There is a study that says that 70% of people who win the lottery lose their winnings in a few years. The missing link is financial education and temperance. Luck won't confer you any of those. You earn financial education by  studying and executing strategies while temperance, well... that's a virtue that is much harder to gain.

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Hello, I'm going to have some free time the next weeks so I can restart my contributions to the Bitcointalk community. Would love to work with you, Royse, again. Happy holidays, everyone!

Current number of post (Including this one): 4092
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Merit earned in the last 120 days: 3

Reserved. I shall post my review in a few hours.

REPORT

Platform login was straightforward. I like that metamask clearly specifies the permissions granted to the app.

UI
Clean, modern interface at first glance.
Suggestion: Change the font color of the notifications. The nuances are close to each other and that it makes them harder to read.




Features

Chat – I really dig this feature as it allows the two parties to communicate privately without the need of a phone number, photo or a name. Just two addresses with humans behind them. Great for those who value privacy.

My hypothetical case study for testing Zenland

I'm with my car in The Hague and I want to use the services of a company that provides ferry-boat transfers to England. The company agent managing my account is named John.
They accept using Zenland as an escrow platform. This way I can pay with crypto while also being safe - I will only spend my money if the other party meets the condition to get me safely to the specified port in England in the agreed timeframe.

Steps:
- John sent me the bsc address of the company
- I created the smart contract on the Zenland platform using a really user-friendly (no-code) template
- I set the Agreed amount to be 10 BUSD
- Zenland fee is transparently displayed (Suggestion: I would love to see the estimated network fees as well before creating the contract.)
- The contractor (seller) reviewed and approved my smart contract in a matter of minutes by logging on Zenland using his credentials.
- I deployed the contract on the blockchain with the click of a button.
- Before embarking on the ferry, I transferred the agreed amount to the contract address (again by clicking a simple button on the platform).
- I arrived in England 1h:30 later than expected so I decided to dispute the contract to get back a part of my money (after all time is money and the seller assured me that I'll be there by 6:00PM)
- I was able to dispute the contract even if the buyer protection time expired - citation from documentation: "This time is known as buyer protection time. At any point during this time, the Contractee is able to dispute the case for the reasons listed above.
The dispute request** will stop the buyer protection time countdown, and prevent the Contractor from releasing funds by the end of it. The purpose of doing so is to let the Contractee reach out to the other party to discuss disagreements and settle the issue between the two parties." - Question: is this a bug?
- I chatted with the seller and they agreed to reimburse me 20% of the funds (2 BUSD). However I haven't found any option on the platform to change the terms of the contract (Suggestion)
- I gave the seller a 5-star rating and a text feedback for having good customer service.

You might think that it is a long list of steps, but the process is very simple and straightforward on the platform. There is information on everything and they also have a well-structured documentation.

I hope my suggestions help you further develop the platform. Now that I have tested Zenland, it is something that I'd use IRL. I can definitely see its utility. However I'm still wary about smart contract integrity. I know you're still in beta, but for further assurance I'd like to see some reputable third-party audits on them.

Telegram username: @chris_skyleaf
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Network: Binance Smart Chain - Testnet

Username: ChrisPop
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Bitcointalk Username: ChrisPop
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I'm sure that the president has access to councilors in regards to managing the country's finances. But you've got to understand that no one can predict what will happen to the price. You can be the biggest financial advisor in the country, you still don't have a crystal ball in your pocket. Anyways, I don't think the 1771 BTC the country owns represent a significant amount in its treasury.

Anyways El Salvador is not in a 'rosy' situation having 82.6% of GDP in debt. For every $1 of GDP they have to pay around 5 cents just to cover the interest (~5%). In comparison, the United States only pays ~1.6% of GDP in interest expenses.

I think it would be useful to expand a little bit on this. Why does trading produce considerably more emotional stress than gambling?

I would say that is because there is much more decision on the part of the player/trader. In gambling you place your money and you get an outcome almost instantly. In trading you can leave your position running for seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, etc. You are the one who makes the calls - where to take profit, where to cut the loss, when to add to the position and when to hedge. This is on top of the analysis that (I hope) precedes your trade decision.

We all know that the current financial system based on centrally controlled fiat currencies has its flaws. We go through booms and busts. After the economic problems caused by the COVID pandemic and the instability generated by the international conflicts we should expect recessions, even depressions and possibly civil wars (we already have military wars *ukraine and pressure is on Taiwan as well)

Thanks for documenting the tweets, but something tells me this is just the beginning. People in developed are facing difficulties with keeping up their lifestyle. Think about the third world countries where wages are exponentially smaller. Let's not forget that the winter hasn't come yet. That's when most of the casualties happen.

If you have free time to dedicate to Bitcoin's growth you can certainly come up with something. Here are just a few suggestions:

As an average joe you can...

• Share your experience with your friends, tell them about the time you payed with lightning network and how did that feel
• Contribute to discussions on forums, social media groups and posts, etc.

As a business owner you can...

• offer discounts to people who pay with Bitcoin - i.e. you own a coffee shop and you organise a Bitcoin promo --> pay with Bitcoin and you get a 10% discount. That would not only incentivize people to start using Bitcoin, but if you keep it running they would get used to it. Moreover you might also get some tax benefits depending on where you live (check with a cpa). Another type of promo you can organize is a lottery with a prize --> each customer who pays in Bitcoin will have his address entered into a sweepstake where the random winner gets free coffee for a year or smth like that. Be creative!
• simply advertising that you accept Bitcoin as a payment method is more than enough to make your contribution

This remains to be seen...

If you are conservative trader you should generally wait for confirmation. A candle close above ~$22.5k preferably with decent volume would be a signal for me that we are ready to move to the next resistance - perhaps the $28k level. But the type of confirmation you wait for (horizontal break, ema intersection, stochastic cross, etc.) should be subjective to your own trading strategy.

Here's a better word of advice: before doing anything related to your finances, read a couple of books on financial education. It certainly doesn't hurt. This way you will expand your financial vocabulary and learn how important it is to not lose money and to read the T&Cs (contract). You can't be with your head in the clouds when managing your money. That is a serious skill that few master.

Loan apps have their use in the economy, otherwise they wouldn't have become popular. But yet, someone who knows how to manage their money will rarely (maybe never) have to resort to them. What I would be careful instead is how they handle your personal data. I suppose they asked your friend for KYC. It is a good practice to try to minimize the amount of companies who have copies of your personal data. You can't just rely on their word that they will respect the law. See what happened in China...

I've followed the train of thought in this thread. If Bitcoin reaches national reserve status in more open-minded countries the polarization with the ones who have banned it will be massive. I'd say that Bitcoin is certainly not an asset that you want your country to miss out on. Not with the macro implications that come with its development as a store of value.

As far as I am concerned Feng Shui is just another superstition. I would even go as far as comparing it to people who suffer from OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder) who, in many cases, have a need for order and to follow certain patterns of behaviour before doing an activity.

The effectiveness of Feng Shui on gambling can be easily verified with a study. Grab a bunch of people, note who follows Feng Shui, who doesn't and track their gambling performance. On a large enough scale I'm sure there will be no difference between the two groups. Otherwise the casinos would have gone bankrupt 

I don't doubt that cost of production is a factor that influences the actions of market participants (miners especially). Logically when the cost of production grows and the price of Bitcoin drops or remains stable they will increase the amount of BTC they sell to cover their operational expenses. However, because due to the limited nature of the supply the miners' impact on the market will likely drop as institutional adoption increases.

No, this is not right. A completely decentralized society is an utopian dream. Going to the roots we as humans are social creatures. We need to leave in society. You can't just condemn the ones who were born with lower intelligence or who are handicaped in any way. That is why we need to pay taxes  --> to maintain somehow of an equilibrium in the society + fund public property and services like police, firemen, doctors, etc.

Polarization of society classes creates conflicts, very ugly ones I might add. I think the best way is to find a balance between centralization and decentralization. The financial system is especially broken creating big problems so Bitcoin might be the solution for it, indeed.

There is no doubt that that keeping the identity of Bitcoin anonymous has been a very smart strategy. But even if the real identity of Satoshi would be discovered that doesn't change Bitcoin's design, features and of course its +13 years of history.

God only knows how would the history of this cryptocurrency have flown if politicians and bad intentioned actors have had someone to "blame" for the success.