Bitcoin, the war on cash, Clif High, and the NSA's long range plans

[Jayke]

I’ve been following the Chinese token ‘Red Pulse’ for the past couple weeks. The values already gone up 400% in that time but at 0.20 per token, there might still be time to get in on the action. Red Pulse is due to be listed on the Hong Kong cryptocurrency exchange, OKEx, in early January. Could be the next token to see a dramatic price surge over the 1.00 threshold.

[apokalypse]

this whole thing BTC reach 20+ by Jan/feb is BS? let alone 50k or 100k within 1-2 years..?

[Jayke]

Posted by apokalypse (here)
this whole thing BTC reach 20+ by Jan/feb is BS? let alone 50k or 100k within 1-2 years..?

Price is reflective of demand so it just depends how far the deep state wants to push it. I’m still seeing articles being released building bitcoin awareness, and still hearing people—who generally have no interest in conspiracy theory/alt media topics—eager to get started in bitcoin.

The media are currently bringing in their biggest authority pieces to promote bitcoin-style technology, like this article from yesterday...Bank of England to create own digital currency

I always thought 50k was optimistic but swinging between 20k and 10k could carry on for some time.

There’s a study that looks into lunar phases and stock returns (http://personal.lse.ac.uk/yuan/papers/lunar.pdf). It’s a full moon on the 2nd January. Full moons have historically proven to show lulls in stock market activity, new moons are when lots of the action happens (as new moons create a similar state of psychology to Mercury retrogrades). It’ll be easier to determine the fate of bitcoin at the end of January after the next wave of crypto-junkies get drawn into the marketplace.

[Michelle Marie]

Honestly, the Bitcoin thread is above my head!

Just visiting as per cross reference on Q thread.

Information processing is changing. That's what Paul and I were discussing, but I didn't want to change the subject over on the Q thread.

I'll try to review some posts and try to figure out what blockchain is...

MM

PS. Sounds like the stock market. I never played that, either. This is just not my forte!!!

[apokalypse]

Posted by Jayke (here)
The media are currently bringing in their biggest authority pieces to promote bitcoin-style technology, like this article from yesterday...Bank of England to create own digital currency

YES YES YES, it's all connected and makes sense now...i think Paul and/or someone else talked about this elites pushing crypto hard as testing phrase for new Monetary System. technology behind it is much more important which is Distributed Ledger Technology.

[Michelle Marie]

Posted by apokalypse (here)

Posted by Jayke (here)
The media are currently bringing in their biggest authority pieces to promote bitcoin-style technology, like this article from yesterday...Bank of England to create own digital currency

YES YES YES, it's all connected and makes sense now...i think Paul and/or someone else talked about this elites pushing crypto hard as testing phrase for new Monetary System. technology behind it is much more important which is Distributed Ledger Technology.

Do you have to recruit others, or are you recruited or locked in in any way?

What relationship exists between the owner and source of Bitcoin?

Is this currency dependent on electronic stability of some network or software program?

Sorry if these are basic questions, but I just haven't tried to understand this before.

I did look up the explanation and definitions and saw some pretty cool graphics.

MM

[Hervé]

From Jim Stone:

BOOM: RUSSIA HAS ANNOUNCED THE CRYPTO ROUBLE

Due to crippling sanctions imposed by other nations, Putin has commissioned a new crypto currency called the "Cryptorouble" and has assigned Russian programmers to make it happen.

From Coindesk:

"President Vladimir Putin has reportedly commissioned Russian officials to work on developing a national cryptocurrency dubbed the "cryptorouble."

According to the Financial Times, Sergei Glazev, an economic adviser to the president, told a government meeting that the cryptocurrency would serve as a "useful tool" to evade western economic sanctions.

Glazev explained:

"This instrument suits us very well for sensitive activity on behalf of the state. We can settle accounts with our counterparties all over the world with no regard for sanctions."

The adviser indicated that the cryptorouble would be equivalent to the rouble, but with its circulation "restricted in a certain way," and allowing the Kremlin to track its moves."

My [Jim Stone's] comment:
If Russia played this right, supporting the currency with the full protection of the Russian state, and then followed up with making sure people could actually use it, Google, Paypal, and all western "gates" to currency exchange and payment via the web would suddenly have to behave.

Google would not be able to get away with blacklisting web sites and banning ads that way (unless Chrome was specifically set up to cause it, which would mean lawsuits) and there would be an enormous rebound for not only Alt media, but for free trade in general.

If Putin could use this to circumvent international sanctions, joe blow could CERTAINLY, WITHOUT QUESTION, use it to circumvent Google evil. A fully Russian backed crypto could trigger a cascade of freedom.

Obviously there would be many people worried about "mark of the beast/electronic currency" implications, but if that matters, Visa and all other credit cards have turned cash into e-currency already. It would be nothing new.

[Callista]

HODL, HODL, HODL! From Clif High's Twitter just now:

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=JZYZoQQ6LJQ

[ThePythonicCow]

Posted by Desert Dreamer (here)
Do you have to recruit others, or are you recruited or locked in in any way?

What relationship exists between the owner and source of Bitcoin?

Is this currency dependent on electronic stability of some network or software program?

Bitcoin and the blockchain technology it is based on can be explained at several levels.

For a perhaps more familiar example, with wide reaching effect, consider the internal combustion engine and petroleum based energy. This can be studied at the basic technology levels, such as designing engines for trucks and cars, or the chemistry of refining petroleum into various products. But that would not begin to shed light on the effect that these technologies have had on human civilization in the century. My grandfather, in the horse and buggy era of his youth, in the late 19th century, could not have imagined the diverse and far reaching impacts of this technology that unfolded during the 20th century.

Blockchain technology is just one piece, one critical piece, of what I see shaping up as the electronic/digital nervous system of our civilization, as it extends out across this solar system.

Blockchain technology enables digitally connected devices (computers, smart phones, smart power meters, robots, satellites, refrigerators, thermostats, autos, planes, and so forth) to reliably share data and in particular to reach a consensus on what has happened and on what has been decided so far.

The first well known use for this technology is in implementing a variety of cryptocurrencies, of which Bitcoin was the first and remains the most well known.

Cryptocurrency ledgers keep track of who has how much of some cryptocurrency, and they record the transactions, as that cryptocurrency is exchanged between one holder and the next.

Unlike bank accounts, where one master computer at the bank tracks how much is in each account at that bank, and records transactions that credit or debit accounts, these blockchain based currencies have no central authority. Rather a consortium of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of independent people or groups of people each provide one or many computers for tracking the ledger of some cryptocurrency, and those computers essentially vote on which newly proposed transactions (say Desert Dreamer wants to send 0.001 Bitcoin to Paul -- Thanks!) are to be accepted and permanently recorded on the Bitcoin blockchain.

But that same blockchain technology, or variations of it (such as the radically more efficient algorithm at the heart of hashgraph) could enable a number of robots to work together to mine asteroids, a swarm of drones to fly like a flock of birds, or thousands of self-driving cars to coordinate their movements in the rush hour traffic in Los Angeles.

Civilization changing technologies are not isolated, but rather a complex interacting web of technologies combine to create the more substantial effects. Blockchain technology works with, and on top of, the digitized computer and communication technologies that have been transforming significant portions of our civilization for my entire life (I was born the month that Bell Labs announced the invention of the transistor.)

For the last five hundred years, the best tool for tracking accounts was double entry bookkeeping, which reduces the error rate by having every transaction recorded twice, as a debit from one account, and a corresponding credit to another account. This always assumes that some person or some institution owns the book ... is in control of the master ledger that tracks some set of accounts.

Blockchain technology is being used to keep ledgers (such as how many Bitcoin I have, a small fraction of one of them) without any central authority owning the Bitcoin ledger book.

Blockchain technology provides a distributed, consensual, ledger of events, of what has happened and of what has been agreed to.

[Michelle Marie]

Posted by Paul (here)

Posted by Desert Dreamer (here)
Do you have to recruit others, or are you recruited or locked in in any way?

What relationship exists between the owner and source of Bitcoin?

Is this currency dependent on electronic stability of some network or software program?

Bitcoin and the blockchain technology it is based on can be explained at several levels.

For a perhaps more familiar example, with wide reaching effect, consider the internal combustion engine and petroleum based energy. This can be studied at the basic technology levels, such as designing engines for trucks and cars, or the chemistry of refining petroleum into various products. But that would not begin to shed light on the effect that these technologies have had on human civilization in the century. My grandfather, in the horse and buggy era of his youth, in the late 19th century, could not have imagined the diverse and far reaching impacts of this technology that unfolded during the 20th century.

Blockchain technology is just one piece, one critical piece, of what I see shaping up as the electronic/digital nervous system of our civilization, as it extends out across this solar system.

Blockchain technology enables digitally connected devices (computers, smart phones, smart power meters, robots, satellites, refrigerators, thermostats, autos, planes, and so forth) to reliably share data and in particular to reach a consensus on what has happened and on what has been decided so far.

The first well known use for this technology is in implementing a variety of cryptocurrencies, of which Bitcoin was the first and remains the most well known.

Cryptocurrency ledgers keep track of who has how much of some cryptocurrency, and they record the transactions, as that cryptocurrency is exchanged between one holder and the next.

Unlike bank accounts, where one master computer at the bank tracks how much is in each account at that bank, and records transactions that credit or debit accounts, these blockchain based currencies have no central authority. Rather a consortium of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of independent people or groups of people each provide one or many computers for tracking the ledger of some cryptocurrency, and those computers essentially vote on which newly proposed transactions (say Desert Dreamer wants to send 0.001 Bitcoin to Paul -- Thanks!) are to be accepted and permanently recorded on the Bitcoin blockchain.

But that same blockchain technology, or variations of it (such as the radically more efficient algorithm at the heart of hashgraph) could enable a number of robots to work together to mine asteroids, a swarm of drones to fly like a flock of birds, or thousands of self-driving cars to coordinate their movements in the rush hour traffic in Los Angeles.

Civilization changing technologies are not isolated, but rather a complex interacting web of technologies combine to create the more substantial effects. Blockchain technology works with, and on top of, the digitized computer and communication technologies that have been transforming significant portions of our civilization for my entire life (I was born the month that Bell Labs announced the invention of the transistor.)

For the last five hundred years, the best tool for tracking accounts was double entry bookkeeping, which reduces the error rate by having every transaction recorded twice, as a debit from one account, and a corresponding credit to another account. This always assumes that some person or some institution owns the book ... is in control of the master ledger that tracks some set of accounts.

Blockchain technology is being used to keep ledgers (such as how many Bitcoin I have, a small fraction of one of them) without any central authority owning the Bitcoin ledger book.

Blockchain technology provides a distributed, consensual, ledger of events, of what has happened and of what has been agreed to.

Great explanation, Paul. Thank you for taking the time to help break in a "newbie" in this realm.

I was a bookkeeper before I was a teacher, and before accounts were computerized, so your analogy hits home--a knowledge structure I can fit these pieces into and build upon.

Is this like the opposite of the centralized banks? Spreading out the oversight and control so that it is fair for everyone?

Would it be wise to invest in a variety of crypto Currencies? Is it really risky, like playing the stock market?

Are there crypto advisors who handle currency portfolios?

I was in Europe just before the euro went into effect. I could go to a bank and exchange one currency for another, or get multiple currencies for various countries. How would you exchange differing crypto currencies?

Maybe I should start getting some crypto currencies, just so I can learn the system and figure out how to manage it. And, yes, I could just send you some for practice!!!

Thank you so much for providing information. You are so kind to do so, especially when I'm so far behind.

MM

Post Update: I'm getting some of these answers here...

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=eDQyj097Kl0

[ThePythonicCow]

Posted by Desert Dreamer (here)
Great explanation, Paul. Thank you for taking the time to help break in a "newbie" in this realm.

You're welcome!

Posted by Desert Dreamer (here)
I was a bookkeeper before I was a teacher, and before accounts were computerized, so your analogy hits home--a knowledge structure I can fit these pieces into and build upon.

Ah - good. It helps to have a touch point - something familiar.

Posted by Desert Dreamer (here)
Is this like the opposite of the centralized banks? Spreading out the oversight and control so that it is fair for everyone?

The ledger tracking for any particular blockchain can easily be distributed, so that anyone can participate in maintaining a copy of it.

Similarly, anyone can setup a Web Server ... I've setup a few of them, and Ilie has setup many more of them. However, 99% of all web users rely on the web servers that others have setup, rather than setting up their own.

Similarly, all users of cryptocurrencies on smartphones, and most users of cryptocurrencies on PC's, are relying on others to do the "heavy lifting" for them, on other, more powerful computers somewhere on the Web.

But as you might know from being a bookkeeper, it's not the bookkeeper that gets rich. It's the corporate and banking elite and a few other such that get rich.

Similarly, managing a distributed ledger using blockchain technology is not itself a core power position. Blockchain will disenfranchise some bank tellers and ATM repairmen, but the key power positions are in the creation of money, not its accounting.

I fully expect that money creation will continue to be done by the big banks, lending new money into existence to individuals, corporations and governments. Such "debt-money" has been a major, if not the most major, control mechanism of human civilization for many centuries, and I fully expect that it will continue to be so.

I expect that the day will soon come when one can go to a bank and get a Bitcoin (or whatever national cryptocurrency is used locally) loan, in the way that one gets a Dollar (or whatever is fiat currency is used locally now) loan.

Posted by Desert Dreamer (here)
Would it be wise to invest in a variety of crypto Currencies? Is it really risky, like playing the stock market?

If you had say $50 or $100 that you were willing to set a match to, just to see the color of the flames, then you might start your crypto journey by buying some crypto (one particular cryptocurrency) instead.

Then if that money grows, or if you have more money you want to risk, one can add some more cryptos to ones portfolio.

Posted by Desert Dreamer (here)
Are there crypto advisors who handle currency portfolios?

I am not aware of any such. The crypto market is still in its infancy stage, with wild swings and massive changes. Professional Investment Advisors are a phenomenon that show up in more mature markets

Posted by Desert Dreamer (here)
I was in Europe just before the euro went into effect. I could go to a bank and exchange one currency for another, or get multiple currencies for various countries. How would you exchange differing crypto currencies?

There are exchanges where one can buy and sell cryptocurrencies, as one might buy and sell other items over the Internet. I currently have accounts on several exchanges, including Coinbase, Gemini, Kraken and Binance.

As with opening bank accounts, one usually has to produce copies of things such as drivers licenses or passports, to satisfy the "Know Your Customer" (KYC) regulations and to prove who you are.

The biggest losses and fraud in the cryptocurrency world have been with these exchanges. People will leave their crypto on deposit with an exchange, so that they can quickly and easily exchange it with other cryptocurrencies, and sell it for currency. There have been several cases of major losses on these exchanges, including some complete failures. There is no insurance, government or private, backing these exchanges. If you have crypto on deposit with an exchange, and it suddenly fails ... then ...your crypto is gone.

Posted by Desert Dreamer (here)
Maybe I should start getting some crypto currencies, just so I can learn the system and figure out how to manage it. And, yes, I could just send you some for practice!!!

Any cryptocurrencies sent to me by fellow Avalon members would be normally considered to be a donation to the forum, which I would send along to Bill, in the form (Paypal) that works for him.

[Carmody]

Ripple is now fully at 50% of Bitcoin's market cap, and that's new ground that has never been seen before.

It is causing Ripple to take off like a rocket. Of course, part of that rocket is the 50% market cap of Bitcoin but the average dude won't see that, they'll just see that line being crossed for the first time.

The bell begins to toll for Bitcoin. Due to investment in it, within extant financial infrastructure, it will likely fight back, but there is not much to be done.

As stated, figure out your given bitcoin exit strategy and be ready to enact it or begin enacting it.

This is just advice to be considered, it is not designed to be a replacement for your own brains and decisions.

[Michelle Marie]

Paul,

That's exactly what I was thinking...

You said

If you had say $50 or $100 you would be willing to set a match to...

And that is how I've been with gambling at casinos. I only gamble the amount of money I'm willing to lose on order to play. Then I usually quit while I'm ahead and profit very little, or see how many hours I can have fun within my budget.

I've researched wallets, and I think I'm going to get the hardware kind. It seems you don't have to be associated with a bank. I hope I'm right on that one. I avoid dealing with banks. They just cash my checks. I don't have a credit card or debit card.

It might take awhile to get started, but I'm going to do it. I'm going back into local consulting to earn some extra bucks. My base income is not sufficient.

If it weren't for you, piquing my curiosity about crypto-currencies, I would have never gone down this road.

Again, I want to thank you.

I'll let you know when I get my wallet.

MM

[ThePythonicCow]

Posted by Paul (here)
Blockchain technology is just one piece, one critical piece, of what I see shaping up as the electronic/digital nervous system of our civilization, as it extends out across this solar system.

I was explaining this to my son, Sam, earlier this evening, and he responded with an interesting question.

He figured that it would take more than just distributed blockchain ledgers to colonizing and mining the solar system, and asked what other technology would be needed.

We came up with the following list:

• Advanced propulsion ... chemical rockets won't cut it.
• Advanced energy ... petro fired engines won't cut it (giant oil tankers in space ... I don't think so.)
• Extraterrestrial politics ... public awareness of and interactions with alien beings.
• AI (artificial intelligence) ... smart bots will be doing most of the work, semi-independently.
• Distributed information sharing and decision making ... by these smart bots, on variants of blockchain technology.
• 3D printing ... so the smart bots can replicate and repair and adapt.
• Virtual reality and smartphones ... moving humanity onto a digital network in which smart bots can participate as equals.
• More unified human political world ... refocus our aggressive, colonizing, resource extraction energies off planet.

I see dramatic advances happening in all these areas, and already being made widely visible to the public in all but the first three of these areas.

[ThePythonicCow]

.
Now, in light of my previous post, just above, listen to this interview of Stan Larimer, currently running BitShares (which was originally created by his son, Dan).

Notice that Stan spent 40 years with defense contractors, developing drone technology, and notice that he repeatedly talks up the reliability and efficiency of a swarm of reliable bots handling one's financial transactions, rather than current financial institutions that are subject to fraud and favoritism, and that are much slower and more expensive than a second generation cryptocurrency network, such as BitShares, can provide.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=iNglDNm7BtQ

I find it a small leap of imagination to extend Stan Larimer's expertise out into our solar system, using swarms of mining and manufacturing robots, self replicating using 3D printers and intelligently adapting to the local situation.

I would fully expect that the US military-industrial sector would be heavily into such an expansion out into the solar system, and I find it not surprising that a former long time employee of them is now leading one of the early public development efforts for one piece of the required technology.

The key connection for me, between Bitcoin and colonizing/mining the solar system with mostly smart robots is captured in this quip:

On the Blockchain, nobody knows you're a bot.

The ability for bots and other devices, some small and numerous, to work together, share information, and reach a reliable consensus, rapidly and efficiently, will be a very valuable ability, and this ability has a key technology piece, that is evident in Leemon Baird's hashgraph patents. Well ... very evident to me at least ... I have been a published, professional, expert in earlier variants of similar such technology.

[leavesoftrees]

Posted by Paul (here)
.
Now, in light of my previous post, just above, listen to this interview of Stan Larimer, currently running BitShares (which was originally created by his son, Dan).

Notice that Stan spent 40 years with defense contractors, developing drone technology, and notice that he repeatedly talks up the reliability and efficiency of a swarm of reliable bots handling one's financial transactions, rather than current financial institutions that are subject to fraud and favoritism, and that are much slower and more expensive than a second generation cryptocurrency network, such as BitShares, can provide.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=iNglDNm7BtQ

I find it a small leap of imagination to extend Stan Larimer's expertise out into our solar system, using swarms of mining and manufacturing robots, self replicating using 3D printers and intelligently adapting to the local situation.

I would fully expect that the US military-industrial sector would be heavily into such an expansion out into the solar system, and I find it not surprising that a former long time employee of them is now leading one of the early public development efforts for one piece of the required technology.

The key connection for me, between Bitcoin and colonizing/mining the solar system with mostly smart robots is captured in this quip:

On the Blockchain, nobody knows you're a bot.

The ability for bots and other devices, some small and numerous, to work together, share information, and reach a reliable consensus, rapidly and efficiently, will be a very valuable ability, and this ability has a key technology piece, that is evident in Leemon Baird's hashgraph patents. Well ... very evident to me at least ... I have been a published, professional, expert in earlier variants of similar such technology.

I heard an interview the other day where the guy was saying that there won't be just self driving taxis, but the taxi robot will own itself, making decisions to reap the most amount of profit for itself. Becomes even more terrifying if these bots are out trawling the solar system

[ThePythonicCow]

.
I started a new thread, over on the Secret Space Program forum, entitled What specific technologies and other advances are needed, for humans to colonize the solar system? using my above two posts, Post #274 and Post #275.

[apokalypse]

once you join investment world in these kind of stuff like stock, it really play your emotion. before put my money into crypto able to accurate predict the prices with technical drawing and now getting nervous. just sold bitcoin and buying on the dip...that whole feeling and i can truly see why people who suicide from invest in stuff like stock.

from newbie experience just put money in and HOLD...waiting for the dip put money back in join the fun.

thanks Paul and this thread really open my eyes answer my question why crypto and behind crypto...now i consider it's all about technology behind crypto not about cryptocurrency like bitcoin.

[SiriusB]

I heard an interview the other day where the guy was saying that there won't be just self driving taxis, but the taxi robot will own itself, making decisions to reap the most amount of profit for itself.

Thats correct. That why they gave the A.I. Sophia the Saudi Citizenship on Future investment Fund. They need a legal title to do business.

[ThePythonicCow]

Posted by apokalypse (here)
thanks Paul and this thread really open my eyes answer my question why crypto and behind crypto...now i consider it's all about technology behind crypto not about cryptocurrency like bitcoin.

The "blockchain", and similar such distributed ledger technology (DLT) behind bitcoin will do (at least) three big things that I can see so far:

1. Further integrate humanity with "smart", AI, robotic, ... devices and grids on this planet.
2. Provide the "nervous system" for a mostly robotic colonization and resource mining around the solar system.
3. Provide a new technical basis for our civilization's monetary system, replacing the centuries old double entry bookkeeping and emulations thereof on current computer servers using SQL databases.

In each of these three things, the infrastructure is being developed to integrate humanity with (increasingly smart) robotics, which will be especially essential for expanding civilization to the solar system, most of which is not hospitable to humans.

As I listed in my What specific technologies and other advances are needed, for humans to colonize the solar system? thread, the list of technologies required to colonize the solar system is stunningly similar to the list of technologies currently being actively developed here on earth, either openly, as with distributed ledger and 3D printing technologies, or covertly, as with advanced energy and propulsion technologies.

It is that (to me, at least) stunning similarity that confirms, for me, the financial analysis that Catherine Austin Fitts and others have done, showing the funding of a Secret Space Program, and that further suggests, for me, just what that funding is going for.