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Comment by arisAlexis | Hacker News Reader

Past bubbles didn't involve an economic paradigm shift

Except for the dot-com bubble, the railway mania, canal mania, South Seas, and that's just the ones I can think off the top of my head.

One of the classic warning signs of a bubble is people saying "but this time, it's different." Particularly in response to claims of a bubble.

I still wish I could have gotten in on the railway mania. Rail is truly amazing.

Don't forget the housing bubble. The first time it occurred to me that housing was a bubble was when I heard the economist for the National Association of Realtors say on the radio this time was different because of a paradigm shift. It reminded me of what I had heard during the dot-com bubble.

Then I saw this map and was convinced:

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2005/06/15/business/arm3...

again these have nothing to do with banking and money itself

That's exactly what was claimed about the Internet bubble, over and over and over again in every bubble touting story about how it was "the new economy" and "different this time."

Besides the Internet did in fact involve a once in a generation economic paradigm shift. Just ask China, $6+ trillion in annual online payment processing / exchange flow. Their entire economic output was $800 billion circa 1998. Entire vast industries have been and are being reshaped by the Internet. Crypto-currencies can never reach the paradigm shift scale of the Internet, they're sub to it.

There are in fact lots of other examples. The automobile didn't generate an economic paradigm shift? It sure did, massively; amounting to reshaping the entire way people live, travel, and how and where things are built, how commerce is transported & transacted, how food is distributed, and so on. Was there a huge automobile bubble? There sure was.

Paradigm shifts do not banish economic fundamentals / realities, they're ultimately beholden to them, which is what inevitably destroys the bubbles.

> Was there a huge automobile bubble? There sure was.

I'm not familiar with a past (or any) automobile bubble. Are you saying you think we're in now?

I've heard this theory before, but I don't know what would cause it to pop, or how one could protect oneself (if that's even needed) from it popping.

There were at one time hundreds of automobile companies. Most of which were outright scams.

Much like the dot com bubble the scams went bankrupt and lost every dime, some got bought out for pennies on the dollar, and then there were a dozen or so survivors that actually created long-term wealth.

Neither does this one.

What is this paradigm shift? Bitcoin is a terrible currency, is about as good a store of value as tulips and beanie babies (Actually, beanie babies are better - at least you can play with them.)

You may say blockchains are a paradigm shift (I don't believe that), but even if they are, there is absolutely no reason for why Bitcoin is the best blockchain that has, or will ever be created. If they are a critically important paradigm shift, then I can with 100% certainty say that bitcoin will be completely dead in the near future - much like Mintel vs Internet.

Sigh, BTC fanboism sounds so much like 70s scammy cults, it’s annoying.

Folks, you’re so blind to the risks and obvious manipulations it’s heart wrenching, but the stupid dismissiveness of anything else — and the arrogant superiority complex that comes with it — makes me want to invest in popcorn.

Introducing new forms of exchange isn´t an economic paradigm shift - it´s something that keeps coming around, viz.:

http://www.jstor.org/stable/2338493?seq=1#page_scan_tab_cont...

Now the Star Trek replicator.. that would be a paradigm shift.

It's not just a new form of exchange, it's a new way of storing and transfering ownership and value in an immutable way -even by the most powerful entities of the world. For the first time in history the separation of state and economy is something conceivable. That's not only an economic paradigm shift, when materialised (and I firmly believe it will, because it makes so much sense), it will affect practically every aspect of society.

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