Quote from: Quickseller on May 16, 2015, 06:27:02 AM

No. Bitcoin is a decentralized system where people do not need to trust a third party in order to send money to the third party. Either you need to trust the third party, or the third party needs to trust you if you are to send money to the third party.

Are you just not hearing yourself? In one sentence you say Bitcoin is a decentralized system where people do not need to trust a third party, then the very next sentence says "Either you need to trust the third party or the third party needs to trust you." Those statements are contradictory and is indicative of the fact that you don't understand how bitcoin works. I will touch more on that below.

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No. The Bitcoin protocol says that a node will process all transactions unless the transaction is invalid. This means that even if a scam transaction is valid, it will be included in the next block (assuming that the pool's tx policy allows such transaction to be included based on it's tx policy, the size of the tx fee and the size of the tx). The fact that a tx is potentially part of a scam will not at all be considered when deciding if a tx will be accepted/confirmed or not.

Again, you are mistaken and clearly do not understand how bitcoin works. Let me cite an example for you:

Code:

static struct BlacklistEntry BlacklistedPrefixes[] = {
{0x06f1b600, 0x06f1b6ff, "SatoshiDice"},
{0x74db3700, 0x74db59ff, "BetCoin Dice"},
{0xc4c5d791, 0xc4c5d791, "CHBS"}, // 1JwSSubhmg6iPtRjtyqhUYYH7bZg3Lfy1T
};
...
const char *CScript::IsBlacklisted() const
{
if (this->size() >= 7 && this->at(0) == OP_DUP)
{
// pay-to-pubkeyhash
uint32_t pfx = ntohl(*(uint32_t*)&this->data()[3]);
unsigned i;

for (i = 0; i < (sizeof(BlacklistedPrefixes) / sizeof(BlacklistedPrefixes[0])); ++i)
if (pfx >= BlacklistedPrefixes[i].begin && pfx <= BlacklistedPrefixes[i].end)
return BlacklistedPrefixes[i].name;
}

return NULL;
}

In this example, someone does not like, trust or agree with Satoshidice, Betcoin dice and one other entity. So they choose not to process their transactions. That is a user driven choice. That is not enforced by any central authority. I could also choose not to relay any blocks that contain those type of transactions. Another user driven choice, not controlled by any central authority.

So I'm sorry, but you are completely wrong. The Bitcoin protocol says "You may process what you wish." It does not say you WILL process every transaction whether you want to or not. I could, in fact, choose to process ZERO transactions, ever. That would be a user driven choice, not enforced by any central authority.

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Lack of experience. The fact that, for all intensive purposes Bitcoin transactions cannot be reversed, and that for all intensive purposes, that Bitcoin transactions are anonymous changes the landscape in which scams happen. If I were to accept a check from someone after personally checking their ID (in person) then I most likely could take them to court and/or press criminal charges then the check turns out to be somehow fraudulent, while the same cannot be said with bitcoin deals.

And this is where I start having trouble taking you seriously. Did you seriously just type "For all intensive purposes" not once, but twice? But I digress...

Bitcoin is no different than a check. You can choose to not accept a bitcoin transaction from someone without first checking their ID if you wanted to... but that, again, is on YOU. Not dictated by some central authority. In fact, I'm not sure why you even brought this up, since bitcoin and "check" are synonymous in this context. You can choose to do or not do what you wish when accepting either a check or a bitcoin transaction. You are not forced into either action and bitcoin does not default you to accepting certain nodes as being more trustworthy than other nodes, like the DefaultTrust does.

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In order to use escrow, you need to know who is trustworthy enough to trust them with your money. Without a good trust system to allow me to make this determination then using escrow is worthless. As mentioned previously, in a decentralized system, the scammers will appear trustworthy, so scammers would simply start offering escrow services and would steal money via escrow.

What? Again, do you even realize what you are writing? How is the trust system any more trustworthy to Joe Random User than looking for a reputable escrow system? The DefaultTrust has scammers in it. The DefaultTrust has outdated entries in it. The DefaultTrust is no better than an educated investigation, but also provides a false sense of security, making it a worse scenario.

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A good number of the scams are here are far from amateur. A good number of them are pretty advanced and take a good amount of research to detect.

Oh please. The word "scam" is thrown around far too often to be of any meaningful value, but the fact of the matter is even basic due dilligence and precautions would protect anyone from any of the scams or so-called scams we have seen on the forum to date. If you are unable to understand that, you have, liked I said, larger problems to worry about.

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As mentioned above, it is primarily the lack of experience that allows people to get scammed.

Piggybacking on my previous example of accepting a check from someone, if I were to sell my car and accept a check from someone, then after the check bounces for whatever reason, then I could have the title reversed back into my name after proving that I never received payment and could report the car as being stolen.

Fine, it's a lack of experience. So how does the DefaultTrust, being forced upon everyone, advancing that? The only people with green "trusted" ratings are those that have dealt with Tier 1 and Tier 2 members. Are you seriously proposing that newbies only deal with Tier 1, Tier 2 and that small elite group that have also traded and been rated by those people? That seems rather parochial and elitist. Once again, you provide a fine example of the 1% saying everything is fine and everyone else can go fuck themselves because they are just whiners.

Believe it or not, people don't need your all-knowing Godlike hand to guide them. They can get a long just fine without your benevolence and guidance.

But I submit to you, if DefaultTrust works and is so great, why are there still so many scammers and crooks? Why is DefaultTrust still so important if it works? The answer is because it doesn't work. It doesn't prevent scams and it doesn't protect people. It just serves as an elitist 1% that know better than everyone else and they should guide the rabble!

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The use of a system where everyone's trust ratings are equally untrusted would be much worse. It would be impossible to tell which ratings are legitimate and whose are not.

And that's different from the current system, how? DefaultTrust leaves illegitimate ratings all the time. Untrusted leaves legitimate ratings all the time (far more often than DefaultTrust does). So basically if we take what you say at face value, DefaultTrust is exactly what you're arguing against. Right now, it's impossible to tell which ratings are legitimate and whose are not. Untrusted has hundreds of examples of legitimate ratings and DefaultTrust has hundreds of examples of illegitimate ratings, which by your definition makes it impossible to tell.

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I disagree. People who engage in this kind of practice tend to get removed from the default trust network pretty quickly. There are plenty of examples of people getting removed quickly after engaging in this kind of activity. There are also a lot of examples of people claiming abuse when there is really none that results in people not being removed - these people are almost universally scammers.

Of course you disagree, you are in the 1%. The people in power will never agree to remove themselves from a privileged position. They will go to great lengths to justify and rationalize their position and a need to keep the status quo. They will even go so far as to make contradictory statements and then fool themselves into believing what they are saying is not a logical fallacy, just as you are doing in this post. Then, when it's pointed out to them, they will either return with more illogical responses that don't stand up to even a modest amount of reason or resort to ad hominem attacks like Vod does.

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There is nothing that forces anyone to use it at all. However without it there would be nothing that would allow newer users from knowing who can be trusted and who should not be.

Yes there is. It is impossible to sign up on this forum without having DefaultTrust turned on. So newbies are forced to use it. To not be forced to use it, these things would have to take place:

1. The newbie would have to know DefaultTrust exists.
2. They would have to know what it is and what it does.
3. They would have to know how to remove it.

That is the bare minimum of knowledge required to not be forced into using the DefaultTrust network. That is a tall order for a newbie, if they are as naive and inexperienced as you say. However, if you don't think that's too big of a hurdle for a newbie to overcome, then by extension you must agree that the newbie is sophisticated enough to perform those steps. If so, then they are easily sophisticated enough to make their own decisions about trust and due dilligence on transactions, negating the need for DefaultTrust.

You can't have it both ways. Either the newbie is to inexperienced and naive to be trusted and they need your benevolent hand to guide them and consequently the act of disabling DefaultTrust is too complicated, so should not be enabled by default. Or they are sophisticated enough to turn it off and consequently don't need your all-knowing guidance.

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The people who freely give out positive ratings when nothing is risked for a single trade should be removed from the default trust network. If someone were to engage in this kind of practice then they will not be reputable and their ratings will not be taken seriously.

So why is it bad to freely give out positive ratings when not risking any trade but it's good to give out negative ratings when nothing was risked? Again, it's a contradictory position and you probably are completely blind to it. But the principal is sound and I agree with it. If you've never traded with an individual and risked anything, you should not be using the rating system to rate them, positive or negative. However, that would mean virtually everyone in the DefaultTrust gets removed, and that I agree with completely.