Congrats on achieving the last rank you'll probably ever see (that's a hint, Theymos ol' bud)!

If I may make a completely unsolicited suggestion:  you obviously know how important it is to earn merits in order to rank up and yet out of the 1015 merits you've earned (which gave you 507 sMerits), you've only sent 187 to other members, most of which are already high-ranking ones.  So I would humbly suggest that you pay forward what's been given to you and in the process keep the merit system running smoothly.

In any case, keep up the great work--you're not only Legendary but on DT2 and have dark green trust per BPIP.  Sweet.

Oh man, I handed out that negative when I was on a rampage back in 2016 and anyone even placing a bet (when forum accounts were being auctioned publicly) would get one from me. 

To the point of this thread, I don't think it matters who the author is of a stickied thread as long as whatever point is being made is valid, which should be the case since the assumption is that pegging a thread to the front page of a section is an endorsement of its importance and accuracy by Theymos and/or the mods.

Stephen Gornick never asked me to remove that feedback as far as I know.  I probably should, since it was so long ago but I have mixed feelings about it.  Judging from his other feedback he looks to be a chronic seller of accounts of various types.  Or at least was when he was last active here.[/list]

WOW.  Though I've been an admirer of Buffett's for years I never really kept an eye on what Berkshire Hathaway had in its portfolio--and I figured doing that would be fruitless since he's the type of investor whose holdings don't have a high level of turnover.  That is an eye-popping amount of stock for him to own, no matter what the company is.

Jesus, can you imagine?  Sure, that's not Buffett himself receiving that money but I think it's great to be getting income like that which you can plow into more shares or other investments.

Not sure I agree with that viewpoint 100%, but I get why Buffett would view Apple that way.  Honestly I would never have guessed that he would have thrown so much money into a tech company even if it seems to be masquerading as a "lifestyle brand".  That phrase better describes Coca-Cola I think (but I know they're a beverage maker primarily).  Good for Buffett.

Discriminated against, probably not.  But bounty hunters have had a bad reputation for as long as I can remember, and I was probably a member when the first bounty was started (and I don't know when that was).  I'd also add that the negative rep was earned for at least two different things: shitposting up a storm and cheating by enrolling alt accounts in the same bounty.  Plagiarism among bounty hunters is or was a big issue, though that could be lumped in with the shitposting.

You weren't born yesterday by any chance, were you?  Whatever praise and other shit the managers get, I've found that it's a good rule of thumb that most newly-registered bounty hunters are either alt accounts or are on a path that will only lead to them showering bitcointalk with their projectile diarrhea, and when you see enough of their nonsense posts you begin to realize that it affects the flow of reading for everyone and decreases the quality of the forum significantly.

TL;DR: Ain't got no sympathy for bounty hunters as a rule unless they've proven themselves NOT to be scumbags.

OK bitches.  Given that the world economy is swirling round and round in a shitstained crapper, I want some concrete plans from people who want to build the castle in whatever country is the most paradise-like.

In his thread, uneng discussed the ridiculously low cost of living in Brazil, and frankly I got aroused.  I bet there's a lot of land on which to build the signature campaign/party-harder-than-FTX headquarters.  But give me suggestions and whatever else to boost my mood.

Pleeeease....!

Holy crap! 

Now this is what I'm talking about; I love discussions like this and I'm reminded of my masturbation-fantasy thread which I'm going to unlock so's I can get some colorful input in my brain instead of the dark gray cloud that seems to be going around like some kind of psychiatric contagious disease.

Brazil is beautiful from what I've heard, and I'm shocked that the cost of living is that low.  OP, there's nowhere in the US where you can get a meal as cheap as the one you described (am I correct in assuming that's USD in your post?).  Even the dollar menu at McDonald's is now like the $5 menu, and if you can easily spend $15 just for an unsatisfying sandwich, fries, and a watered down soda.  It's no better anywhere else as far as I know, and I think it's only going to get worse.  There's an egg shortage now?  WTF?

Dude's username should be ShitImBad.  Maybe Theymos could grant him an honorary name change, because it's an astounding non-accomplishment to be here 3+ years and still be pegged at Newbie rank and absolutely no recognition from whoever his peer group is.  I'd clap my hands if they weren't otherwise occupied.

I would suggest that there's a very low standard for respect going on there.  There are plenty of members who haven't cheated bounties or campaigns, but not only don't I respect them for that, if a list of those members were produced right here in this thread I bet I wouldn't even recognize most of them.

But hey, if we were all the same and agreed on everything this forum would be as boring as the trollbox on Yobit.

Blaaaaah....I think OP is way overthinking the concept and application of passive investing.  I get the writer vs. surgeon argument, but writing a book still doesn't qualify as passive in my mind--the only thing that does is when your money is working for you rather than you working to make it.  Dividends, business investments where you don't have an active role in the company, staking coins, etc.  Those all pass the sniff test for meeting the definition (again, in my ever-so-humble opinion that's how I see it).

And then there's the question of whether any of us are into OP's scenario.  I'm definitely not.  I gotta bust my ass raw to make a dolla an' a cent, and I'm not joking.  I wish I had enough spare scratch to invest in something that produces a sweet return.  Maybe one day, but it seems like the clock is ticking a lot faster these days.

Going to see therapist now, bye.

OP, that shit goes on everywhere scams are found--and yes, bitcointalk isn't immune from it although I haven't seen many blatant examples of scam-busters going rogue in a while (unless I've missed something very obvious).  I remember a few years back there were a few members who seemed to appear suddenly and make a fast reputation for themselves by sniffing out scammers, only to pull shenanigans of varying degrees of seriousness.

If you asked me to provide names, I wouldn't be able but I'm sure members with better memories would if they've been here since at least 2016 or so.

And Jesus, it seems like Youtube has turned into nothing but a drama TV service with 20-somethings slamming everything, including each other.  And yep, they're usually shilling questionable crap from their sponsors like Established Titles and whatever else.  It's maddening, because no matter how many times I clear my browser cache, I always wind up with the same suggestions within minutes and it's all the same style of content as OP described.

Well fuck yes I'd prefer whatever it is that qualifies as a crypto gift card over those other lame-ass choices (if I had a Valentine, which I don't and it's sad).  But I'm not sure what's meant by that term anyway.  A gift card is a gift card, no?  A card with a seed phrase is a gift of crypto but isn't a "gift card".

These articles drive me nuts in their stupidity, and I'm not just being bitter about lack of love this time of year.  This is Yahoo news for christ's sake, so you know they're just scraping the literary barrel for stuff that will appeal to their readers.  I wonder if bitcoin hadn't rebounded to >$20k if they would have published this.  I doubt it, but my cynicism as regards mainstream media knows no bounds.

Economic implications?  If any of the big world powers end up in a war, economics might come down to how many cockroaches you can scrounge up to feed whatever is left of your family, assuming any of us are alive at the end of said war.

But before the nukes start flying, I'd expect severe sanctions to be imposed on all sides, just like with Russia.  As far as the US is concerned, if China were to impose sanctions like that, it'd cripple our economy (or at least put a big ding in it).  I'm hoping none of this happens--for the sake of generations to come, because a war between China and the US would probably wind up as a full-blown world war, and as you probably all are aware we've got much more powerful weapons now than during the last world war.

And yet we have all of these UFOs flying around....kinda makes you wonder if the rumors Abiky referenced are true.  I don't suspect they're from outer space; they're probably Chinese spy-things gathering intel.  Ugh.

Hell yes he's human, because he's argued specific points I've brought up about Michael Saylor and Microstrategy which a bot or script or even an alien from Mars would not have been able to do.

About the merits he's sent, I don't know what criteria he's using in sending them, but there's no abuse I can see.  It's actually impressive that he's been able to send such small amounts to so many members--it's definitely not my style, but whatever.  I think he's helping the community quite a bit by doing it that way, by sheer diversity alone.  Lately my merit "targets" have been people who've requested post history reviews, whereas with JJG it looks like he's really spreading those merits around to a lot of different members.

Also, I'm pretty sure no merit source is a bot, no matter what it looks like.  JJG, if you look at his posts, spends a lot of time writing them and puts a lot of thought into them.  That's just how some members roll, know what I mean?

LOL.  Yeah, put that baby down when you're analyzing the depths of various rabbit holes here on bitcointalk lest your nips dry up and the baby starts screaming from lack of attention/milk.

OMG, that's just straight-up awful.  Glad it got reported--and yet I still wonder if that was from a bot/AI or just some moron who's ignorant as to what this forum is all about simply plagiarizing info about wallets in general (the spiffy leather kinds in particular, lol). 

That post brought me back to 2016 or so, when it seemed like there were tons of posts like that from account farmers just ranking up accounts based on activity alone.  I'm going to quickly forget ever reading that, and I will mention it no further.

So are bots the same as AI scripts or what?  I'm assuming there's not a hell of a lot of difference in either case, but "AI" just sounds so much more nefarious.  And I'm guessing that this forum has had a problem with AI/bots for a long time now, though they've probably gotten harder to detect.

If they can be caught, and if what they write can be detected as garbage.  I'm not sure I'd be able to tell the difference between a script and just some random bounty spammer who can't write English to save his or her life. 

My, my how times have changed.

Reputation is key for receiving any donations, regardless of whether asking for them is allowed or not.  If you're a nobody on this forum and start asking for donations for any of those surgeries you listed, you can forget about it.  The only reason yahoo62278 received all the bitcoin he did is because of the trust and rep he's built up over the years.  He's managed a lot of campaigns and a lot of money, so obviously people didn't think he was up to anything when he said he was in the hospital waiting for a heart transplant.

For as long as I can remember, asking for donations wasn't allowed, no matter who you were.  It was considered begging, and I was surprised to see a btc address in yahoo62278's thread.  Eh, medically he's out of the woods for now and it's not a huge deal that he asked for a little bit of charity from the community IMO.

Yep, doesn't surprise me at all that any BTCATM operators are going bust.  After using a few of them and seeing the outrageous fees they charge, I can't imagine why anyone would use them consistently.  If they allowed sales of crypto, that would probably be a different story but all of the ones I've seen don't.

I haven't checked coinatmradar in a while, but last I did ATMs were springing up all over my city, and Coin Cloud was just one of the operators.  There's still one at the closest gas station to me, but I bet that's not going to be there much longer since it seems like no one ever uses the thing.  I am hoping that they don't all disappear, because I love the concept of them, just not the fees.

It is, and I'm not even sure which countries fall into that category anymore--but I can't say I haven't used the phrase myself, since it's useful in some cases.  I guess if your country's capitol doesn't have massive skyscrapers and a business district, it's a third world country.  Eh.

OP, congrats on earning some bitcoin but are you using Coinomi for a wallet?  That's what it looks like, and I'd probably switch to Electrum if I were you and if you're going to keep it on your smartphone, use a strong password.  Those suckers can get stolen or lost in the blink of an eye, and then you're screwed if the person who ends up with it knows what he's doing.

Signatures are disables in the Ivory Tower and Serious Discussion sections, so Theymos could make it happen were he so inclined (which I have 0% doubt he won't be).  Those sections were made to be free of anyone who's incentivized to post for money, though last I checked they weren't exactly thriving like the rest of the forum.

That's not a bad idea at all, actually.  I wonder if Theymos would go for some kind of PSA thread stickied to one or both of the gambling sections.  I've participated in some discussions about problem gambling before--not because I'm a gambler but because of my interest and work in the field of addiction--and I'm confident there are a lot of people here who've got serious problems with it.

Yeah, you can see why I misunderstood this pea-brain's post above.  There's no way in hell this joker's going to win any argument in English--or any other language for that matter since the facts are against him all the way.  All I can see is him dodging everyone's pointed barbs with insults and idiocy.

I always loved that rebuttal, "few cents".  That exact combination of words has been used to describe members in sig campaigns posting in threads like this, where someone got snared in their own trap.  OP, you might be filthy rich and consider $6 to be a few cents (that's for Chipmixer participants), but I'm thinking that you're just bitter or don't know how much campaigns actually pay.  Either way, none of that is helping you convince anyone about anything. 

I'm telling you, just lock this thread up because all you're going to get is more of the same.

You started this thread, bro.  Why do you now want to discuss things privately with someone who called you out for your apparent BS?  You might as well explain your side of the story with respect to what Bitcoin_Arena wrote right here, else lock the thread and forget about your claim.

*Edit*:
Whoops, I misunderstood what OP was saying.  Silly language barrier.

I don't know; the timeline Bitcoin_Arena posted looks pretty solid and convincing to me.  Insulting him doesn't strengthen your claim here.