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Why Monero

benkaiser.dev

251–260 of 394 posts

Re: Why Monero

#251
post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh no, it works like cash! People will do things with money that you're uncomfortable with. If it's criminal, then laws and enforcement and investigation will have to evolve. That doesn't mean "well, I guess we have to give up privacy now. " Not your money, not your business. Privacy is important, and it's a binary proposition. It's either part of the currency or it's not. You can't have any gray area because people…

Cash doesn't burn a bunch of electricity on a PoW scheme.

The dollar system is built on eternal growth and the oil economy, and its proof of work is endless wars. I'll take bitcoin and monero any day; they're much, much greener than what we currently have.

Re: Why Monero

#252
post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just because the government knows about my bank account doesn't mean my wife/neighbor/rando does. No one is talking about radically public bank accounts; the surveillance is only for the government.

So what happens when your abusive boyfriend is a cop or a government worker?

which they are, of course, statistically more likely to be in this instance. https://www.amazon.com/Police-Wife-Epidemic-Domestic-Violenc...

Re: Why Monero

#253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're "running as a full node" then your full node is the remote node for a hardware wallet, isn't it?. I'm confused. I've only ever used the CLI which provides separate applications for wallet and node, and I connect the CLI wallet over RPC to my local (full) node. My understanding is the GUI works the same way while only presenting the one interface to the end user. But you should have a monerod running under t…

No the hardware wallet is only used to sign the transaction that's broadcasted by my local node. The failing case was with monerod in the background. Maybe I should look into the CLI. Does it support Ledger?

CLI supports Ledger, just need to have it plugged it at the time

Re: Why Monero

#254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're "running as a full node" then your full node is the remote node for a hardware wallet, isn't it?. I'm confused. I've only ever used the CLI which provides separate applications for wallet and node, and I connect the CLI wallet over RPC to my local (full) node. My understanding is the GUI works the same way while only presenting the one interface to the end user. But you should have a monerod running under t…

No the hardware wallet is only used to sign the transaction that's broadcasted by my local node. The failing case was with monerod in the background. Maybe I should look into the CLI. Does it support Ledger?

The CLI does support Ledger but it uses the same monerod binary as the GUI.

Did you export your view key with Ledger? If you refuse it can cause hanging and crashes. With exported view key and the latest version there shouldn't be any of the issues you are describing.

Re: Why Monero

#255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Paper money is much, much more difficult to use for crime than cryptocurrencies.

It depends on the kind of crime. Some crime is easier with cash. For example, many professional bartenders commit tax fraud every day by not reporting cash tips. This is directly facilitated by paper currencies.

It is not "facilitated" by it, that is just because cash tips are given in paper currencies and not in Monero.

If tips were given in Monero, the tax fraud would be even easier.

Re: Why Monero

#256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh no, it works like cash! People will do things with money that you're uncomfortable with. If it's criminal, then laws and enforcement and investigation will have to evolve. That doesn't mean "well, I guess we have to give up privacy now. " Not your money, not your business. Privacy is important, and it's a binary proposition. It's either part of the currency or it's not. You can't have any gray area because people…

Cash is much more difficult to take across borders... Monero is superior to cash for criminal activity in just about every way, the only downside is that it's a bit less liquid. This deflection about it being used in crime less than cash is weak to the point of bad faith. The privacy argument has more to stand on though. Although I will say "not your money, not our business" is a pretty controversial take.

Criminals send illegal goods from Colombia to Europe through amateur submarines [1].

Doesn't require much thinking to guess what submarines come back filled with.

It's not that they can't move money illegally already.

We wouldn't advocate the usage of horses in modern cities because cars make it easier for criminals to escape law enforcement.

I also don't think it's reasonable to not support Monero just because you worry it might be used for criminal activity.

[1] https://insightcrime.org/news/analysis/colombia-narco-submar...

Re: Why Monero

#257
post #223

Bitcoin is totally useless as a currency because it’s slow, has high transaction fees, and easy to trace. So it’s bad for both regular consumers and criminals alike. Monero is a solid improvement because it has low fees (so far) and is very hard to trace. So it’s popular for criminals or intense privacy types. It’s still far too slow and hard to use to ever be accepted in your local grocery store. It’s also hard to b…

You are correct on the Bitcoin-is-easy-to-trace point but transactions in the Bitcoin Lightning Network are instant and very cheap. Bitcoin is the only cryptocurrency with guaranteed-not-to-change monetary policy and supply cap. That's because Bitcoin as a whole is uniquely hard to change. Monero is great but easy to change and so not a reliable store of value. Bitcoin and Monero need each other badly.

In a few decades, when the block subsidy dwindles to insignificance, Bitcoin relies on a constant backlog of high fee paying transactions to provide security. If that cannot be maintained and Bitcoin becomes prone to 51% attacks, then one can imagine Bitcoin adding a tail emission.

A cryptocurrency with a fixed emission of 1 coin per second forever is more guaranteed never to change, as it is already as simple, non-arbitrary and fair as possible.

Re: Why Monero

#258
post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh no, it works like cash! People will do things with money that you're uncomfortable with. If it's criminal, then laws and enforcement and investigation will have to evolve. That doesn't mean "well, I guess we have to give up privacy now. " Not your money, not your business. Privacy is important, and it's a binary proposition. It's either part of the currency or it's not. You can't have any gray area because people…

Cash doesn't burn a bunch of electricity on a PoW scheme.

A wasteless means of payment and accounting is wishful thinking, from my point of view.

We don't really use cash anymore, but a digital representation of it. This comes with a lot of electricity consumption on datacenters, among other waste.

For example: financial institutions have to waste a lot of resources just to keep the system "safe", for you, the government, etc. Requires extensive cybersecurity, bureaucratic and legal spending.

Re: Why Monero

#259
post #57

How can anyone think this is a good thing? At least other crypto projects have a degree of transparency going for them. I don't understand how people can possibly think that identity obfuscation at scale is a good thing for a financial system. The rule of law and democracy are far from perfect, but it is unquestionably the safest, cushiest time to be alive in human history right now for the average human being. Let's…

What do you think of E2E encryption in apps like Signal? Does the same logic apply?

Re: Why Monero

#260
post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How are mining oligopolies better than staking oligopolies?

It's harder for mining oligopolies to exclude new entrants.

How? The only way I can think of that staking oligopolies can exclude new entrants is if they somehow manage to remove the crypto from markets. Basically killing their stake.

It is far easier for me to buy some crypto and stake it than it is to buy mining hardware and mine.

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