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Coinbase and the Widespread Adoption of Cryptocurrency

melewi.net

11–20 of 25 posts

Re: Coinbase and the Widespread Adoption of Cryptocurrency

#11

Why would something that serves such an extremely small niche market ever be “widespread”? Rather than focusing on what crypto is bad at (nearly everything because trust is useful for 99% of its applications), crypto should focus on the niche where it’s actually good at: large money transfers across international boundaries.

> ... niche where it’s actually good at: large money transfers across international boundaries

Is Bitcoin even good at that?

If you're going to transfer a million dollars from Nigeria to the USA, presumably you're going to want to cash it out at the other end. If the exchange providing your USD follows the law, they'll be asking the same questions concerning the provenance of the $1M that would get asked for a regular wire transfer. So you're not really getting access to the money any quicker in the end.

Of course if the intent is to diffuse the $1M into smaller crypto transactions and cash out those under the radar... Well, that's a different niche entirely than just plain old "large international wires".

Re: Coinbase and the Widespread Adoption of Cryptocurrency

#12

Why would something that serves such an extremely small niche market ever be “widespread”? Rather than focusing on what crypto is bad at (nearly everything because trust is useful for 99% of its applications), crypto should focus on the niche where it’s actually good at: large money transfers across international boundaries.

aka Crime (for the most part)

Re: Coinbase and the Widespread Adoption of Cryptocurrency

#14
post #12

Why would something that serves such an extremely small niche market ever be “widespread”? Rather than focusing on what crypto is bad at (nearly everything because trust is useful for 99% of its applications), crypto should focus on the niche where it’s actually good at: large money transfers across international boundaries.

aka Crime (for the most part)

Silk Road has been gone for a long time. At this point I would guess that 75% of the volume of BTC movement is from speculators. That's probably conservative.

Re: Coinbase and the Widespread Adoption of Cryptocurrency

#15
post #3

off topic, but what's up with the gifs in this article? they're super distracting and they make up 80% of the page.

It's pretty relevant though. The article is completely unreadable for me unless I disable images. I don't understand the mindset of someone putting huge gifs everywhere in their article, that is something a small child would do, not someone that wants to be taken seriously.

Re: Coinbase and the Widespread Adoption of Cryptocurrency

#16
post #7

Why is this guy shilling so hard for Coinbase? Is there a conflict of interest disclaimer I missed in this post?

Coinbase is the most user-friendly crypto exchange for non-technical users. It more closely resembles an online banking experience that most people are used to. On this point, I have to agree with the author.

Re: Coinbase and the Widespread Adoption of Cryptocurrency

#17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would Coinbase agree to an acquisition by a tech giant? * Coinbase is making plenty of money, * Google, Facebook or Apple etc wouldn't provide much more additional value, * and there would be a real risk that an acquisition would be a disaster since tech giants clearly don't understand cryptocurrencies (see AOL/Timewarner). I could see an acquisition by a large bank or exchange.

> Coinbase is making plenty of money Coinbase’s volumes have consistently fallen every month since December. January was less than December, February less than January, March less than February, et cetera . They're not in a terrific place, for raising an up round nor selling their business. [1] https://www.wsj.com/articles/can-the-biggest-u-s-bitcoin-exc...

Coinbase volumes spiked due to an insane spike in the price of Bitcoin. Starting your measurement on the peak of that spike seems likely to bias any trends. A better question is what does coinbase's volume look like if you measure 12 months from today or 24 months from today? [0]

[0]: https://data.bitcoinity.org/markets/volume/2y?c=c&exchange=c...

Re: Coinbase and the Widespread Adoption of Cryptocurrency

#18

Why would something that serves such an extremely small niche market ever be “widespread”? Rather than focusing on what crypto is bad at (nearly everything because trust is useful for 99% of its applications), crypto should focus on the niche where it’s actually good at: large money transfers across international boundaries.

Ah yes, like how Coinbase told its investors that Bitcoin is great for money laundering and bypassing sanctions?

  Immune to country-
  specific sanctions 
  (e.g. Russia-Visa)
http://freebeacon.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/COINBASE-IN...

Re: Coinbase and the Widespread Adoption of Cryptocurrency

#19

Why would something that serves such an extremely small niche market ever be “widespread”? Rather than focusing on what crypto is bad at (nearly everything because trust is useful for 99% of its applications), crypto should focus on the niche where it’s actually good at: large money transfers across international boundaries.

That is including or excluding paying capital gains taxes that is required for cashing out such transactions?

Re: Coinbase and the Widespread Adoption of Cryptocurrency

#20
post #2

The countdown to Coinbase getting acquired has already started. Now it's just a matter of when it will happen and which of the tech giants will end-up owning it.

Why would tech giants want this particular industry? I don't see them buying guns manufacturers, despite that being a very profitable business.
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