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You Can Forget About Crypto Now

theatlantic.com

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Re: You Can Forget About Crypto Now

#71

Post by eternalban »

slaw wrote: post #3

> despite the ricketiness of the whole system, despite the constant feeling that everything might fall apart at any moment, there will come a time when crypto really arrives. For me crypto was always Ponzi scheme and nothing more, but it is because I don't laundry money or sell drugs, so I am not the target for crypto.

I favor a conspiracy theory.

For me, Bitcoin (and the whole disappearing creator act and hints of NSA involvement) has always been a tinfoil moment. This is the perfect mechanism for total economic awareness not the supposed virtues, such as anonymity, that it does not really have. The Ponzi schemes seem to have been permitted to establish the necessary infrastructure (mining, exchanges, etc.) and normalize the technology. Next stop should be the regulators post MSM preparatory media campaign (“Explainer: why we need crypto regulations today”). Then it will likely support CBDCs transactions (the CBDCs being the actual main event here btw). You will get a ‘wallet’ at birth and say goodbye to banks and remember that all you spendings are now recorded for posterity. (Remember “cash is bad” & is also a vector of nasty viruses).

If the big 5 scammers go to real jail — double digit billions of dollars are involved here — and don’t end up suiciding themselves, i will reconsider my current take on this entire affair.

Re: You Can Forget About Crypto Now

#74

Post by legutierr »

albertopv wrote: post #10
slaw wrote: post #3

> despite the ricketiness of the whole system, despite the constant feeling that everything might fall apart at any moment, there will come a time when crypto really arrives. For me crypto was always Ponzi scheme and nothing more, but it is because I don't laundry money or sell drugs, so I am not the target for crypto.

Where's the value in crypto? What's the purpose? Decentralisation? Democratisation? And then you have to use wallets, exchanges... There's literally no value in crypto currency, but trust. Like plain old money, which is highly regulated, so much more stability to use it in real economy. So why should I use crypto currencies? And which one, given that everyone can create their crypto currency?

Here are three things that are extremely valuable about blockchain technology:

* Financial infrastructure that is transparent and does not rely on corporate CEOs being honest: Enron, Lehman Brothers, and now FTX have shown that global regulators cannot be trusted to protect ordinary people when institutions are corrupted from the top. DeFi markets are fully transparent—with code and data being open and replicated thousands of times over—and users maintain custody of their assets at all times.

* Instantaneous settlement for payments and trades: With blockchain tech, vendors and merchants don't need to wait for credit-card payments to be deposited in their bank accounts—tokens are transferred in real-time. Traders don't need to wait for the proceeds of their sale to be wired to them two days after the trade takes place—settlement happens instantaneously with each DeFi trade. In some developed parts of the world, these settlement delays are slowly being fixed, but blockchain technology does this out of the box, today, and works everywhere.

* Security and automatic transfer of lending collateral: Overcollateralized DeFi loans hold collateral on-chain, and will instantly liquidate any outstanding loan that dips below the collateralization ratio. This is one reason that even through all the recent turbulence in crypto markets no one who leant money through DeFi on an overcollateralized basis—including, for instance, to Celsius—has lost money. (Note however that the courts have not yet ruled as to the disposition of these DeFi loans in bankruptcy cases.)

I think it's also important to differentiate between "crypto" and "blockchains". Cryptocurrencies are a type of application that can run on blockchains, and they play an important role by creating a unified market to reimburse providers for delivering the computation and storage services that blockchains depend upon. I would agree with those that believe that they have been overhyped, however.

Re: You Can Forget About Crypto Now

#75

Post by randomsearch »

zimbatm wrote: post #45
albertopv wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where's the value in crypto? What's the purpose? Decentralisation? Democratisation? And then you have to use wallets, exchanges... There's literally no value in crypto currency, but trust. Like plain old money, which is highly regulated, so much more stability to use it in real economy. So why should I use crypto currencies? And which one, given that everyone can create their crypto currency?

Have you ever tried sending money abroad? With BTC/ETH/USDC it takes seconds. The whole process is entirely transparent. It doesn't get blocked if you reach some threshold. And the fees are smaller than with the traditional banking system. And unlike with banks, anybody is allowed to open a new wallet. You don't have to get approval, which is difficult if you live in the streets or in a 3rd-world country. I'm not end…

I am skeptical of all the crypto schemes, and this is the only use case I find convincing. The small producer in China is paid by the American company via a digital currency. Faster, easier, cheaper.

Continued use of such a medium could over the long-term conceivably lead to widespread adoption, regulation, and a global currency. Fiat is disadvantaged when transactions cross borders.

I think we'll look back on this period as a painful learning process, which will set back such a digital currency by years. Perhaps it is inevitable, though, that some people will in the short-term exploit such situations for personal gain at the expense of the rest of us. Now we have to sort out the mess and wait.

It seems that both in the adtech (Facebook etc.) and crypto spaces, our industry has disgraced itself. We are at an incredible moment in history when our skills are pivotal - we're building the infrastructure of the modern world. We need to use our skills to improve things. The most obvious way to improve the situation is to carefully choose who we work for.

Re: You Can Forget About Crypto Now

#76

Post by exitb »

haasted wrote: post #42

> “We’re so early,” goes one popular crypto mantra I'm tired of this mantra. To me, crypto is starting to look less like the early internet, and more like the file-sharing mania of the late 90s early 00s, ie Napster, Kazaa, Limewire etc. A very likely outcome is that crypto will continue to be around, like some of the file sharing services, but using them will be more and more irrelevant and frowned upon by most peop…

Isn’t that actually a success story where the community eventually converged around a single protocol that really works?

Re: You Can Forget About Crypto Now

#77

Post by msrenee »

haasted wrote: post #42

> “We’re so early,” goes one popular crypto mantra I'm tired of this mantra. To me, crypto is starting to look less like the early internet, and more like the file-sharing mania of the late 90s early 00s, ie Napster, Kazaa, Limewire etc. A very likely outcome is that crypto will continue to be around, like some of the file sharing services, but using them will be more and more irrelevant and frowned upon by most peop…

Weren't those three all sued out of existence due to copyright infringement? That's very much a different reason for failure than what's going on in crypto.

Re: You Can Forget About Crypto Now

#78

Post by dragandj »

zimbatm wrote: post #45
albertopv wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where's the value in crypto? What's the purpose? Decentralisation? Democratisation? And then you have to use wallets, exchanges... There's literally no value in crypto currency, but trust. Like plain old money, which is highly regulated, so much more stability to use it in real economy. So why should I use crypto currencies? And which one, given that everyone can create their crypto currency?

Have you ever tried sending money abroad? With BTC/ETH/USDC it takes seconds. The whole process is entirely transparent. It doesn't get blocked if you reach some threshold. And the fees are smaller than with the traditional banking system. And unlike with banks, anybody is allowed to open a new wallet. You don't have to get approval, which is difficult if you live in the streets or in a 3rd-world country. I'm not end…

At first I was excited to hear more about the process of “sending money” you had mentioned, but then I read your post, and realized that there weren’t any money involved, but “BTC/ETH/USD”...

Re: You Can Forget About Crypto Now

#79

Post by School-Cotton »

zimbatm wrote: post #45
albertopv wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where's the value in crypto? What's the purpose? Decentralisation? Democratisation? And then you have to use wallets, exchanges... There's literally no value in crypto currency, but trust. Like plain old money, which is highly regulated, so much more stability to use it in real economy. So why should I use crypto currencies? And which one, given that everyone can create their crypto currency?

Have you ever tried sending money abroad? With BTC/ETH/USDC it takes seconds. The whole process is entirely transparent. It doesn't get blocked if you reach some threshold. And the fees are smaller than with the traditional banking system. And unlike with banks, anybody is allowed to open a new wallet. You don't have to get approval, which is difficult if you live in the streets or in a 3rd-world country. I'm not end…

Not sure about the others, but it takes a very long time to send Bitcoin (tens of minutes) if you care about waiting for one or more confirming blocks which most people do.

Re: You Can Forget About Crypto Now

#80

Post by esperent »

azangru wrote: post #67

When they say "crypto", what do they mean. No, I understand that it's something to do with cryptocurrencies; but, confusingly, they must mean something more specific than that; because isn't bitcoin the OG of cryptocurrencies? And doesn't it still hold the promise of a parallel peer-to-peer non-inflationary currency, suitable for self-custody, which is totally orthogonal to the meltdown of a cryptoexchange? Does The…

> doesn't it still hold the promise of a parallel peer-to-peer non-inflationary currency, suitable for self-custody, which is totally orthogonal to the meltdown of a cryptoexchange?

In my experience whenever some poses a convoluted leading question like this, it's because they have already decided the answer.

But let me try a simpler version:

> doesn't it still hold the promise of a... currency

Did it ever? Has any crypto ever actually been successfully used as a currency for something other than the black/grey market?

That's my own convoluted leading question, and I'm fairly confident the answer is no. But if you feel I'm wrong please share a counterexample.

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