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Wikipedia RFC to stop accepting cryptocurrencies passes by majority vote

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Re: Wikipedia RFC to stop accepting cryptocurrencies passes by majority vote

#281

Post by ls15 »

mardifoufs wrote: post #37

Honestly the reasoning is weird. Don't get me wrong, I think crypto currencies are for the most part a scam, a ponzi scheme or a platform for pump and dumps. Yet the whole thing just does not make sense imo. It's one thing to be against crypto, but refusing it when you are a charity for the most asinine moral purity tests is absurd. This 100% reminds me of the almost cultist like extremely negative reaction to anythi…

> This 100% reminds me of the almost cultist like extremely negative reaction to anything related to crypto on some parts of twitter.

This could as well be orchestrated by fiat enthusiasts.

Re: Wikipedia RFC to stop accepting cryptocurrencies passes by majority vote

#282

Post by nemothekid »

ncann wrote: post #279
roamerz wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup core values. More often than not sticking to them come with some kind of cost. Kudos Wikepedia. This world would be a better place if more did the same and honored their core values at whatever cost.

Core values is just a vague concept. A lot of things considered backwards or even downright evil today used to be core values not too long and vice versa, e.g. racial segregation, LGBT, women's right, etc.

It’s used to be widely accepted that all light travelled through a luminiferous aether that encompasses the entire universe.

Then we learned about special relativity. Societies learn and adapt.

Re: Wikipedia RFC to stop accepting cryptocurrencies passes by majority vote

#283

Post by gibrown »

mattdesl wrote: post #254
rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe they prefer currencies that ought be under democratic control, rather than crypto scheme that are designed to be be controlled politically (which includes democratically).

This is an interesting line of thought. Which currency is more democratic: USD, or BTC/ETH? With ETH for example, I can create a new EIP, and if the majority of users agree with it, the currency can evolve. For example see EIP-1559 adoption despite it going against miners best interests, or even EIP-721 which has led to profound changes in the way the network is now used. This is pretty much "majority rule" but obvio…

Agree that this is an interesting line of discussion. I think you missed a few options of why USD are more democratic. You can also: - run for office - organize people politically

The open source point is important, but any individual crypto seems very hard to change once it is in place. Feels like it assumes you can predict how it will be used and what the consequences will be. The law isn’t easy to change but there is a clearly defined abs democratic process for doing so (assuming you are in a democracy).

Re: Wikipedia RFC to stop accepting cryptocurrencies passes by majority vote

#284

Post by vermilingua »

danamit wrote: post #212
topranks wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- It’s not significant in terms of the funds it brings in. - Crypto has been on a 10+ year long quest for “adoption”. So far it’s been fairly pathetic. Organisations who accept it provide a focal point for crypto advocates to point to, legitimising it and luring more retail investors into the Ponzi. - The environmental impact is massive, which makes accepting it ethically dubious and does not align with the Wikimedia…

I worked and got paid in crypto in the past, which made me able to move out. Also I used crypto to pay for services, I just bought a GPU (for gaming, current one broke, I do not mine crypto) with crypto that's still shipping. I won't call the adoption pathetic, it is just that you are not in the circle of adoption/need. Just like I see people mentioning services here that they say they cannot live without and I do no…

> Crypto is a needed option, it can be made to be more environmentally friendly.

This argument has never made sense to me. BTC is fundamentally proof-of-work, and attempts to switch it to some other “green” mechanism will almost certainly fail (see Bitcoin Cash). Ethereum has been promising PoS for nearly as long as ETH has existed. Other “green” coins are either tech-demos, ponzi schemes, or some amalgam of the two.

The ball is rolling, the train has left the station, BTC and ETH have the momentum. Other than rug-pull incentives like airdrops, why would those in the “circle of adoption/need” choose green crypto over what is established?

Re: Wikipedia RFC to stop accepting cryptocurrencies passes by majority vote

#285

Post by robonerd »

jdrc wrote: post #280
robonerd wrote: post #269

In response to these kind of stories, the comment sections online are always filled with crypto advocates upset about the organization not taking their money. This really makes clear who needs who. Crypto needs wikipedia much more than wikipedia needs crypto. Wikipedia is not hard up for cash (if you earnestly believe their begging ads, you must be naive. Give me a break.) But crypto is hard up for legitimacy.

its not just the crypto-buffs. This is a purely ideological decision that actually goes against the original libertarian ideas behind wikipedia. Keeping BTC payments costs nothing to wikipedia, and it actually meshes with the original idea of BTC as "native internet money" which has not yet been refuted. Wikipedia and BTC are a good match because of their nonaligned, distributed web 1.0 nature . Wiki&banks are not, w…

The 'original founding ideas' of wikipedia, whatever they may be, aren't relevant if they aren't actually encoded in the organizations rules. And since nobody can come up with a persuasive argument that wikipedia must accept crypto by wikipedia's own rules, this clearly isn't the case.

Without that, the 'founding ideas' are just ideas wikipedians used to have, and are far less relevant than the ideas wikipedians presently have. Their present views are evidenced by this vote, which crypto advocates are clearly upset about.

Re: Wikipedia RFC to stop accepting cryptocurrencies passes by majority vote

#286

Post by vmception »

timerol wrote: post #259
vmception wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Charitable giving with crypto is just getting off the ground As tax considerations with crypto are just getting off the ground So you basically have this wide polar extreme of: A) People using crypto and thinking there are no taxes B) And entrepreneurs moving their premines to their own non-profits for massive tax breaks and exemption leaving existing non-profits just waiting People in A) move slightly towards the ce…

> As tax considerations with crypto are just getting off the ground This is very not true. Buying and selling anything has very clear tax implications. It's more that enforcement is slow, and people are willingly breaking the law because of it. Here's a good Twitter conversation explaining the situation: https://twitter.com/patio11/status/1501707876888240131 > I think the issue is mostly that the industry’s core requ…

> This is very not true. Buying and selling anything has very clear tax implications.

I was saying that crypto users willing to consider tax and more complex tax is just getting off the ground, not that the law itself ever ignored them

I think the rest of my post makes that clear

> People in A) move slightly towards the center year over year as reality catches up to them (the reality that tax always applied)

but I can see how it doesn't, especially if you are expecting a crypto tax / regulation protestor

Re: Wikipedia RFC to stop accepting cryptocurrencies passes by majority vote

#287

Post by jdrc »

robonerd wrote: post #285
jdrc wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

its not just the crypto-buffs. This is a purely ideological decision that actually goes against the original libertarian ideas behind wikipedia. Keeping BTC payments costs nothing to wikipedia, and it actually meshes with the original idea of BTC as "native internet money" which has not yet been refuted. Wikipedia and BTC are a good match because of their nonaligned, distributed web 1.0 nature . Wiki&banks are not, w…

The 'original founding ideas' of wikipedia, whatever they may be, aren't relevant if they aren't actually encoded in the organizations rules. And since nobody can come up with a persuasive argument that wikipedia must accept crypto by wikipedia's own rules, this clearly isn't the case. Without that, the 'founding ideas' are just ideas wikipedians used to have, and are far less relevant than the ideas wikipedians pres…

> Wikipedia has no firm rules

> Wikipedia has policies and guidelines, but they are not carved in stone; their content and interpretation can evolve over time. The principles and spirit matter more than literal wording, and sometimes improving Wikipedia requires making exceptions. Be bold, but not reckless, in updating articles. And do not agonize over making mistakes: (almost) every past version of a page is saved, so mistakes can be easily corrected

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Five_pillars

people who are looking for rules to manipulate perhaps should build their own projects

Re: Wikipedia RFC to stop accepting cryptocurrencies passes by majority vote

#288

Post by robonerd »

wahnfrieden wrote: post #177
Liquid_Fire wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Checking this may be impractical. But for crypto donations, you don't need to check - you _know_ that it was generated in an environmentally-unfriendly way (at least for the currencies currently accepted).

eth is moving to proof of stake imminently

I got sick of hearing this claim years ago. At this point, it's tantamount to gaslighting.

Re: Wikipedia RFC to stop accepting cryptocurrencies passes by majority vote

#289

Post by DennisP »

koonsolo wrote: post #99
colesantiago wrote: post #2

This is great news, it is pretty pointless to use cryptocurrencies at all anyway since for Wikipedia: > Crypto was around 0.08% of our revenue last year, and it remains one of our smallest revenue channels. Remember that Wikipedia is one of the top 10 websites on the planet, I'm also assuming that other websites trying to accept crypto have even smaller percentages rendering cryptocurrencies as payment useless, not t…

Ukraine received millions of dollars of donations in cryptocurrency. So your last statement is not really correct.

As of March 11, close to $100 million. According to a deputy minister in Ukraine:

> “In a situation like this, where the national bank is not fully operating, crypto is helping to perform fast transfers, to make it very quick and get results almost immediately.”

NYTimes: https://archive.ph/3HVqU#

Re: Wikipedia RFC to stop accepting cryptocurrencies passes by majority vote

#290

Post by robonerd »

jdrc wrote: post #287
robonerd wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 'original founding ideas' of wikipedia, whatever they may be, aren't relevant if they aren't actually encoded in the organizations rules. And since nobody can come up with a persuasive argument that wikipedia must accept crypto by wikipedia's own rules, this clearly isn't the case. Without that, the 'founding ideas' are just ideas wikipedians used to have, and are far less relevant than the ideas wikipedians pres…

> Wikipedia has no firm rules > Wikipedia has policies and guidelines, but they are not carved in stone; their content and interpretation can evolve over time. The principles and spirit matter more than literal wording, and sometimes improving Wikipedia requires making exceptions. Be bold, but not reckless, in updating articles. And do not agonize over making mistakes: (almost) every past version of a page is saved,…

Absent rules to manipulate to force wikipedia to accept crypto, crypto advocates who want to get their way must rely on their powers of persuasion to influence opinions in the present. The opinions of founders years ago, whatever they might have been, aren't relevant.
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