This is still fantasy.
Bitcoin will have many competitors soon. Who knows what the price will be.
If u r talking about Alts, none is close as of yet. The combined market-cap of all the alts are far lower than Bitcoin's market-cap alone. I read an article several months ago that said the combined market cap for all altcoins is roughly 20% of that of bitcoin, although I think this number has gone down as altcoins have done poorly over the past several months. Another issue with this is that altcoins are much less secure then bitcoin is, and when you add that to the fact that altcoins add nothing to the table that bitcoin does not provide you will result in all altcoins ultimately failing. |
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I use a deterministic wallet on my phone. I use Wallet32 but there are other deterministic wallets. I wrote down the 24 seed words on a piece of paper and keep the paper in a very safe secure secret place.
Now, I have a password on my phone to access my wallet. The wallet has cash in it. But, better than a normal cash in wallet scenario if I lose my phone then all I have to do is buy another phone, install the Wallet32 application, enter the 24 words from my backup and every Bitcoin address I have every used, every change address I have ever used, every transaction I have ever done is recovered "from the cloud" and "put back" into my new phone.
So a deterministic Bitcoin wallet on your phone is better than carrying cash in your wallet!
Also, you never have to back it up. All you have to do is keep a list of 24 words safe, secure and secret.
I think that is easy enough for just about anyone that is smart enough to own a smart phone.
yes this is interesting I am new and did not even know this was possible. All btc I have are on exchangers to avoid these problems. I am not a tech guy, only investor. So I understand the problems of common people with btc. Having all your bitcoin on an exchange is probably the best way to have he greatest chances of having your coins stolen/lost. You are not only risking that the site owners run away with your money but you are also risking that your account gets hacked and your bitcoin withdrawn from your account. I know but the exchanger is bitstamp, I set 2 steps authentication and control my account. Coins are still there. I am not a tech guy so I have fear to make some errors in keeping my btc by myself and lose. I asked help here in this forum but none explained my each step in detail.. they simply said "save in your hard drive" but I don't know how. Bitstamp seems quite professional to me. I have used it for long and always satisfied. If you kept your bitcoin on an exchange then you would have the risk that the exchange were to run away with your bitcoin. 2FA is not going to protect you from this. Also the exchange's customer service may have lax policies for disabling 2FA and/or resetting passwords, potentially making it easy for an attacker to gain access to your account. |
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I like the idea of purse.io, but ultimately what's to stop you being on all sides of the same transaction (i.e. using stolen cards to buy yourself stuff from Amazon and, of course, receiving the escrowed bitcoins to another address)?
purse.io should take the risk, but do you think they will?
There is nothing to stop someone from doing this. This is the reason why amazon will not reimburse the OP for the stolen gift cards. That's true, and that's why I didn't expect Amazon to instantly reinstate the cards without an investigation. Posting the details as I know them (and being willing to answer any other questions that come up to the best of my ability, probably with assistance from Purse) was done precisely to help an investigation determine that I'm not playing both sides of the fence here. What are they suppose to investigate? It doesn't matter if you are on both sides of the "fence", the fact of the matter is that gift cards were purchased and Amazon did not receive payment. As a result they canceled the gift cards. I cannot imagine anyone even hoping for any different of a result. If the gift cards did not work despite paying for them via purse then you should bring up this issue with purse. |
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I think this should allow bitcoin adoption to grow rapidly throughout these countries rapidly as coinbase has helped the adoption rate in the US. Bitcoin is ultimately an international currency and in order for it to be successful it will need to be adopted around the world.
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Spoken too soon: https://blockchain.info/tx/681a8696e7ab54c983364fd45987ef2f6a8b4a09584bf70e5e3b46a6689e8b10  Added a tag to my address as well, looks sweet  Btw, is that tag thingy like permanent? or it can be removed? Never received anything from them but i once received 0.0136 from an unknown address, i was happy to get it at the time but next day my blockchain wallet was hacked and i lost it along with about 0.002 of my own.
There is no way to tell if it was conected but it was strange.
Always sus on anything for free now.
 Is this possible, could this be a hack, can they somehow steal bitcoins this way??  No, they cannot steal bitcoin this way. It is a way for them to advertise. They "tag" their address by signing a message on the blockchain.info website and the tag will be available to others on blockchain.info block explorer. If you use another block explorer then you will not see this tag. |
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The US government worked with the Iceland government to have the site be shut down at a specified time, a time after which they had planned to have arrested Ross (so as to not tip him off). The data was then provided to the US government.
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Unfortunately, Bitcoin is an excellent medium for scaming.
I think what you meant to say or in my opinion should have said is, "Too bad the average person doesn't do enough to secure their money and is a target for scamming". Just like anything else people will be targeted for scams if the scammer feels their targets have something of value they want. There are other ways that people can scam without stealing the private keys. For example around a month ago there was an article about people who were sending letters to restaurants threatening to give them bad reviews on sites like yelp if they did not send them 1 BTCI agree. Bitcoin has been a way that people have coerced others into giving them money and allowing the scammer to launder their money to spend safely. Another example of this would be crypto locker virus that encrypts a user's files and the only way to ever access the files again is to pay a certain amount of bitcoin to an address specified by the program. |
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Government wont kill bitcoin. I'm sure they will regulate it by not allowing us to control the private keys. Bankers will operate a Federal "Mycelium" type wallet system that we can use but the private keys will be kept where the government has ultimate control over them.
It is not possible for the government to prevent us from controlling our private keys. All a private key is a very large string of numbers saved, usually in encrypted form. This would be very simiilar to saying the government would restrict what we are able to think about. |
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This would make the price to high for the average person and then there would be issues with poor distribution. The large miners new what they were getting into and if not they should have. Nobody will bail them out and they are not to big to fail. This type of thing would not be good and set a horrible example/precedent for how problems should be solved(IMO).
Bitcoin is divisible up to 8 decimal places. If the price were to reach these levels then the "average" person could simply buy lesser of a fraction of bitcoin if they are to start using it for the first time. |
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It would be better if Braintree were handling Bitcoins themselves. Coinbase seems sketchy. Has anybody found out where they really are? Their published addresses are a mail drop on Market St. in SF and somebody's apartment.
Why are bitcoin companies so secretive about their address? Notice how like 90% of any bitcoin'ish company does not post that information on their website? They use a different address for each transaction. This is how they keep track of when a customer pays for their order. Also most companies will end up selling their bitcoin as soon as coinbase/bitpay allows so their address is kind of a moot point. |
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He's not banned (AFAIK), I just don't trust him personally.
Why everyone else here seems to think it's their business whom I decide to trust, I don't know...
I just think you gave him that negative rating because you didn't get one of the awesome deals. If you don't trust anyone, it doesn't mean you have to give him a negative rating. Just avoid him. If he scams you then that leaving the rating would be understandable. He gave him the negative rating because he does not trust him. Anyone can give anyone positive trust if for whatever reason you trust the person, and you can give negative trust if you do not trust them. There was also a link the luke-jr posted of a transcript of an IRC chat when he was offered to let luke-jr double a .01 payment if luke would send .01 to bipolarbob first, luke declined because this is something that a scammer would do even if he has come through prior times. A I'm just going to be flat out honest with you guys. Bob's sent me probably more than 1 BTC in the past, for no reason; sometimess he'd randomly message me offering me BTC, or I'd send him a message asking him for a few mBTC for whatever reason, he hasn't sent me anything in a few weeks, but he's sent me plenty in the past. The most he's ever sent me at a time was .2 and he's sent me BTC quite a few times, so I'm sure it's been more than 1. So unless you guys are going to say/think that Bob is a wallet hacker too, you should just disregard every negative thought you have about him because he really is just a nice, generous guyHe completely deserves the positive trust I gave him, as well as the ton of it a bunch of other users did too. He may very well be generous to people, but it is still suspicious. He could very well be setting people up for a very big scam, or he could be prepping people to fall for a scam from other accounts. It was said near the beginning of the thread that people who are bipolar and going through a manic attack do not realize they are going through mania and will make decisions that are bad but they think are good. BiPolarBob is openly admitting that what he is doing is a bad deal for him. At the very least he is lying about being bipolar. |
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If it was not for drug dealers then drug users would never be able to get ahold of drugs, nor would they have ever gotten into using illegal drugs. Also drug dealers will often take advantage of a person's addiction and do things like extend credit and give a discount to a person who is unable to pay to prevent them from potentially breaking their habit.
As if people that support the war on drugs really give a shit about drug addicts. Drug addiction isn't the problem, it's just a symptom. That's why trying to take away the supply won't eliminate the demand. Only counseling and treatment can do that. Furthermore, not all drug users are drug addicts. Many are recreational users with no danger of becoming addicted. If drugs are not available in the first place then people would never get addicted. You are correct to say that not all users are addicts, but the majority of the drugs consumed are done so by addicts. This and many "hard" drugs more or less guarantee that people will get addicted and many people get addicted after using it just one time. |
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Why is he only one being prosecuted?
There are still a lot of people selling on localbitcoin.
I think his case is being used to set an example and make us behave. Everyone trading cash and Bitcoins without the proper license on localbitcoins is most certainly in violation of the law. I wish DnT was in this thread. He studied up on it and could explain the ins and outs. I think it is more about buying and selling drugs over the internet. They charged Ross with the harshest statutes that were designed for drug lords. They changed that guy in FL with money laundering when he sold bitcoin on LBC at outrageous prices (huge mark up) to a undercover cop that told him he was going to use the bitcoin to buy drugs and do other illegal things. You may be right. It might not have anything to do with Bitcoin. It may just be a warning to anyone trying to bypass drug laws using the deep web. If they prosecute anyone whose identity they can figure out who does any significant amount of business on illegal drug sites then they will essentially spread FUD among people who do business on these sites and people will likely not want to buy/sell over TOR (either that or will be more careful about keeping their identity secret). |
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you need 2fa to log in and withdraw coins but not to release from escrow. that is the prerogative 0f the seller/buyer.
Yes, you do need 2FA to release from escrow. At least on my account you need that. I just checked and there was no option to choose when 2FA will be used. In theory, someone could use one of those cell towers that are meant to spy on people using the cell tower. (there is a thread in politics and society about this). The attacker could make it so your cell phone does not use encryption, requests a 2FA code they know will be delivered to your phone and then intercept the code, and not deliver it to your phone. If they know your account credentials then they would have access to your account. |
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wtf is a 'pen register'?
"A pen register is an electronic device that records all numbers called from a particular telephone line. The term has come to include any device or program that performs similar functions to an original pen register, including programs monitoring Internet communications." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pen_registerBasically they monitored all the internet usage of Ulbricht for a few days, this was "judicially authorized". "The Pen Registers did not collect the contents of any communications. They collected only routing information, such as the IP addresses being contacted using the account, router, and devices, the ports being accessed, and the MAC addresses of the devices involved. We used the Pen Registers to track when Ulbricht was connected to the Internet and what IP addresses and ports he was connecting to. By monitoring when Ulbricht appeared to be online, and comparing it to the times when “DPR” appeared to be logged in to Silk Road (as reflected by his activity on the Silk Road discussion forum), additional evidence was collected corroborating that Ulbricht was in fact “DPR.”More at 18 - 21 in the declaration Isn't that circumstantial? I'm not computer whiz but how did the captchas leak information to the SR servers. Aren't captchas like an external process ie not hosted on whatever server the website uses? People are convicted on circumstantial evidence all the time. Usually not of crimes that are this serious however it is possible. Although it is circumstantial, the chances of it being someone other then him does decrease as the number of times he was observed online increases. |
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I think saying Bitcoin is "really fragile", conjuring images of a shipment of chinaware, is a bit misleading.
One could say the US multi-trillion dollar economy and infrastructure is fragile and defenseless to physical and cyber attacks on its power grid. Yet life goes on.
What's missing is the countermeasure argument. There are all sorts of what-if potential problems all around us, all the time. That doesn't mean we fear getting out of bed each day. What I mean is, sure, Bitcoin isn't perfect nor completely invulnerable to attack, but that can be said for lots of things. However, what I do believe is it's incredibly resilient due to the resourcefulness of its supporters. That counts for a lot.
That's one of my problems with Mike, its like the guy has no idea how his glib little statements impact the larger ecosystem he's working on. Not quite BP "We're Sorry" kind of gaffe, but certainly up there considering how much effort and money has been invested in the Bitcoin sphere. I think what he was doing was trying to prevent bitcoin from growing too quickly, as if it grows too quickly then it would be vulnerable to unknown attack vectors and if it has grown and is attacked then it will likely fail, verses it being attacked while being smaller, it's chances of survival are greater. |
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Just like bitcoin it's an interesting concept and experiment for sure. As I understand it anyone can use the software to set up their own sites so new ebay-like sites and also darknet sites will surely rise up. I really would love seeing a competitor to ebay arise, especially one that is free. Why wouldnt people use it?
The only issue I see is the complicated method of setting up shop so far. Your everyday "ebay seller" won't have a clue how to do this they barely can turn on a computer.... https://blog.openbazaar.org/openbazaar-beta-1-0-tutorial/Yeah that's a good point actually. I'll have to read a bit more into that. I'm sure like most technology it will get easier and simpler to use as time goes on. I know somebody who has an ebay business. They would love to not have the fees. I could easily see them using this tech. At the same time, ebay/paypal makes buyers feel safe. And ultimately buyers need a way to feel safe. If a buyer is buying drugs that they can't get elsewhere, yes an open bazaar is worth a try. But if somebody just wants to buy regular things, amazon and ebay offer much more consumer protection. Until this point is addressed very well, this kind of tech will have problems. I am an optimist and I do believe that it will eventually be addressed. Open Bazaar will offer notary, arbitration and reputation system using proof-of-burn. When everything will be geared up, I don't see why it will be any less secure than ebay/paypal. It would be less secure because the arbitrator could potentially be influenced by one of the parties. Or the arbitrator could actually be one of the parties. When you are dealing with a site like eBay, you know that arbitration will follow a certain set of rules (regardless if you agree with these rules or not) so if you have the right evidence and enough evidence to show you are in the right then you would know with reasonable certainty that eBay will side with you. I agree. I think that users would be very vulnerable to potential fraud by shill escrows. This would be especially a problem at first because there would be no established system of trust in place to know which "escrow" users to trust. But any new site will have to deal with this and there are several measures you could put in place. There's always going to be scammers but the trustworthy people quickly show themselves and rise to the top. Why would you deal with this kind of site in the first place when you can do a trade on a site when you know who is trustworthy? It would be difficult for people who will become trustworthy to know when it is appropriate to take a risk with another trader because the counter-party has an unknown level of risk. |
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There have been charts including this one by MIT:  I think the reason for this change is that people are now spending a lot more to mine bitcoin. As a result they will have bigger bills to pay that they need to sell their mined bitcoin for. In 2009 for example it almost wouldn't even be worth someone's time to sell their mined bitcoin to cover their electric costs. Another likely reason is the fact that most miners use pools to mine. As a result (with the exception of eligius), the found block will have the block subsidy "deposited" into the pool address, and when it is time to pay the miners the reward will be transferred to the miner's address. Bravo! I've been seeing that graph posted for a while now and you are the only one that actually realizes what's going on. The reason an outside entity like MIT can't just grab the Blockchain and start analyzing transactions is because they really don't know how Bitcoin works or have any involvement in the community of users. It was probably some grad students class paper and he was "guided" (and I'm using the term loosely) by an even more clueless professor. I wouldn't be surprised if this study was done by some clueless student/professor. What I would argue this graph/study does prove is the fact that solo mining is more or less dead and does not happen anymore. Even miners with the fastest (in terms of hashrate) equipment are going to have to use pools in order to minimize variance in their earnings. |
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Sure go for Electrum, but not bitcoin qt! Also I think that newbies don't need cold storage and if they have big amounts invested in bitcoin they can surely take the time to learn about the whole process or at least have someone teach them how to do it.
I think this is something that is very dangerous for a newbie to try to do. Especially when it is not in a not public environment (via PM or at your house for example) as no one will be able to look at the advice being given and can say the advice is good/bad. I would personally almost assume that someone giving advice in private is going to tell a newbie to do something that would make it easy for the person giving advice to easily steal the bitcoin being put in cold storage. You didn't get it. Having someone teach you how to setup a cold wallet isn't the equivalent of actually using those wallets. It means that the newbie can learn and he can do it by himself at home. If you are recommending an wallet, you can also tell him to protect his future private keys/wallet like real money. Once the newbies knows all the process of setting up a cold wallet he can do it for an infinite times. How would a newbie know that he needs to set up their own cold wallet on their own? Wouldn't you think it would be a lot easier to simply use the wallet that the person who is helping you sets up with you? It would be a lot easier but it would be less secure this way, but the newbie would not know it is necessary to set up the cold wallet independently unless he was told so, but if the person helping is going to try to scam/steal then he would not tell him as such. |
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Anyone have a syllabus for the class? They're probably going to teach kids why crypto currencies will fail.
I would doubt this would be the only thing they teach. I think the classes will likely be somewhat more balanced then the views about bitcoin on this forum, but I also don't think they will teach that crypto currencies will certainly fail eventually. I think the classes will most likely teach the pros and cons behind crypto currencies, the risks and potential rewards of using a crypto currency as well as the technical aspect as to how they work. You may be right but if you have taken many upper level college courses you quickly learn that some professors like to teach from text books they wrote. That forces you to literally study what they think. While most of them attempt to be unbiased that seldom happens. I was a UTA for two years. Part of my little suck butt job as a UTA (other than fetch cups of coffee) was to help several assholes professors teach their courses. I have seen two different professors teach the same material with two different synopsis. Their final exam questions were even tailored toward what they wanted you to believe. My upper level college level courses were in finance and there is little room for opinion in this courses. I didn't find any of my upper level professors to be biased, although this statement may be skewed by the fact that they were conservative which matches my general views. |
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