This is one reason why I think Nano (Nano.org) will eclipse Bitcoin for pure transfer of value transactions. Nano uses a block lattice that doesn't require mining. The transactions are instant and feeless b/c of this. There is a tiny bit of PoW on the sender's device to prevent spam transactions.
You sound a lot like me. I have had tons of trouble making myself work, even on my passion projects that I have invested significant amounts of my own money in. I would recommend that you read Turning Pro by Steven Pressfield. He was a chronic procrastinator who turned things around. I would combine this with renting a desk at a coworking space and keeping regular work hours, though they might only be four or six hours per day (8 is too much if you are actually working).
I've worked in the visual effects industry for many years and this is incredibly interesting. In vfx to create a face replacement, we would have to create a 3D model of a head and then texture it with photos/scans of a the desired face. Then we would 3D track this cgi head onto an actor in the shot and then animate the face either by hand or using motion capture data from the stand-in actor's face. Then you'd light and render the cgi head and composite it into the shot.
It's pretty incredible that there's a completely different way to do a head swap. Of course, the vfx method gives the artist complete control over what the face/head does.
It seems like one of the disadvantages of Satoshi being anonymous is that Bitcoin wasn't trademarked, which allows for forks like Bitcoin Cash to use the name Bitcoin. I think this is kind of an interesting case of why trademarks are important as having both Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash must be very confusing to new users on Coinbase.
It may be that your bank is charging you an international transaction fee and that is the second charge you are seeing. This happened to me the other day with Coinbase. If you buy from Coinbase with a credit card the transaction actually gets processed in London. Some American banks will charge you a 3% fee for this international transaction. So it will look like Coinbase has charged you twice, but actually the second charge is from your bank.
I can attest to the fact that LA rents have gone insane in the last maybe 5 years. A run-down 1 bedroom apartment in a working-class neighborhood of LA (Palms) without central air and no dishwasher will rent for $1700/month at the minimum. I'm currently apartment hunting in LA and it's brutal.
I don't think that letting people who are interested in Tezos know about a coin with very similar features is "pumping" the currency. Tezos has some really interesting features, but they have stumbled with the ICO and delayed their release. As someone who was waiting for Tezos to launch I was excited to hear about Cardano and I'm sure there are other Tezos enthusiasts here who are happy to learn about the existence of similar coin. To say that I'm "pumping" the coin implies that I will dump the coin, when I'm really just interested in the Tezos technology, which is also present in Cardano.
If you like the idea of Tezos, have a look at Cardano. It has on-chain governance voting, formal verification, and the ability to upgrade the protocol without the need for hard forks. Basically, all the stuff that got me interested in the Tezos project.
I'm proposing that the concept of states is obsolete now and we need to move to what I'd call a "unified America" policy, where we get as close as possible to a majority rule system of democracy. The best way I can think of to achieve that is to abolish the Senate and the electoral college.
If you think our current system of governance is working well, then please say so. If you think our system isn't working well, then please let me know how you propose to fix it.
This whole idea of "coastal elites" and "flyover states" is just a tool that those with real power (corporations and special interests) are using to divide Americans so that they are easier to control. If you were the NRA looking to make sure that "bump stocks" don't get banned after a gunman shoots hundreds of people in Vegas using them, where would you focus your resources? On the Senate, of course! Because the House can't do anything without the Senate's approval and influencing 41 Senators is a lot easier than trying to influence hundreds of members of the House.
It's the same with the presidential election. If you're the NRA, what's easier for you to influence? A popular vote or our current electoral college system where only a few swing states matter?
If you're saying that the electoral college and the Senate are a means of protecting those in the "flyover states", then I would just you how that's working out? Do you think "Wyomingers" are the ones who are going to benefit from repealing the estate tax? The House, Senate, and Executive branch are all controlled by Republicans who should, in theory, be advocating for "Wyomingers" and yet they seem to only be working on behalf of the interests of the wealthy, special interests, and corporations.
Just abolish the states all together as far as I'm concerned and let's have one unified America, which would be much harder for special interests and corporations to influence.
Here's my proposal for tweaking the USA's current government so that it better represents the will of a majority of Americans: 1) abolish the Senate 2) end the electoral college 3) end gerrymandering 4) reform campaign financing.
Because it's harder to corrupt a "pure" democracy. If you have a policy that is bad for the population at large, but good for your own interests, in a "pure" democracy then you will have to convince a majority of the voters to vote against their own interests.
Yes, and this would be fine if the senate did not exist. But the senate can kill anything that the house proposes. So Wyoming has undue influence over what the (correctly balanced) house tries to make law.
Well, the real question to me is do we think of people who live in Wyoming as "Wyomingers" and those in CA as Californians? I don't think so. We just think of everyone in the USA as Americans. So why should it be that some Americans (those who live in Wyoming) having outsized voting power over national laws? A minority of Americans is controlling the country via the methods I mentioned. It doesn't seem to be working out very well. We need to make sure that the majority of Americans have veto power over things like electing Donald Trump, the current tax bill, the attempts to end Obamacare.
The Senate doesn't reflect majority rule based on population. California has 38.3 million residents, Wyoming has 600K residents [1] but both states have 2 senate votes. Due to this, Wyoming residents have much greater voting power in the Senate than residents of CA.
I completely support this idea. Additionally, I think the USA needs to move away from anything that doesn't reflect majority rule. For example, abolish the Senate, end the electoral college, end gerrymandering, and reform campaign financing.
The USA could be a lot more democratic than it is at present and until that is fixed, you will keep seeing a minority of the population control policies that affect the whole nation.
Interesting. I assumed that spending more time working with Python would be beneficial, but I guess it's not a big deal. This is great to know, as I've been resistant to starting with Ruby/Rails for the reason I described. Thanks!
Check Nano's FAQ regarding "Is Nano vulnerable to attacks?" here https://nano.org/en/faq