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The “strategic reserve” exposes crypto as the scam it always was

alexkolchinski.com

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Re: The “strategic reserve” exposes crypto as the scam it always was

#141

Post by quantadev »

desumeku wrote: post #138
quantadev wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, I expect your air jars can easily get quite a bit higher than $80K, while the FoMo is still on the rise. During Tulip Bulb Mania a bud was going for the same amount as the price of a HOUSE. It's about psychology isn't it. Everyone knew that amount for a flower was insane, but did it anyway. Because, after all, something is worth whatever people are paying for it don't ya know. Tell me this...how is your NFT colle…

You sound pretty jealous and bitter that you missed out in the best return on investment in human history.

When you end up with nothing left but a personal attack, that's how you know you lost a debate.

Re: The “strategic reserve” exposes crypto as the scam it always was

#142

Post by r3ctilinear »

SR2Z wrote: post #131
r3ctilinear wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolute sovereignty is the important detail that brings the strategic reserve argument into complete focus. There are many types of wealth but none of them offer the level of freedom against censorship and external interference that bitcoin does. In an increasingly multipolar world bitcoin offers the greatest degree of self sovereignty for individuals and nations alike.

Bitcoin is vulnerable to 51% attacks, and before China banned it there were mining pools that were intentionally limiting signups to avoid hitting that number. Then there's the throughput issue, the mandatory deflation, and a ton of other small issues that make it a terrible store of value. Bitcoin is subject to far more limitations than folks normally consider and certainly does not offer more "self-sovereignty" tha…

I have been using bitcoin since shortly after it's inception. I don't buy any of your spurious claims. Bitcoin survived the blocksize war of 2016 and it's only become more durable and secure since. 51% attack is now outrageously prohibitive. Gold is a fancy paperweight that's impractical to use. Adoption is happening hand over fist for a reason. If you can't see it too bad.

Re: The “strategic reserve” exposes crypto as the scam it always was

#143

Post by bufferoverflow »

InfiniteTitan wrote: post #96
bufferoverflow wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are at a war where your whole electric grid and internet and SMS are completely down, you have much bigger problems than currency not working. It means your bank accounts are gone, your credit cards are gone. And how are you actually going to use gold as currency? Walk into a shop and shave off some gold at the checkout? And how will the store owner authenticate that it's actually gold? Bullets will be a bette…

> And how will the store owner authenticate that it's actually gold? Umm this is a solved problem. Believe it or not gold has been used as currency for thousands of years.

It's not a solved problem. Notice how you didn't actually answer the question of how a random store will authenticate your gold shavings.

Even banks and large jewelers fail to authenticate gold.

https://testyourgold.com/gold-plated-tungsten-in-russian-ban...

https://decrypt.co/34033/chinese-firm-dumps-83-tonnes-of-fak...

Re: The “strategic reserve” exposes crypto as the scam it always was

#144

Post by SR2Z »

r3ctilinear wrote: post #142
SR2Z wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin is vulnerable to 51% attacks, and before China banned it there were mining pools that were intentionally limiting signups to avoid hitting that number. Then there's the throughput issue, the mandatory deflation, and a ton of other small issues that make it a terrible store of value. Bitcoin is subject to far more limitations than folks normally consider and certainly does not offer more "self-sovereignty" tha…

I have been using bitcoin since shortly after it's inception. I don't buy any of your spurious claims. Bitcoin survived the blocksize war of 2016 and it's only become more durable and secure since. 51% attack is now outrageously prohibitive. Gold is a fancy paperweight that's impractical to use. Adoption is happening hand over fist for a reason. If you can't see it too bad.

> 51% attack is now outrageously prohibitive

No, it's not! It's almost happened in the past - Google it. The rapid adoption and deployment of ASICs around subsidized or cheap electricity makes it relatively straightforward for anyone with real resources to pull it off.

> Gold is a fancy paperweight that's impractical to use

Bitcoin (the core blockchain) can only process about seven transactions per second. Don't tell me gold is impractical!

> I have been using bitcoin since shortly after it's inception

Yes, and that's the only reason you seem to able to believe these things. Tell me, what can you ACTUALLY buy with Bitcoin without requiring a conversion to fiat currency under the hood? It's not just for tax reasons, it's because it's an awful store of value and would be disastrous for any modern, long-lead supply chain to rely on.

> If you can't see it too bad.

What I see is a "currency" with such terrible liquidity and deflationary properties that Trump is planning to sell off the US gold reserve to pay out these "Bitcoin billionaires" who would otherwise be totally screwed.

Re: The “strategic reserve” exposes crypto as the scam it always was

#145

Post by r3ctilinear »

SR2Z wrote: post #144
r3ctilinear wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have been using bitcoin since shortly after it's inception. I don't buy any of your spurious claims. Bitcoin survived the blocksize war of 2016 and it's only become more durable and secure since. 51% attack is now outrageously prohibitive. Gold is a fancy paperweight that's impractical to use. Adoption is happening hand over fist for a reason. If you can't see it too bad.

> 51% attack is now outrageously prohibitive No, it's not! It's almost happened in the past - Google it. The rapid adoption and deployment of ASICs around subsidized or cheap electricity makes it relatively straightforward for anyone with real resources to pull it off. > Gold is a fancy paperweight that's impractical to use Bitcoin (the core blockchain) can only process about seven transactions per second. Don't tell…

Since the July 2014 mining pool distribution wake up call (the likely "attack" event you're referring to and blowing out of proportion) Bitcoin mining has become more decentralized and more mindful of safe hash rate distribution. The hash rate has also increased to be 4.5million times stronger(!!!) since then. Winning an arm wrestle against a ~1ZETTA hashes/second distributed protocol with an interest in self preservation is SO not "relatively straightforward" that it's funny.

Gold is utterly impractical unless it's paper gold in which case you have limited sovereignty over it. People keep cutting open gold bars and finding tungsten! lololol

The TPS works fine for me. So does store of value. So does layer 2 transactions. A new global monetary standard has arrived whether you like it or not.

Re: The “strategic reserve” exposes crypto as the scam it always was

#146

Post by harambae »

defrost wrote: post #136
tacon wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since Russia is loading planes with bricks of gold to pay for imports and evade banking sanctions, they must think bricks of gold are useful in a dire situation.

With an obvious drawback highlighted on the 15th of March 2018.

I had to look this one up…

“Approximately 3,400kg of gold ingots break free from a Nimbus Airlines Antonov An-12 cargo plane and fall onto the runway at Yakutsk Airport.”

Re: The “strategic reserve” exposes crypto as the scam it always was

#147

Post by dragonwriter »

r3ctilinear wrote: post #142
SR2Z wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin is vulnerable to 51% attacks, and before China banned it there were mining pools that were intentionally limiting signups to avoid hitting that number. Then there's the throughput issue, the mandatory deflation, and a ton of other small issues that make it a terrible store of value. Bitcoin is subject to far more limitations than folks normally consider and certainly does not offer more "self-sovereignty" tha…

I have been using bitcoin since shortly after it's inception. I don't buy any of your spurious claims. Bitcoin survived the blocksize war of 2016 and it's only become more durable and secure since. 51% attack is now outrageously prohibitive. Gold is a fancy paperweight that's impractical to use. Adoption is happening hand over fist for a reason. If you can't see it too bad.

> 51% attack is now outrageously prohibitive.

If there isn't a diversity of commodity suppliers of the best ASICs, then there are obviosuly actors for whom it is not prohobitive if a motive exists. Such actors exist even if there is such a diversity, really; the assumption has really always been that no one will have both the capacity and the motivatiom for carrying out a 51% attack.

Re: The “strategic reserve” exposes crypto as the scam it always was

#148

Post by dragonwriter »

bufferoverflow wrote: post #46
cypherpunks01 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best case is an argument similar to the reason the US gold reserve exists. While the gold no longer directly backs the currency, gold is a neutral asset and wouldn't go to zero during wars/depressions, so could be sold strategically if needed to fund government in a dire situation. The claim is that BTC is also a neutral asset, meaning it's not linked to any one government or economy, and it has certain propertie…

BTC is better than gold in many regards. - impossible to counterfeit - trivial to audit - easy to transfer - easier to store - its supply is actually limited (unlike gold, which is near-infinite in the universe). Most of it has been mined. Its supply will actually diminish over time, as keys get lost forever, though it's hard to tell how fast that process is.

> its supply is actually limited (unlike gold, which is near-infinite in the universe)

100% (to very many significant figures) of the gold in the universe has a sufficiently near infinite cost to deliver to the surface of the earth that it is irrelevant to any discussion of human economics; once that subset is eliminated, the available supply of gold is quite finite.

Re: The “strategic reserve” exposes crypto as the scam it always was

#149

Post by InfiniteTitan »

bufferoverflow wrote: post #143
InfiniteTitan wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And how will the store owner authenticate that it's actually gold? Umm this is a solved problem. Believe it or not gold has been used as currency for thousands of years.

It's not a solved problem. Notice how you didn't actually answer the question of how a random store will authenticate your gold shavings. Even banks and large jewelers fail to authenticate gold. https://testyourgold.com/gold-plated-tungsten-in-russian-ban... https://decrypt.co/34033/chinese-firm-dumps-83-tonnes-of-fak...

Simply incredible. Used for millennia as currency but not a solved problem to determine what is gold…
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