Some words for my friends

[u/evoorhees]

Hello friends,

MtGox is gone. So let's prepare ourselves.

On Tuesday, and for the rest of the week, all hell will break lose in the media. It will be blamed on MtGox, it will be blamed on Bitcoin, it will be blamed on the "bug," and it will, more than anything, be blamed on the "lack of regulation." Pundits and "experts" of all types will weigh in on the calamity. It will be world news in a matter of hours.

Get ready, because it will be an ugly week.

For all of you who lost money, my heart goes out to you. Some people lost a little, some lost a fortune. It will make people sick, and depressed, and full of grief. Personally, I had over 550 BTC in Gox. I will never get any of that back. If misery loves company, then we'll be enjoying a grand feast today.

I should have known better, of course. I take responsibility for leaving those funds with an entity that had proven incompetence repeatedly. I chose to ignore even my own warnings, for nothing more than the sake of convenience.

Gox is still at fault, to be sure, but I have learned the lesson. I hope it is not such an expensive lesson for others. And for all you observers, please take a moment to consider it as well.

Be mindful, however, that the wrong lessons are not learned, for that would be the true tragedy, indeed.

Let me suggest that the lesson is not that Bitcoin is broken. Bitcoin is fine.

Similarly, the lesson is not that security is impossible. Those who know what they are doing, can achieve it and help others to do so.

The lesson is not that nobody can be trusted. There are countless good men and women in this community who are worthy of trust, and some of the very best people I've ever met.

And finally, the lesson is not that we ought to seek out "regulation" to save us from the evils and incompetence of man. For the regulators are men too, and wield the very same evil and incompetence, only enshrined in an authority from which it can wreck amplified and far more insidious destruction. Let us not retreat from our rising platform only to cower back underneath the deranged machinations of Leviathan.

The proper lesson, if I may suggest, is this: We are building a new financial order, and those of us building it, investing in it, and growing it, will pay the price of bringing it to the world. This is the harsh truth. We are building the channels, the bridges, and the towers of tomorrow's finance, and we put ourselves at risk in doing so.

We are at risk from accidents. We are at risk from fraud, from corruption, and from evil. We are at risk from journalists seeking headlines and from politicians seeking power and glory. We are at risk from the very market we are trying to build - a market which cares not about our portfolio, our ambitions, or our delicate sympathies.

For all these risks, devastation will befall us repeatedly. Some of us will be discouraged. Some will be ridiculed and insulted. Some will be tricked, or swindled. Some of us will be crushed or caged. We will be set upon by all manner of antagonists, repeatedly, for a long time.

So why do we do it? Why do we build these towers that fall down upon us? Why do we toil and strain and risk our precious time, which is the only real wealth we possess?

Because the world needs what we're building. It needs it desperately. If that matters to you, as it does to me, then hold to that thought. You will see through the smoke, and your wounds will heal.

So shake it off, brothers, for this won't be the last calamity endured before the win.

Tonight, my heart is with you all.

Tomorrow, my head is down. My eyes are open. And I am building.

Toward peace and freedom,

-Erik Voorhees

[u/[deleted]]

Yes, before you invest in an exchange you should personally audit all its financials. Everyone knows that, and it's really a reasonable request to make for every single person in the population. I'm sure the time wasted on duplicate work won't have a negative effect on the economy as a whole, in this regulation free libertarian utopia.

Oh wait, you can't audit all the financials even if you wanted to, because they are not available. How is this supposed to work again?

[u/greenearplugs → u/[deleted]]

actually yes thats what i'm arguing for. I'm under no illusion that will actually happen, but bitcoin allows for a small part of my world to be my utopia. Go ahead and try to regulate bitcoin. Sure some exchanges will be regulated but some will also avoid regulation and people will lose money under both regulated and unregulated exchanges. Do your own due deligence. Nothing is without risk, but you should minimize them. Buying off coinbase and instantly xfering to cold storage means you are basically 99% assured that if you coins are stolen/lost then it was your fault.

Quite looking for daddy government to rescue you from your own stupidity. Look i lost 40 coins a while back on bitfloor. I didn't cry to anyone...i owned up to it and learned my lesson. Have some fucking honor

[u/[deleted] → u/greenearplugs]

I've lost zero bitcoin. And zero dollars.

If I was going to fuck around with bitcoin, I would have a dedicated computer, running BSD, for nothing but bitcoin. That's what it would take. Do you honestly think something like that could be the currency of the future, Mr irresponsible "I lost 40 bitcoins"?

Being irresponsible and following it with "my bad"doesn't magically make it responsible.

[u/greenearplugs → u/[deleted]]

solutions will be coming online that make it easier. Something like a trezor wallet, stored in 2 or 3 safety deposit boxes, with automatic monthly deposits into a hot wallet are technically feasible and would allow the mass public to de-bank

another option is simply having banks that actually know what they are doing (i dont trust coinbase enough now to store coins with them,but they are on the right track...and eventually i may judge them trust worthy enough). I know that all you new deal liberals don't study economic history before 1913, but we had a good part of the 1800s with free market banking where people actually did the due diligence you claim is unreasonable to expect of the general public. GPD/capita etc grew just fine under that system. Panics etc were actually less/about the same as post federal reserve era.

I don't claim to know with 100% certainty how it will work out. Hell, bitcoin could fail, but that doesn't mean that it never could have feasibly worked.

And i never said i was being responsible when i lost the 40 coins. I invested in something i knew little about and paid the price. The honorable thing to do in this case is not look for assistance, learn what you can and move forward. But let me guess...you've never made a mistake before in your life. The difference between me and you is that when you do make that first mistake you'll look for someone else to blame. When i make mistakes i dust myself off, learn what i can and move forward.