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

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

#281

Post by frgtpsswrdlame »

monort wrote: post #271
xg15 wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, it is - which proves the parent's point. This would be an example of something that's both just and coercive.

But this definition is unusual and doesn't bring any insight. It reminds me about psychological egoism, that says that there is no altruism, everything is egoism. Technically correct, but doesn't help to explain altruism-behavior.

No, I don't believe so. Take taxes, taxes are coercive because if you refuse to follow tax law then the government enacts violence against you right?

Now take property, property is coercive because if you refuse to follow property law then the government enacts violence against you.

It's one to one.

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

#282

Post by lisper »

KirinDave wrote: post #279
lisper wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> using fiat currencies to buy the hardware and energy The process had to be bootstrapped somehow. And given that the world's economy at the time bitcoin was invented ran on fiat currency, it's not surprising that fiat currency was used to help bootstrap the process. > I'm not sure what your point is here. My point is that your original claim: > Buuuuut, they bought it with fiat currencies, in many cases USD. So... r…

Did you read a sentence that you disagreed with and then immediately refused to finish the paragraph? > A valid criticism of this argument is that it's a variant of the the serf comic argument (or genetic fallacy) in which those embedded in a bad system may not question it because they benefit from it. I'm just saying, the idea that there is in fact an equitable pre-distribution of agency and power to draw from is fa…

When you begin your argument with a claim that is factually incorrect there is no need to read further to know that the argument is invalid.

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

#283

Post by [deleted] »

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…

[deleted]

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

#284

Post by ggm »

cantrip wrote: post #251
ggm wrote: post #244

In classic gambling, whales are the people you comp high worth rooms, food, drugs to, because they are willing to drop huge sums on the games of chance. You nurture whales, to make a living off whales. You fly your whales to interesting casinos and then quietly wait for the odds to fall in your favour. Is this the metaphor the bitcoin-digerati want?

The whale metaphor in this sense means something completely different. Language is highly subjective, so no the gambling metaphor is not applicable here.

the whale metaphor is subject to multiple interpretations and gambling is pretty much what hodl is.

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

#286

Post by VMG »

rspeer wrote: post #232
VMG wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is more ethical than financing wars through deficit spending. A on-chain bitcoin transaction allows an arbitrary number of off-chain transactions.

How many times are people going to try whataboutism on HN? Everyone can recognize it by now. The existence of war does not absolve you. If your standard of morality is "everything that's better than war is okay", you have approximately no morality.

The whataboutism started with uninformed statements about bitcoin energy usage. My rebuttal is about the costs of the alternatives.

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

#287

Post by googletazer »

UncleMeat wrote: post #272
googletazer wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They could have been doing something else with their time. Instead they were mining, promoting, and trading this technology. By definition there is an opportunity cost to being an early adopter instead of going with the flow - so indeed they took a risk.

Does that opportunity cost justify owning a meaningful percentage of all of the coins that will ever exist?

What does "justify" mean here? Are you somehow saying its not fair that early adopters have a lot of coins?

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

#289

Post by em3rgent0rdr »

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…

> "What do you think about the concentration of Bitcoins in the hands of a small number of people?"

It should be emphasized that bitcoins don't have a fixed value (bitcoin can't force an exchange rate), and that anyone can created a competing currency (bitcoin can't force people to accept bitcoin). So although bitcoins may be concentrated, that doesn't necessarily mean that wealth is being concentrated. A lot of (non-libertarians particularly) mistakenly conflate currency with wealth.

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

#290

Post by KirinDave »

lisper wrote: post #282
KirinDave wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you read a sentence that you disagreed with and then immediately refused to finish the paragraph? > A valid criticism of this argument is that it's a variant of the the serf comic argument (or genetic fallacy) in which those embedded in a bad system may not question it because they benefit from it. I'm just saying, the idea that there is in fact an equitable pre-distribution of agency and power to draw from is fa…

When you begin your argument with a claim that is factually incorrect there is no need to read further to know that the argument is invalid.

So. You didn't read it. Proudly.

And it IS factually correct in that there was state-maintained fiat currency at the genesis of nearly every story, we just both agree it doesn't matter that much.

Consider how uninteresting this exchange is, and how much of our collective time you've wasted by not reading the entire post. You've spent MUCH more time talking with me (and I with you) than if you had JUST READ THE POST.

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