1541
We live in the future! (europe.pub)
submitted 3 months ago by to c/programmer_humor@programming.dev
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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/9525207

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[–] 48 points 3 months ago (13 children)

Fake money probably, it allows me to easily buy drugs from online.

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  • [–] 21 points 3 months ago (6 children)

    If people value it I guess it isn't so fake. Most "legit" currencies are just the goverment promising you its worth something anyway.

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  • [–] 11 points 3 months ago (4 children)

    A government promising it's worth something carries a hell of a lot more weight than some random tech-bro promising it.

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  • [–] 16 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    In both cases the trading value of the currency has almost nothing to do with who originated it, and almost everything to do with how the general public feels about it.

    Just like crypto, most "government" currencies are worth what they're worth only because everyone agrees that they are. That's called "fiat" currency. And that's why fiat currency exchange markets exist. The US Dollar hasn't been "convertible" (redeemable for a fixed amount of precious metal) since 1971, and many other world currencies were already backed in some way by the US Dollar at that time.

    The real difference is in the supply.

    Government fiat currency is difficult to counterfeit, although the government (or reserve bank) can always make more whenever they want. We trust them not to print more money, increasing the money supply and devaluing the currency. However, this is exactly what has happened sometimes in the past, and no doubt will happen again in the future.

    Crypto currency is virtually impossible to counterfeit, and IIRC there's a finite (but not precisely known) amount of it that can be made, no matter who you are.

    Personally, I still use physical fiat currency and no crypto. I'd like to use crypto, but regulation in my country makes it very difficult to use without registering your details with a central authority. And although everyone's pushing e-money options which are similarly tracked, thankfully I still have the option of using anonymous cash.

    I don't do anything bad or illegal. I just believe that government and big business don't deserve to know everything I do in my life simply because they want to.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago

    Fiat currency is based on the government's ability to issue and service debt, which is based on its ability to collect taxes, which is based on the economy it oversees. It's a bit roundabout but the pieces all connect.

    Crypto is supposed the compensation for providing compute resources to a blockchain, which ostensibly backs some application with actual intrinsic value. In that sense crypto is real, but there are no actual blockchains which support valuable applications. The entire thing much more closely resembles a ponzi scheme where real currency is deposited, and then the appreciation it experiences is proportional to the ratio of inputs vs withdrawals, without there being an actual asset creating value.

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  • [–] 4 points 3 months ago (3 children)

    I tried looking at dreadforum to see how markets work nowadays and found out in a minute I was viewing a mirror that was injecting links

    I think I'll just ask a dude on the street at this point

    But then again I am in a country where that would work with 0 negative consequences for me as the user

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  • [–] 3 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    Doesn't dread's captcha force you to check the url? Afaik it makes you fill in specific parts of the url, so that you check that the url you are using is the same one they are using. Curious how the mirror was able to bypass that.

    Regardless I just spent some initial investment saving the pgp public keys and making sure they are legit, so that I can use them to verify dread's mirrors.txt whenever needed. Faster than walking out to the street imo

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago* (1 child)

    It's my first actual visit, and I did what apparently is the obvious faux pas

    I googled for dreadforum link, was pointed towards one shown at https://dreadforum.io/

    I entered it into tor browser, no captcha was shown and I landed directly on the site/mirror.

    The one post I read, something concerning validation and opsec on markets or dreadforum, had an explanation that if the text they wrote in hyphens differed from the url right under it I was already viewing a mirror, as they spelled out a link.

    That was true, the url shown was darkmyurl dot com instead of the actual link spelled out hyphenated.

    I was humbled, and have now learned that even asking for the true php keys from you right now is submitting to defeat. The only good opsec seems to be your own

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  • [–] 2 points 3 months ago

    honestly, I wouldn't be so hard on yourself. This stuff is way harder than people think. People don't realize how hard it is to establish trust starting from none. Normally you type a website into Google, and Google has already done the work for determining which website is the legit one and which is the shady phishing site, and will filter out the shady site. This convenience does not exist for darknet sites, so you just have to establish trust yourself.

    even asking for the true php keys from you right now is submitting to defeat

    not necessarily. You can get the pgp keys from random strangers online. It's just not the only source you should rely on. Get it from multiple sources and then verify if they are all the same. If they are, think to yourself how likely it is that all 3 sources are actually the same attacker giving you a fake key.

    DM me if you're actually interested in the pgp key and I'll dig it up from my notes

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