Topic: El Salvador has become the first country to make #Bitcoin legal tender! 🇸🇻 - page 77. (Read 38876 times)

Currently, there are many of the "elites" in the legacy financial industry that views Chad Bukele and Chad Saylor, and disregard most of what they are preaching/teaching/saying/showing the public. BUT within 10 years, I believe that everyone will remember the two of them from the bear market of 2021 - 2023, and perceive that, as it happened, THEY might not be sufficiently bullish.

 

President Bukele's decision to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender in El Salvador, was a historical and bold decision, but it faced criticism due to the potential volatility of the cryptocurrency market, which significantly decreased value of their investment in 2022 in terms of fiat currency . However, as the market improved, the Salvadoran government's investment saw an increase. The President's tweet in Korean suggests he may be reaching out to a wider audience to promote the use of Bitcoin in El Salvador.More countries are likely to adopt Bitcoin in future.

EI Salvador, the first country in the world to recognize Bitcoin as legal tender, the President of EI Salvador faced various criticisms after announcing Bitcoin as legal tender.The Salvadoran government suffered a loss of over 60% of its investment at a time when the Bitcoin market was in dire straits. However, as the market went up, President Nayib Bukele tweeted in Korean Language which is presented to you.

Tweet screenshot:



Nayib Bukele tweet(Quote Tweet):https://twitter.com/nayibbukele/status/1619856330742984704?s=19

It is true that adoption of Bitcoin in El-Salvador as legal tender has shown positive result in reducing crime rate and debt. Government's efforts in educating the people about Bitcoin and successful launch of volcanic bond are noteworthy and worth & should be admired. These advancement reflect the bright future of Bitcoin as legal tender, not only for El-Salvador, but also in other countries that adopt it as a legal tender.

Thanks! Well, if so I guess developer's expectations of this city is in initiatives of future inhabitants. They suppose that attractive tax system and good financial system will make main part. It might work. Most confusing is that if you have no concrete plans on city economy then how do you plan it's structure? Different builfings are needed for tourism, financial organizations or industry...

Hope they will clarify their vision on how the business development in the city would be organized.

Fuck shitcoins... they do not necessarily help, even if they are something that cannot be stamped out, but to be proclaiming that they are a good thing seems to be crazy-talk.. like do you even know the difference between bitcoin and shitcoins?  What is your percentage of bitcoin compared to shitcoins?  On a personal level you better be well below 10%, otherwise you are wasting time, energy and money..  . minimize your gambling.. and just say no to it.  Have you heard of "just say no?"  Well, if not.. apply that to your thinking about shitcoins, and perhaps.. if you learn about bitcoin first, then the just saying no will become easier.. perhaps? perhaps?  not everyone can figure it out, but if you at least learn what the fuck is bitcoin, then maybe you will not be so easily lured into having to tell us about how you love shitcoins.

I have also heard that Singapore and also other countries that have made crypto legal and there are many countries that want to legalize crypto. Because they have to do to it and there just no other choice regarding this and also we should be thankful to Tesla and Elon Musk to accept dogecoin and also crypto and that's just good for crypto.

Back in the day, I tried to summarize most of what was then revealed in this post. I’m sure that whipping through the complete thread may throw in some further information, but I believe there is no in-depth source to-date that depicts the construction plan in details:

i.e. phases, total budget broken down by stages and sources of income, private/public sector, energy pulled from the volcano vs elsewhere, incentive plans to build/live/work there (other than an exemption from multiple taxes, which could be a biggy, but maybe not enough per se), and so forth.

Well, looks good, but if we talk about a future city the first thing I want to know is its economy: what are the industry plans on this city? I  tried to search but found only two main ideas: first is that financial side of a future city's economy would be based on bitcoin (good, but it is not all economy of a city, I guess), the second is volcano power generating industry (if it will be main economy base of a city... it will be a rather small town). Maybe there could be plans for tourism what could be reasonable for El Salvador, but I didn't see statements about that (maybe I was not attentive enough). If there's more info about a project it would be interesting to learn more.

Their economy seems to have improved though which they have cleared debt to IMF as said by Reuters. Such as a small amount but this is a small country too. IMF had been calling Bukele to reject Bitcoin but yes they are moving forward and what is good for El Salvador I think is good for the Bitcoin market as well.

Although it could be something to be done by Bukele because he is running for 2nd term. A good way to make it, he will get re-elected.

Bitcoin is not going to light up only El-Savador but every country that deemed feet to adopt it a a legal tender, the volcanic bond is one of the indications we can see to the possibilities on this, El-Savador has been making tremendous effort ever to bring the volcanic bond a reality and also along so many benefits the people already were enjoying through bitcoin, for the fact that it was able to clear some part of its debt and had a reduced crime rate is enough indication that El-Savador is moving forward already while the government is tirelessly providing every aids needed to get people aware of bitcoin abd be taught, two years achievements looks great just like how 14 years is with bitcoin.

Wow, that looks like an interesting city to visit! I applaud El Salvador's efforts. With the adoption of the US dollar in 2001, El Salvador lost control of monetary policy. Their move to Bitcoin, however, made them somewhat independent from dollar inflation. In 5 years we'll know if it was a smart move or not, but Bitcoin's track record has been pretty good since its invention.

reading the last few posts
in summary. dont just blind trust a forum post or tweet

research. find the source data behind the social narrative
RESEARCH

---

here are some prime examples of bad "trust" of stuff people read

a. a certain person used mining stats of a website who's "methodology explainer" uses the words guestimate, assumption, average far too much

b. those that thought el-salv citizens were getting real onchain btc in sept-dec 2021 but reality was a chivo balance using flawed LN msat redemption being phished as being bitcoin(which is where elsalv failed in its citizen utilising bitcoin adoption..) and stalled their opportunity to bring bitcoin to the masses in 2022 by being conned into using LN instead of the bitcoin network in late 2021
the president has been spending the whole year of 2022 trying to sort out some proper deals and provisions and protocols and stuff that are bitcoin related which seem to now be coming out in the open

I am not taking it personally.  Perhaps, I am largely trying to push back on the idea that you have already asserted that bitcoiners give too much benefit of the doubt to others if they perceive them to be pro-bitcoin, and then if that's the case, they (or we) no longer engage in critical thinking.


For sure, I am not taking your comments personally as if you were talking about me.. .. even if I might sometimes share beliefs with a variety of other folks on this forum, even while there might not be any particular member that I agree with about everything because I realize that every person has his/her strengths weaknesses, and sometimes I find some members who seem to be geniuses on various topics, but then I perceive that they have some flawed thinking in other areas... and surely some areas are discretionary too.. so we could disagree greatly but then just recognize that discretion may well be employed in ways that comes to different results... or sometimes come to similar (or the same results) but based on different rationale.


hahahahaha.. I hope that it would be in the hundreds, ultimately.. even though there could be some people who any of us might consider to be a bit lame on certain topics, but they seem to be genius on other topics, so we are not necessarily going to follow or agree with them in the areas that we perceive that they are lame... but we might respect their judgement and analysis in other areas.... and surely, it is also quite likely that it is really difficult to know some members in terms of looking at their posts, and there could be a decent number of members who we believe to share a lot of agreement, but if we met them in a bar, we might discover that there are areas in which we do not agree, even though through their posts, we had tentatively concluded that we had agreed on a lot more than we ultimately discovered.  .. and the opposite could be true, too.


That's true... and some members might agree with you, but they do not like to type... or they cannot type very well, or maybe their English is not as good as yours.. so yeah, I understand that sometimes there might be views out there (or in the forum) in which the members might not be expressing their beliefs but those members might be glad that there are some posters who express their views.. and that might also be demonstrated partly in the merit button.. but maybe not completely.. it might be better expressed  if we had a "like" button. .but we do not have that feature here.. the last time I checked.. hahahahaha.. actually as I think about it, some members might not even want to click on a "like" button, even if they agree with you.. and sometimes I am like that on "facebook" because I don't necessarily want to telegraph my views, even if I might agree.. so different strokes for different folks, and perhaps the forum (or the medium) might make a difference in terms of how free or true any kind of sentiment might be expressed.


Fair enough... but I doubt that I would change my response to you in spite of such clarifications that you are making.


Does it really matter?  I mean bitcoin is not like some shitcoin, even if some people might treat it that way, yet in some sense there might be some people who come into bitcoin for the "wrong" reasons, but then they learn about it along the way, and there might be other people who never learn anything.  There are some folks who are compulsive gamblers and there are degenerate people who might end up coming into bitcoin.  

Sure in the earlier days of bitcoin, such as now when we likely ONLY have about 1% of the world's population in bitcoin and even that those who are in might even be under invested (in terms of being a low coiner, rather than being a no coiner), we still might want to suggest that there is some moral responsibility in terms of how "we sell" or "promote" bitcoin, and so there could be some growing pains that last 10-20 years or longer where some folks are going to get burned or even some folks engage in really shitty risk management and no one told them to be careful, and don't put 50% into bitcoin, maybe ONLY put 5% or something that is more appropriate for you, and if you have shitty financial management and/or psychology, then maybe you should ONLY put 1% or maybe bitcoin is too volatile for you..

.....though I am not sure if I am going to suggest for anyone not to take a stake in bitcoin, but surely I do agree that people do have to make sure that they have their expenses covered and that they have enough of a budget (or timeline) before they can establish that they have enough of an extra cashflow to actually be in a position to invest in bitcoin or in anything else, but who's fault is that?  Are we going to blame Bukele for that?  Can't we leave some of this for people to figure out for themselves?  Maybe here's the advice.. get your financial and psychological "shit together" before investing anything into bitcoin.  Ok..?   After that, who's responsibility is it whether normies make sure that they don't over invest into bitcoin or any other investment?  Bukele's?  Some normies listened to Michael Saylor and misapplied his situation to theirs?  People/normies have to figure out their own finances and psychology, no?  I am not going to blame saylor or bukele or PlanB for people failing/refusing to engage in their own self-assessment and proper attempts at risk management.  Is that what we are talking about?


No kidding.. hahahahaha


Maybe that is ok.? I don't know.  It seems that it is a bit of a glass-half full to the world, and sure there are people like that and any new thing they first attack it and then they might come around to liking the thing after they attack it.. but still seems a bit stressful to have such an approach.. even if it might be something that you believe works for you, overall.


Sure, but are the responses either black or white?

I like to consider that I will respond only if I feel that I have some kind of personal perspective to add, or I want to quibble with something.. but sure, if there are several members who largely said what I was going to say, then my post would not be a contribution.. so maybe we are similar in that regard.. even though I might say, "I agree with what several members are saying here.. and my reason is this.", so in that regard, I might still be saying the same thing or something similar, but just letting anyone know (to the extent anyone gives a shit) what my thinking is on the topic, however, I must clarify that sometimes I am not posting for anyone else except for myself, and sometimes I feel that I just want to clarify my own position on a topic merely by typing it out.. so it might not even be the case that I know exactly which points I am going to emphasize until I finish drafting the response, so in that sense, I could end up saying something different than I expected or maybe I will even change my mind or my point of view as I am going through the process of typing it out and then realizing that I did not really believe what I was going to post, but instead, I realized that I believed the exact opposite of what I thought that I was going to say.  Call me a wiffle-waffler, if you must.  


Yes.. facts can make a difference, and also tone can make a difference in terms of whether people might continue to listen to what you are saying.  I used to be in a business relationship with a person who had responsibility over selling things, and I usually tried to just let that person do things the way that she was comfortable, but there were so many times that I would hear her respond, "no, but" when the potential customer asked her if she could do something, and frequently I would tell her that she was screwing up by the way she began her responses, and if she merely would say "yes, but" instead of "no, but" she would do a lot better in her way of communicating with some of those potential customers, and I was not really even suggesting that she change anything that she was saying except to just frame her answers a bit different, and she could still use a large majority of the same substance that she had been using.  Because she surely was knowledgable enough about the product, and in the end, it was most likely that the answer was really "yes, but" even though her repetitive habit was to frame her answers as "no, but."...,. and sure, maybe she would revert back to "no, but" when I was not around.. but sometimes, she would actually see that saying "yes, but" was a lot more inspiring in terms of making the sale... and it was not like anything was being forced on the customer, because they were actually engaging in the conversation because they wanted the product, but it was a matter of particulars in terms of some of the tweaks and features and maybe even sometimes about price or method of payment or installments or various kinds of things that should not have been deal breakers as long as the details of the deal were clearly communicated on both sides.


We might just disagree about how something might be said... now for example, there could be a statement that says we expect BTC prices to go up 12x, but then it might not be within the same statement in which they are selling the bonds or selling the great idea for the project or when disclosures about how much it will costs and how much it will produce in profits and whether the profits even cover the costs, and surely when there are a lot of unknowns, sometimes it might not be a great idea to disclose all of the various ways that it is considered to go forward and/or the potential back up plans in case plans A, B and C fail, we happen to have plans D, E and F.. but why the fuck talk about anything beyond Plan A?  and maybe a slight reference to plan B, those may well be discretionary disclosures that are not a good idea to make, and let's say for example, the most likely way forward is going to be going for Plan C, but all they talk about in public is plan A and plan B, and there might not even be any deceptive reason for not disclosing that the real plan is Plan C.. there could be legitimate reasons that are within the public's interest to present plans A and B without discussing the true plan, and I am not even saying that I know the answer or that I am trying to promote deception, but I am saying that there still could be legitimate and honorable reasons to have other plans that are not disclosed or even to present a scenario that is less likely to play out.. because in fact it could be that any of the 6 scenarios could play out.. but it may be foolish to wiffle-waffle with a lot of that and then get caught up in a variety of speculations about weeds... instead of staying focused on the forest, we are talking about irrelevant bullshit and weeds and not really getting anything done.. or maybe all of the plans and alternatives are presented in the writing or some non-public writing, but the ONLY ones in the public writing are the first three... not necessarily deceitful to engage in that kind of conduct.. and there maybe discretion in regards to some of those kinds of matters, and maybe the specifics are presented further down the line when it becomes more apparent that some of the possible scenarios are no longer viable..


Yes.  You can assume negative if you like, and if you have a variety of reasons to not trust the leader (such as Bukele in this case) it may well not be helpful for Bukele to try to disclose to a broader constituent like you and then it ends up causing the supporters to wane.


If the leader has support they might not want to engage.. You may well be free to criticize and to dig into whatever they have said.  Let's say for example, they outline everything that everyone seems to agree with in some kind of a plan, and they seem to be somewhat overly vague about how the numbers are reached (as you have already pointed out), but then they put in some kind of a vague footnote that says some kind of amorphous language about:

"an expectation that the BTC price could double or it could go up 100x or it could go up some variation in between 2x and 100x within the next 6 months to 10 years, and this plan that is being outlined is partly dependent upon such good price appreciation scenarios playing out in regard to BTC prices.. blah blah blah."

Of course, they might want to keep the language even more vague than what I have outlined because they already know that there are guys like you out there that is going to sink his teeth into any kind of detail of information, so in that regard, they are incentivized to be more vague about it, even if they do not necessarily have bad intentions, but they do not want their gambling/speculation and expectations in regards to the BTC prices saving their asses to be directly stated and admitted.

You can frame their behavior as deceitful and others might consider their behaviors to be fair given the political hostilities against them.  Do you think that this get's resolved except at the ballot box, and if Bukele is likely to stay in power until 2029 and if things turn out good, then he might even be able to appoint a successor to continue after 2029.. then maybe that is their gamble that seems to be somewhat discretionary and somewhat based on BTC prices going up 12x sometime soon enough to save their assess to pay for the planned city and/or in the event that other aspects of the plan do not blow up prior to then for other reasons that may or may not be adequately prepared for.. and if a leader is popular (which Bukele is and seems to continue to be), then he has more likelihood to have more discretion (as you seem to not like, even if it might be in line with a possible positive bitcoin outcome which some scenarios of that seems to be o.k. with you, too.)..


You think that you can stop one thing without the other?  I don't know.. there is a mish-mash of dynamics, and we have both traditional financial systems and bitcoin going on at the same time, and it is not like you can just get rid of one system and transition over to the other, so there are going to be reminants of both systems infiltrating the other, and surely a lot of folks consider bitcoin as a good thing because it improves incentives .. but there is almost no way in hell that there is not some kind of transitionary period that could take an additional 10 years from now or it could take another 200 years from now.. and yeah, bitcoin is going on year 14, and it has already had a lot of impacts, even though it is still a relative baby in the terms of size.. so there seems likely to be a lot of turmoil along the way and sure, you can lament or yell or whine about certain things that you see happening, and sure, you might affect some people, but how you going to say, bitcoin cannot be used to buy, attract or whatever when it comes to political influence?  Seems pretty arbitrary and hard to control.  Let's socially shame and meme everyone who tries to do such political attraction.. go on, do it?  What's your anti-bukele meme?  the pro-bukele memes seem to be winning, and I am not even going to say that people will not be critical of him, if it is perceived that he goes too far, and I suppose if you are suggesting that he has gone too far, and you are campaigning to get the word out about the numbers are not backed, then go ahead.. do it do it do it.. maybe you will be right and the price rise of bitcoin will not be enough, or perhaps maybe by the time people start to get worried that there won't be enough money, the BTC price will go up sufficiently to save his ass.. I am not even proclaiming to know, yet I don't consider the various things that he is doing to be bad, even if the numbers do not currently seem to add up, absent various miracles or fleshing out the substance a bit better or the BTC price going up 12x after the bonds had already been issues and after El Salvador had bought the bitcoin stash with that money (assuming he does not run off with them or jeopardize them in a way that someone else runs off with them).


So often, I hear people claiming credit for being the lone voice out there, and sure sometimes they end up being correct, but not always.  Sometimes I get irritated because I hear some podcasters say that they are the first ones with X, Y or Z message, and I say to myself "bullshit, you got into the BTC space in 2018, and some variation of the same thing has been being said since I got in in late 2013, and I am pretty sure that it was being said before my time, so no, you are not the first to be saying that."  At the same time, it is good for people to be saying things and even being critical or even sometimes saying things that no one (or few folks) seem to be saying, and surely sometimes there can be some unique ways that people say things and then they might also get attributes for being the one who came up with such idea, which may or may not be true, just like Satoshi did not come up with bitcoin out of thin air, even if there were some innovative attributions that he made to some preexisting inventions, but no one had quite put them together like him.. and then some luck in that it got momentum and more momentum and here we are in a state of momentum that may or may not go how we expect.


Yeah.. it could be that you were right in some ways and that you were wrong in some ways, but then you might end up being 100% right or wrong, too, and I doubt that anyone can really blame you, unless we might think that you are just trolling or that you are not being genuine.. I remember criticizing Stolfi for picking some kind of an outlandish not very likely scenario and then just dwelling upon it as if it were more likely than it is.. .. and so maybe sometimes you might be criticized for getting in the way or trying to ruin dee moo.. or for bashing on one of our heros (Bukele in this case), and if Bukele ends up rug pulling us, then you can say I told you so.. and then if Bukele starts the city and ONLY gets 1/12 of the way through because the BTC price got stuck at $23k until 2029, then you can say, I told you that he did not have a good enough back up plan.. fucking bitcoin only at $23k. .and he thought that it was going to go up 12x at some point between 2023 and 2029.. that fool... or maybe you will say.. look, the BTC price only ended up going up 6x, and Bukele's plan required 12x or more, and that's why the plan failed.  He should have told us so we could have more properly debated whether we wanted to invest in that way or not... he's such a deceiving dictator.. even though he used to be liked, no one likes him now because we run out of money... and BTC prices did not go up enough to reach the goals.. so therefore there is nothing to show for all the efforts, and plus the secretary ran off with her boyfriend, and they went to Alabama... I already could have told you that was going to happen if we had properly debated the matter in 2023 until waiting until 2029 to see it all come to fruition.. just like I would have predicted if there had been proper disclosures from the start... blah blah blah.. you go the could have been stompix that was not given the proper info!!!!!!!

I actually think I specified twice in the last post that I'm not referring to you when I say that, and I only said you because I replied to you, there are tens if not hundreds of people on this board which I don't consider lemmings at all, and there are some even more radical about and against the "yes men", a lot who still think and who still scrutinize everything, although some are not as vocal as me for various reasons. Plus I wasn't actually restricting this to the board, in here is quite tolerable, on Twitter or Reddit the madness is on a different level!


We're not talking about Salvadorians for which 30$ could turn into 300$ in a year could mean something, from paying finally the rent on time for an entire year to actually eating enough for the whole family, I won't ever blame one such for doing what I might think is morally wrong, the only ones I have a beef with are the ones that have no other stake in this other than the price. And don't care about anything other either!


Actually, I remember a conversation here on the same thing:


Probably it's a thing I'm doing unaware, the fear of not falling for an illusion, I know I have my flaws, a lot of them, I prefer to criticize things before embracing them so I don't put a stamp of approval on it with which I will have to live all my life if I'm wrong, etc etc.
At the same time, one might have the wrong impression because my post always seems contrarian but it's not that I'm always against something, I simply don't post when I share the same opinion with someone or if the whole topic has 100 posts with the same positive vibe, so it's pretty obvious I have more that argue against an idea than clapping for some other!


This for me is something on a personal level, probably more than 90% of all the fuckeries in my life be it at work, be it with family members or with so-called friends, even in your politics from town mayor to the country legislators have been caused by things that don't add up and when you finally find the missing piece you wish you wouldn't have found it at all and you could just jump in a time machine and not touch it again.
Again, part of our cultural commie heritage, lol:


But if this is the plan, why not say it?
Because if you're hiding from us how you're going to get that money I can only assume that, you have no clue, you don't actually plan on doing it and your city is just another Akon city! If your plan is to bank on a 12x increase in Bitcoin price, then say it, and let's have a discussion on how feasible this is on a plan, not on, what??? Rumors?!? Jpegs?


My point also, and this is one thing I love about it, is that anyone can use it the way it wants, and not just based on some whitepaper, you want to buy 0.1BTC and wait till you can buy a Ferrari with it, go ahead, you want to hide some of your money cause you think your wife is cheating and might run away, do it, you want to buy something from Irak but no bank will let you send money, that's your choice! Go!
But using it to attract political capital, no! No!


For sure I'm part of something, maybe the cult, maybe one cult worse than this, maybe I'm just one that under his mask is more radical than the one I'm criticizing for being radical, who knows, I might be the one who is the most in the wrong. It's going to hurt a lot in a few years if I was wrong and I won't gain anything from being right but, here we are!  

It sounds like the Bitcoin City project has achieved a significant milestone by winning the 2023 LOOP architectural design award. However, there is still a lot of work to be done in order to turn the designs into a tangible reality, including securing funding and navigating the logistics of construction. The idea of using Bitcoin bonds to kickstart the infrastructure is an interesting approach, and it will be interesting to see how the project progresses in the coming years. The LOOP awards are considered prestigious in the architecture industry and winning it is considered a great achievement The awards are given out to the best designs and projects in the industry and winning it is considered a recognition of the quality of the project.

No problem, if you want to proclaim that forum members are not engaging in enough critical thinking.. but you gotta admit that you frequently go overboard with your insinuations that we are a bunch of lemmings.


There are varying levels of trust that goes into any system based on who we are and what are our life experiences, and sometimes there might be needs for a certain level of blind trust if we might have other priorities... .. so for example, if I am struggling to put a roof over my head and buy some food, I might be ready, willing and able to take any job, which I might hope to be an interim job "until I get back on my feet," but sometimes people are not in a very good position to question certain kinds of matters, and I am not even trying to excuse it, but we do not necessarily have resources to be able to investigate everything that is presented to us... and don't get me wrong, I am ongoingly trying to encourage higher levels of critical thinking when I hear people tell me certain things that I find to be difficult to believe based on what I believe to be facts and/or logic that I have at my disposal (or within what I believe to be better than the facts and/or logic that they are working with).


He seems pretty genuine to me, especially when I had seen him in various interviews.  Yeah, of course, I have not met the guy, and of course, we should be somewhat sceptical in regards to whether some folks might be misrepresenting matters, and if they are misrepresenting matters, then we might want to know the reasons for such misrepresentations.  No one would appreciate anyone lying to their face, but also many of us are going to weigh certain kinds of political objectives higher than others.. I mean in terms of what Bukele seems to be striving to achieve, and whether he is acting in the interest of El Salvador or some other interests or if I might consider what he is doing or trying to achieve to be contrary to my own perspectives and/or world values.. to the extent that I even have enough information to know all of these things.


Is that what this is?  You might be labelling it.   "If everyone likes it, then I don't like it."  hahahahaha

"If everyone likes it, then it must not be good for me."

"If it tastes good, spit it out."


Sure, some claims are more reachable than others.


Sure, actual material delivery of results is important, so if there is a claim that blackouts are happening less frequently, then there should be ways to measure it.. and perhaps even plausible reasons for why the results have changed from time 1 as compared with time 2.  The same would be true with something like crime rates or even economic prosperity, and some of that might not be easily measured, so we might have to take some time to see if the ways of measuring and the presentation of measurements are accurate, too.


We cannot deny that power comes in a variety of ways, including getting elected to a political office, so then there are powers to appoint people to powerful positions.  Sometimes power comes through charisma too, and I cannot really know if these systems are fair because sometimes people in powerful positions might have difficulties in terms of controlling their urges or even making sure that they are getting critical thinking within their circles.  Leaders are likely aware of those dynamics, and some of them are likely more abusive of their positions than others.  I have been accused of being paid by Michael Saylor.. and it is not like we can always know if someone might be being paid off or incentivized to spin.. and surely there have been sometimes when I have come to similar conclusion in regards to lacking of facts or a need for better facts, yet at the same time, I cannot see that we might just look at one side in a vacuum - in terms of Bukele taking a pretty bold position in terms of implementing Bitcoin specific laws... and so far he has not been lured into shitcoins, and so far it seems that he has been continuing to develop bitcoin specific routes forward and so far he has not seemed to have been rug pulling anyone, but yeah sure maybe there was some shenanigans going on with how some of that Chivo money had gotten "taken by scammers".. and yeah, maybe Bukele has been slipping some money into his own coffers, and yeah, maybe his level of fame and popularity causes people around him to be unable to question his motives or to request more transparency or to request better information disclosures (if it might be polls or if it might be releasing some progress reports that are factual rather than spins/conclusions that don't seem to completely add up)...


Well that might not be good if they are making those kinds of misrepresentations about capabilities and progress..and yeah of course, there may well be some needs for contemporary clips and data to the extent that there might not be issues regarding security and/or sabotage.... I don't like when I see information that does not add up, either... and I agree with some of your insinuations that some of the spins might be a bit much.. including a bitcoin city without income taxes, yet at the same time, I don't have a problem in terms of having inspirational goals that are within a ballpark of reachable.. but if the numbers do not add up and cannot be reached then sometimes there will be needs for more modesty in the way that the goals are framed or in terms of the timeline.. and various factors that try to maintain somewhat realistic goals.. and in that regard, any of us likely realize that there can be some justifications for why politicians need to be more general when they are outlining goals, but they will be criticized for being too vague if they don't try to set forth some specifics, so no matter what there is some balancing that has to occur that is not always an easy way to balance, especially when there may also be some uncertainties that are based on low probabilities.. or maybe if there might be too much reliance on a bunch of low probability events all coming true, but a lack of adding them all up.. to assign the right level of probability to some future event that is described.


Those criticisms seem to make sense.. but does that mean that the whole thing is bonkers?.. let's say that they bank on bitcoin prices going up 12x?  Maybe that going up 12x could take longer than when they would need the money?  So there could be some reliance on the bitcoin price going up, which makes it unrealistic to be banking on something that may or may not happen... but yeah, maybe they are able to provide some justifications for a variety of ways that the money might come or be raised or be generated or whatever.

You likely have looked at the details way more than this here cat... to the extent that I even give too many shits about getting into details of each and every claim or to suggest that he is not being genuine or trying to make efforts towards aspirational goals that may or may not have sufficient back up plans.


Sometimes you seem to be bitter.  I mean it is quite irritating for some of us pro-bitcoiners or bitcoin bulls or whatever you want to call us as if we are cultists or if we are being overly religious about bitcoin.... and I am not even completely sure what the proper balance is going to be because it seems to be true that bitcoin has historically outperformed the expectations of a lot of folks, even conservative bitcoiners, and there is no real reason to conclude that it does not have great chances of continuing to outperform other assets and even to outperform conservative expectations about its likely performance... and at the same time realizing and recognizing that nothing in relationship to bitcoin is guaranteed.. while at the same time recognizing and realizing that bitcoin remains amongst the greatest of asymmetric bets that is currently in front of any of us to make our choices, including that we are likely in the midst of the greatest peacetime wealth transfer in history... yet we cannot take any of that for granted, but at the same time, we have to recognize and appreciate bitcoin for what it is... and it seems to me that Bukele has surrounded himself with largely realistic bitcoiners, and of course, you can criticize each and everyone of them, but he is not consulting with Ethereum dweebs or Doggie coin bullshit, and I don't think that he tied any value up with FTX/SBF bullshit.. even though we cannot completely be sure about those, either.. however, there are some connections with Bitfinex, Tether and Binance and there may likely be some other points in which there could be vulnerabilities (or questionable relations) in his plans and structures, but I remain unconvinced that completely disclosing all of the details would be the right move given how so many well to do folks, institutions, and governments are hell-bent to work towards his failure in regards to bitcoin related projects and probably they hate him in other ways too.. just because he is a threat to status quo relations that strive to maintain Latin American countries and also less empowered people in ongoing servant positions.. and that seems to be part of the challenge that bitcoin ongoingly presents to the "powers that be" in terms of a lot of the ways in which bitcoin allows the empowering of the various disobedient folks.. and sure likely challenge the world as we know it including the various ways that wester powers have been controlling other parts of the world and gaining likely unfair benefits from some of the way matters are structured.


I would think that ultimately bitcoin is for everyone, and whether bitcoin succeeds in El Salvador (or expands or not), there are aspects of bitcoin that can be used by friends and enemies, and I am not sure what to think if you believe that bitcoin is being used by exploiters or disingenuine folks, and maybe you are concerned about the inevitable rug-pull which surely could happen if Bukele or some of the various involved folks run off with bitcoin.. and yeah if any of us invest, then we might get rug pulled too.. and it is your choice whether to invest in bitcoin or in el salvador or neither.

I suppose you can still be there saying I told you so and calling anyone who supports Bukele as an ass-licker.. that's fine.. it is good to have various kinds of critics, and we don't all need to agree whether one direction or another direction is better or preferred anyhow.  On an individual level we do need to consider whether to invest, how much to invest, and how to spend our time and energies.


These are not bad points to the extent that they matter, and to me it seems quite likely that Bukele will be in office until about 2029.. and then if he is able to pick a successor that is able to win and to carry on the legacy, then maybe the exact details may or may not be released... to the extent that the details might be damning.. and there could be ways in which Bukele is making the less preferable decisions, but then banking on the BTC price going up in the next 2-4 years, and if the BTC prices go up, then he will be saved from any of his currently less preferable decisions... and there are other ways in which he could end up falling from grace, just like some other persons in bitcoin that we thought were heros and then they become personas non grata based on information that we find out later.  I don't know if Bukele might become some version of a Mark Karpeles or a SBF or maybe he will turn out to be a Trace Mayer.. Who the fuck knows? 

We largely ONLY have the information in front of us, and I am surely not going to fault you for raising questions or proclaiming that some of the matters do not add up, but sometimes your calls for disclosures might not exactly be the better ways forward given the specific situation that Bukele is in, and sure maybe he put himself into such a position because sometimes it does seem that he is overly cocky or overly poking the bear or stirring shit, and whether his approach is the better way forward is somewhat discretionary, and maybe history will end up telling us that it was a good way to approach the matter or maybe his poking will end up blowing up on him, and I would not put it past some of the powers that be to want to put high stakes on taking out Bukele, and I am not really going to know if they will be successful or if the fall out might be good or bad, depending on how much effort is put into the situation, and throughout bitcoin's history many of us attempting to pay attention to what is going on in regards to bitcoin, we have witnessed a variety of desperation efforts to quash bitcoin that have not really been successful so far, but sometimes we do not find out about some of the efforts that were being made, and was their government involvement in FTX and SBF's situation and will we find out or did that blow up in their faces, we may well not really know, even though we hear all kinds of spins that may or may not be correct, depending upon which side of the conspiracy theory you are buttering your bread...or do you want to take both sides of the argument so you appear neutral..;. this is not some kind of a neutral battle in regards to Bukele and to try to make some comparisons that he should do X, Y or Z might not necessarily make sense, while at the same time, we cannot completely be sure about whether he is a good guy or a bad guy and we just go based on various aspects that we believe to be more convincing or not.. and like I mentioned, we don't necessarily need to agree. .as you suggest, Maybe you are part of the cult too.. stompix, you are just part of the disagreeable part of the cult.    

Just a quick note to indicate that the Bitcoin City project has recently won the 2023 LOOP architectural design award, under the landscape category.

What remains is obviously the most difficult part of the quest: turning the fancy images and models into something concrete (no pun intended), starting with the Bitcoin bonds to kick the infrastructure off, and then determining how to gradually finance and build all the rest of the city. I’d be happy if we see anything similar to the designs in real live in the span of a decade.

Note:
My knowledge of architecture is essentially null, and though I’ve read that the LOOP awards aim at being prestigious, I’m not really sure to what degree they are. Ideally, they’re not something like those awards given in the car industry, where every brand seems to have a best car of the year in one category or another, one competition or another.
 
See:
https://www.loopdesignawards.com/
https://www.loopdesignawards.com/project/bitcoin-city/

What I want to do is finally make people realize that you have to weigh on how much truth and how much lies are hiding behind everyone's tweets and actions, no matter if his name is Bukele or Warren Buffet! Just as how you must verify and not blindly trust a bitcoin transaction, just as how you can be your own bank and not trust an IOU card from a bank, it's the same when believing a lying piece of something like el Presidente in question!  I hate populism, I hate leaders that claim all kinds of grand realizations and projects unseen by the world, I had my full of it in the communist era, I know how to spot when someone is just making claims on how great things are, how great the economy is doing and his televised shitshow gets cuts because we have a blackout, the hot water is colder than the cold one and the gas had less pressure than the one from a farting pussycat!

What annoys me even more, is that exactly here, where most of us are done with politicians and their promises, there is an entire horde who has magically found out that when you stick your tongue down some politician's ass and you pass the 30 cm mark it stops smelling like shit and it becomes chocolate flavor, or whatever since I don't see any other reason for anyone kissing his ass that much like some (not you of course) do here!

The 200MW geothermal well? There is no such in the whole world, and the one in the filming was already 10 years old!
The mining operation? One 10-second clip with (at that time) 3 yo gear that nobody has heard a word about it after! Have you?
The green energy in Salvador that will allow mining? You have a fucking FSRU ship docked in the main port pumping LNG!
The 1 billion city constructed with only half of that since the rest would be invested in BTC ? It became so ridiculous even they had to come back on it and add it's actually more than 7 billions. Where are the rest of the 6 billion going to come in a 28 billion-a-year economy? Crickets!

And despite this, despite every single thing going this way the cultist still never even dare to look if the idol has hidden something from them!
This is the world some want to create?  Count me out! This is not bitcoin, this is ass-licking and Twitter liking in hope of another 100$ in gain on the btc price!


Of course, it sounds better, but, do we know at what rates he got those loans, how much will he pay for them?
Because it might be a genius move or it might be some idiot rolling the loans, cause he won't be president forever, get me one another mandate, and then who cares, let the next guy figure it out!

That's why we verify numbers and data and we don't jump to conclusions before we have them all!
Well, some of us!

Yep.. various ways to roll over debt happen all the time.. and the $21 million question might be whether they are being deceptive in terms of whether their debt is in getting into a more healthy state, a less healthy state or staying the same.

A presumption is that El Salvador is getting their debt into a more manageable and less dependent status... .. and surely there can be some questions in regards to whether those kinds of claims or inferences can reasonably be made based on actual known facts?


Is that better or worse?  I recognize that you are hinging on the "paid in full" claim as if that might be deceptive to say that it was paid in full when it was actually just rolled over.


Isn't he correct to assert that the claims that El Salvador was going to default incorrect?  That seems to be a pretty BIG deal, no?  So far, they did not default, even though many of the big players were proclaiming that they were going to default and also downgrading and denigrating their credit rating (worthiness).  That seems like a pretty big deal in terms of information warfare, to the extent information warfare is going on in these circumstances.


I kind of agree with you on the point of having some kind of verifiability that El Salvador owns the BTC that they claim to own, but I also understand aspects of not necessarily disclosing the particulars... there are a lot of current practices in which finances are NOT very open, and sure governments are supposed to be more open because they are supposed to be accountable to the people of whom they are supposed to represent, yet I am not sure what good comes out of attempting to cause Bukele and the El Salvador government to be MORE open than other governments.. when we already should realize and appreciate that they are engaging in a kind of investment (into BTC) and a public posture in regards to investing into BTC that status quo PTB financial and governmental institution (and the status quo rich) are largely hostile to such investments and attempts at self-sovereignty that El Salvador is making and that there have been institutions in place for more than 50 years that have been hostile to self-sovereignty of smaller governments and various other smaller players including within western countries in which there are ongoing desires to suppress communities from their abilities to be self-sovereign... not that we can necessarily completely divorce ourselves from status quo institutions - or even status quo systems without a violent revolution, and bitcoin seems to be one of the ways in which less violence may well be able to take place in order to return some levels of self-sovereignty.. in the event that we might be able to have some faith that Bukele is a good actor and is not going to rug-pull the whole situation.. which is seeming to be the presumptions that you want to make stompix?


**note: this response fixes the missing bracket in your above quotes stompix.. in order to clarify what was your response and what was DdmrDdmr's.

Frequently we see surveys that are greatly inadequate in the ways that they ask questions and even which questions they ask.. so cannot really disagree with you about those kinds of concerns stompix.  We know that sometimes proclaimed neutral survey takers are not as neutral as they are striving to present themselves, and surely governmental and/or public entities might want to attempt to be more open, but sometimes they won't release raw data to the public..... .. For sure, we know that there are various forms of information sharing on the internet that are more free than they have been historically, but people still get concerned about NOT being able to speak freely on certain topics.. whether it might be something like twitter, or even a forum like this... .. .. We might know that sometimes there are fears about allowing information to spread too freely because sometimes the information might not be true and then also the public might not be able to discern true information from untrue information.... so surely, dynamics of the release of poll data has these kinds of concerns, and maybe even concerns about which questions to ask and whether the poll taker wants to know that information.. or there might be some rationale in which I agree with you, if you are already spending the time, money and energies to take the poll, then what's wrong with including a couple more clarifying questions?  Even some of the arm-chair criticizing that guys/gals like you and I do on the interwebs could end up motivating some folks who are involved in poll creation to become more inquisitive, and inspire journalists to ask the more probing questions or to spend money on on the ground investigations - which sometimes is not being done these days either.. who's going to pay them to send someone into probe?  People gotta get paid for their attempts at "investigative journalism," no?  Sure some will do it for free. .but at some point, they also start to get hungry, need to pay for lodging and transportation too... cover their costs.