All You Need to Know About Bitcoin's Rise, from $0.01 to $11,000 • Hacker News Board

Re: All You Need to Know About Bitcoin's Rise, from $0.01 to $11,000

#41

Post by option_greek » Sat, Dec 02, 2017, 4:03 PM UTC

legojoey17 wrote: post #30

option_greek wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't get the $4-$10 fee that everyone keeps talking about. The exchange I trade on charges me a minimum fee of 0.0001btc (which I keep cribbing about) to withdraw btc. I know from experience many of the times even fee below that gets happily accepted. 0.0001 translates to $1.2 fee.

The 4$-10$ fee being mentioned is a flat flee when transferring between wallets. When you are trading on an exchange, there could very well be nothing happening in the background. It's instead a process that's just flipping some bits for who owns what in their own database.

I meant between exchange wallet and mine. Don't have to trust me. Look it up: https://blockchain.info/tx/21c79cdba9c5a61d4e342ed946de4c47d...

That is $6.5 fee for 12 different outputs. So around $0.5 per transaction.

Re: All You Need to Know About Bitcoin's Rise, from $0.01 to $11,000

#42

Post by StavrosK » Sat, Dec 02, 2017, 4:03 PM UTC

fiatjaf wrote: post #35

StavrosK wrote: post #7

I am really sad that Bitcoin is the only cryptocurrency that ever managed to touch "mainstream" (it's on Steam, it has Stripe support, etc) and we fucked it up so hard that you need a $4 fee just to pay for one thing with it . I was really hoping it would catch on as a medium of exchange, because there's value in being able to pay for things quickly, cheaply and without giving people a bunch of info, but nope. Digita…

Who fucked it up so hard?

All of us, I guess, by not using it enough for everyday transactions. Although it's a chicken and egg problem, and the fact that it's so different from traditional banking that it's hard to explain to people how it works doesn't help.

Re: All You Need to Know About Bitcoin's Rise, from $0.01 to $11,000

#43

Post by fiatjaf » Sat, Dec 02, 2017, 4:03 PM UTC

eqmvii wrote: post #10

Something I rarely see discussed is the gender breakdown of bitcoin ownership. I'd be surprised if it wasn't something like 90%+ men mining, trading, and owning bitcoin. If bitcoin really takes over the world, it's going to look like a bunch of dudes printed themselves a fortune and then convinced the rest of the world to buy it from them.

You can say the same replacing "gender" with "profession" and "men" with "computer people".

You can say the same replacing "gender" with "age" and "men" with "young people".

You can probably do the same with multiple other grouping criteria.

Re: All You Need to Know About Bitcoin's Rise, from $0.01 to $11,000

#44

Post by bitxbitxbitcoin » Sat, Dec 02, 2017, 4:04 PM UTC

StavrosK wrote: post #7

I am really sad that Bitcoin is the only cryptocurrency that ever managed to touch "mainstream" (it's on Steam, it has Stripe support, etc) and we fucked it up so hard that you need a $4 fee just to pay for one thing with it . I was really hoping it would catch on as a medium of exchange, because there's value in being able to pay for things quickly, cheaply and without giving people a bunch of info, but nope. Digita…

I'd argue that certain other cryptocurrencies have "touched" the mainstream - however briefly. Not detracting from your point, though. Bitcoin is definitely the most "mainstream" cryptocurrency.

Re: All You Need to Know About Bitcoin's Rise, from $0.01 to $11,000

#45

Post by lawn » Sat, Dec 02, 2017, 4:04 PM UTC

fiatjaf wrote: post #35

StavrosK wrote: post #7

I am really sad that Bitcoin is the only cryptocurrency that ever managed to touch "mainstream" (it's on Steam, it has Stripe support, etc) and we fucked it up so hard that you need a $4 fee just to pay for one thing with it . I was really hoping it would catch on as a medium of exchange, because there's value in being able to pay for things quickly, cheaply and without giving people a bunch of info, but nope. Digita…

Who fucked it up so hard?

The Core developers who refuse to raise the blocksize despite the completely lack of evidence against the smallest increase (1MB -> 2MB).

Some even celebrated when the blocks became full and the fees started to increase...

Re: All You Need to Know About Bitcoin's Rise, from $0.01 to $11,000

#46

Post by bitxbitxbitcoin » Sat, Dec 02, 2017, 4:05 PM UTC

influx wrote: post #18

eqmvii wrote: post #10

Something I rarely see discussed is the gender breakdown of bitcoin ownership. I'd be surprised if it wasn't something like 90%+ men mining, trading, and owning bitcoin. If bitcoin really takes over the world, it's going to look like a bunch of dudes printed themselves a fortune and then convinced the rest of the world to buy it from them.

What do you see as the barriers for women to participate in bitcoin?

Not that this will explain the large gap entirely, but aren't women generally more risk adverse?

Re: All You Need to Know About Bitcoin's Rise, from $0.01 to $11,000

#47

Post by emodendroket » Sat, Dec 02, 2017, 4:05 PM UTC

backtoyoujim wrote: post #26

> , a Nobel laureate in economics, said recently that bitcoin "ought to be outlawed” because it’s designed to evade regulation and "doesn’t serve any socially useful function." A world where if something is not required it is forbidden is not a world that I want any part of Nobel winner or otherwise.

It seems to me like you're only taking into account half of the argument (the other half being that it's designed to evade regulation).

Re: All You Need to Know About Bitcoin's Rise, from $0.01 to $11,000

#48

Post by StavrosK » Sat, Dec 02, 2017, 4:05 PM UTC

bitxbitxbitcoin wrote: post #44

StavrosK wrote: post #7

I am really sad that Bitcoin is the only cryptocurrency that ever managed to touch "mainstream" (it's on Steam, it has Stripe support, etc) and we fucked it up so hard that you need a $4 fee just to pay for one thing with it . I was really hoping it would catch on as a medium of exchange, because there's value in being able to pay for things quickly, cheaply and without giving people a bunch of info, but nope. Digita…

I'd argue that certain other cryptocurrencies have "touched" the mainstream - however briefly. Not detracting from your point, though. Bitcoin is definitely the most "mainstream" cryptocurrency.

Hmm, I haven't heard of any cryptocurrencies accepted for payment on standard, automated checkout flows. Stripe accepts BTC, though.

Re: All You Need to Know About Bitcoin's Rise, from $0.01 to $11,000

#49

Post by bitxbitxbitcoin » Sat, Dec 02, 2017, 4:05 PM UTC

NiklasMort wrote: post #23

"Bitcoin’s current estimated annual electricity consumption stands at 29.05 Terawatt hours" I just leave that here...

Do you know what the estimated annual electricity consumption of VISA as a corporation is? What about the Treasury portion of the US government, let alone all the other parts.

I'll just leave that there :).

Re: All You Need to Know About Bitcoin's Rise, from $0.01 to $11,000

#50

Post by yolobey » Sat, Dec 02, 2017, 4:06 PM UTC

I got an international payment recently via bitcoin and the fee was under £2 on the sender side. If it had gone through my bank It would've costed me £7 to receive and way more on the other end to send.

So I do get the criticism about high fees when paying for a coffee, but maybe that's not the ideal use case for bitcoin. It could've been cheaper with another cryptocurrency but it's a tolerable enough percentage at the moment compared to another widely used solution for international transfers.