GameStop, Bitcoin and the Commoditization of Populist Rage

> Bitcoin doesn’t work, it’s a naked speculative bubble based on a technology that doesn’t scale can’t and can’t replace any existing financial service

When you say Bitcoin doesn't work, what are you referring to? As a medium of exchange, you're correct: it doesn't work. But the narrative in crypto communities is that Bitcoin is becoming a store-of-value. Under that narrative, Bitcoin is "working": it's replacing gold as a store of value. We're seeing institutions expand their portfolios to include BTC. There are additional arguments for why Bitcoin may be a better hedge against inflation than gold or oil. Here is an interesting analysis by Winklevoss twins [1]

There's more to cryptocurrency than Bitcoin. Today, there are over 4,000 crypto tokens out there and they're each solving various use cases with varying success. One particular thriving area is Decentralized Finance (DeFi) which creates decentralized exchanges, market makers, lenders/borrowers that aim to disrupt traditional (centralized) financial structures. As proof that there's something here, decentralized exchanges are taking market share from centralized ones - which are valued at $100B.

Or consider the more visionary take on cryptocurrencies: decentralized computation networks that create economies for network participants. Centralized businesses must act in the interest of shareholders and are built to extract as much value from their product as possible. Decentralized computation networks, on the other hand, do not. They can (and are) constructed to be minimally extractive, taking only what is needed to reward network participants & secure the network. Thus, the value capture is distributed across all network participants, enabling new forms of humans organizing together to achieve a common goal. Check out [3] if you're interested in learning more.

I hope this spurs your curiosity to dig into cryptocurrencies beyond just the surface. Thanks for writing the article!

[1] https://winklevosscapital.com/the-case-for-500k-bitcoin/ [2] https://defipulse.com/ [3] https://smartcontentpublication.medium.com/the-purpose-and-v...

"Buying lottery tickets and trading manipulated crypto assets are both a tax on the poor and disenfranchised."

Because not everyone is predisposed to be a programmer, engineer or statistician. Not everyone can become a whitecollar worker. This is reality of the world we live in, no amount of though experiments will change that.

What you are really doing is blaming victims of a system set against those people.

Our society should be built so those people can have decent lives too. Ie minimum wage should provide you with above poverty life. Currently in some cities 3 minimum wages are barely that.

I am not talking about giving poor people money for palm beach holidays twice a year. Working in McD should be enough to pay for an small apartment bills and food and sending you kids to school.

What current situation created is that middle class has to subsidize the social welfare for working class people - WORKING people. Ie middle class pays part of wages of minimum-wage workers because they are in poverty while holding a full time job(s).

I find it funny how first-worlders are horrified by the idea that they might have to live in mild discomfort. Maybe try looking at how most of the world that isn't the US and Western Europe lives before saying people's lives will be "nasty, brutish and short" because they won't be working some low-skill 9 to 5 for 40 to 50 years while making 6 figures and then retire with the rest of their lives pretty much planned out for them.

People I talk to who dont have the range of wide education miss a lot of context for the world they are living in, temporaly, politically, and socially. And would push to keep it a necessary part of that stem education.