Bitcoin and other crypto-The CR thread

[Bullneck 19168]

13 hours ago, Immaculate Vibes said:

 

Yep old Ron, waging war on our democracy from his garage studio. 
 

Didn’t realize Ron Paul was so divisive. 
 

Don’t forget doctors. 

Question:  should black people be allowed to buy bitcoin?

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

1 hour ago, Bullneck said:

Question:  should black people be allowed to buy bitcoin?

Of course. The best part is that it’s permissionless. they have equal access to the beginning of a new financial system. No one can keep you out because of your race, sex, nationality. 

[Captainant 27680]

FBI says North Korean hackers stole more than $600 million in cryptocurrency in single hack

Quote

 

"Through our investigation we were able to confirm Lazarus Group and APT38, cyber actors associated with the DPRK, are responsible for the theft of $620 million in Ethereum reported on March 29th," the FBI said in a statement. "DPRK" is an abbreviation for North Korea's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, and Ethereum is a technology platform associated with a type of cryptocurrency.

The FBI was referring to the recent hack of a computer network used by Axie Infinity, a video game that allows players to earn cryptocurrency. Sky Mavis, the company that created Axie Infinity, announced on March 29 that unidentified hackers had stolen the equivalent of roughly $600 million -- valued at the time of the hack's discovery -- on March 23 from a "bridge," or network that allows users to send cryptocurrency from one blockchain to another.

 

Lmao at Axie Infinity getting owned because of web3 smart contracts and the necessary 3rd party off chain shit to make it actually work. For more fun, check out https://web3isgoinggreat.com

EDIT: it's worth checking out the slightly more detailed version of why axie got pwned. TLDR- they got the keys to 5 of 9 validator nodes on network, and then cleaned em out.

Edited April 16, 2022 by Captainant

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

1 hour ago, Captainant said:

FBI says North Korean hackers stole more than $600 million in cryptocurrency in single hack

Lmao at Axie Infinity getting owned because of web3 smart contracts and the necessary 3rd party off chain shit to make it actually work. For more fun, check out https://web3isgoinggreat.com

EDIT: it's worth checking out the slightly more detailed version of why axie got pwned. TLDR- they got the keys to 5 of 9 validator nodes on network, and then cleaned em out.

Shitcoiners gonna shitcoin. Centralized web3 Bs is still centralized Bs no matter what hot term to put on it. 

[gyroprotagonist 2594]

axie generated something like $1.3B revenue in 2021 with most of that in the last 6 months of the year.  peaked at over $350M a month.  I think all of their revenue generation came from taking 4.25% of each sale and fees for 'breeding' (creating a new nft char from an existing one) the nft chars that battled in the game (think pokeman).  i thought about trying to form scholar teams in the June time frame last year, but did not want to lay out the $800-$1500 per team and then find and manage scholar teams (scholars were people that played the game using other people's teams for a cut of the profits).  knew of several people who we managing 20-40 teams and making decent money, but it took 2-3 months to break even.  like anything else in crypto, if you got in early and had 20+ (good) teams, it was netting like $500+ per team per month.  Most were putting the money back in and buying more teams.

it is very popular on this thread to say everything is a ponzi, but these games absolutely rely on growing the user base to keep the party going.  any MMO game needs paying users to the keep the servers on line and the game running.  Blizzard charges ~$180 per year for WoW and they raked in $8B in 2021 for comparison.  The popularity and increase in user base was obviously driven by how much one could profit from the game.  I did not think the game was that fun on its own, but maybe some did.  so axie had literal exponential growth for users and revenue

obviously if new axies are getting created someone has to buy them or the price tanks.   

If you want a massive dive into the beginnings of the rise of axie, this article from July is super in-depth https://www.notboring.co/p/infinity-revenue-infinity-possibilities?s=r.  You can see why so many people wanted in on the action around this time and why that growth was going to lead to problems down the road.

 

[Captainant 27680]

1 hour ago, gyroprotagonist said:

knew of several people who we managing 20-40 teams and making decent money, but it took 2-3 months to break even.  like anything else in crypto, if you got in early and had 20+ (good) teams, it was netting like $500+ per team per month.  Most were putting the money back in and buying more teams.

it is very popular on this thread to say everything is a ponzi, but these games absolutely rely on growing the user base to keep the party going.  any MMO game needs paying users to the keep the servers on line and the game running.  Blizzard charges ~$180 per year for WoW and they raked in $8B in 2021 for comparison.  The popularity and increase in user base was obviously driven by how much one could profit from the game.  I did not think the game was that fun on its own, but maybe some did.  so axie had literal exponential growth for users and revenue

None of what you're saying here is an argument against it being a ponzi/pyramid scheme lol. Comparing to LuLaRoe, if the vast majority of your cash flow is from signing up new people... You're gonna run out of people and the music is gonna stop. 

The only folks who are doing well with axie and other games like that are the people who came in on the ground floor and have a deep downline of users. 

There's no reason to play the game, aside from trying to recruit more people to play it so you can earn a cut of their earnings. It's the exact same conundrum with every other crypto. The value is derived solely from the hope of being able to sell it for a higher price sometime in the future - there's zero intrinsic value of utility granted by being on the Blockchain. And the overhead of being on the Blockchain eats your margins (read: gas fees)

[Bullneck 19168]

6 hours ago, Immaculate Vibes said:

Shitcoiners gonna shitcoin. Centralized web3 Bs is still centralized Bs no matter what hot term to put on it. 

Does Consumer Reports have a report on the best bitcoin to buy?  Or what shitcoin to avoid?  

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

Take a look at this. Sam is owner of one of the biggest crypto exchanges out there. 

Tony Blair and Bill Clinton speaking???
 

Bitcoin is really all that matters. Shitcoiners bring in fucking Tony Blair and Bill Clinton? I wish the crypto people here would figure it out. Everything else will be co-opted. What are you actually achieving?

[Captainant 27680]

Mfw in 8 pages we've gone from "smart contracts and web 3.0 are the future of crypto and society!" to "anything not BTC is shitcoin"

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

15 minutes ago, Captainant said:

Mfw in 8 pages we've gone from "smart contracts and web 3.0 are the future of crypto and society!" to "anything not BTC is shitcoin"

I never said the first thing. Don’t confuse me with others. 

[gyroprotagonist 2594]

14 hours ago, Captainant said:

None of what you're saying here is an argument against it being a ponzi/pyramid scheme lol. Comparing to LuLaRoe, if the vast majority of your cash flow is from signing up new people... You're gonna run out of people and the music is gonna stop. 

The only folks who are doing well with axie and other games like that are the people who came in on the ground floor and have a deep downline of users. 

There's no reason to play the game, aside from trying to recruit more people to play it so you can earn a cut of their earnings. It's the exact same conundrum with every other crypto. The value is derived solely from the hope of being able to sell it for a higher price sometime in the future - there's zero intrinsic value of utility granted by being on the Blockchain. And the overhead of being on the Blockchain eats your margins (read: gas fees)

i am not arguing for either side and tried to point out that yes, for growth, new users are a must.  it's just a fascinating story to me that $1.3B could spring up in 6 months and i posted that since revenue came solely from sales, they obviously needed new blood coming in.  it will be interesting to see if something like this can stabilize.  For the massive user profits, it 100% needs new players coming in.  just like any other MMO game out there. but unlike Activision/Blizzard reaping 100% of the profits, players could partake in some of the profits.

It is not a 'recruiting' thing and you have the mechanics wrong.  players did not seek out people to sell your nfts to and there was no residual income coming in from selling to others.  There was so much demand that if you wanted to sell the nfts, you just listed on the marketplace and people coming in could buy them.  after that sale, there are no financial ties between the 2 parties.   The lure of quick 'easy' money was brining in new players by the 1000s each day. Everyone wanted to be a super user and set up several teams so the demand stayed strong.

The recruiting was from super users (people who put up $20K-$100K to buy 100s of nfts to create dozens of teams) recruiting mostly 3rd world citizens to play the game for them like a job and split the earnings.  Each team made maybe $20-$50 a day depending on the strength of the team and how well and how long the user played.  so outsourcing the labor for dozens of teams could pay off over time.  Just like people playing hearthstone/pokeman, there were also 'professional' gamers that could make a lot more just from playing, but for the people who ran it like a business and outsourced the game playing, they just wanted a team that was 'good enough'.  

Quote

there's zero intrinsic value of utility granted by being on the Blockchain. And the overhead of being on the Blockchain eats your margins (read: gas fees)

unlike traditional games, which prohibit selling accounts/items/etc.. you could sell your nfts because you owned them without violating the Ts&Cs.  RE: gas fees, aside from initially moving an L1 currency into the side chain, the gas fees were negligible (pennies) for all the gaming transactions.  if a game resided on the Eth mainnet, you are right and it would not be viable.  But almost all blockchain games use a side chain for in-game transactions for this very reason.

Axie is a real game that some play for fun, some play to earn a few shekels and a lot more are in it to try and extract a profit because they saw other do it before them.     

[956 Worldwide 34715]

I know nothing about Axie beyond what I read here but I have to say it seems worse to try and make money that way than just getting a job. 

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

Symbolic gesture, but I dig it. 
 

 

[Captainant 27680]

22 minutes ago, Immaculate Vibes said:

Symbolic gesture, but I dig it. 
 

 

that's a waste of money for the local muni unless they're getting a sweetheart concession from their electric provider. \

but you redhats love wasting public funds for publicity stunts so hooray distributed government inefficiency! I sure am glad tax dollars are propping up your ponzi scheme

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

19 hours ago, Captainant said:

that's a waste of money for the local muni unless they're getting a sweetheart concession from their electric provider. \

but you redhats love wasting public funds for publicity stunts so hooray distributed government inefficiency! I sure am glad tax dollars are propping up your ponzi scheme

One of my follows that is involved in mining says it would make very small profit, but like I said it’s symbolic. 

In other news our friends at the World Economic Forum have co-opted the whole “change the code” campaign. Cite a debunked stat about environmental impact. Talk up Ethereum. It’s plain as day who/what  the establishment backs and why. From the group of elites that says you’ll own nothing and be happy…
 

 

Edited April 27, 2022 by Immaculate Vibes

[BrickHorn 18237]

6 minutes ago, Immaculate Vibes said:

From the group of elites that says you’ll own nothing and be happy…

Congratulations! You have achieved Alex Jones Level misunderstanding! This achievement badge enables you to jump to wild, sinister conclusions based on the most superficial interpretation of innocuous quotes taken completely out of context.  

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

10 minutes ago, BrickHorn said:

Congratulations! You have achieved Alex Jones Level misunderstanding! This achievement badge enables you to jump to wild, sinister conclusions based on the most superficial interpretation of innocuous quotes taken completely out of context.  

 

https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/11/8-predictions-for-the-world-in-2030/
 

it’s literally on their site. You’re free to interpret it as you wish. 

[Captainant 27680]

51 minutes ago, Immaculate Vibes said:

One of my follows that is involved in mining says it would make very small profit, but like I said it’s symbolic. 

In other news our friends at the World Economic Forum have co-opted the whole “change the code” campaign. Cite a debunked stat about environmental impact. Talk up Ethereum. It’s plain as day who/what  the establishment backs and why. From the group of elites that says you’ll own nothing and be happy…
 

 

did you happen to actually read that article, or just quote what the headline and your twitter follows told you? It's just suggesting proof of stake over proof of work - and they've been fucking that chicken with ETH for half a decade now lol.

There's nothing in that article that suggests there's an improvement to the efficiency of BTC - and the entire analysis hinges on "well dryers and refrigerators use more energy than BTC mining, so BTC mining isn't so bad". It's just a shitty #bothsides that equivocates the actual real utility of safe to eat food and clean clothes to a massively inefficient distributed financial network that is quantitatively worse than existing mechanisms only to protect against a threat that almost never happens.

Edited April 27, 2022 by Captainant

[wildcat09 29355]

22 minutes ago, Captainant said:

did you happen to actually read that article, or just quote what the headline and your twitter follows told you? It's just suggesting proof of stake over proof of work - and they've been fucking that chicken with ETH for half a decade now lol.

There's nothing in that article that suggests there's an improvement to the efficiency of BTC - and the entire analysis hinges on "well dryers and refrigerators use more energy than BTC mining, so BTC mining isn't so bad". It's just a shitty #bothsides that equivocates the actual real utility of safe to eat food and clean clothes to a massively inefficient distributed financial network that is quantitatively worse than existing mechanisms only to protect against a threat that almost never happens.

And which doesn’t protect against the massive scams and theft that routinely happen in crypto.

Other than all that though, I’m sure it’s great.

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

15 minutes ago, Captainant said:

did you happen to actually read that article, or just quote what the headline and your twitter follows told you? It's just suggesting proof of stake over proof of work - and they've been fucking that chicken with ETH for half a decade now lol.

 

Of course I did. I posted it because it’s the first time I’ve seen the WEF advocate directly for bitcoin to change to Proof of Stake. They obviously carry enormous influence. 
 

21 minutes ago, Captainant said:

 

There's nothing in that article that suggests there's an improvement to the efficiency of BTC - and the entire analysis hinges on "well dryers and refrigerators use more energy than BTC mining, so BTC mining isn't so bad". It's just a shitty #bothsides that equivocates the actual real utility of safe to eat food and clean clothes to a massively inefficient distributed financial network that is quantitatively worse than existing mechanisms only to protect against a threat that almost never happens.

Here’s a nice thread by a progressive discussing why the environmental concerns are misguided. Hopefully a different framing helps you look past me as the messenger. 
 

From the fin 

 

1 minute ago, wildcat09 said:

And which doesn’t protect against the massive scams and theft that routinely happen in crypto.

Other than all that though, I’m sure it’s great.

I don’t defend other crypto. Scams are bad. 

[Neonmoon 38129]

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

Couldn’t have found it on a map, but here you go. 

[956 Worldwide 34715]

“Don’t do what the Central African Republic does” is a remarkably reliable public policy guideline. 

[wildcat09 29355]

How's it working out for the first country that adopted Bitcoin as a legal currency?

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

5 hours ago, 956 Worldwide said:

“Don’t do what the Central African Republic does” is a remarkably reliable public policy guideline. 

I wasn’t aware of all the monetary history of this region. Could see this spread if they’re all under the same colonial umbrella. 
 

 

[BrickHorn 18237]

Bitcoin is a great currency! You can use it to buy stuff from like at least 4 or 5 places, you usually don’t have to wait more than a few hours for the payment to clear, its buying power fluctuates wildly day to day, and it only costs around $200 per transaction. 

[Al Bundy's Napoleon Hand 13585]

23 minutes ago, BrickHorn said:

Bitcoin is a great currency! You can use it to buy stuff from like at least 4 or 5 places, you usually don’t have to wait more than a few hours for the payment to clear, its buying power fluctuates wildly day to day, and it only costs around $200 per transaction. 

 

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

 

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

17 hours ago, Immaculate Vibes said:

 

 

[B00M 6419]

On 4/27/2022 at 9:29 AM, BrickHorn said:

Congratulations! You have achieved Alex Jones Level misunderstanding! This achievement badge enables you to jump to wild, sinister conclusions based on the most superficial interpretation of innocuous quotes taken completely out of context.  

 

[956 Worldwide 34715]

Pumping BitCoin as a solution for desperately impoverished African nations and their citizens as a hedge against wild currency swings and devaluations is the height of cynical exploitation. 
 

This is why coin bros have the reputation they do. 

Edited April 29, 2022 by 956 Worldwide

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

26 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

Pumping BitCoin as a solution for desperately impoverished African nations and their citizens as a hedge against wild currency swings and devaluations is the height of cynical exploitation. 
 

This is why coin bros have the reputation they do. 

Not declaring myself anywhere close to an expert on Central Africa, but some striking stats from that article. 
 

Out of the bottom 10 poorest countries in Africa, half are in this CFA zone. 
 

10 of the 15 nations in the CFA zone are in the “least developed” in the world category according to the UN. 
 

But they should definitely keep doing what they’re doing, including operating under a monetary regime that appears to be built specifically to exploit them. Seems like that system is the cynical exploitation.
 

Or you could call it something worse if you throw in the colonial nature of it all. 

[Captainant 27680]

Know what's going to really put some jet fuel into those third world economies?? Extracting a buck fifty to three hundred bucks PER TRANSACTION! Totes not exploitative lmao

[wildcat09 29355]

12 minutes ago, Immaculate Vibes said:

Not declaring myself anywhere close to an expert on Central Africa, but some striking stats from that article. 
 

Out of the bottom 10 poorest countries in Africa, half are in this CFA zone. 
 

10 of the 15 nations in the CFA zone are in the “least developed” in the world category according to the UN. 
 

But they should definitely keep doing what they’re doing, including operating under a monetary regime that appears to be built specifically to exploit them. Seems like that system is the cynical exploitation.
 

Or you could call it something worse if you throw in the colonial nature of it all. 

This take should get you tried in the Hague for a crime against humanity. 

[956 Worldwide 34715]

You can be completely correct about the French doing all sorts of nasty colonial things and even nasty post-colonial monetary things. Right up until your take on a solution is a Central African making 60 cents per hour is better served putting their meager savings in fucking BitCoin. 
 

That’s completely fucking sociopathic, what the fuck is wrong with you people? Pump up your bullshit by scamming stay at home Mormon moms like a decent human being. 

Edited April 29, 2022 by 956 Worldwide

[wildcat09 29355]

Don’t forget the Dutch.

[Brisketexan 105154]

Don’t forget the Dutch.

I never do.

Wooden shod motherfuckers.

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

1 hour ago, Captainant said:

Know what's going to really put some jet fuel into those third world economies?? Extracting a buck fifty to three hundred bucks PER TRANSACTION! Totes not exploitative lmao

Lightning 

55 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

This take should get you tried in the Hague for a crime against humanity. 

???

48 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

You can be completely correct about the French doing all sorts of nasty colonial things and even nasty post-colonial monetary things. Right up until your take on a solution is a Central African making 60 cents per hour is better served putting their meager savings in fucking BitCoin. 
 

That’s completely fucking sociopathic, what the fuck is wrong with you people? Pump up your bullshit by scamming stay at home Mormon moms like a decent human being. 

It sounds to me like they could benefit from an open monetary network, not controlled and manipulated by their former colonial masters. It’s opt in, so we’ll see if they feels it benefits them.
 

What will be interesting to see are the potential dominos to follow. If their partners in this monetary union see them not getting even more rekt than they were previously, I see others following. The whole union has about 150M people. 
 

Then you have the Panama move. It seems pretty clear that this movement will initially be focused in Central America and Africa. 

[Captainant 27680]

1 minute ago, Immaculate Vibes said:

Lightning

But I thought your position was anything that wasn't BTC was a scam? Why would a side chain or trusted third party be anything different?

Also, lightning doesn't address single transactions. You still have to close the lightning transaction on the BTC Blockchain. Lightning only scales nicely if you do a bunch of business or transactions with the same wallet(s). 

You're just moving the problem somewhere else with lightning, you're back to a trust based model to paper over limitations of the BTC protocol.

[gyroprotagonist 2594]

i, for one, am buying stock in lambo futures on this news.  sooooo many new peeps in Africa about to be driving cars with doors that open 'up' instead of 'out'.

  

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

56 minutes ago, Captainant said:

But I thought your position was anything that wasn't BTC was a scam? Why would a side chain or trusted third party be anything different?

Also, lightning doesn't address single transactions. You still have to close the lightning transaction on the BTC Blockchain. Lightning only scales nicely if you do a bunch of business or transactions with the same wallet(s). 

You're just moving the problem somewhere else with lightning, you're back to a trust based model to paper over limitations of the BTC protocol.

Lightning is built on bitcoin. Not a scam. 
 

How is it trust based if I’m using a self-custody Lightning wallet like Muun? I understand there are trade offs but it is still a trust minimized, open network. 

[Captainant 27680]

1 minute ago, Immaculate Vibes said:

Lightning is built on bitcoin. Not a scam. 
 

How is it trust based if I’m using a self-custody Lightning wallet like Muun? I understand there are trade offs but it is still a trust minimized, open network. 

IMO, lightning is just a fancier, more complicated, and more expensive version of escrow accounts with every party you have a channel open with.

You have to trust that the people/party you have the lightning channel(s) with aren't going to just write a bunch of transactions against your lightning wallet and then close it while you're AFK. Once that channel is closed and the tally of lightning transactions is settled, that final transaction is still written back to the BTC blockchain and becomes immutable. Meaning your shit is gone. You have to trust that whomever you have a channel open with isn't going to completely drain your escrow.+

Nevermind that in terms of usability, the party that you're paying still has to actually close the lightning channel to actually receive the BTC. You STILL have to pay the piper dude. If you send someone 1000 BTC in a lightning chain, that's not reflected on the BTC blockchain until you close the sidechain.

 

My point being: lightning does nothing to materially solve the fundamental scaling problems with BTC. It addresses a narrow set of usecases, adds significant complexity to an already complex system, and has inherent vulnerabilities that are only acceptable in a trust-based system.

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

50 minutes ago, Captainant said:

IMO, lightning is just a fancier, more complicated, and more expensive version of escrow accounts with every party you have a channel open with.

You have to trust that the people/party you have the lightning channel(s) with aren't going to just write a bunch of transactions against your lightning wallet and then close it while you're AFK. Once that channel is closed and the tally of lightning transactions is settled, that final transaction is still written back to the BTC blockchain and becomes immutable. Meaning your shit is gone. You have to trust that whomever you have a channel open with isn't going to completely drain your escrow.+

Nevermind that in terms of usability, the party that you're paying still has to actually close the lightning channel to actually receive the BTC. You STILL have to pay the piper dude. If you send someone 1000 BTC in a lightning chain, that's not reflected on the BTC blockchain until you close the sidechain.

 

My point being: lightning does nothing to materially solve the fundamental scaling problems with BTC. It addresses a narrow set of usecases, adds significant complexity to an already complex system, and has inherent vulnerabilities that are only acceptable in a trust-based system.

That’s not how it works. 
 

I used Muun wallet today to purchase a blog post. The web page had link/QR code for an invoice. I pasted the invoice into my wallet and hit send. That’s it. It went through in seconds and I just hit refresh on the page and the blog was open. 
 

To load the Muun wallet initially I created an invoice for the amount I wanted in the Muun wallet. I then pasted that invoice into my Cashapp and sent it.

 

In either case, you can’t just vacuum up funds from another account with invoices. The other side must input them and verify them. That’s just fake news. 
 

 

[wildcat09 29355]

"I purchased a blog post" is one of the saddest things I think I've ever read.

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

24 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

"I purchased a blog post" is one of the saddest things I think I've ever read.

Lol. I did it to try out the UX. 
 

Lightning does make online micropayments basically frictionless despite the assertions of CA. The bigger picture idea is to move away from an ad based model for content to one that’s pay as you go.
 

Podcasting 2.0 is a way to apply that to listening to podcasts. There’s apps where you can easily link a Lightning wallet and you stream sats, or micropayments, every minute that you’re listening. You can set it to any amount. Then podcasts can be ad free and not beholden to outside interests. It’s a good ways from being mainstream, but maybe something to look for in the future. Probably something more for the crypto thread discussion but since you asked. 

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

Go crypto!!!  🤡 🤡 🤡 

If you’re into crypto and think you’re building something that’s going to make a difference, think twice. Look who’s pumping your shitcoins. Just stop and think about it. 

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

Lulz Senator Karen. Is she not aware of the shit etf or meme stocks or other shit you can buy in your 401k?
 

 

[Immaculate Vibes 114]

22nd bailout with the IMF? The debt ponzi must go on. With new conditions. 

[Bullneck 19168]

On 5/5/2022 at 8:21 AM, Immaculate Vibes said:

Lulz Senator Karen. Is she not aware of the shit etf or meme stocks or other shit you can buy in your 401k?
 

 

If Elizabeth Warren is doing something, it's smart.  No wonder you don't like it.

[Bullneck 19168]

I'm surprised bitcoin didn't end for good during the Great Freeze of Texas.