The first Bitcoin post on HN

Post by nationcrafting » Wed, Nov 20, 2013, 3:26 AM UTC

sentenza wrote: post #33

cs702 wrote: post #7

That four-year-old submission has just two comments: one expressing doubt, one expressing optimism. Interestingly, despite growing worldwide adoption of Bitcoin, comments about it on HN continue to be more or less evenly split between doubters and optimists. And I wouldn't be surprised if comments to this submission are evenly split between those same two camps. No amount of evidence or reasoning seems to persuade ei…

But it is not that black and white, is it? While it is quite clear that Bitcoin has "value" as long as people are willing to trade it (i.e., indefinitely), there is still no reason to assume that it will ever stop having these extreme fluctuations. To the contrary, I'd say that, as time progresses, we observe Bitcoin having the same problems that the gold standard had, mixed with an additional proneness to speculatio…

Post by pfisch » Wed, Nov 20, 2013, 3:57 AM UTC

XorNot wrote: post #262

pfisch wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess I don't understand. First of all these kinds of transactions need a vehicle like bitcoin, because using cash introduces a lot of middle men that dramatically decrease the efficiency of illegal transactions. Second of all there is no way to send money right now for legal transactions without also introducing a bunch of similar middle men. I think square cash is maybe free right now in a promotional sort of way…

This post seems like you don't understand the Bitcoin protocol or the exchanges. The current BTC trade goes as: You --> some money handler --> exchange --> bitcoin --> a bunch of nodes which take a cut for processing a transaction (and 20 minutes to hit the network) --> exchange --> another money handler --> recipient. What part of that seems like it has less middlemen? And oh yeah, very few of those parties are beho…

Post by XorNot » Wed, Nov 20, 2013, 4:08 AM UTC

Groxx wrote: post #120

digitailor wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Bitcoin is different in that is the purest form of a fiat currency in the sense that it is backed by nothing and thus has no intrinsic value whatsoever. It's backed by the tremendous amount of electricity required to run the transaction processing network (ie. "mining"). Remember this is the world's largest distributed supercomputer. BTC is a proxy for electricity, that's why mining equipment ended up at ASICs so…

The USD is backed by the material value of everything USA, at a minimum. It's practically impossible for the USD to go to absolute zero, there's still some gold in the reserves and oil and mining to be done at absolute worst. Obviously our debts exceed this, but that's a different issue. Say everyone cashed in at once - they'd get a percentage of our debts, not zero, since there's still material value. You can't "und…

Post by cbr » Wed, Nov 20, 2013, 4:17 AM UTC

fiesycal wrote: post #220

ericb wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To explain: The fear that often is associated with deflationary currency (like bitcoin) is that no one will spend it, because waiting always gets you a slightly better deal. And if that happens the economy will grind to a halt with everyone waiting to spend. The point of my second statement is that we have examples of cases where even though every month your money buys more, people still do buy things.

There may be specific examples (HDTV) where waiting means your money buys more, but overall the more you wait the less your money is worth in the economy due to inflation. Technology making products cheaper is not an example of deflation. Inflation and deflation pertain only to currency not products. If however you hold your currency and everyday its worth more, besides the bare essentials there is barely an incentiv…

    Inflation and deflation pertain only to currency not products.

    Growth deflation: an enduring decrease in the real cost of
    goods and services as the result of technological progress,
    accompanied by competitive price cuts, resulting in an
    increase in aggregate demand.  A structural deflation existed
    from 1870s until the cycle upswing that started in 1895. The
    deflation was caused by the decrease in the production and
    distribution costs of goods. It resulted in competitive price
    cuts when markets were oversupplied. The mild inflation after
    1895 was attributed to the increase in gold supply that had
    been occurring for decades.

Post by yen223 » Wed, Nov 20, 2013, 5:58 AM UTC

Pitarou wrote: post #254

Joeri wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The value of a currency lies entirely in the perception of that value. I don't consider bitcoin different from a traditional currency, except that its rate of production is known in advance. It will keep having value because by now enough people think it does.

No. If somebody sues me, and I offer to pay my debt in bitcoins, the court may refuse to recognise this payment. But if I pay in the national currency, the court is required to recognise this payment. This is part of the legal system in every country. It's one of the mechanisms governments use to force citizens to use the national currency.