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"Ethan M. Penn" deserves some e-gold for this piece. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-gold https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-gold

lsc 8y ago
Lol. I personally didn't get on the bitcoin wagon 'cause I had (well, I guess still have) frozen e-gold. Not that I speculated in it, but I accepted some as payment for services back in the day and never got around to cashing it out for money. I am really surprised that people seem to think that the less-centralized nature of bitcoin makes it that much more resistant to government interference; But what do I know? I think bitcoin has lasted a lot longer than e-gold, and has gained a lot more legitimacy. I do find it really curious that so many in the bitcoin community either haven't heard of e-gold or don't see the parallels. I mean, I am also a huge Stephenson fan, and had read "Cryptonomicon" and the idea sounded really cool, but I never really had anything I wanted to buy with e-gold, so other than allowing me to have customers who couldn't get credit, it was not particularly useful. (By the way, is there a "Cryptonomicon" of bitcoin? I mean, I guess the idea of nazi gold is way more compelling than some math? but still... "Cryptonomicon" seems to be like exactly the template) But... my loss in the e-gold shutdown (and my relating of e-gold to bitcoin) meant that I was pretty late to start accepting bitcoin, and that when I did, I used bitpay; Which has worked fine, I suppose, but I had people trying to buy with bitcoin fairly early on, and if I had accepted that and sat on it, I'd probably, well, I wouldn't be hugely rich or anything, but it would have been a nice payday. But I suppose that's the standard regret one has for not timing the market when something goes up in value sharply. I'm personally still a long-term bear on bitcoin... but I kinda have a reputation for being a bear on a lot of things that have, uh, apparently inflated values, so who knows.
- darawk 8y ago
  > I am really surprised that people seem to think that the less-centralized nature of bitcoin makes it that much more resistant to government interference Why? Decentralized systems are sort of the standard way of defeating centralized governments. See: Tor, Guerilla warfare, Lone wolf terrorism, etc..
  - Nursie 8y ago
    BTCis centralised in various ways. It's likely that one actor (Bitmain) could muster 51% hash power relatively easily. There are relatively few on-off ramps for the ecosystem. These two facts alone point to possibilities for interference at a large scale.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]

lsc 8y ago

Lol. I personally didn't get on the bitcoin wagon 'cause I had (well, I guess still have) frozen e-gold. Not that I speculated in it, but I accepted some as payment for services back in the day and never got around to cashing it out for money. I am really surprised that people seem to think that the less-centralized nature of bitcoin makes it that much more resistant to government interference; But what do I know? I think bitcoin has lasted a lot longer than e-gold, and has gained a lot more legitimacy. I do find it really curious that so many in the bitcoin community either haven't heard of e-gold or don't see the parallels. I mean, I am also a huge Stephenson fan, and had read "Cryptonomicon" and the idea sounded really cool, but I never really had anything I wanted to buy with e-gold, so other than allowing me to have customers who couldn't get credit, it was not particularly useful. (By the way, is there a "Cryptonomicon" of bitcoin? I mean, I guess the idea of nazi gold is way more compelling than some math? but still... "Cryptonomicon" seems to be like exactly the template) But... my loss in the e-gold shutdown (and my relating of e-gold to bitcoin) meant that I was pretty late to start accepting bitcoin, and that when I did, I used bitpay; Which has worked fine, I suppose, but I had people trying to buy with bitcoin fairly early on, and if I had accepted that and sat on it, I'd probably, well, I wouldn't be hugely rich or anything, but it would have been a nice payday. But I suppose that's the standard regret one has for not timing the market when something goes up in value sharply. I'm personally still a long-term bear on bitcoin... but I kinda have a reputation for being a bear on a lot of things that have, uh, apparently inflated values, so who knows.

darawk 8y ago
> I am really surprised that people seem to think that the less-centralized nature of bitcoin makes it that much more resistant to government interference Why? Decentralized systems are sort of the standard way of defeating centralized governments. See: Tor, Guerilla warfare, Lone wolf terrorism, etc..
- Nursie 8y ago
  BTCis centralised in various ways. It's likely that one actor (Bitmain) could muster 51% hash power relatively easily. There are relatively few on-off ramps for the ecosystem. These two facts alone point to possibilities for interference at a large scale.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]