Quote from: bluemeanie1 on October 21, 2014, 11:12:21 PM

mostly, it's a philosophy that lives entirely on the Internet. You'll find it's greatest outspoken proponents are anons on twitter or random forums like this. Few people would confess such beliefs to their mother, that's for sure. It's a sort of attitude that builds up over time. I think a lot of these people, especially on here dont really transition their psychological state from playing violent video games to interacting on these forums. They say and do things they would never dream of in 'real life'. Sometimes I even think Ulbricht lost touch with reality at some point. People have said he spent all day on his laptop and never spoke with anyone.

If you get to know any of these cryptokids on here, it's a pretty typical profile. Young, no social life, loves video games, marginally employed, etc. They encounter another player-character in the forum video game that angers them, the solution is throw a grenade or fire rocket launchers. They just don't understand that theyre in public and they're accountable for their actions.

That is exactly the impression I got after spending 5 minutes on here. One of the first posts I saw was this big long explanation about Bitcoin and how I needed to be a member of World of Warcraft and how I needed to read Vorhees' blog to understand what Bitcoin is. I was thinking, "what the hell is this?" Most people would end their interest in Bitcoin right there. I was able to poke through all that and look at the technology but that is a difficult bridge to cross.

Theymos had a tremendous opportunity with this forum and look what he has done. People selling accounts, endless scams, etc. If you read his stuff about things like GLBSE he talks about virtual companies and I have often said he sounds like he lives his life in a video game. Almost nothing that goes on in this forum happens in the real world. One of these clowns advocated breaking into the FBI computers because he said they were too stupid to keep the Silk Road bitcoins secure. Guess where the guy works? For the State of Maryland. This stuff is beyond ridiculous. These people think that because they promoted Bitcoin early on that they know more than the rest of the world or that somehow everybody owes them something.

I also noticed that many here are not up on things outside of video games and reddit. It was comical to watch Ver and Vorhees say how great their honey badger billboard was. When people pointed out almost nobody in the general public will understand it they argued the opposite.

I also did a Bitcoin public event once at the Philly Punk Rock Flea market. Most of the Bitcoin Philly group would not come because I refused to allow them to hand out "Bitcoin Not Bombs" stuff at my table. I talked to a large number of people who mostly never heard of Bitcoin. Not a single person asked about collapsing banks, ending wars, replacing the dollar, or any of the other nonsense you see here on a daily basis. Just try it yourself.

I retired from my job as a federal employee of 27 years for the FAA.. I worked on research of explosives and weapons detection systems and then on information security requirements for large FAA systems. While I was a researcher rather than regulator I worked in the system for a long time, including 9 years in Washington, DC. I also participated in many of these public comment things involving privacy and I testified at a few FTC workshops such as the first couple "spam summits" back in the late 90's. I can say with absolute certainty that comments like Erik Vorhees makes about the Bitlicense and the motives of regulators is completely wrong and his meme-based arguments are going to be disregarded. He has a few correct points here and there but his arguments don't fit together. Patrick Murck is pretty good be he still works for the Foundation and Vessenes. Jerry Brito and Coincenter.org is the place to watch because he is good and I think he is independent or at least more independent than Murck.