bit¢oin$

does it mean that someone can look up someone else's public key, get their private key, and do something nefarious wiht it?

I guess I don't really know but it sounds that way? I don't think 'public' keys are supposed to be truly public. Then again isn't there a fairly public transaction record that contains this data??

https://likeinamirror.wordpress.com/2013/12/01/satoshi-nakamoto-is-probably-nick-szabo

tempted to comment "first!"

ugghh
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/college-kid-made-over-24-153845085.html

spoiler: guy actually just sent most of the money to himself for publicity

in lol news

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-25185225

The more I get back to reading about bitcoin, the more I feel like my friend has probably lost his judgment living in the silicon tower

yes

it's weird though, dude is smart as fuck and usually a cool-headed and skeptical thinker. But he keeps repeating these catch phrases like "it feels like the internet in 1990" that must ping-pong around a lot out there. He spent years having his employer do his laundry and drive him to work, so he may have lost touch a bit.

oh also "it's going to disrupt banking"

crypto currency drive a man crazy

I'm quickly growing tired of this use of "disrupt"

https://twitter.com/bitcoin_txt/status/407646887647252480

lol

"it feels like the internet in 1990"

i have a feeling in a few months it may feel a lot like internet in 1990

it is the internet in 2013

but it feels like the internet in 1990

in 2013

bitcoin is like having a website with nothing on it but a photo of the earth and a hit counter

Bitcoin feels like a Prodigy discussion group

Real talk first BBS I ever saw was a wheel of time one on prodigy in like 1995

it's like swiss banking in 1939

This is a pretty interesting piece:
http://www.businessinsider.com/im-changing-my-mind-about-bitcoin-2013-12

It's based on the assumption that the value of bitcoin is pretty much exclusively money laundering, illegal transactions and tax evasion, which is what I thought. It does make an interesting point, though, that it doesn't really matter if the value of bitcoin is "stable" for it to be useful, because these kinds of transactions tend to involve converting money in and out of bitcoin relatively quickly. In other words, if you buy weed using bitcoin, you don't care what the price of bitcoin was 6 months ago or what it will be 6 months from now -- you just want to quickly convert your dollars to bitcoin and get your weed at the current price. IMO this doesn't really qualify it as a "currency" though, it's more like a vehicle.

my understanding is the market isnt very liquid tho which makes its value for that sort of thing limited

i mean maybe itll all sort itself out if enough criminals start using it but idk

like all these stories about people who have millions of dollars in bitcoins leave out the fact that its basically impossible to cash in that much

i will cash your bitcoins

also if it became a big enough deal in the black market the authorities would find a way to hobble it

buzza

right well I guess bitcoiners are hoping to draw more people into the market so that it becomes more liquid. At 11B I'm sure it's liquid enough for buying weed, but probably not liquid enough for members of the kleptocracy to move significant cash

and yeah what you said is what I think too -- there's a paradox that if it becomes successful enough to work it becomes much more likely to get shut down

11B cap is sort of pitifully low for what its proponents are trying to make it out to be

another article pointed out that if regulators really want to go after bitcoin transactions, the "anonymity" doesn't matter because it's not anonymous to cash in your bitcoins. Like if bitcoins are overwhelmingly being used for illegal purposes, then authorities will just target people who are exchanging/cashing bitcoin.

yeah the thing abt a virtual currency is no matter how super good its coded it had to interact with the real world at some point and its always gonna be vulnerable there

like w silk road they seemed to roll the whole thing up pretty comically easily

it'd be sweet if you could buy weed with bitcoin and have it delivered by amazon drones

I'm also reminded of some file sharing services that tried to hide behind the fact that there were legitimate uses for them, but the courts were like "come on, we know what this is for."

yeah

http://i.imgur.com/LFrCz8R.png

These guys never learn

do u guys have any bitcoins

i have all the bitcoins i am satocher

bit_coiner

http://www.reddit.com/r/SheepMarketplace/comments/1rvlft/i_just_chased_him_through_a_bitcoin_tumbler_and/

I find this guy's post to be oddly (and sadly) poetic

Its like running a marathon through fog, listening for the footsteps of other runners.

This is the biggest heist of all time. Is it in the newspapers? No TheNodManOut made the hardest spot - the escape route wallet from sheep. I assume he normally drives round in a van solving mysteries.

I was still sending fractions of bitcoin into sheep, looking for the puncture, and saw that TheNodman had already sussed it. I clicked the link to the wallet and stood open-mouthed to see a planet-sized spaceship hovering above europe. We were both pretty knackered I think, but every door led to another door, rooms full of bitcoins stacked from floor to ceiling. I was ready to call it a day, but the spaceship started to dissappear into a fog before my eyes!

I just sent 0.00666 btc to the first person to attach a threat to 0.000666 of a bitcoin, for good luck. I'm sure the NodManOut is pleased we're not alone now, because its hard to follow the blockchain and try to shout "OVER HERE! $100m is being towed away! Hello? I'm one confirmation behind him, and he's boarding a crowded tube train"

I don't use the word "hero" lightly. But TheModManOut is probably the greatest hero in world history.

Its easy to go wrong on the blockchain. There are no blockchain accountants yet. If we do, we can go back to the first escape hatch he discovered and work from there.

I feel like the only thing missing from that is Carol Channing popping out of a cake and shouting "BITCOOOOOOOIN!"

(I need to ask jjj if GZeus is into bitcoin)

i just mined mondo bitcoin for over an hour

also if it became a big enough deal in the black market the authorities would find a way to hobble it

exactly, I think all of r/bitcoin is underestimating what the feds actually know about this

This is an article my friend posted. It's about 75% breathless hyped up nonsense, but the other 25% mentions some interesting possible applications of the technology.

http://startupboy.com/2013/11/07/bitcoin-the-internet-of-money/

http://www.sheepmarketscam.com/

like all these stories about people who have millions of dollars in bitcoins leave out the fact that its basically impossible to cash in that much

― lag∞n, Monday, December 2, 2013 10:34 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

theres a ton of stories of ppl trying to cash out modest amounts and being stymied at every turn

http://buttcoin.org/easy

My friend and I went and contacted a buyer on localbitcoins, and met with him at lunch. The buyer was offering 600$/coin in cash according to the listing, and was willing to buy up to 25 coins.

My friend showed up, the buyer instead insisted on paying the entire amount in Amazon giftcards (50 bucks a card, and had a small plastic shopping bag just filled with gift cards).

I asked him how do we know the gift cards are activated? “Trust me”.