Is Smooth a Hypocrite ?

[smooth]

I wish smooth would realize that even he really wants a free market.

Of course I do. And a free market includes a free market of ideas where people can give opinions, point out problems, and criticize actions (including my own).

It does not mean that everyone is free to rip everyone else off without being called out for it.

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[iamnotback]

ns, point out problems, and criticize actions (including my own).
It does not mean that everyone is free to rip everyone else off without being called out for it.

Getting "ripped off" is ambiguous as it is all part of the game. Was I ripped off when I chose to sell localbitcoins via paypal and lost $600? I think so. But I was stupid enough to not think that someone could be using a stolen Paypal account. It was a good lesson for me to learn. I charged it to experience.

We don't need a NannyState. We are all adults and can decide for ourselves what risks we want to take.

I have no problem with you pointing out that Dash had an instamine and giving your reasons why you think that will make the technology (masternode co-option), marketing, adoption, and business model less successful.

But it doesn't help if you/we think that by stopping what we perceive to be n00bs from buying Dash, by constantly yelling "scam", because we are not omniscient. And that is not production. That is just a logjam of destroying degrees-of-freedom. And we are not omniscient as evidenced by our wrong perception of the income potential in altcoins and of Bitshares' potential. Thus it is harmful to ourselves and others when we act as if we are.

You and I both should be introducing more inspiring ideas and projects than attacking other projects. It is very annoying. In spite of the fact that Vitalik's work doesn't scale and has other technical problems and they never yet worked out a viable use case, at least he was out there promoting inspirational ideas whilst you and I were like curmudgeons wasting our time trying to ferret out all the cockroaches.

The distinction is Vitalik doesn't try to control what others do. He goes out there and creates his game.

The winners in any sport don't focus on complaining about what others do. They focus on their own game.

I want to be youthful and create. Not yet ready to sit in the rocking chair and point at others because of being incapable of doing myself.

Ball and out.



Edit: and i really don't care if John Conner plagiarized Bitcoin code.  Fuck copyright (but be wary of the law). All I care is what he is producing or not producing. I don't care about an indicator of his ethics. Well feel free to share it, but I am not going to really place a high relevance on that. I will learn about his capabilities via his designs. Then i will know whether he is worthy of my attention.

You and I both want a meritocracy, but what I am saying is let's go straight to the production. Never mind the meta noise.

[iamnotback]

I haven't read 100% of the posts on this thread (mostly just the first page) so I may have missed something. But the main question seems to be whether I endorse their launch strategy or anything else about it. The answer is mostly no, I just mined it, as a few said earlier in the thread.

The only thing I would endorse is that the web site itself doesn't seem half bad. It is a lot like reddit without the uncontrolled sock puppets. There have been some good crypto posts and discussion on there, and I was planning to mirror major Monero announcements on there so people could have another place to discuss if desired (but there haven't been any major Monero announcements recently so I haven't yet don't that)

If people want to try that (usually for free either by my bitcointalk account offer or their facebook/reddit offers), I see no harm in it. Does not require you to buy anything at all.

1. I am curious how you can offer Streemit accounts to Bitcointalk users? Do you have some special affiliation with Steem that enables you to do that?

No I don't. Anyone who has the cli wallet can create an account using the create_account command. It costs 10 coins (about $3) but as long as I don't get Sybil attacked that cost is not a concern for me at all. It is also possible for anyone to mine accounts without paying any coins, which I have also done for various people I know (from forum or otherwise). Those accounts are turned over for free if and when they want them.

Both mining and using the cli wallet/node requires a degree of technical skills (I think you have to compile it yourself, although it is possible there are Windows binaries somewhere), but once you have an account on the blockchain you can use the web site.

Oh thanks for explaining that. So due to my ignorance of their API, I had the wrong initial assumption. Thanks for correcting me.

And I am wondering why you are doing that promotion for them? Is that so you can improve the liquidity of the coin so you can sell? I mean you are promoting a stealth mined coin which seems to go against your highly public ethics against non-fair mining. Normally I wouldn't care at all what you do or why, but it is just because of your desire to use the bully-pulpit.

Because I think it is a useful site, and maybe it helps my personal reputation a bit to help people out (I got one or two positive trusts from it, though I never asked for any). Getting a free account from the site directly requires linking it to your Facebook account, which a lot of crypto people don't like or may not even have.

No I don't think it will improve liquidity. It would take far more than that (probably impossible).

Ah I see it is only the personal reputation motivation. I should have realized that, but the likely reason I didn't it because I think as you can observe that I don't place a very high value on status, as I abandoned my Hero account (which would have been Legendary by now) and a couple of Senior level accounts also.

Some people like to aspire to titles such as President of the Student Council, or other forms of recognized social status, especially when these are empowering, such as how on this forum having reputation allows one to muck with reputation of others.

I personally detest those structures and have always avoided them since even high school.

The only titles I ever valued were the ones of accomplishment. For example, my past sporting and software venture achievements. The only reputation I want is one of being someone who created something great. I don't want political clout. And I don't want to use political clout.

So that is a fundamental difference between us that will be difficult to reconcile, which explains why I got upset with your moderation of the Monero thread and deleting my defenses against those who berated me there. Albeit you were always trying to balance the politics and you tried to retain my comments quoted into tiny font. I just reject the entire community concept of a leader censor managing a lot of underlings. I prefer a flat structure of competing achievers. The defacto leader is the one who achieves the most.

I hate meta noise. I want a flat lean, self healing structure.

3. Lastly I have no qualms about you not endorsing something meaning you think it might fail technically, marketing, or business wise. But if you mean that your reputation should matter when endorsing ethics of distribution schemes, then I want to inform you that I no longer support you in that. And in fact, I might become quite a thorn to those who continue to berate others about Right and Wrong, as if God appointed you to do that.

OK, I mean when I'm busy with something else I barely comment. In fact I wouldn't even be writing this (or seen the thread) except that I was asked out-of-band by someone about it.

I have no problem with criticizing things I think are done poorly for whatever reason, and that includes Steem (as I just did in this thread, or maybe it was the other one).

If you think that community self-regulation is inappropriate when there is no other effective authority doing any regulation of abuses and scams, then we disagree. We also disagree on what it means to let things be wild and free, because pretty much all wild and free systems generally include some form of community self-regulation.

Yeah I am against the concept of community self-regulation. I prefer no regulation.

We'll agree to disagee and I won't pesker you about it any  more. I'll just ignore it when I see it.

Again sorry for shifting sands of my attitude.

What you seeing now is the real me. I was trying to be someone I wasn't, I guess to appease others.

Sorry I am really a minanarchist at heart, bordering on full anarchist.

I don't know if because I was so sick, perhaps I lost my internal compass due to the semiconscious state (delirium) of fighting with my CFS. But my internal compass throughout my life, has always been non-interventionalist. Perhaps I was also driven by fear (debilitating health can break any person) and financial desperation which caused me to perhaps lose the confidence in myself that I need to not compromise my ethics of anarchism (i.e. feeling I was helpless and needed to rely on others and my reputation for their approval)

[iamnotback]

Okay yes I remember that. It seemed at the time Bitshares was going through a lot of turmoil, which included seeking alternate sources of funding such as building custom systems for banks (not clear that they ever got any takers). I still don't know the details of it, but it seems that project model has not worked out very well ultimately, just as I said at the time. It appears that Dan sold his remaining coins at a much-reduced price and moved on, though it isn't entirely clear whether he may contribute to it in some manner in the future. All in all I can't see how that is called a great success of a project; you might disagree.

Although perhaps an accurate summary of some facets and appreciably sobering, I think this is indicative of too pessimistic or one-sided perspective which needs more balance.

He may have profited earlier during the ProtoShares, which may have kept him motivated to keep trying. And then eventually he lands on the Steem project. There Butterfly Effects and serendipity is beyond our omniscience. We stay engaged so we are ready to have breakthrough moment, such as this morning when I awoke and realized the killer app for smart block chains.

The Bitshares model was not replicated when Dan went and started his new project Steem, which to my mind means someone who knows a lot more about that model than I do also didn't think much of it. Now he's tried another (stealth-mine) model, which I also don't think has really worked out all that well either (though the jury is still out on that one objectively).

Well I am very glad he tried it before I did, so I can learn not to try it. Nature meanders and all the noise is integral to (essential element of) the process of decentralized annealing to the optimum fitness.

My analysis/opinion thus far is that the challenge for Steemit thus far is the investment and usership model:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1505886.msg15233793#msg15233793

So maybe you have your own ideas how to launch a coin and make money. If you have new approaches, good for you.

No comment.  

To be fair, you were aware of my illness and perhaps you were concerned and felt I might be better off to take employment, get medical insurance, and have a more stable and less risky source of potential income and funding for health care.

That's exactly right, and I think I said so at the time. I even suggested that you take up on some offers that you had for paying work to get your personal finances in better shape (so you could at least afford to take a trip to a developed country for medical evaluation and potentially treatment).

That fucking Chronic Fatigue Syndrome delirium scrambled egg brain fog health crap has been a 4 year DAILY (1460+ days!) fucking albatross around my neck! Good grief Mr. Nature/Universe/God, please give me a break! I want to code!

But I just know that before that discussion, I never thought about the altcoin market as being one giant scam and being entirely fake. I really bought into your take on that. But now in hindsight, I think you are not entirely correct. Seems people who have produced less technology than I am working on, having reaped some significant paydays.

Waves raised ~$15 million and referred to IOHK's open source without apparently having developed anything at all. It was apparently purely a marketing campaign. Heck I never expected even a $million, so with better tech than they have, why shouldn't I be able to get my $500,000 and also do some good for the CC community.

When I respect someone, it means I listen intently to what they have to say.

Well if you think you can raise money without having developed anything at all on the basis of, for example, very questionable claims about members of the IOHK team being on their team or being advisors (which IOHK denied) and you think that isn't a scam, go for it. I don't think that path leads anywhere except putting some money into the organizers pockets, and maybe a token that can be pumped. I don't believe the $15 million number either, but I'd believe they did raise some.

Of course I will not copy their methodology. I will not launch vaporware and instead something with real technological and marketing innovation that can withstand peer review.

But I am also not going to criticize them other than noting what they did. I'll let the speculators decide how they play the game. I'll be trying  to observe and understand what all the players in this altcoin arena game are doing. I'd rather understand, than delude myself into thinking I have any control over others.

Any influence I have will most significantly only be due to any great accomplishments, if any.

And fluffypony commented in this thread. And he has more great accomplishment in altcoins than I, so I am humbled. Apologies i am so loud mouthed. Just replying to all your points.

[iamnotback]

Please note I am humbled by your accomplishments in CC compared to mine and I noted that at the end of the prior post.

In short, those enforcers on this forum make me want to puke. Any one doing censorship (other than self-moderated threads for their own official coin thread), bullying by politik, or any other holier than thou crap will be on my personal shit (do not like) list (which basically means nothing so no big deal).

In other words, I am urging us all to stop the nonsense political control game. Let it run wild and free. Don't be afraid to not be in control. Don't be afraid. Just let nature be.

I tend to agree with you, but I also think that non-technical people are simply not in a position to fully comprehend the risks involved in poorly designed security software / consensus systems. This is evidenced by the Bitcoin block size debate, where a great deal of opinion has come from decidedly non-technical individuals.

Therefore, those that are technical, and I do not imply that I am included, have a right and perhaps even a responsibility to point technical and even ethical flaws out out in a way that is understandable to non-technical users. To this end, smooth has been consistent in his criticisms - he has even been consistent (to me at least) in his statements regarding Steem, effectively saying that the website is an interesting publishing platform, but the entire thing might be extremely broken, and he has not had the opportunity to fully comprehend how it all fits together.

A favourite post of mine, that I tend to go back to every time a criticism of mine is met with accusations of FUD, is this one by gmaxwell (emphasis mine) -

On Tuesday at a Bitcoin event I was still being harangued by Ripple/Stellar advocates claiming the absolute soundness of the system.  I care about the whole cryptocurrency ecosystem since, in the minds of the public any failure is harmful to all of us, and I don't want to see anyone suffer losses not even the gullible... But it makes no sense for me to spend my limited time providing free consulting for the impossibly torrent of ill-advised, impossibility claiming, systems... especially when they're not thankful and/or respond with obfuscation that makes their work unrealizable or hand-waving without admitting their new assumptions. I don't want to see anyone get hurt, but ... hey, I spoke up a bit and people continued on anyways without asking the kind of tough questions they should have been asking. I'm certainly not going to spend all me time correcting everyone who is wrong on the internet, especially when altcoin folks have been known to play pretty dirty toward their critics. No one should assume that other people are going to go out of their way to beg them to not use something broken.

Perhaps in the future more people will ask the hard questions and demand better answers?  If so, it would be worth more time for experienced people to spend time reviewing other systems and we could all benefit. Otherwise, perhaps those who aren't interested in standing up to some of the rigor we'd normally expect from a cryptosystem will stop calling their broken altcoins "cryptocurrencies".  Those of us who actually want to build sound systems don't want our work sullied by these predictable failures, and being able to say "I told you so" is no consolation.

I appreciate your and gmaxwell's eloquently worded case for self-regulation, or more accurately on the logic of why self-regulation is futile.

QED.

And my further point is that not only is it futile (you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink), but my prior replies to smooth are arguing that it is harmful, because if we remove the degrees-of-freedom from nature, it can't anneal. Then we end up with top-down driven grid lock of expert omniscience, e.g Blockstream's clusterfuck Troika of SegWit, LN, and Sidechains. I've mentioned my reasons for that stance on those technologies else where.

Gregory seems to play the collectivist card, and I suspect he also thinks man-made global warming is not a hoax to tax carbon based on his support for oppressive CopyLeft software licenses indicating he is for radical leftist style intervention. In short, I read gmaxwell to be an interventionist of a much higher degree than smooth. But interventionalism is also a groupthink effect and becomes a mania. Thus I am think we need to be very well grounded in anarchism and respecting nature, else we will slide into another Holocaust.

We need to allow all viewpoints and all experiments.

Nothing wrong with stating your case for example on the Monero documentation as to specific reasons why other systems are inferior. You should promote the advantages. And then it is up to the market to decide.

But creating a BCT/Reddit funnel that all speculators must pass through, wherein we try to control the process, is stomping on nature and will result in failure to anneal or the annealing will route around the Coasian barrier.

Quoting myself (the linked original contains some links which I didn't bother to copy over in this quote):

Knowledge Anneals

Unsophisticated thinkers have an incorrect understanding of knowledge creation, idolizing a well-structured top-down sparkling academic cathedral of vastly superior theoretical minds. Rather knowledge primary spawns from accretive learning due to unexpected random chaotic fitness created from multitudes of random path dependencies that can only exist in the bottom-up free market. Top-down systems are inherently fragile because they overcommit to egregious error (link to Taleb's simplest summary of the math). Given Kurzweil's sensationalized magnum opus is the technological singularity, it is surprising that he is apparently not well studied in the field of social knowledge formation.

Kurzweil states that the brain is composed of a finite number of pattern matchers and that humans train to be exceptional (unique) to think deeply about some subject matter. Whether Kurzweil is implying that computer brains could have more pattern matchers and/or process information from the environment faster thus obtaining higher levels of cognitive capability from more input entropy so as to attain the claim that computers will vastly outpace human knowledge, he fails to understand a basic fact that simulated annealing (SA) is the only known global optimization algorithm when the subject matter is not known a priori. SA requires many simultaneous, independent small (imperfect trial and error) steps. The free market optimizes better than top-down because the larger number of actors anneals better. So again, the computer brains at best can supplement the supply of humans, but they can't overpower the free market. Frankly I am shocked that Kurzweil didn't realize this, since my A.I. studies in the 1980s is where I first learned about SA.

The knowledge creation process is opaque to a single top-down perspective of the universe because to be omniscient would require that the transmission of change in the universe would propagate instantly to the top-down observer, i.e. the speed-of-light would need to be infinite. But an infinite speed-of-light would collapse past and future into an infinitesimal point in spacetime— omniscient is the antithesis of existential. In order for anything to exist in the universe, there must be friction-in-time so change must propagate through resistance to change— mass. The non-uniform mass distribution of the universe is mutually causal with oscillation, which is why the universe emerges from the frequency domain. Uniform distribution of mass would be no contrast and nothing would exist. Taleb's antifragility can be conceptualized as lack of breaking resistance to variance amplification.

[iamnotback]

main question seems to be whether I endorse their launch strategy or anything else about it.

Main question is the contrast to when Dash is launched with better distribution than Steem you make it your multi-year mission mission to label it a scam and people selling with profit scammers.

First off that statement is obviously nonsense because no one knows the distribution of Dash, nor can we can really compare on a apples-to-apples basis between Steem at a few months old and Dash at a few months old.

But let's compare Dash with Steem.

Dash was launched with misleading statements by the developer about the launch time. Steem did not do this and in fact relaunched with a day advance notice of a specific launch time after there were some problems with the first launch. By that time some community members had already posted guides for how to compile and mine and even some lesser-skilled miners had started attempting it, making it somewhat less of a stealthy launch.

The Steem code was essentially feature-complete at launch so everyone could look through the source code as I did in order to determine what the coin was intended to do (and everyone had extra time to do this given the relaunch). Dash, on the other hand, did not release any feature or development plan information whatsoever until after the conclusion of the instamine, and in fact deliberately withheld it.

The Steem developer told people at launch that he was mining a lot and released the names of the accounts he was using for mining, making it all transparent, disclosed to all participants, and verifiable on the blockchain (there are no relevant privacy features and the blockchain uses transparent named accounts for all operations).

Steem mining proceeded at a constant rate for one month. Dash's instamine was front-loaded primarily onto literally one hour (and remember that is one hour following a misleading launch time), then front-loaded to a lesser extent over the first 8 hours and finally concluded after two days. At some point during the month the Steem developer stated he had mined "enough", cut back on his mining so others could mine more (and again, it was verifiable on the blockchain that he actually did this).

At the conclusion of the pure-PoW mining phase, all of the coins from the developer mining accounts were merged into the transparent 'steemit' account, with a stated plan to sell them off to pay for development and distribute them for free to new users (each new account requires 10 STEEM funding). These actions have occurred and are transparent on the blockchain. Where did the Dash instamine coins go? How much was mined by the developers or others? Is there similar transparency? Are there or have there ever been explicit, transparent and verifiable plans to distribute it?

Unlike Dash, there have been no supply or emissions cuts in Steem that have the effect of amplifying the early mining. There have been no new schemes introduced to pay more of the supply to the instaminers, and indeed some of the tweaks and proposals that have been made have the effect of diluting early holdings even faster.

And finally, on top of all this, Steem isn't even trying to by a cryptocurrency, it is a social media site. The Steem token is totally unsuitable for use as a cryptocurrency, and no one (including the devs) suggests otherwise. So again, comparing it and its distribution with Dash (even if Dash's distribution were likewise transparent which it mostly is not) makes no sense.

So while I will repeat that I don't think their stealth mine strategy is a good idea, nor do I personally support it, nor do I think it has worked out particularly as they had planned, nor do I suggest that anyone invest in it, comparing it to Dash or suggesting that it is somehow more of a fraudulent launch than Dash ignores all or nearly all facts about what actually happened with each coin.

I support that this is a free market and you have every right to point out those differences.

I hope the distinction is clear, that what I think it is futile is trying to maintain awareness of your stance, by basically advertising by brute force the above information.

Fact is that the altcoin market ends up ignoring and forgetting that information. And who are you (and your Monero group) to force it down everyone's throat over and over and over and over.

I realize you didn't repeat that every day, but the underlings (myself included) maintained the barrage.

How about accepting the fact that the market doesn't really care. (We should) Move on. Find a new vocation and hopefully one that is more creative and produces something great for altcoins. If the market doesn't think Monero is great, that is not Dash's fault. Dash has nothing to do with why the market is not going bonkers for Monero.

The real problem for Monero is that speculators are not investing for some 20 year Manhattan project. They want to invest in near-term 10 - 100X gain potential. They also don't see that level of potential excitement about anonymity.

Speculators are shooting for the next Bitcoin investment. Ethereum already fulfilled that goal, rising by 100X from the IPO price.

Perhaps you and some other Monero long-term HODLers wanted the altcoin market to be about something which it isn't.

You may remember back when rpietila used to proclaim that Monero would be the next best thing to Bitcoin and I was really pissed off for him lording over the future like a God. And this was someone who I was cordial with and had done business with in silver. There was always this air of snobbishness and condescending attitude from the Monero supporters (not all, but a lot).

I often said this altcoin market is not for heirlooms. New ideas and goals are popping up every 3 - 6 months. Innovate or die.

The long-term Linux approach appears to be inapplicable to altcoins.

[iamnotback]

I see steem as equally as bad as dash.

If steem were to captive instamine as dash did and not be branded with exactly the same brush they should have kept a full transparent ledger of their instamine and how it is getting paid out to posters on steemit.

Both are as bad as each other. If you don't like what one did it is impossible to like the other.

I have not seen smooth promote steem myself and he did say he though the start was very unfair (even though yes it was honestly unfair to a degree that does not make it any better). I have always found him to be rather honest and up front in the past over things. However yes I would think he should not approve of steem in its current form.

If steem has a full ledger for every instamined coin that would be different but until they do they are no better than dash. You could argue evans has hung around working and using his premine stash too.

Is steem claiming "No premine, fairly and transparently launched"? If they aren't making these claims, and are open and upfront about what they did, then they are not similar to dash in the respect to truth in advertising--one is the guy who is ridiculously jacked and admits to steroids and another guy who is ridiculously jacked and claims he never ever used performance enhancing drugs; one is a juicer and the other is a juicer and a liar.

For a while I think their thread did say "No premine" which was literally true but misleading. They caught some heat for it (with good reason) and it was removed. But if we are going to compare with Dash lets keep in mind what the Dash thead still says:

Dash has no premine and was fairly and transparently launched

Really???

I argue that the distinction between Steem and Dash is irrelevant when we are applying to whether one who tries to be perfect can never be. My point was by allowing all experiments we don't get trapped in trying to explain ethically that one less than wide distribution is less worse/wrong than another more concentrated distribution, as if two ethical "wrongs" make one ethically right. I am not even convinced either was ethically "wrong" (because this is the altcoin game and know the rules or lack thereof before you play). They just are what they are. Facts aren't ethically or morally qualified, unless you are a politician who bends the definition of fact. As for being "wrong" in terms of technological or marketing success, those are useful datums for speculators.


If Michael Jordan had expend his time and effort explaining why all the other players sucked, he would not be a G.O.A.T..

Achievers achieve. Bitchers bitch.

Each of us gets to choose.

[smooth]

I often said this altcoin market is not for heirlooms. New ideas and goals are popping up every 3 - 6 months. Innovate or die.

The long-term Linux approach appears to be inapplicable to altcoins.

You are doing what you decry, which is trying to declare the market to be according to your perceptions or desires (all about 100x pumps and 3-6 month hype coins). Monero is doing fine after two and half yeare. Development continues, the market cap is at or near its all-time high, and even the price in Bitcoin is higher than it has been for most of if its lifetime (or another way to look at that is the weighted average of coins from their date of emission).

Monero has outlasted and outgrown hundreds of hype crap coins that came after it and it will continue to outlast most of the current crop of garbage. If you want to play the pumps as a trader, or think that you are have a particular skill set that makes you well-suited to playing crap coin launches as an organizer and hype promoter, only then would all this short term noise even matter to you.

[MadCow]

But let's compare Dash with Steem.

Dash was launched with misleading statements by the developer about the launch time. Steem did not do this and in fact relaunched with a day advance notice of a specific launch time after there were some problems with the first launch. By that time some community members had already posted guides for how to compile and mine and even some lesser-skilled miners had started attempting it, making it somewhat less of a stealthy launch.

The Steem code was essentially feature-complete at launch so everyone could look through the source code as I did in order to determine what the coin was intended to do (and everyone had extra time to do this given the relaunch). Dash, on the other hand, did not release any feature or development plan information whatsoever until after the conclusion of the instamine, and in fact deliberately withheld it.

The Steem developer told people at launch that he was mining a lot and released the names of the accounts he was using for mining, making it all transparent, disclosed to all participants, and verifiable on the blockchain (there are no relevant privacy features and the blockchain uses transparent named accounts for all operations).

Steem mining proceeded at a constant rate for one month. Dash's instamine was front-loaded primarily onto literally one hour (and remember that is one hour following a misleading launch time), then front-loaded to a lesser extent over the first 8 hours and finally concluded after two days. At some point during the month the Steem developer stated he had mined "enough", cut back on his mining so others could mine more (and again, it was verifiable on the blockchain that he actually did this).

At the conclusion of the pure-PoW mining phase, all of the coins from the developer mining accounts were merged into the transparent 'steemit' account, with a stated plan to sell them off to pay for development and distribute them for free to new users (each new account requires 10 STEEM funding). These actions have occurred and are transparent on the blockchain. Where did the Dash instamine coins go? How much was mined by the developers or others? Is there similar transparency? Are there or have there ever been explicit, transparent and verifiable plans to distribute it?

Unlike Dash, there have been no supply or emissions cuts in Steem that have the effect of amplifying the early mining. There have been no new schemes introduced to pay more of the supply to the instaminers, and indeed some of the tweaks and proposals that have been made have the effect of diluting early holdings even faster.

And finally, on top of all this, Steem isn't even trying to by a cryptocurrency, it is a social media site. The Steem token is totally unsuitable for use as a cryptocurrency, and no one (including the devs) suggests otherwise. So again, comparing it and its distribution with Dash (even if Dash's distribution were likewise transparent which it mostly is not) makes no sense.

So while I will repeat that I don't think their stealth mine strategy is a good idea, nor do I personally support it, nor do I think it has worked out particularly as they had planned, nor do I suggest that anyone invest in it, comparing it to Dash or suggesting that it is somehow more of a fraudulent launch than Dash ignores all or nearly all facts about what actually happened with each coin.

I agree 100% with smooth's analysis, DASH & steem are very different, both might not pass the sniff test, but DASH was a scam, and steem is just a bad design, maybe even with bad motivation, but not a scam.

[iamnotback]

Okay yes I remember that. It seemed at the time Bitshares was going through a lot of turmoil, which included seeking alternate sources of funding such as building custom systems for banks (not clear that they ever got any takers). I still don't know the details of it, but it seems that project model has not worked out very well ultimately, just as I said at the time. It appears that Dan sold his remaining coins at a much-reduced price and moved on, though it isn't entirely clear whether he may contribute to it in some manner in the future. All in all I can't see how that is called a great success of a project; you might disagree.

Although perhaps an accurate summary of some facets and appreciably sobering, I think this is indicative of too pessimistic or one-sided perspective which needs more balance.

He may have profited earlier during the ProtoShares, which may have kept him motivated to keep trying...

A better summary of what Dan was going through during that period and I specifically saw his frustration for the few moments I was in his forum:

https://steemit.com/crypto-news/@dan/is-the-dao-going-to-be-doa

[cryptohunter]

The Steem code was essentially feature-complete at launch so everyone could look through the source code as I did in order to determine what the coin was intended to do

Just like everyone could've installed VirtualBox+Linux on their Windows machines at Dash launch to mine yet that's one of the key points you like to attack.

Which is easier, reading through code to determine wtf it is, or following through 5 step instructions on how to install VirtualBox+Linux?

The Steem developer told people at launch that he was mining a lot and released the names of the accounts he was using for mining, making it all transparent, disclosed to all participants, and verifiable on the blockchain (there are no relevant privacy features and the blockchain uses transparent named accounts for all operations).

How do you know he didn't have more accounts he didn't disclose?

The Steem token is totally unsuitable for use as a cryptocurrency, and no one (including the devs) suggests otherwise. So again, comparing it and its distribution with Dash (even if Dash's distribution were likewise transparent which it mostly is not) makes no sense.

Why are they unsuitable as cc? Are they better suitable as speculation tokens? They seem to be perfectly suitable for generating BTC and new bagholders judging from the Bittrex action.

You were the FIRST person other than me to call out evans for captive instamining xcoin (dark/dash) it is right there in the thread. You are the one saying evans engineered the launch to set up the premine. Look at the first 5 pages of the darkcoin thread???

"wut.. no premine but you have 5k to throw?"  illodin (page 5) even before that you are moaning about the launch and you like most at the launch were for some reason having a big problem trying to mine the coins. Seems your 5 easy steps weren't so easy in this case.


Why?  because the entire thing was set up for evans and a few others to take them all whilst telling everyone else it was a fair release like other alts that were released at the time. It was not. It is therefore a scam. It like this you tell people it's a fair launch with no premine no instamine then do exactly what you say you are not doing. That is a scam. There is no need for a deep philosophical debate 50 abstract levels deeper and off on all tangents.

How are you still protecting that scam coin??

So later you managed to get your hands on some and it's all okay and there was no reason to complain??

Every other coin claiming a fair release had windows binaries. Yes, if you really want a fairer and wider distribution you will release with windows binaries.

Steem and dash are both scams. They deliberately did what they said they were not doing. It's that simple. That's a lie. That's a scam. There will be those that will persuade many through elaborate thought experiments that these are not scams or that they are simply scams that should take place. That's not going to wash for the majority of the board. They want "fairer" "wider" distributions and if you can show in simple observable terms that a currency has not attempted fair and wide distribution then hopefully it will be cast out as a pariah project regardless of the tech behind it. It can always be cloned and distributed in a fairer and wider manner.

[iamnotback]

I often said this altcoin market is not for heirlooms. New ideas and goals are popping up every 3 - 6 months. Innovate or die.

The long-term Linux approach appears to be inapplicable to altcoins.

You are doing what you decry, which is trying to declare the market to be according to your perceptions or desires (all about 100x pumps and 3-6 month hype coins). Monero is doing fine after two and half yeare. Development continues, the market cap is at or near its all-time high, and even the price in Bitcoin is higher than it has been for most of if its lifetime (or another way to look at that is the weighted average of coins from their date of emission).

Monero has outlasted and outgrown hundreds of hype crap coins that came after it and it will continue to outlast most of the current crop of garbage. If you want to play the pumps as a trader, or think that you are have a particular skill set that makes you well-suited to playing crap coin launches as an organizer and hype promoter, only then would all this short term noise even matter to you.

I don't keep track of XMR.  I saw something about it crashed in recent months exactly as I warned multiple times your highly censored speculation thread to take some profits when it ran up high recently. Maybe it has pulled back up, yet in that interim time ETH has made a 100X gain off the IPO price. As far as I know XMR has not yet exceeded its all time price high (of course mcap is higher because money supply has increased) right after launch perhaps due to rpietila's incessant promotion at that time. I think XMR investors have been quite frustrated to see ETH and DASH kicking its butt in terms of gains made and so out of jealousy they go attack others.

That is not to diminish the work of for example fluffypony, because that is still a lot of work and I have said he deserves what ever success Monero can muster.

Well my 1970 Radio Shack (Texas Instruments) handheld calculator might still be operating with 1 occasional user but that is irrelevant isn't it.

Yeah I suppose Monero still has some 1000s of users because Zcash isn't released yet. But the clock is ticking on that plus as other coins moves towards 100 millions of user adoption and add anonymity then why will anyone still bother with Monero. Even Steem plans to duplicate RingCT, but they probably don't understand marketing well enough to be that popular coin, although we both give them kudos on making an actually slick Reddit clone. The problem is they don't seem to understand social networks well. But they may learn fast and adapt. We'll see.

If there are any grand plans for Monero that are way beyond RingCT, then I apologize for not being aware of them. So factor my myopia on that aspect in accordingly.

Sorry if you feel I am trying to paint a false perception. That is honestly and frankly how I see it playing out. RingCT isn't even the best or only anonymity technology and the real problem is that which ever coin ends up being very popular will just add anonymity.

I am not trying to be extra callous, but I am just so tired of hearing how Mundanero will still be going 20 years from now. Hey I need a popular coin now! If Monero can't do it, then someone else will.

Btw I agree that there haven't been really serious achievements from altcoins. Ethereum is an unfinished and highly unpolished work, that doesn't yet have a killer app. The DAO is an unmitigated disaster in the making. And Dash is of course Dashtardly.

Steem appears to have good coders. If they had only consulted with me to get the marketing design right and the debasement design right. I am quite tempted to find out who their best coders are and try to approach them, but I've watched Dan so many times botch things, that I am wary. I also know what he did to Charles and I have never repeated that and never will. It is so difficult to choose a partner. I've observed Charles get kicked out of two projects.

I honestly wish I could say good luck to Monero. But some of them have berated me and been so condescending to me, that I don't think I can't wash the taste out of my mouth ever. I must admit the feeling borders on hate. I try to push it down, but it is difficult to forget the way the community treats others. The top assholes include:

Shen-noether
iCEBREAKER (and he also backed off his attacks when he saw that I really knew my shit about PL design with Keann but frankly it is already too late because I see his true colors)
(and that other guy I've forgotten his username, although he tried to be nice just before I got banned)
and various others at various times.

They probably think I am an asshurl as well. Bad blood. I will just stay away from them entirely. Thus I hope Monero fades far away from my consciousness.

It is really a horrible feeling when I hear the word Monero. And I am not the only person who feels that way. You guys killed your marketing.

That is not to say I dislike everyone who supports Monero. There are some guys there I get along with. You being one except I am kind of annoyed that you are the leader and the censor. I just pray all the animosity of it will disappear. And all the snobbishness and condescending berating. Arghh!

Ya know if anonymity was really the #1 market, I would have built a coin on my Zero Knowledge Transactions. But I realized it wasn't the good priority. There is no significant adoption, so it ends up just being a fist fight between the various camps, because no camp can really go gain an adoption market to make it clear which one is the winner.

[cryptohunter]

But let's compare Dash with Steem.

Dash was launched with misleading statements by the developer about the launch time. Steem did not do this and in fact relaunched with a day advance notice of a specific launch time after there were some problems with the first launch. By that time some community members had already posted guides for how to compile and mine and even some lesser-skilled miners had started attempting it, making it somewhat less of a stealthy launch.

The Steem code was essentially feature-complete at launch so everyone could look through the source code as I did in order to determine what the coin was intended to do (and everyone had extra time to do this given the relaunch). Dash, on the other hand, did not release any feature or development plan information whatsoever until after the conclusion of the instamine, and in fact deliberately withheld it.

The Steem developer told people at launch that he was mining a lot and released the names of the accounts he was using for mining, making it all transparent, disclosed to all participants, and verifiable on the blockchain (there are no relevant privacy features and the blockchain uses transparent named accounts for all operations).

Steem mining proceeded at a constant rate for one month. Dash's instamine was front-loaded primarily onto literally one hour (and remember that is one hour following a misleading launch time), then front-loaded to a lesser extent over the first 8 hours and finally concluded after two days. At some point during the month the Steem developer stated he had mined "enough", cut back on his mining so others could mine more (and again, it was verifiable on the blockchain that he actually did this).

At the conclusion of the pure-PoW mining phase, all of the coins from the developer mining accounts were merged into the transparent 'steemit' account, with a stated plan to sell them off to pay for development and distribute them for free to new users (each new account requires 10 STEEM funding). These actions have occurred and are transparent on the blockchain. Where did the Dash instamine coins go? How much was mined by the developers or others? Is there similar transparency? Are there or have there ever been explicit, transparent and verifiable plans to distribute it?

Unlike Dash, there have been no supply or emissions cuts in Steem that have the effect of amplifying the early mining. There have been no new schemes introduced to pay more of the supply to the instaminers, and indeed some of the tweaks and proposals that have been made have the effect of diluting early holdings even faster.

And finally, on top of all this, Steem isn't even trying to by a cryptocurrency, it is a social media site. The Steem token is totally unsuitable for use as a cryptocurrency, and no one (including the devs) suggests otherwise. So again, comparing it and its distribution with Dash (even if Dash's distribution were likewise transparent which it mostly is not) makes no sense.

So while I will repeat that I don't think their stealth mine strategy is a good idea, nor do I personally support it, nor do I think it has worked out particularly as they had planned, nor do I suggest that anyone invest in it, comparing it to Dash or suggesting that it is somehow more of a fraudulent launch than Dash ignores all or nearly all facts about what actually happened with each coin.

I agree 100% with smooth's analysis, DASH & steem are very different, both might not pass the sniff test, but DASH was a scam, and steem is just a bad design, maybe even with bad motivation, but not a scam.

How can anyone know. There is no ledger for either. What if Dash is actually spending more of his instamine on development of the coin than steem is?
Steem says strictly no premine whilst taking many measure to ensure only they can mine all the coins at launch. To be fair if only the devs can mine then it is really a premine or captive instamine. I don't see one as much better than the other.

[Moneroman88]

Wow, hats off. This thread got to be one of the most insightful in crypto land. Posts on a level as we can enjoy here are rare to come by. Shelby and Smooth discussing all things crypto and distribution.

[smooth]

Yeah I suppose Monero still has some 1000s of users because Zcash isn't released yet. But the clock is ticking on that plus as other coins moves towards 100 millions of user adoption

There are no coins making any real moves to 100 millions of user adoption with the possible exception of Bitcoin perhaps slowly very, very doing so. But this was a discussion of altcoins, which makes Bitcoin irrelevant.

Leave that kind of hyperbole to the pumpers. You're not very good at that game (no insult).

I am not trying to be extra callous, but I am just so tired of hearing how Mundanero will still be going 20 years from now.

It may, it may not. I'm on record saying many times that it will probably fail and become worthless. Of all the coins around, it is in a small group that has the best chance to be around in 20 years (Bitcoin obviously far eclipses all the rest, and not only because of its size)

Hey I need a popular coin now! If Monero can't do it, then someone else will.

Maybe. It could be that the mass market just doesn't want it. One of the merits of a slow and steady approach is that the mass market may wants something in the future that it doesn't want now.

Btw I agree that there haven't been really serious achievements from altcoins. Ethereum is an unfinished and highly unpolished work, that doesn't yet have a killer app. The DAO is an unmitigated disaster in the making. And Dash is of course Dashtardly.

Steem appears to have good coders. If they had only consulted with me to get the marketing design right and the debasement design right. I am quite tempted to find out who their best coders are and try to approach them, but I've watched Dan so many times botch things, that I am wary.

IMO the Bitshares ecosystem (including Steem) has the best coders and not just Dan, at least if you want to stick with C++ or don't care about PL. Also the best quality code stack. Bitcoin has very good coders, but I'm assuming you are only speaking of alts. Monero had one excellent C++ coder but he unfortunately passed away, along with several competent ones. I'm unsure about Ethereum; apparently Gavin was a good coder (speaking on second-hand reports, not my personal assessment). Vitalik is hardly a coder at all. I don't know about the others. But as you say coding ability is not the only thing that matters. There are many other ways to mess things up, and other ways to add value.

[smooth]

I agree 100% with smooth's analysis, DASH & steem are very different, both might not pass the sniff test, but DASH was a scam, and steem is just a bad design, maybe even with bad motivation, but not a scam.

How can anyone know. There is no ledger for either. What if Dash is actually spending more of his instamine on development of the coin than steem is?

What they hell? I showed you the ledger for Steem's "stealth mine" coins. Most of the Steem "stealth mine" coins are sitting in the 'steemit' account doing nothing. A relatively small amount have been sold off, and coins are consistently being distributed to new users.

Steem says strictly no premine whilst taking many measure to ensure only they can mine all the coins at launch. To be fair if only the devs can mine then it is really a premine or captive instamine. I don't see one as much better than the other.

Only the devs can mine is wrong. I mined and so did some other non-devs. Unlike Dash, Steem has a hyper-transparent ledger where most of the coins in existence can be clearly seen and tracked with people's names on them.

It was not a "fair launch" as you like to define that term, but it wasn't completely closed either, nor was there anything deceptive or misleading about it that I have identified.

I'm also not sure where they claim "no premine" either. It used to be on their thread but I don't see it any more.

[cryptohunter]

I agree 100% with smooth's analysis, DASH & steem are very different, both might not pass the sniff test, but DASH was a scam, and steem is just a bad design, maybe even with bad motivation, but not a scam.

How can anyone know. There is no ledger for either. What if Dash is actually spending more of his instamine on development of the coin than steem is?

What they hell? I showed you the ledger for Steem's "stealth mine" coins. Most of the Steem "stealth mine" coins are sitting in the 'steemit' account doing nothing. A relatively small amount have been sold off, and coins are consistently being distributed to new users.

Steem says strictly no premine whilst taking many measure to ensure only they can mine all the coins at launch. To be fair if only the devs can mine then it is really a premine or captive instamine. I don't see one as much better than the other.

Only the devs can mine is wrong. I mined and so did some other non-devs. Unlike Dash, Steem has a hyper-transparent ledger where most of the coins in existence can be clearly seen and tracked with people's names on them.

It was not a "fair launch" as you like to define that term, but it wasn't completely closed either, nor was there anything deceptive or misleading about it that I have identified.

I'm also not sure where they claim "no premine" either. It used to be on their thread but I don't see it any more.

Fair enough... didn't read that part earlier. Yes, well in that case if the tally of the instamine roughly matches with the total payouts less a reasonable sum for the devs it is not so bad. You can argue really the distribution process only starts via the steem.it board. The first part was merely away of getting the coins into the devs hands without calling it a premine.

[iamnotback]

Yeah I suppose Monero still has some 1000s of users because Zcash isn't released yet. But the clock is ticking on that plus as other coins moves towards 100 millions of user adoption

There are no coins making any real moves to 100 millions of user adoption with the possible exception of Bitcoin perhaps slowly very, very doing so. But this was a discussion of altcoins, which makes Bitcoin irrelevant.

Leave that kind of hyperbole to the pumpers. You're not very good at that game (no insult).

I am not trying to be extra callous, but I am just so tired of hearing how Mundanero will still be going 20 years from now.

It may, it may not. I'm on record saying many times that it will probably fail and become worthless. Of all the coins around, it is in a small group that has the best chance to be around in 20 years (Bitcoin obviously far eclipses all the rest, and not only because of its size)

Present performance and events are not necessarily an indication of future performance. The DAO came out of no where to $168 million.

Please don't tell me you are omniscient. You have no idea what I am doing for example, unless you planted a virus on my computer.

And don't underestimate my ability to pump. I will only pump what I believe in, which means it has to actually be technically sound.

I am not saying I will be the one. Again Steem also has some of the right ingredients. They need some of my ingredients. If the two could be put together, that would very much increase the odds. But the problem is all the vested interests and personalities, etc.. Sometimes it is more efficient to just code yourself than to go talk with others.

Hey I need a popular coin now! If Monero can't do it, then someone else will.

Maybe. It could be that the mass market just doesn't want it. One of the merits of a slow and steady approach is that the mass market may wants something in the future that it doesn't want now.

The mass market is ready but we haven't tapped it yet. That is specifically what I could really help Steem on. I already have the design. I am just trying to implement. It took them years to build up their code stack. I am starting from scratch.

Btw I agree that there haven't been really serious achievements from altcoins. Ethereum is an unfinished and highly unpolished work, that doesn't yet have a killer app. The DAO is an unmitigated disaster in the making. And Dash is of course Dashtardly.

Steem appears to have good coders. If they had only consulted with me to get the marketing design right and the debasement design right. I am quite tempted to find out who their best coders are and try to approach them, but I've watched Dan so many times botch things, that I am wary.

IMO the Bitshares ecosystem (including Steem) has the best coders and not just Dan, at least if you want to stick with C++ or don't care about PL. Also the best quality code stack. Bitcoin has very good coders, but I'm assuming you are only speaking of alts. Monero had one excellent C++ coder but he unfortunately passed away, along with several competent ones. I'm unsure about Ethereum; apparently Gavin was a good coder (speaking on second-hand reports, not my personal assessment). Vitalik is hardly a coder at all. I don't know about the others. But as you say coding ability is not the only thing that matters. There are many other ways to mess things up, and other ways to add value.

Who passed away amongst Monero core devs? You had a dev older than me?

Yeah most people think Vitalik is so awesome but I see he butchered the DAO concept. And he doesn't code and debug.

Steemit has a lot of JS I assume at least on the client side? Are they writing the server side of Steemit in C++?

I prefer to move away from C++ if I can. I can code rudimentary C++ but I quit C++ in 2001 before all  the bells and whistles that have been added hence including STL, etc.. Of course I can readily pick up all that because I am polyglot, but I prefer not to use C++.

[smooth]

Who passed away amongst Monero core devs? You had a dev older than me?

warptangent was a talented coder and active Monero developer but not "core team" member and certainly not a forum personality (I think he may have posted once or twice). I'm pretty sure he was younger than you. Out of respect for his family's privacy I would rather not go into further details about his death (and I also don't know that much)

Announcement was here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Monero/comments/4c9wh8/a_fond_goodbye_to_our_friend_and_contributor/

Steemit has a lot of JS I assume at least on the client side? Are they writing the server side of Steemit in C++?

The blockchain node, which includes most of the core logic for managing accounts, rewards, tokens, etc. is all C++. The web site back end is closed source so we don't know anything about it, or at least I don't. They have several developers (full time I believe) with apparently different specialities.

[iamnotback]

I understand that transparency and widely distributed mining will be important to some, many or perhaps most investors. I am not trying to say that you all can't or shouldn't point out such differences in projects.

My point is that it gets annoying. What we really want to read about are more inspiring topics.

For example, I find the topic of discussion in the Monero Speculation thread to be so useless. If I had to waste my time reading all that crap in that thread, I think I'd rather quit entirely. Once in a while there is some topic there I am interested and most often because it is something I posted there (but I don't dare post there again because it usually gets nasty).

I'd like to talk about more exciting and inspiring topics.

Just so tired of all the negativity and inane topics about exchange shorting, 20 day moving averages, etc.. The buggers in my nose are more interesting.