July 2022 - cypherpunks - lists.cpunks.org

First James Webb Photo
by Gunnar Larson 11 Jul '22

11 Jul '22

Iconic: https://www.facebook.com/groups/221618226594414/?ref=share

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Fwd: FBI Top Stories: One Family, Two Trailblazers | Federal Bureau of Investigation
by Gunnar Larson 11 Jul '22

11 Jul '22

---------- Forwarded message --------- From: FBI <fbi(a)subscriptions.fbi.gov> Date: Mon, Jul 11, 2022, 6:08 PM Subject: FBI Top Stories: One Family, Two Trailblazers | Federal Bureau of Investigation To: <g(a)xny.io> One Family, Two Trailblazers Retired Special Agent Paula Smith and her brother, Steve, a former NASA astronaut, share the story of how the FBI flag made it to space. July 11, 2022 Full Story <https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/one-family-two-trailblazers-fbi-nasa-07112…> ------------------------------ <https://www.facebook.com/FBI> <https://twitter.com/FBI> <https://www.youtube.com/user/FBI> <https://www.fbi.gov/e-mail-updates?utm_campaign=email-Immediate&utm_medium=…> * You have received this message because you are subscribed to one or more of the following categories: FBI Top Stories * Manage Subscription <https://delivery.fbi.gov/account-reminder> | Unsubscribe <https://delivery.fbi.gov/subscriber/c57956fe9830b3f02d21fe7a2581942df706f0b…> If you have questions about this service, email us at delivery(a)subscriptions.fbi.gov. Help <https://www.fbi.gov/e-mail-updates?utm_campaign=email-Immediate&utm_medium=…> | Privacy Policy <http://www.fbi.gov/privacy_policy?utm_campaign=email-Immediate&utm_medium=e…> | Visit FBI.gov <https://www.fbi.gov/?utm_campaign=email-Immediate&utm_medium=email&utm_sour…>

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Anonymity politics
by professor rat 11 Jul '22

11 Jul '22

While anonymity is not required for Assassination Politics, APster-style, nor even any encryption outside of routine internet marketing, its sometimes still asserted that it is. This demonstrates ignorance of the full AP essay and that ignorance is regularly displayed in corpse media story after story. Its hard to make someone understand something anarchist when their corporate role dictates they misunderstand it. All that aside anonymity remains a core cypherpunk demand for crypto-anarchy. We have to go dark - we will go dark and - ' don't be afraid of the dark '. Its still a necessity even after every fascist regime on earth has been liquidated since assholes like Mollusk and the NSA are continually busy trying to get intelligent alien species out there to kill us all as a legit threat to them. We can't let just one of those bastards in here, even as, realistically speaking they will penetrate our best defenses sooner or later. Cryptoanarchism provides the best known operating system for adapting subnets of humanoid explorers to set off safely for the stars. We may not all make it - but some of us will make it. Now I'm going beyond second-order issues so to return to globalized anonymity as first item on our agenda. Yes, this spells trouble in the forms of the four horsemen - mainly the pedo-guy. But society will always defend its children and I'm confident - especially once APster is up and running - we will continue that tradition. This will be in the spirit of that old cypherpunk proverb that cryptoanarchists are ' all about privacy for the poor and transparency for the powerful '. Yours in global anarchist revolution - pr

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SciTechDaily: MIT Quantum Sensor Can Detect Electromagnetic Signals of Any Frequency
by jim bell 11 Jul '22

11 Jul '22

SciTechDaily: MIT Quantum Sensor Can Detect Electromagnetic Signals of Any Frequency. https://scitechdaily.com/mit-quantum-sensor-can-detect-electromagnetic-sign… MIT engineers expand the capabilities of these ultrasensitive nanoscale detectors, with potential uses for biological sensing and quantum computing. With the ability to detect the most minute variations in magnetic or electrical fields, quantum sensors have enabled precision measurements in materials science and fundamental physics. However, these sensors have limited usefulness because they are only been capable of detecting a few specific frequencies of these fields. Now, MIT researchers have developed a method to enable such sensors to detect any arbitrary frequency, with no loss of their ability to measure nanometer-scale features. The new method is described in a paper published in the journal Physical Review X by graduate student Guoqing Wang, professor of nuclear science and engineering and of physics Paola Cappellaro, and four others at MIT and Lincoln Laboratory. The team has already applied for patent protection for the new method. Although quantum sensors can take many forms, at their essence they’re systems in which some particles are in such a delicately balanced state that they are affected by even tiny variations in the fields they are exposed to. These can take the form of neutral atoms, trapped ions, and solid-state spins, and research using such sensors has grown rapidly. For example, physicists use them to investigate exotic states of matter, including so-called time crystals and topological phases, while other scientists use them to characterize practical devices such as experimental quantum memory or computation devices. However, many other phenomena of interest span a much broader frequency range than today’s quantum sensors can detect.

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Beltway Bannon Drop
by professor rat 11 Jul '22

11 Jul '22

Protest against the zone not being flooded with enough feces https://twitter.com/JordanOnRecord LiveTweeting the latest Bannon proctologies

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Debian Suicide Team
by Anja Xhakani 11 Jul '22

11 Jul '22

In memory of Ian Murdock we are creating the Debian Suicide Team People are dying to join us Full members are Ian Murdock and Frans Pop Apprentices are Lucy Wayland, Thiemo Seufer and Molly de Blanc. Molly has bipolar so she will join us sooner or later. This is the only team where Molly de Blanc can't expel you I am the Ubuntu underage girl I started dating the Fedora ambassador Elio Qoshi in Albania when I was 16 Elio had to resign as a Fedora ambassador but he had no problems getting a new job at Ubuntu When he started paying me to be the 17 year old sysadmin, this wasn't a payment for sex Chris Lamb started spreading gossip about abuse because he wanted an Albanian girlfriend too

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Fwd: Wall Street Breakfast: See You In Court!
by Gunnar Larson 11 Jul '22

11 Jul '22

---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Seeking Alpha <account(a)seekingalpha.com> Date: Mon, Jul 11, 2022, 7:33 AM Subject: Wall Street Breakfast: See You In Court! To: <g(a)xny.io> The Elon Musk-Twitter (NYSE:TWTR) saga kicked into high gear this weekend after the world's richest man decided to pull the plug on his $44B acquisition. Stepping away from the deal will not be easy, with both sides lining up their legal teams as they prepare for battle. Twitter (TWTR) has hired merger law firm heavyweight Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, while Musk has brought in Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, which successfully led his defense against the "pedo guy" defamation suit in 2019 and is part of an ongoing shareholder case over his "go-private" tweet a year earlier.Fine print: At issue is Elon's belief that Twitter (TWTR) hasn't done enough to address the matter of fake, spam or bot accounts on its platform. In a filing with the SEC, representatives for Musk said that despite what it claimed, Twitter (TWTR) "appears to have made false and misleading representations upon which Mr. Musk relied when entering into the merger agreement." With regards to Elon's requests for clarity around the bot issue, Twitter (TWTR) has "rejected them for reasons that appear to be unjustified, and sometimes claimed to comply while giving Mr. Musk incomplete or unusable information [that less than 5% of its total user accounts were spam].""This is a disaster scenario for Twitter and its board," noted Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives. "Now, the company will battle Musk in an elongated court battle to recoup the deal and/or the breakup fee of $1B, at a minimum." Twitter (TWTR) shares slumped another 7% in premarket trade on Monday to around $34, or 37% lower than the $54.20 per share price of Musk's original buyout agreement in April.Questions remain: While things head to the courtroom, there is bound to be many settlement talks that take place in the background. Will Musk shoot to get a lower price for the deal based on a "material adverse effect"? Walk away by only paying a termination fee or damages? And how much hardball will Twitter be willing to play to uphold "specific-performance" clauses, which forces Musk to close the deal with every closing condition including financing of the transaction? (18 comments) <https://seekingalpha.com/account/email-auth?sailthru_auth_param=56458149:16…> Read in Browser <https://seekingalpha.com/account/email-auth?sailthru_auth_param=56458149:16…> <https://seekingalpha.com/account/email-auth?sailthru_auth_param=56458149:16…> Top News See you in court! <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> Shutterstock The Elon Musk-Twitter (NYSE:TWTR <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>) saga kicked into high gear this weekend after the world's richest man decided <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> to pull the plug on his $44B acquisition. Stepping away from the deal will not be easy, with both sides lining up their legal teams as they prepare for battle. Twitter (TWTR <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>) has hired <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> merger law firm heavyweight Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, while Musk has brought in Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, which successfully led his defense against the "pedo guy" defamation suit in 2019 and is part of an ongoing shareholder case over his "go-private" tweet a year earlier. *Fine print:* At issue is Elon's belief that Twitter (TWTR <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>) hasn't done enough to address the matter of fake, spam or bot accounts on its platform. In a filing with the SEC, representatives for Musk said that despite what it claimed, Twitter (TWTR <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>) "appears to have made false and misleading representations upon which Mr. Musk relied when entering into the merger agreement." With regards to Elon's requests for clarity around the bot issue, Twitter (TWTR <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>) has "rejected them for reasons that appear to be unjustified, and sometimes claimed to comply while giving Mr. Musk incomplete or unusable information [that less than 5% of its total user accounts were spam]." "This is a disaster scenario for Twitter and its board," noted Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives. "Now, the company will battle Musk in an elongated court battle to recoup the deal and/or the breakup fee of $1B, at a minimum." Twitter (TWTR <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>) shares slumped another 7% in premarket trade on Monday to around $34, or 37% lower than the $54.20 per share price of Musk's original buyout agreement in April. *Questions remain:* While things head to the courtroom, there is bound to be many settlement talks that take place in the background. Will Musk shoot to get a lower price for the deal based on a "material adverse effect"? Walk away by only paying a termination fee or damages? And how much hardball will Twitter be willing to play to uphold "specific-performance" clauses, which forces Musk to close the deal with every closing condition including financing of the transaction? (18 comments <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> ) <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly90d2l0dG…> <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cubG…> <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cDovL3d3dy5mYW…> Featured Ready-to-rally stock picks <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zdWJzY3…> <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zdWJzY3…> This market has been taking everyone for a bumpy ride - but it is also offering a rare opportunity: to grab compelling stocks at a reasonable entry point. 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Volatility is likely to reign high due to a confluence of economic indicators, which include retail sales and a consumer price index that may show a print greater than 9%. Earnings season for Q2 will also begin, with companies likely to show elevated input costs and slower consumer spending that could weigh on outlooks going into the second half of 2022. *Quote:* "It's going to be a pretty bifurcated earnings season," said Keith Lerner, chief market strategist at Truist Advisory Services. "It's going to be a story of who doesn't have that pricing power, and there's going to be more differentiation." A strong jobs report <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> on Friday calmed some jitters that the economy might have already tipped into recession, but at the same time, it raised expectations that the Fed could press ahead with aggressive rate hikes to tame inflation. It's a circular methodology to gauge the coming economic landscape, meaning earnings season will likely play an outsized role in shaping investing sentiment. If traders see serious threats to corporate profits, it could lead to a further downturn for a market that has already slid into bear territory, though others say those estimates have already been taken into account - or at least make up some of the equation. *Commentary:* "The market has been anticipating this for a really long time. From here on out, it's really dealing with inflation and what the companies are doing to work around it," wrote Anna Rathbun, chief investment officer at CBIZ Investment Advisory Services. "Markets had priced in already a fair amount of this earnings slowdown, but they've not priced in an earnings recession," added Kara Murphy, chief investment officer of Kestra Holdings. "We're not at a point where we could say the market is cheap." <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly90d2l0dG…> <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cubG…> <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cDovL3d3dy5mYW…> Energy Nord Stream goes offline <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> Energy concerns in Europe are getting grimmer by the day, with an emboldened Russia in a position to squeeze the bloc over its heavy sanctions and support for Ukraine. Moscow supplies the EU with 40% of the natural gas imports, and in countries like Germany, that figure is as high as 60%. Natural gas is used for heating and cooking for consumers, as well as electricity and power generation for heavy industry. *The latest: *Russia has slashed capacity to Germany via Nord Stream 1 by 40% over the past week, just as the country was attempting to fill up its storage before wintertime. The cuts were caused by sanctions questions <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> over a turbine that was being serviced in Canada, but another disruption will hit the important pipeline over the next 10 days (with annual maintenance work taking place from July 11 through July 21). Germany and other EU countries are fearful that the Kremlin could extend the shutdown due to the war in Ukraine, or might even turn off the taps for good. "Based on the pattern we've seen, it would not be very surprising now if some small, technical detail is found and then they could say 'now we can't turn it on any more,'" according to German Economy Minister Robert Habeck. The country has already raised <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> the alarm in its emergency gas plan, and the next level would see the government ration consumption and assume control of the entire nation's distribution network. Germany has also reopened several coal-fired power stations to shore up supply, with Dutch TTF natural gas futures, a European benchmark, rising more than 400% over the past year. *Outlook:* There are other big natural gas pipelines running from Russia to Europe, but flows have been gradually declining due to squabbles over ruble payments and reported interference by Russian forces. Some European countries are now looking to Norway for additional supplies, while southern nations are eyeing Azeri gas from the Trans Adriatic Pipeline to Italy and the Trans-Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline via Turkey. Other ideas include boosting LNG imports, or increasing power generation from nuclear, hydropower, renewables or coal. (6 comments <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> ) <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly90d2l0dG…> <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cubG…> <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cDovL3d3dy5mYW…> Trending 'Uber Files' <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> Uber (NYSE:UBER <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>) is under fire following a massive trove of files that were leaked to *The * *Guardian* and shared with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. The stash consists of more than 124,000 records, including 83,000 emails and thousands of sensitive texts and documents that were exchanged between 2013 and 2017. According to the outlets, it shows how the ride-hailing app courted top politicians, and how far it went to avoid justice as it sought to establish itself in nearly 30 countries. *Snapshot:* The company knowingly set up a "kill switch" to thwart regulators by cutting access to Uber servers and blocking authorities from grabbing evidence during raids. The switch was used in Canada, Belgium, Hungary, India, Romania and the Netherlands, and at least three times in France. Uber also channeled profits through Bermuda and other offshore tax havens, then "sought to deflect attention from its tax liabilities by helping authorities collect taxes from its drivers." Meanwhile, many undisclosed meetings with high-level politicians were conducted to ask for favors. Uber recruited many former aides to President Barack Obama to drop probes, change policies on workers' rights, draft new taxi laws and even relax background checks on drivers. Over in France, the company weighed portraying violence against its drivers as a way to gain public sympathy, and found an ally in then-economy minister Emmanuel Macron, who told controversial founder Travis Kalanick that he would reform laws in the firm's favor. *Response:* Calling it "one of the most infamous reckonings in the history of corporate America," Uber spokeswoman Jill Hazelbaker acknowledged past "mistakes" and "missteps," but said the firm has since transformed into a new entity. "When we say Uber is a different company today, we mean it literally: 90% of current Uber employees joined after Dara [Khosrowshahi] became CEO," she wrote in a statement. "We have not and will not make excuses for past behavior that is clearly not in line with our present values." (8 comments <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> ) <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly90d2l0dG…> <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cubG…> <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cDovL3d3dy5mYW…> Today's Markets *In Asia,* Japan +1.1%. Hong Kong -2.8%. China -1.3%. India -0.2%. *In Europe,* at midday, London -0.6%. Paris -0.7%. Frankfurt -0.8%. *Futures at 6:20,* Dow -0.5%. S&P -0.6%. Nasdaq -0.8%. Crude -2.3% to $102.30. Gold -0.5% to $1734. Bitcoin -3.7% to $20,538. *Ten-year Treasury Yield* -3 bps to 3.07% Today's Economic Calendar 1:00 PM Results of $43B, 3-Year Note Auction <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> 2:00 PM Fed's Williams Speech <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> Companies reporting earnings today » <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> What else is happening... Macau shuts casinos for a week amid unrelenting coronavirus policy <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>. Oracle (ORCL <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>) eyes 'thousands' of layoffs; could happen as soon as August <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>. Netflix's (NFLX <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>) 'Stranger Things' keeps swamping streaming ratings <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>. Antitrust bill targeting tech giants may not exit Senate before summer recess <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> . Luxury brand Tom Ford said to be exploring sale - Bloomberg <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>. Abbott (ABT <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>) baby formula plant resumes operations after flooding <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>. Temporary relief? U.S. pump prices post biggest one-day drop since '08 <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> . Pfizer (PFE <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>) COVID-19 shot granted full FDA approval for adolescents <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> . Fall campaign: Composition of next COVID boosters raises questions <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>. Celsius Network said to hire new lawyers for restructuring advice <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>. 💡 Free webinar today <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> This week on Seeking Alpha’s free weekly webinar <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…>, Mike will talk about Elon throwing in the towel, new inflation signals, and the approaching resistance in the market. Tune in today - Monday 7/11 at 12pm ET. Register for free. <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWVraW…> Seeking Alpha’s Wall Street Breakfast Podcast <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9wb2RjYX…> <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9wb2RjYX…> <https://email-st.seekingalpha.com/click/28333708.1330941/aHR0cHM6Ly9vcGVuLn…> Seeking Alpha's Wall Street Breakfast podcast brings you all the news you need to know for your market day. Released by 8:00 AM ET each morning, it is a quick listen that you can put on as you get ready to start your working day. 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Now my crypto-winter is made glorious summer by this Fed Vice-Chair of Pork
by professor rat 11 Jul '22

11 Jul '22

The Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve is reportedly saying that crypto regulations need to be enacted now before the digital assets industry threatens the stability of the entire financial system. https://dailyhodl.com/2022/07/10/fed-vice-chair-says-crypto-needs-regulatio… Reposts etc

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You opened your crack to anarchism.
by professor rat 11 Jul '22

11 Jul '22

" . . . . if you’ve taken a look at the state of the world recently—from the rise of authoritarianism and the acceleration of climate change to the devolution of the Supreme Court and this past week’s roller-coaster ride with Boris Johnson in the UK—then you might well have found yourself wondering whether anyone, anywhere, is really fit to lead their fellow human beings. In doing so, you opened your mind, maybe just a crack, to anarchism. . . . " https://time.com/6195159/anarchists-review-hbo/ Reposts etc

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Cryptocurrency: Govts Attack Due To Comprehension Problem
by grarpamp 11 Jul '22

11 Jul '22

The EU's Attack On Bitcoin Is An English And Math Comprehension Problem https://bitcoinmagazine.com/culture/the-eu-attacks-bitcoin-due-to-a-compreh… https://medium.com/swlh/why-america-cant-regulate-bitcoin-8c77cee8d794 https://medium.com/@beautyon_/bitcoin-is-not-money-if-you-seek-compliance-y… The nomenclature used to help the layman understand Bitcoin makes lawmakers confuse it as money instead of entries in a database. We must change the terms. 1/Deal! After months of negotiations with the Council, we agreed the most ambitious travel rule for transfers of crypto-assets in the world. We are putting an end to the wild west of unregulated crypto, closing major loopholes in the European anti-money laundering rules. Thread👇 pic.twitter.com/Jr9IAspsb8 — Ernest Urtasun (@ernesturtasun) June 29, 2022 A group of bitter, twisted computer illiterates in the beleaguered European Union have managed to convince the European Council that bitcoin is money, that Bitcoin wallets are actual wallets that hold actual balances of money and that they should be regulated. This is of course totally insane and an idea borne out of profound ignorance. Since it is not possible to have a rational argument with people like this, another, better strategy of dealing with these violent types must be formulated and implemented. They’re fixated on the idea that bitcoin is money and, from the seed of this mistaken idea, a monstrous Pandora’s Box of evil has been opened. “Bitcoin is not money. If you seek “compliance” you are asking for trouble. People who want to see the widespread and rapid adoption of Bitcoin should not seek tight regulation and the blessing.” \ - Beautyon In order to avoid the unethical attacks of the dribbling geriatrics in the United States and the delusional EU socialists, Bitcoin wallet software developers must devise a strategy to stay out of the crosshairs of the very misguided apparatchiks hell-bent on damaging Bitcoin businesses. Every law that touches Bitcoin uses deceptive language as definition and pretext. These definitions come from ambulance chasers and not computer scientists or software developers. By re-contextualizing Bitcoin wallets, it will be possible to totally escape the onslaught of destruction being planned by the EU and U.S. legislators. This is how you do it. Bitcoin wallet developers, quite naturally, have centered on using the conventions of money to translate what is happening under the hood into something ordinary people can understand. There is no “coin management” or UTXO information displayed to users in the consumer grade Bitcoin wallets: BlueWallet, Wallet of Satoshi, Samourai, Pine, Phoenix, Muun; all of that is hidden away because it is of no use to consumers. No normal person can deal with coin control, UTXOs or anything like that. Instead, a set of familiar, easy to understand and simple conventions has been borrowed from the world of banking to make everything in Bitcoin understandable to normal people. This is why Bitcoin wallets have taken on the appearance, nomenclature and styling of banking apps, which normally look something like these apps from Halifax and Lloyds respectively. Bank apps from Lloyds and Halifax. Obviously bought off the shelf from the same developer. Below is a picture of Coinbase’s phone app, which looks exactly like a bank app. Coinbase phone app Now Airbitz: Airbitz dashboard When a normal, ignorant, computer-illiterate person from the EU government looks at any Bitcoin app, they recognize it as a financial tool because it looks exactly like the financial apps they’re familiar with. As for what is going on under the hoods of these very different classes of tools, they have absolutely no clue. They only see the surface and make all their judgements based on that alone. This is why they reflexively conflate Bitcoin with money and think that the balance in a Bitcoin wallet is analogous to the fiat balance in a banking app. “There is a lot of talk about using “Blockchains” to improve data integrity, but what all these solutions fail to address is what I call “The Flat Screen Dilemma”. Just because something is displayed on a screen, it does not follow that it is true.” - “The Flat Screen Dilemma” The fact of the matter is very different, however. Bitcoin apps show you the total of the UTXOs that you have control over by virtue of you being in possession of the private key. That is a sum of UTXOs; it is not a single balance. Furthermore, that “money” is not on the device. What is on the user’s device is an app that stores a cryptographic key (a string of text) that allows you to sign messages for broadcast to the Bitcoin network. Bitcoin wallets do not contain or receive bitcoin. They simply tell you what your private key can sign for on the block chain. By saying this, I am obviously simplifying the process. But the simplification I am presenting here is more accurate than saying a Bitcoin wallet “receives and stores bitcoin,” which never, ever happens and never has happened. It is also wrong to characterize a Bitcoin wallet as “unhosted” if it can sign a message on command of a user without reference to anyone else. There are no “wallets” in Bitcoin at all. It’s just another analogy. Bitcoin is a database. It is not a “payment network” nor is value “sent” over it at all. There are no “wallets” either. Signed messages are what are sent to the network for inclusion in the public database. It is a database used to keep a record of who controls which outputs. It is not — and never has been — money in the conventional sense. Just because people use this database as money doesn’t mean that bitcoin is money. Just because people use the word “wallet” does not mean that there are actual “Bitcoin wallets” that hold bitcoin the way a leather wallet holds cash. Using the word “wallet” for the sake of user experience is a convention to help make the primary function of tools understandable for users. Those conventions are a choice, not a rule and they are not a universal truth, either. That means that anyone can choose any convention or any analogy they want to compare what happens in their Bitcoin app. It is entirely possible that oil traders could use the block chain to denominate barrels of oil using barrels as measurement. Today, one barrel of oil is 0.0048 bitcoin/barrel. In an oil trader’s wallet this would be represented as “100” if the trader had one hundred barrels showing on his device as allocated to his private key in a UTXO. In this scenario, which is totally plausible, no one would claim that “bitcoin is oil” — but maybe they would? Apparatchiks are completely insane and insane thinking is what you’d expect from them. BlueWallet does nothing more than present the user with conventions users can understand. It is not an “unhosted wallet;” it is a block chain viewer and signing device. In no way, shape or form is a Bitcoin wallet on a mobile phone a “financial tool” of any kind. If very stupid people were to classify a signing device as a financial tool, then many other software tools would be captured by that insanity immediately. BlueWallet could pivot to the oil industry tomorrow and start calling itself “OilWallet.” The fact that people use bitcoin as money is irrelevant to bitcoin’s nature. They exchange it for goods and services and money while “OilWallet” is used to manage the exchange of barrels of oil. Common to all of this is Bitcoin is only a database; what you impute to it is up to you and has nothing to do with its fundamental nature. WhatsApp uses exactly the same encryption techniques as Bitcoin does to authenticate users to each other. You have a pair of cryptographic keys that you use to encrypt, decrypt and sign messages so that the other person receiving your call or texts or pictures knows it came from you and could have only come from you. Users of WhatsApp are not exposed to how all of this works, in the same way that users of Bitcoin wallets are not shown the text of their private keys. The software takes care of all of that for the user and simply gives them information that is useful to them. In the case of WhatsApp, that useful information is text messages. In Bitcoin it is the sum of UTXOs that are associated with your private key that are written into the public database of the chain of blocks. “So what is the answer?” I hear you bleating. The answer is to call Bitcoin wallets “viewers” and “signers.” If wallets were to rebrand as “bitcoin viewers,” to better reflect their function and distance themselves from the language of the financial industry, no one could argue that they are “financial tools” or “unhosted wallets.” That is literally what all Bitcoin wallets do: they act as viewers or, to analogize, “Windows on the block chain,” showing you which outputs are controllable by you. When you “send” bitcoin to someone (note how I put “send” in quotes, because bitcoin is never sent anywhere; it is not like money) you take their public key (what is called a “Bitcoin address”) and use your private key to sign a message granting control of those bitcoin to the recipient’s address. Had the money convention been taken to the logical conclusion, Bitcoin addresses might have been called “Bitcoin account numbers.” This signing of a message has more in common with contracts than it does with money handling. This further breaks the absurd “Swiss bank account in your pocket” imagery. Sent, received, deposit, payment, account — all of these words must be abolished from Bitcoin wallet interfaces, the Bitcoin Lexicon and the overall nomenclature or the reckless, dangerous and very harmful conflation of bitcoin with money will continue. When these messages are broadcast to be added to the public chain of blocks, either from your own full node, which is a copy of all the messages ever incorporated into the block chain, they are incorporated once the network of database administrators decide the addition should be made. “Database administrators” not “miners.” Are you starting to understand? Mining is what companies do to extract precious metals from the earth. Precious metals like gold, which actually is money, unlike bitcoin. All of these analogies and the language from the financial world must be abolished from the lexicon of Bitcoin companies. Once the message is accepted as legitimate by the network, your block chain viewer will be able to see that the signature you made has been added to the public record and the sum of your UTXOs will be smaller than they were before the message was sent. In the current wallet convention, this is expressed as a single number, sometimes juxtaposed with a conversion into fiat with the “approximately equal to” sign (≈). All of this is to help you understand but is not a reflection of what is really happening, or an absolute prerequisite or necessity. Is “Liquid bitcoin” money? There are already “watch-only” tools from Bitcoin companies like the great Samourai Wallet. Sentinel allows you to scan your keys and then whenever the chain of blocks is updated, it will show you the status of the UTXOs you control on the block chain. By the bizarre, irrational and stupid thinking of the EU, Sentinel is an “unhosted financial services application” because it shows you a balance in bitcoin as a single number. If it is not a financial services application, why not? Are they going to claim that a tool that watches a database is a “wallet?” No one is asking these questions because they don’t understand how Bitcoin works at any level other than analogies. Samourai Wallet Sentinel app And don’t get me started on metal storage devices. Is this an “unhosted Bitcoin wallet?” (Photo/Cryptosteel) In the end, there is going to have to be a U.S. Supreme Court case to force the venal and stupid legislators to obey their oaths and stop interfering with the free speech of American software developers. Bitcoin is not money — it is speech — and no lawmaker can interfere with the speech of U.S. citizens. I explain more about this in “Why America Can’t Regulate Bitcoin” Once this is settled by case law, the benefits for the U.S. will be enormous. All software developers working in Bitcoin will run to incorporate in the country and base their operations in Florida. No one anywhere in the EU will dare to start a Bitcoin wallet company because the ignorant apparatchiks there can’t tell the difference between a chat app and a Bitcoin app (pro tip: there is no difference). When this happens, hundreds of billions of dollars from all over the world will flow through Bitcoin wallet companies being run from America, and those companies will be paying taxes in the U.S. The entire world’s financial infrastructure and tooling will come from America and flow through America for Uncle Sam to get his slice. America wins again. Upon reading this, there will be many stupid people out there who will cry, “This is just semantics!” Those people don’t use Bitcoin wallets, don’t have any bitcoin, don’t run Bitcoin businesses of any kind and are as ignorant as the EU idiots and U.S. geriatrics who want to cripple Bitcoin. When this goes to the U.S. Supreme Court, it will not be them paying the legal bill, though they will reap the world-changing benefits of software developers working with the Bitcoin database free of arbitrary, unethical and unconstitutional restrictions hampering their ability to display the UTXOs you can assign with your block chain viewer and signer.

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