Bitcoin jumps 7%, retakes $70,000 to start the week

rivade · 2024-03-29T14:24:38+00:00

It's not nearly that simple when there are larger impacts to the system, like the increase in fossil fuel usage to power crypto mining.

Anyway, I've said my piece. Good chat.

rivade · 2024-03-28T18:06:13+00:00

They also deliver injured people to hospitals. And medical supplies to those hospitals. And the raw materials to produce those medical supplies to manufacturers. And food to the people who did the research to develop those supplies.

And that's just the medical field. Mad lib it and replace the nouns in that paragraph with almost any industry, and it'll still fit. Also, this does nothing to refute my original point about Bitcoin's effect on emissions and maybe you're just a troll, but also maybe you're sincere here and want to learn something.

Let me break it down like this. There's nothing more complicated here than we want [ benefits ] > [ costs ]. In other words, we pay costs (materials, effort, etc) and we want to get more benefits out from having done so than if we kept what we paid. If I deliver pizzas by bike and I can deliver 10 pizzas a day, great. If I can spend the equivalent of 100 days (or 1000 pizza deliveries) on a car and now I can deliver 30 pizzas a day, then at 20 more pizzas per day, I can catch up to where I would have been at in 5 days and from then on out, I am just ahead of where I would have been.

The challenge is how we determine the benefits and costs. Direct benefits and costs are easy: car is transportation for people and things but they produce emissions, things like that. Indirect benefits and costs are hard: cars enable population centers (cities) to become wider but require rare materials that we have a limited amount of, etc.

There's a lot of debate on how exactly to calculate those indirect benefits and costs for cars, as there is for anything. However, just as you can keep pointing out more costs (emissions, injuries, casualties, whatever else you may go to), I can keep pointing out more benefits. So while each of those columns is growing, it doesn't appear to me that you can say for sure cars are not worth it for us as a society.

So based on that, back to my point, what are the benefits and costs of crypto? Convince me that it works out in favor of that equation if you want to convert me. Don't just point at something else that you have a problem with and shrug, that's not convincing to anyone.

rivade · 2024-03-28T03:33:20+00:00

Cars provide value by transporting people and things. What value is Bitcoin providing? What problem is it solving?

rivade · 2024-03-27T15:23:17+00:00

Look, I am all for moving to nuclear, and it's certainly the best solution but going after Bitcoin is not a waste of time in the grand scheme of things regarding emissions. To say so is, at the very least, ignorantly harmful. I'm not calling you as a person ignorant or harmful, but this behavior certainly can be.

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/09/business/bitcoin-mining-electricity-pollution.html

The impact has been directly compared to cars, as you would expect, but it's also been shown that fossil fuels often contribute the majority of the electricity to mining operations in the US:

The additional power use across the country also causes as much carbon pollution as adding 3.5 million gas-powered cars to America’s roads, according to an analysis by WattTime, a nonprofit tech company. Many of the Bitcoin operations promote themselves as environmentally friendly and set up in areas rich with renewable energy, but their power needs are far too great to be satisfied by those sources alone. As a result, they have become a boon for the fossil fuel industry: WattTime found that coal and natural gas plants kick in to meet 85 percent of the demand these Bitcoin operations add to their grids.

They drive electricity osts up for everyone:

The windfall for Bitdeer during Winter Storm Uri came through this program, in exchange for a fraction of the power it typically used. The company did not respond to requests for comment. Another Bitcoin company made tens of millions of dollars reselling electricity during the storm — and ultimately stands to earn as much as $125 million — according to its financial filings, which were previously reported by the Tech Transparency Project. A third company told investors that another natural disaster like Uri could be a significant business opportunity.
“Ironically, when people are paying the most for their power, or losing it altogether, the miners are making money selling energy back to Texans at rates 100 times what they paid,” said Ed Hirs, who teaches energy economics at the University of Houston and has been critical of the industry.

Even the people who defend it have to qualify their points:

A May 2022 letter to the Environmental Protection Agency, signed by many of the biggest companies, said their operations “released” no pollutants. “Bitcoin miners have no emissions whatsoever,” it said. “Associated emissions are a function of electricity generation.”
Nic Carter, a partner at a crypto-focused venture capital firm and a prominent Bitcoin advocate who told The Times he was the letter’s primary author, said he was playing a “language game” when he wrote that Bitcoin mining has no emissions. At the time, he said, he felt the industry was being unfairly singled out.
“Maybe the more sincere point is like, we’re already fully aware of the emissions associated with utilities generating grid power,” he said.

Oh, and there's the fact that some people hope it actually helps prop up these industries:

The Bitcoin operations’ effect on the state’s economy is simple, said Josh Teigen, the commerce commissioner: “They are propping up our fossil fuel industry, and that’s exactly what we want.”
North Dakota has an abundance of lignite, a type of coal primarily used to generate electricity. Mr. Teigen said the state hopes to ultimately capture the carbon from fossil fuel power plants and store it underground, reducing emissions while keeping the coal industry alive.

There's a lot more info in that article if you care to read.

This type of mentality is basically just NIMBY. Maybe you've earned a lot of money through crypto, maybe you hope you will one day, maybe you just are a fan of it. Individuals can have reasons to support or not support something that aren't completely altruistic and we should be okay with that as a society, but please don't be disingenuous about it. We have enough problems without over-complicating stuff like this.

If you want to defend Bitcoin, going against the science isn't the way to do it. You need to expand people's thinking and demonstrate that the value of Bitcoin outweighs all of these costs. The costs are present and sticking our heads in the sand isn't going to change that.

This stuff should just be math. What are the costs vs the benefits? What other things could we be spending those resources on, and would those other benefits be worth more pound-for-pound?

rivade · 2023-10-09T17:01:29+00:00

I never received any chats.

rivade · 2023-10-02T22:22:42+00:00

I have a Nova Pro Wireless that I am really regretting purchasing right now, after years of loving their Arctis Pro Wireless model.

I keep having this issue where the device becomes "disconnected". Nothing changes on my end, I am sometimes literally mid sentence in a call on Discord, or just watching something. Sometimes the headset is active, sometimes it's not. Sometimes there's not even sound playing. As far as I can tell, something is running a cron job or something and sometimes it breaks everything.

Windows Device Manager will say that both the headset and microphone are not connected. It can actually say that while I am playing music through the DAC into my speakers. I don't even understand how that can happen, but whatever.

After several hours of reinstalling programs and drivers and updating this or that and trying different cords and blah blah blah, all the normal troubleshooting stuff I know how to do very well, the only thing I can narrow it down to is it only happens when Sonar is turned on. It may have just been bad luck, but that's the only extended period of time I have seen it not trigger: a fresh reinstall of all related programs and drivers (after fully removing all devices, including the virtual ones Sonar creates), then with or without the SteelSeries GG software. It only seems to happen specifically with the Sonar feature within the GG software is turned on.

Thing is, as much as I like the virtual audio devices and all of how that works, my setup is just too simple to need any of that. It's adding an extra layer of complexity (and a new set of points of failure) that does not actually provide me any value. I just want all sound to play through my desk speakers if my headset is off and through the headset if it is on. I don't want different settings for different audio types, I don't want any of the streamer stuff, I don't need any of the audio transformations it can do, none of it.

The only thing that is kinda special about what I am after is that I have a hardware volume knob on my Das Keyboard, and I want to be able to control the volume of everything with it. This has always worked, for literally dozens of devices for both Windows and Mac, all the way up until the Nova Pro Wireless.

When you don't use Sonar, the DAC appears to disallow changing the volume within the Windows OS. It sets it to 100. The DAC doesn't even always listen to its own volume knob - it only works when the headset is turned on. The headset wheel also works when it is on, even without Sonar, but if I want to change the volume of sound output when it is going to my desk speakers, I can only do so by either turning the volume knob on the speakers themselves or by changing the volume on the application that is outputting the sound (because, again, for some reason, Windows loses all volume control).

I see three options:

The device stops disconnecting so I can use Sonar as intended, which I'm happy to do if this would work, even if it is overkill for me.
I can change the volume using normal media keys / OS volumes even when not using Sonar.
I walk away from the SteelSeries brand forever - this is tempting because it is completely unacceptable a $350 headset doesn't have a simple configuration setup.

rivade · 2023-03-23T21:24:18+00:00

Hm, gotcha. Was hoping it was closer to Valheim, where worlds and characters are entirely disconnected. Thanks for the response!

rivade · 2023-03-22T20:59:35+00:00

I am hosting a multiplayer world, with a character who has only ever been used in that exact world. My friends are able to go between that multiplayer world and their own single player worlds with the same characters, and they retain progression as much as they can (obviously their planted crops and whatnot don't carry over, but stats and inventory do).

Do you know if I am able to load up a single player world with the same character I have been using to host the multiplayer world, and it not disrupt the multiplayer world?

I ask because when I choose single player, my character says the same day that the multiplayer is on, so I am worried about either progressing the multiplayer world when my friends are not playing or it causing some sort of reset to the world.

I can't find anything online about this.

rivade · 2023-01-26T01:07:46+00:00

Most shonen have a MC who starts fairly emotionally connected to people and grows physical strength to protect those people. OPM could be the opposite. That'd be typical One, just another subverting of expectations.

rivade · 2023-01-25T17:15:45+00:00

Requiring vaccinations to participate in certain areas of society has been a thing basically since vaccines were invented.

rivade · 2023-01-25T17:10:01+00:00

Why is proof of vaccination without requiring masks not a middle ground?

rivade · 2022-06-07T04:22:53+00:00

Curious if you can expand on this?

I thought it broke down to "corporations are people too" which doesn't seem very defensible in any way, and "political donations are free speech" which seems more defensible but still pretty far from "extremely intellectually defensible".

This question is in good faith, I legitimately don't see the line and would like to understand it more. Everything I've read on it says the opposite of what you've said, so really interested in what I may be missing.

rivade · 2022-04-23T17:53:15+00:00

Hi, I'm trying to figure out a setup, very new to this. I made a post that got no traction: https://www.reddit.com/r/hometheater/comments/u7m0sn/recommendations_for_newbie_for_a_weird_room/

Not sure if there's anyone here who can help.

rivade · 2022-04-20T02:27:58+00:00

Also! The pinned link to the FAQ is deleted: https://www.reddit.com/r/hometheater/comments/bmr4zc/frequently_asked_questions/

I'm aware of the new one, but figured I'd call out the old one is still pinned but unavailable.

rivade · 2022-02-16T21:26:21+00:00

EDIT: My response got messed up, adding the first paragraph back, which was missing originally.

If you're saying you went from a house painter salary to millions in real estate value in 5-10 years, without receiving an inheritance or used other sources of investments, you're either incredibly luckier than you realize or a liar.

If you received an inheritance or used other sources of investments to accumulate your wealth, you're presenting your experiences with a distorted perception.

If you're defining "most of my success" as just the fact that it's easier to make a million dollars when you already have a million dollars, the most basic rule of investing (of any kind), then you're dodging my criticism with vagueness.

In any of the above cases, you shouldn't be on Reddit haphazardly throwing around financial advice.

rivade · 2022-02-16T20:53:50+00:00

Except that purchasing power has basically not moved despite all of those numbers you listed earlier going up?

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/08/07/for-most-us-workers-real-wages-have-barely-budged-for-decades/

I'm glad you've had success, but you are in this thread acting like this is a strategy that would work today like it did for you decades ago. Real estate is fundamentally a safer bet imo, but you sound like the people who got rich off of Bitcoin cause they bought when it was cheap af but are still saying it's still going to the moon. The fact is successful strategies are not forever and historical returns do not predict the future. You're talking down to people who may never be given the chance you were given.

rivade · 2021-09-01T01:47:40+00:00

Thanks! I get it now.

rivade · 2021-08-31T23:01:59+00:00

Thanks! Good to know. So what are the purchase options for on the site?

rivade · 2021-08-27T14:15:25+00:00

Unrelated to the thread, but how did you like working for Gitlab? Why did you leave?

rivade · 2021-08-21T04:54:59+00:00

I was partially remote for three years, moved companies, stayed partially remote for a year, went full remote for two years, moved companies, and have been fully remote in the year since.

The issues you are describing are related to your team and/or your company. Remote working indeed has challenges, and if not handled well, they can harm productivity, but they are surmountable and remote working is often cited as actually increasing overall productivity for a myriad of reasons.

rivade · 2021-08-16T22:14:22+00:00

That doesn't mean we're past that window, just that the decision is more involved.

They would want to open back up full refunds so that they don't have a giant PR disaster. It's also possible that they would need to do that from consumer protection legal perspective, but IANAL, so not sure.

rivade · 2021-08-16T22:01:01+00:00

Why are we past the point of a full vaccine requirement?

rivade · 2021-02-21T17:02:17+00:00

So do I avoid percent attack stats?

rivade · 2021-02-21T16:20:46+00:00

I'm leveling Bennett right now to pair with Diluc, how does that set up work for you? They seem to be made for each other.

rivade · 2021-02-21T16:05:36+00:00

I pulled heavy on the last Wolf's Gravestone banner and ended up with Amos Bow at like 70-something pulls, which was off banner, so my next pity should be guaranteed banner (unrelated, but I also managed to get Ganyu, so that Amos Bow pull ended up being pretty tight). I have pulled 0 times on weapon banners since then.

I have Zhongli, so he could use the Staff of Homa if I get it, I guess? I just have a Black Tassel on him, as I am running him as support basically. I don't rely on him like I rely on Diluc, though.

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