Bitcoin Is [Functioning as] a Scam
gauravsharma.com
gauravsharma.com
Cryptocurrency gives us the first opportunity to have trust minimized financial transactions, and contract enforcement without the use of violence. This is revolutionary in ways I couldn't do justice to explaining here in the comments. Almost no one in the field is actually working towards these goals, but I want to live in a world where these things are possible, so I keep hope.
So here's why crypto is useful:
* Ease of dissemination has intrinsic value. Keeping track of gold/fiat/etc. and transporting it is difficult and error-prone. Crypto doesn't have that problem.
* Cutting out middle-men. You don't need transaction services to send and receive crypto.
* More transparency (or more privacy). We can easily see how much Bitcoin people are moving around, as we often see with the seemingly quarterly "whale sends $1 billion in Bitcoin to someone" reports, and yet no one can really know how much crypto you personally have.
* Smart contracts. You can make the transaction of crypto trigger events, or create second-degree value as part of the transaction.
Crypto is very young, so these things are being worked on and improved. Some things might not pan out, and some new things might suddenly become extremely valuable.
People saying "lol, crypto is stupid like who even needs it" are dinosaurs living with delusions of grandeur - and stability. Society is at a crossroads whether people like it or not, and things will drastically change over the next decade.
To say that Bitcoin is behaving like a Ponzi scheme isn't inaccurate. Yes, it's almost like the gold rush in terms of people rushing in to probably find themselves washed up and broke. It's still a gold rush though (so maybe start making shovels?)
Why sell shovels when you can make money selling services.
How do I become a crypto retirement advisor.
Also, how do you tackle the environmental effects of crypto?
This statement is false and backed by zero evidence.
>* Ease of dissemination has intrinsic value. Keeping track of gold/fiat/etc. and transporting it is difficult and error-prone. Crypto doesn't have that problem.
USD hasn't been gold backed for a while, argument invalid. Regarding tracking and transporting, I'd rather have the money in my bank than be the guy that can't remember his wallet password, or threw out the HDD that it was on. This addresses a problem created by cryptocurrency, not one people are asking to be solved today.
>* Cutting out middle-men. You don't need transaction services to send and receive crypto.
You don't realize you're just moving the middleman. You still need nodes, networks, and other operators that become your middleman and will squeeze you when it benefits them. Also no casual user is going to download the whole BTC blockchain just exchange a few bucks with you.
>* More transparency (or more privacy). We can easily see how much Bitcoin people are moving around, as we often see with the seemingly quarterly "whale sends $1 billion in Bitcoin to someone" reports, and yet no one can really know how much crypto you personally have.
You're welcome criminals and otherwise already insanely rich people. More on this at 10.
>* Smart contracts. You can make the transaction of crypto trigger events, or create second-degree value as part of the transaction.
This provides zero real world value, see above regarding rich people.
Here's the thing, a majority of the world's population doesn't have access to digital currency at all. 42% of Bitcoin value is held by 0.01% of holders. This isn't some grassroots, "screw the man", "by the people", or whatever slogan you want to attach revolution. This is just a replay of where we're already at, with different names attached to things. Instead of 'real estate' you call it 'cryptocurrency', and instead of 'high frequency trading market manipulation' you call it 'smart contracts'.
If you want to do something spectacular with cryptocurrency (and probably get rich at the same time), figure out how it can help feed the estimated 690 million people that will go to sleep hungry tonight.
The Chinese central bank has filed hundreds of patents for CryptoYuan and is fast-tracking its efforts to back it with gold so they can win the crypto war. Must be nothing.
The European central bank is currently building it's own crypto likely due for release by 2022, and so is the US Federal Reserve.
States want crypto precisely because they'll be able to fully control the finances of citizens. Yeah, that's my idea of utopia alright.
You have no idea what the value of a smart contract is, because no one really does. Some projects like ETH are trying to evolve it into something valuable.
As for Bitcoin, you can make your own Bitcoin/Lightning nodes, and it's a race to the bottom in terms of charging fees for usage - so how do you imagine a middle-man will appear that will somehow strong-arm you into not being able to use the thousands of much cheaper nodes?
Judging by the progress of technology, I'd say we're about 5 years away from being able to download the full Bitcoin blockchain within an hour.
Here's the thing, you're arguing with a phantom in your mind and thinking you're winning something. Wake up and take cryptocurrencies seriously.
Like they largely do already? How do you think cryptocurrency substantially changes any of that?
>The Chinese central bank has filed hundreds of patents for CryptoYuan and is fast-tracking its efforts to back it with gold so they can win the crypto war. Must be nothing.
DCEP differs from existing cryptocurrencies because it is legal tender, centralized, and not anonymous. It's backed by Yuan deposits for crying out loud! It's nothing like BTC! The Chinese government's plan is to digitize the yuan, not introduce a separate cryptocurrency. They're doing it to capture the missing part of the population not in the existing banking system (and thus the multiple methods of surveillance employed to track citizens and control their liberty).
>You have no idea what the value of a smart contract is, because no one really does.
Thank you for helping prove my point.
>Judging by the progress of technology, I'd say we're about 5 years away from being able to download the full Bitcoin blockchain within an hour.
Your _guess_ is irrelevant and unsubstantiated. The fact is that 40% of the world's population isn't even connected to the internet and even less than that have access to broadband indicates to me that it will be more than 5 years before the average user can download the staggering 321GB of the full BTC blockchain.
You're mistaken if you think I don't take cryptocurrencies seriously. They're very serious, but it doesn't make them good or right.
Not as long as there are taxes to be paid... and the moment the government accepts crypto payments, crypto becomes as fully fiat as any government-issued currency.
Well that part of the argument didn't age well :)
Looking for the next big thing...
I am feeling the same way. Not really about the value but I feel like I don’t want to be part of it anymore
"I don't trust anyone who stopped using Python to give me their opinion on Python"