The Funny/Stupid Pics Thread

[chitoryu12]

What are the chances of this thing going sentient?

[The Right Honourable Mlle Antéchrist]

Even if it does, it'll overheat and burn this guy's house down before you can say "SKYNET".

The one submerged in a tank of oil is my favourite.

[m52nickerson]

Only if it is motivated BJ!

[Askold]

How very odd, Nyarlathotep's human form is supposed to be a tall man with black skin.

Really? Huh.


*link NSFW due to language.

I believe in that story where he was a tall man with black skin, it was described as not with Negroid features. But anyway it is as someone said earlier. Nyarlathotep assumes thousands of forms. As to Lovecraft having racist tendencies. it is pretty much documented. He was a product of his time, anyhow.

That said. stop reading Lovecraft stories. everybody! You'll lose your sanity

In Lovecraft's partial defense, he WAS very much a product of his time and place, growing up in northern New England. His journals reveal that, after living in New York, his views toward other races became more enlightened.

Nobody escapes their upbringing. No matter what we do, we will always be influenced by it. The most we can do is recognize and account for that influence in our thoughts and actions.

Product of his time, sure. But his antisemitism was just insane. Especially considering that his wife was jewish.

[MadCatTLX]

Jesus christ:







How the fuck do you even sleep with these things in your house? (Assuming you still have a house when the energy bill comes in.)

Anyone know how profitable that crap is? I here people here and there crowing on about bitcoin, but then you realize 95% don't even know what it is. I know just the bare gist of bitcoin and the mining of coins.

Apparently those purpose built GPUs solve math problems to "mine" the coins. The thing is though, if bitcoin is supposed to have no hub or issuer, where do the math problems come from?

[The Right Honourable Mlle Antéchrist]

Hard to give an exact number, since BTC fluctuates like crazy and the amount mined depends on the rig, but:

Cost of rigs is in the thousands (some of these guys are spending upwards of 20 grand on these things), plus the excess cost of electricity to run them (hundreds a month). Meanwhile, those things will mine a fraction of a coin per day to start with (between $5--$15 at current prices, I'd estimate) However, as time goes on, it gets harder to mine blocks, meaning that you need to invest in more equipment to prevent your income from drastically declining.

Basically, the only way to break even (much less make a profit) is for prices to magically skyrocket up to thousands per coin (never going to happen, no one will adopt such an unstable currency) or try to get away with mining at work (which will get you fired).

(Oh, and if those rigs fuck up and die, you can lose all of your mined coin.)

[chitoryu12]

Bitcoin is most profitable for people who bought them when they were nearly worthless, since now a coin that cost literally a few cents is now worth close to $200. Well, sometimes.

The price fluctuates so badly that the woman who did the "Live on BTC for a week" challenge found it changing by as much as $10 multiple times over the course of the day.

[Valerius]

Hard to give an exact number, since BTC fluctuates like crazy and the amount mined depends on the rig, but:

Cost of rigs is in the thousands (some of these guys are spending upwards of 20 grand on these things), plus the excess cost of electricity to run them (hundreds a month). Meanwhile, those things will mine a fraction of a coin per day to start with (between $5--$15 at current prices, I'd estimate) However, as time goes on, it gets harder to mine blocks, meaning that you need to invest in more equipment to prevent your income from drastically declining.

Basically, the only way to break even (much less make a profit) is for prices to magically skyrocket up to thousands per coin (never going to happen, no one will adopt such an unstable currency) or try to get away with mining at work (which will get you fired).

(Oh, and if those rigs fuck up and die, you can lose all of your mined coin.)

That makes these people's stupidity all the more hilarious. Why would anyone in their right minds spend so much on bitcoin mining then?

[The Right Honourable Mlle Antéchrist]

^^^ Because Bitcoin can only go up uP UP! (in flames, when your mining rig catches on fire)

Bitcoin is most profitable for people who bought them when they were nearly worthless, since now a coin that cost literally a few cents is now worth close to $200. Well, sometimes.

The price fluctuates so badly that the woman who did the "Live on BTC for a week" challenge found it changing by as much as $10 multiple times over the course of the day.

It was up over $200 back in, I think, April/May, but crashed (as usual). It's currently worth between $90-$100.

And yeah, it's only worth anything if you purchased it early on and then sold when it hit triple digit prices. Buying now would be ill-advised, however, especially with the fed case against MtGOX.

Edit:



I guess the bubble/crash took place in March/April, not May. Such a beautiful, textbook example of a bubble. Just like in 2012 and 2011. The free market in action, folks.

(Also, lol, look at that fluctuation. For an alleged currency.)

[chitoryu12]

The reason it fluctuates is because it's made by people who don't really understand how fiat money works. The dollar is no longer on the gold standard (same with quite a few modern currencies), and only has value because people accept that it has value. Bitcoin is similarly "worthless" in that it's only valuable to people who accept it. But it's not being distributed by an established government or trusted entity. People accept the dollar because the United States isn't going anywhere soon (and it's been an economic powerhouse for quite some time). The Bitcoin can suddenly become worthless, so nobody has faith in it.

It doesn't help that Bitcoin is essentially a currency that has to be purchased (rather than truly exchanged), since so few places accept it as money. What did they THINK would happen when a bunch of people bought cheap BTC and then sold it off as soon as it was worth something?

[The Right Honourable Mlle Antéchrist]

Of course, these idiots treat the lack of centralization as a selling point, which is both tragic and hilarious. Lolbernomics in action.

[MadCatTLX]

Of course, these idiots treat the lack of centralization as a selling point, which is both tragic and hilarious. Lolbernomics in action.

This raises the question, could someone counterfeit a shit ton of bitcoins? If so, how? If someone did do that, who would be able to stop them? Couldn't that one person's actions bring the whole bitcoin thing down?

[chitoryu12]

Of course, these idiots treat the lack of centralization as a selling point, which is both tragic and hilarious. Lolbernomics in action.

This raises the question, could someone counterfeit a shit ton of bitcoins? If so, how? If someone did do that, who would be able to stop them? Couldn't that one person's actions bring the whole bitcoin thing down?

I did some searching on the production of bitcoins. It's 100% digital, with the bitcoin miners (the servers that work to record transactions) generating a small amount of bitcoins as they update the ledger. They halve the amount of bitcoins that the miners produce every 4 years, so 10 minutes of activity today produces 25 bitcoins. In 2017 it'll become 12.5 bitcoins. They plan on having a hard limit of 21 million, which won't be reached until 2140.

According to people far more vested in bitcoins than myself, it's supposedly nearly impossible to counterfeit: it uses a blockchain that holds a record of all transactions, so you can't just create new data and shove it in. The system is so decentralized that in order to counterfeit it, you'd need to actually edit the blockchain itself, which they estimate as taking most of the world's supercomputers to do.

This is the only reason bitcoin has lasted so long. You know that if it was possible to easily counterfeit bitcoins, it would have collapsed before the value ever came close to triple digits. A better solution is to con your way into stealing them.

[Osama bin Bambi]

How very odd, Nyarlathotep's human form is supposed to be a tall man with black skin.

Really? Huh.


*link NSFW due to language.

I believe in that story where he was a tall man with black skin, it was described as not with Negroid features. But anyway it is as someone said earlier. Nyarlathotep assumes thousands of forms. As to Lovecraft having racist tendencies. it is pretty much documented. He was a product of his time, anyhow.

That said. stop reading Lovecraft stories. everybody! You'll lose your sanity

In Lovecraft's partial defense, he WAS very much a product of his time and place, growing up in northern New England. His journals reveal that, after living in New York, his views toward other races became more enlightened.

Nobody escapes their upbringing. No matter what we do, we will always be influenced by it. The most we can do is recognize and account for that influence in our thoughts and actions.

Product of his time, sure. But his antisemitism was just insane. Especially considering that his wife was jewish.

Apparently he also hated the French, and The Shadow Over Innsmouth was intended as a cautionary tale against "race-mixing" inspired by Lovecraft's discovery that an ancestor of his was Welsh. The horror.

ETA: He also wrote this lovely poem:

(click to show/hide)

On the Creation of Niggers (1912)
by H. P. Lovecraft

When, long ago, the gods created Earth
In Jove’s fair image Man was shaped at birth.
The beasts for lesser parts were next designed;
Yet were they too remote from humankind.
To fill the gap, and join the rest to Man,
Th’Olympian host conceiv’d a clever plan.
A beast they wrought, in semi-human figure,
Filled it with vice, and called the thing a Nigger.

[Hoplite]