To use a baseball analogy, there have been a few big hits, a much greater number of singles, but yet a fair amount of strikeouts as well.

Today I can go to BitAddress.org and print out a few paper wallets to carry around.  When describing to someone one way that bitcoin can be transferred I'll pull out the paper wallet, and add funds to it using my Bitcoin wallet mobile app. I simply scan the paper wallet's Load & Verify QR code to get the address, enter the amount and hit send.

The recipient can then later take that paper bitcoin and from her tablet go to EasyWallet.org and hit scan.  Seconds after focusing on the Spend QR code from the paper bitcoin, the mobile-enabled web page displays that the funds are enroute.  She can then go to CoinDL and use bitcoin for payment of a new ringtone for her phone.

The magic is that all of this happened without there being some strategic plan that said by the end of 2012, this will be possible.   There isn't even a single party responsible for more than any one step of the above story board flow!    BitAddress was created by an individual.  The vector art for the paper note was created from another independent effort.   Then the wallet mobile app I used was created by yet another individual.  When I hit send it went to EasyWallet which was created by another individual.  And finally the purchase at CoinDL was possible only because an individual built that service.

These were all enabled thanks to efforts of individuals that built these sites, apps and services.  

There are some VC- and angel-backed startups building, shipping and positioning for Bitcoin's future but I'm not so sure many of them are anywhere near earning profits yet.  But the incredible takeaway is that they aren't dramatically that far ahead of these one-person efforts.

And there are so many ideas that probably won't be solid enough to attract angel funding but are good enough that a few months of nights and weekends are all that's needed to get a project from conception to launch.  There are likely many ideas being worked on now as we discuss this topic.

I was hoping that the equity crowdfunding concept (particularly with the U.S. JOBS act) would be what would enable this cambrian explosion of individuals taking ideas and building.  That looks to be fizzling out (in the U.S. at least) and after GLBSE's corkscrew into the ground I don't know how long before that concept finds its way here in our community once again.

But I know the opportunities are out there.   I can't use a vending machine anymore without thinking how the experience could have been so much better with BTC.   Thanks to the lottery-buying zombies at the convenience store (thanks to a record powerball) my gas purchase today took five minutes longer than it should have.  The first person to build a pay-at-the-pump solution that accepts bitcoins has a bright future, I suspect.

Because bitcoin is an open protocol and much the community works together (as the aim is not just profit but to further bitcoin adoption) it is an ecosystem that will continue to grow.   bitZino gave KingCo.in permission to share its "provably fair" verification web service, for instance.  In a world where sometimes you can't even do a deep link to a competitor's website without getting bitched at, here with these two we have two services cooperating and adding value for each other's service.

The year 2012 is not over and I'm suspecting there's a few encouraging developments coming yet.   The takeaway is that a year ago Bitcoin was still reeling, Nobody realized that the bottom had been hit and a rebound into 2012 was underway, with the year yielding some huge strides (and some huge setbacks as well).  

So anyone on the fence about taking an idea and building should consider how fast bitcoin can grow and to not waste time waiting.  Get started planning, creating, designing, building and shipping -- because there's probably a place for it once you have it ready to go.

Certainly someone reading this has something they are working on and would chime in by saying "working on it [...]", right?

I know you already tried fixwallet.py, as described here:

   
[GUIDE] Simple wallet recovery using bitcointools
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=11331.0

There is a tool that searches a disk device for strings that are bitcoin private keys.   

I'm not sure if it will access a wallet.dat directly.

So maybe the file isn't readable as a BDB database but perhaps enough of the data inside is still instact and the private keys could be discovered:

Bitcoin private key/wallet.dat data recovery tool!
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=25091.0

The twenty four thousand BTC that were heisted are gone.  I understand that BitFloor doesn't have funds to cover the losses.  I'm not posting here to demand the return of funds that BitFloor doesn't have.

I'm posting because I suspect those who today are carrying a balance of USDs or BTCs at BitFloor are probably expecting that they will be able to withdraw those funds on demand when they want to withdraw them.   But if some account holders whose bitcoins were previously heisted decide to take legal action against BitFloor, it is today's USD and BTC balances that exist in the exchange accounts right now that are at risk.

Take a look at the depth chart at BitFloor:


 - http://bitcoincharts.com/markets/bitfloorUSD_depth.html

Notice how the blue (asks) is less than 100 BTC for all sell orders at $14 or lower?    Even the bids have low depth (excluding the aggressive bid at $12.30) and there would be just $4K USD of bids on the books.  To me that indicates that others are concerned about leaving funds in their account at BitFloor as well.

BitFloor hasn't settled with those whose bitcoins are still on "hold" and hasn't filed for bankruptcy protection so that it can continue operating without putting at-risk the funds deposited by today's customers.



It wouldn't matter if what BitFloor was storing was its customer's gold, its customer's widgets or its customer's bananas.   A debt is a debt and a company that is not able to honor its debt commitments is insolvent.

All I'm pointing out is that customer deposits with BitFloor are not safe, in my opinion, as long as there are customers such as myself who are not able to access their funds.   Additionally, even customers who do withdraw all their funds might not be safe because of clawback provisions due to preferential transfer (though I'll concede that the amount of preferential transfer that is occurring probably isn't a large enough amount to warrant getting clawback approved nonetheless see any success at actually reclaiming funds from customers.)

What if tomorrow morning a judgment lien were to be granted and BitFloor's bank accounts are then seized?

I am not a lawyer, however ....

There is no question that my account shows that my balance of bitcoins today shows "hold" and that I am being refused access to my coins.

This makes BitFloor in default of its obligation to me.

From another thread:



When a company becomes insolvent or enters the zone of insolvency, things change -- directors and officers become fiduciaries of the corporate assets for the benefit of creditors.  Each time a person withdraws funds from BitFloor, that is a disbursement to its creditors.   That ability to obtain funds is not offered to all creditors equally because today I am still being denied access to my funds that have been on my account since before the September breach.   I don't know in the State of NY, but in some areas that would be considered preferential transfer that could even be clawed back (up to two years worth of any payments to creditors):
 - http://www.thebankruptcysite.org/resources/bankruptcy/filing-bankruptcy/the-clawback-provision-preferential-transfers.htm

Now, if several creditors who together have a big enough claim go petition to have a judge approve a wind down or get a judge to freeze BitFloor's bank funds (to halt further preferential disbursement) then it isn't shtylman who decides who gets access to their USDs and their bitcoins.   BitFloor could file today for bankruptcy protection so this doesn't happen, but the same thing -- anyone with USD or BTC funds held with BitFloor would not be able to withdraw them as bankruptcy law then determines who gets paid what and when.

BitWasp Marketplace - to make sites similar to Silkroad
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=109223.0

There's a concern that was raised (the report of how the MoneyPaks purchased come from multiple states), and you didn't respond to it.  Posting here in a new thread only makes me feel the need to make sure the issue is posted here as well:

That's why BitLotto should be seeing way more use than it is getting now.     You can join a pool, exactly as you describe:
 - http://bitlotto.com/pool.html

We're not going to start seeing articles in the Press board every time there's an article with the word "bitcoin" in the comments now, are we?

Which part are you looking for info on, ... the blockchain side for finding when any transactions come in, or the SMS API side for sending an alert once one is detected?

Incidentally, third party services to do this for you (or help you with parts for doing this):

 - http://www.bitcoinmonitor.net
 - http://bitping.net

Your first question should be ... should I even mess with a broken GPU for mining?

And that would depend on what you pay for electricity, as in a few hours your mining proceeds will drop by half, making GPU mining unprofitable for anyone who pays more than maybe seven cents per kWh.    Following that in a matter of weeks will be ASIC shipments, which will be the final nail in GPU mining's coffin.

If you want to repair it for sale or for whatever reason, here's a source for parts:
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=123996.0

Here's someone wanting to sell 19 BTC for cash:

WTS 19 BTC UK bank xfer or cash swap in Bristol/Newport
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=128001.0

Also, you might find a person to trade with in another thread that happens to have many buyers and sellers:
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=118396.0

But LocalBitcoins.com is probably the best place to find a local, cash trade:
 - http://www.LocalBitcoins.com

[Edit:


and details from my reply cleared as requested.]

Just to exclude the chance that a separate -datadir wasn't tested with -salvagewallet,

rename your
  C:\Users\n.belenkov\AppData\Roaming\Bitcoin
to something else (e.g., Bitcoin.old)

Then create a new, empty
 C:\Users\n.belenkov\AppData\Roaming\Bitcoin

and then in there place your wallet.dat from the backup
and then try to do the following (without -datadir):
   bitcoin-qt.exe -salvagewallet

If that gives the same thing (unexpected file type or format) then that wallet.dat just does not seem to be readable.
Do you have any older backups of it?

Except BitFloor still is in debt to the amount of more than twenty thousand bitcoins to its customers following the September security breach.

If an account holder (or a group) were to pursue this debt through the court system they would probably get a judgement and gain access to BitFloor's funds -- and if you have funds (USD or bitcoins) in a Bitfloor account, those are Bitfloor's funds as far as what a judgement against Bitfloor would have access to.

The Bitcoin-Qt client will pull a new address from the key pool for change.  Thus any amount sent to an address that already has been used in a transaction is unlikely to be change.   Of course, with other clients, particularly Blockchain.info, this isn't necessarily the case.

There are some clues from anecdotes as well.  For over-the-counter trades, quite often upon receipt of funds the recipient will turn around and spend those funds that were received as soon as there has been a confirmation.

This alone doesn't help much but because the coins chosen by Bitcoin-Qt client will first try to use coins for a transaction where all coins selected already have at least six confirmations, then if a transaction spends a coin with fewer than six confirmations it was only done so because there were insufficient funds in the wallet of coins with six or more confirmations.

So take a transaction A with outputs X and Y.
Then another transaction, (transaction B), spends X after 1 confirmation.   More often than not, it would seem, the argument could be made that looking at both transactions together, that Y was the change in transaction A.   The odds are much less likely to be that X was the change but that change was then used in another transaction from the same wallet shortly thereafter.   It might even be likely that in transaction B, if there is more than one output that the smaller output is the change.  A person that spends funds shortly after receiving them will generally be spending all of the funds received or at least a large chunk of it.

Blockchain-based provably fair gambling sites like SatoshiDICE use a publicly known address for each wager and for each payout.  This causes them to be good candidates for use in study.

I'm not sure what information it might yield.  Since individual wagers there frequently are in the 100 to 250 BTC range (i.e., $1,200 to $3,000 USD for a single bet) it would be interesting to know if somehow this service is being used as a low cost mixing service.

While this doesn't remove traceability, it does change the composition of a wallet.  So taking coins that are tainted and sending the coins through SatoshiDICE is something that costs 1.9% per pass but it cuts the level of original taint by 50% (statistically, over the long run).    Of course, this is a flawed approach for mixing because the winnings returned would assume the same level of taint that the coins used in the wagering  (i.e., a tainted coin taints every other coin in a SatoshiDICE payout) had.  But the tools that report taint probably aren't sophisticated enough to take this characteristic of SatoshiDICE payouts into account and thus report low levels of taint after being passed through SatoshiDICE.

I don't know how you could identify wagers made for the purpose of mixing (reducing taint) versus wagers made for gambling / entertainment purposes though.

What if it is mined by eligius or p2pool or any other method that generates to multiple addresses?

With yesterday's lawsuit by the CFTC against Intrade, it is possible this site will receive communications from the CFTC, including possibly the demand that no U.S. subscribers be allowed to place wagers.  This may also involve the domain being taken over, as India ( .in TLD) would likely comply with a request (or initiate a takeover on their own once being notified.)

How will Bets Of Bitcoin respond should this happen?

Let's say the site were to resurface with a .bit (namecoin) domain, or as a Tor hidden service, or just some other domain  -- how could a player know to trust that it truly is coinjedi that is operating at the new domain?

One way of ensuring the authenticity of communications would be for coinjedi to provide here a public key so that at some later time if necessary, a signed message (GPG) on the site would then suffice as a method to verify that coinjedi is in control of the site at a new location.  But I've never seen a public key for coinjedi.

Well it looks like it is trying to load the DB from Bitcoin directory and the log from 222.   Which means it looks like the -detachdb isn't doing its job.  Which, looks to be correct because I gave the wrong syntax.  Should be "-detachdb=1", sorry.

Can you try that again?

Also, worst case scenario ... v0.7.1 has a "-salvagewallet"

BlockchainRoulette does this:
 - http://blockchainroulette.com



Yup, and that was brought up for BlockchainRoulette as well:


With BlockchainRoulette, this currently isn't a fatal flaw though because the site max bets are so low that if the site were to do this to save a 10 BTC payout (maximum risk of loss to the house) they have to throw away a 50 BTC block  (well, even when it is 25 it will still be a greater loss than paying out the winner.)