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Taproot, Bitcoin’s long-anticipated upgrade, has activated

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Re: Taproot, Bitcoin’s long-anticipated upgrade, has activated

#171

Post by rabite »

egypturnash wrote: post #95

Does Taproot do anything to reduce the absurd power consumption? If not then it just feels as useful as rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic to me.

Bitcoin's power consumption is not absurd -- proof of work is a method of converting power to security. It uses far less energy than the legacy banking system, which is enforced by trillions of dollars of military expenditures and banking employees burning fossil fuels instead of a comparatively tiny amount of electricity.

When we finally phase out the legacy banking system completely for cryptocurrency, it will represent a drastic reduction in finance-related energy consumption worldwide.

Re: Taproot, Bitcoin’s long-anticipated upgrade, has activated

#172

Post by RC_ITR »

Mengkudulangsat wrote: post #165
vkou wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Good riddance. I don't think KYC/AML are a force for good If KYC/AML is not possible in the bitcoin world, you're not going to be getting a world with bitcoin that doesn't have KYC/AML. You're going to get a world with no bitcoin.

Finance without KYC/AML is like air travel without TSA. Everyone remembers those times fondly, but have lost the imagination to believe they are possible again.

And even more forget why we put those systems into place to begin with.

Just because the response is a bad one doesn't mean that the problem doesn't exist.

FWIW, even if TSA is bad at stopping terrorists, I AM glad that all of these people punching flight attendants are, with certainty c. 1, not packing heat.

Re: Taproot, Bitcoin’s long-anticipated upgrade, has activated

#173

Post by baby »

atweiden wrote: post #127
baby wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's highly unlikely that Bitcoin will move towards a proof of stake protocol without strong incentives (like regulations). The whole point of the proof of stake was to make the protocol censorship resistant.

> Overcoming censorship is not possible in a PoS system, as the censor has acquired majority stake and cannot be unseated. As such PoS systems are not censorship-resistant and the theory is therefore invalid. https://github.com/libbitcoin/libbitcoin-system/wiki/Proof-o...

I meant proof of work :)

Although in theory you still need to find who owns these accounts in a proof of stake system. So it’s not as bad as what people think.

Re: Taproot, Bitcoin’s long-anticipated upgrade, has activated

#174

Post by echelon »

rabite wrote: post #171
egypturnash wrote: post #95

Does Taproot do anything to reduce the absurd power consumption? If not then it just feels as useful as rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic to me.

Bitcoin's power consumption is not absurd -- proof of work is a method of converting power to security. It uses far less energy than the legacy banking system, which is enforced by trillions of dollars of military expenditures and banking employees burning fossil fuels instead of a comparatively tiny amount of electricity. When we finally phase out the legacy banking system completely for cryptocurrency, it will repr…

> converting power to security

What the hell does this even mean?

Quantum computers will eventually rip this stuff apart. And the reason folks won't be able to do the same to US banks and institutions using QC? The military and NSA will hunt you down.

Re: Taproot, Bitcoin’s long-anticipated upgrade, has activated

#175

Post by baby »

Gosper wrote: post #169
baby wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because those touted energy efficient protocols come at the cost of much weaker security guarantees which undermine a key point of Bitcoin That's FUD. Protocols like Bitcoin can fork, whereas others don't. Thus, Bitcoin, and proof-of-work, are less secure protocols.

You can fork endlessly and each fork won't matter one whit because they don't follow the longest chain secured with the most hashing power. Or your fork can follow the longest chain and abide by the rules so your transactions are accepted by the rest of the network, in which case you're using Bitcoin and haven't forked.

The problem is that you never know if you’re on a fork, or if there’s going to be a reorg.

Re: Taproot, Bitcoin’s long-anticipated upgrade, has activated

#176

Post by largbae »

Analemma_ wrote: post #163
ulzeraj wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good riddance. I don't think KYC/AML are a force for good. Its just more box ticking laws that serve to give a false sense of security while poor people are being excluded from the banking system and normal people have their all their data stolen from centralized databases. Real dangerous criminals don't give a damn about KYC/AML laws and operate freely within the banking framework. The European Central Bank chairwom…

Good or bad, "no KYC/AML" is not an option. If governments decide Bitcoin can’t provide KYC/AML, Bitcoin will be nuked from orbit.

KYC is fine at the edges already wherever crypto meets fiat. That would be the same here right?

Re: Taproot, Bitcoin’s long-anticipated upgrade, has activated

#177

Post by anonporridge »

Hjfrf wrote: post #148
ulzeraj wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then we go to spaaaaace https://blockstream.com/satellite/ Semi-serious jokes aside (the block stream satellite can receive blocks but not broadcast), the protocol can operate under Tor in which the bitcoin core daemon is very well integrated. If worst come to happen, sneaker net is somewhat popular ( https://opendime.com ) and people have transacted using radio waves as a proof of concept ( https://satoshi.radio.br/…

Peer to peer on-chain transactions seem unkillable at this point. Surely governments would target exchanges instead? Without the dollars coming from retail investors, the value proposition for speculators disappears. You could still trade bitcoin (slowly) at that point, but converting to fiat would be difficult.

The question for me, is if I can no longer legally sell my bitcoin for dollars, then that implies that bitcoin can't be legally valued.

Does that mean I can then exchange it directly with others without incurring a capital gains tax event?

Point is, shutting down legal exchanges won't happen in the US. Since you can't kill the underlying system or stop people from using it, you only make it impossible to tax.

Re: Taproot, Bitcoin’s long-anticipated upgrade, has activated

#178

Post by FDSGSG »

lightweb wrote: post #20

Ignore at your own potential peril.. BTCers don't care, apparently https://coingeek.com/could-taproot-privacy-features-make-btc...

Why are you posting a disinfo blog on HN? This same blog pushes the lie that Craig Wright is actually Satoshi.

Re: Taproot, Bitcoin’s long-anticipated upgrade, has activated

#179

Post by Macha »

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #149
Macha wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A currency that is not usable in China _or_ the West is inherently less valuable. Most of the bitcoin users are speculators, not people enamored by its value as a currency, and if they need to go to Lebanon to withdraw their gains in a fiat currency, then that is a serious negative.

We don't consider dollars less valuable if they're paid via American Express, even though it's less accepted than Visa. As long as there's a critical mass of users somewhere, the "who accepts what" problem reduces to a software problem that most people will ignore.

No, but in this analogy, bitcoin is american express, not USD. American Express cards are definitely considered less valuable to potential customers here because they're only accepted in ~70% of stores. It's been a bone of contention at my current employer as our corporate cards are American express but they consequently can't be used semi-frequently

Re: Taproot, Bitcoin’s long-anticipated upgrade, has activated

#180

Post by danlugo92 »

wayoutthere wrote: post #138
bigdubs wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then it's going to be weaponized to launder money and be made illegal eventually.

The banks themselves launder money for organized crime. Why shouldn’t money laundering be available to the masses too?

Good old "private banking services".
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