Ashamed to be a bitcoiner – Bitcoin Expo London

[pand70]

with 'faster payment' services so what bitcoin would bring to the UK is not fast funds transfer, but access to banking for the unbankable and ways for the unemployed to find work outside of establishment.

And who will do that? The already wealthy people buying bitcoins right now or the early adopters that only spend their coins on new mining equipment?

[Justy]

OP; I have to ask.. wtf are you talking about?

People being rude by not allowing people to pass.. genuine gripe.  A speaker disregarding the other speakers whose slot he is infringing upon, genuine gripe.

People cheering 1000 silk roads.. that is not a genuine gripe.  If you are excited about bitcoin for no reason other than it has, and will continue to, make you fat fiat profits.. then you are in the minority among the true believers; and history will be the judge of your convictions.

People embrace bitcoin not just because it is "sound money" *per se*; but because of the ramifications of sound money.  Those stinky neckbeards you love to hate, they see something you have apparently missed: many aspects of the state are evil (including, quite loudly, the so called 'war on drugs').

Not because I think it is the most important example, but because you specifically bring it up and it is just oh-so-easy to destroy, the inevitable '1000 silk roads' is a direct result of a combination of lobbies and facist, religiously-inspired legislation that does nothing but harm to everyone other than the government agencies which are granted power to enforce such legislation; as well as profit for the check-writers for said lobbyists.

Is heroin itself bad?  Maybe.. Is heroin addiction bad?  Clearly.  What about marijuana, should that be illegal too, Mr. Nostink? Has elevinty billion dollars and some of the most powerful government agencies in the world done a single iota to stop heroin addiction, or heroin distribution?  No.  

They have done one thing: consolidated the absolutely inevitable suppliers for this free market demand into cartels.  They have increased risk to drug addicts by an order of magnitude since they get neither government nor legal free-market oversight to verify the purity of their drugs; and they source them from dangerous situations.  They have increased prices by an orders of magnitude, leaving addicts not only high, but desperately broke.. unable to get themselves out of a hole which surely only further triggers the underlying neurosis that is leading them to addiction in the first place.

i was with you, for a minute; a bunch of stinky neck-beards being geeky and self-important. It's annoying, I can see.  It doesn't rub me personally, but I can see how a stick-in-the-butt but otherwise genuine figure could be turned off by it.  

But getting pissed off that people are bringing up anarchism at a fucking bitcoin conference?  You have to be out of your mind.  Anarcho-capitalism?  Heard of that?  Any non-gutter-punk pseudo intellectual or better that even feigns to promote 'anarchism' is fundamentally assuming that commerce will continue to happen among a bunch of self-interested actors.  Are you so completely removed?

We need a revolution.  We need a revolution for the exact reason that we need bitcoin.  Wealth continues to be concentrated in the hands of the few that are closest to the fountain-of-cash known as central banks; while the middle class shrinks and billions continue to live in poverty.  "Capitalism" is simply freedom.  Freedom to transact and trade capital for one's best interest.  God forbid people recognize the blindingly-obvious fact that power is currently almost entirely in the hands of those that go beyond their own freedom to transact, but shape society and law to restrict others from doing so.

You've received a lot of support and agreement, well of course.  Probably half from anti-bitcoin circle jerkers; as well as other short-sighted fools like yourself.  Look here, in this thread, up until this post and past it; look at your article submitted to /r/bitcoin.  Read the comments.  Go on pretending that the bitcoin community agrees with you; if you can handle the mental dissonance--you seem upto the task.

Viva la resitance!

hear hear my friend,I had a similar story to tell at bilderberg in Watford this year,but all press were shit scared to film it,fear of a spanking that's coming i feel,for those inside the grove this year,long time coming,bitcoin could be inert deflection,worlds mad,lets not change it to much,its interesting?

[applelover]

I guess I would be one of the slightly more well dressed non stink anarchist / mindless libertarian types.

Anarchism is not about no rules... and 'anarchy' as you have been led to believe, it is about the fundmental right for someone not to use force / violence / coercion against someone else.

You seem to think you have the right todo this.

I'm happy with Cody Wilsons, 'there will be a 1000 silk roads', because he's right, there will be, the cat is out the bag, bitcoin destroys statism, taxation and the war on drugs...  maybe your just a well dressed pompous idiot who hasn't yet figured this out ?

So.

Eat it.

there are somethings on silk road whcih are unacceptable, like child porn.  so people need to use force, to stop pedophiles from using force on helpless kids.

[applelover]

i support the OP.  looks like there are a lot of butt hurt people who want to support dick behavior.

[hilariousandco]

I guess I would be one of the slightly more well dressed non stink anarchist / mindless libertarian types.

Anarchism is not about no rules... and 'anarchy' as you have been led to believe, it is about the fundmental right for someone not to use force / violence / coercion against someone else.

You seem to think you have the right todo this.

I'm happy with Cody Wilsons, 'there will be a 1000 silk roads', because he's right, there will be, the cat is out the bag, bitcoin destroys statism, taxation and the war on drugs...  maybe your just a well dressed pompous idiot who hasn't yet figured this out ?

So.

Eat it.

there are somethings on silk road whcih are unacceptable, like child porn.  so people need to use force, to stop pedophiles from using force on helpless kids.

Silk Road never sold or dealt with child porn. In fact, it was against their rules.

[FiatKiller]

OP, it is only commonsense that many hardcore bitcoiners were there at the beginning and are mostly mega-geeks who don't bathe and still live with their parents. Don't worry as time goes on this will change as more and more main-streamers want a piece of the pie. I accept all people and was probably someone in between the two extremes. Never saw the logic of wearing a retarded tie that chokes you, but taking a bath is a daily routine for sure.

[dayfall]

I couldn’t help but marvel at the irony of libertarian anarchists attending a capitalist conference, because lets face it, bitcoin is money

I am confused.  Is it the anarchists or the libertarians that should oppose capitalism (i.e. money), or just the libertarian-anarchists?

infact the the libertarian/anarchist paranoid self destruction is completely beside the point at a gathering to discuss and be excited by money.

In fact, at a gathering about THIS kind of money it is exactly the point.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

But then there were the others. Almost like the occupy movement had rolled out of bed after months in a tent, having avoided showers and deodorant, swarming together in a bleary eyed collision of half present minds and merging into a single cloud of overwhelming stench.

Wait till you see what I'm wearing during the Inside Bitcoins (West) conference in Las Vegas.

~TMIBTCITW

[Voodah]

This is really stupid and short minded.

We'll never get mass adoption with people like you.

Everyone is there for Bitcoin. You are the one judging and trying to exclude people.

I agree I'd much rather have everyone clean and sharp; but if you're "ashamed to be a bitcoiner" because of your own prejudice, you should probably sell your BTC and never look back, otherwise you're also a hypocrite.

[justusranvier]

Wait till you see what I'm wearing during the Inside Bitcoins (West) conference in Las Vegas.

Same as CCC in Atlanta?

[piramida]

addicts with money.

Comparing to the amount of actual addicts with millions in fiat money (not just "somebody is unpleasant must be a drug addict"), this is nothing. You don't like certain people, understandable, they probably didn't like you either, and could vent the exact same way about "some mildly aftershaved douche in expensive clothes trying to squeeze past everybody as if he is somehow more important".

And the way you fail to understand what bitcoin is all about, I say they were right.

[hieroglyph]

I could not ever be ashamed of Bitcoin just those who misuse it.  I'm liking the discussion about the community as a whole by the community.  I don't have much of an opinion on the matter I think it is what it is really.  Some people just have better manners in some ways what can you do but voice your opinion and move on.

[andye]

I was present - I also found the (quite small) "smash the system! fuck the government!" crowd cheering Cody Whatshisname childish and embarrassing. I was amused that CW was disappointed that he hadn't been stopped from entering the country. He hoped they'd get him on the way out.

To balance him, there was the sensible guy on the panel at the end (sorry, can't remember the name) who spoke for bitcoin users who don't want to be law-breakers.

On the whole I would say the sensible speakers outnumbered the nutters about 5:1.

Re scruffyness: I was glad. Actual hackers (in the good sense) and not just suits were present. Reminded me of internet things in the '90s. As someone upthread says, RMS was among the scruffy group.

I was amused that Stallman didn't want to conduct the auction in bitcoin.

I was also amused that the organisers couldn't quite manage the logistics of paying me the 0.15 BTC that came with the entrance ticket - obviously Bitcoin usability does have some way to go still!

On the whole I found it an interesting and useful event. Kudos and thanks to the organisers.

[skull88]

Anarchists and libertarians on a Bitcoin Expo, really?
Who would have thought 

I also don't really get this:

I couldn’t help but marvel at the irony of libertarian anarchists attending a capitalist conference, because lets face it, bitcoin is money

You know a libertarian is an anarcho-capitalist right?
The words should be pretty self explaining.

I do judge people based on their appearance (everyone does)

Everyone? So, you know how 7+ billion people think? That's a pretty great gift.

I think you would be pretty surprised how many of the suit wearing guys were actually the drug addicts. I'm one of the people that wants 1000 Silkroads and I hardly use drugs. I smoke +-4 joints a year, from time to time a dram whiskey or glass whine and I vape low nicotine liquids. But imo nobody has the right to say others what they can or can't use as long as they harm nobody else.

How I look is probably in between and I take a bath or shower daily. But I'm not embarrassed if someone with different opinions and looks, uses the same money as I'm using. 

[KonstantinosM]

Misleading title and blanket statements. Truly one of the worst articles I've read in a long time.

[kuverty]

What can I say. I recommend that OP drops some acid. But seriously, that was not a good post.

There are not very many people who are that much into Bitcoin that they would come to a meetup, that don't hold some ideals that can be described as anarchist. It's not about breaking stuff or getting respect from your friends by going to demonstrations and eating vegan food from a dumpster. You will find that many of the leading scientist and thinkers on this planet could be described or describe themselves as anarchists.

Perhaps I should clarify, what I meant by recommending you to drop acid was that you should really broaden your horizons.
All in all, it's cool that RMS was present, and I'm glad there were enthusiastic people working towards a more interesting (maybe even better) world; who cares if they wore perfectly fitting suits or oversized GNU T-shirts.

[bitpop]

Op is ashamed of himself and for not having the confidence that even uglier people have

[rebuilder]

This is about bitcoin and shouldn't be coat hangered by politics.

There's a strong political motivation underpinning the way the whole system was designed. It's not like a bunch of punks just suddenly crawled out of the woodworks to make things hard for the normal, upstanding Bitcoin users. See the discussions from a few years back, I think you'll find the folks with more mainstream sensibilities such as yourself are the newcomers.

Now, part of the politics of the design is not restricting who can use Bitcoin. That means the suit-and-ties crowd will have to either deal with the idea that for many, Bitcoin is an expression of political radicalism just the same as the Amir Taakis out there will have to deal with the fact they have to share the system with the most conservative of capitalists out there.

Take an honest look at the implications of Bitcoin. Silk Road is one. If you can't accept that, draw your own conclusions.

[bitpop]

Most of us here aren't crazy, the crazy ones found us.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Most of us here aren't crazy, the crazy ones found us.

bitpop freaks me out sometimes, but I like him/her/it.

~TMIBTCITW