jberm123

This sounds like bs to me. I've been in the space for years too, I've encountered many pro-XRP folk. Every single one either didn't know anything about it and bought because they wanted to get rich quick, or was aware the network is controlled by a consortium of banks.

Could you share the text of an email someone sent you that shows what they weren't aware of?

Edit:

>It's extremely easy for people to fall down the rabit hole of only reading content authored by people pumping it.

I also don't even deny this. But it doesn't excuse the irresponsible decision to buy something without understanding the most critical aspects of what it is and how it works. We should expect people to be responsible when investing, and to be able to do proper research for themselves, and to let them lose their money when they fail to do so. We don't need to waste tax dollars babying and protecting irresponsible investors.

You actually think someone who bought XRP at any point in the past unaware of this did reasonable diligence?

>by deceiving unsophisticated members of the public

I don't think they've deceived anyone. It takes <2 minutes of research to figure out that it's a network of financial institutions approved by Ripple controlling their network, as well as their supply schedule details/distribution. Anyone who buys XRP should be expected to figure this out for themselves. The government shouldn't waste tax dollars and resources babying irresponsible people who don't take the time to figure it out before buying.

I can't believe I'm defending Ripple. I think anyone who buys XRP is making a very unwise decision, precisely because the government does ridiculous things like this all the time.

I wish the government wouldn't do things like this and Bitcoin had no use case. But alas, governments will continue to suck.

I think I phrased my comment wrong. I didn't mean to imply that what you actually see on the screen and how content is presented to you are unimportant. I meant aesthetically pleasing elements (like nice colors and brilliant animations) are less important components to "great" design than actually feeding content to users in the most intuitive way possible. Great designers are still very much needed to achieve the latter in my opinion.

I'm not a hater of designers :)

Agreed. I think content plays a much more significant role than aesthetics in what makes a site "great". I mean, look at the site we're on now. HN's aesthetics are clearly outdated and "unsleek" by all modern comparisons. But the site facilitates bringing the relevant content to its users well, like Stripe's website. That's the differentiating thing Stripe does well -- its visual design is not the difference maker.

Sounds nice in theory, but deferring to the government for this is how to fuel the lobbyist industry and end up with regulatory capture.

Anyone can host a website, market their product, ship with FedEx/UPS. Preach people do that instead, rather than bow down to our government stamped and approved overlord Amazon.

OP assumed the rest of the world will become less dependent on foreign goods, which would therefore hurt China. I pointed out China is hedged to come out on top in that scenario, not that China would necessarily push for that scenario.

If China becomes less dependent on exports to the US, they could dump US treasuries, which could potentially destroy the US economy & the dollar.

They have the US by the balls.

This sounds contradictory to me:

If Amazon wants to run a delivery network it should [be an even larger monopoly]

...

Federal antitrust action against monopolies and monopsonies would be helpful too.

Assuming this is as easy as you make it out to be, don't you think it would be relatively easy to host this scam business' site offshore/anonymously and scam people outside the jurisdiction of the US courts?

When I buy a product from a brick and mortar store, there is NO risk to not receiving the product.

When I buy a product online, this is ALWAYS a risk, no matter what.

Your solution uses my tax dollars to make online businesses more competitive with brick and mortar stores, thereby making it more difficult to run a profitable brick and mortar store/mom and pop shop.

>No matter whether they're internet based, no matter how old they are, if a company offers a product for sale, it should not be "risky" to purchase it.

Your solution offloads some risk from the consumer onto everyone else. I agree with the comment, you put the burden on the courts and by extension, me, to pay taxes to support other people's poor ability to reason about what businesses may or may not be scams and encourage risk-taking buying products from risky businesses.

>But if we don't, there's nothing stopping them from doing it again and again.

Again, informed consumers... Accept you're taking a risk buying a product from a fledgling internet-based startup, a risk that wouldn't just go away even if we all incur the large expense getting the courts involved.

We're both basically just saying everything we've already said. No sense in going in circles

I don't think you are either. But it's a risk you're taking buying a product from a fledgling internet-based startup. Shall we make it easier to start an internet-based business over a brick and mortar shop with laws that benefit the former with the latter's inherent advantage?

Did I say I support scamming?

>what's to stop the same employees and founders from following that method ad infinitum?

Informed consumers