An interesting micro trend is playing out thanks to GEPOTUS signalling support for Bitcoin mining happening in the USA. This character, who is a, "...teacher and Bitcoiner. Author of A Progressive’s Case for Bitcoin.", is s member of the class of "Bitcoiner" for whom everything is academic and not real.
This character does not mine Bitcoin, does not sell access to it, does not develop software that runs with it, doesn't design, conceive or do anything that means taking risk.
He has written a book. About "Progressivism" (Socialism) and Bitcoin.
It's another case of someone trying to shoehorn their bad philosophies into something that everyone agrees is one of the most exciting events ever across several disciplines.
This book is not like Saifedean's crucial and essential book, which has a clear purpose and utility in that it tells the truth about economics and Bitcoin to the ignorant simultaneously and very successfully; this is a book designed to steer Bitcoin thinking into Progressivism, to mischaracterize Bitcoin and do all the other fallacious things Progressives do and slobber over.
There are other people like this; the "Bitcoin Socialists", the "Community" obsessives and the hyphenated Bitcoiners who plop their self assigned category name as prefix to the word word Bitcoin, thinking that that's any sort of requirement to use and benefit from it or associate with it.
Sad!
And there are many people who think like this. They on the surface can appear to be Bitcoiners, but in fact all they're doing is reciting from the Bitcoin Cult Liturgy. You've seen them do it most commonly as they try to describe Bitcoin. There are words you must use in the right order to be recognised as a member, and they all do it. I've overheard it whilst wading in a swimming pool on a blistering day in El Zonte. Incredible brainwashing.
The illusion breaks however when these same people talk about sound money and "Bitcoin only" and then start promoting Ordinals. They can't understand why Ordinals are toxic to Bitcoin because they never understood what Bitcoin was for, and are using at the most downstream part of it; it's just another excuse for having a rave up...
...and there's nothing wrong with having a party.
There is nothing wrong with having a wrong opinion either, especially in a world where Bitcoin is the only money, because in that world, opinions don't matter, Progressivism doesn't matter, Socialism doesn't matter; only Bitcoin Matters, and having Bitcoin, and being able to obtain it and then use it.
Jason can believe whatever he wants. He can vote Biden. He can vote Kennedy. None of that matters now that Bitcoin exists...barring WW3, which wipes all the chess pieces off the board. The only thing that matters is the rapid dissemination of Bitcoin to everyone on Earth. PERIOD.
Trump Derangement Syndrome is a Real thing. Simply mentioning "Orange Man" to these people drives them berserk with rage; they're victims of Mainstream Media Programming, and of course, they will never admit that they've been brainwashed. Why would they? How could they?
Being "Bitcoiners", they've been gulled into believing that they're a breed apart from everyone, and that's very probably not true, since their opinions are completely pedestrian and malleable like the lowest of the lowest common denominator peasant; blowing like a leaf in the wind at the fetid breath of Rachel Maddow and MSNBC whispered into their earwax smeared ear holes.
Once again, you will never be rid of these people, Bitcoiner. They are here for the duration of your life. Your job is to protect yourself and your family from them by accumulating Bitcoin, spreading Bitcoin as quickly as possible and using those actions to create a defensive wall to stop their votes from stealing your life from you and your children.
You may not like the sound of all of this, and believe that (because this is the way you are) everything you read like this is posturing and said merely for effect. Projection is the base and vulgar fundamental technique the lowbrow mind blind and ignorant use to protect themselves and their threadbare mentalities from upset; it is "ORANGE MAN: BAD" it is "THE PROTOCOL ALLOWS IT" and other things that collectively encapsulate the direct result of fiat and fiat education and brainwashing.
Down with it.
Down with them all.
UP Bitcoin!
It appears (naturally) that some Bitcoiners don't understand at least two things.
America is not a totalitarian state. If all Bitcoin mining moved to the USA, and Americans asserted their rights that Bitcoin it not money (which they refuse to concede, being fully paid up members of THE CULT), then there would be...
NOTHING TO STOP BITCOIN MINING IN THE USA. IT WOULD BE FULLY PROTECTED UNDER THE LAW; THE FIRST AMENDMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION, DULLARDS.
https://medium.com/swlh/why-america-cant-regulate-bitcoin-8c77cee8d794
And of course, just because all sane miner owning companies have move to the USA, this does not...
PREVENT ANYONE ANYWHERE ELSE ON EARTH FROM RUNNING MINING FARMS IN ANY COUNTRY ON EARTH, YOU COMPLETE, UTTER EEJITS.
What GEPOTUS unleashing Bitcoin would do is increase competition at the nation state level, incentivising countries to relent with their retarded Bitcoin regulation, just as what happened with France and its insane regulation of public key cryptography.
What's that? YOU "DIDN'T KNOW"?
Well read this, you cloth eared numbskull:
You people really need to brush up on your history!
AND...WHO IS "WE"?!
The self righteous and fantastically rich people in the west who have the power to solve these problems many times over are not at all concerned with the plight of other people, and are satisfied with pontificating and endlessly describing the same problem over and over. PATHETIC
Thankfully because Bitcoin is software and software can’t care about who writes it, the problems of fiat will be solved by people who can describe a problem, think, and who aren’t Virtue Signalling, playacting cowards. This work is happening without their permission or knowledge.
Buying Bitcoin to make payments is going to be the number one use case on Earth. It’s going to be done with Pine wallet, Blue Wallet and Azteco as the means of getting Bitcoin. I’m not speculating by the way. Mr. Jabesi is 100% correct. He can see this thanks to his perspective.
Without exposure to different perspectives and the ability to empathise, it is not possible to understand why Bitcoin was written. If you think Bitcoin’s use case is solely a “store of value”, you are parochial, ignorant, mind blind and closed off from reality. You don’t matter.
Bitcoin Matters. Bitcoin Exists. Bitcoin doesn’t follow your instructions or fit into your thinking; it is a tool that obeys the person who writes on it. If you understand what it is, you can use it to solve problems. That’s all there is to it. What you believe doesn’t matter.
Your limited imagination isn’t the standard that Bitcoin or developers must adhere to. Your lack of imagination, exposure, experience and guts is entirely your problem. It is not the reality. Other people who are not like you and who live in reality are not constrained by you.
If you’ve constructed the correct model, written the software to give your ideas the power to act, and have market access, the world can change because you’re not a coward and understand risk, problem solving and entrepreneurialism. The weak and frightened can’t do this.
WhatsApp, Airbnb, Uber, Apple, Whisper Systems and others all exhibit the correct way of thinking. If you can’t muster the thinking for yourself, you can try to emulate…but nothing can cure your cowardice. You’ll never build something like Uber, invest in it or be associated.
Cowards just don’t have what it takes to change the world. A coward could never build Uber, and similarly the global Bitcoin Unicorn will not be built by or associated with cowards. These are matters of fact, not opinion. Facts don’t care about your feelings.
Nothing in the last 1000 years would have been built if men and women spent time describing problems as an end in itself. Definition is the first step only; it isn’t the goal. Solving problems and helping people is the goal. Bitcoin exists to solve a problem. Cowards ignore this.
Bitcoin was designed to replace fiat. It wasn’t designed to co exist with it. Many people simply can’t imagine that that goal can be achieved. That’s their problem; the problem of a lack of imagination. Bear in mind, none of these people thought fiat was a problem at all.
Do you really think that these imaginationless “recent converts” who want to constrain and pigeonhole Bitcoin can imagine the future? If you do, you’re a fool; these people can’t imagine anything, let alone what the near future will be like. On the other hand developers can.
Because entrepreneurs are aiming at a point in the future, they can see a future with their tool in it. The imaginationless can’t, because they don’t even know the tools are in development. Steve jobs knew that no phone in the future would have a keyboard. Normal people scoffed.
And YOU are not that stupid because you understand what Bitcoin is, are not a Virtue Signalling coward, and understand that the tools and services of “The Transformation” are being built right now. You don’t just talk about solving problems, you’re solving them by acting.
And let me be perfectly clear, and I’ve said this before. People whose role it is to act as educators are essential parts of the Transformation equation. In order for anything to happen people need to be persuaded that Bitcoin is a boon, and not a threat. medium.com/hackernoon/bit…
The Transformation needs gifted writers, thinkers and educators like @saifedean who is a perfect example of entrepreneurial spirit, and risk taking with his new education platform set to disrupt the global University system. Universities won’t like it like Banks hate Bitcoin.
Version original: https://medium.com/@beautyon_/pathetic-parochial-pusillanimous-2c1c2d6c9dc6
Many years ago, there was a Bitcoin exchange called MPEx, run by the late great Mircea Popescu.
The design of this exchange was brilliant and radical on a technical level, an expression of the genius of one of the greatest Bitcoiners; a man who is sorely missed by all true Bitcoiners.
This exchange had many users, one of which was infamous altcoiner Erik Voorhees.
Mircea Popescu was approached by the US government's SEC to reveal details of Erik's use of MPEx, and Mircea instantly lept to the defense of his client, refusing in the most scintillating and scathing terms to aid the SEC in any way, shape or form.
You can read his responses for yourself
eye opening, inspiring and highly instructive.
This, my dear readers, is exactly how all CEOs should approach any attack from the State, or its infiltrating Apratchicks who have snuck on to the staff.
If all CEOs behaved like Mircea Popescu, then many of the problems you as users of Bitcoin experience would vanish in a puff of smoke.
All the users complaining and posting screenshots showing Gemini asking weird questions that make absolutely no sense in reference to how they use "their" Bitcoin, that in this or any other universe are considered insane, and all the other "power over" abuses you've seen would not be happening.
And Bitcoin would have spread further into the world than it has today as a result.
The role of the CEO is not to Virtue Signal by patting the needy on their heads and other showy things that whilst good in a normal world are absolutely bizarre in the real world, where users are under attack and their rights are daily abused and the Bitcoin ecosystem itself is under constant pressure from enemies.
If we had more Mircea Popescu types, the Bitcoin ecosystem would be far better off than it is today; more resilient, more widespread and more useful at any scale, since it would not be mediated by cowards and weaklings.
Mircea Popescu cannot be a model for anyone I'm afraid, and there is no factory that can produce more of them.
Why is that?
The reason why, is that what I'm talking about in Mircea Popescu is a man of character. A man who understands what power is, and how to wield it justly.
Mircea bailed out OpenBSD
and did many other things in secret that have changed the course of history for the better; that is what everyone should expect, not Virtue Signalling, pandering and being a willing cowering prisoner in a gaol of your own making as a way of life.
It should be obvious to everyone now that when the right man is in charge of something, amazing things can happen that can change the world rapidly.
Elon, for all his many faults, has radically shifted the overton window in the matter of free speech, and caused millions of users to breathe easier by having the threat of their speech cut off removed.
Imagine if this happened in Bitcoin services!
Imagine for a moment, that Bitcoin has no restrictions on how it can be used, and that you can use many services in whatever way you want without any fear that anything can go wrong.
Using Bitcoin like using an iPhone to browse the web at will.
This is unimaginable for anyone inured to the cancerous adversarial culture that has metastasized in "The Bitcoin Community", but for those not infected, the very idea of this makes goosebumps break out all over your skin.
In order for this to come to pass, well designed tools and services that can touch the public are an absolute prerequisite. This is what has been missing for many years for different reasons, but now there is no longer any excuse, and it is a matter of character and will.
You've seen how paradigm shifting services have been launched before from different companies run by fearless mavericks. The world is better off when CEOs are fearless mavericks like Mircea Popescu and Steve Jobs; they are the ones that make the great leaps, and they're sorely needed and will always be needed.
And in case you can't understand this, this is not about starting a very successful company after the groundwork has been done by mavericks; this is about being a groundbreaking maverick.
It's easy to pivot to a keyboardless phone design after Apple have broken the hypnotic Emperor's New Clothes spell of "ALL PHONES NEED KEYBOARDS".
Someone had to do it first.
Someone had to show some guts.
Someone had to reject bad advice.
Someone chose not to run away from imaginary problems.
Someone chose to take the commercial risk.
Bitcoin is going to win. It is a question of when and not if.
We know from the death of the AOL era, that all business models that don't conform to reality are destroyed in the end, and that it doesn't matter how big you are now; you will be destroyed by the market and by entrepreneurs with guts and character.
Bitcoin is no different. The people who are willfully and ignorantly choosing to serve people in ways that are sub optimal, because some pig ignorant Ambulance Chaser told them to, are going to lose in the end.
Losing in this scenario doesn't mean not making money; in 1999, AOL’s market capitalization soared to around $222 billion.
But look at them now. Not only is AOL no longer a standalone entity with its own market capitalization; it is now a mere element in a portfolio managed by Apollo Global Management.
It's dead.
This is the fate of all businesses that are not run by mavericks who embrace risk. Apple is what it is today precisely because Jobs was a risk taker.
If you think Apple is big, just wait till the "Final FinTech Unicorn" emerges that will be built on Bitcoin. Nothing like it has been possible in the past, because Bitcoin did not exist.
In the "Final FinTech Unicorn" future, Bitcoin regulation will be a thing of the past, just as regulation of the web today is a fantasy of EU witches with short haircuts. The web is an unstoppable force for good. Most people know it and nothing can stop it.
The same will be true for Bitcoin, only the changes it will unleash will be far greater than many people can begin to imagine.
"Do you want to be remembered as one of the people who helped make it happen, or not?"
That is the question everyone needs to ask themselves.
I asked ChatGPT to, "List ten of the most revered and beloved tech CEOs of the last 40 years".
It returned...
1. Steve Jobs (Apple Inc.)
2. Tim Cook (Apple Inc.)
3. Elon Musk (Tesla, SpaceX, X)
4. Reed Hastings (Netflix)
5. Jack Ma (Alibaba Group)
6. Shantanu Narayen (Adobe)
7. Marc Benioff (Salesforce)
8. Meg Whitman (HP, eBay)
9. Jensen Huang (NVIDIA)
10. Daniel Zhang (Alibaba Group)
Yikes. That's quite the list isn't it?
And you can't buy your way on to that list by Virtue Signalling. You've got to earn your place on it by doing real things that serve other people, without fear or favor.
Quite the task, isn't it?!
The scope of the “Crypto Larper Lifecycle” is now fully mapped.
It goes something like this…
Dream up “protocol”
Release concept
Collect community
Release app
Launch “Foundation”
Some steps are missing above, but you get the idea.
In this self contained, self limiting, onanistic pattern, is the total possible extent of the CLL cycle, and everyone involved in it is Platonically trapped.
In the CLL cycle, economics doesn’t matter, growth is irrelevant, utility is ignored. Nothing is fixed; Bitcoin doesn’t actually matter.
CLL is entirely about Virtue Signalling to a vanishingly small number of inert onan-elements, who, if they never existed, history could not measure the loss of in the final calculation.
If you are a Bitcoiner, you’re not swayed by antics, stunts, the vapid opinion of the crowd, trappings, brainwashing, the bleating of sheep or other such things.
You are interested in the problem Bitcoin was released to fix, and nothing else. You’re willing to go to any ethical length to see the Bitcoin future come to pass, and you won’t be stopped by normies, Ambulance Chasers, the timid, the frightened, the stupid or their braying brainless followers.
You command and control your resources, use the truth as your razor sharp weapon and cannot be swayed by the crowd.
Bitcoiners understand that facts are central to its existence, and are not optional. The 21,000,000 limit is essential, and not optional. It doesn’t matter what anyone says, wants, asserts or believes. It’s 21,000,000. That’s it.
This attitude should enter the Bitcoiners thinking and touch everything where rigour is required. Bitcoiners should not accept the opinion of, for example, Ambulance Chasers when it comes to defining what Bitcoin and all software processes are and do.
As soon as you accept the opinion of an Ambulance Chaser, you’ve lost.
It means you can concede anything, including the idea of breaking the 21,000,000 limit, “because legal says so”, or “the community has decided”, or some other extraneous, absurd and ridiculous pretext.
Bitcoiners are interested in winning, not performing.
Bitcoiners want to replace fiat, not integrate it.
Bitcoiners have truth on their side, and don’t back down.
This is why Samourai Wallet, and the attitude of Rodriguez and Burroughs is pure Bitcoin. It’s why Mircea Popescu was a real Bitcoiner, and not a Virtue Signalling waste of space.
And what do these people have in common?
They’re hated by LARPING, Virtue Signalling carpet bagging fakes who don’t agree with the aims of Bitcoin, and who are quite happy to not only allow, but to encourage and facilitate the fiat slave system to spread and defraud the weakest, most powerless people on earth.
These carpet baggers take their marching orders from literal illiterates, who have zero understanding of how anything works. At best they’re incomer colonists who bring socialism and, “every voice must be heard” insanity to the table, where, “we want dollars” is given a serious hearing…
BY BITCOINERS.
It’s like taking your instructions on how to organise your life from Slime Mold. That’s how insufferably dumb designing world changing tools by the thinking of idiots is.
Imagine Satoshi making the coin limit flexible because a man in a mud hut told him, “I WANT DOLLAR, MOAR COIN IS BETTER!” That’s what’s happening before your very eyes.
These cretinous LARPers applaud the destruction of tools built by people they dislike, by the very state Bitcoin was designed to destroy. Ironic, isn’t it?
These LARPers, these cretins, these fiat heads, are the most despicable filth imaginable.
And “I can imagine quite a bit.”…
IRONIC
People gathering at a conference to promote democracy and Bitcoin and Bitcoin Privacy, not understanding that the greatest threat to Bitcoin and privacy is democracy is breathtakingly blind.
The number one force against Bitcoin is democracy. If the democratic governments were vanishingly small, who would be able or motivated to simultaneously threaten millions of Bitcoin users and violate their privacy (or bank users for that matter?)
No one.
No one in the market is incentivized to violate the privacy of millions of people other than the State. If you refuse to accept this, then you're living in a fantasy world, where solving problems is not your goal.
-----BEGIN PGP MESSAGE-----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=zBwi
-----END PGP MESSAGE-----
Bitcoin needs heroes.
RATS
The DCG is not Bitcoin. You are Bitcoin
25 min read
Read Flexible: https://medium.com/@beautyon_/the-dcg-is-not-bitcoin-you-are-bitcoin-c57e2d2ce846
There is widespread panic and seemingly insurmountable confusion on many sides about “Segregated Witness”; the complete solution to the Bitcoin scaling problem. This confusion, and the irrational opposition to it is yet another symptom of the problem of widespread Computer Illiteracy.
The “Digital Currency Group” or “DCG” is run by a group of people who are not software developers, trying to crowbar a place for themselves in The Transformation; the global shift away from fiat currency to a market generated and programmable sound money in the shape of Bitcoin. The DCG serves no useful purpose in Bitcoin. They don’t produce any software, and when they discuss Bitcoin with legislators, their Computer Illiteracy causes profound misunderstandings that have the potential to trigger a raft of damaging legislation like the notorious and corrosive BitLicense of New York.
The recent publication by the DCG (https://medium.com/@DCGco/scaling-bitcoin-reflections-from-the-dcg-portfolio-35b9a065b2a4#.t0hesglom) Scaling Bitcoin: Reflections from the DCG Portfolio Scaling Bitcoin: Reflections from the DCG Portfolio exemplifies this problem very well, which is why I will use it today as a framework to address this dangerous, reckless group.
The article starts with the following TL;DR top level assessment:
***
It’s difficult to know what to support and how to contribute to Bitcoin scaling. We want to break out of this current template.
***
It is only difficult to know what to support if you don’t understand Bitcoin and what improvements Segregated Witness (SegWit) offers. Anyone who has an interest in Bitcoin has looked at Segregated Witness and the alternative of changing a single parameter to increase Bitcoin’s transaction rate capacity.
Bitcoin, in order to remain Bitcoin, cannot have its shape changed so that only a few gatekeeper businesses own nodes that can initiate transactions. Everyone should be able to send transactions without permission. Read this article about what Bitcoin is and potential barriers to entry caused by a reckless block size increase.
https://medium.com/bitcoin-think/the-bitcoin-gauntlet-e9e721297aca#.z49wbe5i4
The DCG want to “break out of this template” but what does this actually mean? No one is forcing the companies in this group to use Bitcoin; they can all join together with their billions in capital and launch their own version of Bitcoin that works exactly the way they want it to, and then watch Bitcoin die. The problem is that none of the people at the DCG can write software, and none of the developers (sorry boys) at any of its member companies is as gifted as the developers contributing to Bitcoin Core.
You can never “break out” from Bitcoin, because you can’t develop software. Even if you do as I recommend, and fork Bitcoin, you will forever be stuck on a branch where there is no groundbreaking development. R3 tried it and failed, and you would fail also, while Bitcoin improves in exponential leaps and bounds, leaving you in the dust. More on that later.
***
Following a few days of chatter, we all agreed it would be beneficial to take these discussions, piece them into a more structured narrative, and share with the broader community in the hopes of fostering a more open, pragmatic dialogue about how to break out of this current pattern of stalemate, which seems to be affecting everyone in different, but overall negative, ways.
***
This is the problem. “Chatter” doesn't create executable software. Narratives are for novelists, not software. There is no “Bitcoin Community”. Dialogue doesn't matter; software matters. Bitcoin is not in a stalemate. Eventually SegWit will activate, and when it does, everything will change. There is time for this to happen, and even if SegWit were to activate now, a significant amount of retrofitting, business model adjustment and software development needs to be done to accommodate it.
There are no libraries in high level languages that developers can use to make integrating SegWit processes easier, and there are conceptual mountains to climb in integrating it. I have a suspicion that it is this software retrofitting that many companies simply do not want to do, as it is time consuming, expensive and risky. They understand the proposition of Bitcoin, and now they are being asked to un-know what they know and rethink everything. It’s painful to think about. Software is a tough racket.
***
We (as most if not all of you) are affected by network congestion and it’s difficult to know how to push bitcoin forward from a scaling perspective. Last year we got on the Bitcoin Classic bandwagon out of desperation. Our stance was: Segwit sounds complex and Classic seems easy and buys us time. Today, a year after, it’s difficult to know what to support and how to contribute to Bitcoin scaling.
***
All of the businesses have built their work on a broken model, based on a flawed idea of what Bitcoin is. There are many people like this, and the more brave ones have created forks of Bitcoin that reflect their curious notions of what money is, Freicoin being my favourite example; a coin that decrements your balance if you don’t spend your money, inspired by the fanciful idea of demurrage.
They say SegWit sounds complex. This is an astonishing statement for people in the software industry. Every software tool used by everyone on earth is as complex as SegWit at the protocol level. Take reading this page for example. Loading this page in a browser might sound “simple” to the DCG, but it is in fact, a hideously complex process.
Whenever you visit a site that has SSL enabled (the little green lock in the upper left hand corner of the window, to the left of the URL [the address of this page] for this Medium post) a fantastically complex series of steps is undertaken, but all you as the user see, is a little green lock, that means the content of your session cannot be observed by eavesdroppers
And I am leaving out the other very complex networking steps that HTTP servers use to deliver content, and all the other layers to do with displaying images, styling text and so much more.
Web developers, the equivalent to the members of the DCG, never interact with any of this complexity, which has been abstracted away into high level tools that are simple to use. For example, with Lets Encrypt (https://letsencrypt.org/), setting up SSL is much simpler than it used to be, requiring a single command line instruction, whereas before, it was a real headache.
SegWit is exactly the same as SSL on the web, and SMTP, POP3 with email. All of these low level protocols are hideously complex, but you don’t have to worry about them, once they are abstracted away from you. Very few people will ever interact with these protocols directly, but billions will use them without knowing anything about it, every second of every day.
The DCG says classic “seems easy”. This statement is not serious. It is the same sort of lightweight thinking that created “Blockchain not Bitcoin”:
Software is not about what looks or sounds nice, and certainly no decision about anything should be made on the strength of “it seems easy”. Once again, anyone with sensible objections does not speak like this. Increasing the block size has profound and detrimental implications for Bitcoin, and anyone who brushes them off with a scoff is a propagandist, not a serious contributor to discussion.
***
We took risks and built _on bitcoin_ with our current project — not generic “blockchain” but real public-blockchain BTC… simply demoing to prospective customers has been an exercise in frustration due to simple user experience issues with the network confirming transactions. e.g. we pay an above-average fee and sometimes still takes multiple blocks to confirm.
***
You took risks. Risk does not mean you are guaranteed success, or give you special privileges above any other user. Risk means there is a real possibility that you will fail. This attitude is the result Millennials being trained from a young age that “everyone gets a prize” and trying hard is enough.
It’s interesting that these people, who are promoters of “Blockchain not Bitcoin” now say they represent Bitcoin. Which is it? Once again, your frustration is a result of your broken business models, not any problem with Bitcoin, which never made and could never make any promises to anyone. The people who built correct business models, like LocalBitcoins are thriving. You should look to them for inspiration, and cease trying to shove Bitcoin into your Procrustean Bed.
***
Its been particularly bad last few days, some users sending to [our exchange] were sending over 100 satoshis/byte and still waiting for over 12 hours for a confirm.
***
This is whining. Bitcoin is far cheaper and quicker than Western Union, and it doesn't violate your privacy. This is nothing more than temper tantrum antics, and really, should not be listed at all as a complaint. If Bitcoin could handle billions of transactions per second, all of them taking exactly 12 hours to confirm, it would still change everything. This is not a valid objection, and it’s why serious men don’t invite you to secret meetings.
It’s really bad right now. Bitcoin is starting to make SWIFT look attractive. If this isn’t fixed, I expect we’ll see the non-speculative use cases migrate to other chains.
This is worthless emotionalism. Saying SWIFT is better than Bitcoin shows that whoever made this statement doesn’t understand what Bitcoin is for, or why it was developed in the first place. They should stop using Bitcoin now, as their fundamental premises are wrong. And by all means, migrate to other “chains”. Thats what they are there for (https://www.corda.net/). They’re waiting for you.
***
The current situation is that a Bitcoin node code revision has been put forward (by Core), and it has not secured sufficient ‘votes’ from miners to be ‘adopted’ by the network. Why is this?
***
The language in this is telling. Nodes running Bitcoin Core version v0.13.1 are not “voting”. Bitcoin is not a democracy (https://medium.com/@beautyon_/bitcoin-is-not-democratic-81f87158250a#.9m7zi9q1l). It is taking time for everyone to upgrade to SegWit for several reasons. One of which I outlined above. You cannot take advantage of SegWit without writing software, and this is difficult, expensive and dangerous. Also, there has been a concerted propaganda effort from celebrity Bitcoin investors who are not developers who have been spreading FUD. This is “why”…and why do you ask? Even if SegWit were activated immediately, none of these people are ready to take advantage of it because there are no libraries to accommodate easy, abstracted access.
The sensible thing to do in this case, in their own narrative of being “Good members of the Bitcoin Community”, would be to (https://bitcoincore.org/en/segwit_adoption/) write and freely release SegWit libraries so that developers can take advantage of it as soon as it activates. Of course, this means putting weapons in the hands of their agile and unencumbered commercial adversaries. Difficult choices for the people desperate to pull up the ladder (https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&rlz=&q=pull+the+ladder+up+metophor&btnG=Google+Search&meta=lr%3D&aq=f&oq=#safe=active&hl=en&q=Pulling+Up+the+Ladder+Behind+You+metaphor)!
As you can see in the SegWit adoption list, there are 106 (one hundred and six) companies that are actively preparing for SegWit, with confidence it will activate. They’re doing the hard, low level work that needs to be done, quietly, and everyone will eventually benefit from it. Compare and contrast this with people who don’t even run a full node, or who haven't run any tests, let alone build services against the new software.
***
So how do we cross this impasse before it’s too late? There have been quite a number of attempts to secure agreement on the best path, and yet here we are, no further forward. Why is this?
***
“Too Late”? Too late for who? 106 companies are not sitting around waiting to see what will happen, they are well along the SegWit path, gaining knowledge and building tools. “Wait and see” is not how entrepreneurs behave, they forge ahead and take risk. And note how throughout this, the DCG talks about miners as an abstract other or third person. If they are not DCG members, why not, and if they are, why do they not cite, “the miners who are our members”?
When they say “too late” I suspect they mean that these businesses are not profitable, and they are burning through VC cash with no prospect of ever becoming profitable with Bitcoin as it is. They made a bad bet on Bitcoin and are desperately, frantically trying to tweak their way out of it. This is probably why Coinbase is making insane bets like adopting Etherium.
***
SegWit, is at its core, a technical issue. For entrepreneurs who are busy running their company and trying to keep their products and platforms running for the paying customers, it can be challenging to also try to focus on making serious changes to the core bitcoin protocol.
***
Another telling paragraph. The entrepreneurs in Bitcoin are in a technical field, they are not in a field that is separate from the nature of Bitcoin. This thinking is a leftover from the days when bosses used to dictate to typists on typewriters, and years later secretaries on desktop computers clacking out emails. Your business IS the “tech”. You cannot be separated from it, ignore it or do anything other than be totally immersed in it if you want to succeed. The days of developers being “back room boys” are over, and this is part of The Transformation.
The geeks run the world now (
). They design the software that runs your cars, washing machines, phones and the locks on your doors. Nothing happens today without software mediating it, except growing carrots. If you think you can suceed in Bitcoin by dictating to geeks you will fail. Your business models must start with the geeks otherwise, you will not be able to compete.
Bitcoin works exactly as expected. It is you that has to change. What we are seeing here is a group of people bereft of imagination and creativity. There are (https://medium.com/@beautyon_/how-soon-is-now-df391d6675f2#.bwyiv5vqe) ways that services can scale to billions right now; all it takes is some imagination and skill. Entrepreneurialism can never be free of risk. Risk is your business (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=toG6aSQFF7Y); that’s why you're in Bitcoin.
***
Our summary of SegWit is not “bad” but “complex” — in all senses of the word. SegWit is a good “lego block” foundation advancing the ecosystem. It is also very complex, technically, governance-wise, from a technical readiness standpoint, and more. This is why we’re working on a “SegWit for CTOs” style document.
***
See my points about complexity above. This is a patently absurd complaint. It’s apt that Lego is used as an analogy. The point about SegWit being complex governance wise is telling. These are the people who are desperate to inject the poison of the State into Bitcoin. There are no “governance” problems in Bitcoin, SegWit or any software. Bitcoin is self governing and doesn't need any help from non entrepreneurs or developers in keeping the system running.
***
We’ve been asked by a number of people now to endorse it (whatever that means), and while we like it conceptually, I don’t think it would be responsible to endorse it unless we’ve performed rigorous analysis and testing ourselves (which we’ve not)
***
Similarly, the DCG “endorsing” SegWit is completely meaningless, unless they run a cluster of full nodes full time. What these people think has no effect on running software, and it’s amazing that they don’t employ developers to contribute meaningfully and usefully, or even do the most simple act of running a cluster of full nodes. All they do is arrange for people to be bullied by the legislature. Thanks to Trump, they will be milked of their venom and de-fanged.
They say they like SegWit “conceptually”. This is not possible, obviously, since they are not capable of understanding it. They admit they haven’t done any analysis or testing of it, and they are not capable of doing so either. There is nothing wrong with not having a skill, expertise or understanding; the problem is not having them, and then running to the legislature to control the men who do.
***
Testnet has been SegWit-active for a while now, but little testing has been done by major bitcoin network players. Several larger players are waiting for lib updates to go to production before beginning their own testing.
***
Little testing has been done. How do you know this? If you know this, why have you not paid for testing to be done so you can accept or reject SegWit based on evidence instead of feelings? As for lib updates….I told you!
***
Our understanding is its only been tested by core devs on testnet… the main worry would be that this testing may not match what enterprises actually need on a production level
***
Bitcoin does not belong to “enterprises” who happen to be your members, and what they require is irrelevant to Bitcoin, which does not belong to your members or any particular person. Once again, you can solve this problem by starting your own DCG alt-Coin, where all your members and their collective genius and billions can have absolute control over what you are using, and exclude anyone who doesn't agree with you.
***
Some of us feel that SegWit and Lightning are both in the “exciting, but still in the lab” category — and that nuance is often lost in the SegWit / Lightning excitement.
***
SegWit is in the wild. Your feelings don’t count. Nuance?! (https://twitter.com/search?f=tweets&q=nuance+beautyon&src=typd)….
THIS IS WHY WE CAN’T HAVE NICE THINGS.
***
We don’t want to be anti-SegWit or pro-SegWit, just pro-pragmatism. There seems to be a disconnect between what the devs are developing, and what business actually need and want, which is a bigger problem about how resources are directed.
***
You can’t be anti-SegWit and also pro-Bitcoin. SegWit is Bitcoin. It is also absolutely pragmatic, with exponential benefits for everyone, causing Bitcoin’s capacity to exceed (https://youtu.be/-0kRLvpDBSY?t=8m55s) VISA and MasterCards transaction per second rates. What business wants is not what matters. Bitcoin is not a “business network” or a tool made for business. It is made for users of every class; businesses are nothing more than peers on the network, with no special position, precedence or privilege or right to demand anything whatsoever.
***
In general, the bigger problem is the pursuit of niche projects over business & user needs that could actually change the the user experience in much needed ways.
***
Bitcoin itself was a niche project when it was released. None of the people who want the block size increase today even cared about the form of the money in their pockets in 2009, or encrypted their email or had any dream of a stateless, irrevocable anarchist currency. I do not invoke the ridiculous, bogus, worthless and frankly stupid claim that because you were an early participant in something, your opinion counts more than others, but it is a plain fact that Bitcoin was designed for a specific political and philosophic purpose, and that purpose was not to serve a small number of businesses who want a life without having to innovate.
Calling SegWit a “niche project” is not sane. Given that SegWit will cause Bitcoin to outperform the biggest credit card companies on earth, combined, while maintaining its distributed network shape is a staggering achievement of breathtaking creativity and genius, and it is an unimaginably powerful and profound addition to Bitcoin. Taking into consideration what SegWit will deliver, it’s worth dismantling all the software the DCG members have written and re-writing it to accommodate SegWit. If they don’t accommodate SegWit, someone else will.
***
It would be helpful to have a constructive dialogue with realistic views on technology timelines vs. user experience benefits delivered by technology to prioritize how and when upgrades are deployed to benefit the greatest number of stakeholders.
***
Helpful to who? A dialogue with whom? Who is to say what is realistic and what isn't? The capacity of Bitcoin SegWit, if you had offered those numbers two years ago would have been thought completely unrealistic, and now, they are real. This section is nothing more than a pre Trump Washington Wonkesque call for the takeover of Bitcoin Core, with its oily talk of “stakeholders”. No one is buying any of this. If SegWit does not activate, you will not gain control of Bitcoin. If it does, you will not gain control of Bitcoin.
***
Overall, there are better ways we could deal with new technology as a community. For example, NASA deals with new-new technology all the time, and came up with a ladder to assess how close to production a technology is, called a Technology Readiness Level: https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/heo/scan/engineering/technology/txt_accordion1.html
***
NASA? Really? This is absurd, but what else would you expect from people who think you need the State to regulate Bitcoin? In case you have’nt been watching the YouTube, you don’t need the State to get into Space, (or regulate Bitcoin) and NASA’s way of doing things is completely shown up by Space-X who are performing acts that are mind blowing in their innovation, from the live video links of every section of the fight to the shriek inducing landings of the first stage boosters on robot platforms.
It’s 2017, and you're asking the government for guidance? Give me a break.
And there is no Bitcoin community. What you are talking about is the needs of your monoculture members, not anyone else, pure Argumentam Ad Populum (http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/appeal-to-popularity.html).
***
We’ve never understood why it has to be one or the other — why can’t there be both? Why can’t we introduce 2nd layer technologies (as they are ready) AND have a block size increase as well?
***
You don’t understand because you don’t understand Bitcoin. You can’t have both because increasing the block size will lead to centralization, which is anti-Bitcoin.
***
If you remove all the us vs them rhetoric being thrown around — we could gain benefits from both approaches (block size increase and SegWit)
***
Here we go with the “sotto voce violation of the Verbal Morality Statute” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rVQGT01Kzg) mantra that robust arguing is counter productive and inappropriate. This really is a matter of “us vs them”. On one side, you have a group of men who have a limited horizon view of Bitcoin with strong incentive to repay Venture Capital firms so they can exit and rid themselves of this seething morass of anarchists and geeks. On the other, you have the seething morass of anarchists and geeks, and a few ethical entrepreneurs thrown in for good measure. This is a fight over the biggest software breakthrough since public key cryptography, or the various tools that make up the basic internet protocols. Bitcoin has the potential to change everything; expecting people not to argue over it is irrational.
There are no gains to be made from centralizing Bitcoin, if you are interested in Bitcoin. What the DCG call “gains” people interested in Bitcoin call death. These people are wrong because they can escape at any time and form their own network. In years, if they have made the right bet, they will be the biggest financial network on earth. The problem is they have already bet incorrectly once, and are nervous about making another wrong bet, while Bitcoin goes on to explode without them. They also know that they have a serious technical deficit in the form of strong developers; if this were not the case, they would not be complaining about SegWit, and would be busy writing the libraries I described and that the DCG concedes must be written.
All of this is a logical conclusion based on the facts, and you are not entitled to your own facts. You cannot refuse to take a side, because there are no sides in this matter. SegWit is the logical choice and it should be activated immediately. The only reason why you would be against this is that you are frightened that a startup is waiting in the wings to eat your lunch with its zero conf high speed service that wipes you out. If things stay the same and SegWit never activates, then you get to avoid having to spend a fortune on new, dangerous software, and can pull the ladder up and prevent a startup from obliterating you. The choice is clear for them; SegWit must be stopped. They can participate in any future centralized Bitoin Clearing specialist as privileged actors and the VC spigot will never be turned off. They might even end up being the ones running it. These are the secret thoughts behind the anti SegWit animus.
***
It’s difficult to identify how we move the discussion forward productively — anyone who takes any sort of position in public, even one of compromise, is instantly labeled to be a seg-wit supporter or a seg-wit blocker and the discussion just ends/degrades into name calling
***
This is more soap opera. There are developers who are above this sort of nonsense, being more concerned with the quality of their important work. What anyone “labels” you is irrelevant. People who were undecided have openly said they now support SegWit activation, often after having it explained to them. It’s not easy to understand. There is no discussion to move forward in any case; software is not about discussion; it is about the delivery of code.
We know that increasing the block size alone will irreparably damage Bitcoin, so this is not an option. We know that SegWit will increase the capacity of Bitcoin beyond VISA and MasterCard. Thats it. It’s a no-Brainer. Furthermore, the block size limit will be increased to 2meg giving companies with anxiety time to get their SegWit solutions in place.
Everybody wins with SegWit
***
As a community, we should avoid all-positive documents on SegWit (prudent to include some cautions), just as we should avoid all-negative SegWit commentary. This is a hugely complex upgrade, as the devs themselves have noted many times.
***
Another call to group think, and DCG wants to be the cult leader. It’s a fascinating position to take, but quite understandable when you consider that they are absolutely bereft of power and influence. There is nothing at all bad about making a categorical statement that something is completely wrong if it is in fact, wrong; this is another way of claiming that this matter is nuanced. which should trigger anyone who is interested in Bitcoin’s success. It is a way to say that no matter what your position is, it is always flawed in some way or subject to interpretation, which is obviously wrong.
There are absolutes, there is right and wrong, there is good and evil.
***
What we’ve observed is that communication has done downhill — people are calling one another liars, claiming the “other side” is destroying bitcoin, calling anything that doesn’t match their proposal a “coup,” and it’s incredibly unprofessional. It makes everyone in bitcoin look bad. We want to see communication return to a professional, scientific level.
***
In order to melt iron you need heat. You cannot produce steel without a hot furnace. When men debate, they get angry, they fight, they use curse words and lose their tempers. This is completely normal, expected and useful.
The people who want to centralize Bitcoin really are on the other side of an argument. They really are a threat, not only to the idea of Bitcoin, but to what people can do with their money; transmit it without permission. If you threaten to steal someone’s money, they are going to get angry. This is completely normal, rational and legitimate. As government issued fiat is withdrawn, permission-less Bitcoin is now more important than ever. This not just an academic debate any more, this is a matter of human liberty and dignity.
Trying to wrest control of the Bitcoin source repository and control of the protocol by lying, threatening, attacking the network with thousands of artificial transactions has all the markings of a coup:
Spreading FUD, attacking the network with spam, whispering in the ears of company owners to get employees who are pro SegWit fired (https://medium.com/@WhalePanda/roger-ver-from-bitcoin-jesus-to-bitcoin-antichrist-69fc7a17c622#.42a8fzd1s), (yes this actually happened https://twitter.com/search?f=tweets&q=samson+mow+fired&src=typd) are all attempts to take over the root operation of Bitcoin but worst of all, is the launch of a buggy rival reference client “Bitcoin Unlimited” (https://twitter.com/search?f=tweets&q=bitcoin+unlimited+bug&src=typd), which is tantamount to the firing of a weapon against the Bitcoin network. This is in no uncertain terms an attack, and an attempt to steal control of or spoil Bitcoin, and it is entirely justifiable and reasonable to call these attempts a coup and to vociferously argue against them.
It is not unprofessional to protect your work, and in software, the only thing that matters is whether or not your code works correctly. This is why in offices all over the world, the geeks are allowed to wear their hair in any way they like, are allowed to smell, to keep their work spaces like pig styes, work in their pyjamas and all other sorts of unimaginable, filthy indulgences that only a few years ago would be unthinkable behaviour for any office. In fact, if you do not provide beds, slides ,9https://www.google.com/search?q=office+slide&safe=active&hl=en&biw=1533&bih=784&tbm=isch&tbo=u&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjyo7_N7YjSAhVBnRQKHc7mA9gQsAQIGQ) free food, massages and an absence of rules (on top of a fortune in money, equity and benefits) you can forget hiring the best developers. I could Google many shocking pictures (https://www.google.com/search?q=office+slide&safe=active&hl=en&biw=1533&bih=784&tbm=isch&tbo=u&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjyo7_N7YjSAhVBnRQKHc7mA9gQsAQIGQ#safe=active&hl=en&tbm=isch&q=insane+office+interiors) to prove this, but ill spare you having to buy a new keyboard. Heh (http://www.wasdkeyboards.com/).
Nobody who writes software cares about looking bad in front of normies. All they care about is their work, and that it compiles, and is appreciated by their peers. This is why Open Source software has eaten the world; people working for the good of other people and respect of their peers; those motivations were enough to change everything, and now that energy is being applied to the problem of replacing fiat money.
Making a claim that people are not being professional because they won’t tolerate you destroying their money is absurd. Men really are trying to destroy Bitcoin; this is not exaggeration; it is a statement of fact. That is why people are so angry (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rf7dteQEILo) and they are right to be angry (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7WglEQb35A) at the reckless selfish acts of vandalism that are being launched at Bitcoin, and the useful idiots who know nothing about Bitcoin, can’t write “hello world” in C but who think they are “Stakeholders” trying to force their ideas on something they know nothing about and that they're fundamentally ideologically opposed to.
***
But It’s Clear the Current Approach Isn’t Working
We’ve thought long and hard about this — if anything, what we would really like to see is compromise (e.g. both sides working together on a solution that works for as many as possible) — but its like trying to get someone from the extreme political right and left to agree on something they fundamentally disagree on — any push towards compromise/confronting the issue seems to just entrench the two sides that much further
***
Yes, it is working. SegWit has been developed and is now in the reference client. SegWit is the solution, if you want to work with Bitcoin. No one should compromise with any idea that means Bitcoin becomes centralized, in other words, stops being Bitcoin. This is the problem the DCG does not understand; they are looking at Bitcoin through the lens of their iPhones and not at what makes it work, or valuable. It’s just a number on a flat screen (https://medium.com/@beautyon_/the-flat-screen-dilemma-e84384cfd19f#.lf6hprf8s) "The Flat Screen Dilemma", indistinguishable from any other.
There is a lot of talk about using “Blockchains” to improve data integrity, but what all these solutions fail to…
medium.com
And as for the comparison between left and right in politics, this is a perfect example of how the DCG does not understand Bitcoin. The left in politics believes that the Federal Reserve and central banks should control the supply of money, by right. Bitcoin was written because its author understood that this is not correct, and that money is a product and service that should be produced by the market, not the State. If anything, the DCG is a Socialist organization, because it is for the State and its “regulations” and the de facto centralization of Bitcoin.
The men who produced SegWit are not entrenched. They've produced working software that will change everything, and that you may opt not to use. Every single member of the DCG can carry on exactly as they are and not adopt SegWit. No one is being forced to do anything, and this change is very accommodating and respectful of everyone, not breaking anyone’s software or disrupting anything.
Compare and contrast this with Bitcoin Unlimited, which will eventually push small operators off of the market by making it impossible for them to run a full node. They are the bad guys. It is they who have launched a poison fork, it is they who are spamming the network, running propaganda and asking for employees with different opinions to theirs to be ruined. No one from the SegWit side is going those unethical things.
***
It seems that so far, the approach of “get [devs] to all sit down and figure out how to work together” is a lost cause and that trying to push it has done more harm than good. Events like the Hong Kong Meeting, the various Roundtables, have all isolated rather than included opinion.
***
There is nothing to discuss any further. There have been many hours of discussions, and flying all over the world to solve this “problem” and everyone has had literally years to write software to make their vision real. Only Bitcoin Core has come up with something, at great personal expense, and it’s more than just something, it’s a work of genius that changes everything.
Anyone that has anything to offer needs to offer it in the form of working software. Talk is meaningless and so are the endless “white papers” that cannot do anything. If you really have something to offer, you can write some C, or develop a service (https://medium.com/@beautyon_/azteco-bitcoin-for-the-masses-fc17f8ca1df0); either way, you have to write some software to have influence. That is the only thing that matters.
***
Private, closed-door meetings do little to address the main issues found in support tickets that we’re seeing every day. We need to talk about alternatives and options to get these issues addressed. It seems like a better use of energy to identify a new mechanism that gets devs, business operators, and miners together — not in secret, invite-only roundtables
***
This is a veiled threat to push for the State to directly intervene in Bitcoin’s governance as Primavea De Philippi brazenly called for in Wired (https://www.wired.com/2016/03/must-understand-bitcoin-regulate/?source=post_page-----c57e2d2ce846--------------------------------)
"We Must Regulate Bitcoin. Problem Is, We Don't Understand It
Bitcoin has failed. Bitcoin is the future. Bitcoin cannot be regulated. Bitcoin needs to be regulated."
this is what it means when the DCG says, “a new mechanism”. And there is a reason why men have to meet in secret to discuss these matters. All of them are on the same side of this problem. They want Bitcoin to scale. They want to continue to profit. They do not want Bitcoin to break. They all know what they are talking about, at a source code and network protocol level. Having the DCG and other people, even entrepreneurs who run services on top of Bitcoin but who don’t have expertise in cryptography or C at a meeting would be completely pointless. The people who can’t contribute feel left out, become emotional, and feel like they are being talked down to…which is true and often completely justifiable.
Bitcoin is not about community, meetings, the DCG, endless conferences and lawyers; it is about software. It is not about your opinion. There is no “we” that needs “other methods”. You do not “have a say”.
Whether SegWit activates (it should) or not, what we are dealing with is a profound cultural mismatch between at least three different camps. Two of these camps are powerless, and they can’t stand it. They don’t have the ability to start their own network, or write their own software, and they can’t influence the Bitcoin network, one of the most successful and reliable software projects ever launched. They are trapped. It is the success of Bitcoin which everyone now understands and that is attracting undesirables who want to change the rules of something they never saw the need for and couldn't possibly have imagined.
As I've said many times, if Bitcoin cannot successfully repel these low level attackers, it will have no chance against the State. This is the big picture of the Bitcoin Unlimited vs SegWit competition, which is about the future of Bitcoin, and how in that future everyone interacts with it.
Why do people smoke crack?
Anyone calling themselves a “Bitcoiner” is not impressed by this Virtue Signalling.
The only thing any Bitcoiner wants to hear from Ted Cruz is that he swears again to obey the constitution and will fight with every fibre of his being against any legislation tabled that mentions the word “Bitcoin”.
Anything less than this is unacceptable and is window dressing and Virtue Signaling.
No one cares that you’re running some mining rigs Ted. This is like publishing that you’re drinking rain water. Anyone can drink rain water and running a Bitcoin miner or using Bitcoin for any purpose should be unregulated, and vigorously defended by anyone claiming that they are obeying and are true to the oath of office they swore.
PERIOD.
Why You Can’t Understand Bitcoin
Here are some of the reasons why people can’t understand Bitcoin. It’s taken years to dispel the many myths, misunderstandings and lies that have swirled around Bitcoin. Here is what ails the stragglers.
Computer Illiteracy
You can’t understand Bitcoin because you are Computer Illiterate. This means you have little to no understanding of how your devices or accounts work, and very probably have no interest either. You use Microsoft Windows, “Because its the Standard” . You don’t care how things work as long as they appear to work. You defend your ignorance like the Beavers shore up their dams.
This class of user is a massive problem, not only because they are computer illiterate; most people can get along without knowing the intricate details of the tools they use. They are a massive problem because they are computer illiterate, and they insist on “having their say” about Bitcoin, how it should be treated by market actors, by developers and how Bitcoin itself works.
Crypto Illiteracy
You can’t understand Bitcoin because you are Crypto Illiterate. You don’t encrypt your email, despite knowing that the State and other attackers can and do read all your emails and look at your photos. You prefer wilful, blissful ignorance to easily obtained absolute security, and when pushed to explain why you behave in this irrational way, have only platitudes, fallacies and learned by rote garbage as a response.
This user presents a cultural challenge to anyone who wants privacy to be the default. Many great efforts, aside from the writing of privacy enabling software like GPG, have been undertaken for years, and its only now that that work is bearing fruit in the form of mass adoption on Instant Messaging platforms. There is a long way to go before we achieve total blackout, but now the light at the end of the tunnel is approaching.
Monetary Illiteracy
You can’t understand Bitcoin because you are a Monetary Illiterate. Monetary illiterates come in serveral forms, but there are a small number that are the worst of the worst, and they are responsible for the majority of what’s wrong in this category; Keynesians and Statists. Keynesians believe that the money supply must increase forever. This is a lie. It’s like arguing that the number of numbers must increase over time because the number of things you need to measure is always increasing.
This user of government money is a problem to anyone who wants a stable economy and an end to the warfare state. The inflationary fiat currencies in use today are toxic to liberty, prosperity and peace, and this was one of the reasons Bitcoin was developed; to create a money that was separate from the State, economically sound, global and irrevocable. Monetary illiteracy is what stops people clamouring for sound money. They have no idea they are being robbed on a daily basis. If they understood what was being done to them, it would be pitchforks and bonfires in every world capital.
Statism
You can’t understand Bitcoin because you are a Statist. A Statist is a man or woman who believes that only the State should be the final arbiter of every activity man can engage in. In Bitcoin, Statists are a constant irritant and lethal toxin. Their belief that people should be forbidden from sending messages to each other over a public network is un-American and completely irrational. You don’t need to identify yourself to use WhatsApp, and its messages are fundamentally no different to Bitcoin; its encrypted with the same “tech” Bitcoin uses, yet these Statists can’t explain why the latter should require a passport to use and the former does not.
This user is delusional, violent and extremely destructive to human progress. She believes everyone must be dragged down to her level of base stupidity, and is very often a monstrous admixture of all the bad qualities listed above and below, increasing her toxicity. Once again, these people are not content to wallow in their own mud; they insist on dirtying and contaminating everything they touch with their error, making it increasingly difficult to get work done, make progress, integrate seamlessly with the market and help humanity. Eventually these people are always swept away by the flow of history, but when they are at their peak, they are a constant chafing, sore making irritant.
Clinical Paranoia
You can’t understand Bitcoin because you are Clinically Paranoid. People with paranoid personality disorder are very suspicious of other people. They often feel that they are in danger, and constantly look for evidence to support their irrational suspicions. They have trouble seeing that their distrustfulness is out of proportion to their environment. There are many people like this, who will (for example) immediately select only the perceived flaws in a new device or service, rather than the obvious benefits. In Bitcoin, an example of this would be immediately pointing out that it can be used by criminals to pay debts. Once again, this demographic overlaps with some of the other categories listed here.
This user is highly distracting and negative, and they exist in every generation. The same class of individual made bogus, unsubstantiated claims the State had broken PGP (it never did) and today, they claim that Bitcoin is broken (it isn't) or that some vendor with a radical new design is vulnerable to an abstract Straw Man Flaw (nonsense). It appears that we will be stuck with these types forever as there are always insane people in every generation, and the only way they can be shut up is if mass adoption of the trigger for their paranoia makes it socially unacceptable to spread FUD. There are only two good things about these types: 1) They sometimes provide healthy analysis. 2) They are powerless, since they don’t overlap with the State when talking only about the hardware and software.
Eventually, as the killer Bitcoin business model emerges, everyone will settle on the correct definition of Bitcoin, and no one will suffer from any of the traits above. Bitcoin will become as normal as bottled water. It will invoke no curiosity, questions or false assumptions. It will just be. It will be everywhere, in every pocket, on every computer, just like email, just like cameras and telephony.
Computer Illiteracy will not matter, because the workings will disappear.
Crypto Illiteracy will not matter, just as it doesn't to WhatsApp users.
Monetary Illiteracy will disappear with the death of Keynesianism.
Statism will disappear…because there will be no State!
Clinical Paranoia will remain. For the lulz.
https://mises.org/library/what-has-government-done-our-money
Thought experiment.
What would happen if the 368 million monthly users of Twitter downloaded Primal and started poasting with it on Nostr as they do there?
Hmmmmmmmm!
The Fall of Anti-Bitcoin
As I’ve said many times before. Everyone and every nation will eventually capitulate to Bitcoin. The latest nation to capitulate is Great Britain, whose army of anti-Bitcoin propagandists has just received orders from The Motherland that Bitcoin is to be fully embraced.
For years, Frances Coppola has been one of the most strident, steadfast and consistent anti-Bitcoiners. You could rely on her to provide every irrational pretext for rejecting Bitcoin; every trope, misreading, propaganda line and pretext. She Podcasted against Bitcoin, wrote articles against it, and did everything you saw and would expect a hard core anti-Bitcoiner to say and do.
And now look at her.
In this BBC piece on Bitcoin, the entire narrative has turned 180° from “skepticism” to “Bitcoin is the future and we are now embracing it”.
Because America is embracing it.
Understand that this is just the first part of the total capitulation of Great Britain to Bitcoin. Frances says Bitcoin is good, “As a store of value” after having spent years saying that it is the opposite of a good store of value, “Because it is volatile”.
Bitcoin hasn’t changed. Frances has changed.
The capitulation narrative begins by conceding ground bit by bit. First they concede that Bitcoin is a store of value, next they will concede that it acts just like money and can be used for small, everyday transactions. They have no choice but to concede this.
For years I have been gently trying to persuade The British Government in public and private to take a rational stance on Bitcoin, precisely to avoid the 100% predictable outcome you are seeing today. Which is another country will be the leader in Bitcoin.
Right now, that leader is El Salvador, that has fully embraced the “Consumer Bitcoin” ecosystem by making it Legal Tender. The USA is a close second because the SEC was forced to capitulate by a court order to allow “Free People” to do math and make promises (Bitcoin ETFs).
El Salvador is missing the financialization part, and the USA is missing the Consumer Bitcoin part. Either one of these great countries could do both and take the lead; it all comes down to legislation and leadership.
What we can say for sure is that Great Britain will not be able to catch up now. They were warned 10 years ago by me:
Our submission to the British Government’s “Digital currencies: Call for Information”
We made the following submission to the British Government’s “Digital currencies: Call for Information”. There is at…
medium.com
Had they listened, neither El Salvador or America would have a chance to lead the world on The Golden Path to Bitcoin.
All the entrepreneurs, businesses, know how, software and systems expertise, methods of exchanging and conversion would have been born in Britain, and they would have been able to sell this expertise and invite people from all around the world to participate…and be taxed…in Britain.
They even had two of the world’s greatest experts on Bitcoin living in London, Max Keiser and Stacy Herbert, who are now official advisors to the government of El Salvador. Imagine what would have happened had Britain embraced them as advisors? First of all, their expertise would have been denied to other nations, and Britain would have been the leader by default.
But no. Britain chose the way of the Luddite, and even chased businesses out of Britain. Look at the headlines for yourself…
London-based digital wallet provider Mode is shutting down
Nexo ‘closing two UK subsidiaries
UK Shuts Down Temporary Crypto Company Licensing
PayPal to halt UK crypto sales until 2024
UK Regulators Order Shutdown of Cryptocurrency ATMs
London based Bitcoin App Bottle Pay Shuts Down
There are many Bitcoin infrastructure and consumer facing companies that started in Britain and left (Azteco is one of them) and that were shut down by the imposition of the most insane rules you could not imagine in your worst nightmare.
Wallets run by incorporations in the UK were told that they must not only KYC their users, but that they must also KYC the users who send Bitcoin to their users who are not their users!
I’m not making this up. The FCA has done a thorough job of killing any nascent Bitcoin startup running in the UK, dissuading companies not in the UK to do business from there and generally being a constant irritant. The receipts are available, obviously.
Watch now, as orders coming from on high cause the FCA to 180° on Bitcoin in a desperate, pathetic attemtpt to stanch the flow of brains from Britain.
It’s too late.
Not only did the FCA make it impossible to run a Bitcoin company in Britain, they deliberately made it impossible for any financial rails company to do business with a Bitcoin company.
I can tell you from first hand observation that all financial rails companies, even very big ones, are all terrified of the FCA, and will scarcely take a piss in their own offices without checking if the FCA allows it.
It therefore was impossible to run a Bitcoin business from inside Britain. That was the entire idea.
Now that that policy is abolished, you can expect a huge Public Relations campaign to be launched to try and induce Bitcoin Businesses to relocate in Britain.
They are going to have a hard time convincing anyone.
Why should anyone running a Bitcoin business incorporate in Britain when you can incorporate in El Salvador and be guaranteed that you not only have a stable, safe, First World level country, but that you will not, as a Bitcoin company, be taxed?
You’d have to be BARMY to risk putting down stakes in Britain when incorporating in El Salvador is a matter of a phone call.
And while we’re at it, as a suggestion, El Salvador must partially deregulate its banking sector, or it will lose this race forever.
What can you expect next from Frances Coppola in terms of narrative capitulation?
You can expect her and her class to concede that Bitcoin for consumers is a good thing, and that it can be used not only just as easily, but more safely for both consumers and business globally.
She will concede that Lightning is a real thing, and that on it, the entire world can use Bitcoin. She will concede that the Unbanked will all be put on Bitcoin. She will capitulate in everything she has said against Bitcoin, and abandon the prosaic, poetic pretexts for its failure, like, “The value of Bitcoin is exogenous” and other similar guff.
You were all told this was coming, and you refused to listen, either because your culture is anti entrepreneur, or because you were told to lie about Bitcoin in a vain attempt to prevent it from spreading.
Either way, you all failed.
Now the inevitable is inevitable. Bitcoin is going to do EXACTLY WHAT BITCOINERS SAID IT WAS GOING TO DO and there IS and was NOTHING YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT.
Bitcoiners won.
You LOST.
There is no inducement now that can be offered to any Bitcoiner to incorporate in Britain. That ship has sailed, like the ships taking the first colonists to New England.
No one is coming back, not even if you pay them. You can’t pay them because you have no money (BITCOIN) to pay them with! LOLOLOL!
And just so it’s perfectly clear, the other predictions about Bitcoin that we’ve been making (see the link in my profile) are also going to come true, and those are also now unstoppable, inevitable and very soon to come to pass.
YOU LOVE TO SEE IT!
https://twitter.com/search?q=beautyon+%22Frances+Coppola%22&src=typed_query&f=top
https://medium.com/@beautyon_/over-9000-7f6547aeff86
