The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November • Hacker News Board

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#41

Post by altoz » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 2:58 AM UTC

tfha wrote: post #40

altoz wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're transacting with an exchange or a merchant and accidentally send both coins (as a result of a replay attack) instead of one, they're going to give it back. It's not nearly the disaster this article makes it out to be. The only case where this is a problem are business to consumer transactions and p2p txs both of which you rarely do, if ever if you use BTC as a store of value.

It's not that simple. Once a transaction gets confirmed on one chain, it's permanently able to be spent on the other. If, due to fees or other reasons, that transaction is not confirmed quickly, the merchant may not be able to return the funds. Also, automated system may have no way of handling it if those automated systems are not upgraded. Which means a merchant could end up with thousands of payments that they hav…

> Once a transaction gets confirmed on one chain, it's permanently able to be spent on the other.

That's simply not true. If the utxo gets spent on the other chain, the two coins are permanently split.

> Also, automated system may have no way of handling it if those automated systems are not upgraded. Which means a merchant could end up with thousands of payments that they have to manually fix. And, those merchants will be forced into adopting the new software to correct the issue, they will have no choice to o ignore it.

And incur legal liability? Businesses will gladly do lots of manual work to avoid thousands of lawsuits.

Fact is, it's really only a problem for the businesses and even without any replay protection, they can very easily split coins by using either post-split coinbase coins or any coins ever mixed with any post-split coinbase coins.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#42

Post by kbaker » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 3:15 AM UTC

AgentME wrote: post #25

As a Bitcoin fan (and someone who owns a little), I think it's a pretty good article. Some more tidbits of information from my perspective: >The anti-2Xers argue that the NYA should not be binding because it was negotiated behind closed doors, and that a change of this magnitude needs to be more carefully considered before it is adopted. No active developers were part of the NYA. Some in the NYA have said that they a…

Just for some balance, the Hong Kong Agreement (which is absent from the article) is really important in this timeline - in Feb 2016, an agreement was reached with miners and signed by a few Core devs (however, possibly under duress?) to work on Segwit _and_ a safe hard fork.

The NYA happening with a few CEOs "behind closed doors", was pretty much a result of the year and a half of no progress on the safe hard fork part. Also remember the miners aren't really a fan of cheap transactions, which eats into their profits, and does fundamentally alter their ROI.

Segwit2X was originally sold as a compromise. Activate SegWit for the future since it requires software updates as you noted for the additional transaction formats, and schedule a 2X HF to help the network grow immediately.

> The big-blocker anti-segwit movement stalled work for years, politicized the Bitcoin space, and contributed to making many of the core devs be the target of harassment

I agree sadly, but unfortunately it was the same story on the reverse side. Look at the ridicule and scorn Mike Hearn and Gavin got for their big block proposals in 2015.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#43

Post by loceng » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 3:21 AM UTC

Alex3917 wrote: post #4

The interesting thing is that unlike in July where the price crashed, this time the price is completely stable despite the fact that it's a much bigger clusterfuck. It seems like perhaps the "you can't bet against the apocalypse" rule is being applied.

That's because there's enough people with enough money now willing to buy the crypto-assets at the higher price. They all understand the game they're playing. This batch of speculators just need to keep the value stable long enough that others will start to trust it could be a good way to profit, and then those people putting in money now maintaining the price will sell at a higher price.. This is the cycle that will have existed since inception.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#44

Post by kobeya » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 3:44 AM UTC

QAPereo wrote: post #14

justboxing wrote: post #3

> I am fully cognizant of the perils of making bearish predictions about new technology. > But, to quote another well-worn and wholly unreliable aphorism, this time it's different. It really is. and >... because the only other alternative is chaos, and probably the end of the whole Bitcoin experiment. I'm very much a Bitcoin skeptic, but, I'm not sure this time is different, or that Bitcoin will die. For the last 8 y…

To be fair, the SEC losing their patience with ICOs and turning on the whole sector would do it. Edit To replies: It does if the SEC decides the concept of cryptocurrency is one which fundamentally exists to bypass regulations for the purpose of fraud. I’d disagree, you’d disagree, but only their agreement matters.

> To be fair, the SEC losing their patience with ICOs and turning on the whole sector would do it.

They are already doing just that in the last couple of months, and bitcoin remains unaffected.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#45

Post by artisanal » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 3:57 AM UTC

altoz wrote: post #24

Opt-in replay protection was merged in a few days ago. https://github.com/btc1/bitcoin/commit/a3c41256984bf11d95a56... In any case, if you believe Bitcoin's main value proposition is as a great store of value, then replay protection simply doesn't matter that much. You wouldn't be transacting enough to matter.

Wow they are on Github, awesome

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#46

Post by chrisco255 » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 4:14 AM UTC

Alex3917 wrote: post #28

jacquesm wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does that have to do with bitcoin?

The current price of Bitcoin is mostly driven by the fraud taking place within the Ethereum ecosystem. Let's see where the price is after a few rounds of SEC crackdowns.

It would suffer a temporary drop then inevitably climb back up again. Bitcoin is global at this point. No one jurisdiction is going to shut it down.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#47

Post by rphlx » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 4:18 AM UTC

> ... no obvious way to tell which is the One True Chain.

One obvious way - whether you agree with it or not - is to use hashrate. It's quite unlikely that both chains will have a nearly-equal hashrate for a sustained period of time.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#48

Post by natalyarostova » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 4:20 AM UTC

abecedarius wrote: post #37

betterunix2 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pension funds will not even consider Bitcoin until it becomes much more stable. Pensions are an obligation and therefore demand much lower risk -- if a 5% change in value in a single day is not considered newsworthy there is no way pensions will make that investment. What makes you think the end cannot come before pensions and mutual funds start investing? What if panic selling triggers a deep loss in value, which th…

I don't understand quantitative finance, but I had the impression portfolio theory can find a place for any amount of volatility. If the volatility is very great or it's correlated with the rest of your portfolio, then your appetite may be small, but high returns may make it still worth buying some. Is that wrong? I also have the impression that bitcoin's volatility has been relatively uncorrelated with other asset c…

No, you're right. For portfolios It's all about the covariance matrix. Having said that, there is probably still the more banal reality of pensions or institutional funds actually needing a portfolio manager to go out and buy bitcoin, which probably would be a publicitly/legal nightmare if done poorly, or if the first person to do it gets burned.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#49

Post by mrb » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 4:22 AM UTC

justboxing wrote: post #3

> I am fully cognizant of the perils of making bearish predictions about new technology. > But, to quote another well-worn and wholly unreliable aphorism, this time it's different. It really is. and >... because the only other alternative is chaos, and probably the end of the whole Bitcoin experiment. I'm very much a Bitcoin skeptic, but, I'm not sure this time is different, or that Bitcoin will die. For the last 8 y…

Ah yes. Bitcoin died 172 times: https://99bitcoins.com/obituary-stats/

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#50

Post by mrb » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 4:24 AM UTC

QAPereo wrote: post #14

justboxing wrote: post #3

> I am fully cognizant of the perils of making bearish predictions about new technology. > But, to quote another well-worn and wholly unreliable aphorism, this time it's different. It really is. and >... because the only other alternative is chaos, and probably the end of the whole Bitcoin experiment. I'm very much a Bitcoin skeptic, but, I'm not sure this time is different, or that Bitcoin will die. For the last 8 y…

To be fair, the SEC losing their patience with ICOs and turning on the whole sector would do it. Edit To replies: It does if the SEC decides the concept of cryptocurrency is one which fundamentally exists to bypass regulations for the purpose of fraud. I’d disagree, you’d disagree, but only their agreement matters.

«would do it»

The SEC only has jurisdiction in the US. I don't see how this would impact Bitcoin's use in the rest of the world. Bitcoin is a phenomenon that's worldwide.