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> Hi, I'm sure that whoever runs this account has no idea who I am, but I founded @mozilla and I'm here to say fuck you and fuck this. Everyone involved in the

> Hi, I'm sure that whoever runs this account has no idea who I am, but I founded @mozilla and I'm here to say fuck you and fuck this. Everyone involved in the project should be witheringly ashamed of this decision to partner with planet-incinerating Ponzi grifters. This is an appropriate reaction to the promotion of a scam industry. The antiwork subreddit had to add a warning about crypto because a crypto shill managed to get his post on the front page. The more crypto is normalized, the more regular people will be tricked into worthless "digital property", with their money siphoned into the pockets of people like Gary Vaynerchuk.

zpeti 5y ago
There clearly are a lot of scammers and grifters in this market, as with all upcoming markets usually, but how is crypto a scam industry? In 13 years the fundamentals of Bitcoin have not been exploited. Algorithmically I mean. Human element wise perhaps.
- cookiengineer 5y ago
  > 13 years I am not sure where you've lived the last 13 years, but in this reality lots of projects that were aspiring use cases of that technology were founded, somebody got wind of it with their disciples...and the coin got dumped afterwards. So yeah, I would say crypto coins overall are a ponzi scheme. Doesn't matter how good your tech is, people will exploit it to get rich. And they successfully did, otherwise everybody (meaning the whole society) invested in BTC would be a millionaire by now and the current oligarchic structure with almost neverending wealth through manipulation of other people would not exist. Count the coins, count the IPOs that successfully were dumped. They have a different view on it. Also ask them about whether or not two years after the IPO they've build any actual code or any actual program. Most of them, even the successful ones, abandoned their ideas because they got money out of it and that was the thing they cared about the most. People in the crypto bubble always forget to ask these questions, because they themselves think that they are already invested into crypto and have no alternative way of using their resources anymore. But that's not true either. Coming back to BTC: a stable coin does not have more than 20k$ difference in worth per day. Sorry, BTC failed. And now it's the competition of high frequency traders that you as a citizen have no chance against anymore. That is why I'd say BTC also has failed.
  - randomhodler84 5y ago
    Is your thesis that BTC failed because it’s price is not stable? I don’t think that is a good metric. Most asset prices are not stable. By all the metrics I consider, it’s pretty damn successful actually. Just because you want it to fail, doesn’t really matter. It is not failing, in fact, we had a country adopt it as legal tender last year, with another few to follow in 2022. I like that kind of failure!
    - cookiengineer 5y ago
      A stable economy should be the goal of every economy. Otherwise it cannot not be defined as an economy. My thesis is that BTC failed at exactly that. It's the opposite of stable. BTC only works advantegous for the HODLers because they actually buy things in another currency, and not in BTC. If they would have to buy electricity, food and shelter and actual physical assets via BTC, they would have to pay millions for it; because BTC is in the state of maximum inflation eversince the HFTs went on it. I would recommend you read up on the financial crisises that happened all over the world after the second world war, and what the obligations of a central bank (e.g. European central bank) are and why they exist, and what they prevent. Otherwise this "but it's awesome cause I think I'm rich" discussion is gonna be pretty pointless, because we have really opposing views on what "stability" means in regards to e.g. inflation vs. amount of goods that back up the economy's currency.
      - randomhodler84 5y ago
        This was never about personal enrichment, it was about freedom and sound money. At least to me. I am a cypherpunk. I am well aware of the monetary systems post WW2. What happened was the great US did what no other nation could do in history — monetize their debt and get the world to treat it as their money. It was genius, really. The problem emerged where Governments got really slack with the backing. Now we just print it any time it is politically expedient. I want a system where that isn’t possible. Bitcoin was invented to solve this problem.
        5y ago
- lottin 5y ago
  A fiat (aka unbacked) currency that is issued privately is indistinguishable from a scam, because a fiat currency has a nominal value that is higher than what it costs to produce. This is true of bitcoins, because bitcoins are fiat money too (just not very convenient to use). The average production cost of all bitcoins in circulation is likely less than $1. These bitcoins are now being sold for tens of thousands of dollars. People profiting from this, largely early producers of bitcoins, are being rewarded with millions of dollars for basically doing nothing. They took no risk, they did absolutely nothing that would justify the profits that they have made. I call this a scam.
  - randomhodler84 5y ago
    You are just bitter. Folks that bought Amazon or Apple stock at IPO did nothing either. In fact, a great deal of wealth floating about wasn’t wasn’t earned by the holders at all. Are you angry with every house owner who’s property appreciated, every investor to took to risk with assets?
    - lottin 5y ago
      No, I don't have an issue with people making money from their entrepreneurial activities, in fact I applaud who people do that. I have an issue with people being handed millions of dollars when all they've done is downloading a computer program and running it on a god-damn laptop. I don't agree with that. I think it's a scam, and this is why I'll never buy a cryptocurrency or accept it as payment for anything, because I don't I agree to these people getting rich at my expense.
      - randomhodler84 5y ago
        Nobody is getting paid millions to run software. It doesn’t work that way. Some folks took a risk early by buying it and were very compromised for it. (All the mt gox trade and KYC data leaked, passports etc). Nobody is making millions mining without spending a compatible sum on hardware to do it. That sounds entrepreneurial to me. Solo CPU mining was such a small thing to a small niche, maybe those super super early folks deserve something for their efforts. Some folks are getting paid to stake, which may be more of a scam, and we can agree on that, they sacrifice nothing to produce more wealth. You haven’t said why it is a scam, except that people were entrepreneurs or investors in risky assets who were rewarded for their risk? Lottin you have been passionate against this for a long time, are you sure you are rationally evaluating this?
- tick_tock_tick 5y ago
  Ehh depends on what you call "exploited" the original 0.8 upgrade resulting fork effectively allowed a double spend https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=152348 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=152348
  - randomhodler84 5y ago
    Not a real double spend, just some central exchange accounting mismatch with the active chain. That’s why we wait for confirms. Still, glad you brought this up. 0.7/0.8 db issue was a scary time. Seems like a lifetime ago.
randomhodler84 5y ago
Your money is melting away. Your options are buying houses, which are fixed and hard to sell; stocks, which can be inflated and are not internationally portable (only between brokerages) or Bitcoin which is globally portable, takes no space, cannot be inflated or controlled by any State and self custodial. Where is the scam, except working for inflating fiat? Jwz already made his money, and owns a nightclub in SF. Your average worker in Turkey or Nigeria just wants the fruit of his labor not to be eroded away by politicians.
- imtringued 5y ago
  "Are the maintenance costs of money and inflation comparable? Often, to the proposal for a fundamental monetary reform of our currencies, the objection is raised that a maintenance tax or a user fee of, say, five per cent for money, is in effect nothing but inflation in small doses to the same extent; both of them would put money into motion. The latter is right, of course. But there are still essential differences in both these circulation ensuring measures, not only in their impacts but also in the following points. Maintenance costs of money are applicable only to demand money, cash. Inflation affects the many times larger monetary assets. Maintenance costs of money drive surplus money into banks and increase the credit potential. Inflation drives surplus money into consumption or false investments and heats up economic growth. Maintenance costs of money stabilize the purchasing power of money and thus price levels. Inflation causes, in contrast, constant price-alterations and irritations in the structure of all money related matters, especially of all calculations and settlements. Maintenance costs of money not only enable stability of the purchasing power, but they also push the interest rates little by little towards zero. Inflation, on the other hand, drives the interest rates upwards, with all their negative consequences. Maintenance costs of money flow from the cash boxes of the money holder into that of the state and thus to the general public. The many times higher inflation and interest charges have to be borne by the general public and benefit a minority. Maintenance costs of money can be scheduled at a fixed rate and levied. In contrast, inflation can neither be calculated nor set at a fixed rate. " https://www.themoneysyndrome.org/contents/chapter-34/ https://www.themoneysyndrome.org/contents/chapter-34/ How about we get rid of inflation in fiat currencies then?
- 5y ago
danjac 5y ago
With Matt Damon doing that cringy add, crypto is mainstream and we're getting close to the "shoeshiners giving stock tips" stage of the market.

zpeti 5y ago

There clearly are a lot of scammers and grifters in this market, as with all upcoming markets usually, but how is crypto a scam industry? In 13 years the fundamentals of Bitcoin have not been exploited. Algorithmically I mean. Human element wise perhaps.

cookiengineer 5y ago
> 13 years I am not sure where you've lived the last 13 years, but in this reality lots of projects that were aspiring use cases of that technology were founded, somebody got wind of it with their disciples...and the coin got dumped afterwards. So yeah, I would say crypto coins overall are a ponzi scheme. Doesn't matter how good your tech is, people will exploit it to get rich. And they successfully did, otherwise everybody (meaning the whole society) invested in BTC would be a millionaire by now and the current oligarchic structure with almost neverending wealth through manipulation of other people would not exist. Count the coins, count the IPOs that successfully were dumped. They have a different view on it. Also ask them about whether or not two years after the IPO they've build any actual code or any actual program. Most of them, even the successful ones, abandoned their ideas because they got money out of it and that was the thing they cared about the most. People in the crypto bubble always forget to ask these questions, because they themselves think that they are already invested into crypto and have no alternative way of using their resources anymore. But that's not true either. Coming back to BTC: a stable coin does not have more than 20k$ difference in worth per day. Sorry, BTC failed. And now it's the competition of high frequency traders that you as a citizen have no chance against anymore. That is why I'd say BTC also has failed.
- randomhodler84 5y ago
  Is your thesis that BTC failed because it’s price is not stable? I don’t think that is a good metric. Most asset prices are not stable. By all the metrics I consider, it’s pretty damn successful actually. Just because you want it to fail, doesn’t really matter. It is not failing, in fact, we had a country adopt it as legal tender last year, with another few to follow in 2022. I like that kind of failure!
  - cookiengineer 5y ago
    A stable economy should be the goal of every economy. Otherwise it cannot not be defined as an economy. My thesis is that BTC failed at exactly that. It's the opposite of stable. BTC only works advantegous for the HODLers because they actually buy things in another currency, and not in BTC. If they would have to buy electricity, food and shelter and actual physical assets via BTC, they would have to pay millions for it; because BTC is in the state of maximum inflation eversince the HFTs went on it. I would recommend you read up on the financial crisises that happened all over the world after the second world war, and what the obligations of a central bank (e.g. European central bank) are and why they exist, and what they prevent. Otherwise this "but it's awesome cause I think I'm rich" discussion is gonna be pretty pointless, because we have really opposing views on what "stability" means in regards to e.g. inflation vs. amount of goods that back up the economy's currency.
    - randomhodler84 5y ago
      This was never about personal enrichment, it was about freedom and sound money. At least to me. I am a cypherpunk. I am well aware of the monetary systems post WW2. What happened was the great US did what no other nation could do in history — monetize their debt and get the world to treat it as their money. It was genius, really. The problem emerged where Governments got really slack with the backing. Now we just print it any time it is politically expedient. I want a system where that isn’t possible. Bitcoin was invented to solve this problem.
      - 5y ago
lottin 5y ago
A fiat (aka unbacked) currency that is issued privately is indistinguishable from a scam, because a fiat currency has a nominal value that is higher than what it costs to produce. This is true of bitcoins, because bitcoins are fiat money too (just not very convenient to use). The average production cost of all bitcoins in circulation is likely less than $1. These bitcoins are now being sold for tens of thousands of dollars. People profiting from this, largely early producers of bitcoins, are being rewarded with millions of dollars for basically doing nothing. They took no risk, they did absolutely nothing that would justify the profits that they have made. I call this a scam.
- randomhodler84 5y ago
  You are just bitter. Folks that bought Amazon or Apple stock at IPO did nothing either. In fact, a great deal of wealth floating about wasn’t wasn’t earned by the holders at all. Are you angry with every house owner who’s property appreciated, every investor to took to risk with assets?
  - lottin 5y ago
    No, I don't have an issue with people making money from their entrepreneurial activities, in fact I applaud who people do that. I have an issue with people being handed millions of dollars when all they've done is downloading a computer program and running it on a god-damn laptop. I don't agree with that. I think it's a scam, and this is why I'll never buy a cryptocurrency or accept it as payment for anything, because I don't I agree to these people getting rich at my expense.
    - randomhodler84 5y ago
      Nobody is getting paid millions to run software. It doesn’t work that way. Some folks took a risk early by buying it and were very compromised for it. (All the mt gox trade and KYC data leaked, passports etc). Nobody is making millions mining without spending a compatible sum on hardware to do it. That sounds entrepreneurial to me. Solo CPU mining was such a small thing to a small niche, maybe those super super early folks deserve something for their efforts. Some folks are getting paid to stake, which may be more of a scam, and we can agree on that, they sacrifice nothing to produce more wealth. You haven’t said why it is a scam, except that people were entrepreneurs or investors in risky assets who were rewarded for their risk? Lottin you have been passionate against this for a long time, are you sure you are rationally evaluating this?
tick_tock_tick 5y ago
Ehh depends on what you call "exploited" the original 0.8 upgrade resulting fork effectively allowed a double spend https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=152348 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=152348
- randomhodler84 5y ago
  Not a real double spend, just some central exchange accounting mismatch with the active chain. That’s why we wait for confirms. Still, glad you brought this up. 0.7/0.8 db issue was a scary time. Seems like a lifetime ago.

randomhodler84 5y ago

Your money is melting away. Your options are buying houses, which are fixed and hard to sell; stocks, which can be inflated and are not internationally portable (only between brokerages) or Bitcoin which is globally portable, takes no space, cannot be inflated or controlled by any State and self custodial. Where is the scam, except working for inflating fiat? Jwz already made his money, and owns a nightclub in SF. Your average worker in Turkey or Nigeria just wants the fruit of his labor not to be eroded away by politicians.

imtringued 5y ago
"Are the maintenance costs of money and inflation comparable? Often, to the proposal for a fundamental monetary reform of our currencies, the objection is raised that a maintenance tax or a user fee of, say, five per cent for money, is in effect nothing but inflation in small doses to the same extent; both of them would put money into motion. The latter is right, of course. But there are still essential differences in both these circulation ensuring measures, not only in their impacts but also in the following points. Maintenance costs of money are applicable only to demand money, cash. Inflation affects the many times larger monetary assets. Maintenance costs of money drive surplus money into banks and increase the credit potential. Inflation drives surplus money into consumption or false investments and heats up economic growth. Maintenance costs of money stabilize the purchasing power of money and thus price levels. Inflation causes, in contrast, constant price-alterations and irritations in the structure of all money related matters, especially of all calculations and settlements. Maintenance costs of money not only enable stability of the purchasing power, but they also push the interest rates little by little towards zero. Inflation, on the other hand, drives the interest rates upwards, with all their negative consequences. Maintenance costs of money flow from the cash boxes of the money holder into that of the state and thus to the general public. The many times higher inflation and interest charges have to be borne by the general public and benefit a minority. Maintenance costs of money can be scheduled at a fixed rate and levied. In contrast, inflation can neither be calculated nor set at a fixed rate. " https://www.themoneysyndrome.org/contents/chapter-34/ https://www.themoneysyndrome.org/contents/chapter-34/ How about we get rid of inflation in fiat currencies then?
5y ago

danjac 5y ago

With Matt Damon doing that cringy add, crypto is mainstream and we're getting close to the "shoeshiners giving stock tips" stage of the market.