"Their verdict was: "Absolutely nothing to see. The local Tibetans make sure everything is overpriced.""
point being, all the devs who look down on the masses as stupid & irrational as justification for authoritarian practices regarding decisions in Bitcoin are severely underestimating the power of money to motivate ppl to understand the economics of value transaction. i see this everywhere in the Bitcoin community and it's an attitude that will cost those who employ that attitude in many ways more than just in their pocketbooks.
http://www.coindesk.com/my-life-inside-a-remote-chinese-bitcoin-mine/
What I found most interesting about that article is that the energy could not find a market until the miner showed up. A long time ago I mentioned that bitcoin mining might allow energy providers to over-provision variable energy sources (wind, solar and to a lesser extent hydro). This would be a good thing for the world, because it means a lower fossil component during marginal production days (cloudy or not that windy).
It looks like that's exactly what is happening here -- but coincidentally rather than in a planned manner.
RE: TPTB, I tend to ignore people who consistently reply multiple times in a row during a conversation. Because there is a pathology there... they are writing more for themselves than for others. The exception to this rule of course is the guy who is stimulating conversation in a thread by citing interesting new news, etc. Cypherdoc in this thread and adam in the classic wall observer for example.
that is a good pt. but look at it from the other side as well; that being the costs of gold mining.
not only is it a shame the little African kid has to climb down a 100yd hole but it is more shameful that we have huge strip mining operations not only in Africa but all over the world here in the US, Canada, Australia, and China, etc. one of the worthy goals Bitcoin should strive to achieve is to eliminate that waste and corruption. imagine getting all those ppl and their fiat involved in those operations to switch to Bitcoin or Bitcoin mining. remember the gold mine sold in Canada for Bitcoin? well, i met a lady in March while in Hawaii who owns a gold mine up in Alaska and we got to talking about Bitcoin. she had already heard about it and of course i talked at length multiple times during the trip about Bitcoin replacing gold. she's a smart girl and the wheels were turning in her mind. i then helped her set up a VPN on her iphone as well as download Breadwallet to which i sent her some coin. i'm meaning to follow up with her sometime later this year to see if she moved on it but i bet she will. these types of stories are happening all over the world right now and i claim it is being reflected in the gold and silver price.
we can only accomplish this by letting Bitcoin grow.