WTF Keep Building in Crypto
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In a world where cash is disappearing, this is crypto’s single validated value: in exchange for giving up the stability of a currency, you get the resilience of crypto.
> decentralised Crypto protocols are governed by code that cannot be practically censored or easily changed. For example, you know exactly how many bitcoin will exist in 80 years
Crypto has value in its interface with humans. (This is true of value, fundamentally.) Pretending it’s robotic money is a convenient fiction. If miners decide the number of Bitcoins needs to be increased, it will be increased. You can plead you’re on the real chain, the one as it was meant to be. But that is akin to refusing to convert your lira into Euros on principal.
> we have never had a platform with standardized APIs and immutable open programs for finance
This is almost entirely on account of regulation, not fundamental limits. There are some nonsense limits. Crypto has done a good job of uncovering those, and they’re in the process of being fixed, e.g. FedNOW and T+1 settlement.
I'm not one to call crypto protocols immutable, so I'm sort of with you. That's why I added 'practically' and 'easily' to that sentence.
Not even China was able to ban a decentralised chain. So I'm cautiously optimistic...
-- Edit --
Hadn't seen your first and third points.
1) & 3): Agree with your points. I'd just add that you don't have to speculate to use these networks for real day to day transactions. Also, i'm not bullish on incumbents innovating faster than these permissionless protocols.
This may be due to the difficulty of enforcement, but I don’t get the sense they’ve tried. (We ultimately won’t know until their next balance of payments scare, when capital flight becomes an existential concern to the state.)
(Sorry for the live edits!)
> not bullish on incumbents innovating faster than these permissionless protocols
I’m not either. But the good ideas are being ported over quickly enough to cap crypto’s TAM. There is a model in which crypto is the financial system’s alpha environment. The curiosity is the value seems to accrue to the workers, i.e. when central banks and other players want to implement an idea from permissionless protocols, they aren’t contracting with the companies. They’re hiring folks away. (This is also true in many areas of asset management.)
All good points and I'm super curious to see how it plays out :-) For what it's worth, I hope you're right and non crypto FinServs can improve as a result of alpha leakage.
All three of your reasons boil include the word "money", which shouldn't exist in the same sentence as "cryptocurrency" unless your wallet is totally liquid (it is not).
I'd like to believe in next-generation tech like this, but misconceptions like 'crypto == money' will bring this industry crashing down time and time again.
Crypto is not money, it's a technology that makes it easy to track and transfer units out of account in a trustless way.
Most would confidently argue that stablecoins are money. I would argue Bitcoin and Ethereum are also nascent forms of money, but that's outside the wider tech/platform point.
How would you word it?
Even the peer-to-peer usage is primarily driven by enthusiasts and spot-traders. Cryptocurrency's only future is being treated like ERC-20 Pokemon cards.
> They will always be inferior to the dollar purely on the virtue that they rely on the value of $USD to exist
As long as you can access / cash out from dollars, yes. Most people don't have this privilege or access to first class financial services.
Usage: I agree that usage is currently being driven primarily by enthusiasts and speculators, but in the last 3 years its changing fast... Here are some links. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33723425
I can't see any good with this platform or for crypto as it is used mostly for price speculation.
Crypto is a complete dead end.
For the three reasons mentioned in the post, I think Crypto has the potential to increase economic freedom in the world.
I don't speculate on it and I also HATE the bad actors it draws. It is being used for non speculation use cases so it can't be a complete dead end :D
The problems crypto “solves” can already be solved with existing tech. The fact that some of those problems aren’t being solved by existing tech either means people don’t actually care about the problems, or that there are non-technical barriers in place to solving the problems.
Either way, there’s no there there for crypto.
Here's a great study on remittances:
https://blog.chainalysis.com/reports/africas-grassroots-cryp...
Here's a summary of one on stablecoins:
We met together as a team to reflect on why it makes sense to continue to build open source crypto products.