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Comment by injeolmi_love | Hacker News Reader

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injeolmi_love

Crypto is not zero sum since new value is created.

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> Crypto is not zero sum since new value is created.

I'll bite, because I struggle to find people who think this. What value is created?

All the people who managed to buy drugs safely without risking being robbed by some shady street dealer?

How's that value created by bitcoin? Cash also creates that value.

Personally, the ability to always have access to my money, accept contracts internationally, and to be protected from a fickle financial system.

For other people I’ve seen a wide variety of things they consider valuable that I don’t care for. Trading, community, loans, art, gaming for examples.

> Personally, the ability to always have access to my money, accept contracts internationally, and to be protected from a fickle financial system.

Doesn't cash also fulfil these? I'd have thought bitcoin is more fickle than cash.

> For other people I’ve seen a wide variety of things they consider valuable that I don’t care for. Trading, community, loans, art, gaming for examples.

Sorry - is this crypto related? Or just examples of things people like?

I don’t use Bitcoin because it’s too slow and expensive. Other people do find value in it.

Carrying more than $10k in cash is dangerous, and likely to be seized during international travel.

That’s a list of things people use crypto for. Obviously, if they preferred the non crypto version of those services, they would use them instead.

What I mean is I can do all this with my bank:

> the ability to always have access to my money, accept contracts internationally, and to be protected from a fickle financial system

What's the difference, that is valuable enough to explain the bitcoin price differences?

What’s your bank? I’d like an account there. Every one I’ve checked so far freezes accounts and has a painful process for international wire transfers.

Er. A wire transfer like BACS? You just put in the details, click "yes, I understand this is probably a bad idea" and wait. At least in the UK.

But I'm not saying there's zero value to bitcoin's advantages. I'm saying that that in no way explains the price of bitcoin. What explains it is greater fool theory.

Bitcoin's dollar value is just the amount of it in circulation divided by the people interested, the actual number value doesn't really mean anything directly (e.g if there were 100x more of it then the price would be that much less).

Yes, FTX knows a lot about value creation from thin air.

How so? It's pretty easy to see how economic value can be created via stocks and bonds: they're basically indirect ways to give companies or governments money for investment. That money can then be used to hire more/better people, buy equipment, or build infrastructure, which will hopefully produce more value than it cost. What's the equivalent in cryptocurrency speculation or "yield farming"? Can you explain where the value actually comes from there?

Providing a consistent-over-time and tamper-proof record of transfers. It is pretty obvious how that provides value; if you have a system that provides that and one that doesn't, we'd expect the first to be more valuable. We're also seeing the first asset in history which can't be reliably confiscated without the cooperation of its owner which is also worth a lot. Involuntary rules change mid-game by local authorities has been the cost of doing business for all of human history and it is quite exciting to see that change.

Also, if you're assumption is that all government regulation is automatically good then we don't have common ground on this one but ... most government regulation is destructive. The market for bitcoin is implicitly showing the enormous costs of financial regulation where it makes sense to burn absurd amounts of energy rather than get involved in the financial system. Shaking that off is likely to lead to better outcomes. Freer systems tend to prosper more than systems people don't want to be in.

To be honest, I'm still not sure what practical usage scenarios you have in mind. Is it protecting your money from terrible economic policies if you live in a country like Venezuela? Or are you envisioning a whole new financial sector, free from existing financial regulation? In the latter case, while I don't think that all government regulation is good, I don't see how transitioning to cryptocurrency would help you avoid its problems. After all, if you're doing business somewhere, you have to obey that place's laws no matter which currency you're using to do business.

Say I have a friend in Hong Kong, Russia, the US or wherever. I can send them $10k in Monero. Whatever laws the local country may or may not have mean nothing - they can't detect the transfer and they can't stop it or roll it back even if they could detect it.

We don't know exactly what the value of being able to do that is, but it is not something that has ever been possible before and it is a concrete action that would help a friend. So it definitely has some value.

It’s not the expanding supply of Bitcoin that creates value; it is the people putting money in at higher rates.

Sure. Lots of new bridges to sell - on the blockchain.

and destroyed ..

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