5 ms·

>Democratized access to money means that I can move my life savings as a refugee from a war torn country This has nothing to do with cryptocurrencies, blockcha

>Democratized access to money means that I can move my life savings as a refugee from a war torn country This has nothing to do with cryptocurrencies, blockchains, or "democratized access" at all. What you're suggesting is simply for people to use foreign banks. If your local money is being destabilized by war, I can't see why you'd want to put your money into an extremely volatile offshore casino, which is what cryptocurrency is.

randomhodler84 4y ago
Now we are getting closer to home. I don’t trust banks, they have robbed me my entire life. Have you ever interacted with foreign banks?
- hnthrow1010 4y ago
  What you're saying makes no sense, storing your money in crypto is like putting it in a even less trustworthy foreign bank.
  - randomhodler84 4y ago
    So I must really distrust banks then, eh! I know the usefulness of state-free money. I’ve lived it. You are just trying to worship at the feet of Authority.
    - hnthrow1010 4y ago
      Many things wrong with that: - Cryptocurrency is not state-free money. Among other things, it requires functioning infrastructure, stable electricity and internet available at affordable prices. These things are provided by the government everywhere on earth. - Cryptocurrency is not authority-free. Actually, you're trusting several authorities any time you interact with any blockchains. - I'm not denying you got use out of cryptocurrency. I'm sure you did. At first glance it does appear to be some kind of functioning financial system, but it is not. A lot of other people have also lost significant amounts of money with it.
      - randomhodler84 4y ago
        Electricity and internet access are typically private sector commodities and services. There is often still internet without Government. Which authorities? I signed a tx, sent it to the swarm using free and open source software, and it was included in a block. Trustless. No authority. I’m sure lots of people gained and lost fortunes. It’s fine. The trade off is worth it.
        hnthrow1010 4y ago
        No, laying out a power grid is very much not a private sector thing. In most stable countries, the grid is either operated outright by the government or the government leases the grid out to the private sector. The same thing is true with the internet cabling. >Trustless. No authority. This is very, very wrong. It's another one of those marketing lines repeated by blockchain companies that is blatantly wrong if you look into it even just a little. At minimum, you need to trust the "swarm" that you just mentioned. It's effectively acting as the authority and you're trusting it to make the right decisions. And if the swarm goes away, you can't make your transactions anymore; the value of your tokens will drop to zero. >The trade off is worth it. To this date, no one has been able to explain to me clearly what this trade off is. "It's trustless" is not a trade off, that's not communicating what the actual benefit is. And it's also just wrong.
        randomhodler84 4y ago
        No, you don’t have to “trust the swarm”. You broadcast it at the swarm that can present the highest valid block that satisfies the difficulty equation. This is an expensive proof to fake. The trust we have is the trust in math and physics; eg: not trust. The swarm isn’t going away. It’s grown a lot in the last 14y. You don’t get it because you DONT WANT to understand this. You keep talking about censoring and governments and trust. You can’t accept it because it is.
        hnthrow1010 4y ago
        >You broadcast it at the swarm that can present the highest valid block that satisfies the difficulty equation. And you have to trust that the swarm will not drop your transaction or devalue your tokens through various means that they have available to them. >The trust we have is the trust in math and physics That makes no sense. The "math and physics" you describe are specific equations that were chosen by the swarm operators to ensure their own profits via block rewards. The swarm can change that math at any time by changing the protocol, and they have already done so several times. You don't get to decide what the math is or whether it's favorable to you, the swarm does, and you're trusting them to keep doing it that way. They are quite literally acting as the sole authority to the system; most bitcoin users are not ever going to run a full node. >The swarm isn’t going away. It’s grown a lot in the last 14y. I should remind you, past performance is not an indicator of future results. >You don’t get it because you DONT WANT to understand this. I understand it very well. What you have been told are marketing lies. If you actually inspect the system you'll see that they're not true.
- elil17 4y ago
  Hmm, you’ve been robbed by banks? That sounds like a big deal, you should file a report with the inspector general of the FDIC if you’re US based: https://www.fdicoig.gov/ https://www.fdicoig.gov/
  - randomhodler84 4y ago
    Not US banks. Several countries have confiscated bank funds in the last 10y, in fact my place of birth changed the law that untouched bank accounts within 3y get confiscated by the State. This is a major western nation btw. But since then, I don’t leave enough fiat with banks (including US) banks that they are in a place to rob me. I trust in ECDSA and Schnorr signatures about 100x as much as I trust FDIC.
    - hnthrow1010 4y ago
      And several crypto exchanges/lenders have totally collapsed or rug pulled in the last 10 years. Trusting crypto is not "trusting ECDSA and Schnorr" any more than you would be trusting the bank to use those same algorithms, you still are trusting an entire ecosystem of known bad actors. Do you really think those banks that confiscated funds don't encrypt their traffic?
      - randomhodler84 4y ago
        Yes, and I tell people not to store on exchanges, take custody of their coin. There is no bank in Bitcoin! Agree, there is risk for the 5 minutes it takes to transfer the coins out. If you are on boarding from fiat, there is a degree of trust to extend to the exchange. But this is not Bitcoin, it is a centralized exchange. There are other ways to buy and trade coin too. Earning is best. I knew not to leave coins with MtGox. I knew not to leave them with Cryptsy. This is a lesson I learned from banks. Can you elaborate how a bad actor, any bad actor, can confiscate, steal, reorder or devalue a UTXO recorded on an immutable blockchain for all eternity?
        hnthrow1010 4y ago
j0hnyl 4y ago
Ok, but how?
angio 4y ago
It's incredibly difficult to open a bank account in a "stable" country from a developing country, but anyone can open an account on Binance and then transfer the crypto to their own wallet.
- hnthrow1010 4y ago
  That's only because Binance is just operating as an unregulated bank there. It is also extremely easy to lose all your money that way because the coin you chose to transact in plummeted, or the exchange decided to freeze your account, or the exchange becomes insolvent and decided to halt withdrawals, or your country decided to start blocking that exchange due to massive fraud, or you simply lose your private keys...

randomhodler84 4y ago

Now we are getting closer to home. I don’t trust banks, they have robbed me my entire life. Have you ever interacted with foreign banks?

hnthrow1010 4y ago
What you're saying makes no sense, storing your money in crypto is like putting it in a even less trustworthy foreign bank.
- randomhodler84 4y ago
  So I must really distrust banks then, eh! I know the usefulness of state-free money. I’ve lived it. You are just trying to worship at the feet of Authority.
  - hnthrow1010 4y ago
    Many things wrong with that: - Cryptocurrency is not state-free money. Among other things, it requires functioning infrastructure, stable electricity and internet available at affordable prices. These things are provided by the government everywhere on earth. - Cryptocurrency is not authority-free. Actually, you're trusting several authorities any time you interact with any blockchains. - I'm not denying you got use out of cryptocurrency. I'm sure you did. At first glance it does appear to be some kind of functioning financial system, but it is not. A lot of other people have also lost significant amounts of money with it.
    - randomhodler84 4y ago
      Electricity and internet access are typically private sector commodities and services. There is often still internet without Government. Which authorities? I signed a tx, sent it to the swarm using free and open source software, and it was included in a block. Trustless. No authority. I’m sure lots of people gained and lost fortunes. It’s fine. The trade off is worth it.
      - hnthrow1010 4y ago
        No, laying out a power grid is very much not a private sector thing. In most stable countries, the grid is either operated outright by the government or the government leases the grid out to the private sector. The same thing is true with the internet cabling. >Trustless. No authority. This is very, very wrong. It's another one of those marketing lines repeated by blockchain companies that is blatantly wrong if you look into it even just a little. At minimum, you need to trust the "swarm" that you just mentioned. It's effectively acting as the authority and you're trusting it to make the right decisions. And if the swarm goes away, you can't make your transactions anymore; the value of your tokens will drop to zero. >The trade off is worth it. To this date, no one has been able to explain to me clearly what this trade off is. "It's trustless" is not a trade off, that's not communicating what the actual benefit is. And it's also just wrong.
        randomhodler84 4y ago
        No, you don’t have to “trust the swarm”. You broadcast it at the swarm that can present the highest valid block that satisfies the difficulty equation. This is an expensive proof to fake. The trust we have is the trust in math and physics; eg: not trust. The swarm isn’t going away. It’s grown a lot in the last 14y. You don’t get it because you DONT WANT to understand this. You keep talking about censoring and governments and trust. You can’t accept it because it is.
        hnthrow1010 4y ago
        >You broadcast it at the swarm that can present the highest valid block that satisfies the difficulty equation. And you have to trust that the swarm will not drop your transaction or devalue your tokens through various means that they have available to them. >The trust we have is the trust in math and physics That makes no sense. The "math and physics" you describe are specific equations that were chosen by the swarm operators to ensure their own profits via block rewards. The swarm can change that math at any time by changing the protocol, and they have already done so several times. You don't get to decide what the math is or whether it's favorable to you, the swarm does, and you're trusting them to keep doing it that way. They are quite literally acting as the sole authority to the system; most bitcoin users are not ever going to run a full node. >The swarm isn’t going away. It’s grown a lot in the last 14y. I should remind you, past performance is not an indicator of future results. >You don’t get it because you DONT WANT to understand this. I understand it very well. What you have been told are marketing lies. If you actually inspect the system you'll see that they're not true.
elil17 4y ago
Hmm, you’ve been robbed by banks? That sounds like a big deal, you should file a report with the inspector general of the FDIC if you’re US based: https://www.fdicoig.gov/ https://www.fdicoig.gov/
- randomhodler84 4y ago
  Not US banks. Several countries have confiscated bank funds in the last 10y, in fact my place of birth changed the law that untouched bank accounts within 3y get confiscated by the State. This is a major western nation btw. But since then, I don’t leave enough fiat with banks (including US) banks that they are in a place to rob me. I trust in ECDSA and Schnorr signatures about 100x as much as I trust FDIC.
  - hnthrow1010 4y ago
    And several crypto exchanges/lenders have totally collapsed or rug pulled in the last 10 years. Trusting crypto is not "trusting ECDSA and Schnorr" any more than you would be trusting the bank to use those same algorithms, you still are trusting an entire ecosystem of known bad actors. Do you really think those banks that confiscated funds don't encrypt their traffic?
    - randomhodler84 4y ago
      Yes, and I tell people not to store on exchanges, take custody of their coin. There is no bank in Bitcoin! Agree, there is risk for the 5 minutes it takes to transfer the coins out. If you are on boarding from fiat, there is a degree of trust to extend to the exchange. But this is not Bitcoin, it is a centralized exchange. There are other ways to buy and trade coin too. Earning is best. I knew not to leave coins with MtGox. I knew not to leave them with Cryptsy. This is a lesson I learned from banks. Can you elaborate how a bad actor, any bad actor, can confiscate, steal, reorder or devalue a UTXO recorded on an immutable blockchain for all eternity?
      - hnthrow1010 4y ago

j0hnyl 4y ago

Ok, but how?

angio 4y ago

It's incredibly difficult to open a bank account in a "stable" country from a developing country, but anyone can open an account on Binance and then transfer the crypto to their own wallet.

hnthrow1010 4y ago
That's only because Binance is just operating as an unregulated bank there. It is also extremely easy to lose all your money that way because the coin you chose to transact in plummeted, or the exchange decided to freeze your account, or the exchange becomes insolvent and decided to halt withdrawals, or your country decided to start blocking that exchange due to massive fraud, or you simply lose your private keys...