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Bitcoin. Anyone here actively do it?

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    #16
    Researchers discover illegal content within the distributed ledger, making possession of it potentially unlawful in many countries


    Possession of Bitcoin may be illegal after it has been discovered that the currencies blockchain contains child abuse data and imagery.

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      #17
      Reading the actual paper referenced in the article, there was no child abuse imagery found in there at all. Sounds like someone is trying to short bitcoin.

      Bitcoin’s blockchain contains at least eight
      files with sexual content. While five files only show, describe, or link to mildly
      pornographic content, we consider the remaining three instances objectionable
      for almost all jurisdictions: Two of them are backups of link lists to child pornog-
      raphy, containing 274 links to websites, 142 of which refer to Tor hidden services.
      The remaining instance is an image depicting mild nudity of a young woman.
      In an online forum this image is claimed to show child pornography, albeit this
      claim cannot be verified (due to ethical concerns we refrain from providing a ci-
      tation).
      Also, you don't have to download the entire blockchain to mine - that's simply wrong.
      Last edited by MartyG; 20-03-2018, 13:06.

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        #18
        To be honest I'm mildly surprised at how well Bitcoin is holding on now it's value is so inflated. The increased political, financial and media scrutiny hasn't taken it down... yet

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          #19
          Dollar for dollar, crafting cryptocurrency sucks up 'more energy' than mining gold, copper, etc


          Anyway, my main reason for posting is I was discussing this on FB, and posted the text below, in reply to a comment that regular money also has no intrinsic value. Whenever anyone asks me my thoughts on crypto, or what it is, I give the explanation below. Roughly speaking.

          As far as I am concerned, based on what I've read, I feel I've accurately described crypto mining. However, just in case I am wrong, and in case there is some actual mathematical value in it (is it somehow helping with space travel or string theory? Do the scientists at CERN make use of crypto miners to solve their equations?), can anyone link to reading material or a video which explains it better?

          Normal money was usually based on or backed by physical gold, and even coins and notes have some intrinsic alternative use to being mere currency. Pennies could be melted down into arrow heads, £50 notes used to blow your nose or funnel sherbet up into it.

          And the oil from the oil industry makes planes fly. It's a physical substance that does real things.

          From what I can tell, based on reading everything I can find, cryptocurrency is completely fabricated and the result of people running computer farms 24/7, generating really big random numbers, and when you generate the correct random number, you get an invisible unicorn which you can then trade for actual real things, because the person with that real thing agrees that your invisible unicorn is actually ****ing real and he wants some of that unicorn action.

          It's complete lunacy.

          Crypto miners will say some nonsense like "we're solving incredibly complex mathematical problems", like they're trying to put physical people on the physical moon, or confirm string theory. When it isn't remotely anything of the sort. It is, quite plainly, quite literally, rolling the biggest dice you can imagine to randomly come up with a really big number, hoping that really big number slots into the end of the chain.

          You're not solving ****. There is zero ****ing solving going on. And it's not mathematical problems. It's just random bull**** numbers for ****'s sake.

          In my mind, there is zero difference between a crypto miner and someone playing a slot machine or a roulette wheel. Except crypto miners are actually also sort of murdering the rest of us slowly, by consuming vast quantities of energy and filling the atmosphere with CO2.

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            #20
            You are correct.

            Except non-crypto currencies are kinda based on nothing either these days. The pound dropped in value compared to the dollar today because reasons etc.

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              #21
              You know, I was really hoping I was wrong and that the "complex problems" miners talk about actually was something to do with CERN - like some sort of crowdsourced computational power sharing thing.

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