Did you mean: "Tulip's Golden Future" ?
Bitcoin's Golden Future
51–60 of 147 posts
Re: Bitcoin's Golden Future
#52Transaction time and energy inefficiency makes Bitcoin's future not so golden, imo.
Not only it's slow, but transaction fees are ridiculously high. $4.3 currently. I go to shop and pay $0.5 for 2kg of potatoes (or a bottle of beer), and pay $4.3 fee, and wait 1 hour for confirmations?
This is absurd and hyperbolically incorrect; fees in Bitcoin are calculated per-byte of the transaction's size (and in BTC, no less!), so even if the cost of a transaction was that high, the price in USD would be misleading — with the underlying asset at ~$4500, of course the dollar value of the fee would appear high in a weaker currency.
Who wants to wait _any_ number of blocks for a payment to clear, anyways? Blockchains provide a trust anchor that serves well as a settlement system, but they aren't intrinsically payment networks in and of themselves — the ideal experience is of course an _instant_ payment, and waiting for confirmations just doesn't cut it.
This is why so much effort is going into building payment rapid networks on _top_ of Bitcoin, using "rapidly-adjusted micropayment channels" [0] and routing protocols to build things like Lightning [1].
And you're pumping IOTA in this same post? Unbelievable, these days.
Current fee experience of Bitcoin: https://twitter.com/alansilbert/status/905106387260370945 Historical fees: https://bitcoinfees.21.co/
[0]: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Contract#Example_7:_Rapidly-adjus... [1]: https://medium.com/lightning-resources
Re: Bitcoin's Golden Future
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
The fundamental value of $1 is the full faith and credit of the United States Government and the economy of America. The fundamental value of cryptocurrencies is a shared agreement of value amongst investors. I imagine some snotty 14-year old would argue that there is no fundamental distinction between the two but that's not being economically serious.
I'd argue more, according to your definitions, the "fundamental value" of the dollar (which you conveniently didn't specify) relies on violence (as in, pay up of guys with guns will put you in prison). Whereas the fundamental value of Bitcoin is determined by the free market. It's quite clear to me which one is a more moral system. Again, based on your own definitions.
The property rights to your belongings are also fundamentally reliant on the government's promise to use violence to enforce those rights. Concluding that it is therefore immoral is too simplistic. You have to take into account the full consequences of not enforcing those rights, and then determine whether society as a whole is better off or worse off.
Re: Bitcoin's Golden Future
#54Bitcoin and other crypto require a well functioning internet infrastructure, otherwise it's just data on a hard-drive. Disconnect a country from the Internet (or filter the traffic) and you're forking the chain. Spend on both networks by buying other (unfiltered) crypto. There are states (even large ISPs) that can do that. Also, the first thing to go in case of global conflict is the global Internet. Countries will t…
The fork concern is real, but the double-spend on both forks is less so. It would require the double-spender to have access to both networks. Which isn't that hard to see. But, it wouldn't take too many parties having access to both networks to prevent the fork in the first place. The miners who control such things are very highly incentivized to keep their operation on the main or largest fork. The alternative for t…
> The fork concern is real, but the double-spend on both forks is less so. It would require the double-spender to have access to both networks. Which isn't that hard to see.
Not hard at all. Have a second uplink to the world wide net, e.g. via sat.
Re: Bitcoin's Golden Future
#55Did you mean: "Tulip's Golden Future" ?
nice meme
Re: Bitcoin's Golden Future
#56Bitcoin and other crypto require a well functioning internet infrastructure, otherwise it's just data on a hard-drive. Disconnect a country from the Internet (or filter the traffic) and you're forking the chain. Spend on both networks by buying other (unfiltered) crypto. There are states (even large ISPs) that can do that. Also, the first thing to go in case of global conflict is the global Internet. Countries will t…
I think you have a valid point, but, ultimately aren't all or most trades digital today? Are countries exchanging actual loads of gold and/or cash around? If the answer is no, then isn't it all just data on a hard-drive? In that case damaging internet links will have the same effect all around, though information can probably still go in/out in different ways with some effort. Is there some aspect of crypto currency…
The difference IMO is that gold has intrinsic value by virtue of being rare and shiny. I guess the idea is that even if civilization collapses and we return to the stone age gold will still be valuable. Since the use of gold as currency can be traced back at least to 600BCE[1] there's a good reason to believe that.
Bitcoins however doesn't really have a intrinsic "rest" value. Anybody can (and many do) spawn a new blockchain out of thin air. Ironically Bitcoin is entirely about trust at the core. The trust that the other participants in the bitcoin economy won't lose faith in the currency and dump it. That trust is the only thing that gives the coin value.
Re: Bitcoin's Golden Future
#57Bitcoin and other crypto require a well functioning internet infrastructure, otherwise it's just data on a hard-drive. Disconnect a country from the Internet (or filter the traffic) and you're forking the chain. Spend on both networks by buying other (unfiltered) crypto. There are states (even large ISPs) that can do that. Also, the first thing to go in case of global conflict is the global Internet. Countries will t…
I think you have a valid point, but, ultimately aren't all or most trades digital today? Are countries exchanging actual loads of gold and/or cash around? If the answer is no, then isn't it all just data on a hard-drive? In that case damaging internet links will have the same effect all around, though information can probably still go in/out in different ways with some effort. Is there some aspect of crypto currency…
Banks datacenters holding money are off the grid, and they have material goods for backing part of it.
It doesn't mean they would not be affected by internet going down. They would be hit hard. But they would not disapear.
Re: Bitcoin's Golden Future
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
The article does a surprisingly good job of addressing this issue as well: > What, though, is the value of a digital currency? > It's a fair question, but one that could equally be leveled at gold. Since Richard Nixon ended the fixed $35 an ounce convertibility of gold in 1971, its value has risen at times (the 1970s, the 2000s) and fallen at others. The best argument to justify investing in gold these days is not th…
Agreed - for an article in MSM, I was surprised it wasn't completely terrible! But I'm tired of the BS line that "gold has no value" continues to be repeated as nauseam. If people value it, then it has value. If people don't, then it doesn't. End of story. Things don't have value because some Minister of Value makes a proclamation about what has value and what doesn't (USSR tried that, didn't work!)
that's not quite the case. There is such a thing as objective value. Stocks have objective value because they pay dividends. Real estate in warm climates has objective value because it's pleasant to be in a warm place in winter. BMW costs more than a honda civic because it is objectively a better driving experience. Etc. Etc. So, no, it's not true that there is no objective value
Re: Bitcoin's Golden Future
#59Bitcoin and other crypto require a well functioning internet infrastructure, otherwise it's just data on a hard-drive. Disconnect a country from the Internet (or filter the traffic) and you're forking the chain. Spend on both networks by buying other (unfiltered) crypto. There are states (even large ISPs) that can do that. Also, the first thing to go in case of global conflict is the global Internet. Countries will t…
> Bitcoin and other crypto require a well functioning internet infrastructure, otherwise it's just data on a hard-drive. Disconnect a country from the Internet (or filter the traffic) and you're forking the chain. Less so than in the past: https://blockstream.com/satellite/menu/ > I guess my point is: be careful, this is still very much experimental, don't invest everything you have in them. Well, that much is obviou…
Having satellites broadcasting the blockchain is a good step to make the network resilient but it doesn't prevent governments messing with miners. A great disturbance would occur should china decide to unilaterally shutdown the miners on its territory for instance.
Furthermore unless I'm missing something these satellites broadcast the blockchain but don't relay new transactions. That means that if I'm stuck in some place without internet access I can use the satellite network to keep my copy of the blockchain up to date but I still can't make new transactions, effectively making it useless. I guess they could expand their services to allow for satellite transaction relay but that sounds very expensive.
Re: Bitcoin's Golden Future
#60Bitcoin and other crypto require a well functioning internet infrastructure, otherwise it's just data on a hard-drive. Disconnect a country from the Internet (or filter the traffic) and you're forking the chain. Spend on both networks by buying other (unfiltered) crypto. There are states (even large ISPs) that can do that. Also, the first thing to go in case of global conflict is the global Internet. Countries will t…
> Bitcoin and other crypto require a well functioning internet infrastructure, otherwise it's just data on a hard-drive. Disconnect a country from the Internet (or filter the traffic) and you're forking the chain. Less so than in the past: https://blockstream.com/satellite/menu/ > I guess my point is: be careful, this is still very much experimental, don't invest everything you have in them. Well, that much is obviou…
I read about blockstream some time ago:
https://www.coindesk.com/blockstream-using-satellites-beam-b...
Here Adam Back said: "With a perpetual generator out back with a satellite dish, a Raspberry Pi by the generator, a local wi-fi hot spot, and the necessary software set up, you could be transacting globally with bitcoin."
Anyone can explain me why is the need for a local wifi hot spot here? And how much does it normally cost to setup a satellite dish?
Not to mention countries do have the ability to jam satellite signals. Here's the first article I find on google search: http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/silencing-unwanted...