China sure made the right choice to ban crypto. 0.5% of the world's energy is insane
doubly funny your worries about externalities, when bitcoin actually meaningfully drives renewable production that is going to be essential in reducing those externalities.
> not okay with 0.5% of the earth's energy being consumed to produce sha sums for the sole purpose of mining speculative assets
packed as much manipulation and misinformation as you could into that one, didn't you?
i'm more than ok with significant chunk of energy's energy going into ensuring security of a global decentralized settlement layer and currency with predictable issuance policy that can't be fucked up by politicians that suddenly realize they need to print a couple trillions to cover up how much they stole.
I am so sick of this bs argument from bitcoin apologists. Cryptocurrencies drive renewable energy in the same way lung cancer drives chemotherapy drugs.
It doesn’t matter if renewable energy is built if that new energy is being wasted on cryptocurrency instead of replacing fossil fuel energy for something else.
yes it absolutely matters, because expanding the market of energy with renewable energy is unquestionably better than expanding it with fossil producers. bitcoin difficulty fluctuates with uncertainty in politics, demand for security and demand for the asset itself. when difficulty goes down - freed up energy can be used by other market participants and that will hurt profitability of fossil producers.
this is not bs argument, it's reality.
also, "energy is being wasted" is your subjective understanding.
Bitcoin secures over a trillion USD. 1 in 6 Americans own Bitcoin and user growth is faster than the rise of the internet and Facebook combined. Companies/Wallstreet are in, VCs are in, the first country has used it as a legal currency.
And yet you're still on this 12 year old narrative that it's worth zero?
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5DYFI4TX3RMEIKHS7AWEGEALOI1LNLZLHKGQ2I8MJEU1XAAQPRG5MUYXXNFR9QRQ
W1T7OR1UZ20L6MAXB202PWTN0YQR4IXZ851CS6LB1HUL7AALT9Z8K1OZW7FIK9IS
Y112I5BI0RQ04G6LS1XZ3V4C6CY5G97IOYQ0EJSLRQ6CK4ZGCMNXHH2O3NQQ4RVK
XEIKU2MHPTOQOBPG3TCT09SBPGKR0WZ0UX119IBBBB0HORXV1F0YNF18ADQHE21I
Go wild
https://explodingtopics.com/blog/blockchain-stats
...which states 22% of US adults. If you select for a somewhat younger population (non-boomers), it's even 33%.
So I think the point stands, whether you pick the lowest or highest number amidst these studies. Bitcoin/crypto is far more widespread than some people think.