423
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Bitcoin / Project Development / Re: Android BTC-Widget
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on: April 26, 2013, 07:27:35 PM
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Hey everyone,
I currently developing an Android homescreen widget for Android 4.0 and above to show the current ticker value.
I thought about implementing the following features: - set trading site (MtGox USD/EUR done…more to come) - set refresh interval (done) - chart for a defined interval - alarm - lockscreen widget - better user interface ;-)
Do you have any other suggestions? What do you think?
(You can't yet download the app from the Play Store.)
Regards
If you are not in this for profit, you could consider contributing to the open source Litecoin Widget (which also supports bitcoin and others). I would be happy to "open the books" and give you a cut of the (very small) donation amounts. https://github.com/ogunden/litecoin-widgethttps://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=158777.msg1677458#msg1677458However, I have resisted graphs up until now, preferring a KISS approach. If you are determined to include them, maybe better to do your own. Feel free also to copy the source code for a jumping off point.
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424
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Economy / Service Announcements / Re: [ANN] Bitcoinroommate.com - First Bitcoin Real estate Site
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on: April 26, 2013, 07:18:10 PM
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Woot, hope this works out for you.
I have been looking to rent out a room for bitcoin, airbnb style (daily rates). It sorta looks like I can do this on your site, but maybe that's not what it's geared for. Firstly, I need to be able to enter a fractional bitcoin price..
The ability to add pictures, and calendar management would also be very nice. In fact, there's a lot you could do with this.
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427
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Bitcoin / Development & Technical Discussion / Re: What (if any) mechanism is there to protect against a massive hash rate drop?
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on: April 23, 2013, 01:31:13 AM
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If you're unaware, Terracoin had a problem a couple weeks ago with ASICs shooting up their diff then leaving the network (thus leaving the network at a very high difficulty relative to remaining hashing power). I think NMC had the same problem and it was resolved with merged mining, but that effectively killed NMC(??). I wanted to ask what mechanisms in BTC there are (or can be) to prevent a massive hash rate drop off. Right now, we have some massive amounts of hashing power being generated by Avalon and ASICMINER. If there was a bug in their firmware (e.g. the recent large coinbase bug that dropped all avalons on eligius to 0 MHS) that caused all Avalons or AMs to drop off the network temporarily or permanently, it could take days for a new block to be found. This would wreak havoc on the entire bitcoin ecosystem by bringing transactions to a standstill. Of course, as more manufacturers produce ASICs this problem is reduced, but let's say BFL delivers and their customers end up being 30% of the network...we'd still have the same problem. (We're all very confident in BFL's ability to produce a quality product ) Is this a legit concern? Shoot me down. I'll feel better. I believe there is no such mechanism, and it is a legit concern. Remember people, bitcoin is an experiment . Don't risk your life savings!
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428
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Bitcoin / Legal / Re: Why are people so eager to pay tax?
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on: April 21, 2013, 05:41:58 PM
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Everyone seems to agree that it's "moral" to pay your taxes, and immoral not to pay taxes. But when you consider the violence that is wreaked with your tax dollars, there's a good case for the exact opposite. Some of the great nonviolent thinkers agree: If a thousand [citizens] were not to pay their tax-bills this year, that would not be a violent and bloody measure, as it would be to pay them, and enable the State to commit violence and shed innocent blood. This is, in fact, the definition of a peaceable revolution, if any such is possible.
- Thoreau This sad situation developed after my departure from South Africa, but my idea of having permanent funds for public institutions underwent a change long before this difference arose. And now after considerable experience with the many public institutions which I have managed, it has become my firm conviction that it is not good to run public institutions on permanent funds. A permanent fund carries in itself the seed of the moral fall of the institution. A public institution means an institution conducted with the approval, and from the funds, of the public. When such an institution ceases to have public support, it forfeits its right to exist. Institutions maintained on permanent funds are often found to ignore public opinion, and are frequently responsible for acts contrary to it. In our country we experience this at every step. Some of the so-called religious trusts have ceased to render any accounts. The trustees have become the owners, and are responsible to none. I have no doubt that the ideal is for public institutions to live, like nature, from day to day. The institution that fails to win public support has no right to exist as such. The subscriptions that an institution annually receives are a test of its popularity and the honesty of its management, and I am of opinion that every institution should submit to that test. But let no one misunderstand me. My remarks do not apply to the bodies which cannot, by their very nature, be conducted without permanent buildings. What I mean to say it that the current expenditure should be found from subscriptions voluntarily received from year to year.
- Gandhi
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429
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Alternate cryptocurrencies / Altcoin Discussion / Re: Ripple SCAM: You *do not* own BTC or USD, you own debt that will collapse
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on: April 20, 2013, 07:59:35 AM
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Can you explain more? So ripple is like Mtgox? I can wire cash to a bank somewhere and get BTCs in return?
With Ripple, you can transfer two kinds of things: Ripples (XRP) and IOUs in any real or virtual currency. The system keeps perfect track of those, but to make payments you have to find someone who is willing to accept them in payment. This is the same as with Bitcoin. Trading in real world currencies is made easier by the existence of gateways like Bitstamp. You can send USD to Bitstamp in a number of ways and you can then send that money to Ripple in the form of Bitstamp-flavoured USD IOUs. Those IOUs in turn can be sent back to be redeemed for real USD by Bitstamp. People who trust that Bitstamp will redeem its IOUs for real dollars, will then accept the IOUs as payment. They indicate that trust by granting Bitstamp a certain credit limit within the Ripple system. The same thing works without gateways: if you want to make a payment to someone you don't know, then Ripple will try to find a path between you and the receiver in the trust graph. If that person is a friend of a a friend of a friend, and if credit limits and balances along the path allow it, the transfer of IOUs will be made. Each person can settle with their direct neighbours at the end of the month, or whenever they please. In fact, this uses the exact same system as in the example with the gateway, the gateway is merely acting as a professional "friend" of both you and the receiver, thus making you friends of a friend. To avoid getting scammed, a gateway will not reciprocate the trust and will only issue IOUs for money it has already received from you. It depends on its reputation to get people to buy its IOUs. And since the Ripple system has a built-in exchange, complete with order book, you can even trade IOUs denominated in the same real or virtual currency but issued by different gateways, or even just check the exchange rate to see whether people in the network believe the gateway is credit worthy. You have to get used to the idea before you really get it, but it's perfectly natural. And it turns out it's no more than a digital form of the system that was used in the 17th and 18th centuries: Ripple, or Bills of Exchange 2.0. Thank you for the detailed response. I'm going to sound repetitive, and I hope I don't frustrate you, but I'm still trying to put my finger on a reason I should want to use ripple. In terms of buying bitcoins; it sounds like it's just about the same user experience, maybe a little more complicated. I guess I'll stick to mtgox. And what need have I for IOUs when I can just as easily pay/receive real value in the form of bitcoins? It seems like an IOU is only useful when you're broke, or you've mismanaged your cash flows and need to borrow. And in that case, why not just borrow some bitcoins directly? Are you using ripple for any kind of commerce / financial activity? What for?
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432
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Alternate cryptocurrencies / Altcoin Discussion / Re: Ripple SCAM: You *do not* own BTC or USD, you own debt that will collapse
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on: April 19, 2013, 05:44:06 AM
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Can somebody explain to me why I want to use ripple? Or is it to early to be practically useful in any way yet?
I know why I like to use BTC: I'm in control of my own money, it can't be inflated, cheap transactions (though I understand it might not stay that way), international transactions, trust-free system.
In fact, bitcoin is pretty close to everything I want out of money. Why do I want to use ripple, again?
And does anyone use ripple for anything practical yet?
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437
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Alternate cryptocurrencies / Altcoin Discussion / Re: StableCoin
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on: April 17, 2013, 05:54:50 AM
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I agree that the idea isn't too well thought out, but I think the idea is more to fix the ratio of difficulty to reward. Thus, as the difficulty goes up, so does the reward. As difficulty goes down, reward goes down. Difficulty could still be adjusted to maintain a steady 10-minute block window.
Thus, when the price spikes as it recently did, it becomes incredibly lucrative to mine and sell bitcoins. Everyone and their grandma starts mining, driving difficulty and reward both way up. The increased reward causes bitcoins to flood the market, putting downward pressure on prices. A similar pressure happens in the opposite direction.
The problem of course is if you are trying to create a stable coin there are extended periods of time when the appropriate thing to do is to generate ZERO new coins. That makes mining unprofitable for everyone,so everyone stops. In a bitcoin style framework that means that block creation gets seriously delayed and transactions don't get confirmed. After a while difficulty drops to speed the process back up, but the supply&demand exchange value hasn't necessarily fallen with difficulty so coin creation starts again. Even though the correct monetary policy may be to still create ZERO new coins. As far as I can tell this doesn't produce a stable currency. It osculates tending toward a zero coin value. (continuous over production of coins) It also tends to drive the difficulty level down along with the coin values. Your analysis seems pretty sound. Before I start agreeing with you, let me propose one change (at the risk of going out to la-la-land): Let C and D be some constants, their value TBD. subsidy = C * difficulty This is the original idea, keeping the ratio of subsidy to difficulty constant. Now also, to deal with the times when the subsidy ought to be zero (and is so low that it's effectively zero): mandatory transaction fee = D * moneysupply / subsidy (It could equivalently be D * moneysupply / difficulty, with a different D value) Thus we would have: 1. During "boom" or expansionary times, there is much demand for the coin and the exchange rate begins to increase. As the rate increases, it becomes more profitable to mine, so more people do it, so the difficulty increases, so the money supply increases and eventually applies downward pressure on prices. 2. During slow times, the exchange rate begins to drop. Mining becomes unprofitable. Less people mine. Difficulty decreases, and so does the subsidy BUT, counteracting this effect, mandatory transaction fees begin to increase, to maintain a baseline incentive to keep mining. This might mitigate the effectively-zero subsidy issue. Now, switching back to agreeing with you; here's another problem with the design: when a new mining technology appears that allows people to generate a lot more coins with a lot less electricity (e.g. ASICs), there will be a sudden major inflation. If the ratio of coins generated to electricity consumed increases by a factor of 100, I see no reason the money supply wouldn't also increase a hundredfold. At this point, the miners have most of the coins (they just generated 99% of all coins generated to date), and transaction fees are now 100 times higher. Whoops. We were s'posed to be getting a StableCoin, but instead we got a ZimbabweCoin.
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438
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Alternate cryptocurrencies / Altcoin Discussion / Re: StableCoin
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on: April 17, 2013, 01:34:57 AM
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This papers grand idea is to fix the difficulty. The author isnt aware that the difficulty cannot be fixed due to the 10-minute window that must be maintained (by the difficulty) in order to restrain orphaning of blocks. I agree that the idea isn't too well thought out, but I think the idea is more to fix the ratio of difficulty to reward. Thus, as the difficulty goes up, so does the reward. As difficulty goes down, reward goes down. Difficulty could still be adjusted to maintain a steady 10-minute block window. Thus, when the price spikes as it recently did, it becomes incredibly lucrative to mine and sell bitcoins. Everyone and their grandma starts mining, driving difficulty and reward both way up. The increased reward causes bitcoins to flood the market, putting downward pressure on prices. A similar pressure happens in the opposite direction.
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