Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies • Hacker News Board

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#81

Post by Jasper_ » Mon, Jul 26, 2021, 7:00 PM UTC

snejad123 wrote: post #66

Jasper_ wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> though estimates seem to be ~50-70% of BTC energy use is from renewables Bullshit. When one coal mine in a remote region of China flooded, the Bitcoin hash rate measurably dropped by 30%. Keep in mind this was just one coal mine. Not all of China's production. https://fortune.com/2021/04/20/bitcoin-mining-coal-china-env... > it's more apt to call it Web 3.0 than cryptocurrency at this point. I've said this so many…

just because you don't use it or put in the effort to look at different decentralized projects doesn't mean there are "no use-cases". I think with the amount of activity on AAVE and yearn, plus the growth these projects have received have killed that argument. Very 2017 argument that no longer makes any sense and is presented by luddites. Most the bottlenecks right now to why you don't have day-to-day apps deployed o…

> Most the bottlenecks right now to why you don't have day-to-day apps deployed on ecosystems like ethereum is because of the gas prices. You have hundreds of very intelligent developers working to decrease this to fractions of a cent.

But I can deploy an app on AWS for fractions of a cent right now. What does Ethereum do?

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#82

Post by ben_w » Mon, Jul 26, 2021, 7:00 PM UTC

trident5000 wrote: post #42

jrm4 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not even that there is absence of evidence -- but absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. Moreover, your cherrypicking of "Internet-type" inventions that develop very quickly are definitely outliers. By contrast, the answering machine was invented in the 1930's, and didn't take off until 50ish years later. It's absurdly and ignorantly early to declare "crypto has no utility."

You're on HN. Crypto isnt liked because it might steal jobs/shake up the status quo. More threads will be posted as user adoption continues and especially when price rises. Last temper tantrum was like 6 months ago so its probably about that time.

Even if it functioned as a perfect replacement for all existing currency[0], it wouldn’t steal or create jobs, merely change some titles while the tasks (and likely the employers) remain the same. And the point of this website is to shake up the status quo specifically where tech meets business and finance, so we’d like it better if it actually did that.

[0] which it can’t partly for the same reason the U.K. dropped out of the ERM, partly because inflation is economically useful, partly because it replaces one-man-one-vote with one-computational-resource-one-vote and therefore is explicitly plutocratic instead of democratic, partly because no sane government would expose itself to the risk a different nation that chose not to use crypto would perform a 51% attack against it and the only defence against that is an arms race to control more than half of humanity’s compute resources even if that means a von Neumann manufactured Dyson swarm, partly because the transaction rate means that scale can only be achieved with intermediary layers that end up looking indistinguishable from the existing banking sector

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#83

Post by Jasper_ » Mon, Jul 26, 2021, 7:03 PM UTC

rspeele wrote: post #56

Jasper_ wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> though estimates seem to be ~50-70% of BTC energy use is from renewables Bullshit. When one coal mine in a remote region of China flooded, the Bitcoin hash rate measurably dropped by 30%. Keep in mind this was just one coal mine. Not all of China's production. https://fortune.com/2021/04/20/bitcoin-mining-coal-china-env... > it's more apt to call it Web 3.0 than cryptocurrency at this point. I've said this so many…

Crypto democratizes and decentralizes finance, banking the unbanked, debanking the overbanked, and rebanking the debanked. Using lightning network crypto eliminates middlemen and the annoying experience of transacting money between businesses and customers. With brain wallet seeds you can take your wealth with you anywhere as long as you can remember it or write it down where nobody else will see it, ever. For maximu…

You seem like someone very "plugged in" (ha!) to the cryptocurrency world, so I have to ask: what's the best kind of epoxy to fill my ethernet ports with?

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#84

Post by snejad123 » Mon, Jul 26, 2021, 7:06 PM UTC

briefcomment wrote: post #53

Jasper_ wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> though estimates seem to be ~50-70% of BTC energy use is from renewables Bullshit. When one coal mine in a remote region of China flooded, the Bitcoin hash rate measurably dropped by 30%. Keep in mind this was just one coal mine. Not all of China's production. https://fortune.com/2021/04/20/bitcoin-mining-coal-china-env... > it's more apt to call it Web 3.0 than cryptocurrency at this point. I've said this so many…

> I've said this so many times: But what does it doooooo??? Are you asking about Bitcoin or Crypto? Bitcoin doesn't do much atm, but Ethereum does stuff, and Bitcoin Cash is pretty practical as a currency at the moment. There's plenty that can be done, but the market will have to decide what to converge on.

Bitcoin does a lot. A store of value that hedges against government inflation is by definition a valuable service.

I don't understand why everyone is looking for a swiss-army knife like application from BTC. The value has already been proven in the marketplace, hence why everyone is buying it.

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#85

Post by api » Mon, Jul 26, 2021, 7:06 PM UTC

aww_dang wrote: post #55

api wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Give me one Web 3.0 thing that a non-trivial number of people use that is not directly related back to cryptocurrency itself (speculation, exchanges, gambling, etc.). A product? A service? A game? A hosting solution? The only one I can think of is Sia and maybe FileCoin if they actually ship something useful, and those have only a tiny number of actual users. I guess maybe Steemit if someone actually still uses that.…

Think about this in the context of the discussion. Does it follow that we should ban crypto if it doesn't appeal to you? Or should you just not use it personally?

I'm just responding to the debate about whether cryptocurrency is useful beyond... itself.

For the record I don't believe it should be banned broadly speaking. Banning legal exchanges for proof of work cryptocurrencies is something I might be convinced is a good idea since PoW is a disaster, but I would not support banning non-PoW consensus cryptocurrencies.

Get rid of PoW and a lot of the bad shit about cryptocurrency is gone. Yes you can still buy droogs with it, but most droogs are bought with cash anyway. Cryptocurrency is a small fraction of the droog market.

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#86

Post by bamboo2 » Mon, Jul 26, 2021, 7:07 PM UTC

snejad123 wrote: post #66

Jasper_ wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> though estimates seem to be ~50-70% of BTC energy use is from renewables Bullshit. When one coal mine in a remote region of China flooded, the Bitcoin hash rate measurably dropped by 30%. Keep in mind this was just one coal mine. Not all of China's production. https://fortune.com/2021/04/20/bitcoin-mining-coal-china-env... > it's more apt to call it Web 3.0 than cryptocurrency at this point. I've said this so many…

just because you don't use it or put in the effort to look at different decentralized projects doesn't mean there are "no use-cases". I think with the amount of activity on AAVE and yearn, plus the growth these projects have received have killed that argument. Very 2017 argument that no longer makes any sense and is presented by luddites. Most the bottlenecks right now to why you don't have day-to-day apps deployed o…

It would be more persuasive if you could point to something that has utility and viability in the here and now. A killer app or something that benefits society and offsets the much talked about negative externalities. From the outside it’s hard to see the good and so the crypto community would benefit greatly by focusing on pr at least as much as the technology itself. When I talk to working class people, the view of Bitcoin is as a tool for the wealthy young tech overlords to make even more outrageous fortunes. Punctuate that with news about ransomware and child trafficking and you can imagine. They hate it a lot. Crypto shouldn’t be an enemy of the poor, but it is according to every poor and working class person I ask. That’s a problem worth solving IMO.

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#87

Post by cwkoss » Mon, Jul 26, 2021, 7:09 PM UTC

sidlls wrote: post #32

Lukeas14 wrote: post #15

> But dollars, euros and yen are backed by nations’ respective treasuries. If someone invents a cryptocurrency, any value is based solely on convincing others it has value. They lost me here. Most countries indeed have currency that is backed by their nation's respective treasuries. However, those treasuries are filled dollars, euros and yen. All fiat money no longer backed by gold or anything tangible and whose valu…

The notion that nation-state issued fiat currency is based “solely” on convincing others they have value is quite a reductive over-simplification. The existence of organized societies with some central government body has shown value, and the means of exchange amongst citizens and with citizens of other societies is backed in part by that value. It’s quite a bit more complex than you suggest.

The value of fiat currencies is "based solely convincing others they have value" - it is trust in the issuer.

You are arguing that trusting issuers has been societal valuable, which sure - historically it has been for the fiat currencies that still exist (if you ignore survivorship bias).

Not sure what handwaving "society is valuable and that value is what backs fiat currencies" even means in concrete terms. The government has the power to print as much fiat currency as they want (and they frequently do with intentional inflation targets). There is nothing that stops governments from printing more money except fear that it will damage trust in their currency, leading to devaluation.

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#88

Post by mdoms » Mon, Jul 26, 2021, 7:09 PM UTC

5350-uiop-1130 wrote: post #78

Jasper_ wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> though estimates seem to be ~50-70% of BTC energy use is from renewables Bullshit. When one coal mine in a remote region of China flooded, the Bitcoin hash rate measurably dropped by 30%. Keep in mind this was just one coal mine. Not all of China's production. https://fortune.com/2021/04/20/bitcoin-mining-coal-china-env... > it's more apt to call it Web 3.0 than cryptocurrency at this point. I've said this so many…

> But what does it doooooo??? The blockchain is just a platform. You have to build projects on top of the platform. Asking what does it do doesn't make any sense. It's like asking what does a piece of paper do. The real question to ask is not what does it do but whether the trade offs of using decentralised tokenised platform for building real world apps is useful or scalable. The answers to which are still being dis…

What has been built on Blockchain? Specifically I'm looking for examples of things that solve a problem that couldn't be solved without Blockchain, or at least were unsolved before.

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#89

Post by trident5000 » Mon, Jul 26, 2021, 7:10 PM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #82

trident5000 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're on HN. Crypto isnt liked because it might steal jobs/shake up the status quo. More threads will be posted as user adoption continues and especially when price rises. Last temper tantrum was like 6 months ago so its probably about that time.

Even if it functioned as a perfect replacement for all existing currency[0], it wouldn’t steal or create jobs, merely change some titles while the tasks (and likely the employers) remain the same. And the point of this website is to shake up the status quo specifically where tech meets business and finance, so we’d like it better if it actually did that. [0] which it can’t partly for the same reason the U.K. dropped…

"inflation is economically useful" is not proven (and at high levels is destructive and demotivating - look at socialist countries that blow up from hyperinflation and have no productivity) - its just the status quo. The idea that people dont spend in a stagnant/deflationary monetary environment is nonsense. People still want above average returns (investment) and will still spend on necessities and non necessities.

Im not sure of the rant you're going on. There is no argument that the govt is adopting bitcoin over the dollar. Its a private value store that can be transacted with as they wish.

-- Posting my response to below here since I hit a max:

Thats a perception and its not econ 101. If you take the feds balance sheet and divide it by the SPY, its flat over the past 10 years. Inflation does not drive growth. Production in the US is not up. Only the numbers are. Zimbabwe stock market is a top performer. Their production is trash.

You could make the argument were in the drowning phase as deficits widen relentlessly and asset prices are going parabolic.

I have heard basically nobody suggest the US govt is going to adopt bitcoin as the standard currency. Value store is the dominant narrative.

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#90

Post by skytreader » Mon, Jul 26, 2021, 7:11 PM UTC

rspeele wrote: post #56

Jasper_ wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> though estimates seem to be ~50-70% of BTC energy use is from renewables Bullshit. When one coal mine in a remote region of China flooded, the Bitcoin hash rate measurably dropped by 30%. Keep in mind this was just one coal mine. Not all of China's production. https://fortune.com/2021/04/20/bitcoin-mining-coal-china-env... > it's more apt to call it Web 3.0 than cryptocurrency at this point. I've said this so many…

Crypto democratizes and decentralizes finance, banking the unbanked, debanking the overbanked, and rebanking the debanked. Using lightning network crypto eliminates middlemen and the annoying experience of transacting money between businesses and customers. With brain wallet seeds you can take your wealth with you anywhere as long as you can remember it or write it down where nobody else will see it, ever. For maximu…

Pretty please be satire because that flew over my head the first time and I'm still not really sure if you are sarcastic or serious. What an exemplar of the cultish enthusiasm and logical inconsistencies I consistently get from crypto enthusiasts, which is exactly why I'm wary of the whole thing.