Cryptonomicon: Among the Bitcoin maximalists • Hacker News Board

Re: Cryptonomicon: Among the Bitcoin maximalists

#41

Post by majormajor » Fri, Feb 25, 2022, 7:12 PM UTC

once_inc wrote: post #25

Animats wrote: post #21

That's a great read. What's striking, in his description of the conference, is the total lack of any connection to real world activity. None of these people seem to be trying to get enough Bitcoin together to build a steel mill or a wafer fab or a smartphone factory or, indeed, any kind of startup that does something. Bitcoin is expected to somehow generate wealth without actually doing anything that generates revenu…

There are actually quite a few companies doing things with bitcoin that generate revenue. Bitcoin isn't supposed to make you money; it's supposed to be money. Dollars on their own don't generate revenue, nor is gold locked in a safe. Bitcoin has qualities that make it better than fiat and better than gold, at the cost of an established history. Perhaps the author just spoke to the wrong people, didn't get the fundame…

"Bitcoin is supposed to be money" isn't the only pro-crypto position out there. A lot of its current value is driven by people holding and purchasing it from a perspective including things like "this will be the new backing infrastructure for every transaction in the world" not just "this is digital gold."

Re: Cryptonomicon: Among the Bitcoin maximalists

#42

Post by wmf » Fri, Feb 25, 2022, 7:13 PM UTC

once_inc wrote: post #25

Animats wrote: post #21

That's a great read. What's striking, in his description of the conference, is the total lack of any connection to real world activity. None of these people seem to be trying to get enough Bitcoin together to build a steel mill or a wafer fab or a smartphone factory or, indeed, any kind of startup that does something. Bitcoin is expected to somehow generate wealth without actually doing anything that generates revenu…

There are actually quite a few companies doing things with bitcoin that generate revenue. Bitcoin isn't supposed to make you money; it's supposed to be money. Dollars on their own don't generate revenue, nor is gold locked in a safe. Bitcoin has qualities that make it better than fiat and better than gold, at the cost of an established history. Perhaps the author just spoke to the wrong people, didn't get the fundame…

Isn't the point of Bitcoin precisely that it naturally becomes more and more valuable? If people want money that doesn't make money they can use stablecoins.

Re: Cryptonomicon: Among the Bitcoin maximalists

#43

Post by kragen » Fri, Feb 25, 2022, 7:14 PM UTC

Animats wrote: post #21

That's a great read. What's striking, in his description of the conference, is the total lack of any connection to real world activity. None of these people seem to be trying to get enough Bitcoin together to build a steel mill or a wafer fab or a smartphone factory or, indeed, any kind of startup that does something. Bitcoin is expected to somehow generate wealth without actually doing anything that generates revenu…

As it turns out, moving money from one group to another† is pretty useful in modern society. It's really all that money is good for, after all.

Some of my comments from the last week and a half about what Bitcoin is good for:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30469595 when your country's central bank suspends electronic cash transfers, suspends the foreign exchange market, limits cash withdrawals, and prohibits the issuance of foreign currency from retail bank accounts; or when you want to fund a militia in a war zone

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30435990 when your bank account gets frozen because your family member supported a political protest in Canada

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30446703 in case the government of the current global hegemon imposes economic sanctions against your company or your country; right now that's the US, but probably ten years from now it will be the People's Republic of China

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30408611 as an alternative to a bank when "whistleblowers" send the bank history of 30,000 "legitimate clients who had done nothing wrong" to journalists so they can comb through them looking for something to pin on the accountholders

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30375671 when five Canadian banks mysteriously have an hours-long outage at the same time

I also wrote a bit last year about my observations of how Bitcoin gets used in practice today, outside the world of hoity-toity speculative finance the Harpers article is about: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27448744

______

† Or preventing it from being moved without its owner's consent, which is the value proposition both of safe deposit boxes and the Bitcoin guarantee of a limited money supply.

Re: Cryptonomicon: Among the Bitcoin maximalists

#44

Post by lawn » Fri, Feb 25, 2022, 7:15 PM UTC

once_inc wrote: post #25

Animats wrote: post #21

That's a great read. What's striking, in his description of the conference, is the total lack of any connection to real world activity. None of these people seem to be trying to get enough Bitcoin together to build a steel mill or a wafer fab or a smartphone factory or, indeed, any kind of startup that does something. Bitcoin is expected to somehow generate wealth without actually doing anything that generates revenu…

There are actually quite a few companies doing things with bitcoin that generate revenue. Bitcoin isn't supposed to make you money; it's supposed to be money. Dollars on their own don't generate revenue, nor is gold locked in a safe. Bitcoin has qualities that make it better than fiat and better than gold, at the cost of an established history. Perhaps the author just spoke to the wrong people, didn't get the fundame…

Bitcoin can't function well as money as it's too clogged up. That's why the narrative switched from money + adoption to digital gold + number goes up.

Re: Cryptonomicon: Among the Bitcoin maximalists

#45

Post by astoor » Fri, Feb 25, 2022, 7:16 PM UTC

once_inc wrote: post #25

Animats wrote: post #21

That's a great read. What's striking, in his description of the conference, is the total lack of any connection to real world activity. None of these people seem to be trying to get enough Bitcoin together to build a steel mill or a wafer fab or a smartphone factory or, indeed, any kind of startup that does something. Bitcoin is expected to somehow generate wealth without actually doing anything that generates revenu…

There are actually quite a few companies doing things with bitcoin that generate revenue. Bitcoin isn't supposed to make you money; it's supposed to be money. Dollars on their own don't generate revenue, nor is gold locked in a safe. Bitcoin has qualities that make it better than fiat and better than gold, at the cost of an established history. Perhaps the author just spoke to the wrong people, didn't get the fundame…

I haven't seen any profitable cryptocurrency companies which do anything genuinely useful for non-crypto people in the real world - all the profitable ones are inward-looking, i.e. engaged in "building out the ecosystem" (or "extending the pyramid scheme" depending on your perspective), e.g. the cryptocurrency exchanges. That's a big difference between the internet and cryptocurrency - the internet can be said to have started benefitting ordinary people within a few years, but there's no sign of cryptocurrency ever doing anything useful for the proverbial "man on the Clapham omnibus" after 13 years. In that sense cryptocurrency is more like the gold rush - some people find gold, most people make money selling the shovels, but the vast majority of the world are so far removed from it all that it doesn't impact them in any way whatsoever (except perhaps for the negative effect it has on their environment).

Re: Cryptonomicon: Among the Bitcoin maximalists

#46

Post by majormajor » Fri, Feb 25, 2022, 7:16 PM UTC

Hendrikto wrote: post #34

Melio wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just 100 years old. It's over 1000 years old and it evolved from nothing to what we have. It's very weird that you ignore history like this. You should read up on Spain, silver, gold, china and tons of other history regarding tender. What we have with fiat is your very well working monolith fine tuned over centuries while everyone who wants to make money of of you tells you why their Nanoservice with securit…

Gold and silver coins are not fiat though.

How much actual gold has to be in your gold coin before it crosses from "gold" to "fiat"? You had "debased" coinage in Roman times, if not earlier.

Re: Cryptonomicon: Among the Bitcoin maximalists

#47

Post by gxqoz » Fri, Feb 25, 2022, 7:17 PM UTC

There was an FT long read recently that covered similar ground that I thought was a bit better. HN thread and archive link here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30213690

Re: Cryptonomicon: Among the Bitcoin maximalists

#48

Post by majormajor » Fri, Feb 25, 2022, 7:18 PM UTC

wmf wrote: post #42

once_inc wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are actually quite a few companies doing things with bitcoin that generate revenue. Bitcoin isn't supposed to make you money; it's supposed to be money. Dollars on their own don't generate revenue, nor is gold locked in a safe. Bitcoin has qualities that make it better than fiat and better than gold, at the cost of an established history. Perhaps the author just spoke to the wrong people, didn't get the fundame…

Isn't the point of Bitcoin precisely that it naturally becomes more and more valuable? If people want money that doesn't make money they can use stablecoins.

The fixed number of bitcoins doesn't help you if people decide they want ether instead. Or if either are fine. Or something else in the future. That risk is very alive and well.

(I'd argue that the spread of multiple cryptocurrencies has had a major inflationary effect overall in the world economy in the last five years. Lot of people with suddenly fat bank accounts out of nothing.)

Re: Cryptonomicon: Among the Bitcoin maximalists

#49

Post by kragen » Fri, Feb 25, 2022, 7:20 PM UTC

wmf wrote: post #42

once_inc wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are actually quite a few companies doing things with bitcoin that generate revenue. Bitcoin isn't supposed to make you money; it's supposed to be money. Dollars on their own don't generate revenue, nor is gold locked in a safe. Bitcoin has qualities that make it better than fiat and better than gold, at the cost of an established history. Perhaps the author just spoke to the wrong people, didn't get the fundame…

Isn't the point of Bitcoin precisely that it naturally becomes more and more valuable? If people want money that doesn't make money they can use stablecoins.

I certainly hope not! That's what the article's author was hoping for, but presumably Bitcoin will reach a long-term stable price level at some point. Maybe it already has, or did two years ago when it was at US$8000, or maybe at some point it will rapidly fall to $0 as investors switch to Ether or Grin or ZCash or whatever is popular ten years from now. Its volatility unfortunately appeals to get-rich-quick speculators, but hopefully at some point they'll get burned enough to quit and leave it to serious people. Assuming it doesn't evaporate completely!

The problem with "stablecoins" is that they reintroduce the single point of failure that sunk Digicash and e-gold, which Bitcoin was specifically designed to eliminate. Holding Tether is a bet that neither Bitfinex nor the Federal Reserve will decide to make their money machine go brrr. I don't know how you feel about the Federal Reserve but I wouldn't trust Bitfinex with my lunch money, much less my savings or my country's foreign reserves.

Re: Cryptonomicon: Among the Bitcoin maximalists

#50

Post by toomuchtodo » Fri, Feb 25, 2022, 7:21 PM UTC

kragen wrote: post #43

Animats wrote: post #21

That's a great read. What's striking, in his description of the conference, is the total lack of any connection to real world activity. None of these people seem to be trying to get enough Bitcoin together to build a steel mill or a wafer fab or a smartphone factory or, indeed, any kind of startup that does something. Bitcoin is expected to somehow generate wealth without actually doing anything that generates revenu…

As it turns out, moving money from one group to another† is pretty useful in modern society. It's really all that money is good for, after all. Some of my comments from the last week and a half about what Bitcoin is good for: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30469595 when your country's central bank suspends electronic cash transfers, suspends the foreign exchange market, limits cash withdrawals, and prohibits th…

But can you do it without going to jail when sanctions or similar are in place against you? Technically, you can, but you face the same consequences if you were able to get a wire or SEPA transaction through. That's the point. The tech doesn't change the policy or the law. You still go to jail or your country gets shelled. Miners get chased out of countries.

Russia is reportedly exploring crypto for transfers if they get knocked off of SWIFT. That does not bode well for crypto when it becomes a weapon of a an enemy combatant state.

(obligatory xkcd about getting beaten with a wrench for your private key here)