Here are some great links and tips for securing your own Bitcoin wallet.
Secure Your Wallet!!
Encrypting Your Wallet!!
Call For Secure Wallet Development!
Open for discussion on the secure wallet development; I have been working on my own solution for a bit now. Please comment with your experiences encrypting Bitcoin wallets!
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Why Tim Fernholz is Wrong About Bitcoin
If you haven't, direct yourself over to the Tim Fernholz's article and read for a good laugh. Tim seems to believe some silly misconceptions, based on what he wrote. In his third paragraph, Tim suggests that Bitcoin is a scam. Well such a claim must provide evidence, otherwise his 'new source' is just spreading rumors.
"Each time bitcoins change hands, so does a transaction history encoded in a string of characters. This “hash value” or digest can be decoded by anyone with sufficient computer power and time to devote to the effort. When bitcoins are exchanged, a digest is broadcast to the network of users, a participant does the work of decoding the transaction history, and other users quickly confirm their history is accurate. (The decoders earn a 50-bitcoin bounty for their work.) This happens about once every 10 minutes. Everyone who holds the currency agrees on who owns what, which ensures people can’t copy-and-paste their way to millions or defraud other users without the whole network agreeing that it happened.
Another blunder Tim makes is in his "economic" paragraph. He claims, "Currencies are most valuable when lots of people trust and use them frequently." So by this logic, the most exchanged currency is the most valuable? Wrong again. Currency is based of basic supply and demand principles which stem from more complicated factors, which has no causality to frequency of use.
In his next argument, he claims that Bitcoins wont work (whatever that vague term means) because it's benefiting to miners who have more computing power. All I have to say is that if the concept of using wealth to acquire more wealth is a new concept to him, I am just disappointed he is getting paid to write this stuff.
He then goes on to advocate the power of pools and how they can steal your money. Okay, if the pool owner changes their code to take a unfair amount they get one Bitcent from every user, which is a fairly typical cash-out amount, before everyone in the pool leaves and the owner is left with no more pool power, and a irreparably damaged credibility. Now who's really worse off?
I'm left with the inclination that Tim really hasn't read more then one or two articles before deciding to give his opinion to the world, but honestly, I'd rather hear what you think.
"Each time bitcoins change hands, so does a transaction history encoded in a string of characters. This “hash value” or digest can be decoded by anyone with sufficient computer power and time to devote to the effort. When bitcoins are exchanged, a digest is broadcast to the network of users, a participant does the work of decoding the transaction history, and other users quickly confirm their history is accurate. (The decoders earn a 50-bitcoin bounty for their work.) This happens about once every 10 minutes. Everyone who holds the currency agrees on who owns what, which ensures people can’t copy-and-paste their way to millions or defraud other users without the whole network agreeing that it happened.
In other words, Bitcoin isn’t just a currency, it’s a massive experiment in group trust. It’s also a hint of the financial system to come and, ultimately, a scam."
Unfortunate for Mr.Fernholz's credibility, Bitcoin is not based on group trust. Bitcoin is based on peer reviewed open source, a very strict protocol and specific transaction script. Thus the cryptography applied in the transactions makes this a very difficult protocol to spoof, regardless of how many people are in on the 'scam'.
Another blunder Tim makes is in his "economic" paragraph. He claims, "Currencies are most valuable when lots of people trust and use them frequently." So by this logic, the most exchanged currency is the most valuable? Wrong again. Currency is based of basic supply and demand principles which stem from more complicated factors, which has no causality to frequency of use.
In his next argument, he claims that Bitcoins wont work (whatever that vague term means) because it's benefiting to miners who have more computing power. All I have to say is that if the concept of using wealth to acquire more wealth is a new concept to him, I am just disappointed he is getting paid to write this stuff.
He then goes on to advocate the power of pools and how they can steal your money. Okay, if the pool owner changes their code to take a unfair amount they get one Bitcent from every user, which is a fairly typical cash-out amount, before everyone in the pool leaves and the owner is left with no more pool power, and a irreparably damaged credibility. Now who's really worse off?
I'm left with the inclination that Tim really hasn't read more then one or two articles before deciding to give his opinion to the world, but honestly, I'd rather hear what you think.
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Meeting with Walt Oswald, Motorola Mobility CIO
Today I'll be meeting with Walt Oswald and I'm intrigued in chatting with a respected professional about his opinion of Bitcoins and how he thinks the early era of the Bitcoin will play out. If he has already heard of Bitcoins and has an opinion to share, it will certainly be a exciting discussion. On the other hand, if this is the first time discussing the innovative Bitcoin, then I hope he is as excited as me by the possibilities that can stem from the birth of the Bitcoin. More news to come after our meeting.
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
What Would You Do For Bitcoin?
One of the most fun and intriguing Bitcoin start-ups has got to be ForBitcoin.com. This is a truly entertaining forum. Between the gigs people post, and the gigs people look for, there are some truly hilarious posts. Recently a list was dumped with cracked user names and passwords for this forum; So if you had an account, change your credentials. I also had a few words with founder Brad Mills, and he gave me an awesome quote, "We want to support the bitcoin economy by creating a strong trade and services sector at forbitcoin.com! Day trading an mining are profitable, but we want to see what people will do for Bitcoin!"
BitNews
If you follow BitTalk at all, then you know today was the convo between Atlas and Bruce Wagner of The Bitcoin Show. This was a total fail of a broadcast. The show was constantly on and off air. The finicky nature made the entire program exceedingly difficult to follow, and to top it all off, the chat was frenzied with complaints. This happened off and on for a halfhour until the difficulties were finally quelled. Learn from those who have fallen before you gentlemen, don't run a live broadcast unless you can handle it. This downtime and chat frenzy was only followed by more complaints about how Atlas' homepage uses a javascript miner forcing visitors to mint Bitcoins for him. Please comment with your thoughts, and in the mean time, enjoy the full episode as well as some other quality Bitcoin vids.
Stay Updated!
The only way to win the game is to know the game. There are a lot of useful tools online that can help keep track of Bitcoins progress. With many sites that can help you easily monitor important statistics such as price changes and popular pools, if becomes much easier to be successful while wheeling and dealing in the quick moving Bitcoin economy. Much of the information is useful to experienced users, and some of it is useful for newcomers to Bitcoin as well.
Ultra Easy Ways to Get Free BitCoins
Wanna earn some Bitcoins the easy way? Setting up gigs at http://forbitcoin.com/ is probably the best thing you can do with your time. While the payouts seem small, it is an active entrepreneurial community, trading and supporting one another. Plus, you can always find really neat offers. Another great way to earn free money is to be tipped for what you are already doing. With http://www.youtipit.org/ you can easily receive donations to a secure account. You can always receive direct Bitcoin donations as well; For example: 1321oQefncfgsSALPe3sykGHQJinUcLnxj
................
................
................
................
................................
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)