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CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

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Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#431

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Take crypto out of the equation, what are the implications of the fed issuing a programmable currency? Many financial services would become obsolete. What do I need a stock broker for? What do I need a bank for? You have Wall St and other sophisticated investors profiteering and competing against the general public, devaluing our purchasing power, making leveraged trades because they know the public will hold the bag…

The majority of economic activity is not "programmable"--if I order a ship load of steel from some country, how is that contract going to be enforceable/verifiable with cryptoeconomic techniques?

A firm created at Rice University is actually trying to solve exactly that problem. [0]

[0] - https://statistics.rice.edu/news/student-founded-blockchain-...

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't rely on that one. As cool as Filecoin is, LE can query who has a given file and chase them and their ISP until they no longer advertise that file. Without secrecy you can't have a censorship-free solution.

The Ethereum smart contract can advertise the file in perpetuity by being memorialized on the blockchain in an irrevocable way

You'd have to embed the whole file in the blockchain for that. At that point Filecoin is not relevant. That's not censorship-free either - the use of Eth network can be banned too. And LE or govs see who to target too.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#433
It's already starting. I've heard that Nvidia developed a cutting edge computing audit system, that was developed to detect, in real time, that GPUs are being used for calculating simple hashing algorithms and sniffs out all computation. The next step is just government mandated cpu firmware, installed in all Intel and AMD CPUs that can detect when a computer tries to calculate a SHA hash, and immediately reports it to the fed. This leading edge tech is already being shared by Nvidia with the FBI. I've heard it's unhakable.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#434
post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One use case: Buying something without a credit card online.

And you bought the crypto itself with magic?

You want to know how you get bitcoins without magic? Mining, trading, buyinc frik

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#435
post #424

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The asset won't be the bulldozer, but ownership of the bulldozer. How did the natives of the Yap islands know who owned which Rai stones? Through social contracts. The same would be the case for bulldozer ownerships on Ethereum. It's just a way for you to prove to other humans (or programs) that you own the bulldozer. If you sell the bulldozer in real life, then presumably the buyer would want the ownership. The diff…

Except you keep talking about automation of assets but you haven't answered the question: how does the delivery, and return of the bulldozer work? How does the delivery and return of my USD work? At every junction the answer is "well you trust another party and..." - so why is ethereum needed in the process at all? All of this is just companies providing an API for a service (which generally they don't, now, because…

Your bulldozer would need to have a chip installed that can connect to Ethereum and read off who the current authorized operator is. The operator and the owner would have to have cards that contain keys that speak a protocol that the bulldozer understands. Once the loan time runs out, the bulldozer locks out the renter.

The GP is describing a system kind of like Zipcar - you go online, you enter payment, and Zipcar allows your card to operate a car for a period of time. So, you might say, so what, we already have a Zipcar, why replace it with the blockchain?

Because if Zipcar goes out of business, all the cards and hardware on Zipcar cars are defunct. If all the hardware talks to contracts on Ethereum, there's no Zipcar to go out of business - you buy the hardware once, but the operation of the system happens on Ethereum, not in Zipcars' SQL database.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#436

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> You can create all sorts of regulations but that will only harden the stance of crypto maxis because it will only prove them right. They can harden their stance all they want, but breaking the crypto ecosystem is incredibly easy if governments really wanted to. All you have to do is ban companies from interacting with crypto currencies in any form, be it accepting, exchanging, holding, or producing them. That would…

All they'd really have to do is announce that they were going to build enough computing power to initiate a 51 percent attack on bitcoin. I imagine the NSA is already there but it would be a nice cash injection for Intel or whatever. Bitcoin has a very, very short history of being a decent store of value and the US Government publicly saying they plan to break it would collapse the entire scheme.

This is a silly proposal, bitcoin could just switch to a new PoW algo within days if not hours if someone did that.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just as an example, have you heard of smart contracts? There's a cambrian explosion happening now among networks, everybody tweaks something to be different from others. I suggest you to take a look around, there's a shocking diversity. > How does cryptocurrency help with any of that? How can a globally spanning Turing complete computer help? I don't know, but we will see attempts. > Citation needed. Haha, I always f…

> Just as an example, have you heard of smart contracts? Yes. They seem to be a solution looking for a problem. What problems can you imagine smart contracts solving? > How can a globally spanning Turing complete computer help? I don't know, but we will see attempts. So the answer is "nobody has thought of a single way this helps, after 10 years of thinking about it". > But for fun's sake, go to https://coinmarketcap…

So it's possible to find bad examples, I get it.

What problems smart contact solve?

With my brief experience, they compute the state of a transaction in which everybody agrees. Why is that cool? You don't need an authority to tell who is right.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a ridiculous comparison, though. E.g. try to regularly move billions in cash and see how long it'll take before you're busted for not reporting that you're doing that. A billion bucks weighs a fucktonne. I'm pro cash, anti cryptocurrency, because the comparison is absolutely ridiculous there's no contradiction.

The commissioner of the SEC doesn't find it all that ridiculous. She just commented on it yesterday actually. [1] https://youtu.be/KfvMX8sJEy4?t=525

I don't see her disagreeing with what I said.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Beany babies spawned a lot of successful business, but you absolutely cannot from derive that they were fit for purpose, or in any way useful. You're cargo culting. They're still a solution in search of a problem, backed by tech people who think they understand what they are trying to replace. Once you understand the fence you can tear it down, but cryptonerds really really don't understand law (they think smart cont…

12 year old beanie babies with one of the most accessible financial assets in the world with returns of over 60.000x

You missed the whole point there, bud.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#440

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a ridiculous comparison, though. E.g. try to regularly move billions in cash and see how long it'll take before you're busted for not reporting that you're doing that. A billion bucks weighs a fucktonne. I'm pro cash, anti cryptocurrency, because the comparison is absolutely ridiculous there's no contradiction.

Cash payment limit of $10000AUD is proposed in Australia. $10000AUD weighs fuckall. https://treasury.gov.au/policy-topics/economy/black-economy/...

I could also easily carry more than $10k across a border. It's illegal without reporting it (exact number varies). But that's one type of payment.

I've carried $2k USD in just $20s in my pocket across international borders, and had it been in $100s that would be the limit. But if I want to transfer even one million dollars that 100 trips. Or 100 pockets if I ignore the law. I own cargo pants, but even they don't have 100 pockets. And a billion? That's a thousand people each with a hundred pockets full of cash.

What I was saying is that mere logistics makes it hard to move a billion in cash.

So there's a natural prevention of moving large amounts of cash. It's not impossible, but "making it hard" was done on purpose. So cryptocurrencies are not "clever" for "fixing a problem". They're actually removing the amelioration to the problem.

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