It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency • Hacker News Board

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#221

Post by texaswhizzle » Sun, May 30, 2021, 9:30 PM UTC

blurbleblurble wrote: post #60

I can understand peoples' frustration with the artificial scarcity, but would like to see this same energy over the artificial scarcity of housing and free time. The oligopoly of national money systems is currently failing to provide people with basic access to capital. There's nothing intrinsic about cryptocurrency that will necessarily help this or exacerbate it, but the fact that I can get better interest on US do…

It’s not artificial scarcity, it’s outright fake scarcity.

The total supply of Bitcoin is 21,000,000 coins. However, every single coin is 100,000,000 individual assets.

21,000,000 sounds pretty finite. But 21,000,000,000,000,000 sounds a tad less finite. The price of Bitcoin relies on the fundamental false premise that it’s scarce.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#222

Post by crummy » Sun, May 30, 2021, 9:30 PM UTC

brianolson wrote: post #188

Bitcoin is terrible technology and stupidly wasteful, but there are new blockchain networks coming along that are about a million times more efficient, so use those instead.

How does that affect the whole ransomware, regulation etc side of things?

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#223

Post by icelancer » Sun, May 30, 2021, 9:30 PM UTC

idlewords wrote: post #57

neither_color wrote: post #45

1. Promise a revolutionary technology ("self-driving cars are coming"!) 2. Use that promise as a pretext to ignore all regulation 3. Make a fortune 4. Drop the tech story The author lost me here. Completely subjective take on what Uber has done. They've completely improved ride-sharing and cab hailing within the whole industry, including non uber users. Depending on what country I travel to, Ill be using a different…

I'm the author of the thread. For what it's worth, I grew up as a refugee whose mother had to find incredibly inventive ways to send USD to family back home, where it was illegal to possess. What I don't understand about the crypto remittances argument is how the people sending and receiving them are supposed to convert them into spendable currency. My hunch is that a lot of the value of cryptocurrency in those count…

>> What I don't understand about the crypto remittances argument is how the people sending and receiving them are supposed to convert them into spendable currency.

For all the harsh words you posted without evidence, thankfully you've at least admitted you don't understand much.

Your premise is that cryptocurrency is not "spendable currency" which is simply false. I pay people in hyperinflationary environments in cryptocurrency variants with low transaction costs and fast speed, and they in turn directly spend it on physical goods like food.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#224

Post by idlewords » Sun, May 30, 2021, 9:30 PM UTC

crummy wrote: post #189

meowkit wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree with the characterization that the primary use is a scam. That’s like saying the primary use of email is to receive ads and phishing mail.

Are there numbers on what the primary uses of cryptocurrency are? I would guess remittances, purchasing illegal things, purchasing legal things, and ransomware - but I'm not sure in what order.

I think it also depends on what you count as "use". The #1 function of Bitcoin is as a speculative asset.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#225

Post by Graffur » Sun, May 30, 2021, 9:30 PM UTC

ashtonkem wrote: post #63

idlewords wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't agree with your point hard enough. Really useful nascent technologies all have this pattern—they grow incrementally more interesting and constantly gain applications. Bitcoin followed this pattern for a while. But then at some point it started to regress on that axis. You could no longer buy a pizza with it, you could no longer mine it, and it got too flooded by scammers to use safely. There's nothing to real…

Bitcoin didn’t regress, what actually happened is that its fundamental flaws ended up eventually dominating whatever early enthusiasm allowed them to be ignored. It was never going to work, for a variety of reasons that were incredibly apparent at the time. “Why did it regress” is much less interesting than “why did anyone ever fall for this?”

What are the fundamental flaws you're talking about? (I assume throughput but I'll wait for your reply).

What do you mean by saying people fell for "this"? I assume you mean it's a scam but I will wait for your reply.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#226

Post by dehrmann » Sun, May 30, 2021, 9:31 PM UTC

tomgp wrote: post #3

for me the key tweet here is: > The two things people need to know about cryptocurrency are completely non-technical: > 1. If it doesn't work, it's just an easy to lose casino chip >2. If it works, it creates an end run around all financial regulation, and will be dominated by uses those regulations try to stop (edited for formatting)

The thing people also overlook on point 2 is that if cryptocurrencies and blockchain tech take over the traditional financial system, that doesn't mean bitcoin, or even etherium, did. In no way is bitcoin a bet on blockchain tech; people just tell themselves that story because it feels better than gambling on crypto trading cards. Nothing wrong with gambling on them, either; just don't say you're "investing."

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#227

Post by [deleted] » Sun, May 30, 2021, 9:31 PM UTC

tzumby wrote: post #162

What is surprising is how large the number of techies who don’t get this. It’s not about crypto currencies as much as it is about the game theory that allows it to run a distributed self replicating state machine that is Byzantine tolerant - this is the true innovation

[deleted]

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#228

Post by sneak » Sun, May 30, 2021, 9:31 PM UTC

skrebbel wrote: post #50

These two resonated with me: > A lot of intelligent observers look at cryptocurrency, see that it makes no sense, and reasonably infer that they must be missing something profound on the technical level. Tech culture has a nice tradition of not deriding new ideas, but we need to break it here and speak out > [non-tech people] don't see the huge silent majority of tech people who know it's a scam. That's on us It is o…

This all falls apart if bitcoin isn't a scam. The burden of proof lies with those accusing it.

Additionally, there is no "silent majority" in tech that think it is a scam; the author has invented this.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#229

Post by qualudeheart » Sun, May 30, 2021, 9:31 PM UTC

tzumby wrote: post #162

What is surprising is how large the number of techies who don’t get this. It’s not about crypto currencies as much as it is about the game theory that allows it to run a distributed self replicating state machine that is Byzantine tolerant - this is the true innovation

Right. The hilarious volatility and scams are imo much less interesting than this.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#230

Post by Hamuko » Sun, May 30, 2021, 9:31 PM UTC

Swizec wrote: post #205

Hamuko wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does consensus work in git?

Multiple peer reviewers look at a pull request and when it passes muster, it gets merged to the longest chain. You can always make a fork and keep going with a new chain. Same as bitcoin. You can always split off a new chain. You might not convince everyone that your new chain is the chain, but you’re welcome to try.

a) Where is there a requirement for "multiple peer reviews" on git?

b) What is the longest chain? How do I determine if the longest chain is in Gitlab, on my computer or my coworker's computer? Where does the pull request go?

c) How do I indicate that I have approved a pull request in git?