An insight on Bitcoin

[hellhamster]

...for someone who has complained a lot about how ignorant Edge is allegedly being about this topic it seems you yourself has had little to nothing to offer to the discussion (based on what I've read from your posts in the last 5ish pages of this thread) other then haha "edge is so dumb" and backing it up with... nothing.

How about explaining in detail your position with sources instead of saying "no u" over and over again.

There have been many posts explaining why crypto is better than normal money in this thread. Here's a quick synopsis anyway:

1. Crypto does not rely on a centralised banking system that controls the supply by being the only ones able to print or burn more tokens/money. Overprinting by central banks is what caused this inflationary crisis we see today, that will develop in a huge liquidity crisis soon. This is proven by the money supply of the last few years reported by the FED in the US, and the ECB in the EU to name a few, as well as their balance sheet that is increasing exponentially with each year (asset holdings by central banks that prop up the prices such as houses or equities). This basically means that your labor in order to earn a wage amounts to nothing, because banks can do what they want to print more. Each crypto has its own tools to deal with inflation and deflation, mainly by printing if there is a need for inflation or burning tokens as a means of deflation, usually done by voting or delegator/stake pools (works kinda like a senate).
2. The transfer fees are extremely minimal depending on each crypto's network. Some are more expensive to use than others, some are practically free.
3. Transfers are lightning fast, again depending on each crypto's network. Some take minutes, others less than a second, no matter the distance.
4. You don't have to go through hundreds of loops of bureaucracy if you wanna transfer funds from one part of the world to the other. No more waiting around for weeks until a transaction is finally authorised by the many banks that touch your money as it moves through them and they take a percentage.
5. Energy requirements are vastly less on most proof of stake cryptos compared to banking. This makes crypto as a store of value better for the environment by default should proof of stake become the dominant from of token governance. Proof of work costs more energy, but it is theoretically more secure because the computations are heavier.
6. Transparency. You can't hide your illegal shit from the blockchain, so there is no money laundering or shady stuff going on. If you have a person's adress, you can see their movements. Of course this can be set up in a way that it is only viewable by the police.
7. Security. Crypto held in personal storages are only possible to steal if you can crack a 32 word password or something similar. The only other way to hack a network is to control over half of the supply, which in most cases takes dozens of billions of dollars. Even if that were to happen, the good cryptos have mechanisms in place to prevent that.

Of course some cryptos are better than others, and there are many that specialise in different things such as smart contracts which improve automation in the financial sector through oracles, others are focused on network speed, and others focus on decentralised finance etc.

[Edge-]

Overprinting by central banks is what caused this inflationary crisis we see today

Don't take financial analysis from crypto folks, because while it's a contributing factor it's hardly the sold, or even primary cause.

This is Joe Rogan, "Man, those fat cats that got $2,400 over 2 years during the pandemic are just getting TOO MUCH MONEY FROM THE GOVERNMENT AND IT'S RUINING EVERYTHING" levels of analysis.

Also ignoring the entire idea of monetary policy or why a country would want to actively pursue stable valuation for their currency.

2. The transfer fees are extremely minimal depending on each crypto's network. Some are more expensive to use than others, some are practically free.

Yet we're still dealing with side-chains and temporary tokens in many to make it remotely useful, thus eliminating much of the supposed security benefits. Add on problems in terms of the speed of approving transactions, the number of transactions that can be processed simultaneously, and the fact that fees have already become a major problem for a great many coins, or during periods of instability.

This is not any benefit over the existing system, which performs better.

3. Transfers are lightning fast, again depending on each crypto's network. Some take minutes, others less than a second, no matter the distance.

Minutes is not "lighting fast", and while seconds is damned quick, how many transactions can they process at once? Tens? Hundreds? Thousands?

This is not better than over current systems, which perform better.

4. You don't have to go through hundreds of loops of bureaucracy if you wanna transfer funds from one part of the world to the other. No more waiting around for weeks until a transaction is finally authorised by the many banks that touch your money as it moves through them and they take a percentage.

It's also largely not accepted and useless in many countries, so the need of going through currency exchanges may take some time but isn't exactly the most complicated thing in the world.

This is not a benefit over the current system, which performs better.

5. Energy requirements are vastly less on most proof of stake cryptos compared to banking. This makes crypto as a store of value better for the environment by default should proof of stake become the dominant from of token governance. Proof of work costs more energy, but it is theoretically more secure because the computations are heavier.

Congrats, they're finally making gains. It's still not a benefit over the current system and are not using "vastly less" compared to banking on a per-transaction basis, only if you look at the net-total use for all transactions and ignore that traditional transactions are orders of magnitude larger in scale vs. crypto.

6. Transparency. You can't hide your illegal shit from the blockchain, so there is no money laundering or shady stuff going on. If you have a person's adress, you can see their movements. Of course this can be set up in a way that it is only viewable by the police.

Weird this is a "benefit" given that one of the most common uses for crypto has largely been...money laundering. All this financial information is available to police - with valid warrants - under the current banking system, so this is not a benefit over traditional banking.

7. Security. Crypto held in personal storages are only possible to steal if you can crack a 32 word password or something similar. The only other way to hack a network is to control over half of the supply, which in most cases takes dozens of billions of dollars. Even if that were to happen, the good cryptos have mechanisms in place to prevent that.

Addressed this, side-chains and temporary tokens and the like that are created to make crypto convenient to use blow up all the supposed security benefits.

You can set up complex bank passwords for your accounts. Also, don't people regularly "lose" their crypto because they forget the passwords?

Hacking banks isn't a huge risk to most people who store money there, given that most of the hacks are (similar to crypto) of personal accounts vs. the banks as a whole. And the benefit to traditional banking over crypto on this front? At least in the US, FDIC insurance providing a safety net protecting up to $250K of your money in the bank if it falls apart and goes bankrupt. There is no similar guarantee I've seen for any crypto coin.

smart contracts

Didn't the last few stablecoins based on smart contracts falling apart kinda kill the myth of the magical smart contracts?

[Endus]

There have been many posts explaining why crypto is better than normal money in this thread. Here's a quick synopsis anyway:

1. Crypto does not rely on a centralised banking system that controls the supply by being the only ones able to print or burn more tokens/money. Overprinting by central banks is what caused this inflationary crisis we see today, that will develop in a huge liquidity crisis soon. This is proven by the money supply of the last few years reported by the FED in the US, and the ECB in the EU to name a few, as well as their balance sheet that is increasing exponentially with each year (asset holdings by central banks that prop up the prices such as houses or equities). This basically means that your labor in order to earn a wage amounts to nothing, because banks can do what they want to print more. Each crypto has its own tools to deal with inflation and deflation, mainly by printing if there is a need for inflation or burning tokens as a means of deflation, usually done by voting or delegator/stake pools (works kinda like a senate).

This is a negative. Not being able to control the supply means that you cannot regulate the value of the currency, meaning that currency is highly unstable and can jump or fall significantly in value in just hours. We've seen it happen with cryptocurrencies, repeatedly, with no real exceptions.

Stability of a currency is the central property that makes it useful as a medium for exchange. A highly volatile currency is just making every exchange into a new form of barter, with a new middleman that exists and [i]fails to provide the solution that currency provided; that of a stable medium of exchange.

2. The transfer fees are extremely minimal depending on each crypto's network. Some are more expensive to use than others, some are practically free.

"Practically free" remains a higher cost than "actually free", which is what real currencies cost for transfers. Again, this is a mark against cryptocurrency.

3. Transfers are lightning fast, again depending on each crypto's network. Some take minutes, others less than a second, no matter the distance.

It takes less time to transfer actual funds through banks, so I have no idea why you thought this was an advantage for crypto. I've transferred funds from my bank in Canada to my pocket in Athens, Greece in the time it took me to make the request at an ATM. I can send money to a family member just as quickly. Where did you ever get the idea that crypto is faster, here?

4. You don't have to go through hundreds of loops of bureaucracy if you wanna transfer funds from one part of the world to the other. No more waiting around for weeks until a transaction is finally authorised by the many banks that touch your money as it moves through them and they take a percentage.

Only if you're talking huge amounts of cash, I think it's north of $10,000 in a single transfer? And even then, it's generally not "weeks".

Also, there is no "many banks". There's my bank, and the bank I'm withdrawing from. That's it. Nor are they taking a "percentage"; there's a fee but it's not percentile generally. I can use any ATM in the world that uses the Plus system, I'm just paying normal second-party ATM fees as it's not my own bank's machine. I never had to wait for money while I was backpacking through Europe, and that was back in 2001 before the Euro was even a thing (which would've made it much easier, as I wouldn't have needed like 6 different currencies).

5. Energy requirements are vastly less on most proof of stake cryptos compared to banking. This makes crypto as a store of value better for the environment by default should proof of stake become the dominant from of token governance. Proof of work costs more energy, but it is theoretically more secure because the computations are heavier.

You're comparing the energy cost of all the services banks provide with the energy cost of mining crypto.

That's a dishonest comparison. Compare the cost of mining to the cost of minting fresh bills, at best, and even that's not particularly reasonable as physical cash is being used less and less. Crypto is not more energy-efficient than traditional banking.

The usual comparison that's knocked around is a report showing that Bitcoin (and only Bitcoin) uses half the power of the entire global banking industry.

That's the entire global banking industry, every currency globally, all the services all banks provide, etc. Versus just the currency transfers and mining for just Bitcoin itself.

6. Transparency. You can't hide your illegal shit from the blockchain, so there is no money laundering or shady stuff going on. If you have a person's adress, you can see their movements. Of course this can be set up in a way that it is only viewable by the police.

And if you don't have a person's address, or they have multiple addresses and use some anonymously, there's no way to connect the two. Also, you apparently don't really understand money laundering; the process involves money used for illegal activities being processed through a middle man doing legitimate business, so there's no direct tie back to the illegal activity; organized crime funneling illicit gambling proceeds through a restaurant and then having the (now highly profitable) restaurant's profits go back into their accounts, "clean". Money laundering happens even when actual bills have serial numbers, which allow exactly the same kind of tracking as the blockchain.

If I find anyone who'll take $USD for Bitcoin and not ask questions about how I got the $USD, then by buying the Bitcoin, I've laundered my money, and can exchange it back out of crypto "clean". That's how it works.

7. Security. Crypto held in personal storages are only possible to steal if you can crack a 32 word password or something similar. The only other way to hack a network is to control over half of the supply, which in most cases takes dozens of billions of dollars. Even if that were to happen, the good cryptos have mechanisms in place to prevent that.

"The only way to hack crypto is through these obvious and exploitable means that will remain inviolable until the moment they're trivially violable" isn't an argument for strong security. There's been multiple high-profile crypto thefts already. The Axie Infinity theft totalled $620 million USD. The idea that crypto is particularly secure when such heists are significantly outpacing actual bank heists in value taken is laughable.

[Belize]

Overprinting by central banks is what caused this inflationary crisis we see today,

The highest corporate profits in over 50 years and the consolidation of entire industries into 2-3 mega-corporations that collude to set prices is why we're seeing "inflation" right now, you absolute muppet.

If you're going to parade bullshit talking points invented by the very same corporations responsible for price increases, you 100% deserve to be scammed by crypto.

[Edge-]

The highest corporate profits in over 50 years and the consolidation of entire industries into 2-3 mega-corporations that collude to set prices is why we're seeing "inflation" right now, you absolute muppet.

If you're going to parade bullshit talking points invented by the very same corporations responsible for price increases, you 100% deserve to be scammed by crypto.

Plus, you know...the cracks of "just in time" shipping and our entire supply chain being built to be as cheap and efficient as possible, and not remotely resilient to any interruptions. Plus the fluctuations in transporting goods that cratered during the pandemic and then shot back up faster than companies could spin shipping operations back up. Plus the pre-covid shortage of truckers and other delivery drivers being even worse now.

And that's just scratching the bloody surface of the interconnected, and often structural issues that are contributing towards the global inflation we're still seeing.

[Twdft]

The point about inflation being caused by increasing available money is actually true. The only reason corporations are able to set prices higher and higher is that there is enough money in circulation to pay these prices.

You can see this even in WoW, global sum of available gold increased over the years. Blizzards trys to invent gold sinks to lessen inflation, but is reluctant to decrease new raw gold.

[Edge-]

The point about inflation being caused by increasing available money is actually true. The only reason corporations are able to set prices higher and higher is that there is enough money in circulation to pay these prices.

You can see this even in WoW, global sum of available gold increased over the years. Blizzards trys to invent gold sinks to lessen inflation, but is reluctant to decrease new raw gold.

Sorta kinda not really at all. The $2,400 people got over the pandemic ain't the cause of the global inflation. Pumping money into the markets to shore them up doesn't mean that actual consumers have more money.

WoW is an absolutely horrid comparison to make since the WoW economy in no way, shape, or form represents the actual global economy. Sure there are certain economic theories or generalities that apply like supply and demand and whatnot, but any attempt at a serious comparison falls apart.

Much of this is driven by demand returning to normal while supply has not, and additional logistical problems when it comes to transportation and storage. Companies are paying more to get stuff delivered on-time, and passing those costs along to consumers. Not because consumers necessarily have more money, but because that's simply how they offset the price increases.

Hence why you have so many people talking about how they're struggling to afford all these price increases - because your average consumer doesn't have more available money.

[Belize]

The point about inflation being caused by increasing available money is actually true. The only reason corporations are able to set prices higher and higher is that there is enough money in circulation to pay these prices.

1. No, the stimmies people got 2 years ago aren't the cause for the current massive price hikes. It's simply not a sufficient amount of money injected in the system.

2. You're mostly seeing "inflation" on essential goods, not across the board. Food, fuel and clothing are currently the highest inflatianory targets because people can't go without them. The price of electronics hasn't appreciably increased past their jump in price during the chip shortage (and many have now come down from those prices).

People are paying higher prices, because if they don't it means not eating which I've been told is generally bad for your health.

[Twdft]

Sorta kinda not really at all. The $2,400 people got over the pandemic ain't the cause of the global inflation. Pumping money into the markets to shore them up doesn't mean that actual consumers have more money.

WoW is an absolutely horrid comparison to make since the WoW economy in no way, shape, or form represents the actual global economy. Sure there are certain economic theories or generalities that apply like supply and demand and whatnot, but any attempt at a serious comparison falls apart.

Much of this is driven by demand returning to normal while supply has not, and additional logistical problems when it comes to transportation and storage. Companies are paying more to get stuff delivered on-time, and passing those costs along to consumers. Not because consumers necessarily have more money, but because that's simply how they offset the price increases.

Hence why you have so many people talking about how they're struggling to afford all these price increases - because your average consumer doesn't have more available money.

Consumers not getting the money that is pumped into the economy is exactly the problem with inflation (inflation as such is a core ingredient of our economy and "fine" if you agree with the economic system).

Of course I didn't mean to compare WoW to IRL 1:1 but just imagine tonight at midnight Blizzard doubles (or halves) all our gold... what do you think prices will do tomorrow? Just pointing out the underlying principle of inflation.

1. No, the stimmies people got 2 years ago

I probably have to clarify that the stimmies is not what I mean with increasing the global available money. The stimmies were peanuts. Money gets increased by fractional-reserve banking.

[Edge-]

Consumers not getting the money that is pumped into the economy is exactly the problem with inflation (inflation as such is a core ingredient of our economy and "fine" if you agree with the economic system).

I mean, inflation as a thing will always exist and keep it low and stable is good. It's part of a growing economy, and one of the Fed mandates to maintain stable inflation as best they can using the tools they have available.

But companies having a lot of money right now isn't the cause of inflation, either. They've been having lots of money with dirt-cheap interest rates making borrowing money basically like free money (since as long as expected growth based off any investment was over 1-2% they were making a profit at that point).

but just imagine tonight at midnight Blizzard doubles (or halves) all our gold... what do you think prices will do tomorrow? Just pointing out the underlying principle of inflation.

Again, cost increases are often coming from increases in shipping costs driven by too much demand and not enough supply. That's largely being passed onto consumers.

This is still a bad example of trying to relate the WoW economy to real world economies and economic theories.

[jonnysensible]

edge have you checked the wackoff charts lately

[Edge-]

edge have you checked the wackoff charts lately

I have not, what's the latest? Are the curves still curvy?

[jonnysensible]

I have not, what's the latest? Are the curves still curvy?

based on its predictions the line could either go up, or it could go down.

[Edge-]

based on its predictions the line could either go up, or it could go down.

Shit man, that sounds like a roller coaster ride.

[Zinstorm]

There have been many posts explaining why crypto is better than normal money in this thread. Here's a quick synopsis anyway:

1. Crypto does not rely on a centralised banking system that controls the supply by being the only ones able to print or burn more tokens/money. Overprinting by central banks is what caused this inflationary crisis we see today, that will develop in a huge liquidity crisis soon. This is proven by the money supply of the last few years reported by the FED in the US, and the ECB in the EU to name a few, as well as their balance sheet that is increasing exponentially with each year (asset holdings by central banks that prop up the prices such as houses or equities). This basically means that your labor in order to earn a wage amounts to nothing, because banks can do what they want to print more. Each crypto has its own tools to deal with inflation and deflation, mainly by printing if there is a need for inflation or burning tokens as a means of deflation, usually done by voting or delegator/stake pools (works kinda like a senate).
2. The transfer fees are extremely minimal depending on each crypto's network. Some are more expensive to use than others, some are practically free.
3. Transfers are lightning fast, again depending on each crypto's network. Some take minutes, others less than a second, no matter the distance.
4. You don't have to go through hundreds of loops of bureaucracy if you wanna transfer funds from one part of the world to the other. No more waiting around for weeks until a transaction is finally authorised by the many banks that touch your money as it moves through them and they take a percentage.
5. Energy requirements are vastly less on most proof of stake cryptos compared to banking. This makes crypto as a store of value better for the environment by default should proof of stake become the dominant from of token governance. Proof of work costs more energy, but it is theoretically more secure because the computations are heavier.
6. Transparency. You can't hide your illegal shit from the blockchain, so there is no money laundering or shady stuff going on. If you have a person's adress, you can see their movements. Of course this can be set up in a way that it is only viewable by the police.
7. Security. Crypto held in personal storages are only possible to steal if you can crack a 32 word password or something similar. The only other way to hack a network is to control over half of the supply, which in most cases takes dozens of billions of dollars. Even if that were to happen, the good cryptos have mechanisms in place to prevent that.

Of course some cryptos are better than others, and there are many that specialise in different things such as smart contracts which improve automation in the financial sector through oracles, others are focused on network speed, and others focus on decentralised finance etc.

Thank you for responding at least... Nice to at least hear from the other side of the argument.

I personally can't get behind crypto currency at this point in time. I want to believe that it can have potential as a system that can work but their are just too many problems with it that many people have already outlined (both within this thread and from other sources beyond this forum). It doesn't help that most cryptos are created by people acting in bad faith just to steal money from others.

[NED funded]

The point about inflation being caused by increasing available money is actually true. The only reason corporations are able to set prices higher and higher is that there is enough money in circulation to pay these prices.

You can see this even in WoW, global sum of available gold increased over the years. Blizzards trys to invent gold sinks to lessen inflation, but is reluctant to decrease new raw gold.

It true but kinda moot?

Bitcoin does solve the issue of it not being inflationary but its also deflationary. If I spent 10 bitcoin 10 years ago you would have lost hundreds of thousands of dollars in future value. Under this incentive structure why spend bitcoin at all for most normal transactions and not just hoard it.

I am ignoring the tremendous amount of energy required for the transactions btw and the number of transactions they allow compared to normal banking

[Zan15]

edge have you checked the wackoff charts lately

wackoff chart says 6 figures real soon 9999.99.

[Draco-Onis]

It true but kinda moot?

Bitcoin does solve the issue of it not being inflationary but its also deflationary. If I spent 10 bitcoin 10 years ago you would have lost hundreds of thousands of dollars in future value. Under this incentive structure why spend bitcoin at all for most normal transactions and not just hoard it.

I am ignoring the tremendous amount of energy required for the transactions btw and the number of transactions they allow compared to normal banking

bitcoin isn't a currency it is a speculative "asset" at the closest, it could be worth 100K or $10 a decade from now you have no way to know.

[NED funded]

Someone just hacked 98 million dollars worth of ether.

Don't you just love crypto

https://etherscan.io/address/0x0d043...98d7b2285ded00

https://twitter.com/harmonyprotocol/...10924400324608

[Jastall]

bitcoin isn't a currency it is a speculative "asset" at the closest, it could be worth 100K or $10 a decade from now you have no way to know.

I've thought for a while that cryptoassets is a far more accurate term for these things than cryptocurrency. Everyone treats them as assets in the first place anyway, nobody really says "get tons of USD and do absolutely nothing with this pile of currency until it's worth a dozen/hundred times what it's now!!".