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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

#331

Post by mlcrypto »

DennisP wrote: post #261
mlcrypto wrote: post #205

If you're reading this 10 years from now look how clueless everyone in this thread is. Everyone here still thinks BTC is not even the best crypto let alone the best asset in the world. If 50k isn't enough to convince them, nothing will. Hope you're enjoying $1M+ BTC prices in 2031.

So let's see, at $1M/BTC, three halvings, 6 blocks per hour, that's 9.3BTC/hr in rewards, call it at least $10M/hr because transaction fees. Electricity at 5 cents/kWh means that buys 200GW, but say miner cost is half hardware. So we'd be consuming about 100GW of energy to send seven transactions per second.

It will be securing $20T in terms of market cap. Energy consumption metrics aren't useful without considering the source of energy. BTC gives us the potential to harness natural sources of untapped energy far from cities, convert it into money, and instantly transport it anywhere. The transaction limit is a non issue for me because final settlement is still faster than traditional methods.

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

#332

Post by oceanghost »

UncleMeat wrote: post #291
oceanghost wrote: post #55

Ah, so the guy who has 133 billion dollars, doesn't want the current economic system to change? Shocking

Why would BTC adoption crash the value of Microsoft?

Not sure where you got that idea?

I'm saying Gates is absolutely entrenched in the current economic system. He's won it. Why would he want any change?

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

#333

Post by trimbo »

meowkit wrote: post #253
saalweachter wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know what actually bothers me the most about all crypto-currencies? None of them are actually money, like in the paper-or-gold-coin sense. They're all ledgers. The thing about money is that I can hand it to someone . Possession of the money is possession of the money and third parties don't need to get involved in every transaction. I can hand someone dollars and take a sandwich and walk away, transaction done. T…

> The thing about money is that I can hand it to someone. Honestly don’t know if you’re trolling or just old. I used paper money once last year. To buy weed. Because the federal government has determined I am not responsible enough to use or own weed. No one I know uses physical cash anymore. We’re moving away from physical items where possible, not toward it. I would rather have my currency on a public DLT than cont…

Save the risk of forgery, physical cash is still the only way for a seller to guarantee the dollar value of a transaction with an unknown buyer. Otherwise Paypal could block it, or your bank, or the buyer could reverse the charge, or whatever.

And that's why plenty of businesses still only take cash. Casinos want cash for chips. Peter Luger's still only takes cash. When you buy something like a dog from a breeder, it will be in cash. Any transaction where person on the other end has little recourse if your payment didn't go through will be in cash. Or if the business is popular enough to force it (in the case of Luger's).

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

#334

Post by SwimSwimHungry »

nelsontodd wrote: post #301
ForHackernews wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, technically you only need the threat of violence. Potential-but-unrealized violence is arguably much better for humanity than proof-of-ever-escalating wasted energy.

Maybe true depending on the energy source. I've heard it argued also that bitcoin will become the 'purchaser of last resort' for energy. For example, fracking companies often just burn off natural gas they find while looking for oil... instead, this gas could be used to mine btc. Also well documented that a lot of bitcoin operations in china are fueled by hydroelectric sources. The promise of violence is free until r…

Hydroelectric sources that could be best used on homes, businesses, etc. Anything but Bitcoin, really.

Did everyone forget that the best goal we can achieve with power usage is by reducing consumption outright? Just because some of the mining is done on greener solutions doesn't mean it's a net positive.

Global warming isn't exactly going away if we keep this experiment up.

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

#335

Post by kristo »

bingbong70 wrote: post #293
gnrlst wrote: post #15

Bitcoin is a beautiful concept that has been bastardized by economies of scale. The mining concentration is decreasing its security over time. The centralized block structure and exorbitant fees will afflict it more and more as it grows. Even arguments about renewable energy being used to mine BTC are moot, because they don't consider the opportunity cost of what could be done with all that energy instead. I truly be…

>Even arguments about renewable energy being used to mine BTC are moot, because they don't consider the opportunity cost of what could be done with all that energy instead. If I launch a BTC miner into space and use a star to power it, will you worry about what else could have been done with that energy? The more remote the energy source, the higher the cost to deliver it to a centralized grid, meaning it will probab…

I will worry about the energy used to launch it into space. Or build the dam, or whatever. And the other env. implications of those actions.

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

#336

Post by celticninja »

xkjkls wrote: post #296
celticninja wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Possession of the money is possession of the money and third parties don't need to get involved in every transaction. That's only true if you discount the US government as the third party (at least for USD$) who are involved in every transaction, by virtue of them needing to exist for the $ to have any value or for the seller to accept the $ in the first place i.e for them to know it will still be worth something in…

Eh, it's arguable how much the US Government is determining the worth of dollars rather than cultural consensus. I can guarantee that in the event of a zombie apocalypse where the government falls, USD would be used for a long time after.

I don't think it would. In a zombie (or other type) apocalypse dollars have zero value. You can't eat them or use them as fuel. Gold may have value as a medium of exchange but it would quickly revert to barter system for food, fuel etc.

What good is selling food for dollars if you can't spend those dollars next week? Better to swap the food for another good which can be used or exchanged.

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

#337

Post by peeters »

rawtxapp wrote: post #207
the_local_host wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> An asset that cannot be confiscated by the government It might be intractable to confiscate bitcoin by attacking the math, but why wouldn't governments just put people in jail until they pay up? With adequate control over the internet, governments would be fairly able to track who's transacting. Moreover for the vast majority of people on earth would still have basically zero money relative to the emerging bitcoin…

What would be the reason for imprisoning someone who holds Bitcoin? Don't we live in a free society? And even if they imprison you they won't be able to access your money: https://amp.scmp.com/news/world/europe/article/3120852/germa...

Presumably GP is talking about coercive imprisonment (e.g. contempt of court). If the court has ordered you to give something up, and you don't, they can imprison you to coerce you to obey.

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

#338

Post by melomal »

saalweachter wrote: post #220
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.

You know what actually bothers me the most about all crypto-currencies? None of them are actually money, like in the paper-or-gold-coin sense. They're all ledgers. The thing about money is that I can hand it to someone . Possession of the money is possession of the money and third parties don't need to get involved in every transaction. I can hand someone dollars and take a sandwich and walk away, transaction done. T…

> None of them are actually money, like in the paper-or-gold-coin sense. They're all ledgers.

This is the same when people's net worth is discussed though. To the average individual that hears a net worth it almost feels like they think it's cash money. But it's on paper, as in sell all the shares of businesses and assets to cash it in.

Perception is the mother of all great products and marketing.

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

#339

Post by zionic »

saalweachter wrote: post #220
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.

You know what actually bothers me the most about all crypto-currencies? None of them are actually money, like in the paper-or-gold-coin sense. They're all ledgers. The thing about money is that I can hand it to someone . Possession of the money is possession of the money and third parties don't need to get involved in every transaction. I can hand someone dollars and take a sandwich and walk away, transaction done. T…

There is nothing stopping you from signing a crypto transaction by hand using your private key from memory and handing someone an envelope.
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