[XMR] Monero Speculation

[generalizethis]

Project Space Yacht  

Monohull, catamaran, or trimaran?

Yamato--refurbished in pimp my ride style (though I may keep a few guns for shooting space dragons and such)

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[smooth]

Sorry.  Just trying to nail down / explain why character assessment gets in the way of constructive discourse - not enhance it.

There is no need to apologize, please just stop. None of this is relevant to Monero Speculation. I guess it could be on topic if you think he is trying to manipulate the market with his posts, but I don't believe that and I don't think you do either since your comments continue to focus on topic of ego and such. If he posts off topic then I will delete that too (and I have), so let's just focus on avoiding the significant risk of thread derail

Sorry.  Just trying to nail down / explain why character assessment gets in the way of constructive discourse - not enhance it. TBT is intentionally blind on this fact and loves toset people off by belittling them in order to get a reaction he can then start waving around in a Donald Trump type fashion and threaten to sue.  It is not only unhealthy for good discourse - it's impossible to address with him because his ego is so large and his emotional immaturity completely keeps him from taking any constructive input.

So he walks in as an authority on any given subject not a contributor to a conversation.  And THAT dynamic is kinda on topic for this thread ...

[TPTB_need_war]

Don't argue with him, he is clearly mentally unstable

Nor diagnoses

That is a personal attack. Diagnoses implies there is a mental disease to diagnose.

Are you sticking with that choice of word?

[smooth]

Well if you are not hiding from the government and just want privacy, then we could just use a centralized mixer.

Maybe, Panama Papers seem relevant here, if you are relying on a third party to not disclose information then you may not be safe from future leaks of whatever source. Some of the Panama Papers cases involve divorce settlements, business partners, etc., for example, and nobody really believes that divorce lawyers have the NSA working for them. They too have the info now too, regardless. Same could be said for nosy neighbors.

If you aren't very good at security, maybe you can't even trust yourself not to accidentally disclose in the future, but at least with Monero you can personally retire the wallet, securely delete the keys and not have to worry about that.

[ArticMine]

So is monreo worth investing in or is this another pump and dump scam.  It seems to have more upsides than the other alt coins but that could just be people speculating rubbish.

My take on this is that it depends a lot on the time frame. My opinion is that Monero has very strong fundamentals that can lead upside over the medium to long term. On the other hand a day trader using margin can very easily get stopped out long before any fundamentals are reflected on the price. The recent drop has been very close to lock step with Ethererum. Interestingly Monero is at a significant support level while Ethrereum is not. It is very possible that we see a decoupling at this point.

Investing in Crypto currency is not for the faint of heart. One can see a complete loss of the invested funds and also explosive upside returns. Even Bitcoin has seen some extreme movements like a drop from over 30 USD to 2 USD in 2011 followed by a rise over the following two years from 2 USD to over 1000 USD. Then followed by a low just over 150 USD. Monero is even more volatile.

[TPTB_need_war]

Well if you are not hiding from the government and just want privacy, then we could just use a centralized mixer.

Maybe, Panama Papers seem relevant here, if you are relying on a third party to not disclose information then you may not be safe from future leaks of whatever source. Some of the Panama Papers cases involve divorce settlements, business partners, etc., for example, and nobody really believes that divorce lawyers have the NSA working for them. They too have the info now too, regardless. Same could be said for nosy neighbors.

If you aren't very good at security, maybe you can't even trust yourself not to accidentally disclose in the future, but at least with Monero you can personally retire the wallet, securely delete the keys and not have to worry about that.

I was not arguing for the superiority of centralized trust. But I framed my statement in the holistic context (scalability, what society will allow, etc), not pigeon-holed to this one consideration you are highlighting.

[smooth]

That is a personal attack. Diagnoses implies there is a mental disease to diagnose.

Are you sticking with that choice of word?

It could be an incorrect diagnosis (and very likely unqualified anyway). I do not assume that anything anyone posts is correct (good advice to investors as well, BTW). It was certainly a personal attack as well, which is why it was deleted

[smooth]

Well if you are not hiding from the government and just want privacy, then we could just use a centralized mixer.

Maybe, Panama Papers seem relevant here, if you are relying on a third party to not disclose information then you may not be safe from future leaks of whatever source. Some of the Panama Papers cases involve divorce settlements, business partners, etc., for example, and nobody really believes that divorce lawyers have the NSA working for them. They too have the info now too, regardless. Same could be said for nosy neighbors.

If you aren't very good at security, maybe you can't even trust yourself not to accidentally disclose in the future, but at least with Monero you can personally retire the wallet, securely delete the keys and not have to worry about that.

I was not arguing for the superiority of centralized trust. But I framed my statement in the holistic context (scalability, what society will allow, etc), not pigeon-holed to this one consideration you are highlighting.

I'm just adding another perspective. I don't disagree there are trade offs to be made.

[smooth]

More off topic back and forth deleted. Guys, get a room (and not this room).

Its pure speculation! [wink]

Smooth can clarify if he is speculating that I have a mental disease. Your dribble is irrelevant. Can't you see I asked him? Something wrong with your eyes?

[r0ach]

Project Space Yacht  

Monohull, catamaran, or trimaran?

Yamato--refurbished in pimp my ride style (though I may keep a few guns for shooting space dragons and such)

Technically a monohull, although the keel is probably not providing counterbalance in space.

[smooth]

Personally I think GPU vs. botnet is going to become an irrelevant distinction as more and more botnet nodes will be sufficiently GPU-capable to mine effectively. TPTB posted link to a story like a year and a half ago about a large botnet that was made up of higher end gaming computers, but even lower end computers are showing rapid technological progress in terms of integrated GPU capabilities.

On a current AMD APU, you can effectively mine Monero on both the CPU and the GPU. I don't know if more GPU-focused algorithms like ethhash are effectively mineable there, but if not then clearly that is just a generation or two away.

Ultimately even ASICs will be captured by botnets if network security continues to suck and such ASICs are widespread enough. There have been a few attacks on ASIC mining already that involved redirecting the miners, but if ASICs did somehow become more widely dispersed in the future (as some suggest might happen if and when the chips become commoditized) this would explode.

As long as security is crap, botnets will infect everything.

But at the same time, they seem very self-limiting for specifically mining in practice for now. It is very unlikely there is anything close to the million+ botnet nodes it would take to mine most of Monero, so they are just a small-ish part of the network. If Monero continues to grow their share will probably continue to decrease.

[ArticMine]

Well if you are not hiding from the government and just want privacy, then we could just use a centralized mixer.

Maybe, Panama Papers seem relevant here, if you are relying on a third party to not disclose information then you may not be safe from future leaks of whatever source. Some of the Panama Papers cases involve divorce settlements, business partners, etc., for example, and nobody really believes that divorce lawyers have the NSA working for them. They too have the info now too, regardless. Same could be said for nosy neighbors.

If you aren't very good at security, maybe you can't even trust yourself not to accidentally disclose in the future, but at least with Monero you can personally retire the wallet, securely delete the keys and not have to worry about that.

The Panama Papers example is very relevant. In fact for most people an agency such as the NSA is an insignificant risk at best. The real risk comes fromr large corporations after marketing data and attempting to protect their "intellectual property". Remember Superfish? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superfish This malware was installed on computers sold to consumers by Lenovo. What this malware did was to break SSL encryption by using a bogus root certificate that was trusted by the installed Windows operating system. Lenovo has not learned its lesson and they are still at it.  https://thehackernews.com/2015/09/lenovo-laptop-virus.html. Then there is DRM which is as big or bigger threat to privacy. Remember the Sony rootkit 11 years ago? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal

One simply cannot rely on any product that is mass marketed to consumers by large corporations such as Microsoft or Apple for privacy or security. In fact I will go as far as to say that if a computer or device has a proprietary operating system and supports DRM, one should not have an expectation of privacy with respect to any data on the computer or device.

Edit 1: In the recent Apple vs FBI dispute it is actually the FBI that was the good guy. Why because what the FBI wanted to do was break Apple's DRM (Jailbreak an iPhone) in order to pursue a legitimate and lawful anti terrorism investigation. The reason the FBI could get a third party to access the iPhone is because DRM, unlike real encryption such as what is used in Monero, is based on snake oil rather than sound mathematics.

Edit 2: The same or similar Apple DRM that the FBI broke, was used from 2009 to 2014 to censor Bitcoin and is currently used to censor Monero

[thelibertycap]

I am sure monero as a conflict resource https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflict_resource moral dilemma with this botnet mining discussion someone brought up for some strange reason is the least of our worries.
Unless monero $1000 materializes - but who knows and it is just around the corner exactly as true cryptonnaire in his better days has suggested and we should consider the implications already.
Until then, botnet mining will make us stronger.
Is there some way to advertise? We need decentralized consensus, competing skynets is good.

[Nxtblg]

Think about some of the obvious use cases we all dream about...getting paid in crypto.  Should everybody in the world have a salary that is public record?

Do we want to have psychopaths monitoring every dime spent by every public figure?  Do I even care or should I know how much my mayor paid for that refrigerator?

If I were senior manager of a company, particularly one in the R&D side of things, would I want all of my competitors to know what I'm spending on?

[TPTB_need_war]

The reason the FBI could get a third party to access the iPhone is because DRM, unlike real encryption such as what is used in Monero, is based on snake oil rather than sound mathematics.

Edit 2: The same or similar Apple DRM that the FBI broke, was used from 2009 to 2014 to censor Bitcoin and is currently used to censor Monero

Are you saying that Apple is lying when it says the user has the private keys and not Apple?

[TPTB_need_war]

Think about some of the obvious use cases we all dream about...getting paid in crypto.  Should everybody in the world have a salary that is public record?

Do we want to have psychopaths monitoring every dime spent by every public figure?  Do I even care or should I know how much my mayor paid for that refrigerator?

If I were senior manager of a company, particularly one in the R&D side of things, would I want all of my competitors to know what I'm spending on?

The unknown risk I raised is not whether these things are wanted, but to what degree and in what form will society allow and prefer and how will scalability impact the choice, will crypto-currency even be widely adopted, etc..

I was not implying a simple binary consideration where we are questioning whether privacy is desirable or not.

P.S. implied by my continued posting in this thread, it means I am satisfied with the final resolution of smooth's recent moderation.

[smooth]

The reason the FBI could get a third party to access the iPhone is because DRM, unlike real encryption such as what is used in Monero, is based on snake oil rather than sound mathematics.

Edit 2: The same or similar Apple DRM that the FBI broke, was used from 2009 to 2014 to censor Bitcoin and is currently used to censor Monero

Are you saying that Apple is lying when it says the user has the private keys and not Apple?

Probably not lying, but these systems are complex, always under development to implement the complex, possibly conflicting, and often shifting demands of DRM, and therefore very unlikely to actually ever be very secure.

Also, it is well known that intelligence agencies have infiltrated tech companies in the past and no reason to think this doesn't continue so there may well be back doors (facilitated by complexity in which they can hide) that "Apple" as an entity doesn't even know about even though someone working for Apple or an Apple vendor put it there.

[TPTB_need_war]

Personally I think GPU vs. botnet is going to become an irrelevant distinction as more and more botnet nodes will be sufficiently GPU-capable to mine effectively.

Moreover my economic point (for the slow minded who didn't get it the first time), is that we rent or purchase hardware to mine with if we are doing any serious mining. So what is the difference if we rent or purchase a botnet. It is a free market. The demand for botnets should increase to where price of a botnet and thus the profit from mining from a botnet is the same as from renting the hardware.

I mean common on. This is just Economics 101 that price meets demand at supply.

So the real question of importance is does large economies-of-scale of capital have an advantage with botnets which can lead to centralization? No! Whereas with ASICs and orthogonally (and mainly!) electricity, large capital does have an advantage over us, thus centralizes.

[spatula]

The reason the FBI could get a third party to access the iPhone is because DRM, unlike real encryption such as what is used in Monero, is based on snake oil rather than sound mathematics.

Edit 2: The same or similar Apple DRM that the FBI broke, was used from 2009 to 2014 to censor Bitcoin and is currently used to censor Monero

Are you saying that Apple is lying when it says the user has the private keys and not Apple?

Probably not lying, but these systems are complex, always under development to implement the complex, possibly conflicting, and often shifting demands of DRM, and therefore very unlikely to actually ever be very secure.

Also, it is well known that intelligence agencies have infiltrated tech companies in the past and no reason to think this doesn't continue so there may well be back doors (facilitated by complexity in which they can hide) that "Apple" as an entity doesn't even know about even though someone working for Apple or an Apple vendor put it there.

Kind of like a private cryptocurrency created in the "darknet"  

[TPTB_need_war]

So what is the difference if we rent or purchase a botnet. It is a free market.

The primary difference is that the cost is fronted primarily from someone who is not benefiting from the purchase / electricity usage AND the people willing to rent / purchase a botnet will be limited to those willing to steal from others / break the law.

Again you are making an moral argument that has no relevance on the economic argument. Don't you realize I get tired of repeating myself. Do Not Repeat Yourself is a fundamental tenet or goal of functional programming.

The demand for botnets will rise to the profit arbitrage compared to renting hardware, because there are a sufficient supply of people and capital that don't see a moral problem with it. Personally I wish viruses didn't exist, just like I wish cancer didn't exist. But living in a delusion is not my concept of rationality.

If the people being stolen from were significantly harmed, they'd be doing something about it. Obviously they don't care enough. Whose responsibility and culpability is it to not secure their belongings?

I suppose you can make the argument that those who rent a botnet will only do so if there is some profit compared to renting hardware legally, but I am not even sure if renting a botnet is illegal in every jurisdiction. And I am not convinced that someone couldn't rent out "mining services" and not tell the renters that a botnet is being employed.

If you argue that a botnet farmer will want to do all the mining himself instead of renting out to the highest bidder, the fact is that there is a price where it is more attractive to rent out than to incur the risk of mining yourself, e.g. guaranteed and faster cash flow, etc.. Why do ASIC manufacturers rent out versus mining with their own hardware. Demand rises to meet supply at rational price. This and competition insures it won't be a centralized outcome.

The point is that botnets are much more free market than electricity. This seems to be beyond the grasp of someone here who is now on Ignore at his own request.

Edit: and this same person can't seem to grasp that unenforceable laws have virtually no impact on the economics and thus free market. He conflates "free market" with his decision that he personally won't choose to rent a botnet. He also can't seem to comprehend that the cheapest electricity goes to those with the most capital and huge economies-of-scale (usually bankster loans and probably also corrupt political favors as well). Whereas, the competition for botnet farming includes any Eastern European or Russian geek who wants to spend a few months learning the art. I mean I really can't waste my time arguing with someone who can't grasp Economics 101. I estimate he didn't even take this course at the university. I aced it. Not a personal attack, just explaining why I am sometimes going to be terse and not explain ad nauseum because I don't want to expend all my time on explaining especially to those who won't get the point any way.