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24 hours ago•••
This was a fascinating read. It covers various CIA shenanigans against the Soviet Union, mainly their support for Solidarity in Poland and the Mujahideen in Afghanistan. It was written long before 9/11 when the long term effects showed up.
But for the audience here, the most interesting tidbit is how they spread misleading technical documentation to delay the gas pipelines to Europe (and generally sabotage the economy).
28 hours ago•••
More generally, I agree with James' observation that Bitcoin Core devs are paying much less attention to soft forks than they used to.
I can only speak for myself here. Part of the problem is that the current proposals don't excite me, yet. That's even after spending time at the op_next conference.
SegWit (which happened before I was involved) brought the promise of Lightning. Taproot lets you build cold storage with hidden fallback options.
I'm still waiting for MuSig2 to finally have broad adoption, something that's higher on my review list than new soft forks, and I barely get to it.
In that light, talk of a vault soft fork seems premature. The tool development is too far behind even for forks that already activated.
Similarly congestion control doesn't excite me. I'm general I'm skeptical of claims that the masses are suddenly going to self-custody because of a dramatic event in US politics. Especially given that plenty of other countries are in worse shape and we don't see self custody blossom at a scale where it causes congestion. The US is 5% of the world population.
That's not to say that I'm against these ideas. If I see other people work on and activate them in a competent and careful manner I might be fine with it. It's sad that their main proponents and developers burned out, and that certainly won't speed things up. Maybe grants tailored for potential soft fork devs can help here, as long as the right expectations are set.
But not being opposed does not reach the bar of me actively reviewing it, which is part of what pushes things forward.
If I see a more fleshed out design for a (BitVM powered?) sidechain with unilateral (no 1 of N nonsense) exit that gives me full privacy (Shielded CSV?), that would get me more excited. Especially if it's clear which specific opcodes are best to get there.
Other devs will have other things and other thresholds that get them out of their soft-fork winter sleep. There's a "I know it when I see it" aspect to this too.
All that said, it might be the case that one day every single core dev is excited about a soft fork proposal, or would be if they read enough about it, yet is too distracted by their day to day focus. But I'm not sure if that is really what's happening.
29 hours ago•••
The problem is that time is running out.
Bitcoin has serious trauma with claims like this.
8685ebef...faf8 replied 27 hours ago
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2 days ago•••
Interesting analysis. Two shitcoiner shenanigans in particular:
1. Attack ads against candidates that don't mention crypto at all (and obfuscating the crypto connection by how they named the PACs). This wasn't some broader cultural push either, they would support radically opposed candidates.
2. Mostly supporting candidates that were likely to win anyway
Molly assesses that this was done to impress / intimidate politicians to pay attention to their demands moving forward, even if it's against the interests of their constituents.
A big goal of the industry is to get rid of SEC enforcement against them. Regardless of your opinion about the SEC, I think it's fair to say they're mostly a problem for "crypto", not for Bitcoin. The ETFs are there, that's pretty much all the Bitcoin subset of the crypto industry needs, afaik.
A more relevant goal of the lobby is to deal with unbanking of the industry. But Molly is worried that they want to go beyond that and make the government bail them out next time things implode. Which is also something I expect to happen. Though there's no concrete evidence for this yet. https://youtu.be/06DGU_o8h5A
2 days ago•••
@npub1xts...kk5s can you make @npub18m7...q955 fold mega long posts?
2 days ago•••
Meanwhile Pertsev is still rotting in Dutch jail awaiting #TornadoCash trial. At this point even if he gets acquitted he'll probably have served the full sentence.
Habeas Corpus my ass, is what the judge presumably said, but I didn't attend the hearings. https://x.com/alex_pertsev/status/1859701374814126484
2 days ago•••
Voor de ZZP'ers... https://youtu.be/skWoCfOWGjU
11 days ago•••
Coming soon: Awkward conversations at year-end portfolio reviews… 'So… why did we skip #Bitcoin again?'
#meme #memstr
35 days ago•••
👑 Exciting news! We've just elected a new nprofile1qqsqx84rqcvglmnrr2r0rg8ynnhg70tzty4ju7l9lr430z8ryldngzspz4mhxue69uhkummnw3ezummcw3ezuer9wchsdgwlla board with nprofile1qqs84neseastshrzhrm9g4tvcg0yq9kl3atqfvak3ynef7ythqxh58gpzpmhxue69uhkummnw3ezuamfdejszrthwden5te0dehhxtnvdakqz9thwden5te0v4jx2m3wdehhxarj9ekxzmnyssl7e7 as our new president, alongside nprofile1qqsyxqtfvv0j7p5zccxwhd8eqttg7rr3cjv069c3lkvz7pfv7875y7gpramhxue69uhkummnw3ezuetfde6kuer6wasku7nfvuh8xurpvdjszxnhwden5te0wfjkccte9eh8xetrvf6ku6m9wghxxmmdqyf8wumn8ghj7mmxve3ksctfdch8qatzfh63cu, nprofile1qqsq4hm8gawvch9y2m7nqghydaw4ym4s4a3gf0u9f9xqm4uy0ul9qvcpremhxue69uhkstnrdajxjmn8v9ex2mnp9e6x7up0da6hgcn00qq3vamnwvaz7tmwdaehgu3dwfjkccte9eshqup0qyghwumn8ghj7mn0wd68ytnhd9hx2tcht4zgq and myself as members of the board!
🎉 The entire voting process took place via Nostr events. 🚀 #DecentralizedVoting #Nostr
58 days ago•••
I just spent over an hour in conversation with none other than Phil Zimmerman, and the mission was clear: purple-pilling him on Nostr. Phil hadn't heard of it before, so I had the challenge of introducing something I knew would resonate deeply with him. After all, he's the guy who knows a thing or two about encryption keys and was previously involved in building Okuna, an open-source social network that unfortunately ran out of funding. I showed him Amethyst on my phone and a post by nprofile1qqsw4v882mfjhq9u63j08kzyhqzqxqc8tgf740p4nxnk9jdv02u37ncpz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9uju6mpd4czuumfw3jsz9nhwden5te0wfjkccte9ec8y6tdv9kzumn9wsq3yamnwvaz7tmsw4e8qmr9wpskwtn9wvql3tqm
Phil's got strong opinions when it comes to content moderation, censorship, and those rage-inducing engagement algorithms that seem tailor-made to fracture society. I knew this was my opening. I explained how Nostr flips the script—you get to choose your own algorithm, define your content moderation levels, and uphold the principle that free speech must be the goal. And yeah, true free speech requires free money, so I brought that into the conversation too. That’s when nprofile1qqs9ez06ea26rc45f4rf0cyckdxkvvhlvekeawqee29jttp0hjm5mkcpzpmhxue69uhkummnw3ezumt0d5hsdjaljs chimed in with talk about zaps and ecash, which instantly caught Phil’s attention.
Phil had no idea that Chaum's patents had expired, so I jumped into an explanation about Cashu—how it allows payments to be locked to npubs and the privacy-preserving magic of ecash. I was way out of my depth here but tried to channel my inner nprofile1qqs9pk20ctv9srrg9vr354p03v0rrgsqkpggh2u45va77zz4mu5p6ccpz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduhsz9thwden5te0dehhxarj9ehhsarj9ejx2a30qyg8wumn8ghj7mn0wd68ytnddakj7xph5zr. You could tell the gears were turning...
He's not on social media at all, and I didn't get him to install Damus on his iPhone, but hey—tomorrow's another day. I’ll be back to badger him some more. 🤣
I also tried to make it clear that Nostr is far more than just social media. It's a tool to run coinjoins, decentralized apps, and essentially a DNS replacement. It’s got the kind of flexibility and potential that someone like Phil could see changing the game.
A massive thanks to the POW Summit and nprofile1qqsvezz8q3wqlqc8edchd40dll6srm4hsxk02km7ssm9hhgyfnxkvqgpr9mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuumwdae8gtnnda3kjctv9uemt7cx for making this conversation even possible. And PS: nprofile1qqs0w2xeumnsfq6cuuynpaw2vjcfwacdnzwvmp59flnp3mdfez3czpspzamhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuurjd9kkzmpwdejhgtc98uc8k I need you to tag-team Phil today!
74 days ago•••
Showering was optional back then. nprofile1qqsqx84rqcvglmnrr2r0rg8ynnhg70tzty4ju7l9lr430z8ryldngzspzamhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuurjd9kkzmpwdejhgtc873a78 changed that. Showering is still optional but it's not just nerds anymore. Join your local meetup and meet other #bitcoin'ers! https://video.nostr.build/d31dadf9c2909b6c4f5af46b40030259eb50c0b6f5bd8d33285b8ca20c0b0c60.mp4
#meme #memstr
75 days ago•••
This is the lightning wallet tier list. We don't make the rules. #bitcoin nprofile1qqsrf5h4ya83jk8u6t9jgc76h6kalz3plp9vusjpm2ygqgalqhxgp9gpzfmhxue69uhk7enxvd5xz6tw9ec82cspzpmhxue69uhkummnw3ezuamfdejszyrhwden5te0dehhxarj9ekxzmnytql6f0
#memstr #meme
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