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Notes by Jameson Lopp | export

 Programmable money (ETH, etc) is hard to scale. So people build Layer 2s.

But these Layer 2s are... 
 Federations are good enough until they aren't.

I struggle to think of any federations that have failed thus far, so we haven't enough data. 
 For anyone new here, the Nawsters outnumber the Nohsters, but they’re looking to build up the t... 
 "Nawstrich" is to nostr as "nocoiner" is to Bitcoin. 🙃
nostr:nevent1qqs9hrjyzjluzwkh5fdednsrp0zn24rexwwuqxs5cnmf3ltx8jzftlcpz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduhsyg98ywq9ekn8y5gerjrcdax6trme0e5hwkprqy65h28fr09sxskunspsgqqqqqqsgc8al5 
 Trump assassination attempt has broken X.

Nostr doing just fine. 
 Judging by the drama on X you'd think that woke folks are demanding Bitcoin Core's bathrooms and locker rooms be unisex 😬 
 Simple Mail Transfer Protocol "SMTP" ended up being rather captured/centralized toward an oligopo... 
 It's all about spam management.

Nostr has a leg up given the lightning support. Next steps will be to require micro payments for actions that could be abused by spammers. 
 I'm not interested in playing political games.

But I'm very interested in ruining those games for everyone who plays them. 
 wen trump pump? 
 It's so fucking hot that I'm drinking my coffee in popsicle form. 
 "The most common error of a smart engineer is to optimize a thing that should not exist."

- Elon Musk 
 Faketoshi followers down bad.
Many have gone quiet 
Some have pivoted to Solana / memecoins / politics. https://image.nostr.build/c2d6834f4ec5cd1b053844f5efef38006e913f6384ed2f85350caff53cac7e10.jpg 
 Testnet3 did need to die but why aren't we adopting testnet4 like asap?

This transition period b... 
 Folks are gonna be reluctant until the PR gets merged into Core  
 Just nit picking in the pull request review. 
 I'm pretty much done stress testing backups unless someone comes up with a unique design. 
 I hate eating beets because I always forget that I ate beets the next day in the toilet. 
 I never understood the "go outside and touch grass" saying, as well-manicured grass that is aesthetically pleasing to tread upon is not a natural phenomenon.

For me it's "go outside and chop wood." 
 That feeling when you embark upon a 25 mile bike ride and wipe out 100 yards in while crossing railroad tracks. 
 Only 3 dedicated souls at the gym this morning, dreaming of what can be. 
 What we need is a verifiably fair lottery. 

Not for gambling, mind you. 

For choosing our public servants. 

I bet we'd get a better outcome with randos selected for short terms than with people elected in a popularity contest. 
 Another great hack for saving money is realizing a $5,000 modern motorcycle will outperform nearly every sports car on the market. 
 It is a Darwinian form of transportation for sure. But it's entirely possible to ride safely and defensibly.

I myself ride with full armor, though I've never had to use it! After 15 years and 100,000 miles the worst I've experienced was dropping the bike while parking.

Though I've had no shortage of close calls due to other drivers! 
 Your face when you have a young child who won't give you a moment of peace.
https://image.nostr.build/09ef56d9682394648bd67a9dc71469ce834d6f33a968c83ee0bb3565306ff84d.jpg 
 I'm secretly hoping that the reason I keep seeing ads for HIV drugs and Alzheimer's drugs is a sign that I have sufficiently strong privacy practices. 
 Some studies have shown our brain processes 11 million bits of information per second.

But we only consciously process around 50 bits of information per second. 
 It seemed timely to watch Civil War.

I think it does a pretty good job capturing the senseless violence that is inherent to war.

You never even learn the root cause of the war, but it quite frankly doesn't matter. 
 Depends on what you're looking for. The plot isn't particularly amazing, but I found it to be realistically believable. 
 What errors did you spot?

I recall laughing at the scene with choppers flying 50 feet off the ground between high rise buildings. No sane pilot would do that due to threats from above. 
 Steam has Half Life: Alyx on sale for $20.

4 years after its release, it remains the greatest virtual reality game of all time.

If you're a VR gamer, this is a must-have.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/546560/HalfLife_Alyx/ 
 It is possible to understand that bitcoin is the best money but not be a part of the cause of tak... 
 I'm not here for the engagement.

I'm here to share spicy memes and post politically incorrect opinions.

Though from a relative engagement perspective, nostr beats X by a wide margin. If nostr reaches a million weekly active users, I bet my absolute nostr engagement will surpass X engagement.

nostr:nevent1qqstwsl4c0u08777nknjj75kh9nglx7qpw3g67dghm4nxdmw0r62vgspremhxue69uhkummnw3ez6ur4vgh8wetvd3hhyer9wghxuet59upzqqgd7ry53l56k4xjedl2gg8l5zx409vfsxmw568g8248avka8uz6qvzqqqqqqy6fujqs 
 The boomers will remain in control until they're dead. They've got the numbers, the wealth, the power! 
 I suspect I'm going to be saying "I told you so" a lot more frequently in the coming years.
https://www.wired.com/story/crypto-home-invasion-crime-ring/ 
 I'll post an essay in a few days.

I'd caution against conflating your personal security with the security of your funds. They are separate problems that require separate solutions.

In general it seems home invaders don't want to murder their victims. They just want the money, and even if they fail to get it they tend to just leave. 
 What's to stop someone from killing you for any arbitrary reason?

Few folks actually want the heat of a homicide investigation. 
 America will choose a coherent asshole over an incoherent gentleman any day of the week.

Sorry, I don't make the culture. 
 Most folks aren't particularly smart. 
 TIL that color-changing octopus, like all 🐙, are color blind.

They "see" the color of their environment with their skin! 
 Q: I have 10 guns. If the government seizes 10 guns from me, how many do I have left?

A: 20 guns, because I lied to the bastards! 
 That sounds like a wise decision. 
 Barbed wire. 
 Either my hosting provider our cloudflare changed some configuration today that took down my personal web site by throwing it into an infinite Apache rewrite rule loop 🤬

Thankfully I speak fluent Apache and was able to modify my rewrite rules, but I still have no clue who changed what! 
 Ross next. 
 My personal email server has worked fine for like 10 years but gmail just did something recently ... 
 My toddler, looking at my sandwich: “Oooo I love that”

“Do you want a bite?”

“No, I w... 
 Just putting Pond Nugget in her place. 
 NGL I mostly use Mastodon to follow crypto critics.

It comes in handy because often the things they shriek about are major successes my audience desires to celebrate. 😏 
 It's good for infosec too  
 It's pretty amazing how much you can change your body composition if you're willing to put in the work.

On the flip side, it sucks having to buy a whole new wardrobe every year. 
 Facebook deleted.
Instagram deleted.
LinkedIn deleted.

I didn't really use those platforms besid... 
 Same.

Now my problem is I can't report all the impersonators on platforms where I have no account 🙄 
 How long did it take you to do an initial block download recently?
Trying to get an estimate or a... 
 As long as you're not using a raspberry pi level device then yeah, 2 weeks should be plenty. Most any laptop or desktop manufactured in the past decade should be able to sync in a day or so.