Bitcoin XT - Officially #REKT (also goes for BIP101 fraud)

[VeritasSapere]

I think Bitcoin can do both, and that these different aspects of Bitcoin actually reinforce each other. I also do not think Bitcoin will become a world reserve currency without experiencing mass adoption as a currency for the people first, history also certainly supports this theory as well.

It doesn't.

Typically any form of money that is not fiat started gaining traction as a currency only because people tended to hold it as they considered it valuable.

You should check your history, gold and silver coins have been used as a currency and a commodity for the majority of our known history.

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

You're really dense aren't ya?

Gold didn't start off as a currency but as ornament, jewelry & collectibles hence the argument that people first have to find value in a commodity and hold it before it gains traction as a currency.

This is correct, first a commodity, then a currency and a commodity and only after these stages can it become a global reserve and or settlement system. Mass adoption is still a necessary first step in this process. The financial elites of today will not choose to use Bitcoin when they can command and control their own systems instead. Only through global adoption where we become the new financial elites while rendering the old power structures obsolete can this transformation take place.

[brg444]

It's possible gmaxwell has had enough abuse. Apparently he gave up commit access to the bitcoin github. I saw his last post was in this thread a few days ago.

I've found the abuse the Core devs and BlockStream to terrible. I wouldn't blame any of them for choosing to walk away. On certain (unimportant) forums there's some celebration of the idea that gmaxwell may be walking away. Reading it, I have to say that I would walk away from a community with so many evil people. Frankly, I don't want to be in a "community" with people like that either. If there were a way to boot all of them out and keep gmaxwell, I'd prefer that. If they'd just fork off and leave the rest of us with Bitcoin, things would probably be fine (after a shaking out period). Instead they seem intent on "occupying" Bitcoin.

I'm sure gmaxwell knows he has a lot of supporters in the Bitcoin community. That wouldn't change if he decided to leave. I think most people would understand.

It can be said that the other side feels this way as well. They might even say the same thing about their ideological opponents. Considering that many people did sign up for the vision of Satoshi which Core presently seems to be diverting from.

If Satoshi's vision was so well represented in the XT fork then maybe you can explain why it was unanimously rejected by Bitcoin users by and large?

[VeritasSapere]

It's possible gmaxwell has had enough abuse. Apparently he gave up commit access to the bitcoin github. I saw his last post was in this thread a few days ago.

I've found the abuse the Core devs and BlockStream to terrible. I wouldn't blame any of them for choosing to walk away. On certain (unimportant) forums there's some celebration of the idea that gmaxwell may be walking away. Reading it, I have to say that I would walk away from a community with so many evil people. Frankly, I don't want to be in a "community" with people like that either. If there were a way to boot all of them out and keep gmaxwell, I'd prefer that. If they'd just fork off and leave the rest of us with Bitcoin, things would probably be fine (after a shaking out period). Instead they seem intent on "occupying" Bitcoin.

I'm sure gmaxwell knows he has a lot of supporters in the Bitcoin community. That wouldn't change if he decided to leave. I think most people would understand.

It can be said that the other side feels this way as well. They might even say the same thing about their ideological opponents. Considering that many people did sign up for the vision of Satoshi which Core presently seems to be diverting from.

If Satoshi's vision was so well represented in the XT fork then maybe you can explain why it was unanimously rejected by Bitcoin users by and large?

These concepts are still very new and scary to many Bitcoiners. You played a large part in the irrational fear mongering so you can answer part of this question yourself. I am not convinced however that BIP101 has been unanimously rejected, I think it is still to early to tell.

[brg444]

I think Bitcoin can do both, and that these different aspects of Bitcoin actually reinforce each other. I also do not think Bitcoin will become a world reserve currency without experiencing mass adoption as a currency for the people first, history also certainly supports this theory as well.

It doesn't.

Typically any form of money that is not fiat started gaining traction as a currency only because people tended to hold it as they considered it valuable.

You should check your history, gold and silver coins have been used as a currency and a commodity for the majority of our known history.

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

You're really dense aren't ya?

Gold didn't start off as a currency but as ornament, jewelry & collectibles hence the argument that people first have to find value in a commodity and hold it before it gains traction as a currency.

This is correct, first a commodity, then a currency and a commodity and only after these stages can it become a global reserve and or settlement system. Mass adoption is still a necessary first step in this process. The financial elites of today will not choose to use Bitcoin when they can command and control their own systems instead. Only through global adoption where we become the new financial elites while rendering the old power structures obsolete can this transformation take place.

The "mass" is always the last phase of adoption. Long before Bitcoin gets anywhere close to a global, mainstream payment network it will need to be adopted as a store-of-value by several orders-of-magnitude more wealthy people looking for a safe refuge for their wealth.

[VeritasSapere]

I think Bitcoin can do both, and that these different aspects of Bitcoin actually reinforce each other. I also do not think Bitcoin will become a world reserve currency without experiencing mass adoption as a currency for the people first, history also certainly supports this theory as well.

It doesn't.

Typically any form of money that is not fiat started gaining traction as a currency only because people tended to hold it as they considered it valuable.

You should check your history, gold and silver coins have been used as a currency and a commodity for the majority of our known history.

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

You're really dense aren't ya?

Gold didn't start off as a currency but as ornament, jewelry & collectibles hence the argument that people first have to find value in a commodity and hold it before it gains traction as a currency.

This is correct, first a commodity, then a currency and a commodity and only after these stages can it become a global reserve and or settlement system. Mass adoption is still a necessary first step in this process. The financial elites of today will not choose to use Bitcoin when they can command and control their own systems instead. Only through global adoption where we become the new financial elites while rendering the old power structures obsolete can this transformation take place.

The "mass" is always the last phase of adoption. Long before Bitcoin gets anywhere close to a global, mainstream payment network it will need to be adopted as a store-of-value by several orders-of-magnitude more wealthy people looking for a safe refuge for their wealth.

Maybe so but this does not change the importance of Bitcoin being a viable currency in order to attract further mass adoption.

[brg444]

It's possible gmaxwell has had enough abuse. Apparently he gave up commit access to the bitcoin github. I saw his last post was in this thread a few days ago.

I've found the abuse the Core devs and BlockStream to terrible. I wouldn't blame any of them for choosing to walk away. On certain (unimportant) forums there's some celebration of the idea that gmaxwell may be walking away. Reading it, I have to say that I would walk away from a community with so many evil people. Frankly, I don't want to be in a "community" with people like that either. If there were a way to boot all of them out and keep gmaxwell, I'd prefer that. If they'd just fork off and leave the rest of us with Bitcoin, things would probably be fine (after a shaking out period). Instead they seem intent on "occupying" Bitcoin.

I'm sure gmaxwell knows he has a lot of supporters in the Bitcoin community. That wouldn't change if he decided to leave. I think most people would understand.

It can be said that the other side feels this way as well. They might even say the same thing about their ideological opponents. Considering that many people did sign up for the vision of Satoshi which Core presently seems to be diverting from.

If Satoshi's vision was so well represented in the XT fork then maybe you can explain why it was unanimously rejected by Bitcoin users by and large?

These concepts are still very new and scary to many Bitcoiners. You played a large part in the irrational fear mongering so you can answer part of this question yourself. I am not convinced however that BIP101 has been unanimously rejected, I think it is still to early to tell.

"Irrational fear mongering" heh  

That's a tool of XT proponents. I'd be great if you could stop pointing fingers when faced with an inconvenient truth.

Last time I checked we were getting forked off by BIP101 in December by the industry derps.. What happened?

Get a grip will you? Even Gavin has moved on from BIP101. It's been months already and there's yet to be any sign of traction.What gives?

[hdbuck]

did "teh mass" ever had gold in any meaningful way?

hmnope.

[brg444]

I think Bitcoin can do both, and that these different aspects of Bitcoin actually reinforce each other. I also do not think Bitcoin will become a world reserve currency without experiencing mass adoption as a currency for the people first, history also certainly supports this theory as well.

It doesn't.

Typically any form of money that is not fiat started gaining traction as a currency only because people tended to hold it as they considered it valuable.

You should check your history, gold and silver coins have been used as a currency and a commodity for the majority of our known history.

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

You're really dense aren't ya?

Gold didn't start off as a currency but as ornament, jewelry & collectibles hence the argument that people first have to find value in a commodity and hold it before it gains traction as a currency.

This is correct, first a commodity, then a currency and a commodity and only after these stages can it become a global reserve and or settlement system. Mass adoption is still a necessary first step in this process. The financial elites of today will not choose to use Bitcoin when they can command and control their own systems instead. Only through global adoption where we become the new financial elites while rendering the old power structures obsolete can this transformation take place.

The "mass" is always the last phase of adoption. Long before Bitcoin gets anywhere close to a global, mainstream payment network it will need to be adopted as a store-of-value by several orders-of-magnitude more wealthy people looking for a safe refuge for their wealth.

Maybe so but this does not change the importance of Bitcoin being a viable currency in order to attract further mass adoption.

You'll need to be a little more patient because we're far away from there.

That's why it's rather stupid to attempt to cater to these people right now.

Let's focus on the lowest hanging fruit shall we?

[VeritasSapere]

did "teh mass" ever had gold in any meaningful way?

hmnope.

Seriously check your history, gold and silver coins have been the predominant form of currency for the majority of human civilization. Fiat is only a relatively recent development, Bitcoin represents a return to commodity money and the deflationary economics of the past.

[Zarathustra]

did "teh mass" ever had gold in any meaningful way?

hmnope.

Yes, once upon a time when gold was money. Now gold 2.0 is money.

[Zarathustra]

I think Bitcoin can do both, and that these different aspects of Bitcoin actually reinforce each other. I also do not think Bitcoin will become a world reserve currency without experiencing mass adoption as a currency for the people first, history also certainly supports this theory as well.

It doesn't.

Typically any form of money that is not fiat started gaining traction as a currency only because people tended to hold it as they considered it valuable.

You should check your history, gold and silver coins have been used as a currency and a commodity for the majority of our known history.

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

You're really dense aren't ya?

Gold didn't start off as a currency but as ornament, jewelry & collectibles hence the argument that people first have to find value in a commodity and hold it before it gains traction as a currency.

Gold became money when it was demanded as tribute (tax). The war lords demanded it to produce weapons.

http://www.tutanchamun-game.de/downloads/bilderKatalog/images/dolch.jpg
http://www.goldseiten.de/content/kolumnen/download/pcm-17.pdf

[brg444]

I think Bitcoin can do both, and that these different aspects of Bitcoin actually reinforce each other. I also do not think Bitcoin will become a world reserve currency without experiencing mass adoption as a currency for the people first, history also certainly supports this theory as well.

It doesn't.

Typically any form of money that is not fiat started gaining traction as a currency only because people tended to hold it as they considered it valuable.

You should check your history, gold and silver coins have been used as a currency and a commodity for the majority of our known history.

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

You're really dense aren't ya?

Gold didn't start off as a currency but as ornament, jewelry & collectibles hence the argument that people first have to find value in a commodity and hold it before it gains traction as a currency.

Gold became money when it was demanded as tribute (tax). The war lords demanded it to produce weapons.

http://www.tutanchamun-game.de/downloads/bilderKatalog/images/dolch.jpg
http://www.goldseiten.de/content/kolumnen/download/pcm-17.pdf

Right so gold was first hoarded and collected because it made nice weapon. Thanks for supporting my point!

[brg444]

did "teh mass" ever had gold in any meaningful way?

hmnope.

Yes, once upon a time when gold was money. Now gold 2.0 is money.

The plebs didn't hold any significant amount of gold. They were too poor for that. 

[VeritasSapere]

did "teh mass" ever had gold in any meaningful way?

hmnope.

Yes, once upon a time when gold was money. Now gold 2.0 is money.

The plebs didn't hold any significant amount of gold. They were too poor for that. 

Even the poor needed a currency for the exchange of goods and services, for the majority of known human history this has been in the form of gold and silver coins, my point still stands.

[brg444]

did "teh mass" ever had gold in any meaningful way?

hmnope.

Yes, once upon a time when gold was money. Now gold 2.0 is money.

The plebs didn't hold any significant amount of gold. They were too poor for that.  

Even the poor needed a currency for the exchange of goods and services, for the majority of known human history this has been in the form of gold and silver coins, my point still stands.

Or copper, wheat, grains and other such commodities.

Your point doesn't stand because you've provided factual evidence against it: gold was never a one-size-fits-all type of deal.

In the same way Bitcoin cannot and will never accomodate all use cases

[RoadTrain]

If you want bitcoin network to become the world's most trustworthy money with predefined money supply schedule, responsible for money distribution to other institutions, then nothing needs to be done: The Fedwire system that handles large transactions between Federal reserve and thousands of member banks in US do 4 tps, and bitcoin can do that today

If you want bitcoin to become a paypal like system that handles high frequency trading between billions of private people, then it is an e-commerce system. Its capacity is heavily limited by the CPU speed and network bandwidth (not block size limit), due to the nature of P2P network (exponentially rising data traffic and lag with more and more nodes).

Of course it will be good that bitcoin can both be a secure monetary system while still be able to serve billions of users at protocol level, but if you can not get both, which one do you prioritize? I think it is a huge waste of resource to use thousands of nodes on a P2P network to make sure a coffee transaction is tamper resistant  

I personally believe Bitcoin's main goal is providing monetary sovereignty. But how can you make use of it, if you can't transact in a trustless way, because blockchain is only for settlements? How is that any better than fiat? Hence all this debate. Hence the Lightning Network. It is supposed to solve this problem: let you transact in Bitcoin in a trustless manner, but without the need to put every tx on the blockchain. If we just sit and do nothing, Bitcoin is going nowhere (well, I exaggerate, but it has a lot more potential). It's too early to freeze the protocol, though it must be done eventually, I believe.

You cannot be serious....

For starters one of Bitcoin's central aspect is that for maybe the first time in history you can hold something that cannot be debased. Surely you'd agree that's quite a change from fiat.

It is reasonable to expect that people will still be dealing with financial institutions decades from now, whether it be banks, central clearing houses or what not.

The trendy "be your own bank" line is nothing but pipedream. Financial institutions are not going to disappear, they'll just be held accountable for their actions by the market and only the most competitive and innovative ones will survive. No more TBTF bailout.

I'm quite serious actually, if you take my point as a whole, not pick a phrase from it. What we have now is that anyone can transact on the main chain in a trustless manner. As that might be not workable long-term, there are proposals for a level 2 payment network, e.g. LN. These proposals are meant to be trustless (up to a point) as well. There's a hell of a difference between trustful and trustless off-chain solutions, even though both eventually settle on the main chain.

I did use the word trustless so many times here because it's the thing that matters. If I'm completely cut off from the blockchain's trustlessness, then Bitcoin is of no use for me. I cannot be sure I actually have coins, I cannot be sure I'm not involved in fractional reserve. If you have to trust a third-party in order to use Bitcoin, it's no better than fiat. It's just Fiat 2.0. That's what I meant in my reply to johnyj.

I'm not saying financial institutions will disappear, I'm saying that I want to have a choince not to trust them.

[brg444]

If you want bitcoin network to become the world's most trustworthy money with predefined money supply schedule, responsible for money distribution to other institutions, then nothing needs to be done: The Fedwire system that handles large transactions between Federal reserve and thousands of member banks in US do 4 tps, and bitcoin can do that today

If you want bitcoin to become a paypal like system that handles high frequency trading between billions of private people, then it is an e-commerce system. Its capacity is heavily limited by the CPU speed and network bandwidth (not block size limit), due to the nature of P2P network (exponentially rising data traffic and lag with more and more nodes).

Of course it will be good that bitcoin can both be a secure monetary system while still be able to serve billions of users at protocol level, but if you can not get both, which one do you prioritize? I think it is a huge waste of resource to use thousands of nodes on a P2P network to make sure a coffee transaction is tamper resistant  

I personally believe Bitcoin's main goal is providing monetary sovereignty. But how can you make use of it, if you can't transact in a trustless way, because blockchain is only for settlements? How is that any better than fiat? Hence all this debate. Hence the Lightning Network. It is supposed to solve this problem: let you transact in Bitcoin in a trustless manner, but without the need to put every tx on the blockchain. If we just sit and do nothing, Bitcoin is going nowhere (well, I exaggerate, but it has a lot more potential). It's too early to freeze the protocol, though it must be done eventually, I believe.

You cannot be serious....

For starters one of Bitcoin's central aspect is that for maybe the first time in history you can hold something that cannot be debased. Surely you'd agree that's quite a change from fiat.

It is reasonable to expect that people will still be dealing with financial institutions decades from now, whether it be banks, central clearing houses or what not.

The trendy "be your own bank" line is nothing but pipedream. Financial institutions are not going to disappear, they'll just be held accountable for their actions by the market and only the most competitive and innovative ones will survive. No more TBTF bailout.

I'm quite serious actually, if you take my point as a whole, not pick a phrase from it. What we have now is that anyone can transact on the main chain in a trustless manner. As that might be not workable long-term, there are proposals for a level 2 payment network, e.g. LN. These proposals are meant to be trustless (up to a point) as well. There's a hell of a difference between trustful and trustless off-chain solutions, even though both eventually settle on the main chain.

I did use the word trustless so many times here because it's the thing that matters. If I'm completely cut off from the blockchain's trustlessness, then Bitcoin is of no use for me. I cannot be sure I actually have coins, I cannot be sure I'm not involved in fractional reserve. If you have to trust a third-party in order to use Bitcoin, it's no better than fiat. It's just Fiat 2.0. That's what I meant in my reply to johnyj.

I'm not saying financial institutions will disappear, I'm saying that I want to have a choince not to trust them.

Right, but there's a difference between trustlessness in transacting and trustlessness in holding your assets.

What I mean by that is provided I can run a full node and always check my balance in a trustless manner then it matters less to me if I have to use third-parties for everyday transactions.

[VeritasSapere]

did "teh mass" ever had gold in any meaningful way?

hmnope.

Yes, once upon a time when gold was money. Now gold 2.0 is money.

The plebs didn't hold any significant amount of gold. They were too poor for that.  

Even the poor needed a currency for the exchange of goods and services, for the majority of known human history this has been in the form of gold and silver coins, my point still stands.

Or copper, wheat, grains and other such commodities.

Your point doesn't stand because you've provided factual evidence against it: gold was never a one-size-fits-all type of deal.

In the same way Bitcoin cannot and will never accomodate all use cases

Gold and silver coins sometimes mixed with copper and other precious metals indeed. Wheat and grains have not been used as currencies, certainly not for the majority of human history like gold and silver coins have. I am not sure whether to ridicule you here or to go about teaching history 101, I am a history buff myself, so I am a bit shocked that you are not aware of this well known basic fact and that you are even trying to debate this with me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_daric
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Greek_coinage
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achaemenid_coinage
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Chinese_coinage#Gold
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florin_%28English_coin%29
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_German_gulden
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_dinar
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solidus_%28coin%29
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coinage_of_India
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illyrian_coinage
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stater
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visigothic_coinage
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine_coinage

[brg444]

Gold and silver coins sometimes mixed with copper and other precious metals indeed. Wheat and grains have not been used as currencies, certainly not for the majority of human history like gold and silver coins have. I am not sure whether to ridicule you here or to go about teaching history 101, I am a history buff myself, so I am a bit shocked that you are not aware of this well known basic fact and that you are even trying to debate this with me.

I don't care that you can use Google when your absence of logical skills refrains you from adressing the original argument.

"I am a history buff myself"



To be clear:

Your point doesn't stand because you've provided factual evidence against it: gold was never a one-size-fits-all type of deal.

In the same way Bitcoin cannot and will never accomodate all use cases

You might want to carry on pretending that everyone was using gold coins back then but certainly that would make you the idiot worthy of being ridiculed.

In those days some families whole possessions weren't worth one single gold coin.

*edit wrong meme 

[johnyj]

The "mass" is always the last phase of adoption. Long before Bitcoin gets anywhere close to a global, mainstream payment network it will need to be adopted as a store-of-value by several orders-of-magnitude more wealthy people looking for a safe refuge for their wealth.

True, in the past, people from the ruling class decided what should be used as currency, majority of users had no choice (Even today they still don't have a choice, they just want something secure and trustworthy (and simple), and of course the one that is backed by the power of government/central bank is most trustworthy). So I think gold was not a selection of average people's free will, but the will of the ruling class (They need gold to decorate their house, so there is always a demand from them to support the value of this kind of commodity)