Ah, the Bloomberg and TechCrunch bottom signals I’m looking for.
They started already a few weeks ago. But right now the calm days are starting. The next half year or more will be about people forgetting about Bitcoin.
As Bitcoin Sinks, Industry Startups Are Forced to Cut Back
151–160 of 327 posts
Re: As Bitcoin Sinks, Industry Startups Are Forced to Cut Back
#152Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think that in very high-level terms, you're quite correct. You say, for example, 'it’s not clear to me that “decentralized technology” can prevent the very human process of holding others accountable' - I mean, yeah. That's a good starting point. On the other hand, your comment betrays some of the underlying revelation here: indeed, the MPAA has gone after the centralized components of peer-to-peer file sharing, as…
Sorry but I don’t buy this anarchist ideology. Evidence shows that these are the most peaceful times in human history, and governments are bigger than ever. Sure, we need to be smart about keeping leaders in check, and progress is jagged, but overall, aren’t you much happier to be born now than 3000 years ago? Would you have preferred to be born at any other time? Because if not, then you must realize that we’re here…
Governments might be bigger, but they are a lot more limited. Indeed, we consider the Chinese and North Korean governments to be an aberration, even though they would have been considered ridiculously progressive 3000 years ago.
Also, let's not forget the 100+ million people governments still managed to kill in the 20th century, even with all those handicaps.
Re: As Bitcoin Sinks, Industry Startups Are Forced to Cut Back
#153The discussion of blockchain tech on HN is puzzling to me. On the matter of value: I suspect that if we find ourselves able to send a message back in time two years (when BTC was less than $1,000 USD) and report that the price is now over $3,700, that we'll find this message to be met with an understanding that this is, at least, a validation of the use of blockchain tech as a store of value. I suspect that if we des…
> outdated notions of "intellectual property." Could you elaborate? What is wrong with current notion of intellectual property? What is outdated about it? In general I see this point targeting patents, not the whole concept of IP.
Not sure why you're being downvoted; this is a very reasonable question.
...and truth be told, I'm not exactly sure what I mean. But I do think that it's plain to notice that the internet tends to facilitate a style of sharing that is inconsistent with the "copyright" model of intellectual property (in addition to precluding a functioning patent system, as you point out).
It seems to me that we need to make peace with the innate tendencies of information, including the tendency of data to be copied and shared. The myth of Prometheus teaches us that this is a message deep in the species, and yet somehow governments have gotten the idea that they have the power to reverse it.
If the internet and governments clash head-to-head, of course the internet will win. The forward march of time does not yield, and especially not for something so fragile and childish as a claim to own an idea.
So I don't exactly know which notions of IP will become outdated and when, but I can visualize easily enough that some of them will at some future point.
Re: As Bitcoin Sinks, Industry Startups Are Forced to Cut Back
#154Earlier quoted context omitted.
And yet, should it become illegal for people to exchange fiat for crypto and for domiciled entities to own crypto all the decentralisation in the world wouldn't help.
I don't really see the connection. It seems to me that such a move will make decentralized money more valuable and more likely to be used, not less.
Most people don't care about decentralised money.
Stop the on/off ramps they currently use for speculation and the vast majority will stop speculating, as they were only in it for the get-rich-quick factor.
Re: As Bitcoin Sinks, Industry Startups Are Forced to Cut Back
#155What puzzled me is how comes blockchain startups did not sell their crypto for fiat just after their ICOs. I recommended this to several of my blockchain customers but none of them listened. I dont know if that was motivated by greed or something else. According to Game theory there is no benefit in not selling the crypto for fiat: if you raise lets say 10million during an ico (typical amount raised 6m ago), there is…
What is even involved in finding a buyer for $10mm btc in usd and then getting that usd into a legal/compliant bank account? Sounds non-trivial. It's my understanding from some work I did for a crypto startup that there is approximately zero usd/btc liquidity, the apparent "usd liquidity" and "usd price" last year was actually dominated by tether-btc and tether-eth liquidity. There was not actually a functional usd/b…
The BTC/USD market on Kraken is pretty liquid. I think trading $10m wouldn't have been a problem if you spread it over a few days. They are trading $34m/day now and it would have been far more 6 months ago.
Not sure what paperwork you need - as long as you could document the source was legit it would probably be ok.
Also changing BTC/USDT would at least protected against the decline in value.
Re: As Bitcoin Sinks, Industry Startups Are Forced to Cut Back
#156What puzzled me is how comes blockchain startups did not sell their crypto for fiat just after their ICOs. I recommended this to several of my blockchain customers but none of them listened. I dont know if that was motivated by greed or something else. According to Game theory there is no benefit in not selling the crypto for fiat: if you raise lets say 10million during an ico (typical amount raised 6m ago), there is…
If you do that people will think you're exiting and your company will tank massively.
Re: As Bitcoin Sinks, Industry Startups Are Forced to Cut Back
#157Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ahh, yes, in that sense you're right. But I'm not sure that it's a meaningful standard. We've seen "the bubble" being poked sharply from the inside with relative trivialities like cryptokitties. We've also seen the more blunt effect of undermining prohibition policies - access to a wide variety of (psychoactive and other) forbidden medicines has been difficult to achieve since the garden of eden; this seems like a br…
How much longer are you personally willing to wait for blockchain tech to succeed before you would give up on it?
I don't think this is a well-defined question, at least as you've posed it.
I'm not waiting. I'm taking advantage of the fact that the chaotic redistribution of spending power - caused by the introduction of bitcoin into the world economy - has made funding available to do work that I have long wanted to do. I plan to work full-time at NuCypher for at least another year.
People who are actively using this technology to purchase forbidden fruits over the internet aren't waiting - they're using this technology in life changing ways all the time.
People who (and I know this is a silly one) play cryptokitties aren't waiting - they're making use of this tech, even if it might seem meaningless to you and me.
Maybe you're part of the much larger portion of the population who are still waiting for something that is personally interesting to you to come out of blockchain tech. That's totally cool!
I can't meaningfully ask you how much longer you're willing to wait, because I already know the answer: you'll wait until something that speaks to you becomes available, and then you'll consider it. Right?
Re: As Bitcoin Sinks, Industry Startups Are Forced to Cut Back
#158The discussion of blockchain tech on HN is puzzling to me. On the matter of value: I suspect that if we find ourselves able to send a message back in time two years (when BTC was less than $1,000 USD) and report that the price is now over $3,700, that we'll find this message to be met with an understanding that this is, at least, a validation of the use of blockchain tech as a store of value. I suspect that if we des…
> outdated notions of "intellectual property." Could you elaborate? What is wrong with current notion of intellectual property? What is outdated about it? In general I see this point targeting patents, not the whole concept of IP.
Imaginary Property has a number of drawbacks [0]. Among them, the fact that it trumps real property - IP will prevent you from using your own real property as you see fit. (For example, playing music in your garage without a broadcasting license [1].)
[0] https://mises.org/library/against-intellectual-property-0
[1] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/424...
Re: As Bitcoin Sinks, Industry Startups Are Forced to Cut Back
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
Dormant POW could be as much of a benefit as it is a drawback. If someone owns 10s of millions of dollars worth of miners that are temporarily turned off, do you think this entity would want an attack to succeed? No. They'd want to protect their future investment in mining equipment. They might just turn that hashpower back in, if an attack was in progress, and take a temporary loss to fight off a temporary attack. E…
> If someone owns 10s of millions of dollars worth of miners that are temporarily turned off, do you think this entity would want an attack to succeed? Well that depends on how much they're holding and how deep they are in the hole at the given time. > No. They'd want to protect their future investment in mining equipment. Unless they were in financial trouble and an attack would get them some cash, fast. The sort of…
What I am saying is, that it one "desperate" miner attacks, then 5 other miners, who don't want to lose their investment, will defend.
The network is not static. It doesn't matter if one miner wants to make a quick buck, because the defenders have more to lose, and would spin up defending POW if needed.
Re: As Bitcoin Sinks, Industry Startups Are Forced to Cut Back
#160is anybody really surprised other than people still involved with this blockchain/cryptocurrency nonsense? The entire bitcoin pump and dump was orchestrated.
I think this is a fine case to apply Hanlon's Razor: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor Conspiracy was unnecessary.
ITS NOT A CONSPIRACY
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-13/professor...
DOJ is investigating. If you ran an ICO, and you still haven't lawyered up, you are at risk.