Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is the proposal publicly available somewhere?
https://medium.com/@bitcoinroundtable/bitcoin-roundtable-con...
That's the Hong Kong agreement, which I already know about. I was asking for the proposal tfha mentioned.
The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November
151–160 of 188 posts
Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November
#152Earlier quoted context omitted.
The price is 5x since after the ETH hype started a few months ago. Literally just look at the price history.
Correlation does not imply causation. Did I really have to tell someone on HN this?
You asked for reasoning, not evidence, so it might be helpful not to move those goalposts.
Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November
#153Earlier quoted context omitted.
No they’ve been calling just about everyone operating in their jurisdiction. Many ‘reputable’ ICOs have halted their fundraising as a result of phone calls their lawyers received from the SEC. They’ve only filed suits agains the obvious scams so far, but that’s just a matter of priorities and the fact that they try to be soft handed with non-scams.
I believe it and a very good point. But do you have a source?
Not a quotable one no, although some like colony.io have blog posts explaining why they are changing the terms or schedule of their ICO. Others have refunded their ICO. But it is Back channel sources that tell me the others have received calls too (I work in this industry).
Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November
#154Earlier quoted context omitted.
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 outcome…
It surprises me to see this downvoted.
One fundamental of investing is that stocks represent an economically productive asset. In contrast, commodities just sit there. If I buy a chunk of a company, that company is working to become a bigger, more effective, more value-generating company. If I buy an ounce of gold, it stays an ounce of gold.
Index funds represent a broader bet still. Because they're composed of many things, volatility is lower and you're betting on whatever the common factors of the index are. So buying an SP500 index fund could easily be said to be a bet on the American economy.
And in many ways, Bitcoin is worse than gold. The historical value of gold is known. Bitcoin is new. Gold's floor price is set by the practical use value of it, both industrial and decorative. Bitcoin's floor price is that of bits. That is, zero. The gold market is broad, with producers and consumers all over the world, and open markets in many countries. Bitcoin is effectively controlled by a relatively small number of people and requires careful long-term cooperation of those people.
So it seems pretty obvious to me that Bitcoin is much higher risk. Which can mean higher reward. But as anybody who has shares in a failed startup knows, higher risk doesn't guarantee higher reward.
Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not sure why this is being downvoted. It seems spot on to me. People argue that Bitcoin is a great investment because it's going to go up, up, up! And people argue that it's a good store of value. But they can't both be true. Reward and risk are strongly related. Nobody should know that better than startup people.
"I'm not sure why this is being downvoted. It seems spot on to me. " Bitcoin is a religious subject among the tech crowd. The most fascinating thing about BTC has nothing to do with 'block-chain' - it's the manner in which it has created hype among tech circles. Techies look at it from a tech perspective, financial types from a financial perspective. From a financial perspective, BTC is downright bizarre. Even the 't…
Excellent point.
I am really impressed with it as a technology. It's absolutely brilliant.
But when I put on my business hat, I'm still not seeing it. For quite a number of years I've been asking for proof of daily use among significant market segments. For just as many years, I've been getting, "OMG THINK OF THE FUTURE!!!" as an answer.
I have some hope that we're at peak BTC hype, though. A lot of the enthusiasm (and the bigger scams) seem to have moved on to smart contracts, ICOs, etc. It's much harder now to ignore Bitcoin's years of not being very useful.
Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
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 outcome…
It surprises me to see this downvoted. One fundamental of investing is that stocks represent an economically productive asset. In contrast, commodities just sit there. If I buy a chunk of a company, that company is working to become a bigger, more effective, more value-generating company. If I buy an ounce of gold, it stays an ounce of gold. Index funds represent a broader bet still. Because they're composed of many…
It doesn't surprise me. HN is very pro tech, even when they don't understand the foundation of what they are betting on.
I own 1 share of a SP500 ETF. That gives me an actual fractional ownership of Apple. That gives me an actual cut of the dividends of real american companies. It has an actual meaning of what you own.
What does 1 BTC give you? What is the fundamental purpose of a BTC?
Tulips went up in price too, but they were not a very smart investments. Tulip chases do not win in the long term.
Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November
#157Earlier 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?
That is the wrong measure. The counter argument to that is something like "How did going 100% all in to pets.com in 2000-2001 go?"
You cannot judge future performance by past results. That is the fundamental thing you need to understand before investing. Zoom in on the right part of 2000, and pets.com and a really nice upswing. There have been other stocks that had a nice and steady growth for years and years.. before exploding.
Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November
#158Earlier quoted context omitted.
The largest 500 retailers is an excellent representation of the largest 500 retailers. I think it's also a fine proxy for mainstream ecommerce. That's certainly a metric that Bitcoin advocates would have been happy with, say, 5 years ago. Then they were agitating for major retailers to accept it as the obvious coming thing. The fact that new major merchants are not joining and old merchants are going to the trouble o…
The largest 500 retailers are a poor representation of all retailers. Especially because Bitcoin tends to be more often accepted at small—as opposed to large—retailers. And again the sample size is way too small. Two (2!) retailers dropping it means nothing, in particular because other larger more significant data points contradict this small sample size: BitPay doing 1B/yr at +328% growth... hardly a sign the "visio…
You seem to be working very hard not to understand their point. Or mine.
The largest 500 retailers is an excellent representation of major retailers. It's also a reasonable indicator to use for general consumer behavior, because what makes retailers the largest is their use by consumers.
You could claim that a loss of 2 retailers isn't significant proof of decline, although since it's 2 of 5, a 40% decline seems notable to me. But regardless, having less than 1% market penetration in this segment (and declining) is a pretty good sign that it is not currently successful. If you pitched some VC partners with that as proof of traction, they'd laugh you out of the room.
The BitPay post is definitely interesting, but they're cagey enough about their numbers that it's hard to tell what's actually growing. You might be able to use it to make an argument that BitPay is succeeding in some other segment. But it definitely doesn't prove mainstream consumer ecommerce success. Which apparently isn't interesting to you, but to major ecommerce companies, it's very interesting indeed.
Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
That is a very pessimistic view on the current state of LN. There are three independent open-source LN implementations [1, 2, 3] out there that are being worked on and already implement basic functionality. All three contribute to an document, called Basics Of The Lightning Network (BOLT) [4], which forms an open standard for LN. I wouldn't call it vaporware. Yes, there are unsurprisingly open questions. But nothing…
In the broad terms, how do you even imagine LN to work? Let's say I want to buy a $3 coffee at some random Starbucks I'm walking by. Do we have to first open and fund the channel? How much will it all cost just for that one off purchase? Give particular figures please, no vague nonsense I hear all the time. As for these implementations, I will believe it when I see it. You didn't even try to address the particular is…
You could be transacting your coffee with any crypto that Starbucks supports, and which is compatible with the lightning network. Litecoin will work for this example.
So Starbucks ask you to pay via Litecoin, which is fine by you even though you don't have a Litecoin balance. Atomic swaps over lightning network funded by some bitcoin you own, converted to Litecoin, is how you'll pay for your coffee.
Re: The Bitcoin Apocalypse Is Coming in Mid-November
#160Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the broad terms, how do you even imagine LN to work? Let's say I want to buy a $3 coffee at some random Starbucks I'm walking by. Do we have to first open and fund the channel? How much will it all cost just for that one off purchase? Give particular figures please, no vague nonsense I hear all the time. As for these implementations, I will believe it when I see it. You didn't even try to address the particular is…
You could be transacting your coffee with any crypto that Starbucks supports, and which is compatible with the lightning network. Litecoin will work for this example. So Starbucks ask you to pay via Litecoin, which is fine by you even though you don't have a Litecoin balance. Atomic swaps over lightning network funded by some bitcoin you own, converted to Litecoin, is how you'll pay for your coffee.
What if they only accept bitcoin? That's the case for most businesses accepting cryptocurrencies.
Both of you are suspiciously avoiding a direct and simple question. How does LN work on Bitcoin in this case?