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Topic: Tips on not getting scammed & a fun callout to serious devs. (Read 4513 times)

legendary
Activity: 1148
Merit: 1018
It's about time -- All merrit accepted !!!
sorry i disagree

First in spirit I agree with you however you can talk to people all you want and it can mean nothing.

The code on github is what I personally look for.

I make my own evaluation of it, I make my own wallets, and I don't care what promises are made for the future.

If you are not able to evaluate code yourself or test it.....well than I guess these suggestions are better than nothing

However here are a few tips if you are not used to reading code to help you in this world of alt coins......

I see a lot of , is SELF MODERATED THRES......

I guess they don't want people saying anything negative......

Another thing to watch for is.........code vanishing from github !!  Then appearing later , maybe on a different repo !!

Leaving you wondering.....what changed in between??

Finally watch out for coin gen generated coins,  they keep changing stuff up but i notice a lot of them have the checkpoints.cpp disabled and the actual bitcoin checkpoints in there commented out and the genesis block is the same as bitcoin !!

Here is an example  (not picking on anyone here just pulling up the last sample I remember seeing of this a day ago)

This coin here has it's source on github..... https://github.com/OfficialTitcoin/titcoin-wallet

note the genesis block in the main.cpp file line 34 https://github.com/OfficialTitcoin/titcoin-wallet/blob/master/src/main.cpp#L34

is the same as bitcoin !!  (bitcoin source) chainparams.cpp line 152 https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/src/chainparams.cpp#L152

here is an example from the checkpoints.cpp file of the same coin gen coin with checkpoints commented out

see lines 31 to 55 of the suspect coin https://github.com/OfficialTitcoin/titcoin-wallet/blob/master/src/checkpoints.cpp

compare this to lines 56 to 67 of bitcoin , looks familiar !! of course since it is the same !! (just commented out of the alt coin)

https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/src/chainparams.cpp#L56



The code is the key --- on github from launch --- and able to be built (compiled) by others to verify the released wallets match it.

After a coin is up a few days/weeks an abe block explorer is handy to make 100% certain that there were no hidden coins.

(meaning that someone could release clean code on github and wallets with a hidden premine) which is pretty easy to hide if you know how......


I keep my identity private for good reason.  If that turns you off from any project I have worked on or launched I am sorry but that is me.

I think the code is the most important thing.  Recently I heard comments of Gavin say I did not care if I could trust Satoshi I cared if I could trust the code (not an exact quote just from my memory).

My real point is knowing someones identity , credentials, reputation ect... is no guarantee you won't get burned !!

My heart is with the person who started this thread.  I hate seeing people paying hundreds of bitcoin for ipo coins that drop 98% in value and the developers don't even vanish they just say 'sorry I'm working on it, or it did not work out"   I don't want to give examples here, you can look around for yourself...... They used real names (i guess) and really violated no law I am aware of unless someone could prove they planned it as a scam (conspiracy or theft by deception in the United States) pretty hard to prove......

I am not a fan of going to the cops either.  I think these people should be sorted out by the community. 

Finally I wrote an article a while back about scam coins , maybe someone here would find it of use.


https://cryptocointalk.com/topic/14773-how-to-avoid-scam-coins-and-why-proof-of-developer-is-not-the-answer
Ix
full member
Activity: 218
Merit: 128
I remember those discussions well, and most of which were constructive.  Those initial discussions soon turned to FUD, accusations and whatever else, and I quickly realized that BitcoinTalk is NOT the place to attempt to have intelligent, civil discussions about technical matters.  That doesn't mean there aren't discussions, or technical content shared around the community......it just isn't shared here Smiley

I dunno, your forum never seems to work so if there is any public discussion there I wouldn't know. Whatever gets cross-posted here seems all more of the same, a few images and wild claims, but no technical aspect. Considering the amount of development time you've put into the project, describing one extremely important aspect (double spending protection) in at least some technical detail would have seemed quite prudent by now. The few programmers capable of even copying such a high level idea are all working on their own projects anyway.
legendary
Activity: 1050
Merit: 1016
My question would be why are you back around these forums? Is eMunie getting ready to launch?

Q1 is planned, so no not quite yet.

The reason for occasionally visiting is political.  I wanted a sentiment update basically from the "wild west" on the project....I got what I expected Smiley

lol

Ok, tell you what I will do, next time you are interested, pm me and I will kick you in the balls and call it a day

haha ok, that would actually save me some time!
legendary
Activity: 1610
Merit: 1000
Crackpot Idealist
My question would be why are you back around these forums? Is eMunie getting ready to launch?

Q1 is planned, so no not quite yet.

The reason for occasionally visiting is political.  I wanted a sentiment update basically from the "wild west" on the project....I got what I expected Smiley

lol

Ok, tell you what I will do, next time you are interested, pm me and I will kick you in the balls and call it a day
legendary
Activity: 1050
Merit: 1016
Oh I forgot to mention in the previous post....

Open source before you are ready is a bad thing....look at Ethereum, pipped to the post by Counterparty, then over the past week they have been running around in a flap assuring everybody that Ethereum will have stuff Counterparty doesn't, investors are safe etc etc.

How can that be, it is open source, so they can't guarantee to have anything that no one else has unless they develop those components as closed source until they are finished....*shakes head*
legendary
Activity: 1050
Merit: 1016
My question would be why are you back around these forums? Is eMunie getting ready to launch?

Q1 is planned, so no not quite yet.

The reason for occasionally visiting is political.  I wanted a sentiment update basically from the "wild west" on the project....I got what I expected Smiley
legendary
Activity: 1610
Merit: 1000
Crackpot Idealist
My question would be why are you back around these forums? Is eMunie getting ready to launch?
legendary
Activity: 1050
Merit: 1016

Ask this question:

Dan has revolutionized cryptocurrency technology or he is just a scammer?

Which one seems more likely hmmmmmmm.......


I pick revolutionary Smiley

Dan open source the code so no one can accuse you of being a scammer. You got to be an idiot to think people aren't gonna accuse you of being a scammer, you have absolutely no code or technical papers to show.

Accusing someone of being a scammer is fine, provided there is evidence.  There isn't any evidence, and as far I'm aware society at least likes to think it adopts an "innocent until proven guilty" mindset....the interwebs is a different story, but that is probably due to the fact that you are less likely to get a back handed slap and busted ribs accusing someone on the web as opposed to doing it face to face down the pub.

Possible Ways to pull a scam of:

1. Who knows maybe your jar files could be malicious; snooping on other peoples computers, it makes sense.
2. Cash in on the big IPO. Your code is closed source so it could easily function as described but in a centralized manner.

1.  Funny that in 18 months no single person has come with any accusation of that happening.
2.  Closed source doesn't mean centralized, there have been a number of betas (I'm sure you have been part of some) where all of my machines have been off, and the network has continued to function.

You got to actually show code and technical papers.

I will when I'm ready, it's ready and I'm confident all is in order, not when members of the community demand it or attempt to force a knee jerk reaction by aggravation.

You seem to care so MUCH when people accuse you of scamming, that rings my alarm bells because it seems to be a very touchy subject for you. I also saw you donate some bitcoin publicly to someone in need on this forum, that is scam 101, make your self look like the nice guy.

Whats wrong with protecting my name against unfounded accusations, you and anyone else would do the same thing.

Also the donation, c'mon...if I wanted to look the nice guy I would of made a big song and dance about it and made sure everyone knew how awesome and cool I was......I never posted about that anywhere, and my only postings about it have been in the relevant threads.....straw clutching a bit there.

No one should assume your not a scammer and no one should assume you are a scammer, they should only judge the project by the code end of story.

Correct....almost.....judge by the product, the execution & success of it, not just by the code.

Dan has revolutionized cryptocurrency technology or he is just a scammer?

Not to stir the pot too much, but when fuserleer did originally post how eMunie was going to work, I and a few others pointed out how his design did not solve double spending, and since then there has been a lot of flashy ideas (and over-broad claims of people stealing them left and right as an excuse to divulge no details), and essentially zero content. Programmers are hardly immune from being mild sociopaths (*cough* ANONYMINT *cough*), so as I recommended in the "is emunie a scam" thread - I don't believe it is a scam, but don't invest into a black box either.

I remember those discussions well, and most of which were constructive.  Those initial discussions soon turned to FUD, accusations and whatever else, and I quickly realized that BitcoinTalk is NOT the place to attempt to have intelligent, civil discussions about technical matters.  That doesn't mean there aren't discussions, or technical content shared around the community......it just isn't shared here Smiley
Ix
full member
Activity: 218
Merit: 128
Dan has revolutionized cryptocurrency technology or he is just a scammer?

Not to stir the pot too much, but when fuserleer did originally post how eMunie was going to work, I and a few others pointed out how his design did not solve double spending, and since then there has been a lot of flashy ideas (and over-broad claims of people stealing them left and right as an excuse to divulge no details), and essentially zero content. Programmers are hardly immune from being mild sociopaths (*cough* ANONYMINT *cough*), so as I recommended in the "is emunie a scam" thread - I don't believe it is a scam, but don't invest into a black box either.
sr. member
Activity: 345
Merit: 250
Dan open source the code so no one can accuse you of being a scammer. You got to be an idiot to think people aren't gonna accuse you of being a scammer, you have absolutely no code or technical papers to show.

Possible Ways to pull a scam of:

1. Who knows maybe your jar files could be malicious; snooping on other peoples computers, it makes sense.
2. Cash in on the big IPO. Your code is closed source so it could easily function as described but in a centralized manner.



There are a number of times I have seen posts accusing a new closed source coin of being run by "just a server". Even if it's not a scam people will make accusations until it's open source.
hero member
Activity: 644
Merit: 500
P2P The Planet!
Dan open source the code so no one can accuse you of being a scammer. You got to be an idiot to think people aren't gonna accuse you of being a scammer, you have absolutely no code or technical papers to show.

Possible Ways to pull a scam of:

1. Who knows maybe your jar files could be malicious; snooping on other peoples computers, it makes sense.
2. Cash in on the big IPO. Your code is closed source so it could easily function as described but in a centralized manner.


People know who you are and will be after you if you turn out to be a scammer.


Ask this question:

Dan has revolutionized cryptocurrency technology or he is just a scammer?

Which one seems more likely hmmmmmmm.......


You got to actually show code and technical papers.

You seem to care so MUCH when people accuse you of scamming, that rings my alarm bells because it seems to be a very touchy subject for you. I also saw you donate some bitcoin publicly to someone in need on this forum, that is scam 101, make your self look like the nice guy.

No one should assume your not a scammer and no one should assume you are a scammer, they should only judge the project by the code end of story.
legendary
Activity: 2254
Merit: 1290

I've been working on a possible scorecard, just for sh*ts and giggles:

http://minkiz.co/posting/


Premine scores positively?

It's a first cut, a work in progress. My main objective is to provoke thought and further questions (so, thank you); an aide-memoir presented with Minki's characteristic wry spin.

With respect to a big +10 for a premine: I'm attempting to acknowledge that IRL, ordinary, day-to-day coin logistics requires resourcing, somehow; DNS seed nodes don't pay for themselves per se, nor do nodes hosting block explorers.

The main issue with a premine is previous instances where an unscrupulous dev dumped the premine, trashing the price and effectively killing the coin. The risk of a repeat occurrence remains significant while devs are allowed to remain pseudonymous and I believe I can discern some small degree of hardening antipathy towards pseudonymity of devs.

As the consequences of this change of attitude begin to propagate across the domain, investors will gradually be able to regain some confidence that a specific premine will be responsibly curated because developers will be better able to demonstrate their integrity.

The recent “No, no I'm the EQX dev!" episode has nicely illustrated the profoundly human problem of verifying “personal identity” in the absence of (the usual) validating social context. It's an abstract concept, increasingly difficult to implement canonically IRL and impossible to achieve (with the same degree of confidence) in bitspace. Fortunately, with the intense interest in developing “trustless”  (a misnomer, I caution you) devices, we may be able to make some practical progress towards reducing the risks.

I'm not ignoring the other issue that seems to attend premines, the matter of the amount. Different brand development strategies have different costs, what might be seen as a ludicrously large premine for an unprepossessing “store of value” coin might be seriously underpowered for a coin with an ambition to grow a significant global reach. Assessment has to be performed on a case-by-case basis, hence a mild positive 10.

More generally, from an investor's perspective ...

At the moment, we (collectively) have no reliable means of decentralising control over the fin logistics resources necessary to maintain a coin and, until such a means appears, this de facto centralisation will continue to present practical problems.

The same is true for the management and control of nonfin central resources such as control over the website domain reg, possession of the coin-specific private keys and, importantly, the rights to the IP that emerge from the result of collective efforts of the dev(s) and the community of coin adopters.

These issues cannot safely be left just hanging in the wind - the Mooncoin dev has stopped responding and theymos' response to “can we take over the forum thread?” is that the thread ownership cannot be transferred, another thread must be started. Not a show-stopper admittedly (this time) but a change in URL will have a deleterious effect on communication between p2p participants and on previous promotional efforts after coin adoption that were rash enough to quote URLs for resources maintained by third parties.

The demands that arise from this militate the creation of a self-organised, community-based solution (such as a not-for-profit supporting “foundation”) to which can be ceded control of centralised issues that cannot yet be devolved to a decentralised, “trustless“ solution.

It's going to take time to achieve that transition and until then, I'm inviting assessors to challenge the “received wisdom” about premines and make their own informed assessment, taking into account the coin management's closely-argued, well-supported pitch.

Cheers

Graham
sr. member
Activity: 420
Merit: 250
"to endure to achieve"
@Ngaio

'Being gentle with you" - so am I supposed to be grateful? Crawl back under your stone and be quiet.
I don't care one bit if 'graham' think of himself as being superiour to the rest!
I was pointing out some basic facts of life which has nothing to do with just crypto but everything to do with how to win over peoples trust.
He jumped on my back and for that - well - he deserves my disgust.
He is an insulting, lecturing, egoistic patronising prick as far as I am concerned. He can be oh so clever in what he is doing, but speak/write to people in a proper tone is not what he is clever at, and he does not win over people with that attitude.
Go ahead - claim that I speak bad myself, but let me remind you he brought it onto himself.
I am used to argue with people in a positive spirit - he brought negative spirits into it - so there you have it.

Quote
it's about maintaining the quality of the discussion.
- you must be kidding!? who the heck took the quality out of the discussion? Not me for sure - go up and read what I wrote - it is absolutely relevant. He and now you took the quality out..!

I will monitor what 'Graham' and you comes up with of further insults - and then I will evaluate if it is worth it responding to.
newbie
Activity: 42
Merit: 0
Quote
Cheers

Graham

Where in my post did you see 'patronising' ?
It is all simple facts of life.
You on the other hand are very patronising.

Hi Skywave, I have personal experience of Graham when he *IS* intending to "bash" someone and believe me when I say that he was being gentle with you. He was pointing you in the direction of information that would have better informed your early comment.

Quote
And your onwards stream of 'expert facts' and 'I know better' ...

Yup, he does know better.
Quote
...has no relevance to what I am saying.

Er, no. It was very relevant to what you said.

It's not about point scoring, it's about maintaining the quality of the discussion.

Kind regards, Ngaio.
legendary
Activity: 996
Merit: 1013

I've been working on a possible scorecard, just for sh*ts and giggles:

http://minkiz.co/posting/


Premine scores positively?
member
Activity: 63
Merit: 10
A few questions though:

If this indeed was/is a scam, then why

... does Dan still develop and push new betas to test?
... dosen't there exist posts saying they got scammed?
... does Dan reply to the bullsht and not just keep low?


Seems like an awful lot of trouble for the relatively few dollars invested into emunie compared to, say, Ethereum? - i mean, those guys got 18 million in bitcoin during their IPO and they have a contract that clears their back from actually delivering a fully functioning piece of code, let alone finish the product. Dan is doing 18-20 hr workdays and comes up with a lot of great ideas. The last one we are testing takes the blocktree-model and replaces it with a new way of thinking of the ledger. All in all, i hear it's kickass. It just dosen't make sense to put in so much work if you are going to run a scam??
sr. member
Activity: 420
Merit: 250
"to endure to achieve"
Fuserleer is no scammer.
All those who says so, will be begging to join eMunie when it hits the streets.
War of words over eMunie here in BCT will be a distant memory soon.
You can take almost any thread in here  and they all end up with a few strong-minded persons arguing. Myself included btw Smiley

A fun thought I always have in any forum: I can argue and dislike someone in a forum, but if I ever met that someone in real life it may turn out that we could be best of friends because our charisma is in tune/sync Smiley
sr. member
Activity: 265
Merit: 250
I've no problem with courteous and respectful questions, no matter the subject.  Outright accusations and aggressive ego's I never have and never will stand for and parties taking such an approach will be met with the same attitude in retaliation.

I believe in treating others as you yourself would like to be treated, and I do until provoked.  If people can't or don't abide by the same, then I have no problem taking off gloves Smiley


With your post history lol, ego to the point of several threats against this very forum (which btw the threads you make threats about still exist mr toughie), you come on to use to promote your scam.
sr. member
Activity: 700
Merit: 250
Vave.com - Crypto Casino

1. I think IX's point is that demand is not constant and can move up or down.  BTC has a constant supply generation that cant react to, nor cares about demand.  If you have a moving demand, but the supply is fixed, then it's down to the other variable in the equation to take up the difference, which is price.

2. That is similar in parallel to Gold, except we know the supply parameters of BTC, we don't with Gold.  The end result is the same though, no real control over supply of Gold just as with BTC, so the price is the only variable that can move.

3. Another similarity with BTC & Gold, is that while there is not control over supply, both can be bought and hoarded en mass leading to a bubble, and nothing can be done about it.

4. The above was one of the main reasons I decided to develop eMunie as opposed to doing something with BTC (plus the fact that the economic model is based on the medieval theory of "Value By Labour")

5. From a technical standpoint Bitcoin is genius.  As a tool to kickstart to decentralization of wealth, its genius.  From an economic standpoint, it sucks.

Fuserleer, I must confess that Ix's dismissive attitude towards Satoshi, Bitcoin and the community as a whole was what prompted me to engage him in the first place.

1. I've heard similar arguments before, and I was interested to see which direction he will take. Resolving the pressure of demand with inflation (creating new product units) diminishes both the real and perceived value of the product. I think we've all learned that from fiats, yes?

2. The single similarity doesn't really justify the "barf" remark. Bitcoin is revolutionary. It's a fact.

3. I think the same can be said of any product - unless someone has found a loophole in the law of supply and demand.

4. I take it you mean the labor theory of value? I am very interested to see how you've developed a currency model using ltv. I'll probably check it out.

5. I disagree. Bitcoin has lost one of its central tenets - decentralization, which has effectively crippled its wider adoption. However, Satoshi's entire model as a whole is still revolutionary, as was his code.

Heh I noticed, he's been here as long as me, and probably taken as much shit.  It wears you out Smiley

1.  True inflation does erode the real and perceived value, but so does allowing demand to be countered by wild price swings and bubbles, as then no one has a damn clue what it should be worth.  Ultimately that is the same thing, loss of faith, loss of value.

2.  Perhaps not, and I agree for the most part that it is indeed a revolutionary technology.  That doesn't mean though that it's got everything right, and something else isn't going to replace it that does a better overall job.  Look at almost any technological innovation in history, the first out the door is nearly ALWAYS succeeded by something else bigger, faster, better.

3.  There are no loopholes as such, but there are actions which you can take which cover the short term "bumps", yet allow the long term to pan out as the market commands.  This is something I'm working on and is one of the unique features of eMunie (damn, I knew this thread would keep spiraling here Sad )

4.  
Yes I am referring to the Karl Manx labor theory of value, and no I haven't developed a model that uses it as its inefficient and not required for what our crypto "movement" as a whole is trying to achieve.  I was stating that Bitcoin resembles very closes that theory, whether intended or not I do not know, but regardless it is a consequence of the POW used to secure the network.

5.  Agree also, it has lost it, but that wasn't the point I was trying to make.  It doesn't matter if it has lost that decentralized aspect or not, fact remains it kickstarted an entire industry which revolves around disruptive decentralized technology, so its still genius Smiley

I misunderstood item 4. I thought you meant eMunie, when it was the other way around.  Wink
sr. member
Activity: 700
Merit: 250
Vave.com - Crypto Casino
As far as I am concerned, I am responding directly to your statements.

No, you aren't, you are responding to what you think I said. You conflated my opinions on bitcoin the protocol/code and bitcoin the economic system even though I carefully separated them.
You also claimed that I said something like "satoshi fractured the community" which is definitely not what I said. I said he set a bad precedent - anonymous head of a pyramid scheme is what I was implying based on the prior sentence. I did not say that Satoshi fractured it, but that his precedent led to the inevitability of it.

If you say so.
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