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The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

stephendiehl.com

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Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#121

Post by can16358p »

Not being pegged to a centralized, state-controlled currency is a dealbreaker for me. It's still in infancy and it's true that 99% of the projects are get-rich-quick schemes with no intrinsic value. Though, I think the author lives in a country with a trustworthy government because that's not the case for many people including me. In the last two days my country's currency has shaken much more than crypto and I don't trust a single word my government says. In this case, crypto really shines. In addition, as more services get integrated into crypto ecosystem and as get-rich bubbles wear off, combined with solutions to scalability and speed problems, many will see much more value in crypto.

12 years is nothing when reinventing fundamental workings of economics is at stake. Give it more time.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#122

Post by thinkmassive »

soco wrote: post #64
throwawayffffas wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually I think he is wrong about that, crime can be done better on a centralized infrastructure. See all crime before cryptocurrencies were a thing.

For some reason all ransoms are requested in cryptocurrencies as of late. There must be a reason, hmm...

" as mainstream adoption of cryptocurrency has grown, the percentage of transactions used to promote or conceal crime has also decreased."

- FinCEN Chief Digital Currency Advisor, Michele Korver

https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2021/07/06/fincen-hires-doj-...

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#123

Post by c7DJTLrn »

bob331 wrote: post #101
c7DJTLrn wrote: post #90

I wish I could have discussions about cryptocurrency as a technology rather than a "get rich quick" scheme. Back in 2017 I was really excited about Ethereum and the promises of scalability not just from Vitalik B. but from other developers too. I still think that cryptocurrency could do good for the world if the issues can be resolved but for now everybody's got their eyes on the price, not the technology's horizon.

It has no use case. Zero

Check out Monero. Untraceable, decentralised transactions have no use case?

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#124

Post by kinnth »

Decentralisation offers the following value over centralisation:

* Control by a majority, not a minority. (democratic)

* Open ecosystem that visible and able to be analysed by anyone (transparent)

* Immutable (no one makes up assets without everyone knowing about it)

* Fair. Same price for everyone at all times, no chance of a monopoly.

Those don't exist in central systems and so the price you must pay for that is speed, scalability and anonymity (which is both used for good or bad). I don't believe crypto is the answer to everything, but I certainly don't see it as useless.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#125

Post by faeyanpiraat »

rawtxapp wrote: post #107
bildung wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference is that those people can honestly see and use crypto as speculative assets, which is fine (if we ignore externalities for a second), not making up use cases.

Once you accept that the future is unknown, you'll see that every asset is a speculative asset, no? For the longest time, real estate was assumed to be 100% safe until 2008, etc.

Yes but real assets have a lower chance of their value completely evaporating in an instant.

You can also use some of them, like live in a house asset.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#126

Post by __alexs »

bhouston wrote: post #78
__alexs wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That said digital cash and tokens and NFTs do have value and I expect them to get even more popular. Literally all my cash is already digital.

You are referring to Google Pay/Apple Pay/VISA. This is correct and it is mostly what people use these days. But it isn't on a block chain and it isn't extensible. With our current digital cash I can not create NFTs and trade then around. It also doesn't allow for arbitrarily large transfers. It doesn't replace ACH or Interac. There are no public ledgers. I think that digital cash with the features I described above…

> But it isn't on a block chain and it isn't extensible.

It is very extensible. My bank has an API.

> With our current digital cash I can not create NFTs and trade then around.

I'd call that a feature rather than a bug. I am absolutely able to buy and sell items traceably with other people though. For example I recently bought a house. The transfer was facilitated by my solicitor and recorded in a central government registry.

> It also doesn't allow for arbitrarily large transfers.

Transactions of many millions of dollars are routinely made using existing digital banking technology. My personal account has a 10k/day cap due to money laundering rules but that seems fairly sensible. I can call them up and have it raised for one offs.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#127

Post by throwvirtever »

rawtxapp wrote: post #83
JackFr wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the US has an antiquated payments system vis-a-vis Europe, but crypto solves none of those problems. I don't see it. I see FOMO, groupthink and greed.

You fail to see people who lost trust in their governments and organizations? You don't see how people are unhappy with getting their savings diluted by unlimited money printing?

> You don't see how people are unhappy with getting their savings diluted by unlimited money printing?

Money printing dilutes wealth if you hold it in cash, but every other asset appreciates. Moreover if you have more debt than wealth, money printing reduces that burden.

How many people actually have more wealth than debt but keep it largely in cash? I never understood who exactly has this problem.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#128

Post by Robotbeat »

JackFr wrote: post #76
Scarblac wrote: post #38

I wonder how much of the Crypto hype is because the US banking system still lives in the 1980s or thereabouts. If everybody in the US had access to bank accounts with easy electronic transfers within 5 seconds for no charge, no chargebacks and so on, as people are used to in the EU, would people still be excited about Bitcoin?

So the US has an antiquated payments system vis-a-vis Europe, but crypto solves none of those problems. I don't see it. I see FOMO, groupthink and greed.

Cryptocurrency actually does solve that if you kinda ignore the scalability limitations of blockchain.

Of course, the minute you add another transaction layer or exchanges or other third parties, then that wipes out most of that advantage and generally the more it facilitates cheap and fast transactions the more power is given to the third party and/or more fee is taken.

I’m still a fan of first layer transactions and just making the blockchain much faster using brute force increases in block frequency and block size. Might be able to keep transaction fees low enough to be a useful alternative. But as long as more people are interested in cryptocurrency (and related tech) as a Ponzi get rich quick scheme than as a practical way to facilitate transactions, I don’t see it making a significant dent in the regular financial system.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#129

Post by faeyanpiraat »

tommek4077 wrote: post #68
rchowe wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most Bitcoin transactions have a quite high transaction cost, and I would argue that chargebacks are an important consumer protection.

Only if you do your transaction on the blockchain. Most are done internally. It's like your bank is not sending someone with a suitcase full of money just because you pay your phone bill.

So it's just a different institution doing transactions internally with extra steps.
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