| 12:23 |
awt_akris |
asciilifeform can you post the link to the FG docs? loper-os.org is not currently displaying posts very well. |
| |
~ 57 minutes ~ |
| 13:21 |
awt_akris |
It's called the OP-XY. |
| |
~ 3 hours 16 minutes ~ |
| 16:37 |
asciilifeform |
awt_akris: http://nosuchlabs.com |
| 16:38 |
awt_akris |
asciilifeform: ah yes - thanks |
| 16:38 |
asciilifeform |
noprob |
| 16:39 |
asciilifeform |
errything still there afaik |
| 16:39 |
asciilifeform |
awt_akris: building own fg ? |
| 16:40 |
awt_akris |
asciilifeform: no just generating some new keys |
| 16:40 |
asciilifeform |
aa ok |
| 16:43 |
* |
asciilifeform has the FG II schems/pcb/fw lying around for yrs nao, gathering dust |
| 16:44 |
asciilifeform |
the lyso scintillator thing, ~10MB/s |
| 16:46 |
asciilifeform |
( see also re wainot avail. ) |
| 16:51 |
awt_akris |
I have some experience at demand testing now - successfully marketed and sold t-shirts. While I suspect your reasons for "wainot" are correct, could likely prove it true/false empirically without building the thing. |
| 16:56 |
asciilifeform |
awt_akris: if you discover evidence that 100+ people seekritly want a 1000$+ rng, please lemme know |
| 16:58 |
awt_akris |
asciilifeform: Could likely prove no demand for an ad spend in the 4 figure range or less. |
| 17:00 |
asciilifeform |
see e.g. & elsewhere |
| 17:02 |
* |
asciilifeform not aware of any reason to think that anyffin pertinent has changed |
| 17:04 |
awt_akris |
asciilifeform: not seeing market places where it was advertised, ad campaign details, etc. My recollection of what happened was that dpb bought almost all of the FG units. I don't know what else you tried in terms of marketing them. |
| 17:05 |
asciilifeform |
awt_akris: mp & the pete_d fella were in charge of marketing, and iirc did not detail what, precisely, they had done |
| 17:06 |
asciilifeform |
phuctor www (and for a time, mp's, with supposedly large audience) had a fg banner for a time |
| 17:06 |
asciilifeform |
that, iirc, was all |
| 17:08 |
awt_akris |
yeah my current impression is that mp's audience was very very niche given that I come across links to trilema virtually never, and no one I talk to has ever heard of him. |
| 17:08 |
* |
asciilifeform unprepared to even speculate how to convince e.g. microshit victim that a trng is a useful addition to his setup, given that 'medicine for corpse' |
| 17:15 |
awt_akris |
IDK either. But honestly looks like no one seriously tried to market it. |
| 17:17 |
asciilifeform |
the folx pushing suborned crypto hardware have ~infinite marketing budgets (and vendor lock), the hero who can counter this is prolly not yet born. |
| 17:19 |
awt_akris |
What do you mean by infinite? Millions/month in adspend? |
| 17:20 |
asciilifeform |
infinite as in usg printing press collectively feeds the lot of'em |
| 17:21 |
asciilifeform |
(even if any particular shop very much 'finite') |
| 17:22 |
asciilifeform |
infinite as in anthill, all the while life of any particular ant is not long |
| 17:22 |
awt_akris |
Ok well was trying to put a number on it |
| 17:22 |
asciilifeform |
imho attempts to 'put number' are inescapably focusing on wrong aspect |
| 17:23 |
awt_akris |
Because I guarantee you if you buy ads, they will be seen by real people. |
| 17:23 |
awt_akris |
Or if you put a listing in a marketplace - will be shown to real people |
| 17:23 |
awt_akris |
And it will cost a specific amount |
| 17:27 |
* |
asciilifeform had bought www ads in previous times, long before the fg episode, for 'clearly superior to prevailing $shitware and not even expensive' product, with $0 to show for the ads, went away believing that pushing serious scientific instruments to www randos is a fool's game |
| 17:28 |
asciilifeform |
anyone who seriously thinks 'fg not correctly marketed' is invited to prove asciilifeform wrong by buying 100k$+ worth in 1 go and marketing'em himself |
| 17:29 |
* |
awt_akris bought ads with > $0 to show for it now what lol |
| 17:29 |
asciilifeform |
asciilifeform however is done with fronting costs (incl. own time) on long shots |
| 17:30 |
awt_akris |
asciilifeform: so it was seriously marketed or what lol and who asked asciilifeform to front any costs omg |
| 17:30 |
asciilifeform |
well notionally 'hey if only made moar/sequel, and correctly sold, would sell' is at least hypothetical 'wat if front' neh |
| 17:32 |
awt_akris |
nope incorrect - didn't suggest that a sequel be made, only marketed, and didn't specify by whom |
| 17:32 |
asciilifeform |
asciilifeform's collaboration with mp was 1 long episode of fronting serious $ / time , with ~0 to show for it, ftr |
| 17:33 |
asciilifeform |
iirc there was actually a fella who proclaimed, circa '18 or so, that he'll be baking & selling own fg-like. iirc nuffin happened there |
| 17:33 |
awt_akris |
baking one without proving demand would be a bad idea, as we've seen. |
| 17:35 |
asciilifeform |
whosoever convincingly 'proves demand', can have as many as he wants, 'will roll off conveyor like sausages'(tm)(r)(hrusch). but asciilifeform aint aboutta spend anyffing whatsoever prior to seeing said proof. |
| 17:37 |
awt_akris |
Dunno why proves demand is in scare quotes here. |
| 17:38 |
asciilifeform |
awt_akris: for asciilifeform's edification, plz describe the hypothetical in detail |
| 17:41 |
awt_akris |
Create a kickstarter campaign for product. Spend $(one year worth of netflix) on promoting it and see what happens. If nothing happens after maybe 4 weeks of daily ad campaign iterations, delete kickstarter page. Move on with life. |
| |
↖ ↖ |
| 17:43 |
asciilifeform |
not that one couldn't, but goodluck trying to convince folx to pony up for 1000$ (hand-tested, like aircraft engine) trng on kickstarter where already they see 100% phunded <100$ 'just as good' (from their pov) trngs |
| 17:43 |
asciilifeform |
'pearls before swine' etc |
| 17:44 |
awt_akris |
Why would you go after cheapskates? They're the worst. |
| 17:44 |
awt_akris |
Literally the worst customers to have. |
| 17:45 |
asciilifeform |
is there a separate kickstarter for non-cheapskates ? |
| 17:46 |
awt_akris |
I didn't know kickstarter was only for cheapskates. I do know that the best customers drop $maxint and never bother you. |
| 17:47 |
asciilifeform |
the funny thing is, absolutely anyone could've done 'kickstarter for fg' for ~decade nao, the schems+softs have been public since day1 |
| 17:47 |
asciilifeform |
for sumreason nobody afaik to date did anysuch thing tho |
| 17:50 |
asciilifeform |
(afaik nobody to date even baked own unit for own use -- as asciilifeform encouraged folx to attempt -- much less for commercial purpose) |
| 17:51 |
awt_akris |
asciilifeform: brief search of kickstarter not coming up with any rng devices. |
| 17:52 |
asciilifeform |
hm, maybe was on 'other kickstarters' ? |
| 17:52 |
asciilifeform |
e.g. (outta print?) |
| 17:53 |
awt_akris |
Amazon is showing there is some market for rng devices. |
| 17:53 |
asciilifeform |
the other 1 asciilifeform recalls from l0gz |
| 17:53 |
asciilifeform |
there were at least half dozen that were (or still are) buyable |
| 17:54 |
asciilifeform |
( all of'em afaik 'whitened', unshielded, and/or relied on commercial blackbox rng chip rather than auditable analogue circuit ) |
| 17:55 |
asciilifeform |
( re shield, 'onerng' is a lulzcow, stuffs the digital microcontroller under the same shield as the entropy gatherer, lol ) |
| 17:57 |
asciilifeform |
or take the 'takes fw upgrades from pc via usb' lul. |
| 17:57 |
* |
asciilifeform could go on, but pedantically detailed these in #t days when they came out, and afaik erryone tuned in remembers |
| 17:59 |
asciilifeform |
then there were the various folx who 'gathered entropy' from rf receiver ! |
| 18:00 |
* |
asciilifeform will not say whether 'wreckers' or 'idiots' , but at a certain point difficult to distinguish |
| 18:05 |
asciilifeform |
fwiw mp was earnestly convinced that there were folx like himself walking around somewhere, 'serious btc people' who want to buy dedicated, auditable irons, commercial support for same, etc |
| 18:06 |
asciilifeform |
seems as if this 'loch ness monster' did not reveal itself. the 'serious bags' seem to have split into 2 types -- one type in fact trusted reich with its coin, parked in goxes |
| 18:06 |
awt_akris |
I made something based on similar reports from a guy - was completely illusory |
| 18:06 |
asciilifeform |
... the other, 'laying low' and relying on irons/softs wangled together personally / in-house / openly-published 3 or 4 exchrate zeroes ago |
| 18:10 |
awt_akris |
Anyway making the thing first and then marketing it is the reverse of what should be done. For ex. in my t-shirt biz, I didn't make a bunch of baby tees with a specific design, then try to sell them. Made a bunch of listings with mockups, then when they sold, made the shirts. |
| 18:11 |
asciilifeform |
awt_akris: 'print on demand' worx a++ for shirts, boox, etc |
| 18:11 |
asciilifeform |
not so much for items which require tooling, back'n'forths with fab houses, etc |
| 18:15 |
asciilifeform |
items where unit cost can vary within 2 or 3 orders of magnitude (and with considerable 'floor', as hand-tested) based on qty made -- poor fit for 'sell custom-printed coffee cups' method |
| 18:16 |
awt_akris |
I object to the notion that you can't sell electronics before producing them. |
| 18:17 |
asciilifeform |
plenty of folx in fact tried (and continue) |
| 18:17 |
asciilifeform |
e.g. 'hackrf' was a kickstarter product |
| 18:17 |
awt_akris |
I've purchased a few such items - the lightphone for example. |
| 18:17 |
awt_akris |
They are even still around. |
| 18:17 |
awt_akris |
Making new stuff. |
| 18:18 |
* |
asciilifeform not contending that 'kickstarter -- scam, nothing was ever baked there' fwiw |
| 18:20 |
* |
asciilifeform contends, however, that cryptography -- as a field -- is so thoroughly 'schneierized', that likely scarcely a dozen people alive have any kinda grasp of what the real thing loox like, and what one oughta expect to pay for it |
| 18:21 |
asciilifeform |
... the rest, either wanna pay $0 -- 'rng comes with intel and mswin' crowd, or '$35' -- the various usb stix etc |
| 18:22 |
asciilifeform |
( consider various other lulcrypto-ware, e.g. 'trezor', to see what kinda 'pearls' the 'swine' are interested in buying & at what price point ) |
| 18:22 |
awt_akris |
Well aware of the hw wallet scam |
| 18:23 |
asciilifeform |
of course, for thread-completeness, there is the other end of the scale, 20+k$ 'quantum zyz11222!!!' boxes, but these are sold via usg favouriteson 1-bid contracts, rather than 'to humans' afaik |
| 18:23 |
awt_akris |
I suspect that they're buying the podcasters for extremely cheap |
| 18:23 |
asciilifeform |
awt_akris: likely |
| 18:25 |
awt_akris |
Well known that X account paid tweets can be purchased for 4 figure amounts. |
| 18:26 |
awt_akris |
Seems like only the "bad guys" ever bother to buy anyone off though. |
| 18:26 |
asciilifeform |
aha, and there the winner is the 1 who spends moar $ on buying twits, and as little as possible on the actual product |
| 18:26 |
asciilifeform |
spending on the product -- moar or less -ev |
| 18:30 |
asciilifeform |
hence wai kickstarter, as asciilifeform remembers it, was emblematic for hucksters pushing e.g. chinese whitelabel routers with custom-printed sticker, shitlinux + 'tor' etc. shitware inside, and some fancy verbiage |
| 18:30 |
asciilifeform |
there -- product costs just about $0 from their end, and 'over9000 profit' if just about any chumps can turn up to buy |
| 18:31 |
asciilifeform |
and so yet there it becomes a q of bribing 'influencers' and swimming in various online cloacas in search of the gullible |
| 18:32 |
asciilifeform |
this kinda activity has, yes, made a few people rich, but asciilifeform has 0 interest in being involved in any variant of it, in any capacity whatsoever (oughta not be surprise to anyone tuned in) |
| 18:33 |
awt_akris |
What would be the cost per fg on a 1k unit run? |
| 18:34 |
asciilifeform |
the original fg ? prolly 20bux or so (assuming 'buy at own risk' rather than ' asciilifeform tests each 1 on desk ' ) |
| 18:34 |
asciilifeform |
automated test is theoretically possible but would require tooling that we never sold enuff to justify baking |
| 18:36 |
asciilifeform |
ftr asciilifeform not certain that the original design could still be made in qty w/out revisions -- not all of the parts may be available, it's been ~decade |
| 18:36 |
asciilifeform |
(at any rate there's 0 justification for using the xilinx cpld, with its turdware compiler, rather than e.g. ice40 or lichee fpga ) |
| 18:39 |
asciilifeform |
the hilarious bit is that the classical fg was in fact a stripped-down (at mp's insistence, to keep unit cost manageable) item. omitted e.g. onboard power source, stackability, coupla other arguable 'luxuries' |
| 18:43 |
asciilifeform |
fwiw if asciilifeform were baking irons again, would prolly attempt larger, self-contained gadget incorporating trng, rather than standalone trng |
| 18:43 |
asciilifeform |
very few folx are actually qualified to make use of standalone trng (recall at least 1 who never got his fg talking to his crapple or what was it) |
| 18:44 |
awt_akris |
asciilifeform: yea. |
| 18:44 |
awt_akris |
Could be a lot more convenient to use. |
| 18:45 |
asciilifeform |
subtracting pc-compat & its shitware os (all of'em) is an auto-win, supposing one doesn't replace it with basically same barrel o'shit in smaller package ('trezor' & friends) |
| 18:47 |
asciilifeform |
there's a small pile of open problems in ^ -- particularly, sending the ~9kbaud one needs for decent quality realtime cipherade over a gsm pnoje would need sumthing like a vocoder/decoder speech-mimic cleverness |
| 18:48 |
asciilifeform |
traditional telephonic modems dunwork worth a shit over mandatorily compressed gsm shitchannel |
| 18:49 |
awt_akris |
wait where does gsm come in? |
| 18:49 |
asciilifeform |
ideally no 2 pairs of units would 'speak' in same 'voice', also |
| 18:49 |
asciilifeform |
awt_akris: linked item concerned hypothetical 'attach to headphone jack on pnoje' otp messenger |
| 18:50 |
asciilifeform |
( where, obv, plaintext never touches any part of the pnoje, much less the telco's net ) |
| 18:51 |
asciilifeform |
could even omit the 'headphone jac', have the thing mutter outta small speaker into the handset (and listen from same) , then electrically isolated |
| 18:53 |
asciilifeform |
^ is merely 1 in a # of hypothetical irons asciilifeform discusses that 100% no one is making currently (nor any of the 'usual suspects' is ever likely to) |
| 18:54 |
asciilifeform |
even tho the concept for that one dates to... 1940s! |
| 18:54 |
asciilifeform |
subj . |