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How the Winklevoss Twins Found Vindication in a Bitcoin Fortune

nytimes.com

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Re: How the Winklevoss Twins Found Vindication in a Bitcoin Fortune

#171

Post by jhall1468 »

jpm_sd wrote: post #143
TheBiv wrote: post #3

>> They said they might look at selling when the value of all the Bitcoin in circulation approaches the value of all gold in the world — some $7 trillion or $8 trillion compared with the $310 billion value of all Bitcoin on Tuesday — given that they think Bitcoin is set to replace gold as a rare commodity. But then Tyler Winklevoss questioned even that, pointing out the ways that he believes Bitcoin is better than go…

BTC is far more likely to hit zero than to outstrip gold.

Literally nobody knows what Bitcoin is going to do, so comments like this are not only blatantly false (you have no idea what's more likely), they serve zero purpose.

Re: How the Winklevoss Twins Found Vindication in a Bitcoin Fortune

#172

Post by chrisco255 »

lern_too_spel wrote: post #134
chrisco255 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 51% attack allows you to double spend. It doesn't allow you to steal other people's coin.

By allowing you to double spend, it reduces confidence in coins you buy to zero, which reduces the value of all coins to zero. You still have your coins, but they aren't worth anything.

Which is exactly why no one would spend the crazy amounts of money it takes to execute a 51% attack. It would be like self-immolation. Billions of dollars in equipment and energy and you'd have 51% of a worthless network. In practice, you would have to control much more than 51% of the network, because you'd have to catch up to the 49% that are still hashing away.

Re: How the Winklevoss Twins Found Vindication in a Bitcoin Fortune

#173

Post by cohnnton »

TheBiv wrote: post #3

>> They said they might look at selling when the value of all the Bitcoin in circulation approaches the value of all gold in the world — some $7 trillion or $8 trillion compared with the $310 billion value of all Bitcoin on Tuesday — given that they think Bitcoin is set to replace gold as a rare commodity. But then Tyler Winklevoss questioned even that, pointing out the ways that he believes Bitcoin is better than go…

can someone explain why bitcoin is rare? there are COUNTLESS cryptocurrencies out there. The only reason bitcoin is believed to be rare is blind belief, much like believing in santa claus.

Re: How the Winklevoss Twins Found Vindication in a Bitcoin Fortune

#174

Post by jhall1468 »

perseusprime11 wrote: post #165
jhall1468 wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ideas are worthless. Undoubtedly he took their concept, but I sincerely doubt he developed a complete copy of their idea. Whether or not their idea would have worked is up for debate. But it's a pointless debate, because ideas are worthless... Unless of course, they are patented.

So tomorrow if you hire couple of engineers to build a gaming app, are you saying you will fine if those engineers launch the app by themselves?

No I'd take the the court, because I wouldn't do that without a contract.

Re: How the Winklevoss Twins Found Vindication in a Bitcoin Fortune

#175

Post by dahdum »

ufo wrote: post #51
dahdum wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$550M on just the Coinbase BTC-USD book in the past 24 hours. $1B on Bitfinex. Liquidity is currently very strong.

That is trading volume, not liquidity. And we should be wary of the trading volume on bitcoin exchanges, a lot of it is manipulated. (In particular, I would never trust any numbers coming from Bitfinex)

Ok...last 10 minutes proved your point. That was bananas.

Re: How the Winklevoss Twins Found Vindication in a Bitcoin Fortune

#176

Post by 21 »

saalweachter wrote: post #160
21 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please explain how issuing/buying back shares destroys dollars.

AAPL buying/selling itself is a direct link between the assets inside AAPL and its stock price. Money can literally be "put into" and "taken out of" AAPL.

Those "assets inside" AAPL are still dollars. User payed dollars for AAPL share which ended up in a dollar account or a treasury bond. Stop being so obtuse.

Otherwise I can also say the same thing, that you can literally put dollars into Bitcoin by buying GBTC shares, since the dollars become "assets inside" the Bitcoin Investment Trust company.

Re: How the Winklevoss Twins Found Vindication in a Bitcoin Fortune

#177

Post by maehwasu »

seppin wrote: post #164
ramphastidae wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't really consider it "prescient" to take stock over cash when you're already wealthy. It's more of a privilege.

So was buying a bunch of bitcoin in 2013. It's a bet only a few people could (should have) made.

I know plenty of people with jobs that supported them just fine who were able to acquire a lot of bitcoin early. Most of them abandoned it, and it had nothing to do with privilege or immediate need.

Re: How the Winklevoss Twins Found Vindication in a Bitcoin Fortune

#178

Post by ufo »

dahdum wrote: post #175
ufo wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is trading volume, not liquidity. And we should be wary of the trading volume on bitcoin exchanges, a lot of it is manipulated. (In particular, I would never trust any numbers coming from Bitfinex)

Ok...last 10 minutes proved your point. That was bananas.

What happened?

Re: How the Winklevoss Twins Found Vindication in a Bitcoin Fortune

#179

Post by maehwasu »

moduspol wrote: post #149
sytelus wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's quite a balony. - Both are in fixed quantity so none is more rare than other. - Gold has practical use in industry which puts lower bound on its value. BTC has no lower bound. - Gold is exchangeable virtually in any country and any culture regardless of how technologically advanced that society is. - Thousands of years of history has proven that humans have almost natural lust for this shiny metal and it gets…

> Gold is far more unlikely to be made illegal by governments. Empirically this has not been the case, particularly in the US [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102

Was just about to link to this. I'd also mention that gold confiscation was heavily used by the Nazis.

Gold is great as a store of value when things are good, and incredibly shitty when your government turns on you.

Re: How the Winklevoss Twins Found Vindication in a Bitcoin Fortune

#180

Post by randomsearch »

stevenj wrote: post #80

I think the Winklevoss twins were rightly ridiculed for thinking they invented Facebook. However, they've made two prescient bets and deserve credit for those: (1) Getting Facebook stock instead of cash as part of their legal settlement; (2) Not only seeing bitcoin's future potential, but investing in it and sticking with it. While the final result on the second one is still TBD, they deserve credit for investing in…

How well you think bitcoin’s potential worked out is likely to depend on exactly when in the next six months you decide to sell.

Then again, being able to anticipate irrational investment in bitcoin is arguably also a skill, assuming it’s not just dumb luck.

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