The Bitcoin Whales: 1,000 People Who Own 40 Percent of the Market • Hacker News Board

Re: The Bitcoin Whales: 1,000 People Who Own 40 Percent of the Market

#171

Post by dboreham » Fri, Dec 08, 2017, 4:20 PM UTC

metalliqaz wrote: post #46

sevensor wrote: post #28

It's interesting to see how this is playing out. Libertarians have long argued that government-issued fiat currency is a tool of state oppression. Now we have a real-world experiment demonstrating on a grand scale what happens when you create a currency by consensual fiat. I'd be interested to hear what libertarians think about this: Is Bitcoin truly the kind of currency libertarians have been advocating? Have I misc…

I have a very difficult time separating "true" libertarians with members of libertarian parties. Like people don't readily give up how pragmatic they are. On one end, there seem to be people who really yearn for pure individual freedom with no government at all. I'm pretty sure that was tried for the first 50,000 years of humanity and the results are well documented. (spoiler, for populations larger than ~100 people,…

What you are noticing is that one person's just cause is another person's business model. For many people the call to "have freedom and keep the government out your life" sounds wonderful, even if they either don't know exactly what that means, or if it means 1000 different things to 1000 people. It just sounds good. But it also allows some other people in the process to make more money. e.g. if you make money by digging something out the ground and selling it, you don't want to be told you can't dig any more and you don't want to be told you have to fill the hole in when you're done and put all the plants and wildlife back how it was. So you get a symbiotic relationship emerging between these two groups of folks : the money-makers spend their time and effort pushing "freedom", for purely personal gain, while the freedom-lovers eat it up, improving their self-esteem and feeling good about themselves even though they have very little actual freedom, and a big dirty hole in the ground next to their town.

Re: The Bitcoin Whales: 1,000 People Who Own 40 Percent of the Market

#172

Post by v-erne » Fri, Dec 08, 2017, 4:20 PM UTC

clarkmoody wrote: post #155

frgtpsswrdlame wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Since taxes are not voluntary >The libertarian position is that human interactions should be voluntary, so the coercion problem is where libertarians find issue first. Do you believe obeying property law is voluntary? I find it to be coercive.

Instead of answering your question, I will leave this: Very small children understand and recognize property, since it is a natural right. The toy in my hand is "mine," and when some other kid comes along and takes it, I get upset.

Yeah, right, I’m guessing that You have limited access to children. Otherwise You World have known that they recognize everything as their property (unless the original owner is stronger than them)

Re: The Bitcoin Whales: 1,000 People Who Own 40 Percent of the Market

#173

Post by moduspol » Fri, Dec 08, 2017, 4:23 PM UTC

metalliqaz wrote: post #46

sevensor wrote: post #28

It's interesting to see how this is playing out. Libertarians have long argued that government-issued fiat currency is a tool of state oppression. Now we have a real-world experiment demonstrating on a grand scale what happens when you create a currency by consensual fiat. I'd be interested to hear what libertarians think about this: Is Bitcoin truly the kind of currency libertarians have been advocating? Have I misc…

I have a very difficult time separating "true" libertarians with members of libertarian parties. Like people don't readily give up how pragmatic they are. On one end, there seem to be people who really yearn for pure individual freedom with no government at all. I'm pretty sure that was tried for the first 50,000 years of humanity and the results are well documented. (spoiler, for populations larger than ~100 people,…

> Anyway, I think most Libertarians would be cool with a handful of ultra-wealthy, because they really think they can conquer the market someday and be one of them.

The existence of ultra-wealthy people isn't inherently bad.

The question is about the alternative. If everyone's quality of life improves (including relative to the ultra-wealthy), I'd rather that happen than reduce everyone's quality of life out of a sense of "fairness."

Claiming most libertarians act against their own interests because they think they can become ultra-wealthy is straw-manning the view.

Re: The Bitcoin Whales: 1,000 People Who Own 40 Percent of the Market

#174

Post by VMG » Fri, Dec 08, 2017, 4:28 PM UTC

frgtpsswrdlame wrote: post #138

VMG wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you disagree with money printing, your vote will not matter. In bitcoin, the inflation schedule can be checked very easily. It doesn't matter who is creating it as long as the supply is stable and predictable.

>If you disagree with money printing, your vote will not matter. It would matter more than my (non-existent) vote in bitcoin would. >It doesn't matter who is creating it as long as the supply is stable and predictable. So to be clear, your problem isn't that the fed is centralized and btc is decentralized it's that btc is regular and the fed can be irregular?

> It would matter more than my (non-existent) vote in bitcoin would.

You don't have to use it though.

> So to be clear, your problem isn't that the fed is centralized and btc is decentralized it's that btc is regular and the fed can be irregular?

Both aspects are problematic. It's not only the FED that is centralized, the banking system itself is. Bitcoin is Peer-to-peer without trusted third parties.

Re: The Bitcoin Whales: 1,000 People Who Own 40 Percent of the Market

#175

Post by jsutton » Fri, Dec 08, 2017, 4:32 PM UTC

mmgutz wrote: post #96

I read an interesting analogy yesterday in a poker chat of all places. The guy basically said, let's put bitcoin to buy a coffee litmus test. If I were to buy a cup of coffee in the current frenzy, I would be at the cashier waiting a day for the transaction to go through and when it does go through the fee for transaction would be greater than cost of the coffee. If that is true, how is bitcoin better? Would that tra…

Bitcoin isn't better as a currency, that use of Bitcoin is long gone. It's a store of value and the backbone of the cryptocurrency market place at the moment. Most cryptocurrencies are paired with BTC.

Re: The Bitcoin Whales: 1,000 People Who Own 40 Percent of the Market

#176

Post by whoopdedo » Fri, Dec 08, 2017, 4:33 PM UTC

nnash wrote: post #119

sevensor wrote: post #28

It's interesting to see how this is playing out. Libertarians have long argued that government-issued fiat currency is a tool of state oppression. Now we have a real-world experiment demonstrating on a grand scale what happens when you create a currency by consensual fiat. I'd be interested to hear what libertarians think about this: Is Bitcoin truly the kind of currency libertarians have been advocating? Have I misc…

Considering the difficulty involved in even buying bitcoin I'd have to say no. If you want to make a sizeable investment you need to hand over large amounts of personal data to an exchange. I'm talking the works; routing number, passport, proof of residency etc. I should be able to simply walk to a BTC ATM put cash in and add it to a wallet on my phone (perhaps you can in some places?). Additionally, exchanges like C…

Or just pay more to move your money into a country that doesn't care about such things, then buy it truly anonymously.

Or mine it if you have access to cheap electricity and can afford the equipment to be near the top in hashing speed.

In either case, you can see how Bitcoin wealth is biased to people with lots of fiat to begin with. I question if there could be any new currency that would not suffer the same inequality.

Re: The Bitcoin Whales: 1,000 People Who Own 40 Percent of the Market

#177

Post by trhway » Fri, Dec 08, 2017, 4:33 PM UTC

clarkmoody wrote: post #155

frgtpsswrdlame wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Since taxes are not voluntary >The libertarian position is that human interactions should be voluntary, so the coercion problem is where libertarians find issue first. Do you believe obeying property law is voluntary? I find it to be coercive.

Instead of answering your question, I will leave this: Very small children understand and recognize property, since it is a natural right. The toy in my hand is "mine," and when some other kid comes along and takes it, I get upset.

>Very small children understand and recognize property, since it is a natural right.

they also tend to shit when and where they want (would you say that "it is a natural right" too?). The point of upbringing in civilized society is to put under control the "natural" instincts. And what you mentioned is an instinct, not a right. The notion of rights comes later as the rules that the people with developed "bladder control" agree upon in order to live together and cooperate.

Re: The Bitcoin Whales: 1,000 People Who Own 40 Percent of the Market

#178

Post by pc86 » Fri, Dec 08, 2017, 4:34 PM UTC

avar wrote: post #146

specialp wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess you didn't read the article you posted as evidence. In that article it says all the gold ever mined is 187,200 tons. Percentage of reserves != percentage of gold market. That would have the USA at ~5% and that is a country of 300+ million people. This is a lot different than 1000 individuals.

In the context of this discussion, which is gold holders hypothetically pumping & dumping the market it's pretty much only the big reserve holders that matter. How do you think someone who's gold holdings are 1 kg in a warehouse embedded in motherboards is going to extract that to dump it on the market? Most gold by weight is effectively illiquid, while every Bitcoin is equally liquid. As the source the article uses[…

> it's pretty much only the big reserve holders that matter

We're talking about the entire BTC ecosystem. You can't compare that to a 16% sliver of the entire gold market because that fits your argument better.

> Most gold by weight is effectively illiquid, while every Bitcoin is equally liquid.

Which was basically my point, is that BTC-to-gold is an apples-to-airliners comparison and is at best a strained analogy.

Re: The Bitcoin Whales: 1,000 People Who Own 40 Percent of the Market

#179

Post by googletazer » Fri, Dec 08, 2017, 4:37 PM UTC

frgtpsswrdlame wrote: post #160

clarkmoody wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead of answering your question, I will leave this: Very small children understand and recognize property, since it is a natural right. The toy in my hand is "mine," and when some other kid comes along and takes it, I get upset.

>Very small children understand and recognize property, since it is a natural right. The toy in my hand is "mine," and when some other kid comes along and takes it, I get upset. When a very small child in a poor family looks at what is under a wealthy family's Christmas tree he's also going to be upset. Does that make a relatively equal distribution of Christmas presents a natural right? I see no basis for decrying a…

Upset/uncomfortable - maybe, but at who? The rich family? His own family? Himself? Society? All of those?

People on hackernews and in general tend to view "negative" feelings, envy, etc... as generically "bad". These feelings are evolutionary signals from your primal brain that something isn't going right. Its up to you to fix that, however you see fit.

Re: The Bitcoin Whales: 1,000 People Who Own 40 Percent of the Market

#180

Post by clarkmoody » Fri, Dec 08, 2017, 4:38 PM UTC

fsloth wrote: post #163

clarkmoody wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Government-issued currencies usually come with legal tender laws and citizens are required to pay taxes using the government money. Since taxes are not voluntary, this creates built-in demand for the fiat money. The creators of alternative competitor-money are punished as well. The libertarian position is that human interactions should be voluntary, so the coercion problem is where libertarians find issue first. A si…

"The libertarian position is that human interactions should be voluntary, so the coercion problem is where libertarians find issue first." So basically everyone should be armed to their teeth? Because, if there is no state to impose control, a warlord will emerge who will. Or is there some other solution to the problem that humans have known tendencies toward violence and power hunger?

But Wouldn't Warlords Take Over?[1]

[1] https://mises.org/library/wouldnt-warlords-take-over