Topic: maybe pirate is just a front for banks/governments/people who would destroy btc? (Read 4883 times)

Maybe pirate was just a guy who ran a very successful Ponzi?

I was hoping for a reply like this, and I feel the same. Just making users aware of likely destructive scenarios, mainly that it doesn't have to involve Bitcoin speculation.

Ugh.  No one will accept changes of that sort in the first place.  We know better.  And by "we", I mean the bulk of current bitcoin users, and absolutely 100% of the people running virtually all of the important associated services (pools, exchanges, explorers, gambling sites, etc)

I thought you meant like UI changes and stuff, because making the UI annoying is literally the only thing they could really do.  If someone leaned on the devs to make them change the protocol for the worst, that fork would die on the vine and the old version would continue.

Ok, then lets have a new currency every single fork and see how that pans out, because that is in effect what a fork would mean in this case. In reality I think people would stick to the established Bitcoin, despite changes to core functionality eventually leading to central control and new rules.

I'm not assuming anything.  I'm telling you that the exact thing you are talking about happens every single day.  Not the coersion, but the forking of software projects and the changes in development teams.

Still, I think Bitcoin would survive that scenario, volatile or not.

Perhaps there could be one way to hurt Bitcoin by trading; Pirate sell all of the 500k BTC (he supposedly sits on) over a short period of time, driving the BTC rate towards $0, spread posts like "This is the end!" using sockpuppet aliases on forums, then buy by back as much BTC as possible during the collapse, transfer all Bitcoins to a local wallet and delete it (DoD 7 pass wipe). Second thought, it would probably just drive up the price on the few remaining Bitcoins still in circulation, as he can't get all of them.

I dont think it would destroy Bitcoin. It would just do more or less "damage" if you look at the price of a Bitcoin as a messure of its success which most people do.

Why?
If the price tanks in one second down to $1, this will be reported by NEWS media "everytime" Bitcoin is mentioned.

99% of normal uneducated people would take this as a confirmation that Bitcoin is a failure/dangerous currency and something to stay away from and many merchants would hesitate.
Most people tend to not like money that can crash in value any second.

Ofcourse there is more to Bitcoin and there is allways the saying...
What doesnt kill you makes you stronger and all publicity is good publicity.
But the more people who dare try and understand Bitcoin, the stronger it gets and the lower its value goes the less people who will mine. So the weaker the system gets.

This could be fixed if exchanges had a crash prevention break mechanism.
Something like, not allowing a single person to dump the price down more than 5-10% in a single dump per day.

To get the price down 5% would mean you would have to dump 21,000 Bitcoins. After that he could still sell the rest of his coins, as long as they price was not driven down.

Most people do not even have that many Bitcoins and most people would like to sell them at the highest price possible. So only those who want to break the stability and price of Bitcoins would get a harder time.

This would give people time to react and make it much harder for a single person to control the price of everyone in the worlds Bitcoins. Not allowing a single user to dump the price in an instant at the expense of every Bitcoin holder out there.

Now we would get a stable currency.

istar,

In what way would "getting the coins for free" destroy Bitcoin unless he actually do something with them?


Serenata,

If a government or corporation really "lean" on you, what is the price you are willing to pay to deny?


kjj,

You are assuming one lead developer then, but what if all of of them are targeted (not that many anyway).

Different lead developers would take over the old fork.  It happens every day in the open source world, usually when someone gets burned out.

Not to mention the fact that Bitcoin developers are not "soldiers" following orders.

Cheaper? He got the coins for free. Would even make a huge profit, if the amount of coins is true. Which I doubt.

I think there is a much cheaper way to influence Bitcoin compared to destroying it by trade.

Just lean on the lead developers, push them towards implementing new features no one really wants, which in small steps would move away from the current core concept of Bitcoin where control is with the user.

i wish i could understand what i am seeing here. care to explain?

Actually it seems like the most famous ones only keep it near zero by massive, rampant inflation. (WoW gold, Lindens, EVE isks...)

Take a look at http://galaxies.mygamesonline.org/digitalisassets.html sometime...

-MarkM-

that's _exactly_ my point. especially given all of this building regulation and lockdown of control of all things digital, i'm not sure if it's something that should really be risked.

i would also like to state that reducing the fiat-conversion value of the currency (probably) reduces the number of miners, which (probably) makes the 51% problem even more of a risk.

@markm the games/virtual worlds' currency concept is interesting, and believable as a possible bridge in light of "near zero" fiat conversion value.

This...


...will take a long time. 

In case of volatility the traders should buy low and sell high (https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/bitcoin-needs-more-short-term-speculators-and-a-new-bitcoinica-clone-101668). They will make profit, while the ones causing volatility will make loss.

But yes, we've seen both buy panics aka. bubble starts, and sell panics aka. bubble bursts. People should learn to see what's it really worth, instead of sentiments "now everyone buys" / "now everyone sells".

If you and maybe all the people you know have not managed to come up with customers you can sell bitcoins to for fiat, that is just an arbitrage opportunity for someone who does have some customers secreted away somewhere.

A lot of the best prices one can get when selling virtual/digital currencies are inside games or near games (such as where gamers hang out even if that happens not to be an in-game location). A person selling bitcoins at an important bridge in a game, where the troll that guards the bridge is basically undefeatable and cannot be "sneaked" past and demands toll in bitcoins, can likely get a better price for bitcoins than those selling them elsewhere not only to smart adventurers who think ahead and know they will meet that troll eventually, likely with a pack of dire-wolves on their heels, but also to random passers-by who maybe have no idea trolls and direwolves, or the game in which players meet them, is out there somewhere.

A general public exchange is probably mostly a clearing-house frequented by people who have no really good method of doing whatever the conversion the exchange provides in a more "controlled" environment possibly with customers who are not so much looking for fine distinctions in exchange rates as simply to buy a certain type of coin regardless of the price because they need it right now and it is available right near where they want it.

Basically your folk are thinking a thing is worth zero because they have watched the price drop and drop or whatever; they are all about the exchange rate. The guys facing the troll just know it is something they need right now and have no idea, maybe, how much the last player to pass that way paid nor how much the next to pass will pay.

Maybe your markets simply do not attract the people who actually value the things; I know plenty of people who buy up bitcoins any time they can spare enough of whatever other assets they can buy them with, but never sell any simply because they are so insanely undervalued right now that they cannot get anywhere near the amount they think they are worth. The prices being offered are, basically, an insult. If those people were "rich" you'd see their impact more, but since the only riches they have are their bitcoins, they simply do not have much volume to offer until they win some lotteries or something.

-MarkM-

What I'm saying is the value against fiat being insignificant would not always be the case.



I think you don't see the "bridge" because you're expecting linear progression. What I've been trying to argue is that linear progression is not necessary for Bitcoin's success.


As long as the answer is 'no' it means you assign bitcoins some value even with a fiat rate of $0. That's all that matters.

Just how much you would be willing to part with them for is another matter. You might be willing to part with them for $1 per coin. And I'd be right there buying them from you. Some others (like me) would ask a much higher price to part with them, if they were for sale at all. That's because I consider bitcoins and assign value one way, and you do differently. The fact that we don't share exact same views is to be expected. That's how the world works, and why people make different decisions, for better or worse.

But it doesn't matter because there are millions, actually billions of people in the world; that's a lot of varying views where you can bet some number will lean toward the 'yep they have value' conclusion.

the answer is only no because i would be hoping that someone would figure out the new fiat value conversion problem, someday, and because storage of them costs me nothing.