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Comment by tinkerrr | Hacker News Reader

> bitcoin/etc don't solve the consumer credit problem.

True. Bitcoin should be compared to debit cards instead of credit cards. It isn't a credit-based system. The things Bitcoin is good for though (in its current stage) are more specialized, like paying someone the equivalent of $5 in Nicaragua.

> And if someone's going to go through the ropes to set up an account on a bitcoin wallet service and deposit money into it at the market, they're also likely to be able to do the same with a banking service.

Bitcoin wallets are far easier to create than bank accounts. It's by design that so few people in the world have a bank account, but anyone with an internet connection can get a Bitcoin wallet.

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> Bitcoin wallets are far easier to create than bank accounts.

That might be so, but transferring real-world money into one (a requirement until value stabilizes †) is not nearly as simple.

> It's by design that so few people in the world have a bank account, but anyone with an internet connection can get a Bitcoin wallet.

This reads a little funny when you remember that far fewer people in the world have a Bitcoin wallet. Could this be a mere matter of implementation of the design?

† IDR-USD moved 1.6% in the past month, Bitcoin-USD moved 19%

> far fewer people in the world have a Bitcoin wallet. Could this be a mere matter of implementation of the design?

imho it has more to do with the fact that banks have been around for hundreds of years and Bitcoin is brand new.

What is the rate of Bitcoin wallet creation, compared with rate of de-unbanking?

That sounds like a fair question but could equally be disingenuous.

Is the rate of lack of use of bank accounts ever likely to be public knowledge? There's zero incentive on the banks' side to publicise that kind of information.

If it's not publicly available then your question sounds quite loaded.

> Is the rate of lack of use of bank accounts ever likely to be public knowledge? There's zero incentive on the banks' side to publicise that kind of information.

Public authorities can estimate this (FDIC in the U.S. has done so) and general trends should be evident (if half of previously unbanked Indians get bank accounts we won't need banks to tell us).

But fair - just the rate of Bitcoin wallet creation then? Maybe compare to global/country population growth.

Bitcoin wallet creation went from 1 million to 5 million since last year and it keeps increasing.

Thanks! For comparison, Indonesia's population has grown by around 2-3 million people per year over the last two decades; India's by around 17 million people per year; and the world's rate as a whole is about 70 million per year.

Those are absolute numbers. From 1 million to 5 million is a 500% increase. I doubt any nation has seen anywhere close to a 500% increase in their population numbers.

> Bitcoin wallets are far easier to create than bank accounts.

What's the recommended wallet software to use these days that doesn't need tens of gigabytes of blockchain storage? All of the non-full-blockchain clients seem shady to varying degrees.

I like Electrum: https://electrum.org/

From the site: "Instant on: Your client does not download the blockchain. It uses a network of specialized servers that index the blockchain"

SPV doesn't seem like the right approach. I'd like to see full blockchain hash verification, just not starting from the very beginning of the chain. Why not download the hash of a more recent block and verify the chain starting from there, periodically throwing away old blocks in favor of a single hash?

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