My kitty has a microchip in him, of which variety I do not know.

Help me brainstorm using my cat as a cold storage bitcoin wallet solution.

Serious question: IF someone were to ever step up to claim they are Satoshi Nakamoto, is there anything built into bitcoin that would work as undeniable proof? i.e. is there a known public key that would allow verification of a signed message?

Try: bitcoinwatch.com

Wonder if he's ever seen this?

http://blog.ponoko.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/04/hypecycle.png

I'd certainly donate. That software is a lifesaver, but I'm a little too paranoid to have "Truecrypt" written in stone on my credit card statement.

Similar story here. I kept fairly quiet about it, but somehow I keep getting stopped in the halls and asked things like "hey, you're really into Bitcoin aren't you?". A few have asked if they should get into mining with GPUs, which always ends up being a half-hour discussion about difficulty increases, ROI, hashrates of various hardware configurations, etc. I don't proselytize ASICs, usually, as I really don't want to be responsible for the potential buyer's remorse of buying a BFL ASIC. 

As for the girlfriend, she got a bit fussy in 2011 when NewEgg's packages arrived and I spent a solid 72 hours pumped full of adderall building out my 6950 rigs. That ended around the same time we had a fully bitcoin-funded weekend getaway. I gave her 5BTC back in February with the option to cash them out or keep them as an investment. She kept 'em, and I pretty much have a free pass to do whatever bitcoin-related activities I want now.

She even has Zhou Tonged's "Holding" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NG1qooBzE2w) just about memorized now, huehuehue.

Yeah, Luke, you need to be very clear here buddy. I wasn't picking teams before, but your posts are well within the definition of "intentionally misleading" if you don't have an actual, physical BFL ASIC sitting in your possession.

Hell, I live 15 minutes from their office. Will do daily checkups for hire

Yeah, this doesn't apply if you're using a dead drop or a very good mail forwarder.

P.S. What the heck does "floor 1" mean?

Turn off ad-block!

But really, as far as BFL is concerned I don't see anything updated since 3/15. What gives!? Surely my conspiracy theory cannot be true

 

Chooo Chooooo, here comes the bullshit conductor!

I encourage anyone who has sent thousands of USD/BTC to this man to take a look at Dr. Paul Eckman's work in microexpressions and deception. I was his protégé for several years in a West Coast research facility (this was before the whole Lie to Me series that he inspired), so I have a fair bit of knowledge in this arena.

Let me put it this way: if I was still teaching, I would use this video as a textbook example of extreme masked contempt and happiness. The contempt is obvious, of course, but an interesting point about these emotions - when shown together and masked - is that they are highly correlated with deep-seated deception and feelings of "smugness".

This is just an observation, and the thing about microexpression reading is that it is prone to error in both interpretation and recognition if not performed by a train professional (and the interpretation is always prone to error). I just think it's worthy to note.

Now go read this thread for some more fun insights (not specific to BFL, just in general): https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=156501.0

THANK YOU to Gator-hex for posting this - I was looking for this case. This is precisely what I am getting at with this post - it may sound ludicrous to us who are pro-Bitcoin that it would be a "unique form of domestic terrorism", but the facts are right there in case and statutory Federal law. Even if they weren't, this is a two-part Doom Scenario and the legal portion is only 50% of the risk equation.

I am not claiming that everyone who buys a BFL/Avalon/whichever ASIC is going to be indicted by any means. You are, however, exposing yourself to two very enticing scenarios for two powerful agencies: 1.) devaluation of the hardware you've purchased by a profiteering company pumping and dumping bitcoin, and 2.) collaboration with a government entity seeking to hand down a few (or hundreds) of indictments based on established Federal case law/statutory law. When you buy an ASIC and use your real information, you have irrevocablylinked your name and shipping address as a motivated, financially-capable, and key player in the Bitcoin movement. This is the language of the Department of Justice, not myself.

When you make this association between yourself and Bitcoin, you must realize that the change in legal angle from the von Nothaus case to someone purposefully and willing purchasing hardware with the explicit purpose of "minting" coins is but a few degrees of difference. In addition, you must realize the massive economic incentive for these companies to leverage your investment to fuck you over, and in doing so they would have zero criminal or civil repercussions for their actions. If you listen to, understand, and accept these risks then I have done my job and I am glad that I was able to better inform your decision.

An important piece of evidence was brought to my attention via PM: It takes but a brief search on this very forum to reveal the complete and utter disdain that one of these companies' chief spokesperson holds for the community at large. This is drawing much less suspicion than it rightfully should. This is huge. This is not the way a new company acts toward it's customers.

I started this thread in a lighthearted way, but the PMs I have received have brought a very sour realization of the evidence that actually exists for some variation of the scenario described being in action at this moment.

The government involvement was mainly icing on the cake - the most profitable route still exists with nearly the same negative effects: pump and dump the value, deliver the hardware as promised, and walk away with no civil/criminal liability.

That being said, I would say Bitcoin is one of the best tax evasion strategies ever created if/when the volatility is negated.

The dataset may not be useful precisely for the purpose of prosecuting right now (although I am positive that purchasing ANY sort of mining hardware is an indictable offense - the intent is what matters and that's an open-and-shut case given the specific purpose of an ASIC [unless you want to try arguing to a jury that you bought a SHA256 hasher for something else - be my guest]). However, that dataset is unarguably a master list of the points I mentioned in my first post: intelligent folks with financial resources and proven intent to participate in aforementioned activities.

But again, divorcing the government angle from this argument, you still have tons of incentive + opportunity for a ASIC hardware company to run a pretty big ruin on individuals and the network alike.

Actually you would need only a small percentage of the ~700m USD market capitalization to severely effect the exchange rate. But the real threat is a 51% attack, destabilization of the exchange rate, and - most importantly - the extremely valuable dataset of every pre-orderer's name and address.

You know, now that I think about it, it would be trivial for the government to indict an ASIC company right before they start shipping. Through the discovery and asset seizure processes, they'd be able to snatch all the ASICs and pre-order lists and do what they please. This would be a bit more nefarious from the government's angle, but I assess it as a higher possibility than collaboration between an ASIC co. and the government from Day 1.

On the other hand, collaboration from Day 1 would be a higher likelihood if the government already had an upper hand/bargaining position on an owner of the company (e.g. the person is a felon, on probation or parole, former military, or something along those lines).

Such language is standard-issue spin terminology for getting those less-informed/less able to be informed/less capable of being informed to join the pitchfork party.

It's a thought experiment, not a reflection of my actual thinking.

That being said, the issue of whether Bitcoin is or is not a "threat to national economic activities" has less to do with reality and more to do with how governments decide to label it. I'm no conspiracy nut, but when motive and opportunity meet with no legal recourse, it is in your best interest to examine where that path leads.


One such popular ASIC hardware company has this to say about canceling pre-orders: "Payments made for pre-orders of ASIC based products now under development should be considered non-refundable until products begin shipping or 1 January 2013, whichever is earlier."

Sorry to self-bump, but I realized this might be better-suited for Economics or Mining Hardware discussion.

Mods, please move at your discretion.

Awesome, exactly the sort of insight I was looking for. The technical angle is what appeals to me, but likely won't resonate with the type of person that is asking for information.

Here's a fun little scenario I came up with the other day. Below I describe the most profitable business model for an ASIC hardware company to follow if they are looking to solely maximize profit without regard to protecting the Bitcoin network.

I sincerely hope for the sake of Bitcoin that no company decides to go this route - but where there is massive profit potential with no legal repercussions, there's fire:

Step 1. Recruit the team needed to make a legitimate ASIC offering

Step 2. Get in bed with SEC/FBI/[whatever three-letter agency that wants to see Bitcoin fail while painlessly hiding their involvement in it's failure]

Step 3. Start taking pre-orders and begin furnishing all pre-order information (full names, addresses, payment info) to the given Three Letter Agency. Three Letter Agency now has a dataset containing a very large portion of the United States population that could be considered a legitimate threat to national economic activities. To make it into this list of pre-orders, it implies the following about you:

a.) you have a significant interest in anonymous, decentralized cryptocurrency (this could be argued as an interest in "anti-economic activities" depending on which Three Letter Agency and their interests)
b.) you have the resources to invest significant sums of cash into these "anti-economic activities"
c.) you possess a higher-than-average intelligence and capacity for critical thinking, and further
d.) you have taken definitive and documented action to utilize the above resources to further your interests in these activities (placing a pre-order for a mining device)

Step 4. Continue collecting large pre-order USD/BTC sums, assemble first batch of ASICs

Step 5. Slowly bring ASIC units online in different pools (maybe even your OWN mining pool for maximum control!) as well as solo-mining, and begin funneling your mined BTC to a central location

Step 6. Delay, delay, delay as long as possible to maximize mined BTC profits and lure in any stragglers for pre-orders

Step 7. At some point - the "tipping point" as I will refer to it - you announce that you are on the verge of delivering on all pre-orders. Several important things now happen:

a.) Take your substantial USD assets and artificially inflate the exchange rate (the "pump")
b.) Hold this exchange rate long enough to create a massive bid wall at a desirable USD rate
c.) Execute the "dump" at this favorable exchange rate, turning your pile of BTC into a monolithic pile of USD

Step 8. Congratulations! You've devalued BTC massively, walked away with pre-order profits + mining profits, all amplified by massive and controlled speculation, and to top it all off you got some extra cash from Three Letter Agency and a Get out of Jail Free card for playing ball with them. Now all you have to do is deliver on the (now essentially worthless) hardware, and you have mitigated all your civil suit liability as well!

BONUS ROUND: Do a 51% attack right before delivering to really upset folks' confidence in the market
BONUS ROUND 2: Cancel orders and return BTC to their owners (although they're hardly worth anything now). Continue 51% attacks to keep Bitcoin from recuperating!


I hope you all have enjoyed my theoretical scenario, and I'll look forward to your comments and speculations. Oh, I am so totally not writing this to implicate any specific company either, in case anyone was drawing correlations that I did not intend.