Post: #1

Recently the cryptocoin space has become flooded with weird new coins with innocuous names, such as Ripple, or 3-4 letter acronyms, like NEM or IOTA, who then soar in value.

https://coinmarketcap.com/

Look at this list and it is amazing at all of the new currencies with more than 6 billion in Market Cap:



Looking at this list, you may think to yourself, "What the fuck is going on? Where are these new coins coming from? How are they rising in value so fast? How can I get in on the action?"

But before you start buying, remember you are looking at corporate coins. Corpro coins are not safe, because they are centralized mining coins. This means that the coins are owned by single entities who could easily, in theory, print a million new coins on their ledger and fuck over retail investors (i.e. you) who buy their trash.

Corporations and banks want in on the Crypto Space, but they need to keep it centralized and in their control. So they keep the blockchain technology of normal crypto coins, but get rid of the decentralized mining part. This makes them extremely dangerous to own or hold, but because of the big institutional money backing them there is potentially massive profits to be made as well.

The easy way to see which ones are corpro coins, and which ones are real cyrpto currency beyond the bank's control is to filter out non-minable coins.

At coinmarketcap.com, go to the coin tab and select "Filter non-minable"



Then you'll see a real list of actual coins beyond the Jews control:



Notice, there are only 6 actual coins outside of Boss Jew's reach with over 6 billion in market cap.

The central banks want to kill these coins and keep the world under their control. And if they do that, none of us will have any freedom. Just as Roosh got banned from PayPal and from many western countries, cryptocurrencies are the only chance for true freedom.

If the central banks win, the left will take control and someday pedophilla will be normalized (just as it was under Obama). Your children or grandchildren will be sold into sex slavery and be told it is normal, and anyone who doesn't like it is a pedophobe. Gays and lesbians will be commonplace, and anyone who is White will be expected to work like a slave to support the tower of Babel.

So don't let them win. You can trade with corpro coins to make some $$$, but remember you're dealing with the enemies currency and they WILL fuck you over if they grow large enough. Keep your the majority of your savings in coins that must be mined through decentralized means, and you keep the power out of the bankster's hands.

Personally, I use Monero for my main holding, since it is the most stable price wise and by far the most resistant to outside control.

Post: #2

Samsaeu, stop being a goofball.

Non-minable doesn't mean "centralized". It just means it's not a proof of work coin, so it's more energy-efficient. If anyone here is genuinely curious about Proof of Work and its advantages and disavantages versus things like Proof of Stake or IOTA's tangle, I can provide some links, but this post is already so far off in crazyville that I'm not sure it's relevant.

Buying NEM and IOTA will not cause your children to be sold into sex slavery. Owning 50% in Cardano will not cause the normalization of pedophilia.

I don't like a bunch of these coins either, but you're being ridiculous.

Post: #3

A bit of a stretch maybe to link control of cryptocurrencies to the prospect of pedophilia?

But definitely an interesting way to shill your favorite coin (Monero) over others lol.

But hey, I'm just glad to see my favorite, Ethereum, isn't a pedocoin.

Post: #4

Samseu has completely lost the plot lol.

Post: #5

He's right tho. Crypto is our only fighting chance against central bankers that run us on the hamster wheel treadmills that never ends until we are too old and are replaced by our progeny. Make your gains, free yourselves from bondage, but remember none are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.

Post: #6

It is good discussion to have, although Samseau might be too extreme (I'll admit I'm not sure of it since I'm still learning). Decentralization is a key component of the philosophy of bitcoin and should be taken serious. There's even big debates on how decentralized Bitcoin would still be if they adapted Lightning and how Bitcoin Cash is the one and only Bitcoin according to the creators ideas.

Post: #7

Decentralization is a pipe dream. Same as any other cool utopian idea. People always come up with ways to undermine the current system, only to create a new system with its own flaws. The same will happen with crypto once it gains mass adoption.

BTC is already controlled by one entity.
BCH is basically controlled by Chinese Miners.
ETH, even with staking, over time will see centralization of the staked ETH.

Decentralization assumes you have some sort of uniform distribution of validators or miners. How long is that really possible for?

Take bankers. If they wanted to, they could buy either a controlling portion of any coin they want or buy enough mining equipment to control any chain they want.

The idea that coins like Monero are immune to bankers is laughable. Already, every transaction in other crypto that connects to Monero is under watch as Samseau's post pointed out in the Monero thread:

Quote:The techniques are so potent that software that flags coins suspected of being obtained through crime now tags just about anything converted into or out of monero as high risk, according to Pawel Kuskowski, chief executive officer of Coinfirm, which helps exchanges and other companies avoid tainted money. That compares with only about 10 percent of bitcoin, he said.

Yeah, so Monero might end up worthless as no legal business will want to touch that entire system if governments decree Monero banned. Have fun with that.

Even if bankers don't ever get involved, you'll have some enterprising individuals who work harder, put their money back into crypto and slowly but surely gain a bigger and bigger control of the total. This is why communism fails, and income inequality will always exist. Decentralization is basically the blockchain version of communism. Sounds great in theory, but will fail in due time due to human nature.

You could literally take the most noble dev team, split all the coins among all of mankind equally (thereby having perfect decentralization) and in short amount of time still get some form of centralization.

At best, you can have a certain amount of time of decentralization before centralization takes form.

http://slatestarcodex.com/2017/11/21/con...blic-food/

Quote:The rookie mistake is: you see that some system is partly Moloch [ie. captured by misaligned special interests], so you say “Okay, we’ll fix that by putting it under the control of this other system. And we’ll control this other system by writing ‘DO NOT BECOME MOLOCH’ on it in bright red marker.”

The real value of blockchain isn't so much its decentralized nature, it'll come from useful features like smart contracts that add real value (making things either cheaper, simpler or more convenient to use).

Post: #8

Was going to rep Ghenghis for top-quality post but found out I already repped him. Can someone else rep him again for me?

Post: #9

Bro go outside lol

We're just here to make money

---

On a more serious note:

(01-05-2018 12:53 PM)Genghis Khan Wrote:  Decentralization is a pipe dream. Same as any other cool utopian idea. People always come up with ways to undermine the current system, only to create a new system with its own flaws. The same will happen with crypto once it gains mass adoption.

While I hope that won't be the case, that probably will be the case.
Whoever can figure out something that isn't Proof-of-Work or Proof-of-Stake (aka not prone to "centralization") - if possible - will have the winning cryptocurrency.

(01-05-2018 12:53 PM)Genghis Khan Wrote:  Even if bankers don't ever get involved, you'll have some enterprising individuals who work harder, put their money back into crypto and slowly but surely gain a bigger and bigger control of the total. This is why communism fails, and income inequality will always exist. Decentralization is basically the blockchain version of communism. Sounds great in theory, but will fail in due time due to human nature.

Agreed. Income inequality will always exist because of the simple fact that some people work harder than others.

(01-05-2018 12:53 PM)Genghis Khan Wrote:  The real value of blockchain isn't so much its decentralized nature, it'll come from useful features like smart contracts that add real value (making things either cheaper, simpler or more convenient to use).

This is why I'm bullish (long-term) on things like Raiblocks (XRB). Instant, no-fee transactions; not vaporware - try it yourself.

---

Alt-Right is more or less the rightist version of SJW.
Complaining and consuming "tragiporn" is a waste of time.

If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.
In the absence of capital, your opinion is completely irrelevant.
Get the money first.

(01-05-2018 01:17 PM)SamuelBRoberts Wrote:  Was going to rep Ghenghis for top-quality post but found out I already repped him. Can someone else rep him again for me?

Done

Post: #10

(01-05-2018 12:12 PM)Genghis Khan Wrote:  A bit of a stretch maybe to link control of cryptocurrencies to the prospect of pedophilia?

But definitely an interesting way to shill your favorite coin (Monero) over others lol.

But hey, I'm just glad to see my favorite, Ethereum, isn't a pedocoin.

It's switching to non-minable POS pretty soon, so I hope you're ready to work like a slave to support the tower of babel.

Post: #11

(01-05-2018 01:17 PM)SamuelBRoberts Wrote:  Was going to rep Ghenghis for top-quality post but found out I already repped him. Can someone else rep him again for me?

+1 from me.

Ghengis' heart is in the right place and it's the key reason why I don't think cryptos have a long term place in the market especially when governments wise up and start hacking at it.

Right now, it's the fad du jour. Ripple is literally the cryptocurrency equivalent of a penny stock. I mean seriously, I had a friend tell me about Ripple and he said that it's all pre-mined and that the founders have 2 trillion in coins that can release out to the public to keep the price of the coin modest.

I looked at him and I said, sounds like a penny stock. They can dilute into runs which will prevent the value from going too high, enriching the founders and robbing investors.

Which is ironic because this same guy got me into penny stock trading back in the day. We both got burned and lost a ton of cash. I've been there and done that, and a lot of these coins are the functionally the same.

It doesn't help that there are crypto fan bois out there who can't see this and keep assuming that cryptos will keep going to da moon if governments close the exchanges (cough jjg cough).

I've seen the exact same behavior in penny stocks and it makes me laugh. Some things never change.

Post: #12

Decentralization - aka no one can peer pressure the network to blacklist an address or delete/hold hostage someones fund. So far most decentralized coins do that perfectly. Don't like someone and want to burn his coins on your ledger? Too bad you are now on your own useless ledger. The corp coins will stoke anyones cock for "legitimacy", "partnerships" etc, we already see that with all the KYC needed on ethereum tokens.

I dont know wtf this has to do with communism, the promise is the opposite of communism, its liberty. Owning monero or BTC doesnt give you more power over it aside from causing price fluctuations.

As for coins that will provide technological progress. The are already here. All these ico really just exist to accumulate btc not provide some revolutionary tech.

Post: #13

dupe

Post: #14

(01-05-2018 02:08 PM)The Beast1 Wrote:  Right now, it's the fad du jour. Ripple is literally the cryptocurrency equivalent of a penny stock. I mean seriously, I had a friend tell me about Ripple and he said that it's all pre-mined and that the founders have 2 trillion in coins that can release out to the public to keep the price of the coin modest.

You're being disengenous at best and deceptive at worst. I expect better from this forum.

Total supply of XRP tokens is 100 billion of which 55 billion has been placed in escrow with 1 billion being released every month.

Don't take my word for it, or your friend's.

https://ripple.com/dev-blog/explanation-...rp-escrow/

Disclosure: speculative long position in XRP.

Post: #15

After that pump you're not closing? Good luck, man...

Post: #16

(01-05-2018 03:27 PM)Adonis Wrote:  

(01-05-2018 02:08 PM)The Beast1 Wrote:  Right now, it's the fad du jour. Ripple is literally the cryptocurrency equivalent of a penny stock. I mean seriously, I had a friend tell me about Ripple and he said that it's all pre-mined and that the founders have 2 trillion in coins that can release out to the public to keep the price of the coin modest.

You're being disengenous at best and deceptive at worst. I expect better from this forum.

Total supply of XRP tokens is 100 billion of which 55 billion has been placed in escrow with 1 billion being released every month.

Don't take my word for it, or your friend's.

https://ripple.com/dev-blog/explanation-...rp-escrow/

Disclosure: speculative long position in XRP.

My bad on the exact number of coins, but my opinion still stands. 1 billion coins released each month is the definition of dilution.

Post: #17

Im not putting my 401k into XRP, just using it to make money. And I think it has a ways higher to go.

I put in a decent enough amount when it was <.50 that I got my initial investment back so the rest is house money.

XRP has hype, presence, institutional partners, and is cheap enough that people still feel its accessible. Payments are fast and low fee.

Further adoption of the Ripple network is only going to be bullish for XRP going forward.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/ripple-stea...1515167147

https://www.coindesk.com/ripple-claims-3...-xrp-2018/

Quote:Three of the top five money transfer companies worldwide will be implementing Ripple’s XRP token in their payment flow systems this year, the company said in a tweet Thursday.

If just one of the companies are Western Union or Money Gram, watch out $5.00.

Official prediction: We'll see $5 easy this year, maybe closer to $10.

Post: #18

(01-05-2018 12:53 PM)Genghis Khan Wrote:  Decentralization is a pipe dream. Same as any other cool utopian idea. People always come up with ways to undermine the current system, only to create a new system with its own flaws. The same will happen with crypto once it gains mass adoption.

BTC is already controlled by one entity.
BCH is basically controlled by Chinese Miners.
ETH, even with staking, over time will see centralization of the staked ETH.

Decentralization assumes you have some sort of uniform distribution of validators or miners. How long is that really possible for?

Take bankers. If they wanted to, they could buy either a controlling portion of any coin they want or buy enough mining equipment to control any chain they want.

The idea that coins like Monero are immune to bankers is laughable. Already, every transaction in other crypto that connects to Monero is under watch as Samseau's post pointed out in the Monero thread:

Quote:The techniques are so potent that software that flags coins suspected of being obtained through crime now tags just about anything converted into or out of monero as high risk, according to Pawel Kuskowski, chief executive officer of Coinfirm, which helps exchanges and other companies avoid tainted money. That compares with only about 10 percent of bitcoin, he said.

Yeah, so Monero might end up worthless as no legal business will want to touch that entire system if governments decree Monero banned. Have fun with that.

Even if bankers don't ever get involved, you'll have some enterprising individuals who work harder, put their money back into crypto and slowly but surely gain a bigger and bigger control of the total. This is why communism fails, and income inequality will always exist. Decentralization is basically the blockchain version of communism. Sounds great in theory, but will fail in due time due to human nature.

You could literally take the most noble dev team, split all the coins among all of mankind equally (thereby having perfect decentralization) and in short amount of time still get some form of centralization.

At best, you can have a certain amount of time of decentralization before centralization takes form.

http://slatestarcodex.com/2017/11/21/con...blic-food/

Quote:The rookie mistake is: you see that some system is partly Moloch [ie. captured by misaligned special interests], so you say “Okay, we’ll fix that by putting it under the control of this other system. And we’ll control this other system by writing ‘DO NOT BECOME MOLOCH’ on it in bright red marker.”

The real value of blockchain isn't so much its decentralized nature, it'll come from useful features like smart contracts that add real value (making things either cheaper, simpler or more convenient to use).

It is possible to blacklist money coming into or out of the exchange to buy or sell Monero as tainted but my understanding is you cannot follow Monero when it exits the exchange. There is also nothing to stop a person from exchanging fiat/cash in person by using LocalMonero or by other means.

Post: #19

Samseau, I agree with you about Ripple in that it is the coin (((they))) love. However, for the other non-mineable coins, best be careful about applying the Wall Street generalization on them (EOS and Stellar from what I have read have different applications).

I do agree with you that the best way to get back at Wall Street with respect to the cryptocoins that are nothing more than non-mineable tokens is just to pump and dump them like a 6 before and after the last call at some dive bar in a mid-level/big-time city.

Post: #20

Quote:Yeah, so Monero might end up worthless as no legal business will want to touch that entire system if governments decree Monero banned. Have fun with that.

Yeah, because when the government bans something it totally lowers the price, right? That's why weed, coke, and heroin are so cheap and easy to get...

And to all those oblivious about the left's connection to pedophilla, just look at how many devients and perverts have been arrested since Trump put Sessions in, the numbers are in the hundreds. All of these guys would have had a free reign had Hillary got in.

All the articles defending pedophilla on Salon and Atlantic were taken down. The endless cheerleading of homosexuals by the US government stopped with Trump's win. Not my fault no one else here can draw the obvious connections.

Post: #21

(01-06-2018 03:41 AM)Samseau Wrote:  

Quote:Yeah, so Monero might end up worthless as no legal business will want to touch that entire system if governments decree Monero banned. Have fun with that.

Yeah, because when the government bans something it totally lowers the price, right? That's why weed, coke, and heroin are so cheap and easy to get...

People want to consume weed, coke and heroin. Monero is really just another currency. Nobody is going to sit there and think "man, I really need a hit of Monero today".

If you're into selling drugs and human trafficking, by all means, go ahead and use Monero.

But I'd like to buy normal things and for that I need money that isn't tainted by Monero. And that's how the majority of people will think as well.

People usually pay for drugs in cash. So I'm trying to think how this would play out:

I want to buy drugs.
Now I have to first find someone who will sell me Monero for cash.
Then I have to send the Monero to my drug dealer.
My drug dealer now has to find someone to sell him cash for his Monero.
My drug dealer uses his newly gained cash to buy his new car.

Why do I need Monero?

Seems like it'd be easier to do all this in cash:

I want to buy drugs.
I give cash to my drug dealer.
My drug dealer uses his newly gained cash to buy his new car.

Perhaps if we're dealing with big quantities of money. But then I wonder how you can convert millions of dollars of drug money into cash.

That's the nice thing about cash. You don't need to convert it back and forth. It's the legal tender of the rest of the economy. I'm a drug baron? I can literally just take a stack of cash, go down to the coffee shop and slip a 5 for my morning joe. I don't need to convert from Monero to cash every single time to buy something legal.

All these cryptocurrencies are only useful as long as people will accept it as payment. In terms of Monero, it may not end up completely useless, but it's not going to become mainstream. I just see too many obstacles. Monero reminds me of projects like Tor, DuckDuckGo and Startmail. Very small niche, might even survive long-term, but will never be a big player. If you're looking to make money on crypto, I personally wouldn't bet on Monero long-term. Most of crypto follows Metcalfe's law where the value of the network is proportional to the number of users. Meaning the blockchains with the most addresses and activity will long-term end up being most valuable. Google is more valuable than Startmail, Protomail, Duckduckgo and whatever other privacy-based project out there for a really good reason: most people don't actually give a fuck about privacy and will gladly let major corporations track and sell their information in return for free, convenient and popular applications.

Not to mention if Monero does end up the coin of choice for criminals, governments could potentially invest the money to buy enough mining equipment to brink the entire system. Or possibly force Riccardo Spagni and the rest of the developers to insert a backdoor into an update for Monero. Take a look at what the US government did with Facebook, Google, Yahoo and Intel chips. So many ways for governments to fuck with privacy coins like Monero.

Smartest thing Satoshi did was never to reveal his identity. It makes it infinitely harder for governments to track him down and force him to do things against his will. Riccardo Spagni, the main developer for Monero, on the other hand is a sitting duck.

So much harder to fuck with cash like that. You could hold a million dollars in illegally gotten cash in your house for 2-3 decades, and just slowly consume it without raising any alarms. Monero...fuck you got to use Monero every time you want to use your money. Again, in my mind, it's just so much easier to use legal tender for illegal activities than try to go legal tender -> illegal tender -> illegal activity -> illegal tender -> legal tender.

Post: #22

Quote:And to all those oblivious about the left's connection to pedophilla, just look at how many devients and perverts have been arrested since Trump put Sessions in, the numbers are in the hundreds. All of these guys would have had a free reign had Hillary got in.

All the articles defending pedophilla on Salon and Atlantic were taken down. The endless cheerleading of homosexuals by the US government stopped with Trump's win. Not my fault no one else here can draw the obvious connections.

The connection I draw from this is that pedophilia is being taken care of on its own by good people in power (Trump and Sessions). Nothing more. Seems Trump and Sessions are doing a fine enough job without needing the help of decentralized cryptocurrencies.

Post: #23

(01-06-2018 05:04 AM)Genghis Khan Wrote:  People usually pay for drugs in cash. So I'm trying to think how this would play out:

I want to buy drugs.
Now I have to first find someone who will sell me Monero for cash.
Then I have to send the Monero to my drug dealer.
My drug dealer now has to find someone to sell him cash for his Monero.
My drug dealer uses his newly gained cash to buy his new car.

Why do I need Monero?

Seems like it'd be easier to do all this in cash:

I want to buy drugs.
I give cash to my drug dealer.
My drug dealer uses his newly gained cash to buy his new car.

The innovation of Silk Road was the decentralized marketplace and the relatively small surface area for law enforcement to go after users and vendors. Vendors were able to advertise openly and users were able to consume in the privacy of their own homes. Both parties were able to make transactions pseudonymously, without meeting or knowing each other. This disrupted the whole drug enforcement construct, which is why the government made such an extreme example of Ulbricht (the alleged hits on his enemies didn't help either).

Of course the vast majority of drug trafficking will probably still be done with cash, but that comes with well known downsides: exposure to violence, bad products, shady dealers without reviews, etc. The darknet isn't perfect, but it has improved on many of these problems.

Imagine a similar use case that is still illegal, but more morally acceptable to most people. You have a rare disease, you live in the US, and you are underinsured. The drug you need costs $100,000 per year in the US, but a fraction of that in another country. If the product quality and private payments problems are solved, this will become a huge gray market where regular people, not just pharmaceutical companies, can exploit this geoarbitrage.

Quote:Perhaps if we're dealing with big quantities of money. But then I wonder how you can convert millions of dollars of drug money into cash.

That's the nice thing about cash. You don't need to convert it back and forth. It's the legal tender of the rest of the economy. I'm a drug baron? I can literally just take a stack of cash, go down to the coffee shop and slip a 5 for my morning joe. I don't need to convert from Monero to cash every single time to buy something legal.

I think this is a stretch. If you have large proceeds from a criminal enterprise, cash or crypto, you will have the problem of how to launder it. Buying five dollar cups of coffee isn't going to cut it. Monero is a slight improvement on this problem, only in the sense that it is untraceable and completely fungible. Cash still has serial numbers.

Quote:All these cryptocurrencies are only useful as long as people will accept it as payment. In terms of Monero, it may not end up completely useless, but it's not going to become mainstream. I just see too many obstacles. Monero reminds me of projects like Tor, DuckDuckGo and Startmail. Very small niche, might even survive long-term, but will never be a big player. If you're looking to make money on crypto, I personally wouldn't bet on Monero long-term. Most of crypto follows Metcalfe's law where the value of the network is proportional to the number of users. Meaning the blockchains with the most addresses and activity will long-term end up being most valuable. Google is more valuable than Startmail, Protomail, Duckduckgo and whatever other privacy-based project out there for a really good reason: most people don't actually give a fuck about privacy and will gladly let major corporations track and sell their information in return for free, convenient and popular applications.

Yes, but are people okay with their financial transaction history and balances being broadcast to the world? That doesn't seem like a niche use case to me.

Illicit activity and general asset protection strategies don't seem like niche use cases either. There is quite a lot of money involved with them.

Quote:Not to mention if Monero does end up the coin of choice for criminals, governments could potentially invest the money to buy enough mining equipment to brink the entire system. Or possibly force Riccardo Spagni and the rest of the developers to insert a backdoor into an update for Monero. Take a look at what the US government did with Facebook, Google, Yahoo and Intel chips. So many ways for governments to fuck with privacy coins like Monero.

Resistance to censorship is arguably the only thing that makes crypto useful. If governments can break it, then crypto has no value. If crypto is effectively centralized, then you might as well just use a web server and a database.

Also, it may be easy to force a backdoor in closed source code on Google/Facebook servers, but probably not so easy in an extremely popular open source project. If Riccardo Spagni were forced in such a way, I suspect he would go the same route as the Lavabit founder and quit the project. At which point, other developers would continue his work.

Quote:Smartest thing Satoshi did was never to reveal his identity. It makes it infinitely harder for governments to track him down and force him to do things against his will. Riccardo Spagni, the main developer for Monero, on the other hand is a sitting duck.

By that logic, if Satoshi's identity were revealed tomorrow, would the government be able to insert a backdoor into Bitcoin?

Quote:So much harder to fuck with cash like that. You could hold a million dollars in illegally gotten cash in your house for 2-3 decades, and just slowly consume it without raising any alarms. Monero...fuck you got to use Monero every time you want to use your money. Again, in my mind, it's just so much easier to use legal tender for illegal activities than try to go legal tender -> illegal tender -> illegal activity -> illegal tender -> legal tender.

This seems like kind of a wash to me. You could have a million dollars in a Monero wallet and slowly dip into it as well. It's also easier to secure a million dollars in Monero. You don't have to install a gigantic safe in your house.

Post: #24

Can someone rep Genghis for me too?

Hope this dude becomes a crypto millionaire (if he isn’t already), his top quality posts show sound thinking.

Post: #25

I'll just explicitly state my perspective, some things I've had to come grips with ever since I had to take ethics in science and engineering courses and actually think about the repercussions of being an engineer:

* technology has its trade-offs. For all the good a technology brings, there's always something bad that comes along with it. Right now all I've seen about blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies is the good. All the good it'll bring. But I'm waiting to hear someone tell me what the trade-off will be. And it might take 10-20 years to get there, but we'll see it soon enough. And the trade-offs probably won't be anything like any of us can imagine.

I remember when smartphones came out, and everyone went ga-ga over the iphones. And now we're seeing what price we paid, with people glued to their phones all day and the insane amount of attention women get. Did anyone predict that a decade ago when the iPhone came out? Blockchain too will have its trade-offs. It might fix some issues, but it'll bring its own host of issues.

* technology consolidates - in every field of tech, long-term you end up with a few major players that dominate.

The internet was supposed to be about free flow of information. How's that coming along 20 years down the line? We're living in an era where 99% of people online in the US get all of their information from Google or Facebook. Both Google and Facebook suppress information that they don't ideologically agree with.

* the big players always have a few things in common: they play nice with the ruling powers, and they put practical considerations above idealistic considerations. Projects like Startmail, Duckduckgo which favor idealism will always remain niche applications. The average person will long-term always prefer the cheap, convenient or easy solution, even to their own detriment.

* technology ends up corrupted those it makes rich and famous. I don't think Facebook or Google started off as evil. Google's motto was unironically "don't be evil". But that didn't stop both from getting corrupted. When money and power are involved, people's priorities change. People, who early on were more idealistic, suddenly come face-to-face with their internal greed and desire for control.

* we're in a stage of Western civilization where technology is rapidly making a few people better off at the cost of making more people worse off (goes back to the trade-off point, but worth especially noting). What this means is that some people, including quite a few RVF members, will do quite well betting on all this stuff. Most people will probably not. You might end up seeing quite a few white collar professions go the way of the travel agents as blockchain eats up their jobs.

* technology won't bring salvation. I don't believe in the idealism I see in tech - as if tech can deliver save mankind. It cannot. And I most definitely don't believe that Monero or some other PoW coin is going to destroy (((them))) and save our grandchildren from getting diddled.

With that said,

So far, the best argument in favor of Monero I've seen is that it's used by drug dealers. If that's the best you got, long-term Monero won't end up as the next Facebook or Google.

And with that, I'm also going to pass on debating the pros and cons of using Monero vs. cash for drugs. I had a bunch of arguments written up, but in reality it's just a matter of perspective of how you imagine technology evolving.

Heck, I don't even mind conceding. Monero will become the de-facto currency of drug and human traffickers, mobsters, and whoever else wants to do illicit stuff.

Whooptifuckingdo. So what? How is that going to stop the decline of the West or whatever else you think is ailing the world.