The opposite way to pose this is: Cryptocurrencies have been around for 9+ years, and there has been literally 0 use for it apart from conning rubes on the internet. The important thing to ask is whether it has a purpose and has it delivered on that purpose. There's really only one theoretical purpose that it's meant to serve - being free from tyrannical government. Well that kind of worked when capital fled into it from China - but there's also been crack downs. It also doesn't explain the US fascination.
I think there comes a point where 9 years in, you have to ask: What purpose does cryptocurrency serve beyond enriching people who are already invested.
The externalities. This very thread is about how Bitcoin is messing up power grids and will soon be responsible for a non-negligible percentage of Earth's entire power usage (and the attendant pollution). It's not consequence-free fun.
That's weird, I've been using it to buy stuff off amazon and aliexpress. Am I a conned rube?
Does that mean Visa is conning rubes as well?
How? Neither company seems to accept Bitcoin directly.
You've got some strong arms on you my friend, moving those goal posts so far so fast.
I pay with bitcoin. Stuff arrives in the mail. I am using bitcoin.
>Cryptocurrencies have been around for 9+ years, and there has been literally 0 use for it apart from conning rubes on the internet.
So...
>Yes, you are using Bitcoin
Yes, I am. I don't understand why you two are so angrily and bitterly agreeing with me.
Call it gambling if you will. What is the intrinsic value of a game of blackjack? None, yet an entire industry is propped up by it.
Limited scope and obviously doesn't justify the money that is swirling in crypto right now.
However, if we want digital things to be non-fungible we're probably going to need something like a block chain. Cryptokitties(as beanie-baby-esque as they are) and the implementation of the ERC-271 token come to mind.
Again I realize cryptokittes are not really a great example other than proof of concept, but imagine with me for a second a fine art market where all the art is digital, this requires a decentralized non-fungible token, maybe digital house or car keys would be another thing where we want to limit the number of people with access to the thing, again if we don't want to trust someone like say equifax, with control over that we're going to want a decentralized non-fungible token.
I realize these aren't necessarily the best examples of non-fungible assets we might want one day. However it seems absurd to me that moving forward society won't at some point demand some digital asset that is non-fungible. If that assumption holds true then some form of cypto-currency is going to be necessary to provide such an asset.
In other words, most things don't last very long, but things that do last for a long time tend to stick around a lot longer than you might normally expect them to. Like people predicting the death of Facebook. Sure, something will probably eventually take it down or become the next Facebook. But it's been around for so long now, a betting man shouldn't bet on it happening anytime soon.
Now one might argue that on the day Myspace died this effect would predict that it would be around for yet another 6+ years (or whatever it ended up being). And to that I'd say that this is a guide for predicting future behavior, not a crystal ball that can accurately predict everything forever. And some would argue that the writing was on the wall for Myspace long before it actually went kaput anyway.
So Bitcoin has been around in some form or another for 9+ years, and withstood a huge laundry list of setbacks, tests of its security, and evolution of the ecosystem in the meantime. So it's probably going to stick around for awhile.
Meanwhile, XYZCoin and it's hot new ICO has been around for about five days, so there's nothing to suggest that it's going to stick around for very long and you should be a lot more careful about putting your money into it.
More info on the Lindy Effect: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_effect
Even so, how much wealth in this world is based in "actual, hard currency"? How many developers have unvested options? How much of Musk's wealth is in the bank as opposed to tied up in his businesses? I think you're trying to stand up a strawman.
Yes. Definitely.