After testing Ripple...

[mmeijeri]

So is ripple a competitor or friend to bitcoin? Still having trouble getting my head around it.

It's both. The rippling mechanism combined with the distributed order book is a great way to exchange between all kinds of currencies, which is great for Bitcoin adoption. But it's a double-edged sword because it's also great for the adoption of XRP as a rival currency. If you are sitting on thousands of BTC or if you have thousands of dollars / euros invested in high end mining rigs, then that isn't a pleasant thought. It's perfectly all right to be opposed to this, as long as you realise that you are then opposing it for personal gain. And again, that's perfectly legitimate, but it works both ways. XRP has as much of a right to compete with BTC as BTC has a right to compete with XRP.

All this talk about Ripple being a scam needs to stop however. It's immature, unprofessional and unethical. If you want to preserve your investment, work to get the synergy you can get from Ripple and work to promote the advantages Bitcoin has over Ripple and to mitigate the weaknesses it has. Help fellowtraveller to build his slighly less decentralised partially competitive and partially synergetic Ripple alternative. Unlike Ripple it's not a double-edged sword and doesn't threaten Bitcoin directly, although it would also help Ripple.

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[mmeijeri]

If you mined all the bitcoins in the first block you would have XRP.

There would be nothing morally wrong with that, but then the trick would be to get people to use it as a currency.

[mmeijeri]

I agree that if they don't distribute in a reasonable manner they will be just forked with another initial issuance method, but I don't think mining is much reasonable despite how much p2p it is.

There's nothing unreasonable about keeping any amount for yourself, but it would be unreasonable to assume such a currency would take over the world. In the end you cannot sell your creation for more than market value, unless there is deception involved. One possible scheme would be to have one giant auction, a bit like an IPO. Or they could do what they in fact plan to do, which is to give away some to get the network going and then gradually sell the rest.

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

Ripple is 100% scam. Imagine a new coin that is 100% premined owned by 10 people. That's ripple. You have to be mentally slow to buy into that crap.

Just like stocks are 100% premined scam, that's right the entire economy is a scam!

That is not the real reason ripple is a scam. Ripple is a scam, because they use lies get you (and your money) into the game, so they can get more profit.

You realize that you guys gonna hit a brick wall once ripple comes out of beta?
Either way you can get access to the source of rippled right now if you reveal your openid to opencoin.

Once Ripple comes out of beta and opens their sources i will totally stop accusing them of being scammers and remove all links from my sig (perhaps even edit some of my posts).

But the **current** state of affairs is that they are obvious scammers. I don't care about the future. I am saying the **current** truth.

If they played fair from the beginning and told only the truth (for example: remove lies from their site & wiki), there would be no problem at all. But they are lying from the very start, just as any petty scammer would do.

This is disgusting and unacceptable. How is Bitcoin community supposed to gain public trust if so many swinglers try to bend it to their needs ?
Vermin such as Ripple needs to be eradicated.

[ElectricMucus]

Ripple is 100% scam. Imagine a new coin that is 100% premined owned by 10 people. That's ripple. You have to be mentally slow to buy into that crap.

Just like stocks are 100% premined scam, that's right the entire economy is a scam!

That is not the real reason ripple is a scam. Ripple is a scam, because they use lies get you (and your money) into the game, so they can get more profit.

You realize that you guys gonna hit a brick wall once ripple comes out of beta?
Either way you can get access to the source of rippled right now if you reveal your openid to opencoin.

Once Ripple comes out of beta and opens their sources i will completely & totally stop accusing them of being scammers.

But the **current** state of affairs is that they are obvious scammers. I don't care about the future. I am saying the **current** truth.

If they played fair from the beginning and told only the truth (for example: remove lies from their site & wiki), there would be no problem at all. But they are lying from the very start, just as any petty scammer would do.

Did you even read the latter sentence?

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

Ripple is 100% scam. Imagine a new coin that is 100% premined owned by 10 people. That's ripple. You have to be mentally slow to buy into that crap.

Just like stocks are 100% premined scam, that's right the entire economy is a scam!

That is not the real reason ripple is a scam. Ripple is a scam, because they use lies get you (and your money) into the game, so they can get more profit.

You realize that you guys gonna hit a brick wall once ripple comes out of beta?
Either way you can get access to the source of rippled right now if you reveal your openid to opencoin.

Once Ripple comes out of beta and opens their sources i will completely & totally stop accusing them of being scammers.

But the **current** state of affairs is that they are obvious scammers. I don't care about the future. I am saying the **current** truth.

If they played fair from the beginning and told only the truth (for example: remove lies from their site & wiki), there would be no problem at all. But they are lying from the very start, just as any petty scammer would do.

Did you even read the latter sentence?

Yes. [Citation needed]
I'm not seeing any "download" button on their page.

EDIT: There is only client under the "source code".

[ElectricMucus]

Ripple is 100% scam. Imagine a new coin that is 100% premined owned by 10 people. That's ripple. You have to be mentally slow to buy into that crap.

Just like stocks are 100% premined scam, that's right the entire economy is a scam!

That is not the real reason ripple is a scam. Ripple is a scam, because they use lies get you (and your money) into the game, so they can get more profit.

You realize that you guys gonna hit a brick wall once ripple comes out of beta?
Either way you can get access to the source of rippled right now if you reveal your openid to opencoin.

Once Ripple comes out of beta and opens their sources i will completely & totally stop accusing them of being scammers.

But the **current** state of affairs is that they are obvious scammers. I don't care about the future. I am saying the **current** truth.

If they played fair from the beginning and told only the truth (for example: remove lies from their site & wiki), there would be no problem at all. But they are lying from the very start, just as any petty scammer would do.

Did you even read the latter sentence?

Yes. [Source needed]
I'm not seeing any "download" button on their page.

Do you feel entitled or something?
It's on the wiki, I suggest you read it.

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

Ripple is 100% scam. Imagine a new coin that is 100% premined owned by 10 people. That's ripple. You have to be mentally slow to buy into that crap.

Just like stocks are 100% premined scam, that's right the entire economy is a scam!

That is not the real reason ripple is a scam. Ripple is a scam, because they use lies get you (and your money) into the game, so they can get more profit.

You realize that you guys gonna hit a brick wall once ripple comes out of beta?
Either way you can get access to the source of rippled right now if you reveal your openid to opencoin.

Once Ripple comes out of beta and opens their sources i will completely & totally stop accusing them of being scammers.

But the **current** state of affairs is that they are obvious scammers. I don't care about the future. I am saying the **current** truth.

If they played fair from the beginning and told only the truth (for example: remove lies from their site & wiki), there would be no problem at all. But they are lying from the very start, just as any petty scammer would do.

Did you even read the latter sentence?

Yes. [Source needed]
I'm not seeing any "download" button on their page.

Do you feel entitled or something?
It's on the wiki, I suggest you read it.

I did read some of it and i didn't find it.
Show me where it is, please.

[ElectricMucus]

https://ripple.com/wiki/Gateway_Integration_Manual#Preparation

I see I did one mistake though you don't even have to tell them your real identity(openid) just the github account...

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

https://ripple.com/wiki/Gateway_Integration_Manual#Preparation

I see I did one mistake though you don't even have to tell them your real identity(openid) just the github account...

Where is the license information ? This is still NOT open source.

If they give you the source, it does not mean it is open. It does not mean you can share it, modify it, redistribute it.

They can sue you if you use their code against their guidelines / share it with somebody.

[ElectricMucus]

https://ripple.com/wiki/Gateway_Integration_Manual#Preparation

I see I did one mistake though you don't even have to tell them your real identity(openid) just the github account...

Where is the license information ? This is still NOT open source.

If they give you the source, it does not mean it is open. It does not mean you can share it, modify it, redistribute it.

They can sue you if you use their code against their guidelines / share it with somebody.

It's not like there is a binary version of it either. If you get access to the software you get the source, if you don't you don't.

You know what Richard Stallman would say?

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

It's not like there is a binary version of it either. If you get access to the software you get the source, if you don't you don't.

Still not Open Source.
So ripple is STILL a scam, because they are STILL lying on their wiki & frontpage !
They could stop it any time by removing the lies. But they don't ? Why ? Because that is what scammers do.

You know what Richard Stallman would say?

Actually, yeah. He would say that it is not GPL and therefore does not protect user's freedom.

[ElectricMucus]

It's free software imo, under the definition RMS uses.
It does give users freedom by distributing the software by source code. That you have to adhere to certain conditions to become a user doesn't change that. You can check the software for malicious features and modify it to your liking. It may not be a copyleft licence, but that's an independent issue. Redistribution and access to the source code are different things. Just that the GPL happens to be a free software copyleft licence doesn't mean that every free software has to be copyleft.

So RMS would say, it's free software, don't use the term open source.
Please show me what lies you mean, I can't see them. Do they even say it is to be open source?

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

It's free software imo, under the definition RMS uses.
It does give users freedom by distributing the software by source code. That you have to adhere to certain conditions to become a user doesn't change that.

Again, [citation needed]. There is nowhere said that you can freely distribute all the code (daemon too, not just client).
So you cannot and you have no freedoms RMS talks about.

Please show me what lies you mean, I can't see them. Do they even say it is to be open source?

Oh yes they do:

The world's first open payment network

Get in our github

(Yeah, like that GitHub repo is the WHOLE source)

Ripple is an open source, distributed peer-to-peer payment network
Ripple transactions are irreversible, sent over the Internet, and counterfeit proof
Ripple uses the same underlying cryptography as Bitcoin

Ripple is an open source peer-to-peer payment system. Ripple lets you easily, cheaply, and safely send money over the Internet to anyone, anywhere in the world. Because Ripple is P2P software, no individual, corporation, or government controls Ripple

Lies, lies lies, lies. Goddamn lies everywhere.

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

@ElectricMucus

Bitcoin is like a variation of Schrödinger's Cat. Everything about it is both scam and fully legit at the same time until you open the box.

By the way, you talk bullshit and your signature is complete bullshit.
So fitting.

[ElectricMucus]

ok I guess, you are right they call it open source then. (although open payment network can mean lots of things)

For the rest of the debate:
I suggest you watch this interview with RMS: http://youtu.be/uFMMXRoSxnA

He clearly states that free software is about the ability to control the software, not about re-distribution.
The GPL for instance restricts re-distribution under other licences and using the program in proprietary products, while the MIT Licence does not restrict the use in proprietary products and the public domain licence poses no restrictions. It is entirely possible for a free (or if you like to call it open source) software to be prohibited in re-distribution.
But we don't even know under which conditions the ripple daemon can be distributed do we?

[drawingthesun]

Not sure about using RMS as a beacon of freedom. Its a type of freedom but the license he advocates is more restrictive than the license Bitcoin uses.

see: http://stackoverflow.com/a/11752204/405763

RMS is about a certain type of freedom, its all about the end user. This is not bad but it IS restrictive to developers. The MIT license is more flexible and free, but someone could make changes and distribute a closed source version of a MIT program and that's ok. That is truer freedom. RMS advocates GPL that restricts what developers can do with the code (no closed source changes can be distributed without access to source code)

I think MIT is more free because it can be used in more situations than GPL can. Remember RMS is very much against a license being 'too free' that would possibly harm the end user.

Ok this rant is over, I was trying to get the point across that uses RMS as a beacon of freedom is wrong, because his freedom is loaded with his opinions.

Also see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#GPLRequireSourcePostedPublic

You might agree with GPL and RMS, however one thing you cannot deny is that it is slightly more restrictive than the MIT license. So RMS is not for 100% freedoms, only 99% freedoms. He wants certain restrictions on stuff and this is ok, what I don't like is how he is always going on about free software as if he is the beacon of freedom. When there are more free softwares out there.

[dancupid]

It doesn't work.
I have tradefortress  'bitcoins', but I can't do anything with them. They are sitting in my account.
I can't send them back to tradefortress, I can't delete them, I can't trade them. I don't want them.
How do I differentiate these 'bitcoins' from other 'bitcoins'?

I'm not sure what you mean by how do you differentiate them. It seems like you already have -- these are different because they are worthless. If you want to get rid of them, drop your trust line to him to zero and see if anyone will take them from you. If not, you can "write them off" by paying them back to him.

If I send the bitcoins back to tradefortress how do I know he is not going to receive my bitstamp bitcoin IOUs? I only want to return the worthless tradefortress bitcoin IOUs.

[ElectricMucus]

It doesn't work.
I have tradefortress  'bitcoins', but I can't do anything with them. They are sitting in my account.
I can't send them back to tradefortress, I can't delete them, I can't trade them. I don't want them.
How do I differentiate these 'bitcoins' from other 'bitcoins'?

I'm not sure what you mean by how do you differentiate them. It seems like you already have -- these are different because they are worthless. If you want to get rid of them, drop your trust line to him to zero and see if anyone will take them from you. If not, you can "write them off" by paying them back to him.

If I send the bitcoins back to tradefortress how do I know he is not going to receive my bitstamp bitcoin IOUs? I only want to return the worthless tradefortress bitcoin IOUs.

If I take a $100 bill, declare it as worthless and give it away is it really such? If ripple is successful TF will just have a bunch of debt. He then can claim it's worthless all he wants, people won't care.
He made a gamble that ripple will fail, which would be ok if he had some stakes to win.

[JoelKatz]

If I send the bitcoins back to tradefortress how do I know he is not going to receive my bitstamp bitcoin IOUs? I only want to return the worthless tradefortress bitcoin IOUs.

The pathfinder *should* always prefer to return a person's own balances to them. It is a system invariant that one must always accept one's own balances at face value. However, it may not be all that well tested. Being able to see the transaction paths prior to sending would be a really nice feature to have and a manual feature to directly adjust the balance of a pathway is planned.