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Crypto lobbying is going ballistic

economist.com

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Re: Crypto lobbying is going ballistic

#101

Post by selfhoster11 »

uh_uh wrote: post #74
spiorf wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> government or industry backed digital currency That's your bank account and credit cards etc.. The whole point of cryptocurrency is to not to be backed or controlled by any single entity.

Your bank account and credit cards are not programmable money. They don't have smart contracts where third parties can verify the fairness of the financial instruments you are purchasing. All you have is trust in financial institutions.

The only reason why they aren't programmable, is because banks choose not to expose an API. In fact, even that's not completely true: Starling offers programmable bank accounts in the UK, and there is at least one programmable credit card provider in the US.

Re: Crypto lobbying is going ballistic

#102

Post by numair »

Since this seems to be yet another HN comment thread filled with people who feel really smart for dismissing the potential of cryptographic digital currencies and the emerging liquid market for these digital assets, I'll just copy and paste my thoughts (which I might end up having to do often, since these sort of crypto-hate-fests are now popping up on HN at a rate of several per day):

> Money moves fast in the crypto world. It’s “minted.” It’s “burned.” It’s earned. It’s hacked. It’s fundraised. It’s parked into a failed DAO. It’s gambled away. It’s up on a 100x leveraged return. It’s wiped out in a margin call. It’s up 20% — oh wait, now it’s flash-crashed down 30%. It’s unstable, risky, prone to failure — and it’s exactly what the global economy needs. We need ways to convince capital to move around in new and weird ways. We need to get money into the hands of different sets of hands way more often than we’ve been doing. We need to experiment, to be right, to be wrong, to be doing things with money. That’s what capital productivity is all about. Money isn’t supposed to sit in a bank feeling “safe;” it’s supposed to be running around, acting young and risky, learning new things and creating new opportunities.

https://numair.medium.com/the-intelligent-case-for-crypto-43...

Re: Crypto lobbying is going ballistic

#103

Post by denton-scratch »

Jensson wrote: post #91
clippablematt wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hundreds of years after the tulip bubble, tulips are still a big part of Dutch tourism with flower markets being a big attraction in Amsterdam. Because culture doesn’t disappear. So good look with that.

Crypto bubble bursting just means that all investors leave, not that crypto currencies disappear. So bitcoin would go back to levels it was at before the investment craze 4 years ago, so about 5 years ago? At that point you could buy stuff with it and send people money, but people didn't view it as an investment vehicle.

The blockchain is an append-only structure; it can only grow. The longer the blockchain, the more it costs to process a transaction.

So if people divest from bitcoin and the price drops, that won't make bitcoin more suitable for buying stuff. Nothing can make the blockchain shorter.

Re: Crypto lobbying is going ballistic

#104

Post by uh_uh »

selfhoster11 wrote: post #101
uh_uh wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your bank account and credit cards are not programmable money. They don't have smart contracts where third parties can verify the fairness of the financial instruments you are purchasing. All you have is trust in financial institutions.

The only reason why they aren't programmable, is because banks choose not to expose an API. In fact, even that's not completely true: Starling offers programmable bank accounts in the UK, and there is at least one programmable credit card provider in the US.

These are good steps yes. But still, you're at the mercy of fintechs. Also, for this stuff to be really useful, it needs to be standardised worldwide. E.g. Algerian traders should be able to trade with Japanese counterparties by interacting with the same smart contracts.

Re: Crypto lobbying is going ballistic

#105

Post by boppo1 »

unicornmama wrote: post #49
MadSudaca wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it’s be like the dotcom bubble. It’ll burst in a big way, leaving many people broke, then from the aftermath good projects will emerge and will come to redefine the world.

Even before the dot com bubble burst, we saw businesses with practical value producing applications of the Internet. Today it’s over 10 years of crypto. I have only observed one application of crypto that touches the real economy - with a relatively obscure token. Everything else, seems to be just be playing financial games inside of crypto, money laundering, side-stepping regulations, speculative meme assets and of…

I think institutions will adopt it for real-time security settlement. T+3 caused the Robinhood debacle of shutting down retail GME purchasing. As far as I can tell from the congressional hearings, T+3 is because the incumbents feel secure that they have a monopoly on security settlement tech.

Re: Crypto lobbying is going ballistic

#106

Post by loup-vaillant »

gambiting wrote: post #83
snarfy wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's true - crypto is bullshit. I've had a hard time shaking the realization that money is bullshit too.

I think there's a fundamental issue here that prevents us from reaching an understanding. ANYTHING can be used as money. The systems that we currently have in place have lots of big problems, but "we" decided to use them and that's why they are popular. We could also decide to use a cryptocurrency as money, and it would be equally valid, and it would become our "money" - that bit is fine and I'm not arguing with it.…

> The second this changes, and we have a cryptocurrency that is actually used as money and not a plaything, I'll happily stop complaining about it.

I won't: we still have proof-of-work to get rid of (and generally, the unreasonable energy consumption and chip usage).

Re: Crypto lobbying is going ballistic

#107

Post by jakub_g »

sktrdie wrote: post #32
5e92cb50239222b wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If climate change is finally taken seriously at some point, I hope they get clamped down on very hard. Unlike meth labs and "terrorists", a large mining farm can be traced by power usage. (Unless you're using solar, then go ahead and mine all you want.) Crypto fanatics are doing nothing of any practical value while greatly helping out with destroying our planet. We've been having rolling blackouts recently because of…

Afaik most % of mining happens close to the energy source where it can't even be transported or where it's already being wasted. At least that would be the most economically viable solution; hence hopefully what everyone will eventually be doing (doing otherwise would not be rewardable). Actually in a way the market price is not only defined by speculation but also how much "paying for energy" compares to "getting th…

There's been quite a few reports of unused coal burning power stations being revived and dedicated to mining crypto.

Re: Crypto lobbying is going ballistic

#108

Post by hamilyon2 »

lui8906 wrote: post #93
gambiting wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there's a fundamental issue here that prevents us from reaching an understanding. ANYTHING can be used as money. The systems that we currently have in place have lots of big problems, but "we" decided to use them and that's why they are popular. We could also decide to use a cryptocurrency as money, and it would be equally valid, and it would become our "money" - that bit is fine and I'm not arguing with it.…

I hold a decent chunk of change in stable coins most of which I lend out to earn interest. Sometimes I top up a VISA card with those stables and then buy groceries. You might reply "you're just using a proxy of USD the original currency, its not new". That's true my reply to that would be: Having the USD be on chain allows very efficient lending. For eg. I can use a lending aggregator that is constantly polling many…

Yes, efficiency matters, permissionlessness matters. Future us will be talking about today as the early days of robotic money.

Re: Crypto lobbying is going ballistic

#109

Post by jakub_g »

unicornmama wrote: post #49
MadSudaca wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it’s be like the dotcom bubble. It’ll burst in a big way, leaving many people broke, then from the aftermath good projects will emerge and will come to redefine the world.

Even before the dot com bubble burst, we saw businesses with practical value producing applications of the Internet. Today it’s over 10 years of crypto. I have only observed one application of crypto that touches the real economy - with a relatively obscure token. Everything else, seems to be just be playing financial games inside of crypto, money laundering, side-stepping regulations, speculative meme assets and of…

Crypto made producing ransomware a viable business model. Touching real economy in real ways!

Re: Crypto lobbying is going ballistic

#110

Post by Gys »

numair wrote: post #102

Since this seems to be yet another HN comment thread filled with people who feel really smart for dismissing the potential of cryptographic digital currencies and the emerging liquid market for these digital assets, I'll just copy and paste my thoughts (which I might end up having to do often, since these sort of crypto-hate-fests are now popping up on HN at a rate of several per day): > Money moves fast in the crypt…

> Money isn’t supposed to sit in a bank feeling “safe;” it’s supposed to be running around, acting young and risky, learning new things and creating new opportunities.

But how is this different for crypto currencies compared to fiat currencies? From what I understand by far most crypto capital does not move at all?

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