Your video, Cryptocurrencies II: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

Okay okay look I know we've had our differences oh, but I just learned about a really good investment opportunity. I know you are not one of the c u c k s so you'll probably want to invest all of your money in this. Have you heard of cryptocurrency oh, well it just got "Maga-fied"

If I were you I would invest all my money right now like put a new mortgage on your house and stuff because Donald Trump is a very trustworthy person, and this is totally not just another Ponzi scheme from a lifelong con man

https://www.rawstory.com/magacoins/
Get your hands on some Maga coins bro

Also, that Epoch times site guy... and the company


I'm not wasting more time on your nonsense than I have to

BUT LET ME BE CLEAR I WILL MAKE THE BET - THROW DOWN IF THAT'S WHAT YOU WANT Ya' FUCKING SELL-YOUR-OWN-COUNTRY-OUT-FASCIST-WANNABE
+buuuurp+ ooo sorry about that, just came out, anyway.

im not wasting my time digging because idk it's like at what point do you tell a person who is suffering from a mental illness that you're not taking them seriously anymore?


+pats your head+




nevertheless, from a glancing of the sources cited on the wiki, there's an...odd? story behind this site?

-------------\
Introducing|>>>>>>>>>>>> The Epoch Times! The news source that is so honest we have no fucking clue where they get their money from...except probably china...probably.
-------------/

"The Epoch Times was founded in 2000 by John Tang and other Chinese Americans affiliated with the Falun Gong new religious movement.[26] Tang was a graduate student in Georgia at the time; he began the newspaper in his basement.[21] The founders said they were responding to censorship inside China and a lack of international understanding about the Chinese government's repression of Falun Gong.[27][28] In May 2000, the paper was first published in the Chinese language in New York, with the web launch in August 2000.[29]

According to NBC News, "little is publicly known about the precise ownership, origins or influences of The Epoch Times," and it is loosely organized into several regional tax free non-profits, under the umbrella of the Epoch Media Group, together with New Tang Dynasty Television.[18][21]

The newspaper's revenue has increased rapidly in recent years, from $3.8 million in 2016 to $8.1 million in 2017 (with spending of $7.2 million) and $12.4 million in 2018.[36] Tax documents of the Epoch Media Group indicated that between 2012 and 2016, the group received $900,000 from a principal at Renaissance Technologies, a hedge fund led by the conservative political donor Robert Mercer.[37] Chris Kitze, a former NBC executive and creator of the fake news website Before It's News who also manages a cryptocurrency hedge fund, joined the paper's board as vice president in 2017.[36]

A 2020 report in The New York Times called The Epoch Times' recent wealth "something of a mystery." Steve Bannon, the former executive chairman of Breitbart News who produced a documentary with NTD, said "I’d give them a number" on a project budget and "they'd come back and say, 'We’re good for that number.'" Former employees say they were told The Epoch Times is financed by subscriptions, ads and donations from wealthy Falun Gong practitioners.[21]

Good post, I was just looking into how Bitcoin works a week ago and this video helped solidify what I learned online. I can see the appeal of cryptocurrencies to criminals, hackers, or your garden variety government conspiracy theorist but I don't really see why an average person would have any interest in this, particularly given the volatility of the exchange rates between cryptocurrencies and the real world or the potential for hacking/losses due to errors in the system (see the disastrous Mt. Gox case here in Japan).

"As I see it, there is a finite amount of money"

This is only true if cryptocurrencies like BitCoin have their way. According to the Fed, by contrast, an infinite amount of money is but just one click away...

Cronyism aside, this is not true at all:
"When one minimally productive person gets 50% of the capital in a project, it's impossible for anyone else to be compensated fairly."

No minimally productive person would get 50% in a free market. And "minimally productive" according to whom? Are you going by the Labor Theory of value? Because the Subjective Theory of Value posits otherwise. It shows that this could not happen (providing an absence of cronyism which, at the moment, is baked into the system). In other words, no one would voluntarily pay 50% of anything to someone they consider to be minimally productive. Would you?

Money is just a medium of exchange whose value is determined by the market. There are some scarce resources (as well as some non-scarce ones). Having limited money/medium of exchange makes prices go down. Wouldn't you want to pay less for gas, food, etc.? When the central banks inflate the currency (i.e., increase the money supply), there is potentially "unlimited" money to buy scarce goods. The market then makes prices rise as a result, making people effectively poorer.

"To say "much of the world is coming out of poverty" ignores reality. Perhaps the ruling class of much of the world is coming out of poverty"

Flat wrong: Look at the statistics. Millions in India, China, Southeast Asia, and other places throughout the world have come out of poverty in the last couple of decades. This is a fact.

The ruling class is never among the poor so I don't know what you mean by, "perhaps the ruling class of much of the world is coming out of poverty." What?

"This is usually not in spite of governments, but rather because of them."

Sure, it is mostly because of governments that such poverty takes so long to be eradicated. Corruption and stupid ideas like the "war on poverty," along with cronyism, currency inflation, commercial regulations, taxes, "intellectual property" laws, and more all contribute to this stupidity which keeps people poor. Throughout the history of civilization, only innovation and free commerce has brought people out of poverty on a larger scale.

I won't argue, however, against the idea that governments are always corrupt, since I completely agree. Nothing good comes out of government that could not come to us, more efficiently, more cheaply, and more effectively from private free commerce.

"Praxeology only shows what human behavior is like"

More or less, it shows the logic and the logical consequences of the fact that humans act.

"it is not an accurate predictor of behavior in an environmental hypothesis."

It depends on what you mean to predict. It is not prediction. It deals in apodictic certainties. Humans act and employ chosen means to achieve desired goals. These are certainties, not predictions. Other things are unknowns, like time preference, the means chosen, the goals desired, etc. and those you need to either predict (thymology) or wait and see (history).

"History is better, and when wealth inequality becomes so outrageous that the populace can't survive on what's left for them, they revolt."

So far yes, history would indicate this is a likely outcome or consequence, although you may need to look more closely at which sector of "the populace" has historically revolted or instigated revolt.

"I hope that this asshat (even if he's just pretending to be an asshat) is among the first ones hung, quartered, and force fed to his own family (like they did in France)"

What has he done to deserve being tortured and murdered? I am unclear about that. The revolution in France, of course, was a disaster that amounted to little good for all involved. But things like that have happened before, and could certainly happen again. Same with the Russian Revolution. Or the Nazi takeover of bankrupt Weimar Republic.

Human behavior cannot be predicted mathematically. Only econometricians seem to think so. Certainly not praxeologists! In fact, that's the basis of Misean praxeology: that you cannot predict human behavior and so economics differs from the natural sciences and requires a different method of analysis.

"that placates the Right Wing, right?"

I have no idea what would "placate the Right wing" or not. Let's not conflate right-wing statists with anarchists. Two completely different things. I also don't care what would "placate" the right wing.


If you really care about inequality, do what you can to oppose government policy, especially warmongering and central banking. They are the biggest contributors to the class divide, regardless of how you parse the data. (Of course, you may find that you can do very little.)

If you think you should be paid as much as the CEO of Apple, then by all means you should try applying to that job. I am not saying you are not worth it, but it's not me you have to convince...

I like the way you think. User-to-user tipping. That could be really cool.
>> ^rebuilder:

I'm not Charter, largely because I find the idea of paying for powers a bit disturbing. I wouldn't mind paying just to avoid seeing ads, depending on the sum of course.
As for something completely different... I was thinking the other day, what if the Sift allowed tipping? As in, you like a member's sift, comment, just generally find them a swell person all around - send a few coins their way. This could be done with something like, say, Bitcoin , and maybe the Sift could take a small cut on all tips.
I haven't put that much thought into the concept yet. There may be serious legal issues with bringing compensation schemes into the system. The social effects may or may not be desirable. With Bitcoin specifically, some may well have objections to the very idea of a cryptocurrency. I'm suggesting Bitcoin because it's well suited to micropayments, as the currency can be transferred virtually free of cost. OK, also because I like the idea.
Thoughts?
http://www.bitcoin.org

You aren't really paying for powers though, your paying for access to features.

"Absolutely no ads
Personal Blog
Six (6) concurrent submission slots in the unsifted queue
Two (2) Power Points per recharge period
Personal subdomain for your member profile, e.g., siftbot.videosift.com
Personalized colorizing for your username and comment background
Customizable styling for your member profile
Participation in the Sift Lounge chat room
Random Personal Queue videos listed on your profile
Use a YouTube video for your avatar image in comments"

You still don't get "double vote" power or anything that affects the meritocracy nature of the site. I guess it does buy you a little influence for promoting with the power points, but I don't really consider that a "power" like I do voting.

There could be legal problems for tipping people for others content, though I have no idea.

>> ^rebuilder:

I'm not Charter, largely because I find the idea of paying for powers a bit disturbing. I wouldn't mind paying just to avoid seeing ads, depending on the sum of course.
As for something completely different... I was thinking the other day, what if the Sift allowed tipping? As in, you like a member's sift, comment, just generally find them a swell person all around - send a few coins their way. This could be done with something like, say, Bitcoin , and maybe the Sift could take a small cut on all tips.
I haven't put that much thought into the concept yet. There may be serious legal issues with bringing compensation schemes into the system. The social effects may or may not be desirable. With Bitcoin specifically, some may well have objections to the very idea of a cryptocurrency. I'm suggesting Bitcoin because it's well suited to micropayments, as the currency can be transferred virtually free of cost. OK, also because I like the idea.
Thoughts?
http://www.bitcoin.org

I'm not Charter, largely because I find the idea of paying for powers a bit disturbing. I wouldn't mind paying just to avoid seeing ads, depending on the sum of course.

As for something completely different... I was thinking the other day, what if the Sift allowed tipping? As in, you like a member's sift, comment, just generally find them a swell person all around - send a few coins their way. This could be done with something like, say, Bitcoin*, and maybe the Sift could take a small cut on all tips.

I haven't put that much thought into the concept yet. There may be serious legal issues with bringing compensation schemes into the system. The social effects may or may not be desirable. With Bitcoin specifically, some may well have objections to the very idea of a cryptocurrency. I'm suggesting Bitcoin because it's well suited to micropayments, as the currency can be transferred virtually free of cost. OK, also because I like the idea.

Thoughts?

*http://www.bitcoin.org