[ANN] Bitcoin Foundation - page 12. | Bitcointalksearch.org

The_Duke

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Quote from: jgarzik on October 01, 2012, 12:33:20 PM

Bogus criticism: the foundation will disappear if its members dislike its actions. Thus there is a free-market economic feedback mechanism and members are the customers.

Oh really? Who guarantees us that? How many people have to dislike its actions before it will go away? 50%? 51? 80? 99%? And then what? It will just *poof!* magically go away? And what about all the stuff it then apparently has already done that made people dislike it? Will that also magically be reversed?
You really think you and your fellow board members will just stop the foundation if people don't like it? Even when a lot of companies have bought the big corporate memberships? And what does that say for the "lifetime memberships"? They are actually "lifetime until enough people dislike us memberships"?

Quote

All this is necessary to deal with USD and other fiat exchange.

No it's not, and other exchanges prove it. It ís necessary if you want to get very rich though....

Quote

Every single large fiat exchange will behave in exactly the same manner.

But bitcoin is not supposed to bé like fiat systems, right? So how can this ever be an argument?

hazek

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Quote from: jgarzik on October 01, 2012, 12:21:55 PM

Quote from: hazek on October 01, 2012, 10:10:10 AM

Quote from: boonies4u on October 01, 2012, 10:02:43 AM

It's quite difficult to wage a war against good intentions. Best of luck to you if you think you're fighting the good fight.

Al it takes is to use reason and look at the facts. So far there's been little of that and a lot of trickery, falacies and ad hominems.

Yes, on the troll side.

If you are looking for simple facts, there are these:

There is not a single technical change to the protocol or reference client that may be highlighted as disliked/evil
There are plenty of technically component people here who may fork the reference client, should any such change appears
There are alternate client implementations, in various stages of completion

There is zero hard, technical evidence of anything supporting the trolls positions.

There is zero evidence of anything beyond the dev team wanting to complete Satoshi's decentralized vision.

Actually a member on the board of directors of Bitcoin Foundation has identified the same dangers that a self admitted self imposed spokesperson, policy setting, business vetting, intertwined with corporate interest body poses as I have. Are you saying he doesn't have his facts straight either?

The_Duke

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Lead Core BitKitty Developer

Quote from: jgarzik on October 01, 2012, 12:21:55 PM

There is zero hard, technical evidence of anything supporting the ~~trolls~~critics positions.

Just the fact that you try to set critics aside by calling them trolls creates some truth in what they say.

Aside from that, you are saying that there is no evidence of X before X has taken place. Which is of course true. However the likelihood that X *might* happen might have been increased. Critics don't need to wait before something bad happens, they can also warn for things that might happen.

jgarzik

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Quote from: ShadowOfHarbringer on October 01, 2012, 12:07:00 PM

1. The name "The Bitcoin Foundation" wrongly suggest that it is the central authority that controls Bitcoin.

[as mentioned before] this is a fair point, but really bike shedding at this juncture.

Quote from: ShadowOfHarbringer on October 01, 2012, 06:31:02 AM

3. There is no safe way for people to have a vote in the Foundation without giving up their identities (which could prove fatal in case of Bitcoin users are declared terrorists, or government tries to confiscate Bitcoins from them).

An understandable criticism, but I think this is within the realm of member policy.

Quote from: ShadowOfHarbringer on October 01, 2012, 06:07:36 AM

(optional) - The CEO of MtGox (with all the problems with anonymity, taint listing, AML shit, KYC shit and arbitrary account freezing in this exchanger) is a founder.

All this is necessary to deal with USD and other fiat exchange.

Don't hate the playa, hate the game ;p

Every single large fiat exchange will behave in exactly the same manner.

jgarzik

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Quote from: hazek on October 01, 2012, 10:10:10 AM

Quote from: boonies4u on October 01, 2012, 10:02:43 AM

It's quite difficult to wage a war against good intentions. Best of luck to you if you think you're fighting the good fight.

Al it takes is to use reason and look at the facts. So far there's been little of that and a lot of trickery, falacies and ad hominems.

Yes, on the troll side.

If you are looking for simple facts, there are these:

There is not a single technical change to the protocol or reference client that may be highlighted as disliked/evil
There are plenty of technically component people here who may fork the reference client, should any such change appears
There are alternate client implementations, in various stages of completion

There is zero hard, technical evidence of anything supporting the trolls positions.

There is zero evidence of anything beyond the dev team wanting to complete Satoshi's decentralized vision.

Portnoy

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My money; Our Bitcoin.

Quote from: EhVedadoOAnonimato on October 01, 2012, 11:46:18 AM

Quote from: Portnoy on October 01, 2012, 11:38:22 AM

And these opinions seem to be based on the fact that you don't seem to understand all definitions of the word
"foundation".
....

Do you want to be that people will be misled?

No one is being misled, but some may not have a full understanding of certain English words. They can be educated, if they are not willfully ignorant.

ShadowOfHarbringer

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Quote from: jgarzik on October 01, 2012, 12:14:00 PM

Quote from: hazek on October 01, 2012, 08:00:56 AM

And a lead dev who owns the git access

Fact check: that is incorrect on multiple levels. No one person "owns" git access... if that is even a concept.

Multiple developers share git write access -- but that is completely irrelevant, because anyone can fork the git repo the moment a disliked commit appears.

Valid argument noted... Will change to (optional)

jgarzik

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Quote from: hazek on October 01, 2012, 08:00:56 AM

And a lead dev who owns the git access

Fact check: that is incorrect on multiple levels. No one person "owns" git access... if that is even a concept.

Multiple developers share git write access -- but that is completely irrelevant, because anyone can fork the git repo the moment a disliked commit appears.

ShadowOfHarbringer

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Updated list of the foundation's bugs:

1. The name "The Bitcoin Foundation" wrongly suggest that it is the central authority that controls Bitcoin.
2. The hosting company of the BitcoinFoundation.org is (with high probability) a Government-run honeypot.
3. There is no safe way for people to have a vote in the Foundation without giving up their identities (which could prove fatal in case of Bitcoin users are declared terrorists, or government tries to confiscate Bitcoins from them).
4. Lack of clear privacy policy. No mention about security of member's personal data (are the servers encrypted or whatever).
6. The organization is not for profit which means it can't go bankrupt should it provide a crappy service as long as big businesses are prepared to open their purse they can operate indefinitely. (a scary thought)
7. The foundation servers are in US, making it trivial for FED & law enforcement to raid them & gather all TBF member data.

(optional) - The CEO of MtGox (with all the problems with anonymity, taint listing, AML shit, KYC shit and arbitrary account freezing in this exchanger) is a founder.
(optional) - The lead dev who owns the git access and is a founding member and a member of the board of directors for the next two years is a conflict of interest.

ShadowOfHarbringer

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Quote from: EhVedadoOAnonimato on October 01, 2012, 11:49:17 AM

I'm not concerned by items 5, 6 and "optional". I also don't know enough to agree or disagree about 2.

For point #2, check out my previous post & response:

Quote

Also, all the servers are in US, so it would be TRIVIAL for any law enforcement to get to the foolish ones who willingly offered their IPs & home addresses.

Quote from: #whois 50.97.137.52 (bitcointalk.org)

OrgName: SoftLayer Technologies Inc.
OrgId: SOFTL
Address: 4849 Alpha Rd.
City: Dallas
StateProv: TX
PostalCode: 75244
Country: US
RegDate: 2005-10-26
Updated: 2012-01-27
Ref: http://whois.arin.net/rest/org/SOFTL

Quote from: #whois 108.162.203.74 (bitcoinfoundation.org)

OrgName: CloudFlare, Inc.
OrgId: CLOUD14
Address: 665 Third Street #207
City: San Francisco
StateProv: CA
PostalCode: 94107
Country: US
RegDate: 2010-07-09
Updated: 2011-11-03
Comment: http://www.cloudflare.com/
Ref: http://whois.arin.net/rest/org/CLOUD14

Oh, MEGA LOL. Cloudflare is an honeypot on it's own.
http://exiledonline.com/isucker-big-brother-internet-culture/
http://techcrunch.com/2011/06/27/cloudflare-ceo-our-marketing-strategy-is-sign-up-all-of-the-worlds-international-criminals-tctv/

I will update the list... completely forgot that the servers are in US.

ArticMine

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Monero Core Team

Quote from: Steve on October 01, 2012, 09:49:27 AM

Quote from: hazek on October 01, 2012, 09:17:08 AM

We know there is no danger right know. But you don't seem be able to comprehend the future danger. Please, open your eyes, learn from history and comprehend the very serious future danger.

People should not dismiss this point of view out of hand, especially those involved in TBF. How is it that you defeat or neutralize a decentralized organization? You centralize it. This is exactly how the Sioux Indians in North America were ultimately defeated. They formed an "entirely voluntary" centralized organization. Their people began to defer more and more of the decision making to this central organization. This organization naively tried to work with the government on the belief that they could reach tolerable agreements. Later in life, Chief Red Cloud said: "They made us many promises, more than I can remember. But they kept but one--They promised to take our land...and they took it."

I don't doubt the good intentions of the people involved in TBF, but as they say, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

This is a valid point; however if I was looking for a centralized point of attack to take down Bitcoin, I would not use the Bitcoin Foundation at all, I would use Microsoft. The latter by virtue of its control over Windows effectively controls a vast proportion of the Bitcoin nodes and a significant proportion of the mining hashpower. Microsoft also has very close relationships with the state; having provided access to the source code for Windows to many state security agencies. In short let us focus on the real threats here.

So:

1) I fully support the Bitcoin Foundation. The benefits this will bring to Bitcoin far outweigh any negatives of the small centralization it also brings.
2) I use GNU/Linux as my primary OS and for my Bitcoin wallets and mining exclusively. The reasons for my choice of GNU/Linux over Microsoft Windows for Bitcoin use have been very eloquently expressed by the many posters in this thread expressing concerns regarding centralization and state control.

To many who have expressed concerns regarding the Bitcoin Foundation, yes you have made many valid points, but please take a good hard look at the operating systems you use on your computers and other devices, because there is where the real threat lies.

The_Duke

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Lead Core BitKitty Developer

Quote from: EhVedadoOAnonimato on October 01, 2012, 11:44:28 AM

Quote from: hazek on October 01, 2012, 08:00:56 AM

And a lead dev who owns the git access and is a founding member and a member of the board of directors for the next two years is a conflict of interest.

If one of the goals - a good goal, IMHO - is to finance the development of Bitcoin software,

I would agree with that if it was not limited to ONE developer, or a small group of developers working on ONE client or project.

EhVedadoOAnonimato

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Quote from: ShadowOfHarbringer on October 01, 2012, 11:36:58 AM

Updated list of the foundation's bugs:

1. The name "The Bitcoin Foundation" wrongly suggest that it is the central authority that controls Bitcoin.
2. The hosting company of the BitcoinFoundation.org is (with high probability) a Government-run honeypot.
3. There is no safe way for people to have a vote in the Foundation without giving up their identities (which could prove fatal in case of Bitcoin users are declared terrorists, or government tries to confiscate Bitcoins from them).
4. Lack of clear privacy policy. No mention about security of member's personal data (are the servers encrypted or whatever).
5. The lead dev who owns the git access and is a founding member and a member of the board of directors for the next two years is a conflict of interest.
6. The organization is not for profit which means it can't go bankrupt should it provide a crappy service as long as big businesses are prepared to open their purse they can operate indefinitely. (a scary thought)

(optional) - The CEO of MtGox (with all the problems with anonymity, taint listing, AML shit, KYC shit and arbitrary account freezing in this exchanger) is a founder.

I'm not concerned by items 5, 6 and "optional". I also don't know enough to agree or disagree about 2. Items 1 and 3 are the ones which actually bother me.

EhVedadoOAnonimato

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Quote from: Portnoy on October 01, 2012, 11:38:22 AM

And these opinions seem to be based on the fact that you don't seem to understand all definitions of the word
"foundation".
....

Do you want to bet that people will be misled?

EhVedadoOAnonimato

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Activity: 630

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Quote from: hazek on October 01, 2012, 08:00:56 AM

And a lead dev who owns the git access and is a founding member and a member of the board of directors for the next two years is a conflict of interest.

If one of the goals - a good goal, IMHO - is to finance the development of Bitcoin software, it looks natural to me that developers have an influence over the organization. If developers have no influence at all, I'd say it's worse. I find it good that developers have a say in where the money goes, which are the priorities etc.

Quote from: hazek on October 01, 2012, 08:00:56 AM

And the organization is not for profit which means it can't go bankrupt should it provide a crappy service as long as big businesses are prepared to open their purse they can operate indefinitely. (a scary thought)

That's not accurate. First of all, do not confuse "profit" in its generic economical sense with "profit" in its financial sense, of "monetary profit" or "dividends". Every organization "seeks profit", in the sense that every organization aims to create something of value for its participants. Profit, in that sense, means to add value, to improve one's level of satisfaction.
And every organization that doesn't use force to keep itself may go "bankrupt". If its donors judge they are not adding value to them, they'll stop donating. That will force the organization to shrink, as happens with a company that doesn't manage to sell its products. If it doesn't shrink accordingly, or if the donation goes down all the way to zero, the organization will break.

Portnoy

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My money; Our Bitcoin.

Quote from: EhVedadoOAnonimato on October 01, 2012, 11:18:19 AM

Quote from: Portnoy on October 01, 2012, 10:11:06 AM

I can't think of a name more innocuous, clear and to the point, more professional, and politically neutral than "The Bitcoin Foundation".
I have not seen a better choice proposed here... except maybe one that would drop "the".

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.1232039
Somebody also suggested "Andresen Foundation for Bitcoin Development".

Quote from: Portnoy on October 01, 2012, 10:11:06 AM

Most people are familiar with foundations of this sort and even if a small minority may take it the wrong way it is easily corrected

It won't be that small minority. Many people will be misled into believing they have some sort of authority over Bitcoin.
Plus, the name is a lie in itself. It's not nice to lie, you know.

And these opinions seem to be based on the fact that you don't seem to understand all definitions of the word
"foundation". Once again... In addition to what you think it means it also means these things below ( and given
the context in which the bitcoin foundation uses its name it should be clear to most people which definition is
being used ):

- an endowment or legacy for the perpetual support of an institution such as a school or hospital
- an institution supported by an endowment, often one that provides funds for charities, research, etc
- the charter incorporating or establishing a society or institution and the statutes or rules governing its affairs

Quote from: Portnoy on October 01, 2012, 10:11:06 AM

Most people are familiar with foundations of this sort and even if a small minority may take it the wrong way it is easily corrected...

ShadowOfHarbringer

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@hazek

Fixed.

Updated list of the foundation's bugs:

1. The name "The Bitcoin Foundation" wrongly suggest that it is the central authority that controls Bitcoin.
2. The hosting company of the BitcoinFoundation.org is (with high probability) a Government-run honeypot.
3. There is no safe way for people to have a vote in the Foundation without giving up their identities (which could prove fatal in case of Bitcoin users are declared terrorists, or government tries to confiscate Bitcoins from them).
4. Lack of clear privacy policy. No mention about security of member's personal data (are the servers encrypted or whatever).
5. The lead dev who owns the git access and is a founding member and a member of the board of directors for the next two years is a conflict of interest.
6. The organization is not for profit which means it can't go bankrupt should it provide a crappy service as long as big businesses are prepared to open their purse they can operate indefinitely. (a scary thought)

(optional) - The CEO of MtGox (with all the problems with anonymity, taint listing, AML shit, KYC shit and arbitrary account freezing in this exchanger) is a founder.

----
Perhaps somebody should start a bugzilla or something...

hazek

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Quote from: ShadowOfHarbringer on October 01, 2012, 10:59:54 AM

Anything else ?

Yeah you missed my post here: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.1235956

EhVedadoOAnonimato

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Quote from: Portnoy on October 01, 2012, 10:11:06 AM

I can't think of a name more innocuous, clear and to the point, more professional, and politically neutral than "The Bitcoin Foundation".
I have not seen a better choice proposed here... except maybe one that would drop "the".

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.1232039
Somebody also suggested "Andresen Foundation for Bitcoin Development".

Quote from: Portnoy on October 01, 2012, 10:11:06 AM

Most people are familiar with foundations of this sort and even if a small minority may take it the wrong way it is easily corrected

It won't be that small minority. Many people will be misled into believing they have some sort of authority over Bitcoin.
Plus, the name is a lie in itself. It's not nice to lie, you know.

Quote from: Portnoy on October 01, 2012, 10:11:06 AM

They have stated they recognize your concerns and will move forward with that in mind.

Recognizing my concerns would imply, at least, changing the name and accepting anonymous members. I don't see that happening.

Quote from: Portnoy on October 01, 2012, 10:11:06 AM

In the same way the foundation shouldn't try to impose its will on Bitcoin, and it is unlikely to ever have that power, neither should
this foundation have to bend to the will of a few overly vocal zealots.

I know they don't have, and will not bend to the criticism here. But what's the problem in trying to show everybody else that, besides being a lie in its own name, this organization lacks basic principles that should be dear to bitcoiners?

ShadowOfHarbringer

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Quote from: boonies4u on October 01, 2012, 11:05:32 AM

Quote from: ShadowOfHarbringer on October 01, 2012, 10:59:54 AM

5. The CEO of MtGox (with all the problems with anonymity, taint listing, AML shit, KYC shit and arbitrary account freezing in this exchanger) is a founder.

MtGox has to have AML and KYC policies if they are to continue to operate, and by that same token, cannot be anonymous for all users of the site.

Changed to optional.

Topic: [ANN] Bitcoin Foundation - page 12. (Read 127621 times)