Cryptocurrency Lolcows

[AnOminous]

Wasn't there a guy who gave himself heat stroke by running a bitcoin farm in his shithole studio aprt bedroom a few months back?

I don't remember that, but it wouldn't surprise me. I've also known of at least a couple people who literally did burn their house down with the careless use of Bitcoin mining rigs.

Slight Bitcoin update. A retarded war over what version of Bitcoin to use is tearing the network apart.

I won't get too spergy in explaining this, but since it's literally impossible to explain it at all without any sperginess I'll just spoiler this next bit.

Spoiler

Part of the Bitcoin protocol is that every successful block generated by a miner is essentially a transaction that gets propagated over the network, referring back to the previous block, and confirming transactions so that they then can't be repudiated. Any transaction that gets into a block, thus, is cryptographically confirmed by every subsequent block and can't be reversed. The more blocks afterward, the more certain it is that the transaction is good as gold.

However, each transaction first has to get into one of the blocks. The incentive to do this is a transaction fee. This is generally pretty small, but higher transaction fees make it more likely your transaction gets into the very next block. Since priority is a function of the size of the transaction and the transaction fee, tiny transactions with no transaction fee may never qualify at all.

This is called the "blockchain" and is the fundamental basis of even trusting the currency at all.

Each block generated has, according to the current standard, 1 megabyte of space for data, including transactions. This is space for a lot of transactions, and each miner that generates a block includes transactions taken from the queue based on their priority, a complex formula involving the size of the transaction and the transaction fee, along with other factors like the actual size of the transaction in terms of how much data it takes up in the block. A small transaction can be really complex and involve a lot of fragmented Bitcoin, while a very large (in terms of value) transaction could be for an entire unfragmented block and take up virtually no space data-wise.

tl;dr because of a problem known about for months in advance, Bitcoin was going to start developing a lengthy queue of unconfirmed transactions, and basically freeze up. Instead of actually fixing the problem, two warring camps formed around potential software to be used.

One of them refuses to change from the 1 megabyte block size, and as a result, the "mempool" that stores unconfirmed transactions increased in length until the confirmation time went from something usually around 10 minutes to hours and hours, with some normal transactions unconfirmed after 16 hours.

Also, the warring camps have been DDoSing each other's networks and otherwise doing dumb shit rather than fixing the problem.

http://bitcoinist.net/bitcoin-core-is-preparing-for-miners-leaving-en-masse/
(Dashjr, the guy quoted in this article, is a pretty massive lolcow himself despite being a brilliant coder. I might explain him at some point.)

I haven't posted about this even though it's incredibly retarded from nearly every perspective, because the reasons it's retarded are almost too complicated to explain to anyone who doesn't already understand the technical issues around this.

This video is actually a pretty decent explanation:

Anyone who actually does know this shit intimately could probably point out a bunch of mistakes in my description of the blockchain. My dumbing down of it is probably intensified by my own dumbness.

ETA: Also sorry this isn't so funny. I've been thinking about this shit and it's hilarious in the full context of the situation, but writing some gigantic thesis to make the context accessible is not really easy.

"These salty idiots really think they can stick with a 1 megabyte block size and survive lol" just doesn't work.

 

[Strelok]

By the way @AnOminous do you have a summary on the whole Garza thing, or should I regale people with that tale? It'll take me a few days to get all the links in order, by which I mean care enough to get all the links in order.

For those who want to dive right in with a teaser though, here is an alleged transcript of his brother effortlessly failing at stonewalling the fucking SEC.

 

[AnOminous]

By the way @AnOminous do you have a summary on the whole Garza thing, or should I regale people with that tale? It'll take me a few days to get all the links in order, by which I mean care enough to get all the links in order.

I don't and would welcome one. This particular scam I haven't followed, because I burned out on one scam after another.

I'd have done something on Josh Zerlan already, but most of the Butterfly Labs idiots have clammed up probably on advice of counsel.

Another I'd like to do is Luke-Jr, the amazingly insane Bitcoin dev.

 

[Strelok]

I don't and would welcome one. This particular scam I haven't followed, because I burned out on one scam after another.

I'd have done something on Josh Zerlan already, but most of the Butterfly Labs idiots have clammed up probably on advice of counsel.

Another I'd like to do is Luke-Jr, the amazingly insane Bitcoin dev.

Is Luke Jr the one who tried to reprogram Bitcoin entirely in javascript, and taught his kids tonal math?

 

[AnOminous]

Is Luke Jr the one who tried to reprogram Bitcoin entirely in javascript, and taught his kids tonal math?

Yes. That guy.

 

[TowinKarz]

]For those who want to dive right in with a teaser though, here is an alleged transcript of his brother effortlessly failing at stonewalling the fucking SEC.

He could make some money on the side by peddling that to the Sovereign Citizen crowd as a new way to get out of court appearances, be too frightened to answer...... what a pussy.

 

[DykesDykesChina]

A large online drug webshop was busted in Germany.

A team of several people, among them a former soccer player from the national team, have been running a webstore called "Chemical Love" for psychoactive substances in Germany, in the style of Amazon or any other internet retailer:

Their website could not only be reached through the Tor-Network but also openly via ordinary internet access: https://chemical-love.to/ (<- probably won't be online much longer.)

Now, I do support psychoactive legalization very much -- but how dumb do you have to be to openly operate a website advertising products which under current jurisdiction are illegal to sell?? It's not like the police do not have resources to find out where a website is hosted and who runs it. Sure enough, they used their digital capabilities to locate the people behind this and caught them recently.

It's something different when you have a smartshop selling mushrooms in the Netherlands -- if you have a disclaimer stating "The customer takes full legal responsibility for imports", you cannot be held accountable, as magic mushrooms are legal within the Netherlands. But these guys not only operated out of Germany, they also sold substances which are currently illegal under most jurisdictions worldwide.

I put this in this thread because the Chemical Love shop only accepted Bitcoin as payment and it all reminds me a lot of the Bitcoin Simulator Game where you buy 3D-printed guns and obscure Chinese drugs from "dark net" sellers. These guys didn't confine themselves to the "dark net", though...

"Payment & Security"

 

[DrJonesHat]

@DykesDykesChina a lot of people who have poor critical thinking skills think that since bitcoins aren't recognized currency, you can't be charged for buying contraband with them. Someone told me that back when bitcoin was taking off.

 

[AnOminous]

@DykesDykesChina a lot of people who have poor critical thinking skills think that since bitcoins aren't recognized currency, you can't be charged for buying contraband with them. Someone told me that back when bitcoin was taking off.

They think a lot of things, like that gambling sites are somehow legal just because Bitcoin (they don't violate relatively new laws specifically against using banks but any existing state law still prohibits them), that you are allowed to run Ponzi scams (you aren't) and in general that it somehow makes you bulletproof.

The idea that Bitcoin is great for illegal transactions is also deeply dumb. To the contrary, the blockchain keeps a permanent record of every transaction. A lot of illegal activity will be on your permanent record and if you're ever caught with the relevant private keys associated with these transactions, it's good enough to nail you, as Ross Ulbricht found.

Also, large drug operations are going to have a physical presence in meatspace. If you are a buyer, you might not be worth going after then, but congratulations, if the dealer is busted you ARE going to be known by name and address as a purchaser of drugs to law enforcement. That can have all kinds of collateral consequences you can't really predict.

 

[smellymarine]

So her magic Netbux have fallen over on her, and she is incapable of using them to buy anything. And yet she still prefers them to Fiat currency?

 

[Rou]

Senpai potentially a lolcow by association. Hilarious. Etherium had one fanatic on /biz/ (and he's still there), ready to do his cheerleading when it went down and then ready to mock everyone when it's up. He's gone quiet though. It must have tanked hard.

 

[TowinKarz]

@DykesDykesChina a lot of people who have poor critical thinking skills think that since bitcoins aren't recognized currency, you can't be charged for buying contraband with them. Someone told me that back when bitcoin was taking off.

A few dopes I knew who were cheerleading bitcoin in it's infancy were of this belief, and, the belief that if you could somehow get the entire population to switch to BTC, it would leave the government without funds because they couldn't tax it. Which was critical research failure, the government could easily pass laws requiring you to pay your taxes in BTC, they just don't for the same reason they don't request it in animal hide, or gold bullion, it's not practical, not that they COULDN'T do it.

 

[The Lawgiver]

A large online drug webshop was busted in Germany.

A team of several people, among them a former soccer player from the national team, have been running a webstore called "Chemical Love" for psychoactive substances in Germany, in the style of Amazon or any other internet retailer:

Their website could not only be reached through the Tor-Network but also openly via ordinary internet access: https://chemical-love.to/ (<- probably won't be online much longer.)

Now, I do support psychoactive legalization very much -- but how dumb do you have to be to openly operate a website advertising products which under current jurisdiction are illegal to sell?? It's not like the police do not have resources to find out where a website is hosted and who runs it. Sure enough, they used their digital capabilities to locate the people behind this and caught them recently.

It's something different when you have a smartshop selling mushrooms in the Netherlands -- if you have a disclaimer stating "The customer takes full legal responsibility for imports", you cannot be held accountable, as magic mushrooms are legal within the Netherlands. But these guys not only operated out of Germany, they also sold substances which are currently illegal under most jurisdictions worldwide.

I put this in this thread because the Chemical Love shop only accepted Bitcoin as payment and it all reminds me a lot of the Bitcoin Simulator Game where you buy 3D-printed guns and obscure Chinese drugs from "dark net" sellers. These guys didn't confine themselves to the "dark net", though...

"Payment & Security"

Jesus christ they Ripped off the Breaking Bad logo. Kinda funny because IIRC the premise of breaking bad was "drugs are bad and destroy lives, here's an insane way this can happen"

 

[MarineTrainedTard]

A few dopes I knew who were cheerleading bitcoin in it's infancy were of this belief, and, the belief that if you could somehow get the entire population to switch to BTC, it would leave the government without funds because they couldn't tax it. Which was critical research failure, the government could easily pass laws requiring you to pay your taxes in BTC, they just don't for the same reason they don't request it in animal hide, or gold bullion, it's not practical, not that they COULDN'T do it.

I like how they think that bitcoin is untouchable. The thought that the government will just start taking taxes in bitcoin is somehow unfathomable to them. I can't really understand the shortsightedness involved.

It's a hilarious catch 22 for them. No one accepts BTC as real currency, but as soon as it's accepted by the mainstream, the government is damn sure gonna be involved.

 

[Rou]

Just a question: is bitcoin stable enough to be a currency? Despite all the talk about how bitcoin would replace all currencies, I thought it was too bouncy and full with speculation for it to work. But if it doesn't swing too bad, I could imagine it working.

 

[DrJonesHat]

Just a question: is bitcoin stable enough to be a currency? Despite all the talk about how bitcoin would replace all currencies, I thought it was too bouncy and full with speculation for it to work. But if it doesn't swing too bad, I could imagine it working.

No, it's not stable enough. It was never intended for real use, it was proof-of-concept only. A bunch of libertarian crazies got ahold of it and it mutated into the defacto currency of the electronic black market.

 

[Jaimas]

One of the funniest things to me has been how the Bitcoin faggots have responded to the emergence (and surprisingly, success) of Dogecoin.

Nice Meme!: The Coin

For the uninitiated, Dogecoin started as a parody of of Bitcoin and is worth maybe a fraction of a cent each because the supply is completely uncontrolled. The idea is that you can grab like a thousand Dogecoin for $20 and use it for sarcasm donations. Pretty much everyone tipping Dogecoin is acutely aware that the currency is basically useless, but it's been used so often for stupid shit that some online stores now accept it. And it seems to have worked; Dogecoin was bigger than not only bitcoin, but every other cryptocurrency in existence combined by January 2014. Even now it's #3 in the world. Even with a huge community of people who try to use Dogecoin as any other altcoin through holding and price adjustment, it's still mostly used as a sarcasm currency at the most.

To this day, mentioning Dogecoin on r/bitcoin or any other similar community will incite absolute, frothing, pants-shitting rage. All because a joke currency based on memes got the better of them.

 

[Rou]

One of the funniest things to me has been how the Bitcoin faggots have responded to the emergence (and surprisingly, success) of Dogecoin.

Nice Meme!: The Coin

For the uninitiated, Dogecoin started as a parody of of Bitcoin and is worth maybe a fraction of a cent each because the supply is completely uncontrolled. The idea is that you can grab like a thousand Dogecoin for $20 and use it for sarcasm donations. Pretty much everyone tipping Dogecoin is acutely aware that the currency is basically useless, but it's been used so often for stupid shit that some online stores now accept it. And it seems to have worked; Dogecoin was bigger than not only bitcoin, but every other cryptocurrency in existence combined by January 2014. Even now it's #3 in the world. Even with a huge community of people who try to use Dogecoin as any other altcoin through holding and price adjustment, it's still mostly used as a sarcasm currency at the most.

To this day, mentioning Dogecoin on r/bitcoin or any other similar community will incite absolute, frothing, pants-shitting rage. All because a joke currency based on memes got the better of them.

I remember seeing it on /biz/ a year or two ago. They linked to the forum @AnOminous showed us and the whole thing was written in comic sans, it was hilarious.

 

[TowinKarz]

Just a question: is bitcoin stable enough to be a currency? Despite all the talk about how bitcoin would replace all currencies, I thought it was too bouncy and full with speculation for it to work. But if it doesn't swing too bad, I could imagine it working.

It's flaws are well documented. The big problem is, to get that wild swinging in value under control, they'd have to put some kind of governing body in charge of how many BTC could be made and to regulate how fast new coins hit the market. Obviously, the libertarians chimp at the mere thought of ANYONE setting any rules, so that's out. That also means there's no solution to the problem that there's no lender of last resort a la' the FDIC that guarantees at least a nominal amount of your money is not going to vanish because the computers took a dump.

I'm also no computer expert, so if I'm missing something blindingly obvious, please explain, but, it seems to me the whole blockchain is unsustainable. Eventually, as it grows, wouldn't it get so large as to become unfeasible? With it taking months if not years to be updated even with the most powerful computing power available to it? That's another big strike against it, it already takes so long to reconcile that it's impossible to use in store-level transactions (those legit retailers that accept it are basically pandering to the BTC crowd and taking the risk that they're going to get their BTC at some point in the future when the chain catches up) and by %, how many BTC users are holding on to their coin as a final product vs those who will never touch it again if they can't find someone to convert it to USD? That online drug dealer at some point is going to want spendable cash, the BTC is just a (flimsy) way to try and launder it at the point-of-sale instead of later at the bank.

So no, BTC as an everyman currency isn't possible because it lacks the safeties and controls to be one because idiots with no idea how economies work or shady ulterior motives. don't like those controls.

 

[Super Collie]

One of the funniest things to me has been how the Bitcoin faggots have responded to the emergence (and surprisingly, success) of Dogecoin.

Nice Meme!: The Coin

For the uninitiated, Dogecoin started as a parody of of Bitcoin and is worth maybe a fraction of a cent each because the supply is completely uncontrolled. The idea is that you can grab like a thousand Dogecoin for $20 and use it for sarcasm donations. Pretty much everyone tipping Dogecoin is acutely aware that the currency is basically useless, but it's been used so often for stupid shit that some online stores now accept it. And it seems to have worked; Dogecoin was bigger than not only bitcoin, but every other cryptocurrency in existence combined by January 2014. Even now it's #3 in the world. Even with a huge community of people who try to use Dogecoin as any other altcoin through holding and price adjustment, it's still mostly used as a sarcasm currency at the most.

To this day, mentioning Dogecoin on r/bitcoin or any other similar community will incite absolute, frothing, pants-shitting rage. All because a joke currency based on memes got the better of them.

Can't forget that time Dogecoin straight up sponsored an entire NASCAR.