Bitcoin's adoption plateau is not because of the technical limitations of the client and the network, but because of the finite supply which makes most people consider it a ponzi scheme. You're going to have a seriously hard time trying to change that.
Right, because a digital commodity with an in-finite supply would better hold its price  People think it's a ponzi scheme because some people made tons of money quickly on the internet. After Bitcoin is around a while, and people see that holders of coins both lose and make money as in any commodity or business situation, the ponzi stigma will fade away. Suggesting that the "limitation on supply" is the problem is foolish. |
|
|
|
It is the loading of a stash of almost 2000 BTC worth of physical bitcoins
I think in the future a statement like this might be remembered fondly just as the 10,000 btc pizza. =) |
|
|
|
|
Desert island. Two men, and one woman. Do the men have the right to vote away the woman's right to her body? Do the men have the right to vote away the things the woman produces for herself? Do the men have the right to take her food, her shelter, or her privacy merely by simultaneously raising their hands?
Immoral actions are immoral, no matter the vote.
|
|
|
|
|
Very much appreciate the notice, Gavin. Thank you!
|
|
|
|
Bitcoin is Better
+1 for being an alliteration +1 for being concise +100 for being true |
|
|
|
Dwolla has no choice but to embrace bitcoin and now with okpay making its move more so then ever - its a race to who gets bitcoins approval right now ...
+1 And this theme will become visible elsewhere. It takes a long time for the first movers to integrate Bitcoin, but after it happens, competitive pressure requires that others integrate as well. Seeing that it's workable is a strong incentive for secondary adopters. Just wait until the first high-profile adult or gambling site accepts Bitcoin and see how quickly the others do... |
|
|
|
It's not clear to me how conversion between currencies at OKPAY is done... but if I'm reading this right it's now possible to sell BTC using only OKPAY.
From their site it says, "Use one of the most anonymous peer-to-peeer digital currency as a direct deposit to fund your OKPAY account." So I think they now accept it as a way to fund your OKPAY account balance... thus anyone who accepts OKPAY now also indirectly accepts BTC. |
|
|
|
|
My family is gonna be so sick of getting Casascius coins this Christmas!!!
They'll thank me later...
|
|
|
|
|
Wrong link I think =) But good commercial!
|
|
|
|
I would however, like to get started with some kind of property
Seems you want to speculate on property assets. My recommendation: simply buy bitcoins and save them. Speculating on Bitcoins will be a far better bet. FAR better. And much more liquid. And much less liable to governments and taxes and theft and all the liabilities of property. Don't be seduced by "owning a home." Own Bitcoins if you want a speculative investment/gamble. And yeah Detroit sucks lol |
|
|
|
mjcmurphy- great response point by point. I second almost all of that. Theymos - I tried to be polite in my first post about this, but it's clear that you've moved beyond considering this policy and are simply going to implement it. You're now in the stage of finding justifications for a policy that is unpopular in aggregate and especially among many Hero Members here. You said... Yes, users can block images in their browsers. But it seems to me most correct to assume that users don't want something possibly unwanted than to assume they do want it. Posts are categorized so that readers have a choice in what they read. Fine. Fair point. So make sig images turned off by default, but let people turn them on if they choose! What you are proposing removes all choice entirely from the user. You are doing the very opposite of providing "freedom and choice" which you ironically use as justification for limiting those very things. And I didn't even realize that embedded images were going to be removed also?!?! Are you mad?!? That is even worse than sig images and would just totally make me blow my lid... and my lid is on very tight by default. I'm on this forum all the time. I love it - it's been hugely educational, entertaining, and wonderful for nurturing the many facets of the Bitcoin community. Now, I can deal with annoying images. I can deal with off-topic posts. I can deal with trolls and idiots and haters and the ignorant hordes. I can even deal with Nagle. But this diktat you propose is so misguided and detrimental that there's a reasonable likelihood it would compel me to start frequenting other forums, and may just leave this one entirely. Images are a fundamental part of the information that is conveyed between users. The fact that much of the information is garbage is only reflective of the fact that most of all information is garbage - written or visual. But even if 90% of images were, as you say, "worthless," it would still be a very bad decision to remove all images entirely. What we see that is garbage is known - but what we don't see that is valuable is unknown. If you remove images there is a great "unknown" cost... all the good information that otherwise would've been conveyed, yet nobody will ever know about it or account for it. You are deciding on an issue which is highly contentious - and on a subject which is not even a crucial problem! You're trying to fix something that isn't broken, and are very likely to break it by doing so. Your justifications, generally, boil down to personal preferences of your own but are being veiled behind "concern for the community." That's a foolish and disrespectful mistake to make. I hope you're making that mistake accidentally and that you will realize the folly of this. Again, please reconsider. For seriously. |
|
|
|
|
Theymos - Please retract this policy.
The signature graphics are a fundamental part of the community. They allow a means of visual expression in what is otherwise a dull text world. Some bars are ugly, some are cool, some are informative, some are annoying. Whatever... they are expression, and the forum is made better for it.
Not to mention, the sig bars add tremendous ability for businesses in the bitcoin world to get some awareness. Personally, I really like finding out about new businesses and sites in the sig bar graphics. They help seed new ventures, and cross-pollinate ideas. Again, some are annoying or useless, but that's part of the package.
Net-net, sig bar images make the forum better. Removing them is a very bad idea and damages what some of us here enjoy as a very strong and dynamic community.
Please reconsider.
|
|
|
|
Every person should own their own means of production whenever feasible. An engineer should own their own workshop, a farmer their own combine and a worker their own robots. When the technology absolutely requires centralization there should be unions or networked tribes. The end goal would be to archive a level of technology were nature can return to it's native state while Man has something like 'The Seed' as described in Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age.
If a farmer should own his own combine, should not the eater own his own farm? And then what purpose would there be for a farmer? Or, looking in the other direction, should the farmer own not only the combine, but also the combine factory, the mines by which metals for such factory are pulled from the earth, and the powerplant by which energy for that production is created? You are seeing the economy perfectly backwards, my good sir. |
|
|
|
It might be something different with a (self!) reproducing good like seeds or chickens (would be debatable but I would still advise against it), but for a limited commodity or money I don't see it as ethical. In my opinion lending should rely on trust and compassion only.
It is my opinion that interest pushes society further apart, and that as a lender you would have greater benefit from the bonding and reputation within society than from the interest. Usury (as refereed to as charging of any interest in the traditional definition) results in the general feeling of disconnectedness which is commonly believed in our society as professionalism which is just another illusion that the exploitation of others would yield in a long term personal benefit.
The harm is mainly substantiation for this connection by means of currency, and to a lesser extent the tendency to increase the steepness of the wealth pyramid. So while there may be a case where no subjective exploitation takes place, in a systematic view I still consider it harmful.
Electric... if you believe lending at interest to be immoral and wrong, that is a fine opinion to have. But trying to force your morality on other people who disagree with you seems antagonistic to the "trust and compassion" you use to justify your position. Personally, I've loaned money, and I've borrowed money at interest. Both behaviors made me better off, and they made the person on the opposite side of the trade better off as well. Far from "pushing society apart," interest-bearing loans help society to flourish, for resources which may be more profitably used by others are able to be acquired in a free and open bidding process... an "interest rate" is simply the price that such a process results in, at any given time. Your alternative of "only relying on trust and compassion" for lending is a great policy among friends, but limits the scope of the marketplace for money solely to close groups of friends. If your policy were implemented as law, I promise you society would be impoverished for its lack of "usury." |
|
|
|
That is something born out of the current system, only possible because the existence of banks and compound interest. If the banks weren't already in the position to lend money (and factor out derivatives) you wouldn't be able to get into this position. The charging of interest is a self perpetuating mechanism which works both ways. If nobody charges interest and only relies on trust and/or compassion it is no longer needed. But anyway: I recon, that lending for interest might not be feasible to prohibit but rather only provide the legal right to get back the loan without interest. On the other hand the lender might come up with other, yet prohibited ways to collect interest which is why it might be wise to prohibit it in the first place. PS: All these considerations are theoretical in nature, since I have no idea how it would be like living in a system without usury. It is only the way I personally think thing should work and it might not be feasible in current society. I attribute myself to parts of syndicalist and primitivist schools of anarchism with a spice of futurism, so it might be understandable that my views might seem a little ''far fetched' or 'conflicting' but it makes sense to me  Let's examine this a bit further... -Assume we live in a free society where some commodity like gold or bitcoin has become the general money -Assume I have lots of this money, and another guy wants some of it as capital to start his business... he wants a loan from me. -I am willing to loan him the money at 10% interest per year until principle + interest is paid back -He is willing to take that offer and agrees to the terms Now... what part of that is immoral?? You call it "usury". By what right do you decide for either of us what is the "acceptable" price of money? Under what justification do you tell the man he may not borrow my money, or tell me I must refund the interest after the debt is paid? Where is the harm? Your idea doesn't seem "far fetched"... it just seems "wrong." For if it's immoral to loan a man a money-commodity at a price, then it ought to be immoral to loan other commodities at a price... such as seeds or lumber or xbox games. Why is it okay to loan a man one seed in return for two later, but it's not okay to loan him one dollar in return for two later? |
|
|
|
hehe, you are arguing around my point.
The lender automatically is in the stronger position.
So when I lend money to the bank for cumulative interest, you are suggesting that I am automatically in the stronger position? I'm really trying to understand why interest is immoral in your opinion, because you're not the only one who says that and I'm totally confused. To me it's just a mutual exchange by two interested parties, and whether one has a "stronger position" or not is irrelevant if both parties believe themselves better off by the trade. Please help me to understand. |
|
|
|
So, properly read, a stat like "the top 1% own 50% of the wealth" should be understood as "the top 1% produced 50% of the wealth"... and then with that understanding it quite quickly shows the folly of policies which punish, tax, and otherwise hinder such people. It also illustrates the sheer productive uselessness of vast swaths of the population.
That's great in a real economy where people actually produce something (usually) to earn wealth. What about bitcoin? I just wrote some site content for a guy and was paid in Bitcoin. What are you talking about? |
|
|
|
The problem is considering competition and compound interest. Suddenly this seemingly innocent act becomes a major influence on behavior. It's mainly a cultural issue.... A weak comparison: In some places the age of consent is 14 in some 16, in some 9...
Now I attribute the to lender a similar responsibility an adult has in respect to sex with younger partners. Understood?
I assumed we were discussing behavior between "consenting adults"... let's say two 35 year old men. Why is interest "financial violence"? And is it immoral of me to ask my bank to pay me interest in return for letting them borrow my money? (let's assume honest banks operating under sound money, not gov-subsidized banks operating under fiat) |
|
|
|
Interest imo is a kind of financial violence.
Hmmmm is interest only "financial violence" when it's applied to money? Or to any commodity? Meaning, if I have a bag of seeds and can be productive in the quantity of X with them, but you can be productive with the seeds in the quantity of X+Y. Am I being financially violent by asking for X+ (Y/2) seeds back at a future date? I have never understood the intense antagonism toward interest. It is merely the price asked for in return for use of a commodity. Most importantly, it's voluntary... what's the problem? |
|
|
|
|
Show Posts
