sirdogealot

One of these assholes incessantly calls up my grandmother (and everybody else in her building) daily, proceeds to scream at her when she denies owning a computer, insisting she does. Then calls her a liar (that she is lying she does not own a computer) until she unwillingly hangs up the phone... upset and confused as to why some young man is calling and yelling at her.

They're all coming from random phone numbers, and there seems to be literally nothing you can do to stop it. Apart from screening every one of her calls for her.

There really are some scummy people out there, unfortunately.

That would be very difficult, and I'm sure will prove to be a major deterring factor in the early adoption of this new currency.

Their old "zerocoin" project website had a neat infographic depicting it's simplified usage: http://zerocoin.org/media/images/zerocoin_blockchain.png

Although I haven't fully read the zerocash whitepaper yet to know if they're still headed in the same direction, I believe that they are.

There is also the Q&A page on the new zerocash-project.org website: http://zerocash-project.org/q_and_a

On one hand, I am glad that the transfer of property is not always 100% absolute.

Can you imagine what might happen if the land of the U.S. federal reserve building was somehow transferred to a random individual?

I used to get "free money" in my bank account all the time. Some banker would make an error, depositing a check from a member of a separate branch into my account with the same account number. The mistake was usually noticed during an audit and the money would magically be removed from my account.

Reversible transactions do have their place, I suppose.

That's a great writeup.

I can't wait to try mine once it arrives!

I almost forgot about the project and basically just wrote it off as $65 down the drain when they surprisingly emailed me earlier this week saying it had been shipped out.

Funny how the $65 still ends up going down the drain one way or another when you spend it on edible products.

I am curious about their project from a legal standpoint.

I live in another country and basically just clicked through some acceptance forms and sent them the money what seems like over a year ago now.

What happens to the soylent company if I die after ingesting it for a week or a month straight? Even if it wasn't what actually killed me?

On another note... after having done some research into making my dog's food... isn't soylent basically just dog food for humans? They take all the right amounts of industrial grade vitamins, mix it together with a substrate, and bake it into kibble bits.

Is soylent just kibble without the baking?

Blockchain technology would certainly make title searches on real property easier.

Right now I have to physically drive to a land records office, pay the people behind the desk to look through some old photocopied records; which they can't even fully guarantee the accuracy of.

My thoughts exactly.

Matthew Green has carefully worded his presentation of this project in the past.

He has always claimed that such an implementation could be possible. Not that it was inherent to the coin itself.

Let's hope that he gets it running sooner, rather than later. Before somebody has a chance to change his mind.

Very interesting. I was not aware that there are "foreigner only prisons". I wonder why they exist?

I haven't kept up on his blog writings much, as it's too depressing to be honest.

Which is a shame considering he is such a great writer.

Thankfully, he should be out soon and it doesn't sound like they have broken his spirit one bit.

The same thing that would happen to any country or state that decided to stop participating in the war on drugs.

They would be sanctioned and heckled by other city governments.

They may even have their drug enforcement programs carried out by other governments, like when Canada sat back for years while Marc Emery sold Marijuana seeds worldwide.

The DEA basically coughed and the RCMP had Emery arrested on the spot and extradited to the U.S.A. to face charges in a country he was not even a resident of.[0]

I am sure there was a bit more to it than that. The USA probably insinuated some very strong consequences for Canada if they didn't turn him over. But that's entirely speculation.

Marc Emery aka "the prince of pot" remains incarcerated in the U.S.A. to this day.

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Emery#2005_arrest_and_extr...

That video is incredible to watch.

It is so amazing that I am slightly worried that it might be faked.

I really hope that this technology becomes an economically-viable and long-term means of helping parkinson's tremors.

Funny that a "spammer"'s URL link is highlighted and underlined when they utter an unpopular comment.

> in the years that broadband service has been subjected to relatively little regulation, investment and deployment have flourished

Perhaps they are referring to the majority of the years/graph between 1997 and 2008? Which if they were, would make that statement true.

Even by saying that investment has increased overall between 1997 and 2013 would be true imho.

Interesting, that's almost exactly how Isaac Newton surmised gravity if I am not mistaken.

I wonder what the dimensions of the gun required to send a payload 8,000 times smaller into orbit would be?

I am wondering why I have yet to see this tindie mentioned on hackaday.com

To the founder, I would approach them for an advertising deal if at all possible.

>If the original title begins with a number or number + gratuitous adjective, we'd appreciate it if you'd crop it. E.g. translate "10 Ways To Do X" to "How To Do X," and "14 Amazing Ys" to "Ys." Exception: when the number is meaningful, e.g. "The 5 Platonic Solids."

http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

That's a terrible idea imho.

Just change the domain name and relaunch. Problem solved before it began, and for just $10.

OP was referring to 'nobody' as being the general public. Not a mob-boss on trial that the FBI has been following for decades.

From my own very biased experience of having lots of close friends and never a dull moment, all whilst working alone for most of the day in my apartment... perhaps I do have low social skills, but it doesn't seem to affect me in a negative manner.

I choose to know a small number of people very well. It doesn't interest me to know a large number of people hardly at all.

If I wanted to "up my social skills" and "gain tons of 'friends'" I could easily do that I would think. Simply by mimicing the flaky personality described in the article and sure, everyone loves a yes-man.

Video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcozjXK-850

Wikipedia describes the video as:

>It is one of the most expensive videos ever made, costing upwards of $2 million, and focused largely on special effects. The video begins with a glass filled with liquid moving toward the edge of its resting area, which spills and transforms into Busta Rhymes as a knight in a futuristic armor suit.

I really wonder what it would cost to complete today.

Maybe it's just that the article was written by a woman. (As I could easily see my significant other behaving in this manner when she was "out with her girlfriends".) But, does anybody on HN actually relate to this paragraph below?

>I might open a conversation, for instance, by saying how nice it is to meet someone—when I’m really not at all happy about it. I might go on to say that I grew up in Boston—a lie, technically, since I really grew up in a small town about forty minutes outside the city. I could say that the person’s work sounds fascinating, when it’s no such thing, or compliment him on his (drab) tie or his (awful) shirt. And if the person mentions loving a certain downtown restaurant where I’ve had a terrible experience? I’m likely to just smile and nod and say, Yes, great place.

I am proud to say that I relate to none of those examples.

I would usually say "it was nice to meet you" when somebody I just met was parting ways just as a pleasantry that has to be said, not that I meant it. And not that the other person would assume that I actually genuinely meant that either. Ending a meeting with "It was nice to meet you" seems just as natural and called for as starting out with "Hello, my name is sirdogealot". Who goes home thrilled or even remembering the fact that somebody they met that day said "Nice to meet you"?

I always am truthful about where I am from. If the person has never heard of my small home town, I would explain it's location to them.

I wouldn't lie and say somebody's work sounds fascinating if it wasn't. If you haul boxes or flip burgers, I don't really care to hear about your job or your problems at work. In fact I find I don't congregate with people who hold boring jobs. It just gets too tedious hearing that you are unhappy and yet not bright enough to realize it and quit.

I would never compliment somebody on their clothing if they actually looked like shit unless they I was trying to cheer them up, hit on them or get a job or something.

If somebody suggests a terrible restaurant, I'll let them know why it's a bad choice. Like the restaurant that served me ants in my stir fry, or the place that gave me food poisoning on Christmas eve one year? No, I'm not eating at those places again. I don't care if I'm trying to win over my girlfriend's parents. If a place is shit I'll call it shit.

Does the author think that her checkout clerk is lying to her when they systematically grunt out "have a nice day" as they pass her her grocery bags?

Do you think the kid at the McDonald's counter is mocking you when he smiles at you?

Do you think I'm lying to you when you ask "How are you doing?" and I only ever respond with "Oh, pretty good! How are you doing?" I might say that if I just woke up in the morning or if I had just been in a car crash but I'm not lying. I know that most people don't care to hear about your problems. So I don't bother them with them.

Society is weird. There are a lot of odd things we do in society but I wouldn't misconstrue them all as lying.

It's like the terrorism shield all the politicians stand behind.

Don't agree with me? You're a terrorist.

Don't think Snowden is a hero? You're a sock puppet.

You read it on The Guardian; a news service, not a Q&A website.

How did they determine who was a porn actor and who was not?

This is what I love about HN. The knowledgeable community. Thank you.

I for one am glad that they are not incessantly restoring and renewing the nuclear missile silos.

It's proper grammar. Blockchain is not a word according to any dictionaries that I know of.

And I wish I was the guy who first thought to buy blockchain.com back on March 8th, 2011.

It was certainly a wise business move.

I believe the word that OP was looking for in his title was "block chain". Not "blockchain".

Blockchain is the company name of one of your competitors.

One of the speakers at the Toronto Bitcoin Expo corrected his own slide during his own company's presentation concerning this matter. It was quite comical.

>it's ridiculous, he can't possibly know about all of these different things

That just seemed petty.

Does Lebron James balk if President Obama gives him a tip on his jumper?

Sure, I could spend my expertise living frugally in one of the world's most incredible cities... or the company I am helping out could help me better by providing me with a simple room to live in inside a house near their office filled with other like minded people.

I am an expert programmer, I don't want to spend my 3 months in San Francisco in a hostel just to help the greater good and save a few bucks.

Asking people to move to San Francisco for 3 months is just a tad bit crazy/expensive don't you think?

One might spend ~$5,000/mo for a short 3 month stay in San Francisco.

Why not organize accommodation for them as well? Renting a house for 3 months over a summer and dividing it by 3-4 grantees would be cheaper for both parties. And it would help manufacture some incredible collaboration as well imho.