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Bill Gates Says that Bitcoin is bad For the Planet

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Re: Bill Gates Says that Bitcoin is bad For the Planet

#181

Post by maxerickson »

bikamonki wrote: post #153

If I understand correctly, by design PoW gets harder with time, so it becomes ever more expensive to mine BTC. At some point, it should be economically unfeasible. Now, BTC is rewarded for transaction validation. Does this mean, that at some point in the future, it will be impossibly expensive to validate a new block, hence making it imposible to conduct a BTC transaction between two addresses?

If there is less mining, the difficulty goes down.

In a bad case scenario, the block reward doesn't keep a large fraction of available hardware online.

Re: Bill Gates Says that Bitcoin is bad For the Planet

#182

Post by wtf_is_up »

mavhc wrote: post #24
jetpackjoe wrote: post #9

There are so many better crypto-currencies. Better for the environment because they use proof-of-stake, and not proof-of-work. Better for users because transactions are confirmed in seconds, not hours, and without the ridiculous fees that Bitcoin has. I think this shows how truly powerful the network effect, and being first to market is. Because without those things, Bitcoin would be nothing.

Which proof of stake systems currently exist and work well?

Algorand

Re: Bill Gates Says that Bitcoin is bad For the Planet

#183

Post by tester756 »

whoisninja wrote: post #171
tester756 wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Linux is a cancer" - opinion "Bitcoin is bad for the planet" - fact(?)

you're asking or deciding? if you know for sure, even then it doesn't matter if Bill Gates agrees or disagrees with you?

I meant that "Linux is cancer" seems just to be purely an opinion meanwhile behind claim that "BTC is bad for planet" stands some convincing things like energy usage and stuff.

Re: Bill Gates Says that Bitcoin is bad For the Planet

#184

Post by BTCOG »

jetpackjoe wrote: post #9

There are so many better crypto-currencies. Better for the environment because they use proof-of-stake, and not proof-of-work. Better for users because transactions are confirmed in seconds, not hours, and without the ridiculous fees that Bitcoin has. I think this shows how truly powerful the network effect, and being first to market is. Because without those things, Bitcoin would be nothing.

Instead, it shows your lack of knowledge on safety and security of a Proof of Work blockchain with the network effect behind it, vs Proof of Stake which is flawed and insecure all in general.

Re: Bill Gates Says that Bitcoin is bad For the Planet

#185

Post by rustybelt »

nindalf wrote: post #116
rustybelt wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. What? This may be the worst false dichotomy I've ever seen.

How so? Seems correct to me. Just this morning I had the choice of paying for groceries either with Bitcoin or by launching a violent invasion of the store.

I stand corrected.

Re: Bill Gates Says that Bitcoin is bad For the Planet

#186

Post by gnrlst »

wyldfire wrote: post #160
gnrlst wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All the features mentioned above. For example: - transaction times - energy consumption - scalability (BTC currently does 7tx/s) - security (BTC is getting more centralized over time, increasing the risk of a majority takeover.) - fewer fees as possible (ideally 0) BTC only has first mover advantage, and security...for now.

I'm a big fan of bitcoin and a few altcoins, including some PoS. But I feel like you are understating bitcoin's security. It has been very well tested and has a large bounty - both in its market cap and value of transactions that have not been susceptible to any double-spend attacks. Other coins might sound good on paper -- adding new features but introducing serious design errors that have yet to be discovered becau…

You're right. But security today does not guarantee security tomorrow in a landscape where mining incentivizes economies of scale. The more mining power converges (as it is already doing), the more likely for a fewer entities to collude. While it may not be in their interest given their investment in the project, who says that a government or malicious actor might not?

Re: Bill Gates Says that Bitcoin is bad For the Planet

#188

Post by whoisninja »

tester756 wrote: post #152
whoisninja wrote: post #74

Steve Balmer and Bill also used to call Linux a cancer but look now: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-03-07/hackers-b... their OS filled with malicious stuff and who knows what kind of backdoors is when exploited by hackers, they blame it on China rather than taking responsibility of putting users at risk with vulnerable OS

"Linux is a cancer" - opinion "Bitcoin is bad for the planet" - fact(?)

also what Linux and Bitcoin have in common that Bill Gates always will try to ignore is open-source software. It's inevitable, environmentalists can try killing Bitcoin - go for it. No one is stopping you.

Re: Bill Gates Says that Bitcoin is bad For the Planet

#189

Post by superbcarrot »

wbobeirne wrote: post #98
jetpackjoe wrote: post #9

There are so many better crypto-currencies. Better for the environment because they use proof-of-stake, and not proof-of-work. Better for users because transactions are confirmed in seconds, not hours, and without the ridiculous fees that Bitcoin has. I think this shows how truly powerful the network effect, and being first to market is. Because without those things, Bitcoin would be nothing.

What defines a currency being "better" than another? Is it number of transactions? Is it acceptance among merchants? Is it low fees? Is it stability in purchasing power? Is it likelihood that there will be a fatal flaw in the system that causes financial loss? Every project has its own strengths and weaknesses, but it's hard to argue that Bitcoin isn't the best on many of those measures. It's all about which of them…

> but it's hard to argue that Bitcoin isn't the best on many of those measures

Seems pretty easy to me. What is Bitcoin best at apart from having the largest market cap?

Re: Bill Gates Says that Bitcoin is bad For the Planet

#190

Post by rfd4sgmk8u »

whitepaint wrote: post #75
rfd4sgmk8u wrote: post #56

I say Bill Gates is bad for the Planet. The reality is PoW is the only consensus mechanism that is secure today. PoS is not secure. It will never be secure. It takes energy to secure money, it is that simple. We will spend as much energy as is needed to secure the bitcoin monetary supply - the economic prosperity of the planet is at risk! For all those folks out there begging for PoS bitcoin, it will never happen. Yo…

> PoS is not secure. That is quite a huge claim. You need to give some arguments for this.

Argument: PoW is a security model that depends on energy usage and mathematics. PoS is a security model that depends on human behavior.

I trust physics over human behavior any day. Human psychology is the weak link in any system.

In the next year, we will see a further consolidation of funds towards traditional finance (they have the capital to acquire the floating btc). We do not want tradfi in charge of coin emission. Proof of Stake is reinventing existing power structures. Bitcoin as PoW prevents this hostile takeover by legacy forces. If tradfi and governments want a say in how coins are transacted/emitted, they better get mining!

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