Moody Urbanity - Past 📴
情绪化城市 - 过去 📴
📷 Zeiss Ikon Super Ikonta 533/16
🎞️ Ilford HP5, expired 1993
#filmphotography #Photography #blackandwhite
Despite much opinion to the contrary, the government money we use is crappy.
I'm at bitfest in Manchester to find out if Bitcoin could be a better money.
It could hardly be worse.
The mood is still good, people are joking about recent devaluation rather than crying. Those who aren't all in are trying to buy more at the discount.
After an introduction by Mad Bitcoins, Joe Bryan explains the problem with government money.
He imagines an island on which two types of money are tried, with a dividing wall between them.
When economic problems hit, government can just print more money on the fiat side. Everyone now using money which is worth less. Distorting prices, inflating asset prices, making the rich (who hold assets) richer and the poor (who have to pay inflated prices) poorer. Driving wealth inequality.
On the hard money side, government must tax properly. Take in more from the rich rather than inflating to take it from the poor. Reducing wealth inequality.
On the government money side, the wealthy monitize houses, stocks, resources. Saving in money is impossible, its inflated away. So they save in assets and hording resources. Capital is misallocated. The youth can't afford houses. Poverty traps are caused. The only way out is printing more for benefits. Making it all worse. More economic crises, more printing. More government debt.
Eventually, the wall is broken. Government money people can save in the hard money instead. It reduces the value of government money further. More printing. More inflation.
Eventually, war. Funded by printed money.
The dollar is the best of a bad bunch all other government money is falling in value even faster.
I wonder, is bitcoin really this better money though? It's limited, hard, and can't be printed without energy investment.
I'm still unsure that fixing money fixes the world.
--
Note: "crypto" is mostly more like government money than bitcoin. It can be printed indefinitely by it's makers, does not cost it's makers to print. Crypto is usually just a scam people to get more bitcoin. Bitcoin is not crypto.
#bitfest #bitcoin
Filings: Meta spent the most on US lobbying in Q3, spending $5.8M, followed by Amazon, Google, Apple; Anthropic, Nvidia, and a16z hit $1M for the first time (Ashley Gold/Axios)
https://www.axios.com/2025/10/21/tech-lobbying-insights-q3
An evening discussing falling enrollment in #STEM courses at universities across Europe, especially traditional studies like chemistry, geology and meteorology. I wonder if young people are unaware of just how interesting #STEM careers to be? Or do they have the perception it's "too hard" compared to other subjects where easier grades may be had? Or is it simply they think they can have "better"* jobs in other fields?
#AcademicChatter
*Where better might mean higher paid, more prestigious, more certain of employment, or less workload or some combination of all of these... ?
🇺🇦 #NowPlaying on KEXP's #AfternoonShow
Flying Mojito Bros:
🎵 Glitter
#FlyingMojitoBros
https://flyingmojitobros.bandcamp.com/album/glitter
https://open.spotify.com/track/7jNsuvcAbrJjUeAY1UugmX
Moody Urbanity - Manmade Confinements 🏗️
情绪化城市 - 人造禁锢 🏗️
📷 Pentax MX
🎞️ Kentmere Pan 400
#filmphotography #Photography #blackandwhite
Canada's financial crime watchdog fines crypto exchange Cryptomus a record ~$126M for infractions including failing to flag suspicious transactions (Canadian Press)
https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/cryptomus-fined-177-million-fintrac-9.6948338
🇺🇦 #NowPlaying on KEXP's #PositiveVibrations
Mortimer:
🎵 Flowers & Flames
#Mortimer
https://ineffablerecords.bandcamp.com/track/flowers-flames
https://open.spotify.com/track/2jmdcCcyJYHqdKEbejup0S
A look at Amazon's Sparrow, Cardinal, Proteus, and other warehouse robots, taking over roles like selecting and picking items, carrying shipping carts, and more (Karen Weise/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/21/technology/amazon-robotics-automa…