Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Traffic From Syria Disappears From Internet

labs.umbrella.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 140 posts

Re: Traffic From Syria Disappears From Internet

#61

Post by WalterSear »

oakaz wrote: post #45
kmcd wrote: post #36

> There is civil war. There is NO civil war in Syria. There is a campaign of terrorism waged by NATO, specifically Turkey , Qatar, Isreal, UK, France to secure the transit for the South Pars/North Dome gas field. http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/08/20128513344... What's at stake? About $200 billion annual output between Iran & Qatar. That's about $360,000 per SECOND. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Pa…

Why this comment is down-voted? He tells the truth. Please look at this guy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahdi_al-Harati He is the commander of the terrorists in Syria. These people are crazy islamists and all they believe is that they'll save Syria by killing people. Please see the truth. The Al Jazeera analysis linked above is really good.

Because they said there was no civil war going on in Syria.

Re: Traffic From Syria Disappears From Internet

#62

Post by angersock »

mrb wrote: post #56
cookiecaper wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this is what bitcoiners and similar don't understand. It's not like your internet connection will remain happy and stable while the rest of the world goes to hell around us. Telecomms will be a first-class target, and most systems have some pretty central points of failure that would make juicy (and easy) targets. In such a situation, if you've chosen to use an electronic cryptocurrency dependent on things like r…

"if you've chosen to use an electronic cryptocurrency dependent on things like robust network and electrical infrastructure to function as your primary value store, you're going to have a bad time." Apparently you are unaware of the tools to build offline transactions. Or of the ability to store bitcoins in your head (brain wallet). Want to send bitcoins to someone without Internet? Just communicate to him/her the br…

I'm going to go with, no. Having easily stockpiled and manipulated hard currency (fiat or no) makes waaay more sense to me than some combination of words or what have you in my brain wallet.

I don't think there's been any real demonstration of the use of bitcoins for non-connected transactions--theory does not a practical application make.

Better off trading bottle caps or ring tabs.

Re: Traffic From Syria Disappears From Internet

#63

Post by BHSPitMonkey »

bitcoinMini wrote: post #50
bitcoinMini wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how about S6c56bnXQiBjk9mqSYE7ykVQ7NzrRy https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mini_private_key_format

i can't reply directly to your post, but if you were to try guessing, well, there are ~ 52^30 possibilities. this is a big number :) our sun will be long dead before you can derive the private key

Ensuring security and ensuring I could never possibly memorize it...

Re: Traffic From Syria Disappears From Internet

#64

Post by BHSPitMonkey »

mrb wrote: post #56
cookiecaper wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this is what bitcoiners and similar don't understand. It's not like your internet connection will remain happy and stable while the rest of the world goes to hell around us. Telecomms will be a first-class target, and most systems have some pretty central points of failure that would make juicy (and easy) targets. In such a situation, if you've chosen to use an electronic cryptocurrency dependent on things like r…

"if you've chosen to use an electronic cryptocurrency dependent on things like robust network and electrical infrastructure to function as your primary value store, you're going to have a bad time." Apparently you are unaware of the tools to build offline transactions. Or of the ability to store bitcoins in your head (brain wallet). Want to send bitcoins to someone without Internet? Just communicate to him/her the br…

Even with the printout in hand, how does the recipient actually make the coin "theirs"? Can't the sender thwart the transaction if they gain Internet access before the recipient is able to (by transferring the coin to a wallet that's ready to receive it right away)?

Re: Traffic From Syria Disappears From Internet

#65

Post by cookiecaper »

mrb wrote: post #56
cookiecaper wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this is what bitcoiners and similar don't understand. It's not like your internet connection will remain happy and stable while the rest of the world goes to hell around us. Telecomms will be a first-class target, and most systems have some pretty central points of failure that would make juicy (and easy) targets. In such a situation, if you've chosen to use an electronic cryptocurrency dependent on things like r…

"if you've chosen to use an electronic cryptocurrency dependent on things like robust network and electrical infrastructure to function as your primary value store, you're going to have a bad time." Apparently you are unaware of the tools to build offline transactions. Or of the ability to store bitcoins in your head (brain wallet). Want to send bitcoins to someone without Internet? Just communicate to him/her the br…

This doesn't deal with the other thing I mentioned, which is that the blockchains will fork without a global view of the network. This means you could spend btc gained before the fork in one segment and spend them again in another segment, and that if you got new btc in one segment, it would be invalid in all the other segments.

Also, as another has pointed out, this is ridiculously implausible when compared with other currency options.

Many invest money in btc that could have been invested in a hard commodity with emergency currency value like gold or silver. Gold and silver will continue to exist in a normal, usable fashion regardless of the state of online connectivity.

Re: Traffic From Syria Disappears From Internet

#66

Post by angersock »

kmcd wrote: post #36

> There is civil war. There is NO civil war in Syria. There is a campaign of terrorism waged by NATO, specifically Turkey , Qatar, Isreal, UK, France to secure the transit for the South Pars/North Dome gas field. http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/08/20128513344... What's at stake? About $200 billion annual output between Iran & Qatar. That's about $360,000 per SECOND. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Pa…

Wow.

That's an interesting read, if nothing else.

Re: Traffic From Syria Disappears From Internet

#67

Post by knowaveragejoe »

cookiecaper wrote: post #6
venomsnake wrote: post #4

There is civil war. And cables will always be delicious target for any party. No bank transfers for the fleeing elite or being able to deal with external affairs, total blackout for the defender (military and police have their own systems usually so the ruling party is not that affected) The situation in Syria is dangerous. A failed state in that location ... Arab Peninsula in the 2013 is the Balkans in 1913 ...

And this is what bitcoiners and similar don't understand. It's not like your internet connection will remain happy and stable while the rest of the world goes to hell around us. Telecomms will be a first-class target, and most systems have some pretty central points of failure that would make juicy (and easy) targets. In such a situation, if you've chosen to use an electronic cryptocurrency dependent on things like r…

And like that, a discussion about the Syrian internet blackout devolves into an argument about bitcoin and currency.

Re: Traffic From Syria Disappears From Internet

#68

Post by cookiecaper »

greghinch wrote: post #21
jmathai wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

During a war, perhaps. But once things settle down I think gold will be the go to unit of currency. In a functional society no one wants to pay for their goods with food or water.

Right but then wouldn't you just go back to standard currency?

No, because things can be sufficiently stable that people are no longer in contest over the fundamentals like food and water, but not sufficiently to have a widely-standardized currency.

Gold is useful because everyone, everywhere recognizes its value independent of any other entity. This happens simply as a function of gold's rarity and manipulability; if you're looking for a natural resource to stand in as a currency, gold meets the requirements better than other materials. This is so, and will remain so despite any human ongoings.

Re: Traffic From Syria Disappears From Internet

#69

Post by Klinky »

BHSPitMonkey wrote: post #64
mrb wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"if you've chosen to use an electronic cryptocurrency dependent on things like robust network and electrical infrastructure to function as your primary value store, you're going to have a bad time." Apparently you are unaware of the tools to build offline transactions. Or of the ability to store bitcoins in your head (brain wallet). Want to send bitcoins to someone without Internet? Just communicate to him/her the br…

Even with the printout in hand, how does the recipient actually make the coin "theirs"? Can't the sender thwart the transaction if they gain Internet access before the recipient is able to (by transferring the coin to a wallet that's ready to receive it right away)?

People can write bad checks or create fake money orders too. It holds as much value as the faith the recipient puts into it.

Re: Traffic From Syria Disappears From Internet

#70

Post by nym »

BHSPitMonkey wrote: post #64
mrb wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"if you've chosen to use an electronic cryptocurrency dependent on things like robust network and electrical infrastructure to function as your primary value store, you're going to have a bad time." Apparently you are unaware of the tools to build offline transactions. Or of the ability to store bitcoins in your head (brain wallet). Want to send bitcoins to someone without Internet? Just communicate to him/her the br…

Even with the printout in hand, how does the recipient actually make the coin "theirs"? Can't the sender thwart the transaction if they gain Internet access before the recipient is able to (by transferring the coin to a wallet that's ready to receive it right away)?

Yes.
Post reply on HN