Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index • Hacker News Board

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#271

Post by JumpCrisscross » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 2:36 PM UTC

px43 wrote: post #254

Please put on your critical thinking hat for a minute. Using electricity is not the same as contributing to carbon emissions. Bitcoin is mostly mined in areas overflowing with excess green energy, and thus contributes negligibly to carbon emissions. The idea that all electricity generation is bad and therefore all electricity usage is bad is completely ridiculous. Instead of working so hard to figure out how to hate…

> Bitcoin is mostly mined in areas overflowing with excess green energy

Source? I thought it’s mostly mined in China?

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#272

Post by sub7 » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 2:36 PM UTC

Can't wait for the (American/Chinese/Russian) secret 4000 qubit computer to make a mockery of that ledger and all the culty idiots who bought into it.

There's a 0.9+ correlation between Tesla and BTC. If we're not near the end of the bubble, we're definitely not more than a few cycles away.

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#273

Post by have_faith » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 2:36 PM UTC

chrisco255 wrote: post #108

IgorPartola wrote: post #10

Slightly off topic, but does anyone have any good resources on how alternative consensus protocols work, like proof of stake and proof of importance? I either see really simplistic explanations or ones that assume a lot of domain knowledge. I also recently saw a crypto coin that claims to be energy efficient, and I don’t quite understand how that’s possible without the possibility of a 50.1% attack.

Proof of stake is relatively simple. You agree to stake a minimum amount of tokens (decided on by the network) and you get to run a node and validate transactions. If you attest to a malicious block and other validators call you out on it, you get slashed (i.e. you lose some portion of your stake, if not all of it): https://ethereum.org/en/developers/docs/consensus-mechanisms... One of the problems with it is that it…

> no single holder owns more than 1% of ETH

You mean no single wallet?

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#274

Post by jiriknesl » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 2:36 PM UTC

jqpabc123 wrote: post #55

Bitcoin is Crypto 1.0. There are better ways to do this. But people remain infatuated with Bitcoin.

It is crypto 1.0. And it can be overtaken.

The problem is (and I have been involved - most often unsuccessfully) that building anything in this ecosystem requires a lot of understanding of digital signatures, distributed system, economics, game theory, security & quality, trustless ecosystems, incentives, possibilities of players with big budgets (PoS - 51% bought by some government)/great developers (bots frontrunning hacking of ERC20 contracts)/criminals (you have strong encryption, but still can be blackmailed/beaten).

Bitcoin is one of a few currencies that deliver what it promises. It doesn't promise a lot, but what it promises, it does. Others promise a lot but underdeliver and later abandon it. At this moment, I think Bitcoin delivers 100% of what I expect from it. Monero is potentially better, but underdelivers. Ethereum is potentially better, but underdelivers. Others are either just copycats or completely fail.

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#275

Post by toyg » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #82

AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It won't and even BTC enthusiasts have given up on that. They narrative is now that BTC is a "store of value".

Exactly. Here's VC and prominent cryptocurrency enthusiast Fred Wilson saying exactly that: https://avc.com/2017/08/store-of-value-vs-payment-system/ While I agree with him that Bitcoin is a terrible currency, I think the "store of value" thing is nonsense as well. Stores of value need to have relatively stable value. Bitcoin is hugely volatile. That's great for speculation, but nobody with any sense would use it as…

The counter-counter-argument is that it's volatile because it's still in its infancy. Gold used to be that volatile too, when wars were commonplace and new sources were found quite often. It can still swing significantly.

I've come around to the idea. I don't hold any bitcoin anymore, and the best chance to get rich is gone, but I can see a future where something digital (hence fundamentally ethereal) acts as dense and largely unregulated store of value, for the people who need it. In the same way the drug trade currently uses artworks and commodities when it needs to move value across national boundaries, they can use hashes or something like that. Transaction costs to convert those from/to cash are actually higher and slower than bitcoin will likely ever be (i.e. a week or two, and several hundrend USDs, will still be acceptable).

We'll never pay taxes or coffees with bitcoin, or hold savings accounts, but it will still act as a commodity.

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#276

Post by minikites » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

px43 wrote: post #254

Please put on your critical thinking hat for a minute. Using electricity is not the same as contributing to carbon emissions. Bitcoin is mostly mined in areas overflowing with excess green energy, and thus contributes negligibly to carbon emissions. The idea that all electricity generation is bad and therefore all electricity usage is bad is completely ridiculous. Instead of working so hard to figure out how to hate…

>realize the massive net benefits it offers to society

Surely you can list some of them.

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#277

Post by ashish1521 » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

alisonkisk wrote: post #188

mettamage wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO it isn't. However, I do see a huge for sending large transactions. In that sense, I don't find it too crazy that Tesla is accepting Bitcoin, because buying a Tesla is a large transaction. IMO a niche use though.

I can't see Tesla BTC as anything more than a marketing gimmick for their computer geek clientele and fan base. Even if it's a logistical disaster, they probably make it back in stock purchases from true believers.

Tesla tested the waters with Elon's tweets and it shook the Bitcoin and sent it to all time highs, then Tesla bought large amount of Bitcoin and now the market exploded even further. It is a marketing gimmick, true, but it is making Bitcoin more volatile and unstable, while Tesla hoards more money from Bitcoin!

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#278

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

sheeshkebab wrote: post #97

mettamage wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO it isn't. However, I do see a huge for sending large transactions. In that sense, I don't find it too crazy that Tesla is accepting Bitcoin, because buying a Tesla is a large transaction. IMO a niche use though.

I think accepting Bitcoin as payment was tried before - it never worked since people buying it are either not selling (and using to store cash that keeps on growing), or buying it for speculative purposes via secondary instruments (gbtc, ethe). Not really sure what’s point is for Tesla but my guess its speculative for them, with an attempt to get some additional value on cash they are starting to swim in now...

[deleted]

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#279

Post by UncleMeat » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

dcolkitt wrote: post #216

Jonnax wrote: post #23

From what I understand bitcoin currently has a $20+ transaction fee with a transaction time takes 60 minutes+ With these issues in addition to the high power consumption, how will Bitcoin become a usable currency?

I have no position in Bitcoin, but isn’t it possible for “BTC scrip” to be the money used day to day. With actual blockchain transactions just being used to aggregate at the institutional level? This is pretty much the way money worked in the 19th century, just with gold instead of BTC. Nobody physically carried or transferred gold to buy a beer. They just used bank notes that were backed by a trusted intermediary ho…

It could, but why? The two things that BTC grants are trustlessness and the inability to enact fiscal policy. If BTC just becomes the backing for institutions, trustlessness is gone. So then it is a question of whether a backing unit that supports fiscal policy is better than one that doesn't. I think I know what institutions would prefer.

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#280

Post by trogsworth » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #270

px43 wrote: post #254

Please put on your critical thinking hat for a minute. Using electricity is not the same as contributing to carbon emissions. Bitcoin is mostly mined in areas overflowing with excess green energy, and thus contributes negligibly to carbon emissions. The idea that all electricity generation is bad and therefore all electricity usage is bad is completely ridiculous. Instead of working so hard to figure out how to hate…

> Bitcoin is mostly mined in areas overflowing with excess green energy I thought it’s mostly mined in China?

My understanding is that there's a surplus of hydroelectric dams, that were built far from any reasonable amount of electricity demand, which is why there's excess green energy in (parts of) China.