The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money • Hacker News Board

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#311

Post by mullingitover » Wed, Jul 13, 2022, 9:39 PM UTC

bananarchist wrote: post #305

kkielhofner wrote: post #289

When will the blockchain ecosystem provide something with that "WOW I need this in my life right now" factor to the average user? Google went from a research project to incorporated and usable on the internet in roughly two years with a total investment of about $2mm in 2022 money. Let's just say the pace of innovation had some serious roadblocks at the time (they literally had to build their own servers and host the…

No user has ever said "WOW I need Google search engine in my life right now" they said "WOW I need some gotdang funny cat pics" and google proved a means to resolve that desire. Similarly, no one will ever say "WOW I need blockchain in my life right now" but they might say "WOW I need to send some money" or "WOW some of my friends are making their money work for them maybe I too should do some speculating" or "WOW I…

> No user has ever said "WOW I need Google search engine in my life right now"

I sure did, and I wasn't alone. I remember thinking the existing search engines were trash long before google came around. The market was starving for a search engine that was user-focused and not 200% bought and paid for by marketers.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#312

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Jul 13, 2022, 9:41 PM UTC

threeseed wrote: post #298

eldenwrong wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah sending value through the internet without an intermediary that can't be stopped, confiscated or censored is whatever Maybe the problem is that you lack an understanding of what money should be and what problems banking and fiat have?

I would argue the negatives outweigh the positives here: Tax evasion, money laundering, trafficking, drugs, sanctions evasion etc. Since the introduction of KYC it's very hard to do any of these in the traditional finance system. And each of them has very serious implications for people's lives.

[deleted]

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#313

Post by kkielhofner » Wed, Jul 13, 2022, 9:42 PM UTC

bananarchist wrote: post #305

kkielhofner wrote: post #289

When will the blockchain ecosystem provide something with that "WOW I need this in my life right now" factor to the average user? Google went from a research project to incorporated and usable on the internet in roughly two years with a total investment of about $2mm in 2022 money. Let's just say the pace of innovation had some serious roadblocks at the time (they literally had to build their own servers and host the…

No user has ever said "WOW I need Google search engine in my life right now" they said "WOW I need some gotdang funny cat pics" and google proved a means to resolve that desire. Similarly, no one will ever say "WOW I need blockchain in my life right now" but they might say "WOW I need to send some money" or "WOW some of my friends are making their money work for them maybe I too should do some speculating" or "WOW I…

Correct - no one asked for Google but it provided instant value and utility to anyone walking down the street inside of two years with $2mm.

"WOW I need to send some money". Enter: PayPal, Venmo, Trust Wise, and any number of others.

There are plenty of ways to gamble and speculate without touching blockchain if that's your thing. What's amazing is even a mafia bookie or the shadiest of casinos won't pull a Celsius on you.

Don't trust the government? With blockchain you're expected to completely trust yourself and any number of shady characters in the blockchain space. Clicked the wrong link and your wallet got hacked? Sorry. Forget your seed/passphrase? Sorry. Some defi exchange with a buggy smart contract (as if there are any that don't have bugs)? Sorry. Picked the wrong exchange and the people behind it faked their own death and disappeared with your money? Sorry. The list goes on and on.

Other than the absolute worst and shadiest governments in the world do you trust these factors and actors more? Does anyone else?

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#314

Post by arcticbull » Wed, Jul 13, 2022, 9:43 PM UTC

alchemist1e9 wrote: post #279

arcticbull wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Fed didn't bail out anyone in 2008. Treasury did. Also, the bail-outs weren't grants, they were loans, and they have been re-paid yielding $110B in profit so far with plenty more to come. [1] I was opposed to bail-outs in 2008 personally, but in retrospect it's very difficult to look back and say that it was anything other than an unequivocal success. Hundreds of thousands of jobs were saved and it was super prof…

Yes they did, Maiden Lane [1], which was distinct from TARP you are referring to. I had a somewhat upfront seat at that time and the unequivocal success narrative is, in my opinion, extremely dishonest and manipulative. We haven’t even started to talk about QE which is actually why the Fed and TARP bailouts (aka investments) ended up being profitable. There are a huge number of losers from 2008 which can’t be seen fr…

> On June 14, 2012, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York announced that its loans to Maiden Lane LLC (ML LLC) and Maiden Lane III LLC (ML III LLC) have been fully repaid with interest. Maiden Lane II LLC repaid its obligations of $19.4 billion on February 28, 2012.

Loans. Fully paid, with interest - the profits also went to Treasury. Also, they seem to have been a rounding error compared to the scale of the rest of the program, but you're right that the actions weren't exclusively Treasury. However, they were primarily Treasury.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#315

Post by whiskyant » Wed, Jul 13, 2022, 9:44 PM UTC

Aaronstotle wrote: post #222

TrapLord_Rhodo wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> its hard cap does not incentive actual use as a means of exchange. Why? Is that because it's has 'Scarcity'? People will pay more for it in the future? If that case is so soundly put why would you not buy as much btc as possible? Playing a bit of devils advocate here but wouldn't you say that it's volitility leads to more trading? Means of exchange need to be further defined in this crazy overfinancialized world we…

I'll use my own example, I purchased a month of a VPN service using BTC when it was ~11k, it's about $5 in fiat per month. If you believe BTC will only go up, I don't see why you would want to spend it if your money will be worth more if you wait. Regarding Volatility, yes it leads to a lot of trading, I mean means of exchange as purchasing everyday goods. The transaction history of BTC also adds regulatory hurdles.

That’s like saying I don’t see why anyone would spend cash when they could buy index funds instead (if you believe index funds will only go up).

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#316

Post by nwiswell » Wed, Jul 13, 2022, 9:44 PM UTC

kkielhofner wrote: post #289

When will the blockchain ecosystem provide something with that "WOW I need this in my life right now" factor to the average user? Google went from a research project to incorporated and usable on the internet in roughly two years with a total investment of about $2mm in 2022 money. Let's just say the pace of innovation had some serious roadblocks at the time (they literally had to build their own servers and host the…

Broadly I agree with the argument that crypto is taking an awful long time to come up with the killer app, but this is not a fair analysis.

Let's be clear: when Google exploded, that was the growth of the Internet in the driver's seat, not demand for Google specifically. Google's growth was a side effect of the exponential growth of the internet because it solved a need where there was no adequate incumbent solution, and where demand for that solution was growing exponentially for reasons basically unrelated to the quality of the solution.

This isn't the case for crypto, because there's an incumbent solution that works fine. More specifically, in our analogy, money is the counterpart of the Internet. Crypto is in the position of needing to slowly sap market share from an incumbent (government fiat) in the same way that, for example, DuckDuckGo does even if you feel it's a superior product.

If Bitcoin was the first-ever instance of money, I assure you its growth profile would look like Google's did.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#317

Post by olalonde » Wed, Jul 13, 2022, 9:44 PM UTC

kkielhofner wrote: post #289

When will the blockchain ecosystem provide something with that "WOW I need this in my life right now" factor to the average user? Google went from a research project to incorporated and usable on the internet in roughly two years with a total investment of about $2mm in 2022 money. Let's just say the pace of innovation had some serious roadblocks at the time (they literally had to build their own servers and host the…

Bitcoin is not a concrete product like Google Search or a smartphone. It's more of an idea, like free speech. The idea being money without a central authority, something that has never really existed before (digitally, at least). No one woke up one day and thought "WOW I need democracy" or "WOW I need free speech". It's abstract and doesn't gratify immediately. The average person does not even have a conception that money could be something entirely different.

Also, Bitcoin threatens the status quo in a massive way. Not only private businesses like banks but also powerful entities like governments and intergovernmental organizations.

Needless to say, I don't expect adoption to be comparable to that of a web search engine.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#318

Post by v4dok » Wed, Jul 13, 2022, 9:46 PM UTC

mullingitover wrote: post #311

bananarchist wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No user has ever said "WOW I need Google search engine in my life right now" they said "WOW I need some gotdang funny cat pics" and google proved a means to resolve that desire. Similarly, no one will ever say "WOW I need blockchain in my life right now" but they might say "WOW I need to send some money" or "WOW some of my friends are making their money work for them maybe I too should do some speculating" or "WOW I…

> No user has ever said "WOW I need Google search engine in my life right now" I sure did, and I wasn't alone. I remember thinking the existing search engines were trash long before google came around. The market was starving for a search engine that was user-focused and not 200% bought and paid for by marketers.

Wait, did you describe what Google is currently?

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#319

Post by eldenwrong » Wed, Jul 13, 2022, 9:46 PM UTC

threeseed wrote: post #298

eldenwrong wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah sending value through the internet without an intermediary that can't be stopped, confiscated or censored is whatever Maybe the problem is that you lack an understanding of what money should be and what problems banking and fiat have?

I would argue the negatives outweigh the positives here: Tax evasion, money laundering, trafficking, drugs, sanctions evasion etc. Since the introduction of KYC it's very hard to do any of these in the traditional finance system. And each of them has very serious implications for people's lives.

You must be joking. What exactly has stopped since KYC? Absolutely nothing. The ones doing the laundering are literally the banks/governments/big corps. KYC was just an excuse to increase surveillance

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#320

Post by lrvick » Wed, Jul 13, 2022, 9:50 PM UTC

kkielhofner wrote: post #289

When will the blockchain ecosystem provide something with that "WOW I need this in my life right now" factor to the average user? Google went from a research project to incorporated and usable on the internet in roughly two years with a total investment of about $2mm in 2022 money. Let's just say the pace of innovation had some serious roadblocks at the time (they literally had to build their own servers and host the…

It is really important to understand that decentralized systems take dramatically longer to upgrade, and thus to mature, than centralized systems.

They also tend to last forever once established: see e-mail.