[2016-04-21] Audio: Andreas Antonopolous -Theymos is hurting bitcoin-

[LiteCoinGuy]

Andreas Antonopolous discusses understanding blockchain technology

http://www.bitcoin.kn/2016/04/andreas-antonopolous-discusses-understanding-blockchain-technology/

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[Kprawn]

How do you justify someone promoting a competing Alt coin {XT} on a platform where Bitcoin should be promoted. Theymos made a judgement call to protect Bitcoin from a competing Alt coin and

now he gets crucified for that decision. In the end, Theymos was right ... Mike Hearn was out to hurt Bitcoin and he nearly succeeded .... when he failed with XT, he jumped ship and went to work for

the biggest enemy... The banks. His decision to view XT as a Alt coin were controversial at the time, but in hindsight it was justified under the circumstances. This forum and \r\Bitcoin on Reddit was

created to promote Bitcoin... not some competing Alt coin.... and the rules clearly stated that. 

[Carlton Banks]

Yep, Andreas Antonopoulos has been a growing problem. He's good at explaining Bitcoin to newcomers, he's got all the rhetorical skills and the right set of metaphors to do so. But not much else. And anyone that gets on Joe Rogan needs to be looked at from out the sides of slanted eyes, anyway.

Does anyone remember when Andreas used to post on bitcointalk? Does anyone remember his avatar, lol (massive picture of his actual face). I found him concerning back then, for that reason alone.

[The00Dustin]

How do you justify someone promoting a competing Alt coin {XT} on a platform where Bitcoin should be promoted.

No, XT was not an alt coin, it was an alt client and the only fork was in code, not in the block chain.  XT had some very bad things and should not have ultimately been the client to run, but the thing Hearn was most wrong about was the suggestion that bitcoin needed a benevolent dictator, and a single group of programmers is not much better than a benevolent dictator, nor is censorship, which is exactly what Theymos was doing beyond his scaremongering.  Unfortunately, it seems all involved are focused on power and control (even if indirectly due to the corrupting influence of potential income) when bitcoin needs to be free and open.

ETA:  To be clear, if Hearn were suggesting a fork in the blockchain at 50% consensus or less, it clearly would have become an alt coin, and at the once tossed around 75% consensus, it would have been controversial, but if it would have sorted itself out and made bitcoin stronger.

[Carlton Banks]

No, XT was not an alt coin, it was an alt client and the only fork was in code, not in the block chain.  

No, Dustin, the entire raison d'etre of the XT client was to fork the blockchain, it was hardcoded to activate on January 11th this year, lol.

bitcoin needs to be free and open.

And everyone is free to go to whichever competing Bitcoin messageboard they choose, of which there are now several. No-one's forcing the majority of people to go to theymos' forum, they're doing that using their own free will. Remember, that attribute you're saying you want to support? Because free will also includes the freedom to make incorrect observations, on public messageboards.

[The00Dustin]

No, Dustin, the entire raison d'etre of the XT client was to fork the blockchain, it was hardcoded to activate on January 11th this year, lol.

Like most forks in the blockchain (including from bitcoin the client before it was core), this fork was originally only slated to happen if a certain level of consensus was believed/detected to exist.  Later in the game, Hearn got really stupid, but it still wasn't an altcoin until the fork occurred.  Don't get me wrong, in my years observing bitcoin, I can tell you that Hearn was amongst the programmers that I expected to be troublesome (Luke-Jr being another prime example, although I don't think anyone considers him too troublesome atm).  However, I firmly believe that a proper hardfork is necessary and kicking the can down the road only ups the stakes when it finally comes.  When I say I firmly believe a hardfork is necessary, I don't mean big blocks, I mean to resolve the barely acknowledged security flaw that even allowed sepsig to be implemented as a soft fork to begin with.  I would have been happy to see sepsig implemented as a hard fork resolving that flaw, and even more thrilled if it also increased or removed the block size limit simultaneously (assuming it could also remove another potential security flaw that larger blocks introduce, but I'm not going to go into more detail here).  However, as an outside observer, it certainly looked like the core side struck first in the misinformation war, and once misinformation is released, it can't be contained, so a lot of damage was done by both sides.  More importantly, things only got worse from there when it went from a war against the (ultimately malicious) client to a war against anyone who uses any client other than core, and that's when damage to bitcoin started to occur.  We may disagree, and my view of this history may not be the one that is ultimately written, but as they say, the history of war is written by the victors.  That having been said, now is a time to move onward to much more important battles, those against corporations who want to suppress information about blockchains so that they can sell their closed ones as somehow better.

[Carlton Banks]

More importantly, things only got worse from there when it went from a war against the (ultimately malicious) client to a war against anyone who uses any client other than core, and that's when damage to bitcoin started to occur.

The more you get things wrong, the less it looks like simple mistakes and more like willful distortion of the facts.

There has never been a "stick with Core, or else" message from the detractors of XT or Classic, you're making that up completely. You're either hilariously uninformed/ignorant, or a liar.

[The00Dustin]

There has never been a "stick with Core, or else" message from the detractors of XT or Classic, you're making that up completely. You're either hilariously uninformed/ignorant, or a liar.

It doesn't have to be stated to be implied.  I have seen claims that bitcoin classic is an altcoin, and I have seem bitcoin classic threads moved to the altcoin section.  I've never supported bitcoin classic, but to the best of my knowledge, it is another client that follows the same protocols on the same blockchain until/unless there is a believed/detected "consensus".  I have also seen similar behavior surrounding another (even more questionable and less supported, but nonetheless allegedly compatible) client whose name I don't recall.  So there was no XT altcoin, and there is no classic altcoin, and there was no altcoin for that other unnamed client,but at least some members of core (and/or the community) with some level of authority are abusing that authority and suppressing alternative (albeit poorly conceived) wallets as altcoins solely because they offer potential future support for potential future changes.  These actions practically scream "it's my way or the highway" so the suggestion that no one has come out and said that means anything is a bit of a farce.

[TraderTimm]

Satoshi help us, there are still XT-Heads that think Hearn's nightmare was the "right way".

Theymos isn't doing shit to hurt Bitcoin, there are other forums, end of story. This propensity to stir up drama over the monumental failure of XT is really fucking stupid. You lost, move on.