2012-10-17

Bitcoins are not a value-store.

When I first learned about the Bitcoin currency a few years ago, it didn’t excite me. A purely digital currency tied to no material good seemed an interesting project, but I didn’t see that it could have the practical value of, say, a digital gold currency. When the media blitz occurred last year I took another look and reached the same conclusion. A few months later I realized I was looking at the currency all wrong: bitcoins are not a value-store, they’re a means of exchange.

It doesn’t matter that Bitcoins are the digital equivalent of a fiat currency, with no inherent value. It doesn’t matter if their value fluctuates in relation to other currencies. There’s no reason to store wealth in Bitcoins (unless you’re a gambler). When you need to send money, purchase some Bitcoins and send them. When you need to receive money, accept Bitcoins and exchange them immediately for another currency. The value of the bitcoins only need to remain stable for the amount of time it takes to complete a transaction.

2012-10-12

micro, crypto

You are responsible for your own privacy.

Every so often there are stories announcing the fact that emails are not legally protected or that G-men can access email older than 180 days without a warrant. There will be some minor uproar, complaining about how outdated the law is, but here’s the thing: it’s irrelevant.

You don’t need to trust your service provider. You don’t need to trust your storage provider. You don’t need the law to protect you. You simply need to take a little self-responsibility and encrypt your data.

Any private data stored on hardware that you do not physically control should be encrypted (and it’s a good idea to encrypt private data on hardware that you do physically control). Problem solved. Unless you’re in the UK.

2012-10-10

micro

MediaGoblin has launched a crowdfunding campaign.

I’ve been following the development of MediaGoblin and OpenPhoto for about a year. Both offer decentralized and federalized photo sharing services, and promise to be excellent solutions for when Flickr finally dies. OpenPhoto currently feels more mature, but MediaGoblin is more ambitious in scope. I hope to see both of them succeed. Today, MediaGoblin announced a crowdfunding campaign to fund development. I’ll be donating.

2012-10-07

micro, bicycle

Other projects prevented an overnight trip.

But I did get out for a ride along the Snohomish and Skykomish rivers on Saturday.

2012-10-04

micro, bicycle, blogroll

That Emily Chappell is cycling around the world.

She quit her job as a London bike messenger and left the UK in September of 2011. Currently she is in Korea, having cycled across Eurasia. I was made aware of her blog a couple months ago and was immediately hooked. I went back to the very beginning and read the blog all the way through. There are not very many blogs out there that I can say that about.

This article was modified 2012-12-22.

2012-10-03

micro, crypto, bitcoin, finance

Bitcoins are not insecure.

I’m no Bitcoin evangelist. I have my reservations about the currency. But one common critique that consistently angers me is that bitcoins are not secure because there have been instances of theft. This is equivalent to claiming that Federal Reserve Notes are insecure because people get mugged. Secure your shit.

2012-09-26

micro

The swinging pendulum of computing freedom.

Jacques Matthjeij discusses the history of computing as a pendulum swinging between closed, walled-gardens and open, free systems.

If my observations are correct then such a swing is about to happen, and this time we had better get it right. Things that point in the direction of a swing are an increasing awareness of ordinary computer users with respect to their privacy and who actually owns all that data. The fragmenting of the smartphone and tablet markets will lead to some more openness and at some point all the bits and pieces to create true open hardware will fall into place.

…

Remember that there are two possible outcomes, one where the internet successfully manages to cause a swing to the edge of freedom, and another where it is successfully co-opted by big money and governments in a concerted effort to give us all a subscription to online Life-As-A-Service where you will be beholden to some party for the ability to gain access to knowledge, information, the right to communicate and so on and where the act of programming will be as tightly regulated as the export of cryptography was.

Discussion on Hacker News.

2012-09-23

micro, wilderness

I spent the equinox in the Glacier Peak Wilderness.

A few days. Me and a pack and some mountains.

Goodbye summer, hello fall.