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The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

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Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#101

Post by brianwawok »

xTrader wrote: post #100
espadrine wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was set to die by design. Bitcoin has a predetermined graph of coin production with time that converges soon. In 2022, 90% of all bitcoins will be produced, and the ideal inflation will be lower than most fiat currencies. But inevitably, people die, and the knowledge of their private key with them, removing bitcoins from circulation. The amount of bitcoin will therefore decrease impredictably All in all, it will b…

> But inevitably, people die, and the knowledge of their private key with them, removing bitcoins from circulation. The amount of bitcoin will therefore decrease impredictably Maybe a bit late, but you finally understood why Bitcoins get more valuable over time: their number grows slowly or maybe decreases, while the number of people wanting them increases. That's why Bitcoin is the best Store Of Value ever devised.

Ok put your entire life savings in BC, i will put mine in the SP500. Lets see how things look in 40 years?

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#102

Post by Fjolsvith »

brianwawok wrote: post #101
xTrader wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But inevitably, people die, and the knowledge of their private key with them, removing bitcoins from circulation. The amount of bitcoin will therefore decrease impredictably Maybe a bit late, but you finally understood why Bitcoins get more valuable over time: their number grows slowly or maybe decreases, while the number of people wanting them increases. That's why Bitcoin is the best Store Of Value ever devised.

Ok put your entire life savings in BC, i will put mine in the SP500. Lets see how things look in 40 years?

How has the SP500 compared to BC since its inception in 2009?

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#103

Post by alexasmyths »

justboxing wrote: post #3

> I am fully cognizant of the perils of making bearish predictions about new technology. > But, to quote another well-worn and wholly unreliable aphorism, this time it's different. It really is. and >... because the only other alternative is chaos, and probably the end of the whole Bitcoin experiment. I'm very much a Bitcoin skeptic, but, I'm not sure this time is different, or that Bitcoin will die. For the last 8 y…

"For the last 8 years, various sources have been predicting a Bitcoin collapse over and over again. It's still here, alive and well and quite high."

It's 'high' mostly because there are a large number of holders who are just sitting there on it.

If it's not being used as a currency, than I can't see how in the long term, people consider it to be a 'store of value' when it could be regulated, deemed illegal, or declared all sorts of things by regulatory bodies which fundamentally change it's nature.

And as an arbitrary store of value? We have tons of 'stores of value' available to us already that are considerably less volatile and more liquid.

So what is the point again? What problem does it solve, and why should anyone want it for a material reason?

I too agree that it will be around for a very long time, but what happens when the very speculative press - and even HN readers get 'bored' of all the news? When the Google queries start to wane (and BTW I think BTC will enjoy a huge surge in interest by 'everyday folks of the world' for a while before it wanes), but eventually, people will lose interest if it's just a 'store of value'.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#104

Post by DennisP »

xorcist wrote: post #68
mrb wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A block size increase is in fact very urgently needed. 99% of blocks are maxed out at ~4M weight DESPITE segwit, because segwit's adoption is too low (7%). Adoption isn't happening faster not because it's unneeded, but because of inertia among wallet developers. Consequently, full blocks and high fees have caused Bitcoin to lose many users to alts (LTC, ETH, ETC, DASH...) All this user loss and tx market loss has bee…

> block size increase is in fact very urgently needed [...] segwit's adoption is too low (7%) 7% in two months . What kind of adoption had you expected? Everyone won't switch over night, that's the whole problem behind why flag dates in distributed systems are hard, and why many people adocate backwards compatible changes whenever possible. > if Core simply agreed to double the block size Core is the name of the Bitc…

Ethereum has pulled off several hard forks, which they ran within weeks of finalizing the software. There's no reason Bitcoin couldn't do the same, especially for non-contentious forks.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#105

Post by alexasmyths »

xTrader wrote: post #100
espadrine wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was set to die by design. Bitcoin has a predetermined graph of coin production with time that converges soon. In 2022, 90% of all bitcoins will be produced, and the ideal inflation will be lower than most fiat currencies. But inevitably, people die, and the knowledge of their private key with them, removing bitcoins from circulation. The amount of bitcoin will therefore decrease impredictably All in all, it will b…

> But inevitably, people die, and the knowledge of their private key with them, removing bitcoins from circulation. The amount of bitcoin will therefore decrease impredictably Maybe a bit late, but you finally understood why Bitcoins get more valuable over time: their number grows slowly or maybe decreases, while the number of people wanting them increases. That's why Bitcoin is the best Store Of Value ever devised.

"their number grows slowly or maybe decreases, while the number of people wanting them increases."

Yes - you are right to point out that as BTC's disappear, it's not such a bad thing.

But why do you assume people would continue wanting them?

"That's why Bitcoin is the best Store Of Value ever devised."

It's currently one of the worst 'stores of value' possible.

It's massively volatile, and inherently risky: governments could decide to regulate it tomorrow - or even ban it. It's highly susceptible to popular whims. It has massive chunks owned by individual investors who could 'change their minds' on something.

If you have $X USD and want to 'diversify' and have 'strong store of value' - there are many other better options. Real estate being on the top of the list. Over the long-haul, there are innumerable places in the world where real estate will hold it's value for hundreds of years. Baskets of commodities, currencies, decent bonds.

Bitcoin is a very speculative asset, which makes it the 'opposite' of a 'store of value'. And if it's not a currency, then why are we using it again?

Let me put it differently:

In 200 years - do you think there will be demand for real estate in London? There has been for 1000 years. What about Tokyo? Shanghai? Of course there will. Maybe less, but certainly some, and probably more.

Will there be demand for BTC in 100 years? It's hard to say. Possibly, but there's a decent chance nobody will know what it is then.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#106

Post by alexasmyths »

Fjolsvith wrote: post #102
brianwawok wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok put your entire life savings in BC, i will put mine in the SP500. Lets see how things look in 40 years?

How has the SP500 compared to BC since its inception in 2009?

The SP500 has been growing consistently, has for quite a long time, and it's a bet on the future growth of the American economy. There will be ups and downs, but by enlarge, steady growth.

BTC has been on a wild ride, and could evaporate at any moment. I don't think it will, but it could, since there's no reason for anyone anywhere to own it.

There's no question the safer bet is S&P 500.

Now - in the range of outcomes, admittedly, the BTC owns the higher end of the spectrum - no doubt, there are possibilities where BTC completely outraces the S&P, however, it also owns the lower end of the spectrum of outcomes, where a lot of those outcomes are 0.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#107

Post by DennisP »

gruez wrote: post #9
iopuy wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I may not be as technical as the author but I truly believe Litecoin is the future. Charlie Lee is about the best face of a digital currency as possible. He's and ex-googler, MIT grad, with a clear vision and an outstanding team. Like VC's bet on people and not always ideas, he is the one to take us to the next step.

to be fair, part of the reason why there's so much drama with bitcoin is because it's biggest by market cap. when there's more at stake, people show their true intentions.

Bitcoin was having drama like this well before it reached the market cap that Ethereum has now. So far Ethereum is remarkably drama-free. There was the DAO controversy last year, but the chain split seems to have resolved that nicely.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#108

Post by shanusmagnus »

Despite all the histrionics about 2X -- just read r/bitcoin -- nobody in the 2X movement is a bad actor, they're people who've come to some different conclusions about what needs to be done.

It's funny to think what an _actual_ bad actor could do to the platform. Every time I hear the cryptocurrency people crowing about the amazing un-censorable power of the technology I just smile.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#109

Post by haywirez »

xTrader wrote: post #100
espadrine wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was set to die by design. Bitcoin has a predetermined graph of coin production with time that converges soon. In 2022, 90% of all bitcoins will be produced, and the ideal inflation will be lower than most fiat currencies. But inevitably, people die, and the knowledge of their private key with them, removing bitcoins from circulation. The amount of bitcoin will therefore decrease impredictably All in all, it will b…

> But inevitably, people die, and the knowledge of their private key with them, removing bitcoins from circulation. The amount of bitcoin will therefore decrease impredictably Maybe a bit late, but you finally understood why Bitcoins get more valuable over time: their number grows slowly or maybe decreases, while the number of people wanting them increases. That's why Bitcoin is the best Store Of Value ever devised.

People also don't appreciate that Bitcoin is infinitely divisible, so the total numbers are meaningless. At the same time, inflation is super low and decreases over time, giving it more and more edge over nation-state currencies.

Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November

#110

Post by mrb »

beaner wrote: post #61
mrb wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A block size increase is in fact very urgently needed. 99% of blocks are maxed out at ~4M weight DESPITE segwit, because segwit's adoption is too low (7%). Adoption isn't happening faster not because it's unneeded, but because of inertia among wallet developers. Consequently, full blocks and high fees have caused Bitcoin to lose many users to alts (LTC, ETH, ETC, DASH...) All this user loss and tx market loss has bee…

> 99% of blocks are maxed out at ~4M weight DESPITE segwit Hasn't been true since July: https://blockchain.info/charts/avg-block-size > full blocks and high fees have caused Bitcoin to lose many users to alts (LTC, ETH, ETC, DASH...) What's the evidence for this? All my friends own btc and alts... but none of them transact in it. They own them only for investment purposes. I don't think anybody is using alts for thei…

«Hasn't been true»

Yes it's true. I said WEIGHT not SIZE. A distinction few understand. Check the kWU column at https://blockchain.info If a full node has built a 4Mweight/1MB block, it is full, because non-segwit txs have wasted the 4M weight quota and prevented the block from growing over 1MB. If segwit adoption stays low, blocks WON'T be able to grow much beyond 1MB.

In fact the problem is that the rate of adoption of segwit is too low compared to the rate of increased txs that Bitcoin needs to be able to support. Therefore blocks are going to continue to stay at or near the ~4M weight quota.

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