I am pretty much an alarmist shill (not paid anything though).

I really love the whole Bitcoin idea (and HODL a decent amount as well as spending some -- like on the VPN service I just signed on with), but am dismayed that the BPTB cannot or will not get together and arrive at a good solution, and do it now.  BTC has a great future if the Lead Developers and Miners get their acts together and resolve this.  Imagine, a smoothly running system run by adults, that would help bring in more BTC buyers and encourage merchants to accept BTC.  So get at it!

...

Obviously HODLing both gold and Bitcoin is better!  Both diversify almost anyone's portfolio, and both BTC and Au move differently from each other (and so are even better suited for diversification).

I know more about gold than I do about BTC.  Still, Bitcoin looks like a great speculation.  It IS riskier than gold, but its possible return could be very high.

*  *  *

cellard wrote that a possible problem with gold might be finding huge mines.  First, that is unlikely (possible of course).  Secondly, the Stock:Flow ration of gold is higher than just about anything else.  

An extra 100 tonnes of production per year (that would be a YUUGE mine) makes no difference, most gold just disappears into a Black Hole of Investment.  So would the 100 tonnes.  So would 300 tonnes...  (Total world production of gold is around 3000 tonnes / year, total stock of gold is about 180,000 tonnes).

Asteroid mining of gold (and even platinum-group metals) is so far off in the future that it can be ignored for the foreseeable future.

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K128kevin2 is correct.  I just signed up with NordVPN, but mostly use Google Chrome.  So Google can follow along, and that of course includes email (at least my email).

Nonetheless, my ISP now cannot track me easily or by default (AFAIK), and I can now use public wifi with much more safety than before.

Using TOR with a VPN looks like a pretty solid defense against many modes of monitoring.

*  *  *

I liked trust.zone's service, it was fast.

But, to use my iPad (wifi only, no cellphone) without a Mac, it was MUCH easier to get and use the software with NordVPN than trust.zone.

Ease of use is very important for me, and Nord is pretty easy.  All three of my devices are now hooked up w/ NordVPN.

I paid $69 for 18 months -- I asked for a coupon by their chat, they didn't have one handy, although they are "out there" -- so their help desk gave me an extra 6 months.

So far, so good. 

Ah, OK.  Please post a link or two to free VPN providers that either you have used yourself or that come highly rated.

Note that I am a beginner here, I don't know how to fool with ports (etc.).  I also need iPad access (without cellphone service nor ability to hook up to a Mac like trust.zone apparently require for iPads) as well as Windows devices.

Also I need service in foreign countries...

* * *

If any reader has used NordVPN, please tells us!  That service *may* be the right one for me.

Thanks.  Great thread.

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Quick graphs & comments on marginal utility.

Graph from wikipedia re marginal and total utility for "most products":



Note that at about 7 products (perhaps Mercedes cars), you get no happier, you have to maintain those cars...  Note that marginal utility goes to zero and then NEGATIVE utility for Car No. 8.


Here was my proposal as to how gold works re marginal utility:



Total utility would follow (or approximately follow) the ln(x) curve, ounces of gold own greater than one.  Note gold would always have a positive marginal utility.  FOFOA proposes that gold would always have a CONSTANT marginal utility (that the 40th ounce would yield as much marginal utility as your first or second ounce).  That does not accord with my experience, my 40th ounce yielded a positive marginal utility, but not as much as the second, third or fourth.

And THAT call, friends, is one of the best market-timing calls I have ever seen.

LTC is up some 22% + just today (5 April), since (late in the day) March 30 (iamnotback's message posted) LTC is up +/- 50%.  If you look at just before the price spike on March 30, LTC is up about 100%...

Nice prediction.  50% is a huge move in just days.

See for yourself at ounce.me, click the blue & white graph logo next to LTC price.

It varies.  If ViaBTC wins a block quickly, then you get your confirmation quickly.  SOMETIMES Antpool will confirm it (I read somewhere that ViaBTC has some kind of ties w/ Antpool).

Once it took over two hours to confirm via ViaBTC, but that trx had been hung-up 14 hours or so before.

The other day I accelerated a trx at about "20 minutes after the hour", and ViaBTC's service was not full.  Every time that I have tried within two minutes after the hour I got Via's "Acceleration Succeeded".  Then it's just a matter of time.

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iamnotback

FOFOA once wrote a piece claiming that gold is one of the very few things with a constant marginal utility.  I explored that idea at a blog piece I wrote years ago.  My contention is that gold has a very slightly declining marginal utility, that the 100th ounce bought has less marginal utility than the first, but performs much better than the 100th BMW car...

Almost everything has a marginal utility that is less than gold.

I even postulated that the marginal utility of gold followed the ln(x) curve.  I got some nice comments on that piece!

PM me for link or just look hard via Google.

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CoinCube

Go ahead and heft a tube of 20 Gold Eagles, and then tell me that...  

I read somewhere that "someone" has a theory that gold is somehow hard-wired into humanity as something considered of great value.  Hey, could be.


r0ach

Zero Hedge had an item the other day that Armstrong thinks that Au will go to a bit below $1000 and then slingshot up to $2300.  Often in volatile markets you get a sharp move, then the REALLY BIG MOVE the other way (so a dip to $1000 would precede the big move up).

Could not tell you how valid that notion is as I have not done the research.

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CrazyLoaf

Greetings

(I forget what your title is, so excuse the informality)

If "ORO BTC" refers to me (OROBTC), well, I'm not a player, I'm just kind of following the action and cheering you guys on.  Looks fun & interesting, but too complex and probably a time-sink for the Gold and Bearing Guy.

Should there be any kind of asset transfer to me, I'm OK with the Upper Echelons of the Kingdom doing with that as they see fit.  For example, worthy DONEES might be:

-- whoever is POOR and might be in need
-- help in funding to build a Navy should things with Sweden not work out...
-- a donation to Sir Shelby Earl of Cebu (SSEoC)

Barring illegality or inadvisability of the above, perhaps coffee in Tallinn might be appropriate in August (when my wife and I will be in town for a few hours).  

If so, any residents of Estoniastan feel free to touch base with me here or by PM.  As long as the coffee is acceptable there.

OROBTC
"Just passing through the USA, Peru and other places"

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favdesu (and others interested)

I have apparently gotten into trust.zone's free trial OK.  I should be good for three days.

Note to all:

One reason I chose trust.zone is for the free trial (to see if I was able to set it up, then use it, etc.).  trust.zone has plans with low prices and it looks like they have a reasonable number of servers scattered around.

It seems to be working OK, apparently even now.  

Great thread, thanks to all of you.

Gents, I have done some reading on Nugen Hand and their ties to the CIA, etc.  What I have read is plenty convincing.

But I wear a tinfoil hat.  Maybe it's a different brand than what others wear, as I do not see any evidence of huge piles of gold laying around, but I will say I have not investigated this enough to be definitive.

One only has just a certain amount of time, there is not enough to investigate all the DEEP rabbit holes out there.

At this point, I just stack.  I stack some BTC too.  Oh, and bearings in Peru for re-sale.   

Thank you, PokerFace3.  I'll start my research with OpenVPN in mind (ease of use) as well as the more normal criteria of how many simultaneous connections, speed of service, up-time, number of countries where they have service, etc.

Happily, I have time to explore all of this, and VPN service does not appear to cost too much.  Again, thanks!

Good catch there, r0ach.  I use Chrome and saw the COEXIST BS, but missed the horns.  They are becoming more obvious each week, now just hiding in plain sight.

*  *  *

Re Steve at SRSrocco, well, I would not expect a gold guy to be very pro-Bitcoin.  Nonetheless, he is right about gold being the Store of Value.  Bitcoin is much more speculative.  And BTC has its own problems with the BU vs. SW Civil War.  I read elsewhere that even MONERO is going to have its own hard fork.  Hard forks (and the adjustments that users then have to make) make it less attractive for Average Joes to want to use cryptocurrency.

Your FSK link is interesting, I will have to read it later.

...

Martin Armstrong has a nice article up on how the sleazy banks are now being required to report ever more cash transactions to the sleazy governments.  If THIS article does not fit into "Economic Totalitarianism", I'll eat my hat.

https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/world-news/taxes/banks-secretly-report-all-cash-transactions-to-the-police/

Turns out that not only is "structuring" a crime (to evade the $10,000 reporting requirement by doing, say, 3 cash transactions of $5000 each), there is a $100,000 / year structuring which gets punished even more severely.

Highly recommended article for the privacy minded.  The noose gets ever-tighter.

...

Armstrong has a nice article up on how the sleazy banks are now being required to report ever more cash transactions to the sleazy governments:

https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/world-news/taxes/banks-secretly-report-all-cash-transactions-to-the-police/

Turns out that not only is "structuring" a crime (to evade the $10,000 reporting requirement by doing, say, 3 cash transactions of $5000 each), there is a $100,000 / year structuring which gets punished even more severely.

Highly recommended article for the privacy minded.

...

iamnotback (SSEoC) &  HRH rpietila

Even if some of the ALTS have properties of great interest, the complexity of those products is daunting for Average Joes like me. 

*  *  *

Risto, your Realm looks very interesting, but way too complex for a busy guy like me.  I'll see if I can take another look around there this weekend.


SSEoC has a message!

I had a look around at various of the VPN sites and reviews, it looks like trust.zone is very competitive.

But, like so much I get into here at bitcointalk, I have to learn all of this from scratch.  How easy/difficult would you (any of you) characterize trust.zone or perhaps another VPN service.

I am looking for ease of use and a good price, and do not need advanced services.  Please share any experiences w/ VPN services for beginners.

Thanks. 

To my knowledge (and I could be wrong), Putin is a gold guy.  Russia has bought up a lot of gold over the past few years, and their central banker (Elvira Nabiullina) has apparently done a great job.

Russia is now No. 7 in the world re Official Gold Reserves (1615 tonnes):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_reserve

They apparently are stacking it up...

Note that NO COUNTRY has Official Silver Reserves.  Still, whither silver goes, so will gold.

I am interested in sound critiques (and even summaries) of iamnotback's work, as it is very dense and hard for me to follow.  So, yes, please do read what you need to, and post back.

I am suspecting that his work likely IS important, perhaps very important, but hesitate to commit the time and energy to try and understand the huge amount of material.

*  *  *

EDIT:

Has CoinCube offered up a general opinion on iamnotback's work?  I have not explored this thread at all thoroughly, and CC is an articulate guy who might be able to tease out main points with suggestions of which routes to follow to for beginners to gain further insight.