331–340 of 364 posts
I'm glad that people are starting to see the consequences of a decentralized network that is outside the law means there is also no recourse for those who have been wronged. This has always been my concern about crypto: fiat currency is backed by judges, and if you don't do what the judge says, it is backed up by the violence of an enforcer with a weapon and the ability to put you in a cage. Crypto doesn't have that.…
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"How do I make a transaction / mine a block?" that's a "how does it works ?" kind of question, you need to know how all the small parts work to explain the functionality. Yes, some aspects you need to look at the code, others you will find documented i would recommend https://learnmeabitcoin.com/ which has very in-depth resources but it seems to be down at the moment
> you need to know how all the small parts work to explain the functionality. I know how all the small parts work. It's not new technology. I just don't know how Bitcoin does it! To mine a block, you: • collect a load of transactions (somehow) • validate them (the obvious stuff, plus the special transaction type requirements, plus unspecified “consensus“ magic I can't find anywhere) • put them in a block (somehow) al…
validate them: your best resource for this is code. your client needs to keep old consensus code around and use it to verify block under the older rules (your client will do a full sync at some point)
rules for formatting a transactions and blocks (and a byte by byte explanation) can be found on https://learnmeabitcoin.com/ as mentioned (probably will be up soon)
keep changing a certain bit of the block until SHA256(f(SHA256(block))) is low enough (with some f: digest → bitstring): yes. you set the block nonce to mine. finding a block means that the hash256() operation (sha256(sha256(block))) returns an hash with at least D (either left or right most, can't recall right now) bits set to 0, where D is the current difficult, which is adjusted by the network to make the 10min/block average time
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A fairly meaningless statement in reality, since it’s not how most people behave.
Well, what is there to do about it? A fool and their money are soon parted. Must we coddle them at the expense of everyone else?
Society relies on trust. The crypto dream that it can be trustless is just a way to cheat people.
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Well, what is there to do about it? A fool and their money are soon parted. Must we coddle them at the expense of everyone else?
Just like with any kind of criminal, stopping deceptive crypto scammers isn’t ‘coddling’ people at the expense of everyone else. Society relies on trust. The crypto dream that it can be trustless is just a way to cheat people.
It is if you're trying to stop these scams by putting greater constraints on, say, the fiat on- and off-ramps.
I mean, how exactly are you going to stop the average investor in doing something dumb like dumping their money into a shady project, without placing additional hurdles on everyone else? The whole point is that you're allowed to move, manage, and spend your assets as you see fit, without any government's ability to freeze your assets or block you from accessing financial services via sanctions -- for better or for worse, of course. And yes, the freedom to manage your assets as you see fit includes the freedom to make stupid financial decisions -- as you see fit.
I'm glad that people are starting to see the consequences of a decentralized network that is outside the law means there is also no recourse for those who have been wronged. This has always been my concern about crypto: fiat currency is backed by judges, and if you don't do what the judge says, it is backed up by the violence of an enforcer with a weapon and the ability to put you in a cage. Crypto doesn't have that.…
Ross Ulbricht would like a word
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It is, and I've had a nagging suspicion for a while now that this is the flaw at the heart of cryptocurrency and related phenomena. It's all built on the premise that the answer to "we can't trust existing institutions" is to try and design systems that don't require us to have trust in any actor, but as Sharlin noted, it's difficult to impossible to do anything transactional that doesn't require some level of trust.…
It's the same as open source software, most people don't personally look at the source code of the Linux Kernel, but they trust it more than Windows because they know many thousands of others have looked at it and haven't found issues. Open systems lead to less trust required, because anyone can verify and report issues. Open finance leads to less trust required because anyone can verify and report issues with the sm…
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Slow and expensive is relative… try transferring money internationally.
Even within the US, ACH settlement times are 3 business days. The settlement period for stock trades is 2 business days and there's a big push to reduce it to 1. Relative to that, bitcoin's 10 minute settlement time isn't so long.
Scams that will collapse in 2022: * Axie Infinity. That's a Ponzi in the collapse phase. Their Smooth Love Potion token is down 90% and in a screaming dive, and their Axie token is down 37% from peak. That one is going to hurt a lot of poor people in the Philippines. Many quit their jobs to play Axie's play-to-earn game. All the money comes from later entrants, so it's a Ponzi by definition. * OpenSea. The NFT market…
Sometime around 2018, not having a clue about popular culture shifted from making you seem lame at parties to insulating you from pyramid schemes.
> The most important takeaway is to avoid new tokens that haven’t undergone a code audit. Code audits are a process by which a third-party firm analyzes the code of the smart contract behind a new token or other DeFi project, and publicly confirms that the contract’s governance rules are iron clad and contain no mechanisms that would allow for the developers to make off with investors’ funds. But how do you know whic…
In the US: financial -> 2008 subprime loan crisis, recent inflation groceries -> couldn't buy toilet paper at the start of the pandemic, still some lingering supply issues, prices going up restaurants -> many not open reliable hours anymore, many closing medical -> costs way too high and continue to rise, hospitals oversaturated with patients from time to time, nurses quitting All of it is ultimately backed by laws,…
I don't think DeFi helps with most of the problems you're talking about. Supply chain issues, COVID-related business restrictions, health care prices and the role of insurance providers, none of these are caused by centralized financial systems.