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It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

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Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#71

1. Promise a revolutionary technology ("self-driving cars are coming"!) 2. Use that promise as a pretext to ignore all regulation 3. Make a fortune 4. Drop the tech story The author lost me here. Completely subjective take on what Uber has done. They've completely improved ride-sharing and cab hailing within the whole industry, including non uber users. Depending on what country I travel to, Ill be using a different…

I'm the author of the thread. For what it's worth, I grew up as a refugee whose mother had to find incredibly inventive ways to send USD to family back home, where it was illegal to possess. What I don't understand about the crypto remittances argument is how the people sending and receiving them are supposed to convert them into spendable currency. My hunch is that a lot of the value of cryptocurrency in those count…

I think NFTs will transform the concept of ownership, and take power away from major corporations in the process. This is just one aspect of crypto that I think more than justifies its value. But there is a ton of hype and a ton of bad stuff going on yes, but that will be pushed to the background as it goes more mainstream. All people inside the industry think this is just the beginning and there is a lot of value to be extracted. Is it overvalued for what it delivers on today? 100%. But I believe it will catch up and surpass it soon. There are multiple singular companies that are more valued than the entire crypto market right now. It’s a drop in the bucket.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#73

Cryptocurrency allows people to exchange money without dealing with financial institutions or governments. I don't own any as an investment, I use it for playing poker online. That's it. We give too much voice to all these people suffering from hysteria. I suspect the only reason these people are given a voice is because they usually call for more laws to "fix" more things which benefits those in power. edit: Also sp…

That's not really accurate. For most people, they deal with financial institutions directly via the fiat onroads and offroads fror the exchanges. The fact that you can formally buy, exchange, and cash out of crypto with full banking support gives cryptocoins a veneer of Government support and legitimacy. The USA bans online gambling and ponzi schemes. Cyrptocoins are worse, because they include a side order of immens…

Can you (and your representative) please just leave me alone so I can harm myself with this "harmful technology"? Whatever the outcome, I'll take my chances. Please leave me alone.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#74
post #64

These two resonated with me: > A lot of intelligent observers look at cryptocurrency, see that it makes no sense, and reasonably infer that they must be missing something profound on the technical level. Tech culture has a nice tradition of not deriding new ideas, but we need to break it here and speak out > [non-tech people] don't see the huge silent majority of tech people who know it's a scam. That's on us It is o…

> I'm pretty sure it's nothing but a pyramid scheme, but I always gave the enthusiasts the benefit of the doubt. So go find out? I’m quoting you here for the “pretty sure” part. Do a deep dive. I’be done deep dives on Bitcoin, Ethereum, Cardano, Monero, Nano, Iota, Hyperledger, BSC, Uniswap, Tether, Chainlink and cursory glances at dozens of other coins/tokens. I’m a tech guy. I work on an operating system/embedded s…

Yeah, U.S. household net worth is near all-time lows in Fed balance sheet terms and people think crypto is the scam: https://mobile.twitter.com/RaoulGMI/status/13987339019132641...

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#76
post #11

Written from the perspective of someone in a first world country. Edit: https://www.statista.com/chart/18345/crypto-currency-adoptio...

What’s the advantage of cryptocurrency over mpesa?

For the unclear: M-Pesa.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-Pesa

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#77
post #62

Seems lobsided. Sure Bitcoin suffers from high fees, but it serves well as a savings account. We've also started accepting litecoin payments on our site: I set it up once, and forgot about it. With Paypal it's a never-ending rigamarole. I've recently closed my bank account, and started using something a bit more up-to-date (Revolut). I believe Bitcoin is the single biggest innovation driver in the tech sector right n…

Bitcoin is more like a security, with characteristics more akin to rare metals than a savings account. It's entirely unfit for that purpose.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#78

Cryptocurrency allows people to exchange money without dealing with financial institutions or governments. I don't own any as an investment, I use it for playing poker online. That's it. We give too much voice to all these people suffering from hysteria. I suspect the only reason these people are given a voice is because they usually call for more laws to "fix" more things which benefits those in power. edit: Also sp…

That's not really accurate. For most people, they deal with financial institutions directly via the fiat onroads and offroads fror the exchanges. The fact that you can formally buy, exchange, and cash out of crypto with full banking support gives cryptocoins a veneer of Government support and legitimacy. The USA bans online gambling and ponzi schemes. Cyrptocoins are worse, because they include a side order of immens…

> The USA bans online gambling

Does that make it right? Ignoring that, many private institutions go out of their way to ban transactions in things that the government doesn't even ban. Marijuana in states where it is legalized for example. All forms of sex work on the misguided belief that it somehow benefits the sex worker. Etc.

Also I don't have a duty to follow your misguided morals.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#79
post #64

These two resonated with me: > A lot of intelligent observers look at cryptocurrency, see that it makes no sense, and reasonably infer that they must be missing something profound on the technical level. Tech culture has a nice tradition of not deriding new ideas, but we need to break it here and speak out > [non-tech people] don't see the huge silent majority of tech people who know it's a scam. That's on us It is o…

> I'm pretty sure it's nothing but a pyramid scheme, but I always gave the enthusiasts the benefit of the doubt. So go find out? I’m quoting you here for the “pretty sure” part. Do a deep dive. I’be done deep dives on Bitcoin, Ethereum, Cardano, Monero, Nano, Iota, Hyperledger, BSC, Uniswap, Tether, Chainlink and cursory glances at dozens of other coins/tokens. I’m a tech guy. I work on an operating system/embedded s…

> The author saying the “silent majority tech people” know its a scam is such nonsense to my experience. Every tech person I know thinks either A) its neat/super cool, or B) they don’t know anything about it besides memes.

Counterpoint: most "tech people" I know — including people who have worked in crypto — both know about it and also think it's a scam.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#80
post #51

When I first heard of cryptocurrency I was reminded of when people started idling in Team Fortress 2 to get content drops. It was such a daft cart before the horse approach, but of course those dropped items could be sold for fractions of a penny and people can be dumb. It also reminded me of Folding at Home. Here people completed by virtue of their personal compute resources. Of course crypto serves as neither a for…

Isn't there some way to combine proof of work and actually useful work?
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