Is this the end of crypto? • Hacker News Board

Re: Is this the end of crypto?

#221

Post by compsciphd » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 6:27 PM UTC

P5fRxh5kUvp2th wrote: post #106

cooljacob204 wrote: post #11

When Crypto was young it was this cool new technology that mostly interesting because of the underlying tech. But even back then it was mostly valuable for buying drugs online and other illegal stuff. Now it's that and a way to scam people of their life savings. I do hope it dies out, it should have been heavily regulated from the get go. Way too many people saw these high production commercials with their favorite c…

When bitcoin first came onto the scene I personally knew a guy who was running a website to act as an exchange. It was small because bitcoin itself at that time was very small. Then bitcoin had its very first dip and it became unprofitable to mine bitcoins. When that happened he shuttered the website and kept everyone's bitcoins. I knew of bitcoin early on due to this guy, but even then I had no interest and consider…

I'd go a step further with the comparison to gold. If everyone would stop mining gold today, gold would retain value (or perhaps even go up in value). On the flipside, if we turned off all bitcoin miners today, bitcoin would go to zero instantly (as its worthless without continuous resources being pumped into it).

This is why I'm sympathetic to those who say its ponzi scheme, it only has value because of new resources continuing to be poured into it.

Re: Is this the end of crypto?

#222

Post by ls15 » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 6:29 PM UTC

runarberg wrote: post #204

pera wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm from Argentina but live in the UK: in 2020 my mom needed an urgent oncological treatment and the only method I had to transfer the money was using a cryptocurrency. I really don't like to talk about this stuff but when people here in HN keep making arguments like "oh who needs this stuff, I can send money to my friends with the Monzo app" it really makes me feel like my problems as someone from the third world do…

I think most people here agree that it is unnecessarily hard and expensive to transfer money between countries. However cryptocurrency is a technological solution to a regulatory problem. This issue could be solved tomorrow by legislation if governments would cooperate and work to do so. All the efforts pushing cryptocurrency for this particular niche would be better served pushing for international standards for che…

> All the efforts pushing cryptocurrency for this particular niche would be better served pushing for international standards for cheap and simple instant money transfers.

That seems impossible given today's geopolitics. Crypto remittance at least works.

Re: Is this the end of crypto?

#223

Post by pseudostem » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 6:33 PM UTC

azangru wrote: post #155

P5fRxh5kUvp2th wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When bitcoin first came onto the scene I personally knew a guy who was running a website to act as an exchange. It was small because bitcoin itself at that time was very small. Then bitcoin had its very first dip and it became unprofitable to mine bitcoins. When that happened he shuttered the website and kept everyone's bitcoins. I knew of bitcoin early on due to this guy, but even then I had no interest and consider…

> When that happened he shuttered the website and kept everyone's bitcoins. > I knew of bitcoin early on due to this guy, but even then I had no interest and considered it bullshit. Then when I saw what this guy did it just solidified my opinion that it can't be trusted. But isn't it instead an early lesson in "not your keys not your coin" maxim that Bitcoin advocates preach? > If the value of gold crashes it still h…

>it's bulky

Slight nitpick, Total gold above the earth's surface is less than a cube with sides 25 metres each.

Re: Is this the end of crypto?

#224

Post by hn_throwaway_99 » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 6:34 PM UTC

cooljacob204 wrote: post #11

When Crypto was young it was this cool new technology that mostly interesting because of the underlying tech. But even back then it was mostly valuable for buying drugs online and other illegal stuff. Now it's that and a way to scam people of their life savings. I do hope it dies out, it should have been heavily regulated from the get go. Way too many people saw these high production commercials with their favorite c…

On one point, I fully agree with you - the whole purpose of regulations is to stop schemes from getting out of hand before the money is gone, because once it's gone, it can't usually be recouped.

But that said, I feel something is fundamentally lacking in our education system that people were convinced to put money into this shithole because Matt Damon or Tom Brady or Giselle Bundchen said it was a good idea. I mean, I have sympathy but part of me is like "Stupid is as stupid does". When celebrities started hawking crypto, it was the definite equivalent of "shoe shine boy giving stock tips" to me.

Re: Is this the end of crypto?

#225

Post by SoftTalker » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 6:35 PM UTC

philippejara wrote: post #124

cooljacob204 wrote: post #11

When Crypto was young it was this cool new technology that mostly interesting because of the underlying tech. But even back then it was mostly valuable for buying drugs online and other illegal stuff. Now it's that and a way to scam people of their life savings. I do hope it dies out, it should have been heavily regulated from the get go. Way too many people saw these high production commercials with their favorite c…

As it stands, without crypto, you are pretty much a hostage to visa, mastercard, discover, and amex to exchange money effectively, and those companies are opinionated to a disturbing extent about who they deny business with when it comes to something so important. While those companies are not operated as some sort of common carrier of transactions crypto is essential for a free global society. Apparently Trump of al…

What happened to cash?

While I don't use it a lot anymore myself, I'm struggling to think of any service or product I use whose provider would not happily accept cash as payment. There are more than a couple of small restaurants here that only accept cash. My barber only accepts cash.

Re: Is this the end of crypto?

#226

Post by P5fRxh5kUvp2th » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 6:37 PM UTC

dang wrote: post #220

P5fRxh5kUvp2th wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

Please don't post HN threads flameward. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

One could argue that the complete and utter strawman by the other poster is more likely to start a flamewar than someone asking if they understood the actual point.

But let me guess, if I press you on this I'm going to get banned in a week or so for such and such reason.

something something assume good faith?

Re: Is this the end of crypto?

#227

Post by soco » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 6:38 PM UTC

azangru wrote: post #155

P5fRxh5kUvp2th wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When bitcoin first came onto the scene I personally knew a guy who was running a website to act as an exchange. It was small because bitcoin itself at that time was very small. Then bitcoin had its very first dip and it became unprofitable to mine bitcoins. When that happened he shuttered the website and kept everyone's bitcoins. I knew of bitcoin early on due to this guy, but even then I had no interest and consider…

> When that happened he shuttered the website and kept everyone's bitcoins. > I knew of bitcoin early on due to this guy, but even then I had no interest and considered it bullshit. Then when I saw what this guy did it just solidified my opinion that it can't be trusted. But isn't it instead an early lesson in "not your keys not your coin" maxim that Bitcoin advocates preach? > If the value of gold crashes it still h…

Uh, I wear some gold on me and cross borders with it and keep it at home when not and there's this thing called pawn shop in my village and otherwise and... are you sure those you mentioned are real problems? Or maybe you mean only the large amounts problems - in which case we should underline bitcoin aims to solve the problems of the rich, which most people on earth are not.

Re: Is this the end of crypto?

#228

Post by P5fRxh5kUvp2th » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 6:39 PM UTC

compsciphd wrote: post #221

P5fRxh5kUvp2th wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When bitcoin first came onto the scene I personally knew a guy who was running a website to act as an exchange. It was small because bitcoin itself at that time was very small. Then bitcoin had its very first dip and it became unprofitable to mine bitcoins. When that happened he shuttered the website and kept everyone's bitcoins. I knew of bitcoin early on due to this guy, but even then I had no interest and consider…

I'd go a step further with the comparison to gold. If everyone would stop mining gold today, gold would retain value (or perhaps even go up in value). On the flipside, if we turned off all bitcoin miners today, bitcoin would go to zero instantly (as its worthless without continuous resources being pumped into it). This is why I'm sympathetic to those who say its ponzi scheme, it only has value because of new resource…

^ that was exactly my point and why I asked the other poster if they actually understood the point.

but I'm in the middle of getting warned and moderated by dang for daring to ask such a question!

Re: Is this the end of crypto?

#229

Post by danaris » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 6:41 PM UTC

aww_dang wrote: post #213

danaris wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "not your keys not your coin" maxim that Bitcoin advocates preach? I keep seeing this phrase crop up throughout the past several days of cryptocurrency news, and something always rubbed me the wrong way about it, but I couldn't put my finger on it until today. It's demanding a change in human nature to accommodate the system, rather than changing the system to accommodate human nature. It's really not that differen…

Self-custody means users withdrawing their coins from exchanges or other custodial services. >"Well, of course your accounts got hacked, because you didn't create a separate 27-character totally random password for every single account you need, like I do, and never store those passwords anywhere except your head!" The keys can be recorded as a seed phrase. Typically this is a sequence of dictionary words. Look into…

I wasn't aware that something had to be "my business" before I was allowed to discuss it on HN.

And "dedicated hardware wallet devices" are exactly the kind of thing that I'm talking about here. There is no way those are going to be appealing to mainstream users; thus, if cryptocurrency were ever to genuinely enter the mainstream, the vast, vast majority of users would be keeping their crypto on exchanges.

Y'know, exactly the way the vast, vast majority of people keep their money in regular bank accounts. Which don't require this kind of rigamarole, and never result in regular people (ie, not the very wealthy) losing money, because it's all regulated and insured by the government.

(Yes, I know FDIC insurance has a limit. The limit is high enough that regular people will never even have to care that it exists.)

Re: Is this the end of crypto?

#230

Post by runarberg » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 6:42 PM UTC

ls15 wrote: post #222

runarberg wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think most people here agree that it is unnecessarily hard and expensive to transfer money between countries. However cryptocurrency is a technological solution to a regulatory problem. This issue could be solved tomorrow by legislation if governments would cooperate and work to do so. All the efforts pushing cryptocurrency for this particular niche would be better served pushing for international standards for che…

> All the efforts pushing cryptocurrency for this particular niche would be better served pushing for international standards for cheap and simple instant money transfers. That seems impossible given today's geopolitics. Crypto remittance at least works.

Maybe that is true of transferring money between USA and Russia, or between USA and the EU, or the USA and any other country outside of Canada and Mexico, but there is no reason that the UK and Argentina don’t have a bilateral agreement in place that would make transferring money between the two countries quick, cheap, and easy.