amarkov

17 ms·

121.
by amarkov 9y ago
The risk vector isn't that the dev team will push "PR 666: add master key to all wallets". It's that someone will introduce a subtle bug (such as a side channel leaking your private key), which goes undetected for months
122.
by amarkov 9y ago
That's a great option for a founder to consider, but it means you won't have the resources to give compensation that's even competitive on paper.
123.
by amarkov 9y ago
Approximately every cryptocurrency buyer hopes for massive gains in the short to medium term. I don't think I've seen a single article saying "This ICO is going to generate consistent 9% returns, that's better than an in
124.
by amarkov 9y ago
"Cap" doesn't mean what you're thinking in this context :)
125.
by amarkov 9y ago
Why is it worse to phone home and synchronize with a central authority than to phone home and synchronize with a blockchain?
126.
by amarkov 9y ago
No, there are explicit affirmative action laws too. For example, some federal contracts are set aside for what are known as "8(a) businesses": small businesses owned by disadvantaged groups.
127.
by amarkov 9y ago
All the projects I've most enjoyed working on had clear, explicit test failures, which almost always gave me enough information to hunt down what I'd broken and where. Obviously that's not realistic for some kinds of projects
128.
by amarkov 9y ago
As you can see leaking through in a few of the examples, the scenarios where it matters are the ones where non-experts are reading to and writing from the database. If a data entry clerk is just typing values into a form thinly wrapping an
129.
by amarkov 9y ago
A $700 lock isn't meant to be even an MVP. It's public proof that you're doing something, and a test that your production pipeline can generate reasonable quality products. The strategic vision for these kinds of startups is
130.
by amarkov 9y ago
I think you're underestimating just how many people believe the opposite. I wouldn't be surprised if something along the lines of "you know, it's great we have tech for our toys and Facebooks, but what really matters is
131.
by amarkov 9y ago
Does it, though? I don't think all the sledgehammer swingers starved to death when the jackhammer was invented.
132.
by amarkov 9y ago
When two banks transfer money, there's no concrete thing being moved or transmitted. It pretty much just involves bank B telling bank A "You hereby have $100k of my cash". So A needs some kind of global ledger to keep track o
133.
by amarkov 9y ago
The relational structure maps cleanly to badly designed objects, where most classes have 5-10 fields and most fields are opaque data values with setters and getters. If you wrote classes like that in isolation, you'd have to do some se
134.
by amarkov 9y ago
But you can't just decide to avoid making assumptions, because the shape of your API strongly dictates the shape of your handler methods. I've never seen an API migration that didn't involve rewriting nearly the entire API la
135.
by amarkov 9y ago
The question is how much those architectures encode insights about how to play the game well , vs just how to play the game at all. After all, you have to teach general-purpose humans the rules of each specific game.
136.
by amarkov 9y ago
The legal system can't reliably provide for redress and restitution in the case of actual fraud, because the legal system can't pull money from thin air. In something like a classical Ponzi scheme, the fraudster simply does not ha
137.
by amarkov 9y ago
It sounds like the basis for claiming this ICO has an investment component was that Munchee made marketing promises about how much money you'd stand to gain from participating.
138.
by amarkov 9y ago
Strict rules for tagging would just run into the same problems as strict rules for demonetization. LGBT groups won't be any happier to see their content publicly branded "sexually explicit" than just demonetized.
139.
by amarkov 9y ago
Well, shouldn't I? If the cost of a consistently growing S&P 500 is consistent inflation between 2-6% rather than wild positive and negative swings, that sounds like a win-win.
140.
by amarkov 9y ago
"Look at my great new financial product!" just isn't that interesting from a theoretical perspective, even if it really is cool and innovative. Knowing how to implement an immutable distributed ledger won't help you unde
141.
by amarkov 9y ago
But most non-libertarians believe in non-aggression and voluntary exchange too. They just argue that some taxes aren't aggression and some exchanges aren't really voluntary.
142.
by amarkov 9y ago
In Bitcoin, the number of outstanding currency units can be checked very easily. What I care about as a consumer is being able to predict the value of my currency at future times. Bitcoin doesn't allow me to do this at all.
143.
by amarkov 9y ago
We can and do. The question is whether we need to go further, and tell everyone they can't let slur-users play with their stuff.
144.
by amarkov 9y ago
The standard example is Michael Clemens, who argues the total cost of closed borders to the world is in the trillions of dollars. If you want an article reviewing more views: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk&#x2
145.
by amarkov 9y ago
> How is it not assured that bitcoin will evolve? It evolves all the time. Are you even following the project? I mean, are you even following the project? Very, very basic changes like "let's change this parameter from 1 to 2
146.
by amarkov 9y ago
The argument is that Bitcoin is a decentralized, globally distributed Ponzi scheme, in the same way that it asserts itself to be a decentralized, globally distributed payment network. It seems unfair for Bitcoin proponents to go around sayi
147.
by amarkov 9y ago
Why does it matter that there's no single centralized group who does the marketing and controls scarcity? Bitcoin's entire selling point is that those kinds of things can happen without centralization!
148.
by amarkov 9y ago
> Obviously I can't verify this, but for example he had a professor who actively taught that nations are a completely artificial social construct, and as such all immigration policies of any sort are illegitimate and harmful. But th
149.
by amarkov 9y ago
But it's just as easy and just as safe to allow two schemas to co-exist within the same database. If you follow the necessary steps for a risk-free data migration, having both schemas coexist simultaneously and doing gradual switchover
150.
by amarkov 9y ago
But most of the world doesn't trade in BTC, so most of the world could easily decide Bitcoin is worthless without a hit to their own pocketbooks.

More ›