Live data from Hacker News

It can all go to zero

feld.com

151–160 of 361 posts

Re: It can all go to zero

#151
post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In that scenario there would likely be a fork of the software to do something like lower the hash power requirements and continue using the network.

If all the miners go away the difficulty requirement will drop on its own to maintain the 10min block rate. No need to fork anything: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Difficulty

[deleted]

Re: It can all go to zero

#152
There are so many glaring issues with BitCoin that it's insane that there are people who are dumb enough to buy it at these prices. 1) 96% of it is controlled by 4% of people. That means if it were to become a currency 96% of the wealth in the world would have to be given to 4% of people either through goods or a fiat currency. 2) It's just a matter of time before enough people lose their private keys that the total number of coins in circulation reaches 0. Already, something like 30% of current coins are considered "lost".

Re: It can all go to zero

#153
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Comparing cryptocurrencies to actual companies isn't fair. A lot of companies that went bankrupt (aka worth $0) had assets. Those assets were worth something and were probably sold off and used to pay debtors. What assets does a cryptocurrency have? What value is actually there?

It's also not fair because a company can actually "go away" as in they sell the building and stop operating. You can't really do this with bitcoin. It's never going to "shut down".

This is why some people think it could be a perpetual ponzi scheme/bubble... price goes up, people get interested, price shoots up, more people get interested, price drops down, a lot of people lose their shirts, but other people will think, "Oh, Bitcoin is cheap now, I should get into that!". I guess until you run out of people, or until it's ruled "illegal" that the pool of people shrinks.

Re: It can all go to zero

#154
post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way I understand it bitcoin is guaranteed to go to zero by design because there is a fixed limit on issue and so eventually there will be no incentive to mine and the network will collapse.

You understand wrong. And are naive to think that such a simplistic flaw would not be considered by the substantial number of intelligent programmers involved in the Bitcoin project. The transaction fees on the network are incentives for miners to pass transactions in addition to block rewards.

Appeal to authority is one of the most naive arguments out there... especially when it's to some programmers attempting to design an economy

Re: It can all go to zero

#155
post #33

Time for the monthly cryptocurrency panic thread. While I fully agree that most cryptocurrencies are grossly overvalued, these articles always pretend a 20% selloff is the beginning of the end, when, in crypto land, 20% selloffs are a pretty standard bad day for the market.

The way I understand it bitcoin is guaranteed to go to zero by design because there is a fixed limit on issue and so eventually there will be no incentive to mine and the network will collapse.

How does the myth stick around so much? The original design from the start has always avoided this issue: miners collect transaction fees too.

Re: It can all go to zero

#156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> these articles always pretend a 20% selloff is the beginning of the end There are individuals in this thread claiming "there will always be buyers" and that the probability of Bitcoin becoming worthless is zero. The point of the article isn't that Bitcoin is doomed. It's that there is a substantial non-zero probability it ends up worthless. That such an elementary claim about a volatile asset is controversial almos…

Ok can you talk more about your failure case then? What are the conditions like what exactly is the end result. There are 0 exchanges?

Someone announces they have had a large quantum computer for a while and have cracked every public key on the blockchain. That'd probably do it. Quantum Jubilee, y'all. The year of decryption, all private keys revealed, all captive coins set free. It's just a matter of engineering at this point. Give it roughly 10 years.

Re: It can all go to zero

#157
post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If people stop mining it then you can't buy it. Remember, with the current design if hash power suddenly drops enough then the network just stops.

If the mining ceases then you could always just mine your own transaction to buy all of it. But so could everyone else!

Depends on how you do it, you could fork the protocol and start mining from the beginning. Otherwise you would need to convince everyone to actually sell before you could mine those transactions.

Often what happens after a massive price drop is people stop trading instead of a larger nominal price drop. AKA, you still get some high value beanie baby transactions, but the market is not large enough to really liquidate a collection at even close to the nominal clearing price.

Re: It can all go to zero

#158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok can you talk more about your failure case then? What are the conditions like what exactly is the end result. There are 0 exchanges?

Someone announces they have had a large quantum computer for a while and have cracked every public key on the blockchain. That'd probably do it. Quantum Jubilee, y'all. The year of decryption, all private keys revealed, all captive coins set free. It's just a matter of engineering at this point. Give it roughly 10 years.

Which is why I bought some QRL recently.

Re: It can all go to zero

#159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok can you talk more about your failure case then? What are the conditions like what exactly is the end result. There are 0 exchanges?

Someone announces they have had a large quantum computer for a while and have cracked every public key on the blockchain. That'd probably do it. Quantum Jubilee, y'all. The year of decryption, all private keys revealed, all captive coins set free. It's just a matter of engineering at this point. Give it roughly 10 years.

You are right however that event is similar to idk deadly asteroid approaching earth. Sure, it might make btc go to zero but so will like so much other shit. Also quantum resistant crypto is possible.

Re: It can all go to zero

#160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok can you talk more about your failure case then? What are the conditions like what exactly is the end result. There are 0 exchanges?

Someone announces they have had a large quantum computer for a while and have cracked every public key on the blockchain. That'd probably do it. Quantum Jubilee, y'all. The year of decryption, all private keys revealed, all captive coins set free. It's just a matter of engineering at this point. Give it roughly 10 years.

Not only cryptography coins,even traditional banking,e-commerce,and our modern society would go down. Quantum for all.
Post reply on HN