I still drop by every few days to see if there's anything going on.   There usually isn't.     I don't do much internet socializing these days.   What little I do is mostly on twitter.

He was a caricature of an Objectivist.   He was definitely a capitalist, but I wouldn't call him an anarcho-capitalist.   Some of the details of the plot are fuzzy right now, but I still got the impression that he was forcing his will on others. 

There's a limit to how many people you can follow in a day, and I think there's also a limit to the ratio of people you follow to people who follow you (or something like that).    Anyway, I followed you and I'm looking forward to interacting with you.

Anyone else on Twitter feel free to follow me:   @iamdisengaged.

I've created a few more since this thread was opened.   And I've put most of my stuff in an imgur gallery for easier sharing:

http://imgur.com/a/WepVa

Okay, so NOW can I initiate violence against people who say you can't buy or do anything with bitcoin?     Please?    Please?

What if somebody started spreading the rumor that Bradley wanted to be called Chelsea and have his genitals cut off...

Cringe.   Geez, thanks for that mental image, Seth. 

I suppose it's possible.  It is certainly morally possible for the people/organizations involved... I believe literally nothing is too extreme for them.   But I don't see them having enough to gain to make it worth the effort.   

Now if Snowden comes out as gay, you know the jig is up.

[not]

Once again, the "you can't do anything with it" shills have another opportunity to go eat a fat bag of roasted [censored].

This is huge news.  Not "huge" as in expect a massive price spike like some people are saying.   That won't happen; not because of this.    But it is "huge" in that the more businesses accept BTC... and the bigger those businesses are... the more the legitimacy the currency has.  I mean the good kind of legitimacy... the kind that comes from popular opinion, not the kind that originates in government fiat.    So perhaps "legitimacy" isn't the right word.   Whatever; you folks know what I mean.   This is good for the medium to long-term health of bitcoin.   

For DishNetwork, it's probably a non-issue.   I don't see anyone changing satellite providers over this, so they won't gain (m)any new clients.   They'll save some money in fees, but there probably aren't enough bitcoin users who are already clients to make a noticeable impact in that area.   Yet.   If they keep accepting bitcoin, though they'll see the benefits as the user base grows.

For Coinbase this is massive.  Don't screw it up, guys.   

Legalize prostitution.

That's funny.   When I heard the details, I told my wife that if his parents had bought him the services of a prostitute, all those people would probably still be alive.   She chose to ignore me. 

But seriously, the guy was rich and was not hideously ugly.     Women should not have been a problem for him... unless he was crazy.   Which, of course, he was.    Money can (and does) erase a lot of faults at least long enough to get the deed done.    But this guy must have been broadcasting a creepy serial-killer vibe like a 100KW radio station.  THAT'S why he was a virgin.

I made it exactly one minute into that video.

I'm not sure what it was I was watching.   It wasn't a debate.   It seemed more like a stage play than a debate.    A stage play that I had no interest in watching.

Perhaps someone who watched the whole thing or who has more information can clear it up:  was this for real?

It looks like DarkMarket is to markets what Bittorrent is to peer-to-peer file sharing.   (Using that same analogy, the Silk Road was Napster.)

I, too, hope they keep working.   The internet needs this sooner rather than later.

This won't kill bitcoin, but it could severely retard its utility (and therefore acceptance) in the United States.   But maybe Bitcoin was never going to succeed in the US anyway.   Maybe Bitcoin was never intended for the US.   The people who have the most to gain from cryptocurrencies aren't in first-world countries like the US.     I firmly believe that the countries who stand against this innovation by banning or slapping ridiculous regulations on it will regret it deeply... and soon.   Within our lifetimes kind of soon.   Within the decade kind of soon.   We'll be around to see the wailing and gnashing of teeth when some Asian or South American country becomes the new dawning economic superpower while the bitcoin infrastructure here in the US struggles for a foothold amid a tangle of regulation and taxation.    Good.   We will have the future we deserve, brought to us by the government that we tolerate.   

Meanwhile, I'm going to pursue what I consider the only proper course for an anarchist/agorist:  I'm going to ignore this.    What little Bitcoin business I do will continue with minimal (if any) changes.      I for damned sure won't be calculating capital gains on every goddamn transaction.  Oh, wow, I guess I'm an activist now!

   

This is bad news.

But from a philosophical standpoint, this news is ONLY as bad as the extent to which people will obey ridiculous laws.   Every anarchist involved with Bitcoin reduces the impact of this just a tiny bit more.

Yes, people and corporations will obey laws and report transactions (which is why it is bad), but if they didn't... this news is meaningless.     I'm hoping that the sheer difficulty and onerousness of even trying to obey this will make just a few people realize that taxation is bullshit.    This may be the first step for some people.

Yeah, I'm dreaming.  Silver lining and all that...

Besides, lets not forget that this bad news for people living in America has no impact to people discovering Bitcoin in other countries.   

.0001, the default in the client.

I agree.  Unless they do something spectacular like cure cancer, they're done.      But more importantly, hopefully a lot of people will learn things from this.   Things like the bitcoin security, due diligence, and common damn sense.

Wishful thinking, I know.

No one knows who Satoshi is.   More importantly, even if his/her/their identity WAS known, he has no "control" to give to anyone.    Locking him up in a cell or holding a gun to his head wouldn't get you anywhere.  He has no influence.     Bitcoin is an open source project involving a peer-to-peer network.     The closest thing the govt. could do to "control" it is to buy/threaten all of the developers.

...not all of the developers involved in Bitcoin.   All the developers ON THE PLANET.   

Being open source means that anyone with the sufficient knowledge and motivation could not only examine the code for malicious behaviors that were introduced, but could also become a "developer" themselves.   This is where most of those alt-coins come from. 

No, the government's attempt to "control" Bitcoin will come in the form of regulating the movement of fiat currency into and out of BTC and/or creating some sort of competing cryptocurrency.    They can't directly control Bitcoin itself.   Any attempt to do so will be somewhat entertaining and ultimately futile.