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CPB director: The Netherlands must ban Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies

netherlandsnewslive.com

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Re: CPB director: The Netherlands must ban Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies

#41

Post by vnorilo »

bo0tzz wrote: post #18
SCHiM wrote: post #8

Why should others decide if I can run useless hashing functions on my computer? Price the electricity accordingly, and make PoW impossible. Cryptocurrency is no the enabler of ransomware. Ransomware was prevalent before cryptocurrencies. The real enablers of ransomware are the countries that shelter the R10 groups, raking in millions. There's a reason some ransomware doesn't run when your system has a Russian languag…

>Price the electricity accordingly So I should pay significantly more on my bills, just because you want to play with some virtual coins?

I think they mean it's more efficient to tax/price energy as heavily as needed to reduce emissions across the board. Playing with virtual coins then becomes much, much less appealing to the average user, but we won't need to accumulate edge cases to ban.

Re: CPB director: The Netherlands must ban Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies

#42

Post by jl6 »

SCHiM wrote: post #8

Why should others decide if I can run useless hashing functions on my computer? Price the electricity accordingly, and make PoW impossible. Cryptocurrency is no the enabler of ransomware. Ransomware was prevalent before cryptocurrencies. The real enablers of ransomware are the countries that shelter the R10 groups, raking in millions. There's a reason some ransomware doesn't run when your system has a Russian languag…

Cryptocurrency is absolutely an enabler of ransomware. Is there any ransomware that extorts money in a form other than cryptocurrency?

And yes, who would have thought that running useless hash functions on your computer could have enormous global externalities?

Compute what you like on your own computer, but sending the results is intentionally participating in a worldwide crimewave and environmental disaster.

Re: CPB director: The Netherlands must ban Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies

#44

Post by airza »

Varqu wrote: post #20
dataflow wrote: post #4

Everyone needs to ban Bitcoin... and likely other cryptocurrencies. Not only are they by far the biggest enablers of ransomware (which we're supposedly taking seriously now), but Bitcoin emissions alone could push global warming above 2°C. [1] Bitcoin already consumes 0.55% of energy produced globally. [2] [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-018-0321-8 [2] https://hbr.org/2021/05/how-much-energy-does-bitcoin-a…

Good luck banning internet access. Even if you ban crypto exchanges and money transfers to them, you cannot ban a single entity called Bitcoin Co, nor you can ban individuals from possessing it. You could potentially ban crypto miners from using the electrical energy, but that doesn't ban Bitcoin either. Any other ideas? :)

Cut off its access to the global banking and finance system. That will curb its usage real quick.

Re: CPB director: The Netherlands must ban Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies

#45

Post by Tepix »

dataflow wrote: post #12
oblio wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need to ban all proof-of-work and generally all resource intensive cryptocurrencies.

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say maybe we should in general ban things that are a certain amount less energy efficient (say, 5x more wasteful) than the best technology we've achieved for a similar purpose so far. And progressively tax anything that's moderately more wasteful (say, 2x-5x). It's bad enough that we have cars on roads that are twice as wasteful as they could be, let alone a transaction processing…

I'm not saying you're wrong but of course it's not that easy. Using your argument we could ban all cars because there are bicycles and they are vastly more efficient.

Or we ban heating in houses because you can just wear warmer clothes instead.

Re: CPB director: The Netherlands must ban Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies

#46

Post by atom_arranger »

hnbad wrote: post #10
premium-komodo wrote: post #2

The reason we have to go to the trouble of making cryptocurrencies is that busybodies like this guy are endlessly trying to reduce our freedom. They're not trying to look out for people; they're trying to protect their ability to print money and steal. In crypto parlance, they want to remain the VIPs that have centralized special privileged access to create tokens, and force usage thereof. But now we have the technol…

Just to be clear, by "ability to print money and steal" you mean having a central bank and levying taxes? You're making a moral argument against the idea of government controlled currency in general, yes? Can you clarify why you think controlled currencies are morally bad and how cryptocurrencies are better? I'd love to hear a less abstract argument than "more freedom". EDIT: I assume downvotes mean there are people…

By printing money the government steals value from existing holders of currency.

It’s effectively an undemocratic (amount is not generally voted on) tax on people’s earnings and cash savings.

Re: CPB director: The Netherlands must ban Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies

#47

Post by becquerel »

f6v wrote: post #14
premium-komodo wrote: post #2

The reason we have to go to the trouble of making cryptocurrencies is that busybodies like this guy are endlessly trying to reduce our freedom. They're not trying to look out for people; they're trying to protect their ability to print money and steal. In crypto parlance, they want to remain the VIPs that have centralized special privileged access to create tokens, and force usage thereof. But now we have the technol…

I don’t think that the Netherlands is the country where wealth is routinely stolen from common folk.

The economy of every capitalist country is based on the exploitation of the working class.

Re: CPB director: The Netherlands must ban Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies

#50

Post by tda »

dataflow wrote: post #12
oblio wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need to ban all proof-of-work and generally all resource intensive cryptocurrencies.

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say maybe we should in general ban things that are a certain amount less energy efficient (say, 5x more wasteful) than the best technology we've achieved for a similar purpose so far. And progressively tax anything that's moderately more wasteful (say, 2x-5x). It's bad enough that we have cars on roads that are twice as wasteful as they could be, let alone a transaction processing…

No, please don't tax something because it is wasteful or not, but tax something based on how much resources it uses. In fact, tax the resource usage not the activity.

Even an extremely efficient car uses a ton of energy to move around. New cars often have engines in the multiple hundred kW range, which is insane compared to any other appliance you own.

If fossil fuels were taxed properly, that would discourage using/wasting fossil fuels. But please don't tax based on what you feel is acceptable usage was wasteful usage, cause the atmosphere does not care if the CO2 came from kerosene on a plane bringing tourists to vacation, or if it was used to power the ambulance that brings you to the hospital.

But when we tax all fossil fuel uses equally and heavily, I'm sure the ambulances will still drive around cause they save lives, but weekend trips to the other side of the Atlantic will be a thing of the past.

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