qengho

"There's no such thing as objective reality".

We did an experiment to prove it, so it must be objectively true!

In other news:

"This sentence is false".

You're screwed. Same thing happened to me. And it was because Stripe wasn't able to fraud-check orders at the time (don't know if they fraud-check orders now) and so some scammers were able to push my chargeback rate higher than Stripe liked by placing fraudulent orders and then issuing chargebacks on them.

I reached out to Stripe, explained the situation, they said they understand and they re-instated my account. Two weeks later they suspended it again for the same reason and this time didn't respond to messages.

Given that they suspended my account for something that was caused by Stripe's own shortcomings, and the terribly unprofessional manner in which it was handled, I decided to give up on Stripe and not risk my business to such an unreliable payment provider.

Stripe sucks, stay away!

Emacs, org-mode.

This is great!

Yes, for the sake of precision I should probably have used the term “PC” rather than “computer”. I thought the meaning was pretty clear from the phrase “handheld computer”.

AsteroidOS looks very cool, thanks for the link. But a watch "running a tiny QT GUI on the touchscreen”, and which you can only really use as a computer by SSHing in via another computer, is not a PC, by any reasonable definition.

I'm aware of many little devices that can run Linux, but they're not full-fledged PCs unless they have reasonably sized screens and enough processing power to run regular PC apps in a usable manner.

Neither is a phone, which is neither marketed as a PC (or a “computer”), nor able to run any apps that aren't written specifically for Android / iOS, without all sorts of complicated shenanigans to jailbreak its lock-down, which is designed precisely to prevent it from being used as a general purpose computer.

Some people can “skate” on a bicycle while standing up on the seat and handlebar. That doesn’t mean a bicycle is a skateboard. Especially if they had to first break built-in protections in the bicycle specifically designed to prevent them from doing that.

Also sideloading APKs is a far cry from “run any code you want”. Can I run a GTK app written in Perl on an Android phone by sideloading an APK?

Phones aren't PCs. They are crippled and locked-down devices. Of the ones that are capable of running a full Linux distro, I don't believe any are even close to the size of Noodle Pi.

I'm not aware of any Linux wristwatch or any other computer that's in production and available to buy that is smaller than Noodle Pi. If you know of a Linux wristwatch that's for sale commercially I'd love to know about it.

The only Linux wristwatches I see in a quick online search are two prototype devices, one made by Steve Mann and the other by IBM. Neither of those devices were actually usable as a PC, or available commercially. Mann's actually relied on a second hidden wearable computer to provide the actual processing power.

Check out Noodle Pi – http://noodlepi.com

It’s the world’s smallest and lightest handheld computer. And unlike most of these devices with tiny built-in keyboards, it features a modular docking system so you can dock it with a range of different keyboards, from a tiny thumb keyboard to a full-sized one, or a gamepad.

Noodle Pi can be assembled, disassembled, repaired and upgraded by users, with no soldering or tools required. Being powered by a Raspberry Pi Zero, it also runs entirely off a MicroSD card, which greatly facilitates physical security for your system. You can just remove the MicroSD card and keep it physically secure, rather than having to secure the whole device.

There are also a number of wearable configurations possible with Noodle Pi, including a wrist dock that enables wearing it as a wrist-watch, a belt holster, and a clip holster. Lanyard holes in all the docks facilitate even more wearable configurations.

Review of Noodle Pi by Bryan Lunduke: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82_bPWyrPFc

Taxation is theft.

There were no "net neutrality" regulations in the US till 2015. Nevertheless none of the horror scenarios net neutrslity proponents like to cook up came to pass, and in fact the 'Net grew to "the Internet as we know it" precisely in an era of no net neutrality regulations. That's ample proof (if any were needed) that all the net neutrality FUD is just that.

In a free market, if an ISP was to mess with the traffic going through its pipes, that would just encourage anyone who cared about this to switch to a competitor.

The real problem is the lack of a free market, which is the direct result of over-proliferation of laws and regulations, which discourage and stifle innovative businesses. Net neutrality regulations are just another layer of these, and will further cripple innovative competition and lead to increased monopolization of Internet infrastructure by big crony-statist corporations.

More fundamentally, it is a violation of basic individual rights and property rights for the government to tell any private enterprise how to operate its business. That's the economics of fascism.

Riiight.. because when there was no net neutrality there was no Internet as we know it.

Oh wait.

Here's a $199 GNU/Linux handheld: http://noodlepi.com. AFAIK it's the world's smallest, lightest and most open handheld computer. Can be assembled / disassembled / upgraded / repaired by end users in under 10 minutes with no tools.

Exactly. Signal is #privacyfail because is requires access to contacts. Wire is better.

Yeah so TIL that Ada Lovelace was NOT the first programmer.

That title belongs to Charles Babbage, who wrote dozens of programs for the Analytical Engine years before her.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ada_Lovelace#Controversy_over_...

So you can stop perpetuating the biggest lie in the history of computing any time now.

It is.

It is incompatible. Just because a property is vacant doesn't mean it is "undesired" or "inefficiently-used".

As long as governments continue to rob their citizens via taxes, people will do their best to not be robbed, resulting in "black money" (which is actually "white money" since none of it went to fund wars and murderous statist schemes, as opposed to the "red money" which is tax paid and so did help fund wars and statist aggression against peaceful citizens).

This "white money" will then find a place to be invested where it receives some ROI, unlike the banks and bonds and stocks that have been completely destroyed by government meddling in the economy. That is real estate or precious metals and that's where the "white money" will go.

The entire "problem" (if it is one at all) is created by statist violation of property rights through taxation, in the first place. Further statist property rights violations will only distort things even further. Let's say you introduce squatting "rights". Well now you know what happens? Nobody's buying real estate in your country any more. All the "white money" flows to alternate investments and real estate in other countries that don't have squatting "rights".

It's basic human action. People don't want to be enslaved and robbed from. And they will do everything in their power to avoid it.

Yes squatting is absolutely incompatible with property rights. As are eminent domain and zoning.

Panama offers a super easy residence visa to citizens of 48 "friendly" countries. If your primary country of residence is Panama, you don't have to pay taxes on non-Panama-sourced income (as long as your country of citizenship doesn't tax you on your worldwide income as a non-resident). Panama corporations also don't pay taxes on non-Panama-sourced income.

From Panama City it's a 2.5 hour flight to Miami, 5 hours to New York / Toronto, about 7 hours to LA / Vegas, 10 hours to Amsterdam. Copa airlines has its base in Panama city and operates direct flights to many US and South American destinations.

A lot of people in Panama speak English so it's fairly easy to get by even if you don't know much Spanish. I found people in Panama City to be very friendly and helpful. Panama City also has great infrastructure, Internet, roads, apartments..

If you're a citizen of one of the 48 "friendly" countries you can be a legal permanent resident in Panama is a matter of months for under $5000.

And if your profession / business is global and online, you can likely break free of highway-robbery tax rates and the mind-numbing, time-wasting accounting / reporting requirements of your home country by moving to Panama.

Unfortunately for US citizens, they're still on the hook for US taxes even if non-resident in the US. But for citizens of 47 other countries, Panama is just about the #1 easiest and most practical residence option on the planet at the moment.

Search for "Panama Friendly Nations Visa".

Sure, but this has nothing to do with the point that gold is not money by statist fiat.

Gold's real scarcity and base value are what make it suitable for use as money and therefore universally accepted as money for thousands of years.

Cowrie shells might also make an acceptable non-fiat currency if cowrie shells were really scarce (they're not, because one can presumably breed cowries and generate them at will - something that was perhaps not so practical at the time when they actually were used as currency) or had a significant base value (again, they don't though they once did, but purely for ornamental uses). Similarly cigarettes are a currency in prison without any fiat being involved because they're scarce in that context and they have a base value (based on their use for smoking).

Bitcoin has neither real scarcity nor any basis for a lasting base value. It has illusory scarcity, and a transient base value based on the fact that in the current historical context, it enjoys network effects and near zero competition for certain use cases (illegal transactions where fiat currencies are unsuitable).

There's nothing sacred about gold either. If efficient nuclear transmutation of lead into gold were possible, gold would no longer be suitable as a currency. We'd have to switch to Latinum.

Not at all. Gold by itself is a currency / medium of exchange. It doesn't need any "statist fiat" to make it so. The fact that states (or other entities) might issue redeemable paper certificates or receipts (or dollar bills) as a convenient stand-in for gold deposited with them is entirely irrelevant. Gold is already money before that and without that.

First, as has already been pointed out, nothing has intrinsic value. Things only have value inasmuch as somebody values them. Value is a relationship between the subject and the object, not a property of the object.

Gold has a 'base value' that arises because of its demand for non-monetary uses, such as its industrial uses or use in jewellery. This base value is what makes it suitable as a medium of exchange as the base value sets gold's initial non-zero exchange rate vis-a-vis other goods. Once gold (or any other commodity) starts being used as a medium of exchange, it generates further demand AS a medium of exchange, and this will increase its price in relation to other goods, giving it a currency value higher than the base value.

It's like mathematical induction - where the general case is predicated on the base case. If there is no base case (or base value) there is no foundation for the general case (or for a currency value).

Bitcoin has no base value. Yes it "can be transferred (spent) electronically over a decentralized network without double-spending risk, chargeback risk, inflation risk and confiscation/bailout/haircut risk". But so can Bitcoins based on an alternate blockchain. What makes the 'official' blockchain Bitcoins have any higher base value than the worthless bitcoins on an alternate blockchain?

In fact, I expect there will be alternate blockchains in the near future, and that is what will burst the bubble as people start to realise that the number of bitcoins may be limited, but the number of bitcoin-like currencies is unlimited, so really, the limit on the number of possible bitcoins is entirely illusory and meaningless.

A free-market, decentralized fiat money is still more useful for many purposes than statist fiat money, and for this reason Bitcoin will enjoy some popularity until a proper anonymous, gold-backed free market e-currency comes along. When that happens, there will no longer be any use case for Bitcoin and its currency value will collapse to its base value of 0.

It is quite incorrect to say that "Historically, money arose from, and in conjunction with, this power." (the power of taxation by states). He gives no evidence for this claim except to reference a "controversial" book - perhaps controversial because of its wildly inaccurate thesis?

Unless the contention is that humans traded solely by barter before states came along to tax them, mediums of exchange (money) obviously predate the statist invention of fiat money. In fact fiat money is a relatively recent phenomenon, as money was historically backed by precious metals long before states invented unbacked fiat money and central (statist) banking.

Which doesn't in any way invalidate his argument that Bitcoin is a bubble. It's totally irrelevant to the Bitcoin issue. It's just wrong by itself.

Another thing that's just plain wrong is the attempt to refute the efficient markets hypothesis (EMH). The only reason Bitcoin actually does have a value above 0 at the moment is precisely because statist meddling in the market has created a huge demand for an alternative to fiat money - such a huge demand in fact that people are willing to try almost anything, including Bitcoin, or even riskier methods with a high failure rate (such as J. Orlin Grabbe's early anonymous banking system DMT, or unaudited gold-backed e-currencies that may actually be backed by nothing at all, among many other examples).

If we had uncrippled free-market gold-backed electronic currencies (such as e-gold was before it was attacked and destroyed by the feds) there would be zero demand for bitcoin as the existing currencies would have all the benefits of Bitcoin, while also being backed by a commodity with a base value (not 'intrinsic value').

So, it _might_ be a refutation of EMH if Bitcoin were to be successful long-term in an actual free market. As nowhere on this planet do we find anything even remotely resembling an actual free market, his argument against EMH is as much of a straw man as all the other examples that pinkos trot out as examples of "market failure" while pretending that there is a free market somewhere, which there isn't. All such examples are really examples of statist intervention failure, not market failure, as the market we are talking about is highly crippled and not remotely free.

I read that too, and I don't want to doubt Stephenson's word, but it's very hard to believe that he hadn't run across Cyphernomicon or the Cypherpunks (hell, they were on the cover of Wired Issue #1.02) in researching crypto for Cryptonomicon. Maybe he forgot he did but the term stuck in his subconscious. Or maybe he really didn't do even basic research before coming up with the name?

PS. Yes, I am the commenter previously known as anarky. No idea why that account got banned after a single comment.

And 5 years before Cryptonomicon there was Tim May's Cyphernomicon (which obviously inspired the title and theme of Stephenson's book).

In 1995 there was Stephenson's short story in Wired about digital cash - "The Great Simoleon Caper".

Of course, the protagonists of Atlas Shrugged had renounced paper money and started using privately minted gold coins from Midas Mulligan's Bank way back in 1957.