Didn't El Salvador just announce that bitcoin is legal tender a few months ago? Isn't it a bit soon to declare that it failed? Especially considering the state of El Salvador's fiat.
[0]https://old.reddit.com/r/Buttcoin/comments/nwblbp/podcast_pr...
[1]https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/2021/0611/In-El-Salvador-...
[2]http://blocktribune.com/david-gerard-can-get-long-way-just-b...
[3] https://old.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/6dkc8w/why_do_we_...
Are people allowed to have opinions any more, allowed to draw conclusions and take a side?
As if Albert Einstein authored anti-quantum hit-pieces, had a classical physics agenda (or choose any other contentious issue in history where people had divided opinions).
If only people applied the same media criticism to crypto trade publications, which are awash in conflicts of interest.
That's the bullshit asymmetry principle in action. Let's go ahead and fact-check the first claim in the article.
>More than 91 percent of Salvadorans want dollars, not bitcoins.
Following the source, we see this quote (google-translated from Spanish):
>University indicates that, when presenting the option of both currencies, 91.4% of Salvadorans favor the dollar, 4.9% for Bitcoin and 3.7% do not. answered.
We also see:
>However, when asked about the decision to adopt Bitcoin as a currency, 35% said they were in favor and 40% against.
These both make perfect sense. Since my landlord won't accept bitcoin as rent payment, I would rather have dollars than be homeless. But in the future, maybe my landlord will accept bitcoin? If the poll is to be believed, 35% of the country wants that future, 40% do not, and 25% are undecided. I think that's a pretty amazing level of public support, accomplished in only a few months, especially in a country where 70% of people don't even have a bank account.
However you feel about it, I don't think a 35%-40% split in the polls is enough to call the president a con artist and declare it a failure one week after the law passes. The author's bias is clear.
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I'll leave the rest of the article as an exercise for the reader, since (1) no one would take the time to read a fact check of the whole article, and (2) I don't have the time to write one. See also: bullshit asymmetry principle.
> but industrial rates in El Salvador are US13¢ to US15¢ per kilowatt-hour. In one four-day period, the Berlín operation mined $US269 of bitcoin — and was estimated to have spent at least $US4672 worth of electricity doing so
because if it's not bullshit, the economics of this are firmly in the scam territory.
If you haven’t noticed, HN hates crypto. Its why posts like these rise up every other week. Its a losing battle trying to argue the value and merits of crypto, when most have made up their mind and will downvote you anyways or parrot memes.
The real shame is that if the article were less biased, it would never have made it this high on the front page.
And then proceeds to cite over 10 outside sources. Why don't you just point out why you think the piece is wrong?
I wouldn't dismiss it as a hit piece. He's obviously spending a lot of time researching what's happening in El Salvador with the Chivo wallet.
As far as i checked/found, all the information he gave, is factually correct. But yes, he is very critical of the usage of Crypto for many use-cases, but that's no reason to dismiss his research. For me personally, i like it as an alternative view of what the crypto/defi proponents are claiming.
Eg. Mentioning that it's nuts to mine BTC while they could have used the geothermal energy to lower electricity costs in the country ( since they import 20%), makes more economic sense for it's citizens.
If you want additional facts about all the hacks that are happening, you should check out https://rekt.news . You'll be surpised about the amount of hacks in Defi/Cryto land.
> (I must note that Alexander and I know each other a bit, and don’t have a high opinion of each other — so read this post with a dash of salt. I won’t use his surname here, ‘cos this post isn’t really about him. Though Alexander is a slight crypto fan.) [LessWrong]
https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/2020/07/03/coindesks-ne...
I think the point is that crypto mining finances the building of power generation in areas where it was not profitable to do so due to lack of electricity transportation infrastructure. This is great for very poor countries that cannot develop low-hanging fruit power generation opportunities due to their nonexistent grid, no paying customers, etc.
It turns out you can't just arbitrarily declare "we're setting up geothermal here", as Bukele did - it's complex and susceptible to dangerous screwups.
e.g. the LaGeo plant mentioned in the piece opened a new 95 megawatt well in June. That was the result of years of careful planning, and there's already concerns that it's screwing up the local groundwater - a serious concern, given a lot of the local villages around Berlin don't have running water and rely on the groundwater.
What does this mean? They have dollarized, they don't have a currency.