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Old 09-06-2017, 15:13   #16
PSM
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Originally Posted by bblhead672 View Post
I agree

Trader of valuable things: "So what do you have to exchange for this food and water?"

Desperate survivor: "I have bitcoins."

Trader of valuable things: "Ha, ha, ha, ha. No, really what do you have of value? Get out of here."
Or:

Trader of valuable things: "So what do you have to exchange for this food and water?"

Desperate survivor: "I have gold."

Trader of valuable things: "OK, I'll take it. All of it or you starve."

Or:

A neighbor that I don't like buys $10,000 worth of gold and I buy $10,000 worth of ammo. An hour after TSHTF, I have $10,000 worth of gold and $9,999.50 worth of ammo.

Pat
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Old 09-06-2017, 15:25   #17
Gruntastic11
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Why would you want to "buy" into some form of crypto-currency that was designed to be almost untraceable?

I'm not buying into anything that you can apparently set a computer farm up to actually create the currency without spending a dime in it.

Wasn't the original intent of bitcoin to be used on the dark web for was Team Sergeant already put out?
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Old 09-06-2017, 15:41   #18
GratefulCitizen
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All forms of currency are just proxies for human time and labor.
Best to invest where you have the most influence.

1-your own health and skill sets
2-mutually beneficial relationships with trustworthy people
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Old 09-06-2017, 16:33   #19
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Originally Posted by GratefulCitizen View Post
All forms of currency are just proxies for human time and labor.
Best to invest where you have the most influence.

1-your own health and skill sets
2-mutually beneficial relationships with trustworthy people
Sound advice, thank you Dr. Phil.
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Old 09-06-2017, 16:33   #20
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Originally Posted by GratefulCitizen View Post
All forms of currency are just proxies for human time and labor.
Best to invest where you have the most influence.

1-your own health and skill sets
2-mutually beneficial relationships with trustworthy people
Ding! Ding! - And we have a winner.
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Old 09-06-2017, 19:25   #21
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Originally Posted by GratefulCitizen View Post
All forms of currency are just proxies for human time and labor.
Best to invest where you have the most influence.

1-your own health and skill sets
2-mutually beneficial relationships with trustworthy people
Agreed.

But when you are fortunate enough to possess good health, a broad set of flexible skills, and a robust personal network you have to put your hard earned money somewhere.

It would be imprudent to put the entirety in "insurance" for low-ish probability events.

Smart portfolio investment models incorporate at least a very small % of speculative investment. Cryptocurrency/blockchain is certainly worthy of serious consideration or at least long term monitoring.

I'm surprised there's so much resistance to cryptocurrencies and the underlying blockchain here with so many innovative/startegic thinkers in the house.

The transformational potential is truly staggering, as is the value creation/capture.

Observing this from an OCONUS/non-western filter, I would bet the proverbial farm that cryptocurrency/blockchain will be more transformative than antibiotics & electricity for the developing world.

There are certainly going to be speculative speed bumps along the way(we've seen that in the dot com implosion, but what rose from the ashes was quite real value creation/capture), but in 20 years blockchains are going to be fundamental foundations to many things we currently do.
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Old 09-06-2017, 19:48   #22
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Originally Posted by Gruntastic11 View Post
Why would you want to "buy" into some form of crypto-currency that was designed to be almost untraceable?

I'm not buying into anything that you can apparently set a computer farm up to actually create the currency without spending a dime in it.

Wasn't the original intent of bitcoin to be used on the dark web for was Team Sergeant already put out?
It's a bit of a misnomer to call Bitcoin untraceable.

While the Bitcoin owners are not identified, the entire Bitcoin ledger is transparent(therefor transactions are transparent) and stored globally to eliminate risk of ledger fraud.

Bitcoin is only anonymous in a very limited sense.

-----

Setting up a server farm to "farm' Bitcoins is done to provide the computational horsepower to crunch the ledger and conduct robust and secure(but transparent) transactions.

It takes a LOT of electricity to run a server farm and it's interesting to see Bitcoin farmers popping up in places like Mongolia with cheap electricity to make doing so a bit more viable.

Bitcoin farming is a closely run effort that unless electricity is free( or stolen) along with the high end gaming graphic cards(expensive) to crunch the numbers, I don't think anyone is getting rich off Bitcoin mining, its just enough to keep crunching the blockchain ledger numbers in a scaling distributed global network.

In a way it's quite a libertarian-ish system which has me scratching my head at the lack of interest here.

As to the original intent of Bitcoin, I reckon it's a pretty libertarian-ish effort to cut central bank power(and corruption) out of the loop.

To me, one of the strongest bits of evidence to support the development of cryptocurrencies/blockchains is because people like Jim Kramer at CNBC oppose it.

Jim Kramer and his ilk have a long history of treating small American Mom & Pop investors like suckers to be fleeced.

Bitcoin/cryptocurrencies/blockchains represent a significant threat to the existing financial gatekeepers and ticket punchers who stand to lose their enormous frictional transaction fees.

That's why traditional folks in banking/finance publically cast doubt on it so much, while they concurrently cast a wide net desperate to hire their own blockchain SMEs to try to retain their monopoly/franchise.

Maybe putting money into it isn't for you, but it's well worth a small slice of precious free reading time to stay current with it.

It is going to change the world.

If it doesn't I'll buy you a beer for wasting your time.
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Old 09-06-2017, 21:05   #23
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Originally Posted by Flagg View Post
It's a bit of a misnomer to call Bitcoin untraceable.

Bitcoin is only anonymous in a very limited sense.

-----

Setting up a server farm to "farm' Bitcoins is done to provide the computational horsepower to crunch the ledger and conduct robust and secure(but transparent) transactions.
Zeroing in on these points.

BC can be completely untraceable. Don't use the blockchain. Pass the BC on a thumbdrive/medium.

Or

Buy some other virtual currency using your BC. Example, buy Ethereum from your known BC wallet (A). Keep it for an hour or so and then sell your Ethereum for BC and transfer it to your unknown BC wallet (B).

Too easy and no feds (US or other) can trace it. Use tumblers and mixers.

BC is not backed by any FIAT it is backed by an agreement of its worth by the two parties.

BC server farms, it is rumored in those circles that Russia, as a state, is starting to mine BC. They are running most of the farms now (in China, Eastern Europe, and US).
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Old 09-06-2017, 21:57   #24
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I have no doubt about that. The question is will it change things for the better or worse?
I guess it depends on perspective.

I think from the little person's perspective, it has real potential to dramatically reduce the chances of a govenrment/central bank inflating away your savings.

It also has great potential to reduce current "franchise" frictional costs.

House titles, etc that require title searches will be a thing of the past in terms of their current huge costs, once in blockchain.

Same thing with smart contracts. The lawyered up wealthy may have reduced ability to beat up the small guy if smart contracts with attached funds are used acting as the ultimate arbiter.

I think it is negative US Dollar(but not necessarily negative US) very long term...as well as every other traditional currency...as other means of exchange options are developed and scale.

This will likely be a significant transfer of power from financial/monetary franchise holders into decentralised formats.

There will surely be losers.....lawyers and accountants are certaly going to have to adapt or die.

And there's also potential dark side stuff with blockchain with "dead man's switch" smart contracts.
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Old 09-06-2017, 22:30   #25
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Zeroing in on these points.

BC can be completely untraceable. Don't use the blockchain. Pass the BC on a thumbdrive/medium.

Or

Buy some other virtual currency using your BC. Example, buy Ethereum from your known BC wallet (A). Keep it for an hour or so and then sell your Ethereum for BC and transfer it to your unknown BC wallet (B).

Too easy and no feds (US or other) can trace it. Use tumblers and mixers.

BC is not backed by any FIAT it is backed by an agreement of its worth by the two parties.

BC server farms, it is rumored in those circles that Russia, as a state, is starting to mine BC. They are running most of the farms now (in China, Eastern Europe, and US).
It's certainly not perfect in terms of mitigating illicit activity.

Humans are incredibly creative with avoiding "the man".

We've been cheating since we self organised into tribes.

But it does a far better job that most common perceptions of the "untraceability" of cryptocurrencies. It remind some me a bit of the Glock plastic gun in an X ray machine narrative pushed in the media.

I don't think it's sensitive to say that authorities have the ability to reconcile and attribute quite a bit.

In person to in person may have a gap(I'm no crypto SME, just an interested investor who lived and breathed tech for the last 20+ years), but...

I'd rather have bad guys using something with at least some degree of traceability/attribution, even if just crumbs rather than the whole loaf of bread to

What would analysts with access to a quantum computer prefer to roll up?

Bad guys using cryptocurrency or physical cash?

We've always had black economy activity since the tax man arrived.

Check out what India's doing in terms of its cash economy. It's pretty aggressive what they're doing to try and kill it(killing cash).

China's going with a requirement that all online comments are attributable shortly.

Estonia, the world's most digital centric country is going with an E-residency program with identity validation and secure/trusted legal signatures via a crypto card/device reader that is EU compliant.

I'm a big believer in internet freedom and anonymity.

But I also see the value of secure/trusted identity validation for online financial transactions and legal signatures.

If a nation state wants to mine Bitcoins or other cryptocurrencies I'm fine with it, because they can't fraudulently alter the blockchain ledger held on thousands of Global distributed systems.

In Venezuela with super cheap subsidised electricity but no food or freedom, people are reportedly mining for Bitcoin fractions to feed themselves, but it has sadly gotten onto the radar of regime LE who are targeting them for confiscation and mining themselves for the small cash flow trickles.

The common factor I see in cryptocurrency farming is converting free/lower than average cost electricity into Gflops.

Cryptocurrencies are certainly going to be volatile moving forward, just like every other investment sector as they've developed and splintered(tech/internet)
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Old 09-07-2017, 04:43   #26
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Currency is a generally accepted form of money, including coins and paper notes, which is issued by a government and circulated within an economy. Used as a medium of exchange for goods and services, currency is the basis for trade.

Some currencies, like cryptocurrencies​, bitcoin​, dogecoin​ and other online currencies and branded currencies are not tied to any country. Branded currencies, like airline and credit card points, or in-game credits are valued in relationship to the value of the products or services they’re tied to. Control over digital currencies is entirely decentralized, and the exchange rate of a digital currency can vary widely in a short period of time.
Currency has no value except that which someone will take it in trade for services or goods. You can't buy anything with Confederate bills or Iraqi Dinars with Saddam's face on it. What keeps Bitcoin from just vanishing? People gullible enough to trade with it.

Bat guano was an investment in the 19th century, you don't see people trading for that anymore.

Guano trading.
Cryptocurrency.
Penny stocks.
Blackjack.
Keno.
Shooting rocks in the alley.
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Old 09-07-2017, 07:01   #27
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Bad guys using cryptocurrency or physical cash?
Yes, both. We saw a bad guys' wallet with ~$98K in BC marked for travel. We have seen dope, guns, and people bought and sold using vc.
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Old 09-07-2017, 08:29   #28
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Yeah, I've read enough to understand bitcoin is a criminal's currency and nothing I want a part of.........

And Flagg spare me...... you cannot track something that only exists on the internet. (At least real currency has serial numbers. )
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Old 09-07-2017, 16:19   #29
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Sweet as!

No worries fellas.

I'll turn it down from a 12 to a 2 and leave it be.

I'll swing back down the track to take my beating and/or buy a box of beers.
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Old 09-07-2017, 17:18   #30
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Blockchain technology is the future and Bitcoin is only one of many options.

Cryptocurrency doesn't just exist on the internet. Decentralized servers and cold storage are actually more secure than any bank account in the event of a serious collapse because they aren't tied to a single corporation, government or insurance organization to redeem. Ethereum is a great example that incentivizes more owners by increasing its security as more people use it.

Bitcoin has increased in value 816% since this thread was started. If I'd have bought 100 of them in August 2016 for $56k, I'd be worth almost half a million dollars right now. If it's "criminal" to yield almost 300 times the return that stocks, bonds and savings packages shoot for then send the Pinkertons after me.

Currently Bitcoin is not nearly as useful as Visa or Mastercard, but to discredit the entire sector is a big mistake in my opinion. One of these tokens that is tied to a revolutionary tech will stick and change the way information is used across platforms worldwide.
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