Gavin is an Agent

[bambou]

facts:

1/ CIA "interview"
          https://bitcointalk.org/?topic=6652.0
          https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=113609.0

2/ After screwing over at the very "honorable" TBF, he has now joined the MIT's Media LAB
          https://bitcoinmagazine.com/20132/gavin-andresen-core-developers-join-mits-digital-currency-initiative/
          http://www.media.mit.edu/files/sponsors.pdf

3/ Forking BS over and over again. now just before the Halving. hOw friggin convenient.
          https://github.com/gavinandresen/bitcoin-git/commit/5f46da29fd02fd2a8a787286fd6a56f680073770





Say goodbye to Bitcoin. Sheeples.

[1714918056]

1714918056

[1714918056]

1714918056

[1714918056]

1714918056

[687_2]

facts:

1/ CIA "interview"
          https://bitcointalk.org/?topic=6652.0
          https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=113609.0

2/ After screwing over at the very "honorable" TBF, he has now joined the MIT's Media LAB
          https://bitcoinmagazine.com/20132/gavin-andresen-core-developers-join-mits-digital-currency-initiative/
          http://www.media.mit.edu/files/sponsors.pdf

3/ Forking BS over and over again. now just before the Halving. hOw friggin convenient.
          https://github.com/gavinandresen/bitcoin-git/commit/5f46da29fd02fd2a8a787286fd6a56f680073770





Say goodbye to Bitcoin. Sheeples.

Maybe. A fork will severely damage the price.

[AGD]

I voted yes, because it would be more fun to watch the story unfold 

[Elwar]

You are free to check the source code to see Gavin's contributions.

[inBitweTrust]

3/ Forking BS over and over again. now just before the Halving. hOw friggin convenient.
          https://github.com/gavinandresen/bitcoin-git/commit/5f46da29fd02fd2a8a787286fd6a56f680073770

Looks like a good time to push for the hard fork as I expect transaction volume to skyrocket at or near the halving. If you are really concerned about his helpful contributions than please submit your own commit and let the network decide.

2/ After screwing over at the very "honorable" TBF, he has now joined the MIT's Media LAB

TBF was a honorable organization?

[pawel7777]

1- CIA wouldn't publicly interview their own agents (or potential ones)

2- TBF screwed themselves + stopped paying the devs in April. GA is still Chief Scientist though afaik.

3- Feel free to contribute yourself, offer alternative solutions or just stay on the old fork.

[hdbuck]

1- CIA wouldn't publicly interview their own agents (or potential ones)

2- TBF screwed themselves + stopped paying the devs in April. GA is still Chief Scientist though afaik.

3- Feel free to contribute yourself, offer alternative solutions or just stay on the old fork.

1/ Thats not an argument. Fact is Satoshi vanishes when Gavin is "invited" @CIA. but lol nobody is just "invited" there.. XD

2/ Gavin is/was an accomplice. Kinda like acknowledging their misbehavior by omission.

3/ I wouldnt call the 20Mb Fork a "contribution". More like a "retribution".. all the way back into USG's frame freaks.



Centralize & Control^TM

[albert11]

The "let the network decide" argument does not convince me really, when/if bitcoin becomes mainstream the majority of bitcoin users will use and rely on online wallets and exchanges, if these centralized companies collude together with big mining companies they will have the biggest blockchain and people won't even have the choice to change blockchain if they want to keep their money, that's why the ecosystem should be as much diversified as possible.
If there is 2 bitcoins blockchains it means we will have 2 differents bitcoin price, people will ultimately go on the bitcoin that is the most valuable and then it's going to snowball effect...

I think the only real way the consensus mechanism would work as it should is if the blockchain is forked in a way that anyone can mine and earn bitc, maybe by putting some sort of limit on processing power/node, decentralized mining is the only thing that will preserve integrity of the protocol IMO

[Kaneki]

if in view of its contribution in the world Bitcoin should he not agent, but we can not guess what is inside his head could have been in changing his mind and became Agent.

[inBitweTrust]

Everyone who is against the blockchain limit being raised has plenty of time to submit their own commits and or finding alternative solutions and working on them like the lightning network.

Its not like we haven't discussed this for years , a plan put in place many months ago, and now you can see the actual commit that is delayed 1 year. If anything Gavin is being extremely careful and this is changing at a snails pace.

Open source projects do not work with complaints. Either submit your own commit, stay on the old chain, or work on an alternative proposal that solves the 3-7tps limitation to convince all the other devs who support the 20MB hard fork.

[Kakmakr]

Gavin got a lot of money to do someone's work, and I guess it's good payment to maintain a secure protocol.
Only a small portion of Satoshi's original code is still in use today but the core principle was kept. Most of the developers agree that Satoshi's programming was average to say the least, but his idea was excellent.
Gavin was one of the people who cleanup up that code, and he should be acknowledged for that. ^frown^

[bambou]

This is it, Bitcoin's big anti-fragility test!

Being attacked from the very inside by so called "Chief Scientist" to fit his masters agenda.

I sure hope it will slam them right back in their faces, into their feces!



ps: @inbitwetrust TBF "honorable"? lol no. that was me being ironic. As if USG sponsored MIT LAB would be any different, if not worst.

[louise123]

1- CIA wouldn't publicly interview their own agents (or potential ones)

2- TBF screwed themselves + stopped paying the devs in April. GA is still Chief Scientist though afaik.

3- Feel free to contribute yourself, offer alternative solutions or just stay on the old fork.

1/ Thats not an argument. Fact is Satoshi vanishes when Gavin is "invited" @CIA. but lol nobody is just "invited" there.. XD

2/ Gavin is/was an accomplice. Kinda like acknowledging their misbehavior by omission.

3/ I wouldnt call the 20Mb Fork a "contribution". More like a "retribution".. all the way back into USG's frame freaks.



Centralize & Control^TM

Now that you guys mention it.
Can anyone give me the link for when Satoshi said: "I am moving on, it's in good hands with Gavin and the guys"

I have been through Satoshi's posts but it's not there.

[inBitweTrust]

Now that you guys mention it.
Can anyone give me the link for when Satoshi said: "I am moving on, it's in good hands with Gavin and the guys"

I have been through Satoshi's posts but it's not there.

He turned over control of the source code repository and alert key functions of the software to Gavin and could have warned us in many other ways after he left if he was concerned. Gavin was one of the few people Satoshi trusted to have private communications with as well.

I sure hope it will slam them right back in their faces, into their feces!

What are you going to do about it besides whine and complain?

[Keyara]

What was his role in bitcoin development before joining CIA?

[louise123]

Now that you guys mention it.
Can anyone give me the link for when Satoshi said: "I am moving on, it's in good hands with Gavin and the guys"

I have been through Satoshi's posts but it's not there.

He turned over control of the source code repository and alert key functions of the software to Gavin and could have warned us in many other ways after he left if he was concerned. Gavin was one of the few people Satoshi trusted to have private communications with as well.

-snip-

That's very nice.
I am really glad that Satoshi trusted Gavin, I can sleep more peaceful now  
I am sure Satoshi had his reasons to hand it over to Gavin.

That is not what I asked though.
I asked: Can anyone give me the link for when Satoshi said: "I am moving on, it's in good hands with Gavin and the guys"

Thanks  

[Lauda]

Please don't get the 'hard fork is bad' nonsense started again. I've just read a comment:"Gavin who do you think you are?"; and I can't believe this.
Why do individuals that are anti-fork think they matter? If we look at contributions to the code I think that Gavin has contributed the most (correct me if I'm wrong).
Anyone who did not do something that is comparable to this (buying is irrelevant!) should not complain. You're free to leave at anytime.
If you didn't notice this is on Gavin's Github page.

Also, no Gavin is not an agent. He's the director of the NSA.  

[Skunk Fu]

Please don't get the 'hard fork is bad' nonsense started again. I've just read a comment:"Gavin who do you think you are?"; and I can't believe this.
Why do individuals that are anti-fork think they matter? If we look at contributions to the code I think that Gavin has contributed the most (correct me if I'm wrong).
Anyone who did not do something that is comparable to this (buying is irrelevant!) should not complain. You're free to leave at anytime.

Also, no Gavin is not an agent. He's the director of the NSA.  

HA!
I knew it. I just f*cking knew it 

[pawel7777]

1- CIA wouldn't publicly interview their own agents (or potential ones)

2- TBF screwed themselves + stopped paying the devs in April. GA is still Chief Scientist though afaik.

3- Feel free to contribute yourself, offer alternative solutions or just stay on the old fork.

1/ Thats not an argument. Fact is Satoshi vanishes when Gavin is "invited" @CIA. but lol nobody is just "invited" there.. XD

2/ Gavin is/was an accomplice. Kinda like acknowledging their misbehavior by omission.

3/ I wouldnt call the 20Mb Fork a "contribution". More like a "retribution".. all the way back into USG's frame freaks.



Centralize & Control^TM

1- That's not really an argument for or against. But using the common sense, if CIA was to recruit GA, they would far more likely approached him quietly, instead of letting him make public statements about the invitation. Seems to me Satoshi did freak out over wikileaks accepting bitcoins (see his 2nd latest post).

2- Sure, let's not blame the ones that misbehaved, lets blame GA for his 'omission'. Anyway, how's that an argument of him being an agent?

3- I was referring to 'your contribution'. Don't like the fork? Let's hear your ideas/solutions. Most of people seem to agree with the need of lifting the limits with some difference of opinions on details.

That being said, I think it's actually healthy to consider the possibility of GA or any other dev to be an agent, and properly examine any proposed changes and look for threats etc. But announcing that as a fact because of the reasons stated in the OP is just daft.

[inBitweTrust]

That is not what I asked though.
I asked: Can anyone give me the link for when Satoshi said: "I am moving on, it's in good hands with Gavin and the guys"

Thanks  

He expressed interest in moving on months before and made preparations in advance but never gave a farewell message and simply disappeared leaving everyone wondering. His only response years later was :
"I am not Dorian Nakamoto."

[AGD]

That is not what I asked though.
I asked: Can anyone give me the link for when Satoshi said: "I am moving on, it's in good hands with Gavin and the guys"

Thanks  

He expressed interest in moving on months before and made preparations in advance but never gave a farewell message and simply disappeared leaving everyone wondering. His only response years later was :
"I am not Dorian Nakamoto."

(verified by his signature)

NOT verified! Most probably the same hacker, that has sent a message to Theymos using Satoshis GMX email account.

[AtheistAKASaneBrain]

Seems like a pretty far fetched theory, worth of infowars.com, still entertain food for thought. I think the theory of him being satoshi is far more feasible tho.

[hellyeah]

That is not what I asked though.
I asked: Can anyone give me the link for when Satoshi said: "I am moving on, it's in good hands with Gavin and the guys"

Thanks  

He expressed interest in moving on months before and made preparations in advance but never gave a farewell message and simply disappeared leaving everyone wondering. His only response years later was :
"I am not Dorian Nakamoto."

(verified by his signature)

NOT verified! Most probably the same hacker, that has sent a message to Theymos using Satoshis GMX email account.

I don't remember there being any verifications with Satoshis signature?
Do you have a source to that claim?

[Lauda]

NOT verified! Most probably the same hacker, that has sent a message to Theymos using Satoshis GMX email account.

I don't remember there being any verifications with Satoshis signature?
Do you have a source to that claim?

He's talking nonsense. http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2014/03/06/bitcoin-creator-returns-to-internet-to-say-i-am-not-dorian-nakamoto/
You can see the post there. There is no signature i.e. it was not posted by the real Satoshi.

Here is also a past discussion: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=763459.0

[hellyeah]

NOT verified! Most probably the same hacker, that has sent a message to Theymos using Satoshis GMX email account.

I don't remember there being any verifications with Satoshis signature?
Do you have a source to that claim?

He's talking nonsense.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2014/03/06/bitcoin-creator-returns-to-internet-to-say-i-am-not-dorian-nakamoto/

You can see the post there. There is no signature i.e. it was not posted by the real Satoshi.
Here is also a past discussion: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=763459.0

I read the stories before.
I remember the hacker later contacted theymos asking for Bitcoins.
As if Satoshi needs more of them. LOL

[inBitweTrust]

I don't remember there being any verifications with Satoshis signature?
Do you have a source to that claim?

I was mistaken. Its validity is argued both ways and we cannot presume much,.

[gentlemand]

when/if bitcoin becomes mainstream the majority of bitcoin users will use and rely on online wallets and exchanges, if these centralized companies collude together with big mining companies they will have the biggest blockchain and people won't even have the choice to change blockchain if they want to keep their money.

I think the only real way the consensus mechanism would work as it should is if the blockchain is forked in a way that anyone can mine and earn bitc, maybe by putting some sort of limit on processing power/node, decentralized mining is the only thing that will preserve integrity of the protocol IMO

I really wonder if there's going to be a way to get away from that outcome. Convenience and preserving their funds is more important to most people than decentralisation even when that's the core principle.

Circle/ Coinbase etc are already engaged on a slow creep towards being cornerstones of a future system. The miners are a much more random element but many are just out to make the most money.

By the time it become clear that decentralised mining is really necessary to keep the flame alive, the block reward might not be worth it any more.

It's quite possible the whole thing will closely follow the trajectory of the internet. What began as the wild west slowly became another facet of everyday life with a side order of extra freedom if you could be bothered. 

[teukon]

Wait.  Weren't agent Smith and "Mr. Andersen" enemies in that movie?  Is Neo's defection a planned plot element for The Matrix 4 or something?

[inBitweTrust]

https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/34riua/hard_fork_allow_20mb_blocks_after_1_march_2016/cqxeoj4

Reddit, I think you're jumping the gun based on watching a personal repository.

I think this is just some testing code-- he hasn't discussed this particular change with the other core developers; I for one would vigorously oppose it: for one, it's actually /broken/ because it doesn't change the protocol message size (makes for a nice example of how misleading unit tests often are; in this case they're vacuous as they don't catch that blocks over about 2MB wouldn't actually work). It's also not consistent with the last discussions we had with Gavin over his large block advocacy, where he'd agreed that his 20mb numbers were based on a calculation error. --- this without getting into the subtle concerns about long and short term incentives which are under-researched, or the practical issue of increasing node operating costs in a network with a node count that has fallen so much).

If y'all go around making a big deal about people's sketchpad work in their personal repos it creates an incentive to move all your work to private repositories where people can't get at them and read too much into them. I'd suggest you try to avoid doing that.

actually, it does change the protocol size....

.... But yes, it is intended as'it is time to discuss this now.' I will be writing a series of blog posts in the coming week or two responding to objections I've heard.

Healthy skepticism is fine... but sometimes these threads devolve into paranoia. Any critics of the block size limit increase should be criticizing specifics like Gregory Maxwell and offering other suggestions to the 3-7tps limitation dilemma.

[bambou]

when/if bitcoin becomes mainstream the majority of bitcoin users will use and rely on online wallets and exchanges, if these centralized companies collude together with big mining companies they will have the biggest blockchain and people won't even have the choice to change blockchain if they want to keep their money.

I think the only real way the consensus mechanism would work as it should is if the blockchain is forked in a way that anyone can mine and earn bitc, maybe by putting some sort of limit on processing power/node, decentralized mining is the only thing that will preserve integrity of the protocol IMO

I really wonder if there's going to be a way to get away from that outcome. Convenience and preserving their funds is more important to most people than decentralisation even when that's the core principle.

Circle/ Coinbase etc are already engaged on a slow creep towards being cornerstones of a future system. The miners are a much more random element but many are just out to make the most money.

By the time it become clear that decentralised mining is really necessary to keep the flame alive, the block reward might not be worth it any more.

It's quite possible the whole thing will closely follow the trajectory of the internet. What began as the wild west slowly became another facet of everyday life with a side order of extra freedom if you could be bothered.  

That bold stuff sums it up. Thing is the Internet is now just some NSA's extension for mass surveillance. Nothing like its inceptors, Cypher punks purists et al. thought of in the beginning. Thank you Google, Facebook & co.

Coinbase & co will sell you to USG. The same way Facebook did. Because Profit.

Coinbase and all US bitcoin startups will follow Gavin's plan as per extension with USG interests, AND FOR THEIR OWN INTEREST. Claiming thats what "market decides" or that you should've come with a "better solution" (to a NON-PROBLEM).
Hence Gavin is now aiming for a fork before we even get the chance to see what happens with full blocks.. and even before the Halving, which should send bitcoin beyond moonscape... Why such a hurry?!

Considering that even JPMorgan & co recognised the potential for Bitcoin to undertake exclusively and effectively large transactions worldwide.

If you cant see this then you are a lost US shill. Whether you recognize it or not. Just like Gavin, whether he is aware of being a USG muppet or not.

MUURICAAA FUCK NO.

[cr1776]

3/ Forking BS over and over again. now just before the Halving. hOw friggin convenient.
          https://github.com/gavinandresen/bitcoin-git/commit/5f46da29fd02fd2a8a787286fd6a56f680073770

I am not sure how ~15-16 months away from the halving  - only about 67% (15.5/48) of the way to a halving - is "just before".

A low limit on the block sizes was only considered a temporary measure all along.

[bambou]

3/ Forking BS over and over again. now just before the Halving. hOw friggin convenient.
          https://github.com/gavinandresen/bitcoin-git/commit/5f46da29fd02fd2a8a787286fd6a56f680073770

I am not sure how ~15-16 months away from the halving  - only about 67% (15.5/48) of the way to a halving - is "just before".

A low limit on the block sizes was only considered a temporary measure all along.

lol no. read again.

Hard fork: allow 20MB blocks after 1 March 2016

Reward-Drop ETA: 2016-07-29 05:53:43 UTC (64 weeks, 3 days, 22 hours, 30 minutes)
http://bitcoinclock.com/

thats hardly 5 months before, and there is still room to lessen the time left until halving.

[Lauda]

3/ Forking BS over and over again. now just before the Halving. hOw friggin convenient.
          https://github.com/gavinandresen/bitcoin-git/commit/5f46da29fd02fd2a8a787286fd6a56f680073770

I am not sure how ~15-16 months away from the halving  - only about 67% (15.5/48) of the way to a halving - is "just before".

A low limit on the block sizes was only considered a temporary measure all along.

Hard fork: allow 20MB blocks after 1 March 2016

Reward-Drop ETA: 2016-07-29 05:53:43 UTC (64 weeks, 3 days, 22 hours, 30 minutes)
http://bitcoinclock.com/

thats hardly 5 months before, and there is still room to lessen the time left until halving.

It's still not 'just before' the halving. No there is no room anymore, you don't know what you're talking about. You obviously have not either participated in many threads or read enough of them.
The halving might come earlier by 1 day than the time mentioned. It was actually coming closer at a quicker rate in the past.
There is nothing wrong with 20M blocks. If the other developers agree with Gavin this will get implemented. However, if they disagree then it won't.

[bambou]

<snap>

There is nothing wrong with 20M blocks. If the other developers agree with Gavin this will get implemented. However, if they disagree then it won't.

this is funny. please point me to such debate..

at best you could find devs disagreeing and in no condition there has been a consensus about it. just no.

yet Mr Bell is moving forward with HIS (USG) plan.

[hdbuck]

1- CIA wouldn't publicly interview their own agents (or potential ones)

2- TBF screwed themselves + stopped paying the devs in April. GA is still Chief Scientist though afaik.

3- Feel free to contribute yourself, offer alternative solutions or just stay on the old fork.

1/ Thats not an argument. Fact is Satoshi vanishes when Gavin is "invited" @CIA. but lol nobody is just "invited" there.. XD

2/ Gavin is/was an accomplice. Kinda like acknowledging their misbehavior by omission.

3/ I wouldnt call the 20Mb Fork a "contribution". More like a "retribution".. all the way back into USG's frame freaks.



Centralize & Control^TM

1- That's not really an argument for or against. But using the common sense, if CIA was to recruit GA, they would far more likely approached him quietly, instead of letting him make public statements about the invitation. Seems to me Satoshi did freak out over wikileaks accepting bitcoins (see his 2nd latest post).

2- Sure, let's not blame the ones that misbehaved, lets blame GA for his 'omission'. Anyway, how's that an argument of him being an agent?

3- I was referring to 'your contribution'. Don't like the fork? Let's hear your ideas/solutions. Most of people seem to agree with the need of lifting the limits with some difference of opinions on details.

That being said, I think it's actually healthy to consider the possibility of GA or any other dev to be an agent, and properly examine any proposed changes and look for threats etc. But announcing that as a fact because of the reasons stated in the OP is just daft.

1/ gavin is CIA buddy because "invitation". Gavin is USG buddy, because MIT Media LAB employee.

2/ gavin "worked" along scammers and deceivers a la Mark Karpeles, Shrem, Murk, Pierce and so on.

3/ there is no solution to be found to a non problem.

Im not saying Gavin is an classic Agent, like with a contract and a nice pension fund. Just that his intentions regarding Bitcoin are closely alined with USG's agenda. By now they surely made sure of it. Dont be naive man.

That being said, im done discussing this, i'll leave it to Bitcoin antifragileness.

[Lauda]

this is funny. please point me to such debate..

at best you could find devs disagreeing and in no condition there has been a consensus about it. just no.

yet Mr Bell is moving forward with HIS (USG) plan.

Do you think that this is an anarchy or something?
Here you can find the list of developers and contributors: https://bitcoin.org/en/development
The changes were made on Gavin's github, thus they are proposed changes. He can't force them. If the developers agree with Gavin then this commit will go into Bitcoin.

https://github.com/gavinandresen/bitcoin-git/commit/5f46da29fd02fd2a8a787286fd6a56f680073770

This is not Bitcoin.

Code:

https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin

This is Bitcoin.

[ashour]

Nah I don't think he is an agent

[R2D221]

Yeah, let's talk about “Gavincoin” again. Why not?

Let's see how many logical fallacies appear this time.

[bambou]

Yeah, let's talk about “Gavincoin” again. Why not?

Let's see how many logical fallacies appear this time.

fallacy spotted.

[R2D221]

Yeah, let's talk about “Gavincoin” again. Why not?

Let's see how many logical fallacies appear this time.

fallacy spotted.

The game is not just to spot them, but to prove they're fallacies.

[bambou]

Yeah, let's talk about “Gavincoin” again. Why not?

Let's see how many logical fallacies appear this time.

fallacy spotted.

The game is not just to spot them, but to prove they're fallacies.

Dude whatever, im not discussing gavincoin with you. Like you know im against (at least until we face the actual issue), I know you're a Gavin-by-extension-USG sweet little cheerleader.

Please move along, you are loosing your precious time.

This is about Gavin being sold to the Worst Totalitarian System Earth has ever bare.

[Cryptowatch.com]

This smell troll, but let's apply some logic to it.

facts:
1/ CIA "interview"
          https://bitcointalk.org/?topic=6652.0

"I want to get this out in the open because it is the kind of thing that will generate conspiracy theories", Gavin Andresen

Gavin is a person that obviously likes to go to conferences, to do talks and so on. Even though he's a coder, he also seems to be a people person. I think he actually got personally excited to go talk to the CIA.

It's not uncommon that high profile people in something like bitcoin will draw the interest of governments. He got an invitation to speak, accepted it, and no transcript exists, which is not uncommon for such arrangements.

         https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=113609.0

Satoshi not responding anymore after Gavin mentioning he went to see the CIA. It might be a coincidence, it might not. I think the most logic assumption is that it is not a coincidence. Whereas Satoshi needed no publicity, Gavin was the opposite. Satoshi would probably never have gone to the CIA to speak, and that's probably why he do not fancy anyone else doing it either. It's not a long stretch to imagine he'd drop the ball there and then in regards to mailing with Gavin.

2/ After screwing over at the very "honorable" TBF, he has now joined the MIT's Media LAB
          https://bitcoinmagazine.com/20132/gavin-andresen-core-developers-join-mits-digital-currency-initiative/
          http://www.media.mit.edu/files/sponsors.pdf

Being a part of the TBF let Gavin do what he enjoys most, to write code and get a salary. Now he has joined MIT's Media LAB and he will continue to do the same, and have access to other academics that he can communicate with, I assume it also gives him a paycheck. He gets to do what he likes the most, and he gets paid..

3/ Forking BS over and over again. now just before the Halving. hOw friggin convenient.
          https://github.com/gavinandresen/bitcoin-git/commit/5f46da29fd02fd2a8a787286fd6a56f680073770

Please read https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=946236.0 for a great post, to get insight in these matters. I do not think Gavin is an agent. He might be, but even if he was, all the code he writes will still be viewable, so if he did something openly hostile, it would most likely be spotted, and it would be a major outcry and he'd instantly lose all trust. Other devs would take up the work, and Govcoin or Gavcoin might get traction, but there would still be Bitcoin.

Since there's no hard and factual evidence here, and there's been no proper research apart from posting a few links that does not prove anything, this thread is over the top FUD.

[BCwinning]

The issue with let the network decide is most ppl don't read.
The "official" website only has to show his new client as the official client and they basically force
the network consensus. At the very least I'm sure they will push it as the way forward with no other
addendums or links to debate.
I for one will run a node 24/7/365 on the old software as my vote.
Hoping one of the alts will gain more traction that acts more like cash than bitcoin.

[RodeoX]

You have got to stop skipping school to watch movies.

[ajareselde]

Gaving is a core developer, and i doubt he even cares about the coming halving, or the bitcoin price.
It is his job to make bitcoin cope with future requirements, and i doubt we all even understand just how much he delivered.
TBF was/is a joke, but thats something else, im talking about Gavin alone now.

[BCwinning]

Gaving is a core developer, and i doubt he even cares about the coming halving, or the bitcoin price.
It is his job to make bitcoin cope with future requirements, and i doubt we all even understand just how much he delivered.
TBF was/is a joke, but thats something else, im talking about Gavin alone now.

I vote to fire him

[ajareselde]

Gaving is a core developer, and i doubt he even cares about the coming halving, or the bitcoin price.
It is his job to make bitcoin cope with future requirements, and i doubt we all even understand just how much he delivered.
TBF was/is a joke, but thats something else, im talking about Gavin alone now.

I vote to fire him

What would be the point, do you think someone better would step in his shoes ? ofc not, it would be the same like it is now.
Anyways, like i said many times, its the network that has the final say in the end, if majority refuses his proposal, Gavin has no power to overthrow that decision.

[AGD]

So Satoshi comes back after years for one message, which is - at the same time - not important enough for him to sign? So he didn't care about people knowing if it was really him or not? Why then write that message anyway? Without signing this message is senseless and at least Satoshi would know that.

[inBitweTrust]

Gaving is a core developer, and i doubt he even cares about the coming halving, or the bitcoin price.
It is his job to make bitcoin cope with future requirements, and i doubt we all even understand just how much he delivered.
TBF was/is a joke, but thats something else, im talking about Gavin alone now.

I vote to fire him

That isn't the way open source projects work. Anyone is free to contribute or not and those not contributing only "vote" by choosing to use the code or not. If you disagree with the consensus made between the developers and don't like the core maintainer you can work on a separate stack/repo or create your own.

Whining about it without contributing constructive criticism like other devs are doing is just pathetic and reflect you don't understand how open source works.

I am done with this thread and will avoid being drawn in any more of these silly conversations.

[AGD]

I would like to know Theymos' opinion about this. Maybe he can shine a light on this phoney message.

[BillyBobZorton]

Gaving is a core developer, and i doubt he even cares about the coming halving, or the bitcoin price.
It is his job to make bitcoin cope with future requirements, and i doubt we all even understand just how much he delivered.
TBF was/is a joke, but thats something else, im talking about Gavin alone now.

How can Galgin "not care" about the coming halving? It is related to the blocksize problem limit which he has been addressing endlessly lately. Everything has an impact as everything is connected. Im sure the halving will bring lots of media attention, which will mean newer users, which will mean more stress, which will mean the blocksize problem being more relevant than ever.

[snarlpill]

I think it's less likely that the CIA/US gov. is behind Gavin, Satoshi, and/or Bitcoin, and find it more likely that the US gov. is behind a few mixing sites and dark markets.

[JeromeL]

Everyone who is against the blockchain limit being raised has plenty of time to submit their own commits and or finding alternative solutions and working on them like the lightning network.

Its not like we haven't discussed this for years , a plan put in place many months ago, and now you can see the actual commit that is delayed 1 year. If anything Gavin is being extremely careful and this is changing at a snails pace.

Open source projects do not work with complaints. Either submit your own commit, stay on the old chain, or work on an alternative proposal that solves the 3-7tps limitation to convince all the other devs who support the 20MB hard fork.

There's no consensus in the core dev team. So things are not as simple as you think they are. In fact Greg Maxwell, Peter Todd and Jeff Garzik make very valid arguments. Scalability can be tackled from different perspectives (lightning networks, sidechain, offchain, local difficulty depending on blocksize, increasing block size, ...). Each with there ups and downs.

Maybe if people argue and disagree, especially on the when and the how, there is a reason. Reason you should not overlook. We are talking here about a controversial hardfork, this is really serious.

[futureofbitcoin]

That is not what I asked though.
I asked: Can anyone give me the link for when Satoshi said: "I am moving on, it's in good hands with Gavin and the guys"

Thanks  

He expressed interest in moving on months before and made preparations in advance but never gave a farewell message and simply disappeared leaving everyone wondering. His only response years later was :
"I am not Dorian Nakamoto."

I don't get why to everyone that 'proves" that dorian satoshi nakamoto is not THE satoshi nakamoto.

I mean if they were the same person, and he wanted to remain anonymous, what else would he say?

[BitUsher]

Gavin always struck me as someone intelligent and sincere. There will likely have to be some compromises made and Gregory does make some valid criticisms but we need to address the transaction limitations sooner than later.

[pawel7777]

I don't get why to everyone that 'proves" that dorian satoshi nakamoto is not THE satoshi nakamoto.

I mean if they were the same person, and he wanted to remain anonymous, what else would he say?

Then he would just make a short statement that he doesn't know what the reporter is talking about and refuse further comments. While Dorian got confused and said something like "I'm no longer involved in that project" in the presence of witnesses which gave Newsweek a good reason to publish the article as a fact.

But let's not further derail this thread.

[bambou]

This smell troll, but let's apply some logic to it.

facts:
1/ CIA "interview"
          https://bitcointalk.org/?topic=6652.0

"I want to get this out in the open because it is the kind of thing that will generate conspiracy theories", Gavin Andresen
Gavin is a person that obviously likes to go to conferences, to do talks and so on. Even though he's a coder, he also seems to be a people person. I think he actually got personally excited to go talk to the CIA.
It's not uncommon that high profile people in something like bitcoin will draw the interest of governments. He got an invitation to speak, accepted it, and no transcript exists, which is not uncommon for such arrangements.

Pure conjectures. What if you are not in Gavin's head?
CIA/NSA got their own analysts. What like Gavin knowledge and coding is unique now? please.

         https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=113609.0

Satoshi not responding anymore after Gavin mentioning he went to see the CIA. It might be a coincidence, it might not. I think the most logic assumption is that it is not a coincidence. Whereas Satoshi needed no publicity, Gavin was the opposite. Satoshi would probably never have gone to the CIA to speak, and that's probably why he do not fancy anyone else doing it either. It's not a long stretch to imagine he'd drop the ball there and then in regards to mailing with Gavin.

Thats more honest conjectures. Coincidence? lol no.  

2/ After screwing over at the very "honorable" TBF, he has now joined the MIT's Media LAB
          https://bitcoinmagazine.com/20132/gavin-andresen-core-developers-join-mits-digital-currency-initiative/
          http://www.media.mit.edu/files/sponsors.pdf

Being a part of the TBF let Gavin do what he enjoys most, to write code and get a salary. Now he has joined MIT's Media LAB and he will continue to do the same, and have access to other academics that he can communicate with, I assume it also gives him a paycheck. He gets to do what he likes the most, and he gets paid..

MIT MEDIA LAb = USG sponsored <=> Gavin = USG employee
Now who's interest is supposed to serve an employee again?

3/ Forking BS over and over again. now just before the Halving. hOw friggin convenient.
          https://github.com/gavinandresen/bitcoin-git/commit/5f46da29fd02fd2a8a787286fd6a56f680073770

Please read https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=946236.0 for a great post, to get insight in these matters. I do not think Gavin is an agent. He might be, but even if he was, all the code he writes will still be viewable, so if he did something openly hostile, it would most likely be spotted, and it would be a major outcry and he'd instantly lose all trust. Other devs would take up the work, and Govcoin or Gavcoin might get traction, but there would still be Bitcoin.

Since there's no hard and factual evidence here, and there's been no proper research apart from posting a few links that does not prove anything, this thread is over the top FUD.

Yes thank you i have red this, but then i'd be tempted to direct you to https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=919629.0 or https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=941331.0. The last one being a little messy.

Facts are hard to find, especially on something this sensitive. US citizens are even denied the truth regarding 911.
Banks, power, money, bitcoin, world, drugs.. I accept that I may not hold the truth, however I also recognize that it is always more complex.
The USG or even the bank(st)ers wont fold that easily. Just ask yourself what would they do.

[Eastfist]

The lot of you trying to prove points referencing stuff posted online or from media just shows you don't know the facts. You only accept what is presented to you as "facts". Gavin may not be an "agent", but I can confirm he is working with government in some capacity. Bitcoin IS a government project. Do you realize that anything that happens that may "disrupt" America must be run by the CIA/NSA first? It's all about control. So if Bitcoin succeeds, it's because CIA allowed it to. If it fails, it's because they wanted it to. In that sense, they tell Gavin to sabotage Bitcoin, then he collects his money, and throws a wrench in it. Then all his fanboys will believe it was with good intentions. By the time they lose their money, they'll blame anyone other than Gavin.

[RodeoX]

Stupid is the funniest kind of discussion!

[Eastfist]

Stupid is the funniest kind of discussion!

When money is involved, fantasy and delusion is reality.

[Eastfist]

Gavin does not care about Bitcoin. He's in it for the popularity and money. Trust me.

[BitUsher]

Gavin does not care about Bitcoin. He's in it for the popularity and money. Trust me.

Great thing about bitcoin is you don't need to trust anyone. Look at the code yourself, and if you don't like it make your own changes to contribute or fork it.

[Eastfist]

Take a look at this picture of Peter Todd, look at his T-Shirt and tell me he's being ironical. You don't wear a T-Shirt with NSA logo unless you idolize them or work for them.

I remember the first time I met Peter Todd, Jeff Garzik introduced him to me, he just seemed to pop out from nowhere. My encounter with him was brief. But I noticed he didn't swallow the bait even then. So I don't really know his real motive being in the Bitcoin game.

[BitUsher]

Take a look at this picture of Peter Todd, look at his T-Shirt and tell me he's being ironical. You don't wear a T-Shirt with NSA logo unless you idolize them or work for them.

From what I understand he hangs out with and talks like an anarchist. That shirt reminds me how all the hippie and druggie teens growing up in certain places of the US I visited would wear "D.A.R.E" (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) shirts to mock the teachers , parents and authority figures. Probably what Peter is doing here.

[Eastfist]

Take a look at this picture of Peter Todd, look at his T-Shirt and tell me he's being ironical. You don't wear a T-Shirt with NSA logo unless you idolize them or work for them.

From what I understand he hangs out with and talks like an anarchist. That shirt reminds me how all the hippie and druggie teens growing up in certain places of the US I visited would wear "D.A.R.E" shirts to mock the teachers , parents and authority figures. Probably what Peter is doing here.

Dude was a strange cat. But I only ever met him like 2 times.

[gentlemand]

Take a look at this picture of Peter Todd, look at his T-Shirt and tell me he's being ironical. You don't wear a T-Shirt with NSA logo unless you idolize them or work for them.

What a black and white world you must inhabit.

[Eastfist]

Take a look at this picture of Peter Todd, look at his T-Shirt and tell me he's being ironical. You don't wear a T-Shirt with NSA logo unless you idolize them or work for them.

What a black and white world you must inhabit.

Ask Peter Todd who I am.

[BitUsher]

Dude was a strange cat. But I only ever met him like 2 times.

The older we get the more I realize we are all strange and have unusual proclivities. We all tend to mask it for ourselves and friends and family members but in reality we are all weird to an outsider.

Bitcoin being a unique project likely attracts many "interesting " people and that is one reason I love it.

[gogxmagog]

I can't really see what use GA would be to the USG as an agent.
First; you would think, if he was, he would have to act in a covert manner. Not publicly announcing that he is going into talk with the CIA.
Second; CIA is used for operations outside of U.S. territory
Next; what is the purpose he serves? He helps the btc ecology, is moving a competing monetary system forward the USG's goal? The common anti-gov bias re; Bitcoin is Bitcoin must fail! If GA is an agent, he's doing it wrong

As Bitcoin exists today it isn't a threat to anyone. If, in say 5 years, we see mass adoption, and something goes terribly wrong with the basic protocol... Well maybe... But somehow I think you're giving these govt spooks more credit than they deserve

[QuestionAuthority]

I miss the old days when everyone on this forum would lick Gavin's ass like it was a lollypop. What's wrong with you people? Show some respect for the messiah of Bitcoin coding. If he wants to fork Bitcoin till it bleeds we'll support him because - Gavin.

As for USG controlling Bitcoin. The lead dev is not the way to do it. They could have infiltrated TBF. Pumped enough money into the org to keep it alive and increased Gavin's salary every year by $20k. That's the way to control Bitcoin. Gavin as a CIA agent is laughable. USG caring enough to control Bitcoin is also laughable. The only action the government has taken against Bitcoin was to apply FIAT laws to Bitcoin > fiat transactions, bust drug dealers, and bust FIAT money laundering. None of those things have anything to do with Bitcoin. If you were buying drugs, engaged in child prostitution, or allowing minors to gamble with chocolate chip cookies then laundering your cookies for fiat the governments reaction would be the same. Bitcoin is not the issue.

[Last of the V8s]

Of course he's not an agent. That's plain ridiculous. He's an asset.
Likely just like you, dear reader.
If you're an inhabitant of a Nato state and you swallow any of their bitcoin-must-scale propaganda, you are a CIA asset.

[Peter Todd]

Take a look at this picture of Peter Todd, look at his T-Shirt and tell me he's being ironical. You don't wear a T-Shirt with NSA logo unless you idolize them or work for them.

I remember the first time I met Peter Todd, Jeff Garzik introduced him to me, he just seemed to pop out from nowhere. My encounter with him was brief. But I noticed he didn't swallow the bait even then. So I don't really know his real motive being in the Bitcoin game.

lolololololol

I got that shirt from the Electronic Freedom Foundation's booth at 31c3: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/06/back-popular-demand-nsa-spying-t-shirts-members

Sadly the NSA isn't sufficiently self-aware to sell shirts saying "ALL YOUR DATA" with glowering, red-eyed eagle's... but they should be.

And for the record, I'm a Canadian - I work for CSIS, not the NSA.

[slavo]

Take a look at this picture of Peter Todd, look at his T-Shirt and tell me he's being ironical. You don't wear a T-Shirt with NSA logo unless you idolize them or work for them.

I remember the first time I met Peter Todd, Jeff Garzik introduced him to me, he just seemed to pop out from nowhere. My encounter with him was brief. But I noticed he didn't swallow the bait even then. So I don't really know his real motive being in the Bitcoin game.

lolololololol

I got that shirt from the Electronic Freedom Foundation's booth at 31c3: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/06/back-popular-demand-nsa-spying-t-shirts-members

Sadly the NSA isn't sufficiently self-aware to sell shirts saying "ALL YOUR DATA" with glowering, red-eyed eagle's... but they should be.

And for the record, I'm a Canadian - I work for CSIS, not the NSA.

traitor!

[Shindo1988]

Take a look at this picture of Peter Todd, look at his T-Shirt and tell me he's being ironical. You don't wear a T-Shirt with NSA logo unless you idolize them or work for them.

I remember the first time I met Peter Todd, Jeff Garzik introduced him to me, he just seemed to pop out from nowhere. My encounter with him was brief. But I noticed he didn't swallow the bait even then. So I don't really know his real motive being in the Bitcoin game.

lolololololol

I got that shirt from the Electronic Freedom Foundation's booth at 31c3: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/06/back-popular-demand-nsa-spying-t-shirts-members

Sadly the NSA isn't sufficiently self-aware to sell shirts saying "ALL YOUR DATA" with glowering, red-eyed eagle's... but they should be.

And for the record, I'm a Canadian - I work for CSIS, not the NSA.

traitor!

LOL!
We should hunt him down like Edwart Snowden.
Then he shall seek refuge in Russia!!!

LOL!!!!
 

[JorgeStolfi]

Maybe. A fork will severely damage the price.

The hard fork to increase the max block size should have been a no-brainer and a non-event, a routine maintenance  action predicted  and proposed by Satoshi himself when he added the arbitrary 1 MB limit.  Why has it become the most dreadful menace to the future of bitcoin?

My best guess is that the promises that the Blockcstream guys made to their investors, when they got their funding, depend on there being no block size increase, no matter how modest.  That would explain their uncompromising and hysterical opposition to the increase -- and the changes that they are making to the protocol.

Specifically, I guess that they promised investors that bitcoin network would become congested by 2016, and then users would be forced to move to some "overlay network" that would carry most of the payment traffic, with only occasional settlements being made on the old bitcoin network.  

Blockstream (they must have said) would then be the key player in that "overlay space", because they already were developing the technology that will make the overlay network possible (sidechains, at the time).  Moreover, since several key developers were partners or employees of Blocksrteam, they had commit control of BitcoinCore, the "official" implementation of the protocol; so they would be able to make any change that they needed to the protocol (like new opcodes), while blocking any change that competitors may need, or that might make the overlay network economically unattractive -- such as a block size increase.  

But (the investors must have asked) if the capacity of the bitcoin network itself is not increased, the number of transactions will forever be limited to 300'000 per day; so how will mining continue to be viable while the block reward gets halved?  Well, Blockstream's forecast (and this is no guess) is that by 2016, as the network becomes congested, there will arise a "fee market", where bitcoin users would have to offer higher and higher fees in order to buy space on the next block.  If the average transaction fee increased to 1.5 USD or more, the revenue from fees (450'000 USD/day) would compensate the halving of the block reward, and there would be no drop in the hashpower.    

To make that "fee market" more "efficient", Blockstream was counting on a couple of changes to the queue-management part of the core software ("replace-by-fee" and "child-pays-for-parent") that would allow clients to increment the fees of transactions that were stuck in the queue, and thus jump over other transactions with smaller fees.

According to this plan, the bitcoin network would be worth using only for large-value transactions, including the "export" of bitcoins to sidechains and settlements between the sidechains.  (Since then it became clear that sidechains will not work as intended, but Blockstream found a new vaporware to take their place in the plan, the Lightning Network.)  Most of the individual users, and services like BitPay and Bitstamp, would be forced to move to the overlay network.  

If that is the plan that they sold to their investors, their attitude would made perfect sense.  Gavin's proposal to increase the block size not only would postpone the need for the overlay network by many years, but also would show that Blockstream did not have control of the protocol.   The investors who bought those claims would be quite displeased, to put it mildly.  

So, at first Blockstream tried to block Gavin's proposal with the claim that it would make nodes terribly expensive.  Which is nonsense, since an increase in the *max size*  would not cause any immediate change to the *average size*: the latter would just continue growing (hopefully) at the current rate, and increase (gradually) beyond 1 MB only in a few years time.  But since the increase proposal has been reduced to 8 MB, they ran out of technical arguments.  So they had to resort to spreading FUD about the terrible risk of a hard fork (while doing soft forks themselves) and personal attacks on Gavin and Mike.

I have no particular admiration for Gavin.  He should have distanced himself from the Shrem Karpelès & Friends Foundation when it started to smell bad; instead, he stayed there as long as it was paying his salary, and even criticized Antonopoulos for leaving it.  And I had not noticed Mike's existence until a month ago.  

Yet I must recognize that they are only trying to keep bitcoin working for a few more years as it was intended to work, and as all the community has come to expect it to work.  Blockstream, on the other hand, is honoring their name, in an ironic and unintended way: their plan is to block the bitcoin stream, so that all the bitcoiners are forced to buy their water...

Moreover, Gavin and Mike have the prudence, competence, technical knowledge, and common sense that are needed to manage a large software project like bitcoin, that manages hundreds of millions of dollars for hundreds of thousands of users.  

Whereas the new core developers, while they may be expert cryptographers and clever hackers, clearly lack those qualities. They seem unable to understand Mike's explanation of how queues behave as the traffic approaches the channel's capacity.  They are unable to see the "fee market" will not be a market but a chaotic melee.  They cannot make any quantitative estimates of what the traffic and fees will be in their planned future. (Had they done so, they would see that an overlay network will not solve the scalability problem, either.)  

One of them explained that all wallet apps out there would have to be modified, so that, instead of just signing a transaction offline, issuing it, and disconnecting, the client would have to first check the queues at the nodes to guess an appropriate minimum fee F, then sign several transactions with fees F, 2F, 4F, 8F, etc., issue the first one, then remain connected to the network, so that his wallet app can watch the queues, re-issuing the other versions as needed in order to remain in front of the the other clients (who are of course doing the same), until the transaction is confirmed; or until the app runs out of pre-signed transactions, and has to ask the client whether he wants to keep trying, in which case he would have to sign a few more.  And tha dev called it "a trivial change", because it would require only "a few lines of code ...

And, worst of all, they want to make bitcoin unusable for its stated goal, in order to force users to move to another network that has not been designed yet, may never work, will not be like bitcoin at all, and will not solve the scalability problem either...

As you may know, I am very skeptical about the long-term success of bitcoin, and I have no love at all for the pyramid investment scheme that has been built on top of it.  Yet, I was expecting to see years of slow price decline, perhaps even delayed by another price bubble or two.  But now, after watching this war and realizing what the players are up to, my hopes for a quick, spectacularly comical collapse have been revived...

  

[a fool and his money ...]

similar thread here:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1076841.0

[acid_rain]

Maybe. A fork will severely damage the price.

The hard fork to increase the max block size should have been a no-brainer and a non-event, a routine maintenance  action predicted  and proposed by Satoshi himself when he added the arbitrary 1 MB limit.  Why has it become the most dreadful menace to the future of bitcoin?

My best guess is that the promises that the Blockcstream guys made to their investors, when they got their funding, depend on there being no block size increase, no matter how modest.  That would explain their uncompromising and hysterical opposition to the increase -- and the changes that they are making to the protocol.

Specifically, I guess that they promised investors that bitcoin network would become congested by 2016, and then users would be forced to move to some "overlay network" that would carry most of the payment traffic, with only occasional settlements being made on the old bitcoin network.  

Blockstream (they must have said) would then be the key player in that "overlay space", because they already were developing the technology that will make the overlay network possible (sidechains, at the time).  Moreover, since several key developers were partners or employees of Blocksrteam, they had commit control of BitcoinCore, the "official" implementation of the protocol; so they would be able to make any change that they needed to the protocol (like new opcodes), while blocking any change that competitors may need, or that might make the overlay network economically unattractive -- such as a block size increase.  

But (the investors must have asked) if the capacity of the bitcoin network itself is not increased, the number of transactions will forever be limited to 300'000 per day; so how will mining continue to be viable while the block reward gets halved?  Well, Blockstream's forecast (and this is no guess) is that by 2016, as the network becomes congested, there will arise a "fee market", where bitcoin users would have to offer higher and higher fees in order to buy space on the next block.  If the average transaction fee increased to 1.5 USD or more, the revenue from fees (450'000 USD/day) would compensate the halving of the block reward, and there would be no drop in the hashpower.    

To make that "fee market" more "efficient", Blockstream was counting on a couple of changes to the queue-management part of the core software ("replace-by-fee" and "child-pays-for-parent") that would allow clients to increment the fees of transactions that were stuck in the queue, and thus jump over other transactions with smaller fees.

According to this plan, the bitcoin network would be worth using only for large-value transactions, including the "export" of bitcoins to sidechains and settlements between the sidechains.  (Since then it became clear that sidechains will not work as intended, but Blockstream found a new vaporware to take their place in the plan, the Lightning Network.)  Most of the individual users, and services like BitPay and Bitstamp, would be forced to move to the overlay network.  

If that is the plan that they sold to their investors, their attitude would made perfect sense.  Gavin's proposal to increase the block size not only would postpone the need for the overlay network by many years, but also would show that Blockstream did not have control of the protocol.   The investors who bought those claims would be quite displeased, to put it mildly.  

So, at first Blockstream tried to block Gavin's proposal with the claim that it would make nodes terribly expensive.  Which is nonsense, since an increase in the *max size*  would not cause any immediate change to the *average size*: the latter would just continue growing (hopefully) at the current rate, and increase (gradually) beyond 1 MB only in a few years time.  But since the increase proposal has been reduced to 8 MB, they ran out of technical arguments.  So they had to resort to spreading FUD about the terrible risk of a hard fork (while doing soft forks themselves) and personal attacks on Gavin and Mike.

I have no particular admiration for Gavin.  He should have distanced himself from the Shrem Karpelès & Friends Foundation when it started to smell bad; instead, he stayed there as long as it was paying his salary, and even criticized Antonopoulos for leaving it.  And I had not noticed Mike's existence until a month ago.  

Yet I must recognize that they are only trying to keep bitcoin working for a few more years as it was intended to work, and as all the community has come to expect it to work.  Blockstream, on the other hand, is honoring their name, in an ironic and unintended way: their plan is to block the bitcoin stream, so that all the bitcoiners are forced to buy their water...

Moreover, Gavin and Mike have the prudence, competence, technical knowledge, and common sense that are needed to manage a large software project like bitcoin, that manages hundreds of millions of dollars for hundreds of thousands of users.  

Whereas the new core developers, while they may be expert cryptographers and clever hackers, clearly lack those qualities. They seem unable to understand Mike's explanation of how queues behave as the traffic approaches the channel's capacity.  They are unable to see the "fee market" will not be a market but a chaotic melee.  They cannot make any quantitative estimates of what the traffic and fees will be in their planned future. (Had they done so, they would see that an overlay network will not solve the scalability problem, either.)  

One of them explained that all wallet apps out there would have to be modified, so that, instead of just signing a transaction offline, issuing it, and disconnecting, the client would have to first check the queues at the nodes to guess an appropriate minimum fee F, then sign several transactions with fees F, 2F, 4F, 8F, etc., issue the first one, then remain connected to the network, so that his wallet app can watch the queues, re-issuing the other versions as needed in order to remain in front of the the other clients (who are of course doing the same), until the transaction is confirmed; or until the app runs out of pre-signed transactions, and has to ask the client whether he wants to keep trying, in which case he would have to sign a few more.  And tha dev called it "a trivial change", because it would require only "a few lines of code ...

And, worst of all, they want to make bitcoin unusable for its stated goal, in order to force users to move to another network that has not been designed yet, may never work, will not be like bitcoin at all, and will not solve the scalability problem either...

As you may know, I am very skeptical about the long-term success of bitcoin, and I have no love at all for the pyramid investment scheme that has been built on top of it.  Yet, I was expecting to see years of slow price decline, perhaps even delayed by another price bubble or two.  But now, after watching this war and realizing what the players are up to, my hopes for a quick, spectacularly comical collapse have been revived...

  

Sir very interesting read. You write in a clear manner. but the whole wall of text hurt my eyeball. You should consider including a TL;DR summary whenever doing a long essay.

and yes, if it collapses due to its poor design flaws and dodgy patchwork, then yes I would agree with you that it would be a quick comical demise of btc but nonetheless it would have given humanity a blueprint.

[JorgeStolfi]

but nonetheless it would have given humanity a blueprint.

Bitcoin is still a very remarkable computer science experiment (that has become also a social and economical experiment, in ways that surely it was not intended to be).  It was a significant advance towards solving the old problem that it set to solve.  But it did not get there yet.

I am skeptical of its longterm success because it has still many flaws, that its fans, being unable to solve, prefer to call advantages.  To fix those flaws and allow it to achieve its stated goal, we need a few more ingenious inventions; which we cannot guess when oor whether they will be made.

Even if it succeeds, it will be just a cheaper, faster, easier, and maybe safer payment system.  It will not end crime, corruption, opression, hunger, wars, abuses of cops and courts, etc..  Clever technology alone cannot fix social, political, or economical problems.  On the contrary, technology often makes the problems worse.  Which we are seeing with bitcoin...

[justusranvier]

I am skeptical of its longterm success because it has still many flaws, that its fans, being unable to solve, prefer to call advantages.  To fix those flaws and allow it to achieve its stated goal, we need a few more ingenious inventions; which we cannot guess when oor whether they will be made.

The fundamental divide is between those whose goal is to create a wall of separation between money and State, and those do oppose that goal.

[JorgeStolfi]

To fix those flaws and allow it to achieve its stated goal, we need a few more ingenious inventions; which we cannot guess when oor whether they will be made.

What is Bitcoin's stated goal Jorge?

It is written right at the beginning of Satoshi's paper, as clearly as it could be.  That is why the protocol was designed as it was, and what the project was meant to achieve.

[hdbuck]

I am skeptical of its longterm success because it has still many flaws, that its fans, being unable to solve, prefer to call advantages.  To fix those flaws and allow it to achieve its stated goal, we need a few more ingenious inventions; which we cannot guess when oor whether they will be made.

The fundamental divide is between those whose goal is to create a wall of separation between money and State, and those do oppose that goal.

hum i thought the State was already separated from money, with central private banskters..

[acid_rain]

Well I do agree that when I first heard about its design, the whole idea of a public ledger (which is here to stay and be analysed forever) has flaws from a conceptual point of view IMO. Maybe take the good parts of BTC and redefine a new protocol would be more adequate in the case that BTC collapses on its own weight.

[justusranvier]

hum i thought the State was already separated from money, with central private banskters..

Why would you think that?

Do people use central bank money because of free choice, or because the central banks benefit from State-granted monopoly privileges?

[hdbuck]

To fix those flaws and allow it to achieve its stated goal, we need a few more ingenious inventions; which we cannot guess when oor whether they will be made.

What is Bitcoin's stated goal Jorge?

It is written right at the beginning of Satoshi's paper, as clearly as it could be.

A  purely   peer-to-peer   version   of   electronic   cash   would   allow   online
payments  to  be  sent   directly  from  one  party  to  another  without   going  through  a
financial institution.

And which flaws are preventing it from achieving this stated goal?

coinbase, bitpay et al. being the new financial institutions? ^^

[acid_rain]

hum i thought the State was already separated from money, with central private banskters..

Why would you think that?

Do people use central bank money because of free choice, or because the central banks benefit from State-granted monopoly privileges?

No one is arguing that BTC isn't a godsend from the bowels of human ingenuity. But maybe the protocol itself needs to be rethought from a software engineering point of view into making it scalable for the future.

[hdbuck]

hum i thought the State was already separated from money, with central private banskters..

Why would you think that?

Do people use central bank money because of free choice, or because the central banks benefit from State-granted monopoly privileges?

i think it is the opposite, as in the State abandoned their money printing privilege to the profit of private banking corporations and are now at their very mercy.

too big to fail remember?

[acid_rain]

To fix those flaws and allow it to achieve its stated goal, we need a few more ingenious inventions; which we cannot guess when oor whether they will be made.

What is Bitcoin's stated goal Jorge?

It is written right at the beginning of Satoshi's paper, as clearly as it could be.

A  purely   peer-to-peer   version   of   electronic   cash   would   allow   online
payments  to  be  sent   directly  from  one  party  to  another  without   going  through  a
financial institution.

And which flaws are preventing it from achieving this stated goal?

coinbase, bitpay et al. being the new financial institutions? ^^

You will always have the coinbases and bitpays of the world. Lamen people need to be spoon fed and things made easy. In software engineering terms its called user-friendliness. Otherwise there would never be a major adoption of anything.

[hdbuck]

hum i thought the State was already separated from money, with central private banskters..

Why would you think that?

Do people use central bank money because of free choice, or because the central banks benefit from State-granted monopoly privileges?

i think it is the opposite, as in the State abandoned their money printing privilege to the profit of private corporations and are now at their very mercy.

too big to fail remember?

State and corporations have joined in a system called corporatism.

yes but State's power is considerably reduced because of this. they are just public muppets now selling what's left of their respective countries (and people) to private interests..
hence it is nonsense to believe states have to be seperated from money, since they already are.

[justusranvier]

[JorgeStolfi]

A  purely   peer-to-peer   version   of   electronic   cash   would   allow   online
payments  to  be  sent   directly  from  one  party  to  another  without   going  through  a
financial institution.

And which flaws are preventing it from achieving this stated goal?

Some of them:

* Payments cannot be reversed, even when coins are sent to addresses that non one has the key, or as a result of crime.  That makes it unacceptable for most comercial and individual uses.

* Users are anonymous, which makes it much more attractive to criminals (much more so than cash, for obvious reasons).

* The fixed supply created the expectation of fabulous gains that turned it into a speculative pyramid schema

* That "ponzification" in turn resulted in extremely volatile price, that makes a bad currency.

* The block reward and the market price were too high, leading to a hypertrophied and unsustainable mining industry.

* For that reason, the cost per transaction is way too high.

* Mining got inevitably centralized (last time I checked, the top 5 Chinese miners had 60% of the hashpower).

* There is no mechanism to reward the relay nodes, which carry increasing load.

* Its design cannot support 1 billion users, maybe not even 10 million, even indirectly.

And a few more.  Before you say it, yes, I know that many bitcoiners see those as advantages rather than flaws.

[acid_rain]

A  purely   peer-to-peer   version   of   electronic   cash   would   allow   online
payments  to  be  sent   directly  from  one  party  to  another  without   going  through  a
financial institution.

And which flaws are preventing it from achieving this stated goal?

Some of them:

* Payments cannot be reversed, even when coins are sent to addresses that non one has the key, or as a result of crime.  That makes it unacceptable for most comercial and individual uses.

* Users are anonymous, which makes it much more attractive to criminals (much more so than cash, for obvious reasons).

* The fixed supply created the expectation of fabulous gains that turned it into a speculative pyramid schema

* That "ponzification" in turn resulted in extremely volatile price, that makes a bad currency.

* The block reward and the market price were too high, leading to a hypertrophied and unsustainable mining industry.

* For that reason, the cost per transaction is way too high.

* Mining got inevitably centralized (last time I checked, the top 5 Chinese miners had 60% of the hashpower).

* There is no mechanism to reward the relay nodes, which carry increasing load.

* Its design cannot support 1 billion users, maybe not even 10 million, even indirectly.

And a few more.  Before you say it, yes, I know that many bitcoiners see those as advantages rather than flaws.

As you said most of those points are considered to be pros rather than cons for 99% of the community.

The last 2 points are where the real problem is.

[twats]

Wasn't he CIA mole? https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1076841.0

[pereira4]

If you were a Maxwell hater, you would say Maxwell is an agent. Same goes for Satoshi.. etc. Everyone that is not liked by someone, gets called an agent. But the thing is, we are all trying to make Bitcoin better in here, just with some different viewpoints, thats all.

[blablaace]

the forking nonsense is just FUD .. he's trying to drive the price down so he can buy it up on the cheap

[Gleb Gamow]

the forking nonsense is just FUD .. he's trying to drive the price down so he can buy it up on the cheap

With what money? The few bucks he made while employed at TBF?

[tvbcof]

...
And for the record, I'm a Canadian - I work for CSIS, not the NSA.

For some time now I've relied pretty heavily on the alternative media for information on how the world works, but it's a tricky situation because the alternate media is chalk full of whackos and moles.  Lately I've put more focus on trying to separate the wheat from the chaff here out of necessity.  It does seem that Canadians are well represented in the alternate media (and related) spheres, and in addition that they seem to be among the most convincing.

Like any interesting observation, it opens of a plethora of new hypotheses.  One of them would be that for (possibly historic) legal reasons, it is more convenient for certain arms of our (supposed) government agencies to employ them.  Another would be that the jurisdictional boundaries give foreign citizens a more confidence to act as they please though I personally don't sense any foreboding in doing what I feel is right for the most part.  Yet.  Associated with the last thought, Canadians are more culturally similar to us, may be bored with their own country, and look with worry to the goings-on of their Southern neighbor.  I would be

I'll say that being a 'conspiracy theorist' is fairly demanding intellectually.  It was a lot easier when I could watch McNeil-Lehrer (my don't miss show as a kid) and figure that one of the two sides was saying what I should be believing.

[hdbuck]

There is no point for argument as this is like beating a dead horse. Some ppl are just dumb as a door knob. Accept it.

You want contributions, i can tell you few points but retards here wont accept it:

1) Opensource means no central of control. I can change some feature of bitcoin and let others decide to use it or not. That does not mean i have successfully forked Btc to be "seriouscoin" (now you know why i have this username, been telling idiots who think btc is just a bunch of code)

2) Network consensus means others can vote for features they want, yelling others who create/change a feature is dumb and censorship. You want open , then stop being a retard and think .

3) Bitcoin mining by design WILL BE CENTRALLIZED. That does not mean bitcoin is no longer decentralized. You must be an idiot to think otherwises, the same kind of idiots who thought LTC was ASIC-resistent....

thanks, simply all those points makes perfect sense to me, with logic and valid facts behind. actually, I agree with them. anyway, calling others "dumb as fck" is just lowering your reputation here, even you obviously know, what you're talking about..got it?

who cares about reputation on some random anonymous internet forum? gavin?

such cheap talk in here, people got their threads, assuming they would be of importance somehow.. such a joke.

decentralized consensus means you can try lobbying and brainwashing people, there will always be others that disagree and tell you how full of shit you are.

[BusyBeaverHP]

Blockstream is the agent, why have one sock-puppet, when you instead can have nine to ruse the public into the illusion called "consensus"?

[hdbuck]

Blockstream is the agent, why have one sock-puppet, when you instead can have nine to ruse the public into the illusion called "consensus"?

there is no consensus, but only the one of money. question is.. who has more?

[QuestionAuthority]

Take a look at this picture of Peter Todd, look at his T-Shirt and tell me he's being ironical. You don't wear a T-Shirt with NSA logo unless you idolize them or work for them.

I remember the first time I met Peter Todd, Jeff Garzik introduced him to me, he just seemed to pop out from nowhere. My encounter with him was brief. But I noticed he didn't swallow the bait even then. So I don't really know his real motive being in the Bitcoin game.

lolololololol

I got that shirt from the Electronic Freedom Foundation's booth at 31c3: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/06/back-popular-demand-nsa-spying-t-shirts-members

Sadly the NSA isn't sufficiently self-aware to sell shirts saying "ALL YOUR DATA" with glowering, red-eyed eagle's... but they should be.

And for the record, I'm a Canadian - I work for CSIS, not the NSA.

Good lord, you're a 19yo Canadian boy? I guess young people are more aptly suited to think outside the box. Your youth is fine but you're Canadian! I may need to rethink my continued support for Bitcoin. That's aboot all I can stand. So you're a socialist that codes while ice skating with a tall cup of Tim Horton's coffee while listening to Celine Dion? lol

[benjamindees]

* Payments cannot be reversed
* Users are anonymous

Advantages.

* The fixed supply created the expectation of fabulous gains that turned it into a speculative pyramid schema
* That "ponzification" in turn resulted in extremely volatile price, that makes a bad currency.
* The block reward and the market price were too high, leading to a hypertrophied and unsustainable mining industry.
* For that reason, the cost per transaction is way too high.

Fair enough.  Satoshi was not prescient.  I think he made it clear that he had hoped for slow, steady growth.  What he got instead was massive early attention and a bubble.  Bitcoin is not unique in that regard, however.  So I think we should try to lay responsibility for "ponzification" of real assets (nay, the entire economy) at the feet of those actually responsible.

* Mining got inevitably centralized (last time I checked, the top 5 Chinese miners had 60% of the hashpower).

Hmm... I think this is a bit controversial.  Mining centralization hasn't seemed to have had any ill effects, so far.  But fair point.

* There is no mechanism to reward the relay nodes, which carry increasing load.

Premature optimization is the root of all evil.

* Its design cannot support 1 billion users, maybe not even 10 million, even indirectly.

That's actually just not true.  There's good reason to believe it could support 1 billion users, indirectly at least.

[JorgeStolfi]

* Payments cannot be reversed
* Users are anonymous

Advantages.

As I wrote, bitcoiners call them advantages, but for the other 99.9% they are fatal flaws.  A system that does not allow mistakes and crimes to be corrected is a stupid defective system.  Anonymous accounts are much more useful to criminals than to honest people.  The two together prevents enforcement of property rights.

* Its design cannot support 1 billion users, maybe not even 10 million, even indirectly.

That's actually just not true.  There's good reason to believe it could support 1 billion users, indirectly at least.

1 billion users doing on average 1 payment per day would be 1 billion tx/day.

Suppose that most of the traffic gets pushed off the blockchain, e.g. to Lightning Network; even so, there will be a need for blockchain transactions.  Let's say that 25 transactions offchain for each transaction on the blockchain.  Then the bitcoin network would have to handle 40 million transactions per day.

The current capacity of the network is 300'000 transactions per day.  You don't want to operate near capacity even at peak hours, so 200'000 tx/day will probably be the limit with 1 MB blocks.  It would have to grow by a factor of 200.

That does not seem bad, but the Ligntning Network is still only a fuzzy dream. No one knows whether it is technically and economically viable, whether people will want to use it, whether it will really achieve 25:1 offchain/onchain ratio.

Note also that, in the 5 years since the 1MB limit was set, the capacity of the network has increased 0%.  How long will it take for it to increase 200x?

[cbeast]

* Payments cannot be reversed
* Users are anonymous

Advantages.

As I wrote, bitcoiners call them advantages, but for the other 99.9% they are fatal flaws.  A system that does not allow mistakes and crimes to be corrected is a stupid defective system.  Anonymous accounts are much more useful to criminals than to honest people.  The two together prevents enforcement of property rights.

If that were true there would not be cash. Everyone would simply use personal checks and use several forms of biometric ID.

[ammy009]

Absolutely NO. I voted for it 

[Xialla]

* Payments cannot be reversed

Advantages.

uhh my experience:

I'm using bitcoin at least once every week for buying some product/service (for last ~3 years) and I really can't call "non-reverse payment" system as advantage. Quick example: I paid part of my BFL order with BTC and part with paypal.

With BTC, I never got my money back, with paypal I simply opened dispute and they pushed them to reverse everything. I also made lot of mistakes during usage of paypal last years (wrong amount, wrong mail address) and I never had any problems to fix them.

With BTC, in last years I sent them once incorrect address (wrong copy paste) and 2x made mistake with floating point..

If you think, that non-reverse payment system is advantageous for customers/end-users, please time to time turn off your laptop, go outside and ask common people, what they think. maybe you will be surprised..

[S4VV4S]

* Payments cannot be reversed

Advantages.

uhh my experience:

I'm using bitcoin at least once every week for buying some product/service (for last ~3 years) and I really can't call "non-reverse payment" system as advantage. Quick example: I paid part of my BFL order with BTC and part with paypal.

With BTC, I never got my money back, with paypal I simply opened dispute and they pushed them to reverse everything. I also made lot of mistakes during usage of paypal last years (wrong amount, wrong mail address) and I never had any problems to fix them.

With BTC, in last years I sent them once incorrect address (wrong copy paste) and 2x made mistake with floating point..

If you think, that non-reverse payment system is advantageous for customers/end-users, please time to time turn off your laptop, go outside and ask common people, what they think. maybe you will be surprised..

That is true. Many people prefer the security the bank offers them, which is why they have their money there.
I am however sure that we will at some point see Bitcoin banks that will do that.

The question now is: Will merchants accept Bitcoin if they have to wait for 3 months for their payment to be cleared?
And have fear of chargebacks?

[Xialla]

The question now is: Will merchants accept Bitcoin if they have to wait for 3 months for their payment to be cleared?
And have fear of chargebacks?

merchants have to wait 3 months these days for clearing payments? I'm just asking, I really dunno.

why should be any serious merchant afraid of chargeback? In my entire life, I used chargeback once against BFL retards..As consumer, you have NO RIGHTS using bitcoin these days, you can only pray in basement, that merchant/service provider will deliver, what you paid for.

and this is not cool at all. Don't get me wrong here, I like bitcoin and everything, but counting non-reverse payment system THESE DAYS as ADVANTAGE is simply fucking madness.

[dblink]

CIA has nothing to do with the Bitcoin Digital currency, these are not into their projects, CIA is an external intelligence service tasked with gathering, processing and analyzing national security information from around the world, CIA has no domestic law enforcement function and is focused on overseas intelligence collection.

[hdbuck]

CIA has nothing to do with the Bitcoin Digital currency, these are not into their projects, CIA is an external intelligence service tasked with gathering, processing and analyzing national security information from around the world, CIA has no domestic law enforcement function and is focused on overseas intelligence collection.

Right, cuz bitcoin is not so much external, just domestic..

[QuestionAuthority]

CIA has nothing to do with the Bitcoin Digital currency, these are not into their projects, CIA is an external intelligence service tasked with gathering, processing and analyzing national security information from around the world, CIA has no domestic law enforcement function and is focused on overseas intelligence collection.

Sure, the CIA never does anything on U.S. soil. Also, you look beautiful in that dress, no you're not fat, the check is in the mail and I promise I won't cum in your mouth.

[JorgeStolfi]

The pseudonymous nature of Bitcoin allows savvy users to protect themselves from all types of crime, including criminals with shiny badges. I find it quite useful and I wouldn't initiate force on anyone. (I hesitate to simply say that, "I am not a criminal", because it seems that in today's world pretty much everything is a considered a "crime" if you look hard enough. As an example, I'll invoke Godwin's law and point out that Anne Frank was a criminal according to her government.)

We must distinguish what is (not) a crime from what ought (not) to be a crime.  The former is decided by laws and courts, and its mostly useless to discuss it except with a lawyer.   For the latter, each one is entitled to his opinion, has the right to defend it on forums, TV, bars, etc.,  and should take it to his lawmakers.

So you seem to be saying that, in your opinion, the only thing that should be a crime is "initiate force on anyone".  Well, that is not my opinion.  While you may not care for my opinion, you should worry that 99.9% of mankind does not agree, either.  

Theft and most kinds of fraud, even if they don't involve any violence, are crimes in almost every country (and I say "almost" just for precaution; actually I don't know of any exception).  In fact, the earliest criminal codes that survive cover theft as well as murder and other crimes.  Corruption of public servants (paying or being paid for violations of duty) is generally a crime, even if it is one where the law most often fails.

Taking drugs ought not to be a crime in my opinion; but pushing people into drugs (whether by advertising, by example, by peer pressure, or just by making them too easily available) ought to be a crime; and, likewise, profiting from other people's addictions.   Gross negligence ought to be a crime too (like intentionally failing to provide fire exits and safety equipment, failing to do standard safety checks in the design of buildings and machines, failing do standard medical tests or to report contagious diseases, etc.) -- and indeed it is in many jurisdictions.

Bitcoin allows me to enforce my property rights unlike any other asset on the planet. No one can take my coins without my explicit permission, again including those with shiny badges. (Before someone posts the $5 wrench comic, yes I realize that someone can attempt to threaten you until you give permission.)

Again, one must distinguish what are one's rights from what one thinks that ought to be one's rights.  The former are defined by laws and courts.  For the latter, different people will have different opinions.  Without a government, those opinions are irrelevant: in a dispute, the side with more guns, more thugs, or better skills will prevail.  

In particular, without laws and courts there is no concept of "property".  Property is distinct from possession; it is the right to have possession.  If a thief takes your car, he will have possession, but the car is still your property; and the government is supposed to use its power (with force, if needed) to take the car from the thief, and give possession back to you.   On the other hand, if you default on payments and the contract says that property of the car returns to the seller, the government is bound to support him in taking the car from you.  Ditto if you have possession of money that the government thinks it is their property (i.e., unpaid taxes).

[hdbuck]

The pseudonymous nature of Bitcoin allows savvy users to protect themselves from all types of crime, including criminals with shiny badges. I find it quite useful and I wouldn't initiate force on anyone. (I hesitate to simply say that, "I am not a criminal", because it seems that in today's world pretty much everything is a considered a "crime" if you look hard enough. As an example, I'll invoke Godwin's law and point out that Anne Frank was a criminal according to her government.)

We must distinguish what is (not) a crime from what ought (not) to be a crime.  The former is decided by laws and courts, and its mostly useless to discuss it except with a lawyer.   For the latter, each one is entitled to his opinion, has the right to defend it on forums, TV, bars, etc.,  and should take it to his lawmakers.

So you seem to be saying that, in your opinion, the only thing that should be a crime is "initiate force on anyone".  Well, that is not my opinion.  While you may not care for my opinion, you should worry that 99.9% of mankind does not agree, either. 

Theft and most kinds of fraud, even if they don't involve any violence, are crimes in almost every country (and I say "almost" just for precaution; actually I don't know of any exception).  In fact, http://www.general-intelligence.com/library/hr.pdfthe earliest criminal codes that survive cover theft as well as murder and other crimes.  Corruption of public servants (paying or being paid for violations of duty) is generally a crime, even if it is one where the law most often fails.

Taking drugs ought not to be a crime in my opinion; but pushing people into drugs (whether by advertising, by example, by peer pressure, or just by making them too easily available) ought to be a crime; and, likewise, profiting from other people's addictions.   Gross negligence ought to be a crime too (like intentionally failing to provide fire exits and safety equipment, failing to do standard safety checks in the design of buildings and machines, failing do standard medical tests or to report contagious diseases, etc.) -- and indeed it is in many jurisdictions.

Bitcoin allows me to enforce my property rights unlike any other asset on the planet. No one can take my coins without my explicit permission, again including those with shiny badges. (Before someone posts the $5 wrench comic, yes I realize that someone can attempt to threaten you until you give permission.)

Again, one must distinguish what are one's rights from what one thinks that ought to be one's rights.  The former are defined by laws and courts.  For the latter, different people will have different opinions.  Without a government, those opinions are irrelevant: in a dispute, the side with more guns, more thugs, or better skills will prevail. 

In particular, without laws and courts there is no concept of "property".  Property is distinct from possession; it is the right to have possession.  If a thief takes your car, he will have possession, but the car is still your property; and the government is supposed to use its power (with force, if needed) to take the car from the thief, and give possession back to you.   On the other hand, if you default on payments and the contract says that property of the car returns to the seller, the government is bound to support him in taking the car from you.  Ditto if you have possession of money that the government thinks it is their property (i.e., unpaid taxes).

state & violence: http://trilema.com/2015/the-problem-of-the-state/

[benjamindees]

We must distinguish what is (not) a crime from what ought (not) to be a crime.

We should also distinguish the way legal systems actually work from how they ought to work.  You've offered a lot of opinions on how they ought to work.  How they work instead is that international financiers buy off or threaten all of the judges and they just do whatever they are told.  Legal systems have no duty to protect individual rights.  When push comes to shove, they don't even have the ability to do so.  Trial judges typically don't even attempt to try.  Millions of people live outside of organized legal systems.  And national governments and their dictates have no jurisdiction in international relations, where Bitcoin must reside.

So you seem to be saying that, in your opinion, the only thing that should be a crime is "initiate force on anyone".  Well, that is not my opinion.

Then your opinion is inconsistent and, therefore, wrong.  It is impossible for any logic-based system to attempt to impose your opinion.  So there is no reason for Bitcoin to even try; and it won't.

A system that does not allow mistakes and crimes to be corrected is a stupid defective system.

Yes, and that's the "system" most of us live under.  Fortunately, Bitcoin isn't a "system".  It's a simple realization of fundamental natural law.  I'm sure, at some point, some will attempt to build reversible "systems" on top of Bitcoin.  And then you and the other 99% can use those, if you prefer.  But, when that happens, they will be as voluntary as Bitcoin is.

In particular, without laws and courts there is no concept of "property".

Individuals are perfectly capable of enforcing agreements without laws and courts.

As I wrote, bitcoiners call them advantages, but for the other 99.9% they are fatal flaws.

I'd argue that most people prefer their currency not to track and front-run them and not to evaporate based on the whims of some third party.  The current bank runs going on in Greece should be evidence of this.

Like I said, Bitcoin is a currency.  It's not a "system".  Systems can be built on top of Bitcoin, and using Bitcoin;  and, eventually, they will be.  But nothing like Bitcoin, which protects the rights of everyone, not just those lucky few capable of navigating corrupt legal systems, can be built on top of any kind of "system" you have advocated so far.

[Kazimir]

No, but even if it were true... What difference would it make?

[tvbcof]

...

...

The above is really nice work in my opinion.  Thanks, bengamindees, for taking the time.

I'll look forward to StolfiCoin as a sidechain and would not hesitate to use it.  If his ideas are good and the offer the kinds of protections for individuals and need for the state that he promises, it will be successful.  If not it will fail.

I have no problem supporting the needs of the state if the state is supporting the needs of the people and will gladly do so.  When the needs of the people are not being served adequately and transparently by the state, I very much welcome other options.

[RodeoX]

I find it so fascinating to see what people think "agents" do.

[Xialla]

I find it so fascinating to see what people think "agents" do.

yeap, everybody is just full of some hollywood blockbusters and similar stuff. common agent is just doing paperwork and bureaucracy, but it least is funny to read, what others imagine behind agent role:)

[acid_rain]

I find it so fascinating to see what people think "agents" do.

yeap, everybody is just full of some hollywood blockbusters and similar stuff. common agent is just doing paperwork and bureaucracy, but it least is funny to read, what others imagine behind agent role:)

I point my finger towards The Bourne movies. They're the culprit!

[BitcoinEXpress]

Yes Gavin is an agent and wants to destroy Bitcoin

No Doubt this explains why he has worked for five years tirelessly to make Bitcoin what it is today.

Because he wants to destroy it.



~BCX~

[JorgeStolfi]

We must distinguish what is (not) a crime from what ought (not) to be a crime.

We should also distinguish the way legal systems actually work from how they ought to work.

But that is another question altogether.  The point is that the word "crime" cannot even be defined, except as "whatever the laws and courts say it is a crime".  Without laws and courts, there are just 7 billion different opinions of what ought to be a crime, and no objective way to choose among them.

So you seem to be saying that, in your opinion, the only thing that should be a crime is "initiate force on anyone".  Well, that is not my opinion.

Then your opinion is inconsistent and, therefore, wrong.  It is impossible for any logic-based system to attempt to impose your opinion.  So there is no reason for Bitcoin to even try; and it won't.

Duh?

Fortunately, Bitcoin isn't a "system".  It's a simple realization of fundamental natural law.

What "findamental natural law"?

If you refer to "guaranteed by math", it isn't: bitcoin is a process executed by humans with the aid of computers.  The humans are unpredictable, and their computers can be programmed to do anything.  

If you mean that "property" is a "natural" concept, you are just wrong.  Property is a cultural invention that (like "crime") did not exist before humans invented governments and laws.

In particular, without laws and courts there is no concept of "property".

Individuals are perfectly capable of enforcing agreements without laws and courts.  

How exacty? By shooting at each other?  By starting a thread on bitcointalk?

An agreement or contract is useless if there isn't an authority that can force the parties to honor it, and arbitrate disagrements.   That is why every functioning contract specifies the jurisdiction for resolving disputes over it.  The ridiculous "contract" between Roger Ver and OKCoin showed very well what happens when that clause is missing...

[QuestionAuthority]

I find it so fascinating to see what people think "agents" do.

Agents sell insurance.



Special Investigators commit crimes for the CIA and FBI.

[BitcoinEXpress]

I find it so fascinating to see what people think "agents" do.

My fav is Special Agent Oso!

Kinda looks like Gavin 

~BCX~

[YarkoL]

Again, one must distinguish what are one's rights from what one thinks that ought to be one's rights.  The former are defined by laws and courts.  For the latter, different people will have different opinions.  Without a government, those opinions are irrelevant: in a dispute, the side with more guns, more thugs, or better skills will prevail.  

In particular, without laws and courts there is no concept of "property".  Property is distinct from possession; it is the right to have possession.  If a thief takes your car, he will have possession, but the car is still your property; and the government is supposed to use its power (with force, if needed) to take the car from the thief, and give possession back to you.   On the other hand, if you default on payments and the contract says that property of the car returns to the seller, the government is bound to support him in taking the car from you.  Ditto if you have possession of money that the government thinks it is their property (i.e., unpaid taxes).

So you are saying that property is a social construct ?

I think the notion of property is intrinsically linked with privacy, and is
a natural consequence of the fact that we are endowed with thoughts, aims and aspirations
that are not immediately visible to others. These constitute the primal basis
of ownership, and tangible things that one acquires to make her life better
are natural extension of them, and so they too are one's private property.
This concept of natural ownership precedes governments.

Whatever happens to Bitcoin, its greatest value is that it has demonstrated
that you can have transferable and divisible digital property without resort
to central authority that sanctions its use. This is like a first shot in a revolution.

From now on, we have a realistic prospect of developing "smart" contracts
- like payment of a car for example -.that are enforced by algorithms and not by
"the side with more guns, more thugs", i.e. the government.
 

[hdbuck]

Yes Gavin is an agent and wants to destroy Bitcoin

No Doubt this explains why he has worked for five years tirelessly to make Bitcoin what it is today.

Because he wants to destroy it.



~BCX~

Its not about destruction, but more about highjacking it for USG's purposes.

[BitcoinEXpress]

Yes Gavin is an agent and wants to destroy Bitcoin

No Doubt this explains why he has worked for five years tirelessly to make Bitcoin what it is today.

Because he wants to destroy it.



~BCX~

Its not about destruction, but more about highjacking it for USG's purposes.

I don't have a problem with that.

If Bitcoin could benefit the US Gov, then that's a good thing for Bitcoin.


~BCX~

[bitnanigans]

Haha. Welcome to bitcoin, a world of intrigue and drama.

[BitcoiNaked]

I believe he's an agent too, people think just because bitcoin is decentralized, all those involved must be legit. He is a kind person yes.

[tvbcof]

Yes Gavin is an agent and wants to destroy Bitcoin

No Doubt this explains why he has worked for five years tirelessly to make Bitcoin what it is today.

Because he wants to destroy it.

~BCX~

Its not about destruction, but more about highjacking it for USG's purposes.

I don't have a problem with that.

If Bitcoin could benefit the US Gov, then that's a good thing for Bitcoin.

~BCX~

Hopefully you will get your wish.  I'm looking forward to a USG Federal level sidechain so I can use it to pay my taxes and so on.  Sidechains are a nearly perfect proxy for actual BTC, so it is completely accurate to say that using a sidechain is the same as using Bitcoin.

Also looking forward to a state-level on, county level one, and community level one.  I need to pay the state and the country independent taxes and am happy to do so as they both provide services that I appreciate and the citizens benefit from.

There would be, of course, very few legitimate reasons for these sidechains to not be quite transparent.  I've actually never complained a lot about taxes in the first place, but would be an even more satisfied tax-payer if I could see how the money I cough up is being used.

[QuestionAuthority]

Yes Gavin is an agent and wants to destroy Bitcoin

No Doubt this explains why he has worked for five years tirelessly to make Bitcoin what it is today.

Because he wants to destroy it.

~BCX~

Its not about destruction, but more about highjacking it for USG's purposes.

I don't have a problem with that.

If Bitcoin could benefit the US Gov, then that's a good thing for Bitcoin.

~BCX~

Hopefully you will get your wish.  I'm looking forward to a USG Federal level sidechain so I can use it to pay my taxes and so on.  Sidechains are a nearly perfect proxy for actual BTC, so it is completely accurate to say that using a sidechain is the same as using Bitcoin.

Also looking forward to a state-level on, county level one, and community level one.  I need to pay the state and the country independent taxes and am happy to do so as they both provide services that I appreciate and the citizens benefit from.

There would be, of course, very few legitimate reasons for these sidechains to not be quite transparent.  I've actually never complained a lot about taxes in the first place, but would be an even more satisfied tax-payer if I could see how the money I cough up is being used.

Murricans should be able to see every dollar the government spends right now without using Bitcoin (except the CIA because their budget is classified). 

[JorgeStolfi]

So you are saying that property is a social construct ?  I think the notion of property is intrinsically linked with privacy [ ... ] This concept of natural ownership precedes governments.

Neither privacy nor property are "natural".  Have a look at any of the hunter-gatherer people who still exist out there.  Nothing is more alien to their culture than "privacy", not even of thir bodies.  If they are nomadic, their material possessions are so scant that "property rights", even if they are present, play an insignificant role in their economy, and are restricted to the objects that they use and cannot be used by others at the same time.  Most of those objects need to be remade periodically.  The more settled tribes may have single family huts (without fences, walls, or locks), but many have instead big multi-family homes, and communal buildings where people spend most of their time indoors.

Most importantly, their "property rights" are not really rights, to the extent that there is no third party to enforce them.  Suppose that a bully takes the bracelet or bow from a weaker tribesman, "because I am strong and you are a wimp".  The victim will be unhappy, but so what?  If the rest of the tribe forces the bully to return the object, there you have governmet and laws, even if unformalized and unwritten.  If the others don't care, what would be the point of saying that the victim has "property rights" over the object?

a natural consequence of the fact that we are endowed with thoughts, aims and aspirations
that are not immediately visible to others.

Those tribes are proof that one thing does not lead to the other.

Whatever happens to Bitcoin, its greatest value is that it has demonstrated
that you can have transferable and divisible digital property without resort
to central authority that sanctions its use.

Bitcoin transfers "possession", not "property". 

From now on, we have a realistic prospect of developing "smart" contracts
- like payment of a car for example -.that are enforced by algorithms and not by
"the side with more guns, more thugs", i.e. the government.
 

I would really like to see a smart contract work without backing of police, laws, and courts.  (Note that contracts are like fire extinguishers: they are useful only when things fail to happen the way they were supposed to happen.)

[tvbcof]

Hopefully you will get your wish.  I'm looking forward to a USG Federal level sidechain so I can use it to pay my taxes and so on.  Sidechains are a nearly perfect proxy for actual BTC, so it is completely accurate to say that using a sidechain is the same as using Bitcoin.

Also looking forward to a state-level on, county level one, and community level one.  I need to pay the state and the country independent taxes and am happy to do so as they both provide services that I appreciate and the citizens benefit from.

There would be, of course, very few legitimate reasons for these sidechains to not be quite transparent.  I've actually never complained a lot about taxes in the first place, but would be an even more satisfied tax-payer if I could see how the money I cough up is being used.

Murricans should be able to see every dollar the government spends right now without using Bitcoin (except the CIA because their budget is classified). 

If it were available on a public ledger in real-time, it is likely that many people would find it practical to get this (theoretically) available information and reduce and publish it.  Bitcoin has demonstrated this.

It just dawned on me now that it actually would be pretty nice if people had to publicly register their own data if they wished to receive payments from the government so tax-payers could analyse the 'first hop' out of government control in tracking how our funds are being spent.

[RodeoX]

OMG, I just realized how serious this is. Did you guys know that Agent Gavin has a copy OF EVERY SINGLE BITCOIN Tx you have ever made! 

[QuestionAuthority]

Hopefully you will get your wish.  I'm looking forward to a USG Federal level sidechain so I can use it to pay my taxes and so on.  Sidechains are a nearly perfect proxy for actual BTC, so it is completely accurate to say that using a sidechain is the same as using Bitcoin.

Also looking forward to a state-level on, county level one, and community level one.  I need to pay the state and the country independent taxes and am happy to do so as they both provide services that I appreciate and the citizens benefit from.

There would be, of course, very few legitimate reasons for these sidechains to not be quite transparent.  I've actually never complained a lot about taxes in the first place, but would be an even more satisfied tax-payer if I could see how the money I cough up is being used.

Murricans should be able to see every dollar the government spends right now without using Bitcoin (except the CIA because their budget is classified). 

If it were available on a public ledger in real-time, it is likely that many people would find it practical to get this (theoretically) available information and reduce and publish it.  Bitcoin has demonstrated this.

It just dawned on me now that it actually would be pretty nice if people had to publicly register their own data if they wished to receive payments from the government so tax-payers could analyse the 'first hop' out of government control in tracking how our funds are being spent.

That sounds nice in theory but I doubt the average current Bitcoin user (more tech savvy than most) could effectively parse the blockchain to find their own transactions. Tracking the distribution of funds from central receiving to final expenditure would be a nightmarish task for Joe Blow. 

[tvbcof]

Murricans should be able to see every dollar the government spends right now without using Bitcoin (except the CIA because their budget is classified). 

If it were available on a public ledger in real-time, it is likely that many people would find it practical to get this (theoretically) available information and reduce and publish it.  Bitcoin has demonstrated this.

It just dawned on me now that it actually would be pretty nice if people had to publicly register their own data if they wished to receive payments from the government so tax-payers could analyse the 'first hop' out of government control in tracking how our funds are being spent.

That sounds nice in theory but I doubt the average current Bitcoin user (more tech savvy than most) could effectively parse the blockchain to find their own transactions. Tracking the distribution of funds from central receiving to final expenditure would be a nightmarish task for Joe Blow. 

Note that in Bitcoin-land there are a multitude of tools made publically available by people who had a modicum of skill.  They allow all manners of pretty general graphics, and simple queries for users which produce legible processed results.

I see no reason why a shit-load of such things would not be created to analyze [corp/]gov monetary flows if the data were as available as it is in the blockchain based Bitcoin system.

[QuestionAuthority]

Murricans should be able to see every dollar the government spends right now without using Bitcoin (except the CIA because their budget is classified). 

If it were available on a public ledger in real-time, it is likely that many people would find it practical to get this (theoretically) available information and reduce and publish it.  Bitcoin has demonstrated this.

It just dawned on me now that it actually would be pretty nice if people had to publicly register their own data if they wished to receive payments from the government so tax-payers could analyse the 'first hop' out of government control in tracking how our funds are being spent.

That sounds nice in theory but I doubt the average current Bitcoin user (more tech savvy than most) could effectively parse the blockchain to find their own transactions. Tracking the distribution of funds from central receiving to final expenditure would be a nightmarish task for Joe Blow. 

Note that in Bitcoin-land there are a multitude of tools made publically available by people who had a modicum of skill.  They allow all manners of pretty general graphics, and simple queries for users which produce legible processed results.

I see no reason why a shit-load of such things would not be created to analyze [corp/]gov monetary flows if the data were as available as it is in the blockchain based Bitcoin system.

That simply transfers trust in the ability of the little low paid government functionaries that currently report to trust in the toolmakers. I suppose it's better because multiple people could review the proper operation of the tool. Then again, there are already private individuals/whistleblowers that review the government budgets. I see it as a wash.

[YarkoL]

Most importantly, their "property rights" are not really rights, to the extent that there is no third party to enforce them.  Suppose that a bully takes the bracelet or bow from a weaker tribesman, "because I am strong and you are a wimp".  The victim will be unhappy, but so what?  If the rest of the tribe forces the bully to return the object, there you have governmet and laws, even if unformalized and unwritten.  If the others don't care, what would be the point of saying that the victim has "property rights" over the object?

Where I live there are still nomadic people (the Sámi) and yes they do have personal things
like clothes and tools and flocks of reindeer as they have had for
thousand years. The major thing that distinguishes them is their
wandering pastoral lifestyle instead of agricultural-based one, that ties one to
the soil.

If the tribesmen come to the defense of someone who has been robbed
of his belongings, that does not mean some kind of primitive police
or government but simply the collective acknowledgement of intrinsic
right to primitive property.

My view is simply that notion of property predates legal formulations
upheld by government, whereas  you appeared to claim that it is created by them
and would not exist without them. And it follows from my premise that there are other
means to secure them than govermental or even social control.

I would really like to see a smart contract work without backing of police, laws, and courts.  (Note that contracts are like fire extinguishers: they are useful only when things fail to happen the way they were supposed to happen.)

Crowdfunding is an example that comes to mind - you transfer an amount
of value to a recipient, and the contract stipulates that if you don't get something
by some date, you'll get your amount back just as everyone else who contributed.
Such a contract is easily implemented algorithmically with just a few lines of code,
and everyone can instantly see that it works.

So which one are we likely to trust - impartial mathematics or some guy with a rubber stamp?

[Fullbuster]

OMG, I just realized how serious this is. Did you guys know that Agent Gavin has a copy OF EVERY SINGLE BITCOIN Tx you have ever made! 

shit, i felt terrible, Gavin is an agent!

[RodeoX]

OMG, I just realized how serious this is. Did you guys know that Agent Gavin has a copy OF EVERY SINGLE BITCOIN Tx you have ever made! 

shit, i felt terrible, Gavin is an agent!

Oh crap, it's worse than I thought. I ALSO HAVE A COPY ON MY COMPUTER!!!! WTF???
I must be some kind of "Manchurian candidate".

[Gleb Gamow]

OMG, I just realized how serious this is. Did you guys know that Agent Gavin has a copy OF EVERY SINGLE BITCOIN Tx you have ever made!  

shit, i felt terrible, Gavin is an agent!

Oh crap, it's worse than I thought. I ALSO HAVE A COPY ON MY COMPUTER!!!! WTF???
I must be some kind of "Manchurian candidate".

It's wurst than that! I'm your sausage-running, mate.

[Fullbuster]

OMG, I just realized how serious this is. Did you guys know that Agent Gavin has a copy OF EVERY SINGLE BITCOIN Tx you have ever made!  

shit, i felt terrible, Gavin is an agent!

Oh crap, it's worse than I thought. I ALSO HAVE A COPY ON MY COMPUTER!!!! WTF???
I must be some kind of "Manchurian candidate".

It's wurst than that! I'm your sausage-running, mate.

how the heck you got another copy? decipher it, it might contain s0me secret message from Gavin the Agent

[JorgeStolfi]

If the tribesmen come to the defense of someone who has been robbed
of his belongings, that does not mean some kind of primitive police
or government but simply the collective acknowledgement of intrinsic
right to primitive property.

What difference do you see between the Sámi tribesmen enforcing his property rights, or the Finnish courts?  Just because the Finnish "tribesmen" pay someone to do that task for them?

In both cases, property rights exist because there is a third party that decides who (by their rules) is the proprietor, and has the power to ensure that he gets possession of the thing, by taking it away from anyone who has possession of it but (in their view) is not the proprietor.

My view is simply that notion of property predates legal formulations
upheld by government, whereas  you appeared to claim that it is created by them
and would not exist without them.

Yes, I do claim that "property" requires an authority that can enforce it. 

I would really like to see a smart contract work without backing of police, laws, and courts.  (Note that contracts are like fire extinguishers: they are useful only when things fail to happen the way they were supposed to happen.)

Crowdfunding is an example that comes to mind - you transfer an amount
of value to a recipient, and the contract stipulates that if you don't get something
by some date, you'll get your amount back just as everyone else who contributed.
Such a contract is easily implemented algorithmically with just a few lines of code,
and everyone can instantly see that it works.

Erm, I don't see how that works, sorry.  The recipient is supposed to spend that money while creating the something.  At the end of the allotted period he has spent it all, but there is no something, or it is only half finished, or it does not work.  What then?

Unless you mean a crowdfunded sale of something that already exists and is ready?  Even so, who is going to decide whether the something was delivered and meets the terms of the contract?

[YarkoL]

What difference do you see between the Sámi tribesmen enforcing his property rights, or the Finnish courts?  Just because the Finnish "tribesmen" pay someone to do that task for them?

In both cases, property rights exist because there is a third party that decides who (by their rules) is the proprietor, and has the power to ensure that he gets possession of the thing, by taking it away from anyone who has possession of it but (in their view) is not the proprietor.

Both cases are examples of social control, but in the case courts the control
has become more complex and formalized procedure whereas in the case of
tribesmen it is more like an family affair. I would say that both instances originally
serve to protect the sacredness of ownership (see, I'm deliberately avoiding the
word "property") but as society becomes more complex, there may arise the illusion
that government, instead of being in charge of maintaining self-evident rights is
in fact the creator of them. And then it follows, as you point out, "property" is totally
arbitary and subject to whims of the powers that be.

I find such a situation to be a distressing and hope that we might be able to
take out human rights out of the domain of violence and instead uphold them by
voluntary associations that are governed by algorithmic consensus. So here I grant you
another semantic concession and merely propose that the government that is responsible
of upholding property rights be replaced by peer-to-peer networks or similar.

Regarding the crowdfunding example, after inspecting the code I realize that it
is not a very satisfactory example, as it still requires external non-algorithmic input to
resolve whether the terms of the contract have been fulfilled. But a progress is still
being made towards the goal of realizing autonomous smart contracts.
 

[RodeoX]

OMG, I just realized how serious this is. Did you guys know that Agent Gavin has a copy OF EVERY SINGLE BITCOIN Tx you have ever made!  

shit, i felt terrible, Gavin is an agent!

Oh crap, it's worse than I thought. I ALSO HAVE A COPY ON MY COMPUTER!!!! WTF???
I must be some kind of "Manchurian candidate".

It's wurst than that! I'm your sausage-running, mate.

how the heck you got another copy? decipher it, it might contain s0me secret message from Gavin the Agent

"sausage running mate" is the phrase that activates my assassination mode! Must find Ben Bernanke.  Must find Ben!!
Whoa, snap out of it! Gavin has taken control of my mind. And I just found MY RECEIVING ADDRESS in Gavin's blockchain. MY ADDRESS!!!! Who does he think he is?

[calaber24p]

This is what happens when you have something a bunch of conspiracy theorists and nutjobs jump on to. I love bitcoin but could do without these people.

[QuestionAuthority]

This is what happens when you have something a bunch of conspiracy theorists and nutjobs jump on to. I love bitcoin but could do without these people.

Good luck! Those people are Bitcoin.

[jorjito25]

This is what happens when you have something a bunch of conspiracy theorists and nutjobs jump on to. I love bitcoin but could do without these people.

Good luck! Those people are Bitcoin.

It took time for me to realize that this is as true as can be. I really feel sorry for those who put in all the hours for bitcoin for little or no income (not including Gavin et. al here).

[Possum577]

facts:

3/ Forking BS over and over again. now just before the Halving. hOw friggin convenient.
          https://github.com/gavinandresen/bitcoin-git/commit/5f46da29fd02fd2a8a787286fd6a56f680073770

Why does the timing of the halving have an implication over the timing of the forking? The two aren't really related are they?

Maybe Gavin is Neo and all the articles are the fog of the matrix...