Exactly. Cheers for clearing that up. Should have probably been a little more specific there.

I've never had a look since it's not something I'd find useful, but it would make sense to be able to limit the download speed. I would assume that it is an option already implemented, but if it isn't probably should be.

On that note, it might be worth actually implementing it. Since, one could argue that by not having something like this in place it could encourage centralisation as you're potentially putting those with less bandwidth capability out of the picture. I know it's probably not a huge problem, but something to consider at least.

I wouldn't go as far to say that "all" open source software is following that philosophy.

Not always, but at least there are some people out there that want to contribute to what they consider a worthy project. I mean, if we take Satoshi no matter his background he didn't exploit Bitcoin to better his career or status. They just made something they thought the world needed. So, we do know that there are people out there that aren't always looking to benefit from it directly.

Sadly, capitalism does encourage what you've said, and therefore the majority are doing it to better themselves in one way or another.

Ah, I didn't realise you were talking about prospective miners rather than the retailers selling the rigs. Anyhow, again I don't think we necessarily need them to know much about Bitcoin. It's just like how investors aren't always clued up, they just see the opportunity to make some money. That isn't a problem really, not every adopter is going to be a believer in Bitcoin in the long term. Doesn't really effect us much in the long term, and probably does improve the amount of money short term investors make.

I don't see a problem with it personally. There's plenty of people getting into other markets that don't understand it, without actually being detrimental to it, and in similar vein I don't think the retail investors as you put it, will be detrimental to Bitcoin. Although, going back to the original point, I think it still stands, they aren't going to have the majority of their friends mining.

How does it help them more than cash would? Surely, using cash with no trace at all, is better than publicly broadcasting that x address sent to y address. Isn't that the very thing that criminals are looking to avoid? I think this is often just brushed over by the media, but cash suits criminals much more than cryptocurrencies in general. The only cryptocurrencies which are facilitating more than cash would likely be the ones which are truly anonymous, but Bitcoin is far from that.

Honestly, I'd like to see some numbers on this, because lets say Bitcoin is one of the largest contributors to illegal activities, how would they be able to determine that if its anonymous? They wouldn't be able too, they would be acting upon assumption for the most part. Obviously, those involved with Bitcoin know that Bitcoin isn't completely anonymous, and therefore as above isn't exactly the best approach for criminals.

Also, absolutely right. Cash will, and likely will always be the go to for criminals. The only exceptions to that will be cryptocurrencies like Monero, that are more anonymous than Bitcoin, which I probably would agree could potentially be a problem.

Which can largely be reduced by using a VPN on services which you don't trust, using a VPN service which has no logs, obviously that can be quite hard to determine, although the best ones to use are the ones that have had servers compromised without any public data knowingly released as that sort of indicates they didn't have it in the first place. Twitter, and Facebook should be ideally ditched completely if you care about privacy, and if not you should try to separate the identity completely.

You should be trying to reduce cookies as much as possible, especially since most websites are now required to ask you for your permission. For example, on Android you can block them completely, which will prevent you from using certain websites, but maybe just look for an alternative or just block certain cookies if possible.

Although, you probably aren't going to completely avoid the privacy invasion that we've become subject too, although there are ways to avoid the most invasive methods.

In reality they don't though, and ideally that situation never arises. Although, retailers might be entering due to fear of missing out, that isn't necessarily a bad thing. It should bring in competition, and prices should actually lower due to that competition, which should be seen as a good thing, as it reduces the amount of centralisation at least partly.

We don't need the retailers to know every intrigue detail, we just need them to create efficient machines, that's all. Which, they definitely know how to do as they've been doing it before Bitcoin was around.

Ideally, we should all have a say, regardless of how much Bitcoin you have or what sort of equipment you have. If you have a good idea, I'd like to think it would be taken into consideration. Obviously, there are people with more power for a lack of a better word, but I don't think that's avoidable. There's always going to be some sort of pull in a certain direction, and usually the people making the changes are the ones to do it, but at least with Bitcoin being mostly decentralised it's easier to upset the apple cart. If you wanted changes to be made, you could put them forward, and see if they're adopted.

Here's my score predictions, for anyone that wants to be influenced .

Arsenal 3 - 0 Man Utd
Leicester 1 - 1 Aston Villa
Man City 3 - 0  Watford
Norwich 1 - 2 Newcastle
Brentford 0 - 1 Tottenham

Chelsea 1 - 1 West Ham
Liverpool 3 - 0 Everton

Honestly, think Arsenal will run away with the game against Man Utd, especially if they play like they did against Chelsea a few days ago. Man City have a relatively easy game, although I don't think they'll blow Watford away i.e score more than three goals. Liverpool should blow Everton away, although Everton have been playing a bit better recently, so I do think they'll get dominated, but will keep the score relatively low. Probably 3 - 0 or 2 - 0 to Liverpool.

I'm not so sure it does favour certain teams. I just think its poor all around. Liverpool have been on the receiving side of VAR a few times this season, and some of them were blatantly onside. I do believe the decision on Firminho last season, resulted in them changing the lines, because it was so obvious that where they drew the lines, and the thinness of them, basically ruled a goal offside when it was definitely onside.

I do agree though, VAR has been awful ever since it has been implemented, and to be honest I haven't seen any improvement at all. I just wish it was never a thing or was implemented similarly to how rugby has implemented it.

Chelsea 1 - 2 Liverpool

Well, depends. Bitcoin isn't going to become less anonymous, however the companies, and exchanges operating with Bitcoin will. Since KYC (Know Your Customer) will likely be stepped up specifically on companies transacting in cryptocurrency, and I imagine the reason given by the governments will be the risk of no accountability, and therefore increases the potential for crime.

My argument would probably be that criminals probably don't want their transactions on a public ledger, but maybe that wouldn't be enough. So, while I do agree that KYC in certain circumstances makes sense, you're not going to be seeing me encourage the use of it, because of the privacy invasion, and the fact that users like me, and you are restricted, just because some users use it as a means of paying/selling illegal activities.

I don't know what the solution is to this, if we do want more adoption, then we likely have to come to accept that companies will be heavily scrutinised, and heavy handed KYC will likely be implemented. However, if you aren't planning on using a exchange, and assuming that P2P (Peer to Peer) exchanges aren't required to change by law, then there are ways to do it while keeping your privacy intact. Although, I do believe P2P exchanges will also be required to keep KYC in the future. I'm not sure how they would go about that, since data protection does exist, and you can't rely on someone who knows nothing about keeping sensitive data secure, so it'll likely be through the P2P platform, which again basically defeats the point of P2P since a centralised platform will be keeping your data on file, and very likely selling it.

While I don't agree with the largely unjustified criticism that Bitcoin has received with its energy consumption, at least when you compare it to other industries which are using a lot more. I do agree that we probably should be looking to do something about it regardless, since it not only reducing the chance of a ban, but it also will increase adoption, since our world is definitely going down a certain path, where being green is seen as a good thing, and people automatically support you more if you look like you care about the environment. I use look like, since I do believe a lot of the companies are using it as a marketing tactic rather than actually caring.

Anyhow, would this be something that you believe would be required to be proven before being allowed to mine? The only issue I see with something like this, is largely the problem of centralisation, which obviously goes against what Bitcoin stands for. We would need a central authority to verify that the miners are using green energy, but also they would need to do it without bias, and would actually need to be able to verify it. How do you verify that you're using green energy? Would it be photos which could easily be manipulated or would it be a in person visit, which could potentially anonymise anyone wishing to stay anonymous.

While, on the surface level I think something like this would be good for adoption, it opens a can of worms in terms of privacy, centralisation, and also probably prices out a lot of people, which further increases centralisation to the richer miners.

Right, going by this it wouldn't be a requirement to mine. The only problem with that, is are miners that can't afford the necessary equipment to use green energy, going to go through all that expense just to prove to a government, that they likely aren't big fans of. I don't think so, either this becomes a requirement, which has its own downfalls highlighted above or miners just carry on how they are due to the expense.

The rule for privacy is generally you want to avoid using third parties whenever you can. While, a hardware wallet can be great, for privacy as stated above is far from ideal. You would have been better off self hosting your wallet, via Bitcoin Core or Electrum. Both, that you can verify the code behind it all, and be sure they aren't collecting any of your data.

It's usually relatively easy to identify when a VPN is being used, especially when they're using one of the more popular services.

Also, remember that this is a discussion forum, and therefore has a lot of users signing up to ask questions, without ever intending on staying on the forum. The thing is, there's no mission, and there's no expectation that a new user is going to try, and reach the highest rank. Not everyone cares about such things, and they just come here to ask the occasional questions, and you know what that's fine. It's not a failure if you haven't progressed all that much, this isn't a place that we should be comparing who's the best, and what not. Ultimately, this place is here for information, and if a new user or even a old user wants information, and doesn't want to participate in the community, and achieve the highest rank/merit it can, they're perfectly within their right, and most certainly aren't a failure because of that.

So, on that note I don't agree with the prematurely leaving remark. This isn't a race, isn't a competition, and is a place of discussion, that's all.

Not just really valuable, but probably one of the things most companies are looking for these days. Most of it is for advertising purposes, and the more up to date information they have on people, the better marketing strategies they have, which will directly correlate with how successful their business is. So, I would argue that data is probably the most valuable thing a company can have, not just valuable.

I hate to admit it, but collecting data from a company stand point is probably vital to their success. Although, I'm definitely not saying I like the fact we've gone down this road, and personally I'd like to see less privacy invasive data collection, but honestly I think we're past that point.

I'm not so sure, maybe I'm reading into it too much, but Fury didn't look himself in the press conference. He was visibly annoyed at his father butting in, and making it about him. We've seen it in the past where Fury gets complacent, and ends up giving an opportunity to his opponent. Remember the cut he received over the eye? That could have easily been stopped, and its not because he was getting beaten, it was because he was complacent. Fury steps up when he needs to step up, otherwise he cruises. Could be a similar story with Whyte, the only thing with Whyte he is capable of knocking him out.

Although, obviously I'm still backing Fury he should find this easy, but it just depends on what Fury turns up on the night.

I don't know of any cases, although that doesn't mean they don't, and to be honest I would be surprised if they didn't. Since, a lot of companies out there unrelated to Bitcoin have been caught collecting data, and selling it. Even when it hasn't been publicly declared, if you go, and sign up to a bunch of companies with throwaway emails or using the +nameofsite@emailprovider.com method, you'll soon find out that the companies claiming not to sell your data are, because you'll suddenly over the next few weeks get a bunch of spam from random companies.

Although, there's probably not a lot that you can do, since the above method isn't exact proof, and wouldn't stand up in a court of law. So, while there might not be any cases to go on, that doesn't mean you should automatically trust them.

Only give your data to people, and companies you trust, and ideally you'll be able to count on two hands the amount of companies/people you trust. I can without a doubt in my mind say that altcoin wallets absolutely have been collecting data that you wasn't aware of, since there's a large amount of crap out there, which is quite openly a scam, so why wouldn't they abuse their user base via their wallet software too.

As for the main Bitcoin wallets, well most of them are open source, so you can verify it yourself. Basically, any closed sourced wallet software you shouldn't be using, and collecting your data would be the least of your concerns in that case.

Not without getting super creative, which would likely result in either over complicating things or not making things complicated enough, i.e taking a picture of a bunch of skittles which spells out the word "that". Obviously, it would defeat the point of this.

Although, if you're doing this for inheritance sake you could potentially just generate a new wallet, until you get a seed which you can include pictures of. Since, there won't be any Bitcoin it in at this point.

Obviously, I think I made it clear before that I'm pretty against this method, and as above it's just better to go the will route. If you want to allow someone to inherit your Bitcoin, there's a cost to it. Some way, you are definitely going to reduce your security, and open up an attack vector. However, while that is pretty unavoidable you should be trying to reduce that risk as much as possible, even if you can't completely mitigate it.

Anyone that's willing to use a known weighted dice, and compare the results to one that is completely balanced, would be appreciated . I'm guessing there would be some sort of bias, but I imagine it would still largely depend on the power/speed of the person throwing it.

In casinos, the throwers (if they aren't using a automatic machine) have very likely got into a habit, and therefore throw the same dice, the same way, at the same projective/angle/technique. However, my technique, and speed/power will differ from if you threw it. So, even though the dice might be weighted, you would assume we would get vastly different results regardless. There could be a small bias to a certain side of the dice due to the balancing issues, but without knowing what sort of bias that is, as it could be very small, I don't think it's something we really need to be worried about.

Personally, while it might be something to consider, I don't think checking if your dice are weighted perfectly is something that's totally necessary. If you are going to be generating a seed with dice, then just make sure you're throwing at a different angle, and intensity every time.

Yeah, although that was because of mental health, and I think it was a good reason. I mean, the reason he fell into that slum was because he had been training for that moment for pretty much is whole life, and then he suddenly achieves it, there was no goal left for him at that point, and this happens quite frequently. I myself haven't achieved anything on scale with that, but I've had similar feelings where when you achieve something you've been building towards for a long time, once you've achieved it you lose the motivation for a short while after.

Tyson is a man that needs those constant goals. Now, that doesn't mean it'll always involve boxing, I do believe what happened to his daughter before the Wilder fight, might have changed some of his priorities, and he might just want to spend more time with his family as a result.

I'm not sure, I guess we'll find out if he's true to his word in a years time, once everything has settled. I wouldn't base any decisions or speculation on what he says after the Whyte fight.

It's most certainly not Liverpool manipulating the results in their favour, but rather that the current VAR system is terribly implemented, and the referees aren't consistent at all. The annoying part is that a VAR type system called TMO in rugby has been in effect for years, and generally is pretty damn good. So, we know we can make it work, but the way it's implemented needs to change.

However, having said that I do agree with you Chelsea seem to have our number this season. You could argue the game in the Premier League where there was a red card for one of the Chelsea defenders, they also had our number there too.

Liverpool just seem to not perform well against Chelsea this season. I do believe though we've got a lot better since the last time we've met, and Chelsea are arguably in one of their poorer runs of form recently. So, I'm still going in confident with a Liverpool win.

I don't know. It probably warrants taking a look into it further. Although, bumping bots are quite common, I do believe even Howey coin has been subject to these types of bumping bots, I'm not entirely sure why that is, and why they've done that, but I do believe I've seen it, and I don't mean the sarcastic remarks about it, but rather the exact same pattern of bumping groups.

It definitely isn't good, but I like to operate on a innocent until proven guilty, and while it doesn't look great correlation doesn't equal causation. If anyone wants to take a further look into it, and can find any other supporting information, it might save a lot of spam in the future.

Yeah, seems like the Copper Membership was a ploy to prevent getting spotted as quickly, since not all staff can ban them. Obviously, they can remove the posts, but banning them is the real preventive measure. Obviously, these bumping groups are usually within the hundreds of accounts, so banning isn't the absolute solution, but it definitely slows them down more than just deleting their posts.