magicjosh

Agreed, a simple disclosure "I own Monero" is needed. The lack of this* hurt the credibility. On the about page the author says they run two Monero nodes.

That said, the article is pretty much a list of links so not as much credibility is needed.

*this: edit - this being a disclosure that they do or don't own Monero

Disclosure: I own crypto but not Monero

My understanding is a lot of interesting stuff gets blocked at the payment processor level. So far-right dildos, drug parphanelia etc may have issues that cryptocurrencies solve. If you've never tried to break the rules it's easy for this stuff to be invisible.

Here's a post from Stripe on this issue:

"Behind the scenes, we work closely with payment networks (such as Visa and Mastercard) and banking partners across more than two dozen countries. Each institution has strict legal regulations that govern them and specific rules about the types of businesses they do and do not work with."

https://stripe.com/blog/why-some-businesses-arent-allowed

Got an article on how Lightning fixes this?

This article is alarming to me as a normie user. I'm curious about going off the big exchanges and using my coins. What if I receive crypto through OpenSea that Coinbase deems soiled?

Although I don't like it, I could see private verification service popping up for P2P. "We make sure the coins are good before the transaction goes through".

Makes me wonder how much of a "walled garden" Bitcoin is. Sure, hold it on exchanges all you want, but don't try to use it or we lock your account.

Anyone have commentary on how cryptocurrencies will step in to this space? Platforms like GoFundMe provide such a thin veneer of value. It's easy for them to overstep their bounds to the point where it's not worth it. If I were a journalist raising funds for a documentary I would be wary of such platforms.

(Didn't see this mentioned elsewhere in the thread)

How about startup advisors? Or others who have received slivers of equity?

The article mentions an account frozen after a deposit from a "far-right donor". I wonder how cryptocurrencies will fill the void left by platforms like GoFundMe. GoFundMe apparently just locked a $10M campaign as it violated their terms and conditions: https://www.opindia.com/2022/02/gofundme-removes-campaign-tr...

It really does seem like the main purpose Bitcoin is succeeding at is sort of a digital gold. It's not good as cash, privacy, or anything else. Lightning seems like a joke compared to the types of efforts happening on Ethereum.

Appreciate this thorough analysis of problems with cryptocurrency.

Disclosure: crypto owner

Similarly, "Be your own bank" gets construed with "run your own checking account". Banking is much more than a checking account. Banking is interest, loans, credit, investments, and other systems that are far more complex.

Nice! Sounds like the course and book aren't delivering what you want. Agree with your points about the summaries and mining doge. Bizarre. I found your reflections in these posts much more engaging than the main post for this thread.

Highly recommend the MIT video course on blockchains: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUl4u3cNGP63UUkfL0onkxF6M...

And for a deep dive into any specific project, it there's an episode of the Zero Knowledge podcast about a project it's worth listening to.

This article seems like it could have been written in 2009 at the launch of Bitcoin. It has no real world examples or data. There are so many disaster stories. Is there a reason you chose to write such a high level article now?

One of the things that made Moxie's piece a hit was it had real examples of his experiences trying to do things.

But this article has none of these examples or experience.

For example, your article misses people who are indeed using cryotocurrencies as banks [1]. It misses the current conversation around social management of keys. The rise of automated exchanges like Uniswap.

Lots of room for critiques on these items. That the only examples of people using crypto for real banking are in collapsing currencies. That if there's such a problem managing keys that social management will still fail. But you seem to have missed all of them which really undercuts your article to me. Again, this seems like it could have been written in 2010 based on the concept of crypto rather than real world experience. Just curious about your motivations for such a piece. It certainly has attracted commenting here.

Disclosure: I own crypto

[1] Reporting of LocalBitcoin use in Venezuela. Certainly room to use these examples of why cryptocurrencies will never scale, but not mentioned in the article: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/s5i64l/24_btc_were...

What do you think about Uniswap and other automated decentralized exchanges?

These automated exchanges seem to be growing rapidly. At one point last year Uniswap had 77% of Coinbase's trading volume: https://tokenist.com/with-33x-fewer-employees-uniswap-has-77...

Is anyone working on a VR-based library simulator?

Sounds so cool to browse the Project Gutenberg library in VR. You could slip in fun additions like this as easter eggs.

[2019]

And could have been written anytime since Bitcoin was invented in 2009. I want to see an article with more depth. Get specific on the fees. Get specific with examples of people and their experiences. For use within countries with inflation, How much volume on localbitcoins is through those countries? For crossing borders - Memorize a recovery phrase? Ouch.

Otherwise this is just fanfic. 2022 demands better.

For those who want depth, this user on Reddit publishes weekly reports of what he says are LocalBitcoin stats for Venezuela: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/s5i64l/24_btc_were...

Wow what are your favorite apps? And a bit more leading question, what apps have you used in the last week?

Wow what's better? As an Oculus owner I dismissed the 2 as just aesthetic. Can it run Alyx natively? On the Oculus 1 it requires a PC and cable.

Too bad Bungie and Activision are off the table!

I like these Zuck spitball ideas tho.

Is the idea really that the metaverse is their big next market? I like VR but who the heck believes FB will lead it?

To be fair to the other commenters, they're also talking about the nature of the article, but more about what these financials mean for the tracking products, Facebook, and the "tracking industry" broadly.

This is a tech community, not a "making bank" community. You may be looking for a subreddit on investing for the reactions you're expecting.

Ah ok! So then the other replies are valid then. Agree with others, to me this is useless. Browser handles it already if I wanted it, and I never use that anyway.

Just to clarify this comment is sarcastic right? It gets confusing in text. (genuinely asking)

tldr; Automatically switching user privacy settings from "off" back to "on" is unacceptable. Tracking company Google does it anyway, says you're misunderstanding.

Search for Drive is mind bogglingly bad. How...I can't understand it. Is it really because Google can't track me from it so they just don't care?

Rando: "So what's your company do?"

Google employee: "I work at a tracking business"

> Also terrible for the environment

Solana published a report on the energy usage of their blockchain:

https://solana.com/news/solana-energy-usage-report-november-...

"By the end of 2021, the Foundation plans to introduce a program to help make Solana’s validator network carbon neutral and offset the footprint of the ecosystem."

Does anyone know if they've accomplished this yet since the report states by the end of 2021?

Appreciate the insightful comment. I also wonder why this is a Solana-developed product. Imagine if Ethereum launched EtherPay, or Bitcoin launched Bitcoin Pay. Seems strange to compete with your own developers like that. I'm not familiar with the details of Solana. Anyone more familiar with the project who can explain?

Check out all the witnesses they brought in. What a waste of life force.

"the only good Brit soldier is a deed one, burn auld fella buuuuurn"

Oooh good one. Yes you need to spell out just how devious you are getting with these exploits. Love it. Skip all the broad sweeping stuff and get specific.

Re: grappling with how to update registration prices after an ENS domain expires --

Different stakeholders want the expiration auctions to work differently. For starters, there are the Devs, ENS owners, ENS users, domain speculators, token speculators, ENS newbies, and more.

Normally this would just be "devs and community", i.e. "we listened to the community and took suggestions". But with ENS anyone can own tokens and vote on what actually happens to the protocol.

There's discussions happening on Discord, in the forum, and twitter to figure out what to do. Then there's another layer where token owners choose delegates and those delegates vote.

It's exciting to see this kind of structure come together, where the friction is, and what ultimately gets built. It's unlikely this specific DAO will succeed, but part of it will work and the model will improve. Imagine a world where this works and all stakeholders play a role in how Twitter, Spotify, or even HackerNews change. Super interesting to me. Understand that the docs and UI for all of this needs a lot of work so that others can join in.

Star Citizen certainly does seem like that! The question is, is this fundamentally because of the liquidity of these mechanisms? Or is there an opportunity to build working funding systems that work better than the VC process? Is VC simply the ultimate evolution of funding impactful businesses?