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Is Bitcoin Down or Just Me?

isbitcoindownorjustme.com

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Re: Is Bitcoin Down or Just Me?

#121

Post by beaconstudios »

kebman wrote: post #116
beaconstudios wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a meaningful service cost, it's just paid for by mining. Environmentally there's also a massive cost, one that is not offset by the benefits bitcoin brings - which is primarily financial speculation and scams. Cryptocurrency is probably one of the worst inventions in recent memory.

Do you have a measure against the banking system? If you do, then I'd love to see how Bitcoin is worse.

Bitcoin hasn't replaced the banking system though, nor could it (or should it). A crypto backed finance industry would be a libertarian hellscape of consumer abuse.

Re: Is Bitcoin Down or Just Me?

#122

Post by notch656a »

politician wrote: post #107
notch656a wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because no private enterprise could provide power or internet. Sure, some of the internet technology was invented with government grants, but lets not pretend these inventions were only inevitable due to US government. If US government were gone today the internet, electricity, and bitcoin will still be here but the usefulness of the dollar will massively decrease.

I'd argue the opposite, if the US government ceased to exist, the electrical grids in North America would collapse shortly thereafter, followed by the Internet and Bitcoin. Without the rule of law and threat of prosecution, a massive surge in usage due to theft would overwhelm systems. Without the nuclear status quo and the threat of retaliation, NA would either be glassed or invaded.

They would probably be collapsed in the short term and eventually be replaced by something, if not decentralized power generation.

>Without the rule of law and threat of prosecution, a massive surge in usage due to theft would overwhelm systems.

I used both internet and electricity in Northern Syria circa 2015, provided by private providers, and it seemed to work just fine then. Why you think rule of law is so important to internet existing? If the dude running the cell phone towers and cell phone stand points an AK out the window when they see a crook, most people decide not to theft that. You don't need central power grid to have enough electricity to run phones and cryptocurrencies.

>Without the nuclear status quo and the threat of retaliation, NA would either be glassed or invaded.

Or cooperative militias and private individuals ally with someone with nukes or seize the ones already in existence. Not to mention invading American part of NA is hilariously foolish as there would be a "rifle behind every blade of grass."

Re: Is Bitcoin Down or Just Me?

#123

Post by matheusmoreira »

krzyk wrote: post #108
matheusmoreira wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> can we at least agree that it is an astounding engineering achievement As the first cryptocurrency, it's certainly an incredible innovation and idea. However, it's already outdated technology. Bitcoin failed to become everything it was idealized to be. It's not anonymous. It's not private. It's not fungible. It's not decentralized. It's not unregulated. It's not even a currency since transactions are not cheap and…

> not unregulated What do you mean? > transactions are not cheap and fast What do you mean by that? Becauee my transactions were cheap and quick

> What do you mean?

When it was created, it was idealized as the digital equivalent to cash. Totally private and anonymous so you can do whatever you want without some bank or government monitoring you or taking issue. It was supposed to be your money, not your social credit at the bank that the authorities allow you to use for approved purposes.

Bitcoin totally failed to become all that. The ledger is public and perfectly traceable so it's even worse than money at the bank. People have even identified the wallets of whales so that they can track their movements and see if they're about to dump on the market.

Coins are not fungible which means exchanges will refuse your tainted money if you use a mixing service for privacy. Governments will sanction addresses, making the coins held by them illegal and unacceptable by any business.

> Becauee my transactions were cheap and quick

Mine were not. Were you using the higher layer networks that delay blockchain settlement? Because that defeats the purpose of having cryptocurrencies in the first place.

Re: Is Bitcoin Down or Just Me?

#124

Post by analog31 »

notch656a wrote: post #82
root_axis wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin subsists on the massive electrical and internet infrastructure that is only possible through government.

Because no private enterprise could provide power or internet. Sure, some of the internet technology was invented with government grants, but lets not pretend these inventions were only inevitable due to US government. If US government were gone today the internet, electricity, and bitcoin will still be here but the usefulness of the dollar will massively decrease.

If not for the relative regularization of commerce provided by corporate law, and relative stability achieved through economic policy, I think there would be no investment in great ventures of the scale needed to build the electric grid, semiconductor manufacturing, telecommunications, etc.

The limitation of liability granted to the shareholders of corporations is the granddaddy of all entitlements, because it enables relatively hands off investment. Without those things, a "big business" would be on the scale of a corner grocery store, or a family owned factory.

Re: Is Bitcoin Down or Just Me?

#125

Post by Andrew_nenakhov »

beaconstudios wrote: post #54
camjohnson26 wrote: post #43

For all the hate Bitcoin gets because it’s obviously in a bubble market, can we at least agree that it is an astounding engineering achievement that an anonymous individual and a small group of researchers were able to build a network capable of transacting billions of dollars of value with only 2 service incidents in 14 years? All without any meaningful service costs and no hacking of the network, despite huge incen…

There is a meaningful service cost, it's just paid for by mining. Environmentally there's also a massive cost, one that is not offset by the benefits bitcoin brings - which is primarily financial speculation and scams. Cryptocurrency is probably one of the worst inventions in recent memory.

If bitcoin's benefits do not offset the "massive costs" for you (because you're likely coming from a first-world country), it doesn't mean that these benefits do not exist for people who were not so lucky as you are.

Re: Is Bitcoin Down or Just Me?

#126

Post by hartator »

anderber wrote: post #110
beaconstudios wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a meaningful service cost, it's just paid for by mining. Environmentally there's also a massive cost, one that is not offset by the benefits bitcoin brings - which is primarily financial speculation and scams. Cryptocurrency is probably one of the worst inventions in recent memory.

> Cryptocurrency is probably one of the worst inventions in recent memory Keep in mind that not all Cryptocurrency use mining. Nano, for example, is zero fee, environmentally friendly coin that is incredibly fast. Bitcoin gets all the talk but there are some great and interesting tech out there. Get yourself a wallet ( https://natrium.io/ ) and I'll send you some so you can try it out. https://nano.org/

I am curious as well. I’ve created a wallet: nano_1g6bkdkp9h6y4594sa3kiyu4xdmfz3nbj9z4zeptrdatcztpprcdsno5p6nr

How is it secure if it’s not doing any wasteful mining though?

Re: Is Bitcoin Down or Just Me?

#127

Post by notch656a »

Guvante wrote: post #104
notch656a wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because no private enterprise could provide power or internet. Sure, some of the internet technology was invented with government grants, but lets not pretend these inventions were only inevitable due to US government. If US government were gone today the internet, electricity, and bitcoin will still be here but the usefulness of the dollar will massively decrease.

Are we pretending that the US government is gone without a worldwide depression? (To be clear the US isn't alone, any of the major countries disappearing overnight would shock the economic system too hard to make these style what ifs meaningful) If so it wouldn't stop being valuable for quite a while still, in this hypothetical you would still have years of contracts in terms of USD, not all of which would be renegot…

>Are we pretending that the US government is gone without a worldwide depression? (To be clear the US isn't alone, any of the major countries disappearing overnight would shock the economic system too hard to make these style what ifs meaningful)

Crytpo will march on with or without US government, I don't see them as existential concern for BTC or other crypto.

I'm not sure if BTC will survive once there is nothing to mine, but other crypto like XMR has infinite tail emission thus mining never dies. I apologize but here I often use BTC interchangeably to mean PoW cryptos in general. I shouldn't do that.

Re: Is Bitcoin Down or Just Me?

#128

Post by kebman »

slg wrote: post #57
camjohnson26 wrote: post #43

For all the hate Bitcoin gets because it’s obviously in a bubble market, can we at least agree that it is an astounding engineering achievement that an anonymous individual and a small group of researchers were able to build a network capable of transacting billions of dollars of value with only 2 service incidents in 14 years? All without any meaningful service costs and no hacking of the network, despite huge incen…

> were able to build a network capable of transacting billions of dollars of value But that is only possible because the value of bitcoin has skyrocketed. The last data I saw had it at only a few transactions per second which isn't that impressive. >All without any meaningful service costs There are service costs, they are just paid in Bitcoin. There is also obviously the electricity spent to keep the whole thing run…

> But that is only possible because the value of bitcoin has skyrocketed.

Even if the price of Bitcoin hadn't skyrocketed, it would still be capable of transacting billions of dollars of value. You'd just have to buy more Bitcoin in order to send the value.

When you do, however, the price of Bitcoin also increase, because it's a scarce asset. That is why it has skyrocketed. And because it's safe. And because it's decentralized. And because it's censorship and regulation resistant. And because it's even scam resistant, due to all transactions being public.

On top of that the transactions per second are irrelevant, as everyday purchases can be handled by side chains that are finally settled on the main chain. This means Bitcoin is still being developed as we speak, and so it's not outdated in any way shape or form. In fact it's getting better day by day.

Re: Is Bitcoin Down or Just Me?

#129

Post by lowkey »

beaconstudios wrote: post #54
camjohnson26 wrote: post #43

For all the hate Bitcoin gets because it’s obviously in a bubble market, can we at least agree that it is an astounding engineering achievement that an anonymous individual and a small group of researchers were able to build a network capable of transacting billions of dollars of value with only 2 service incidents in 14 years? All without any meaningful service costs and no hacking of the network, despite huge incen…

There is a meaningful service cost, it's just paid for by mining. Environmentally there's also a massive cost, one that is not offset by the benefits bitcoin brings - which is primarily financial speculation and scams. Cryptocurrency is probably one of the worst inventions in recent memory.

Tell me you don’t understand the problem Bitcoin solves without telling me.

Re: Is Bitcoin Down or Just Me?

#130

Post by Yuioup »

anderber wrote: post #110
beaconstudios wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a meaningful service cost, it's just paid for by mining. Environmentally there's also a massive cost, one that is not offset by the benefits bitcoin brings - which is primarily financial speculation and scams. Cryptocurrency is probably one of the worst inventions in recent memory.

> Cryptocurrency is probably one of the worst inventions in recent memory Keep in mind that not all Cryptocurrency use mining. Nano, for example, is zero fee, environmentally friendly coin that is incredibly fast. Bitcoin gets all the talk but there are some great and interesting tech out there. Get yourself a wallet ( https://natrium.io/ ) and I'll send you some so you can try it out. https://nano.org/

I keep hearing bitcoin apologists saying "Bitcoin is environmentally unfriendly but... check this out" as if that would solve the record temperatures we're having at the moment.

How about we stop using cryptocurrency completely. Time for the UN to get together and get this banned.

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