is a threat, and the government needs to buy some ASICs.
Step 2: Other lobbyists get wind of the plan, and all try to get their own employers' interests included in the upcoming bill.
Step 3: Legislation in enacted and money is allocated.
Step 4: Contracts are written and approved, ensuring that contractors from all 435 congressional districts are included in the project.
Step 5: Construction begins. Only unionized companies are allowed to work on the facility, and they negotiate for 3 hour work days.
Step 6: The facility is completed. The project is now 8 years late and $15 billion over budget, and half the spent money can't even be accounted for. By this time the Bitcoin network has grown by three or four orders of magnitude. The government's new toy has enough hashing power to mine about a millibit per day. You should look at how quickly after 9/11 the us government moved on the terrorist financial networks or the bank bailout of 2008. If the US government wanted to destroy the bitcoin, then they could do it. Our only advantage is that they are slow, inefficient and very divided. If Bitcoins become too much of a political threat or a monetary threat, then the NSA will develop an ASIC capable of doing it in two months. They don't need congress. An executive order is sufficient. |
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BUT, that does not change the fact that in reality, they exist and could kill Bitcoin easily.
Let's not give them a reason to do so on a silver platter... I'm glad we agree. I want to make sure the public understands that the bitcoin is a good thing for them as quickly as possible. Eventually someone over at the fed is going to understand that the Bitcoin is a very big threat and then pick up his phone. |
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They're clearly a scam. Funding a kickstarter project is known to carry risks. BFL investors were never properly informed of those risks. These pre-orders were sold as finished products with a clearly defined performance level(1Gh/s@1J) and delivery date(October 2012). Not only have they failed to meet either of these goals, they've repeatedly lied to investors to prevent competition and to slow the flow of refund requests. This is not mismanagement or incompetence it's fraud. I agree completely with what you are saying. BFL needs to deliver soon or else they have committed fraud. I do not have an issue with a delivery date being pushed back. Nor do I have an issue with a group of people building specialty hardware having problems fine tuning it completely. Intel at one point at a 10 GHz processor in their roadmap. The difference between a great company and a terrible company is how they manage setbacks and problems with their product. As for the investment being impossible to recover. You have no way of knowing that. I ordered a 300 dollar unit. When it arrives, we'll see how much I make. |
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Speaking as a life member of the Bitcoin Foundation who joined it because Jon Matonis is a Board member, I'm getting a real laugh out of some of these comments. Run for the hills! Jon Matonis is censoring himself! etc.
The foundation isn't censoring anyone. Those actions came from Luke-jr, jgarzik and gmaxwell... which is odd, because nowhere can I find a reason that those three should be able to come along and quash anything to do with the press center. This is why I support the Bitcoin Foundation and I am donating part of my course proceeds to them. My only point was that over time the community needs to start specializing so we can more seamlessly integrate into the mainstream mindscape. |
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I will address your post First This is so false, sounds like someone needs to read the wiki... Don't spread FUD The United States is constructing this facility in Utah http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/03/ff_nsadatacenter/This should give you an idea of how powerful the federal government is. If they decide to invest in an ASIC fueled 51% attack alongside a huge surge in DDOSes to every website supporting the bitcoin, then they will be successful. Second, if the US government passed regulation equating the Bitcoin to money laundering and used international agreements to prevent currency exchanges from converting Bitcoins to fiat currencies, then bitcoins have become cocaine. A black market with hefty punishment for use. I cannot buy everything I need in life with just bitcoins. Bitmit and others are working hard, but not today. The Bitcoin network is not powerful and known enough to prevent this from happening. I'm sorry you don't understand that. First and only stage is we need to get people to do there own research on bitcoin, it is impossible to introduction a complex bitcoin in a news piece, but instead allow people to go on there own and do research and experiment on there own with bitcoins. There were a lot of people who said this about the Internet. They wanted it to be a playground for nerds. I'd refer you to Danny Hillis's Ted lecture about the beginning of the internet: http://www.ted.com/talks/danny_hillis_the_internet_could_crash_we_need_a_plan_b.htmlI want our currency to change the world. Not to be something special for a technologically inclined elite. We could easily create another platform, but they have control of the bitcoin.org, and the bitcoin client it be a uphill battle the entire way up. Do they run Mtgox and the mining pools? Power is distributive and based upon results and community involvement. No one can stop another platform from developing and it will quickly destroy any platform shown to be exclusive. Again no, for the same reasons above. There needs to be an economic institute for the Bitcoin. I do not want the Paul Krugmans out there to poison academic opinion for something they do not understand. |
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Thanks. My hope is to record the collective knowledge of this community and put it in video format. We can't afford to lose our history.
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Exactly we don't need a foundation that wants to censor great people like Roger Ver and Jon Matonis, we need a foundation that will take bitcoin to the next level without worrying about politics.
See everyone the bitcoin foundation is already corrupting the newbies of the forum what next corrupt the media. They are hurting bitcoin. What do you suggest we do? If the United States wanted to kill the bitcoin, then it would be dead in three months. We cannot create a common perception amongst the world that the bitcoin is at best a libertarian playtoy and at worst the newest high tech way to move drug money around. We at this stage need to do two things. First, we need a clear, articulate, and crowdsourced introduction to the bitcoin that is globally accessible. Second, we need message discipline with how we introduce the Bitcoin to the public. I don't like censorship. I don't like exclusion. And I will not support anyone who does it. We as a community should give Jon and Roger an opportunity to share their vast knowledge of Bitcoins with the world, but the foundation is not the platform for them to do so. We should construct another platform. I think the best place for Jon and Roger is a brand new institute/think tank like Ludwig von Mises that specializes in developing the economy theory necessary for academics to understand the Bitcoin. |
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Ok someone has to say it Ron Paul 2016
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Everyone need to calm down. Roger and Jon will always have a place in the Bitcoin community. The Foundation amongst others are just trying to mainstream the Bitcoin and they are taking a very conservative approach. Remember there is no official bitcoin resource. It is a decentralized community. If someone is interested in the Bitcoin, then Jon will eventually come up and it's up to the individual to decide. Our biggest issue right now is that no one in the media legitimately understands the Bitcoin. http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000160877It's clear they don't get it "it's capped at 22 million..' Lol |
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They will ship someday, I'm sure of that. And when it happens difficulty will skyrocket through the roof. Destroying all non asic miners. And that's my point. ASICs will become the new GPU. With any market you have many players and some succeed, some fail. Remember Zilog? |
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BFL claims to have 22 employees, which constitutes a much larger company than any of their competitors. The final product can "vary", no problem, but the final products from BFL "vary" by hundreds of percent and mysteriously never in their investors' favor. BFL's FPGA products consumed 400% more power than advertised and their ASIC products will follow this trend and consume 5-6x the advertised 1w/Gh/s. Meanwhile BFL's much smaller competitors are somehow able to get their estimates nearly spot on.
I've worked on several VLSI projects and I can tell you firsthand that the CEO sent a very robust benchmark that is incredibly difficult to achieve. It was probably a mistake in hindsight; however, my AMD 7950 consumes over 100 watts of power and produces 500 MH/sec. They are offering a device that consumes about 30 watts (and yes the number is verified in my youtube link from a working unit) and has an order of magnitude higher hash rate. I will mine with the Avalons I have on order. The ASICs on the market are very expensive *BECAUSE* of BFL's off the charts fail. Avalon batch one was $1299, Avalon batch two was $1500, Avalon batch three was priced in BTC after numerous Avalon pre-orders were auctioned on eBay for many times their original sale price. Seeing a trend? This happens because BFL has captured a huge portion of the market by lying for several months.
BFL is not even equal to an obsolete 5850, if you put your mind to it you could likely locate and purchase a 5850 for immediate shipping right this second, this is not true of BFL vaporware which cannot be purchased right this second from anywhere. Time to delivery is all that has mattered in the ASIC mining hardware market for several months and BFL and BTCFPGA are the only companies that have failed utterly to deliver. I suspect a large chunk of the preorders went to develop the ASIC. Ever hear of kickstarter? Maybe the Ouya console? I agree with you that they are slow and poorly managed, but I do not believe they are a scam. BFL is positioned to own the ASIC market if they deliver. If they don't, I like everyone else who preordered will seek restitution and I will also launch a kickstarter to get ASICs designed in the open domain. |
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Right. Please explain how BFL lying for months on end about shipping dates and power consumption to make more money does not equal a scam. Bait and switch is a real verifiable scam mechanism. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bait-and-switchEven if the previously convicted felon that runs BFL does not abscond with the loot this is still a scam. People pre-ordering now will not break even because they'll not receive their products for several months, at which time difficulty will be several times higher than it is now. That is why FTC prompt delivery rules exist in the US. BFL is a US based company and is very clearly in violation of these rules. http://business.ftc.gov/documents/alt051-selling-internet-prompt-delivery-rulesFirst, they are a small company developing a ASIC without any support from established manufacturers. The final product will vary as it has with every crowdfunded product. Second, after ASICs take over the market. What will you mine with? Currently the ASICs on market are very expensive and difficult to get. BFL is the new AMD 5850. |
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