Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future • Hacker News Board

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#551

Post by narcissismo » Mon, Feb 08, 2021, 3:21 PM UTC

rzodkiew wrote: post #338

Bitcoin is a mystery to me. Somehow it's hailed as revolutionising the economy, by replacing currency with a worse kind of currency. It feels like this is where all the "how to get rich quick" book writers and other hustle bros went and created one giant financial pyramid, which works in quite simple way: - buy bitcoin - tell everyone around how revolutionary it is, so they buy it and what you holding increases in va…

Large numbers of the 'get rich quick' crowd that you speak of become poor after each crash. More will follow.

Each time this happens, I stand in awe of the brilliance of bitcoin - not so much the details of UTXOs or hash magic, but the choice of time base and halving intervals.

Its as if it were designed to be a FOMO feedback loop from the outset. The fact that its still working after so many boom/bust cycles is amazing.

[Edit] clarify reference to parent

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#552

Post by MrMan » Mon, Feb 08, 2021, 3:21 PM UTC

azatris wrote: post #532

EtienneK wrote: post #380

I love the idea of Bitcoin. But, as someone who's been working in banking for more than a decade - what problem does Bitcoin solve? Serious question; 'cause I'm failing to come up with a good answer. Edit: The closest I've come to answering this: To me Bitcoin is more a decentralized international payment protocol (such as SWIFT); not a store of value / currency. But I rarely see it being pitched in that way.

Yes, a decentralized international payment protocol is a good answer, but it also has a currency itself embedded in it. A type of currency to make this protocol work. The whole thing saves a lot of manpower and energy in the world, so in that regard it potentially holds a lot of value. However, if you told me to open up Excel and calculate the approximate true value of 1 BTC, I am unable to do so. I can imagine scena…

If everyone switched to BTC employment in the financial sector would not shrink. Are you saying it would? I can put a bundle of dollars in the mail but even if that was free, it is still risky. My understanding is that I pay my bank to hold my money and transfer it because it is much less risky than doing it myself.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#553

Post by me551ah » Mon, Feb 08, 2021, 3:21 PM UTC

capableweb wrote: post #478

me551ah wrote: post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get why bitcoin is worth so much.Bitcoin is called a store of value like gold, but gold has inherent uses. If the price of gold went to zero then you could still use it to make jewellery or use it for electrical conductivity. If the price of bitcoin goes to zero then it's worthless. It's also not environmentally friendly and bitcoin mining uses up 0.21% of the world's power supply. And all of this energy is u…

Literally mining gold is also not very environmentally friendly and uses a lot of power, probably not as much as Bitcoin though. And Bitcoin will always remain what it is now, a system for transferring bits in a decentralized fashion over the internet. Even if Bitcoin is worth $0, as long as there is a sender and a receiver (and at least one miner online), you'll be able to transact Bitcoin, this is hardly worthless.…

Gold is unique, few metals can match it's shine and electrical conductivity. But there exist many cryptocurrencies which can act as "a system for transferring bits in a decentralized fashion over the internet". Many also do a far better job than bitcoin. So shouldn't they be more valuable than bitcoin? Etherium, Monero etc

Yes, but you really can't fight the government and run a parallel currency. If the government bans it then you cannot use it for any legal transactions.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#554

Post by rzodkiew » Mon, Feb 08, 2021, 3:21 PM UTC

patricius wrote: post #382

rzodkiew wrote: post #338

Bitcoin is a mystery to me. Somehow it's hailed as revolutionising the economy, by replacing currency with a worse kind of currency. It feels like this is where all the "how to get rich quick" book writers and other hustle bros went and created one giant financial pyramid, which works in quite simple way: - buy bitcoin - tell everyone around how revolutionary it is, so they buy it and what you holding increases in va…

There are practical reasons that getting rid of currency - or money I assume you mean - is a bad idea. It would be much more difficult to exchange goods and services if we had to barter for instance. But perhaps you have some alternative in mind that I haven't thought of.

I do believe that there are some solutions that we could (and will) come up with, but they do require radical shift of priorities in people's lives. Currently our society is just blinded by "chase money by all means" which was always a part of the humanity, but definitely got worse since Commercial Revolution, then even pushed further by Industrial Revolution. At the same time I feel like the pushback is finally slowly showing up in many parts of the society.

I wholeheartedly agree that we definitely do need some vehicle of value, and it might as well be currencies as we know them now, but with some hoarding-prevention mechanisms built in, or maybe some other way to figure out a value of time you provide to the society. Right now we rely on free market for that, but is the coffee you buy in the morning of same value to you as it is to the person in the queue after you? And if that coffee helps you build more value to society than your fellow man for whatever the reason, maybe part of that difference could also be captured by the coffee producer as well. If price of coffee was expressed in something like a fractional unit of your value in a day, let's say 0.02u, then you'd pay the same price, yet with wildly different absolute values. This is just random thought, and it probably will fail in hundreds of ways, but maybe something to spark your imagination.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#555

Post by whb07 » Mon, Feb 08, 2021, 3:22 PM UTC

BenoitEssiambre wrote: post #465

whb07 wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I cannot tell if this is sarcasm or not. But I’ll assume it’s not: You cannot eat gold or bitcoin. The “hoarders” at some point will want to consume be it a pizza or a lambo. Then there’s those who invest in ways to get more... what for it.. gold or bitcoin so they go out and purchase picks and shovels. Crazy stuff, extremely complicated when I write it as such. Btw, the FED made a trivial recession into a “great” on…

I am dead serious. The FED did cause the great depression and a lot of it had to do with currency being tied too closely to a deflationary token (gold). >You cannot eat gold or bitcoin. That is precisely the problem. The economy can get into a bad equilibrium where hoarding intrinsically valueless tokens displaces investing in productive assets. This state can persist because the firsts to invest in productive things…

The "economy" is some number larger than (2^999999999999999999999999999999999) of decisions done at every second. Unless you or some cabal of godly beings exist they cannot determine whats a "good" equilibrium in the first place.

Furthermore, to describe descriptions good/bad to a market is against the definition of a market. It is what it is. A high price signal lets others that they should come in and get involved and thus bring the price down one way or another.

Being humble is a good thing. I cannot understand how certain ideologies or peoples always proclaim to know whats best for a stranger.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#556

Post by zupreme » Mon, Feb 08, 2021, 3:22 PM UTC

This comment is unlikely to win me many friends here, but it is worth considering that while Bitcoin is, nominally at least, decentralized and free from government control, internet access is not.

A simple glance at the trend of governments to partially or to fully shut down internet services to certain areas in times of unrest or mass protest means, in the case of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies requiring collective transaction verification via online communications, that a loss of internet constitutes an inability to conduct financial transactions for those thus affected.

While I applaud the efforts of so many to free the world from government control of "money", the full implementation of this effort should be preceded by freeing internet communications from the control of those same governments, otherwise what appears to be a new financial "power" is actually a new financial "weakness".

Think over this carefully.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#557

Post by lm28469 » Mon, Feb 08, 2021, 3:22 PM UTC

mrb wrote: post #489

rzodkiew wrote: post #338

Bitcoin is a mystery to me. Somehow it's hailed as revolutionising the economy, by replacing currency with a worse kind of currency. It feels like this is where all the "how to get rich quick" book writers and other hustle bros went and created one giant financial pyramid, which works in quite simple way: - buy bitcoin - tell everyone around how revolutionary it is, so they buy it and what you holding increases in va…

While away on vacation, I once sent $1000 in cold hard cash, on a Sunday, to an unbanked person in Los Angeles, in less than 1 hour, thanks to bitcoin and the recipient withdrawing it for cash at a Bitcoin ATM. There is not a single alternative service in the world that would have made this possible. If people thought a little beyond their personal use cases, they would understand the utility of Bitcoin/crypto for ma…

> While away on vacation, I once sent $1000 in cold hard cash, on a Sunday, to an unbanked person in Los Angeles, in less than 1 hour, thanks to bitcoin and the recipient withdrawing it for cash at a Bitcoin ATM. There is not a single alternative service in the world that would have made this possible.

And this is reason enough to replace all other currencies with btc ? Because it's fast ?

If people thought a little beyond their personal use cases, they would understand the NON utility of Bitcoin/crypto for most

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#558

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Feb 08, 2021, 3:22 PM UTC

mrb wrote: post #489

rzodkiew wrote: post #338

Bitcoin is a mystery to me. Somehow it's hailed as revolutionising the economy, by replacing currency with a worse kind of currency. It feels like this is where all the "how to get rich quick" book writers and other hustle bros went and created one giant financial pyramid, which works in quite simple way: - buy bitcoin - tell everyone around how revolutionary it is, so they buy it and what you holding increases in va…

While away on vacation, I once sent $1000 in cold hard cash, on a Sunday, to an unbanked person in Los Angeles, in less than 1 hour, thanks to bitcoin and the recipient withdrawing it for cash at a Bitcoin ATM. There is not a single alternative service in the world that would have made this possible. If people thought a little beyond their personal use cases, they would understand the utility of Bitcoin/crypto for ma…

[deleted]

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#559

Post by fabianhjr » Mon, Feb 08, 2021, 3:22 PM UTC

patricius wrote: post #382

rzodkiew wrote: post #338

Bitcoin is a mystery to me. Somehow it's hailed as revolutionising the economy, by replacing currency with a worse kind of currency. It feels like this is where all the "how to get rich quick" book writers and other hustle bros went and created one giant financial pyramid, which works in quite simple way: - buy bitcoin - tell everyone around how revolutionary it is, so they buy it and what you holding increases in va…

There are practical reasons that getting rid of currency - or money I assume you mean - is a bad idea. It would be much more difficult to exchange goods and services if we had to barter for instance. But perhaps you have some alternative in mind that I haven't thought of.

> It would be much more difficult to exchange goods and services if we had to barter for instance. But perhaps you have some alternative in mind that I haven't thought of.

There has been very few research and development into decentralized economic planning. (Imagine if only a fraction of the development resources that have gone into High Frequency and Momentum Trading had been invested into Decentralized Economic Planning)

https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Planned_economy#/Decentralized_p...

I am quite sure many here would agree that the Economic Calculation Problem doesn't hold much water nowadays (or at least won't in the near future) with the available computation power.

https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Economic_calculation_problem

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#560

Post by sailfast » Mon, Feb 08, 2021, 3:22 PM UTC

Have they fixed the transaction cost issue? Are they going to pay the fees to transact in Bitcoin, or should I continue to pay in dollars? Then congrats on buying something anonymously that you have to register to drive off the lot.

Short of the anonymity, I'm not sure why you'd buy an asset with something that is less inflationary than the dollar. Keep the BTC, use the dollars if you are making an inflation play. That way you cut your opportunity costs down a bit by the rate of inflation?