Live data from Hacker News

Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

thehill.com

181–184 of 184 posts

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#181
post #87
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The notion that nation-state issued fiat currency is based “solely” on convincing others they have value is quite a reductive over-simplification. The existence of organized societies with some central government body has shown value, and the means of exchange amongst citizens and with citizens of other societies is backed in part by that value. It’s quite a bit more complex than you suggest.

The value of fiat currencies is "based solely convincing others they have value" - it is trust in the issuer. You are arguing that trusting issuers has been societal valuable, which sure - historically it has been for the fiat currencies that still exist (if you ignore survivorship bias). Not sure what handwaving "society is valuable and that value is what backs fiat currencies" even means in concrete terms. The gove…

* The value of fiat currencies is "based solely convincing others they have value" - it is trust in the issuer.*

You can continue to assert this, but that doesn’t make it true. And it is definitely not “hand waving” to make the observation that organizational structures provide value. Some more than others, depending on the context and time. Fiat currency arises out of the dominant current organization into nation-states, and the value is from the same root. It’s more or less an emergent property, not the directed efforts of some few elites to convince everyone else of the value. If and when this organization loses value, we’d likely see a similar devaluation of fiat currency. For example, a “mad max” apocalypse scenario.

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#182
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've said this so many times: But what does it doooooo??? Are you asking about Bitcoin or Crypto? Bitcoin doesn't do much atm, but Ethereum does stuff, and Bitcoin Cash is pretty practical as a currency at the moment. There's plenty that can be done, but the market will have to decide what to converge on.

OK then, what does it do? Feel free to tell me. I've asked a lot of times and have never gotten a good response.

If you are genuinely interested, one nice example is this animated short series that sold out yesterday in half an hour: https://www.stonercats.com/faq

It sold NFTs (characters from the show with random properties, look at https://opensea.io/collection/stoner-cats-official for some examples) and each owner of an NFT obtains the right to view the actual episode when released. As these NFTs can be resold, people are collecting their favorite characters, bidding against each other. The makers of the series get a kickback for each sell

Because this is on Ethereum, this unlocks all sorts of other possibilities, some of which are described in the FAQ. Additionally:

* people could rent out their NFT in the future for others to view the episodes

* NFTs can be used as collateral for loans

* the makers of the series could distribute additional earnings back to the NFT holders

Of course, this is doable without a blockchain. But then it wouldn't have these directly on launch:

* a platform to sell the initial set of NFTs, publicly accessible and distributed provably fair

* a large number of wallets (and websites), all able to visualize the NFT to their owners

* a simple method of restricting access to the series to NFT buyers

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#183
post #172
post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I called out whats wrong in your logic. I never claimed anything about fiat/stock or whatever. Its irrelevant, the only point you made FOR bitcoin (namely that no one can take it away from you) is moot because the value can still go away there is just no one to sue/blame if it happens.

You missed the point. Bitcoins value can go to zero. Stocks, bonds, cash: all monetary instruments' value can go to zero. Non-crypto assets can also be taken from you against your will. Part of why Bitcoin is valuable is because it cannot be seized without consent of the owner (if owner is diligent about security). Your criticism of Bitcoin broadly applies to all forms of "saving money" or preserving value. Value can…

No you missed the point. There was never any comparisons between BTC any other "money". There was just your claim that no one could take away you BTC which is true but irrelevant because you dont want the BTC you want the value. Which can be taken away form you any time. It doesn't matter that this is true for other money types as well. You specifically said that his is unique to BTC but its not true. No one said the claim you made is true for other types of money. Its just wrong for BTC.

>Your criticism of Bitcoin...

No, it did not it pointed out the flaw in your claim. Your logic is nonsense. Thats not a critic on BTC at all.

>Your argument essentially boils down to "I believe Bitcoin in particular will crash more than other monetary instruments, so it doesn't have value"

Again no, that was not my argument nor what I said and not even implied. You make shit up on the go to deflect from what I actually said which has nothing to do with bitcoin but everything with your nonsense claim t which you already agreed on that is is wrong as you said ... >"....applies to all forms of "saving money" or preserving value."

Re: Bye-bye, Bitcoin: It's time to ban cryptocurrencies

#184
post #170
post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does it matter? BTC and ETH are the version 1 of something "new". The version one is the playground. There is plenty demand for ETH/BTC like systems without the inefficiencies and so people are building better systems. Flare is an new project that will (maybe, probably, who knows) be able to run everything ETH can because it uses the EVM but it does not use PoW or PoS and thus will not have the fees and slowness. May…

to summarize: - in an ancestor post, crypto skeptic asks "but what does it doooo?" - response, "Bitcoin doesn't do much, but Ethereum does stuff" - me, skeptical "But does Ethereum actually do stuff?" - answer: "no, but something else in the future might" We're 13 years into blockchain technologies, and it seems like there's still not a convincing case of it being a good, useful solution to a real need. Saying that t…

You have to differ between use-case and tech A good use-case likely does not work on the popular tech that we have today.

Like the original use-case of p2p-money (ignore if this use-case actually makes sense or not). It does not work with bitcoin, its way to slow and expensive.

Now if you create a new "bitcoin" that does work for the use case p2p-cash then this should in theory replace the old bitcoin. But in reality it does not. Bitcoin turned into a gambling thing and tribalism over what the real bitcoin is and should do. And your actual solution likely gets no attention at all because its just one of many thousands of other blockchains from which 99+% are useless and probably hundred also say they solved the p2p-cash problem. The chance to taking over bitcoin is essentially zero in the near time future it doesn't matter how much better something is. We have tech that objectively way way better than bitcoin since at lest 8 years now and no one who is not into crypto has ever heard form it. Low TPS/Longe blocktims/energy consumption etc. etc. all solved problems since many many years, yet this is what mainstream crypto talks about.

So your better bitcoin does not "succeed" since 8+ years...

Does that mean the tech you made for p2p-cash is bad/useless? Does that mean the tech does not work for the use-case? Does that mean another XX years without anything useful coming out? It sure looks like that but maybe it just means that everyone else has no clue what tech and use-cases actually could/would/do work because they are all in the shadow of the big 1 coin that failed at everything it tired to be but gets all the attention anyway.

I'm not saying the next thing will magically do everything better. But its just a matter of time before projects that actually do something get the attention. It may take a long long time for that to happen. Most of the new people who came into the crypto space in the last years are in no way able to distinguish between useless stuff like bitcoin, stuff that is straight out a scams and stuff that actually solve a problem better than solutions without blockchain tech could. They are often not even into tech, they are into money. All the scams would not work if a majority of people would have a decent understanding of the tech.

And even the people who have the skills, can not evaluate the different techs in a meaningful way. Ive dug into many projects myself over the years and almost everything is useless but most I will never even look at because it somehow has to get my attention first.

Nonetheless there is n doubt the tech is revolutionary and it will sooner or later power stuff normal people use likely without them knowing, also likely stuff that has nothing to do with money. Its kinda funny how the whole crypto space focuses on how to use the tech with money but there so much more that can be done.

Post reply on HN