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The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

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Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#361

Post by koonsolo »

louwrentius wrote: post #312
llimos wrote: post #301

Most people on HN are rational people who look at the world in a rational way. Bitcoin and friends are not operating in a rational market, therefore we don't understand them, and most of us would probably be pretty lousy investors since we would try to make decisions rationally instead of memeing and YOLOing. But, and this is a key point, that doesn't make us right and them wrong . It's just a different kind of marke…

We are perfectly capable to decide what is better because it isn't magic. For every gain, somebody literally has to lose. All crypto money is just other people's money. The people who win are vocal. The people who lose, stay silent, often in shame And even if you disagree, those gains are not worth the destruction of our planet.

Have you seen the price of bitcoin evolve? We recently had 2 all time highs again. You must be really stupid to lose money on that.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#362

Post by secondaryacct »

twelve40 wrote: post #329
louwrentius wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are perfectly capable to decide what is better because it isn't magic. For every gain, somebody literally has to lose. All crypto money is just other people's money. The people who win are vocal. The people who lose, stay silent, often in shame And even if you disagree, those gains are not worth the destruction of our planet.

To play devil's advocate, the fact that it's someone's money and people are losing it doesn't automatically mean better or worse. For example, Netflix bankrupted Blockbuster and people lost money but it is clearly "better". I guess we're just still waiting for a popular use case, outside of crime, speculation and money transfers to places with no infrastructure.

You cant compare two companies providing service to millions of people worldwide with a completely dead transaction !! Yes there are winner and losers in useful business, but when someone times the btc market better than someone else, what has the universe naturally selected ?

A better degenerate gambler ?

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#364

Post by wsc981 »

dsr_ wrote: post #350
wsc981 wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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? As someone born in the EU (now living in South-East Asia) I am still excited about Bitcoin. Because I feel it's the only safe haven for my honestly earned money out of reach of governments and banks.…

Why do you consider it a safe haven for your money when the volatility is so high?

> Why do you consider it a safe haven for your money when the volatility is so high?

Because I believe in the long term Bitcoin will always go up, as it has done in the past. Especially if central banks keep printing money at high volume, which -at this point- seems unavoidable for the Fed & ECB.

I don't care too much for short term volatility. And as Bitcoin adoption grows, volatility should reduce anyways.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#365

Post by beepbooptheory »

sjtindell wrote: post #354
llimos wrote: post #301

Most people on HN are rational people who look at the world in a rational way. Bitcoin and friends are not operating in a rational market, therefore we don't understand them, and most of us would probably be pretty lousy investors since we would try to make decisions rationally instead of memeing and YOLOing. But, and this is a key point, that doesn't make us right and them wrong . It's just a different kind of marke…

HN’s attitude is very surprising to me. I would think that they could get very excited about flash loans, decentralized exchanges (automated market makers), daos, and other concrete innovations coming out of crypto asset projects. I think it’s mostly jealousy and a feeling that they missed the boat, so they want to see it sink. I think that because I’ve had the feeling many times. They may not realize these are early…

I am not asleep, but I'm definitely tired.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#366

Post by mlcrypto »

secondaryacct wrote: post #355
mlcrypto wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin is smart engineered gold. It's perfectly rational compared to the endless printing in fiat. Most engineers just accept keynesian economics because that's what they were taught. They have a narrow world view beyond their tech expertise. I saw somebody criticize BTC because they couldn't imagine using so much energy "just to secure money". I was like what you just took for granted is perhaps society's most impo…

The endless printing is more necessary than the strict stock control fot a currency. You cannot avoid people starving unless you do it, and you cannot live in peace unless you avoid people starving and getting desperate. You do know there was no printing in the middle age. Good old days these all were.

I see the world transitioning to a USD central bank digital coin for currency and Bitcoin as the store of value in the future

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#367

Post by wayoutthere »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #305
andrewla wrote: post #103

If anything, I think stablecoins are way more dangerous than the author indicates. People talk about things like Bitcoin as a threat to sovereign currencies, and they are, as competitors, of sorts. But stablecoins are another matter entirely. One huge aspect of the value of sovereign currencies is that they are instruments of law -- courts will settle in them as a lowest common denominator, and it is safe to use them…

Wait, you can't legally buy stocks with cash? Why not?

KYC laws aimed at anti-money laundering; any large movement of money has to be between trusted parties. Which means a verification process that is more thorough the more money you move around.

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#368

Post by koonsolo »

secondaryacct wrote: post #351
koonsolo wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, but please speak for yourself. Plenty of people here see the potential that cryptocurrencies and blockchains can offer. Let's find out where it takes us, but at this point, we're winning :D.

Winning what ? US dollards?

You can't win with US dollars ;p

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#369

Post by bradwood »

PantaloonFlames wrote: post #339
llimos wrote: post #301

Most people on HN are rational people who look at the world in a rational way. Bitcoin and friends are not operating in a rational market, therefore we don't understand them, and most of us would probably be pretty lousy investors since we would try to make decisions rationally instead of memeing and YOLOing. But, and this is a key point, that doesn't make us right and them wrong . It's just a different kind of marke…

The issue is not whether a person can make money in a Ponzi scheme. We know it is possible. The issue is, is it a good idea?

And how is fiat not a Ponzi scheme?

Re: The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger of Crypto

#370

Post by joshmarlow »

Igelau wrote: post #184
joshmarlow wrote: post #157

I think a lot of discussions around the utility of blockchains misses (or just ignores) a really subtle but important point: smart contract networks (like Ethereum) could be thought of like public utilities that are implemented via markets. And I think that perspective can unlock a lot of innovation. If I want to launch a startup, I have to cover hosting costs, manage infrastructure (terraform, AWS/DigitalOcean, Dock…

I thought the article did a fairly good job pointing out: - The only applications anyone is implementing on progcoins are exchanges and/or gambling. So far, dApps are a circular argument. - Smart contracts aren't so smart. They are ticking time bombs waiting to get exploited DAO-style. That doesn't leave a whole lot of room for utility.

> - The only applications anyone is implementing on progcoins are exchanges and/or gambling. So far, dApps are a circular argument.

There's an argument that that's okay for now - the finance applications are effectively capitalizing infrastructure construction, which will make future applications easier to build, more scalable, etc. The amount of $ in these applications incentivizes bad actors to help expose the failure modes of the infrastructure - which again would be nice to know and document before it becomes widely useful.

^ that's a prediction - I'll be the first to admit that this crypto stuff may go nowhere. But it might go to some interesting places.

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