Sensationalist claims like that do NOTHING for the legitimacy and growth of the bitcoin community. Be realistic please, Bitcoin will not outgrow Paypal in 1 year...we have a long time to go before we start to really challenge the existing monetary systems.

Excellent analogy. Most people do not see either the revolutionary aspects of new technology, or the blatant problems of existing systems. They just sort of enter the world, and accept that "this is the way things are" and just roll with it. Then once that new technology becomes popular enough they all grab it and act like they weren't just ignoring it (or even criticizing it) a week ago.

My biggest gripe with the show is that Nucky is basically invincible, because he is the protagonist. You just know he is not going to die until the last season and the last episode, which kind of makes all the drama and danger prior to that lose meaning.

Haha are you serious? Russia has some of the world's most advanced military technology. I would say it is relatively equal in terms of military technology between Russia and the US. Having said that though, it wouldn't really matter...if there is another World War, it will be nuclear...and its main portion wouldn't last more than a month because half the world will be destroyed by nukes.

I'm not a fan of war, but as a Russian ex-pat I must object to your narrow view. Yes it is true that in 1904 war and WW1, Russia performed poorly. It could also be argued that Russia performed poorly in the beginning parts of WW2. But from 1943-1945, the Red Army was one of the most effective fighting forces out there - they were hardened by battle, they outsmarted the Germans, and they finally had the organization and supplies they desperately needed.

As for more recent wars, Afghanistan and Chechnya are HORRIBLE examples - these were wars where the enemy was using  mainly guerrilla warfare. Would you also say that the American military sucks because they couldn't deal with guerrilla warfare in VIetnam? of course not - in both cases, the guerrillas lost pretty much 10x what the Russians and American casualties were, although they did succeed at making the wars so costly, that both Russia and the US had to pull out of their respective conflicts.

The Russian military has been the best in the world, on par with the Americans for the better part of the last 70 years.

An autocratic leader in a third-world country that came to power through a military coup ruled like a king? You wouldn't say! I hope that guy's book has more interesting revelations, because everyone already knows that...

I agree it is not really Capitalism, but it is the ideology that most experts seem to agree has ruled over the world for the past 30 or so years.



Now that sounds interesting. Sort of like Bitcoin replacing conventional physical economic systems, Internet could in fact replace physical governments, especially as we move away from separate states into one global society without borders. But that is looking really far into the future I think.

Going to try and post some stuff that hasn't been mentioned yet...

Boardwalk Empire is returning soon for its last and 5th season.

Hannibal (2013) is a great new show based on the character of Hannibal Lecter. Returning for a 2nd season soon.

Live Another Day (2014) going on right now - newest season of the solid 24 series with Jack Bauer.

Silicon Valley (2014) for comedy about computer geeks.

The US is always at war. Drones, Afghanistan, and I'm sure there's plenty of dark-ops operations that we don't know anything about. Now to start an open, large-scale conflict...that is difficult to say. The politicians know they can't be so belligerent as to do another Vietnam or Iraq...the public is fed up with their lies and will not support another large military undergoing, unless there is a VERY good reason, like Russia attacking Poland or something.

Not playing a lot lately but a little bit of everything:

Team Fortress 2
Chivalry: Medieval Warfare
Dota 2
Dark Souls 2
Hearthstone

I've been reading about neoliberalism in my university course, and there are a lot of critiques that I agree with. It seems like neoliberalism is not working as an economic/political ideology and is only dragging us into further problems as economic polarization gets worse. So what do you think is going to replace it? Another form of capitalism? Socialism?

I'm all for it. They're not stifling free speech, they're stifling ignorance and stupidity, one of the greatest threats to the survival and well-being of the human race.

Lol, not surprised at all. Most of the American government is bought out/  controlled by business interests, and big business is exactly the guys that benefit from war and crazy military spending. The War on Terror is a giant joke that only exists because these big businessmen can't create a real enemy after all the major wars of the 20th century. And what is better than an ambiguous enemy that could be said to exist pretty much everywhere in the world? It gives them a continued reason and justification for military operations that is easily concealed and incredibly ambiguous so it is difficult to criticize.

The War on Terror is creating more "terrorists" (we should really stop using this word, it lost its meaning ever since politicians started using it en-masse) than it is killing. Along with the war on drugs, it's bankrupting the American public while filling the pockets of old white rich men in suits.

Because it has a hundreds-of-years-old system built around it. People like consistency and stability, and this system has existed in various forms for over a thousand years (beginning with China's creation of first paper money). People inside this system (bankers, investors, business, etc) benefit from it and oppose anything that wants to create a new system.

From a technical standpoint, we should be using cryptocurrencies for everything because they are superior, at least when we figure out how to make transactions instant. But we are not an entirely rational species, and the old system has a lot of people vested in its survival.

Why are you arguing semantics?

I went up to stage 11 and then back down to stage 10. It was all about the value of reselling bitcoin into fiat, but as time goes on it is more and more about its revolutionary aspects. Non-bitcoiners are mostly between 5 and 7. We need to steer them closer

Yep, same reason gigantic insects can't exist - environmental constraints. Here is an interesting study about - http://phys.org/news79804314.html

Basically, giant insects would require a higher oxygen composition in the atmosphere - this is why they were larger in the Dinosaur periods, as the oxygen content of the air was higher.

But of course a movie is a movie, and watching giant monsters wreck our cities and be completely unstoppable is awesome

You fail to understand that the nature of cryptocurrencies is that they CAN and DO change through continued development. The bitcoin system has changed a lot from its inception in 2008 to now. Bitcoin definitely has several key technical disadvantages at the moment, both those that are limiting all cryptos (ease of use, for example) and those that some other coins have remedied (like transaction speed). But it will solve these problems as development continues.

Bitcoin and litecoin yes. The third spot...that is really debatable. I suppose by sheer exposure, Dogecoin does fit the bill. But unless it truly identifies itself (as a coin used for various non-profit causes, for example) I don't think it is big enough to join the first two.

In other news, people were also encouraged to breathe air and consume organic matter to maintain their bodily functions.