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Comment by tptacek | Hacker News Reader

"Nobody used it and the costs didn't justify the usage" is a complaint you can level at any currency?

Yes. Using any particular currency generally isn't voluntary. If El Salvador had mandated everyone use only bitcoin then it everyone would have been using it. If using USD was voluntary in the US a lot less people would use it. It isn't a particularly strong argument to say that everybody uses one thing that they are legally required to use, then compare it to a new alternative that didn't gain total dominance in a few years.

Although in this case I am happy to agree it might be true despite being a weak argument, I can see a lot of good reasons why someone wouldn't want to use Bitcoin in practice. But the article didn't touch them when declaring a failure and the experiment wasn't run to a natural conclusion where the people involved decided it was not working.

It feels like you're trying to say "Bitcoin was never really tried" because Bukeli didn't make it the exclusive currency of El Salvador.

Paper money was first used in the West in Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1690, was used in limited fashion, became unpopular and then phased out. And that was the end -- paper money was a failure.

Wait....

  The currency was initially unpopular for anything except paying taxes, and was phased out. Within a few years, however, paper currency would return to Massachusetts. The Bank of England began issuing banknotes in 1695, also to pay for war against the French, and they became increasingly common throughout the 18th Century.

> If using USD was voluntary in the US a lot less people would use it.

I'm curious what makes you think so, and what the alternatives would be. My impression is actually that if shops weren't forced to accept USD, 100% would still do so.

Obviously we can't be truly certain without running an experiment or few, but...

1) If they're being forced to do something, that suggests someone doesn't believe they would do it voluntarily. Nobody more suspicious than the person who forces others to do things for their own good.

2) Businesses are invariably blamed for inflation. Every single time the subject comes up organically somebody pipes up to blame "greedy businesses"; it is basically a meme. Some business owners would start up a non-inflating currency just to escape that. They don't want to be political scapegoats.

3) You can spot a bunch of banking crisises coming a mile away, the financial system seems to be mathematically guaranteed to collapse from time to time as I understand it. If given the choice a bunch of people would rather sign up for alternative systems that only enter a crisis state unexpectedly. That includes small business owners.

Would they still accept USD? In the US, probably. But a bunch of alternatives would crop up and it is by no means guarenteed that the USD would be competitive. The US Fed manages the currency and they do a terrible job.

> If they're being forced to do something, that suggests someone doesn't believe they would do it voluntarily

But wait. US retail shops are not forced to accept USD.

They can, if they choose, accept payment only in smiles. Or CAD, or good vibes.

(Taxes, however, must be paid in USD).

In practice, US retail wants USD, for obvious reasons. There are no viable widespread alternatives (but there are countless insignificant local currencies!).

It's funny that you mention it, because quite a few digital storefronts accept crypto. Particularly, the ones that have been censured by the financial oligarchies (Visa, Mastercard et al)

"My impression is actually that if shops weren't forced to accept USD, 100% would still do so."

Kind of like the crypto pump and dump scams that we see daily. Who wouldn't want to create their own currency? It would eventually take power away from the US government.

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