Good points and I apologize for first going to insults.

I counter that the average person’s savings does not need to be allocated to equites or anything ā€œproductiveā€ they simply need a way to save without debasement.

I think the fundamental difference here is that the privacy-coin advocates somehow think there is a way to overpower or ā€œforceā€ the state into respecting their privacy and their liberty, while bitcoiners see that there is no possible way to do so, except by defunding the fiat reserve status.

My approach is non-violent and even for the time being totally ā€œlegalā€ -the totalitarian laws will of course come but if they cannot afford to pay the enforcers salaries the time of reckoning will be much shorter and less violent if the state has clearly lost its ability to print more reserve currency.

And that situation only occurs with a clear new single international reserve asset outside of state control. Not many different communities of ā€œrebelsā€ trying their hand at hiding from the state.

We will each work to our own interests using our best appraisal of the situation- where my motivation comes from is enjoying philosophical argument and also advocating for acceleration of fiat collapse. I do not see an honest motivation for ā€œprivacy-coinā€ advocates to ā€œenlightenā€ me except for increasing their clearly deficient anonymity set.

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Agree that average person should be able to save without debasement

Second part, the perspective I see from privacy-coin advocates is more "Find me if you can" "You can't enforce violence on something you don't know happened". I don't think Bitcoin or Monero can do anything about state-controlled markets (white markets). They are black market by design (permissionless markets)

On a spectrum I see Bitcoin as far toward adversarial-thinking anti-state violence side, but Monero as even more so (as it doesn't even take privacy and anonymity for granted that an enemy can use against you)

All throughout history rebels and guerillas used subversion and hiding to their advantage. You don't attack a more powerful enemy toe-to-toe unless you want to be crushed.

I'm not sure why you cant see any honest motivation for "privacy coin" advocates. It is easy for me to see that most BTC maxis have good intentions even if I may disagree on a lot.

As for the anonymity set comment, I'm not sure if you understand how Monero works. Any transaction I send on Monero, thanks to stealth addresses, the anon set is literally any user on the network it couldve gone to. There is no way to know who. And amounts are completely invisible. Your anon set jab may be towards sender-side anonymity which is "only" a ring of 16 *per transaction*. This exponentially increases every "hop". 16^N, N being the number of transactions. At two hops from the original you're already 1 of ~4,096 (00.02% chance of guessing sender). But even if this is not good enough for you FCMPs (Full Chain Membership Prooofs) are being worked on to further increase sender privacy to match receiver privacy (Everyone on the entire chain will soon be your anon set).

It's quite funny how many Bitcoiners I interact with bring up this "deficient anonymity set" while by default they're on a chain that 100% deterministically shows sender, and doesn't hide amounts or addresses. Bitcoin anon set is quite exaggerated in practice as well. All of Bitcoin is not your anon set. Only a tiny fraction of Bitcoiners even coinjoin to begin with (much less coinjoin every transaction). Your coinjoin peers also make mistakes that decrease your coinjoin anon set over time as well and that is out of your control.

https://github.com/libbitcoin/libbitcoin-system/wiki/Permissionless-Principle

https://github.com/libbitcoin/libbitcoin-system/wiki/Value-Proposition

I refer to the anon set when changing from the privacy crypto to local fiat if the needs arises, and also avoiding that need by growing adoption for non-tech savvy merchants. -in this area bitcoin is far ahead of any other non-state currency.

Continuing the discussion on the most effective anti-state measure-

The "rebels" in bitcoin are not rebels at all, simply users of code speaking and engaging with each other on a voluntary basis, nothing about it is specifically anti-state at all.

Herein lies the effectiveness of the strategy. Nothing about it is openly antagonistic, but the wealth transfer continues and assists the geo-political pressures to rescind the State's totalitarian control over the global reserve unit of account. "Control" means- the ability to freely manipulate the supply.

The ultimate goal as I see it:

Expediently facilitate the recognition of a new global reserve asset which drives competition against state-run fiat currencies.

- In that competition of the best form of hard-money, the only one with the best stock/flow ratio (most resilient hard-cap) will win.

These new crypto projects either have no hard cap or the hard-cap is not sufficiently enforced by vested capital interest. They are not doing the same thing as bitcoin.

If you are trying to hide from the state and survive another generation then go ahead and try your best using whatever crypto, if you want a world for your descendants where the state is forced back into it's proper role (non-existence, or open competition to provide the best services to it's citizen/customers) then you use bitcoin.

Well how is the problem of crypto -> fiat unique to Monero? Same thing would apply to any crypto even Bitcoin, but it's even worse traceability wise. Isn't the ultimate goal to eventually use crypto *directly* anyway?

Even so, it is easy to send cash fairly anonymously by mail if you are familiar with these things (no return address or fake one). Most crypto ATMs also only require an email or phone number (you can use burners for both look at my profile link). Even if you use payment apps they don't see the other side of the transaction. They have no clue why you are getting sent money (and no red flags will trigger as long as it isn't a ridiculous amount at once). But this is all tangential to using crypto directly anyway and not a unique problem to Monero.

What will you do when the state says you can't use Bitcoin unless you take on burdensome taxes (already kind of this way)? Or that you have to use Bitcoin with an "approved" custodian (IOUs will allow them to manipulate supply for their citizens)? Or that it is illegal to use, period (for whatever bogus reason)? You've done nothing different, but now are in black market territory because some lizards in DC wrote some words on paper. I would argue that Bitcoiners are already "rebels" in the states eyes by the mere act of being a Bitcoin user, just look at their increasingly hostile actions against crypto in general, but the law is just slowly catching up to reflect that.

I don't really mind that Bitcoin declares itself the "best SoV" or "hardest money" and don't think Monero is competition with that. Monero is just trying to be p2p digital *cash*. A means to transfer value cheaply, anonymously, privately, and without permission.

Again, I don't mean this as an insult, but your vision that the state is just going to roll over for Bitcoin and let it usurp fiat seems naive to me. Nations could use it as a reserve currency amongst themselves, but there is no way they will let their own citizens use Bitcoin in an unrestricted uncontrolled way that doesn't give them the advantage. That is completely ahistorical. You should always assume the worst case and build around that not hope this utopia will just emerge from Bitcoin. I could argue you are ushering in a financial panopticon for our descendants.

The cypherpunk origins of Bitcoin are more tightly aligned with Monero, so this "trying to hide" stuff as if it is some foreign idea is nonsense. Private, anonymous, untraceable digital cash was the goal:

nevent1qqsq0wvj296nng95kwpw7p9trkt7uqvw97vgzqjal86tmrj46da2ujgpz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduhsyg90wsx3nzathrrmstg2guvwkd2tk0m2lx5cvwdct499eufhrj46s5psgqqqqqqs3jmj9t

Peer to peer digital cash without third parties was and is the successful goal.

The state cannot stop it at this point.

There are already ā€œuntraceableā€ ways to use bitcoin.

What it does that privacy coins don’t do is it has the oldest and most distributed network with the most capital allocation, and it continues to advance regardless of yours or mine actions.

It is my opinion that monero advocates should stop wasting their purchasing power and take their skills and contribute to ecash systems built for bitcoin.

Privacy, anonymity, and untraceability were heavily emphasized. The examples I gave were just a few.

There are ways to be somewhat untraceable on Bitcoin, but never private or fully anonymous (one involves swapping into and out of Monero if done correctly), but this involves extensive knowledge, time, tedium, and expense that most users will never do because of that. I just hit the send button on Monero and get a much better version of that for much cheaper.

Ecash is really great privacy, I mess around with it, but is sadly custodial and mints can covertly print IOUs. Ideally would want self-custody and non-arbitrary decentralized supply issuance.

that's where I think current development can benefit greatly from cross-over with privacy and self-sovereignty advocates. 🫔 glad to have this discussion.

https://github.com/callebtc

I would much rather use ecash on top of Monero than on BTC. Privacy/freedom maximalists wouldn't compromise for a weaker solution if a better solution is available.

And by the way. Monero supply < BTC supply. (Dis-)inflation is 1/2 of BTC (and gold).

Monero plays in a different league than BTC.

What is the hard cap of monero? How many are there?

Monero is hard capped by time.

The trade-off is long term security vs a hard cap by consensus.

Lmfao so there is no cap

So you are one of the cringe Bitcoiners celebrating BTC's hard cap on security?

I keep my laughter for later.

Not going to argue semantics. your depreciating stack of shitcoins is totally private im sure but you dont have much in terms of economic security without owning bitcoins. but at least no one knows how much capital you lost lmao

🄱

So no surprise this is what it looks like.

🄱

Noobs: "The market has spoken".

Me: "Noobs simply love to buy high and sell low".

Also Bitcoiners: The market has spoken. But not when it is bcash outperforming BTC in a bull market.

You want to be taken seriously. Start to be more consistent with the messages you are sending.

I’ve tried to be reasonable and am advocating to bring some of the best privacy ideas from monero into bitcoin via second and third layer solutions but you seem to be committed to your base token.

Unfortunately that token xmr is losing value against bitcoin and will not serve the function of capital preservation. -this ā€œanti-fiat use caseā€ in my thesis is the most effective way to separate state power over money. Not by larping anon with some depreciating privacy token to buy coke with online.

Monero is not good money and I doubt very much it would even help protect from a full outright effort by fincen or equivalent targeting.

So let’s agree to disagree and see how things go

You know you can own both, right?

This is what I can’t understand, if both have different use case why not own both if it improves our financial freedom 🫔

Because blind faith is just that blind - faith.

Ironically blind faith is not what you would expect from smart leaders, but good old sheeples maxis love to hate on day in and day out.

And even more funny. I agree with most of what they say. Their observations in this dailing fuat clown world based on lie upon lie upon lie.

But I am into currency competition, into freedom and into privacy more than I am into imaginary fiat gains.

That's why we are not the same.

I use everything that is useful and gives me max. protection.

As an early Bitcoiner I am your look into the future.

Bitcoin will reach max capitalization within the next x10 (in comparison to the gains I have already seen since 2010 it's ridiculous to even think about risking everything by putting it on a trackable ledger). After full capitalization as digital gold $15T Bitcoin will also behave like it. Meaning it protects you against boring inflation without the investment characteristics. But by then you will seek privacy over more gains for your stack, just as I seek privacy for my stack today.

On a more serious note the inverted chart with x2 within one month pretty much looks like a bubble top that will deflate over the next couple of years.

Google is your friend... or not šŸ˜