Crypto Currency Thread (Vol.2)
Discussion
ERIKM400 said:
Well that's why the decentralized and pseudo anonymous characteristics of BTC are so important.
And the reason why Satoshi had to disappear after bootstrapping Bitcoin.
Because this makes it impossible for organisations to go after a single person or a centralized potential point of failure.
How are you going to shut down or censure a truelly decentralized protocol running on millions of computers worldwide?
You don't, you simply shutdown the egress points or make it very difficult to offramp. Binance is the biggest Crypto exchange, the UK government stopped withdrawals from Binance to UK banks in a snap due to irregularities, that is just one example. Now imagine the Governments decided they'd make a concerted effort and stop withdrawals to lots of other places. BTC is worthless unless you can turn it into fiat at some point which the BTC evangelists seem to be in total denial about. And the reason why Satoshi had to disappear after bootstrapping Bitcoin.
Because this makes it impossible for organisations to go after a single person or a centralized potential point of failure.
How are you going to shut down or censure a truelly decentralized protocol running on millions of computers worldwide?
The powers that be could literally stop BTC in it's tracks tomorrow if they wanted to, they don't need to kill the network, they just need to make it very difficult to turn digital currency into real money.
Just because BTC is better than FIAT (sic), avoids currency debasement etc, is kinda mute when dealing with politics/government. Just because it's obvious regulators / OFAC / pick your enforcement agency can cause it to collapse, doesn't mean you support those actions. But it's a 20,000lb gorilla in the room.
Should Trump get in (looking likely - grrr), he's going to do something epically dumb, that makes a great case for the use of BTC. He is gunning for control of the Fed. I get all the arguments (before techno mumbo jumbo), why BTC is superior - but you cannot avoid the ever present risk of the system shutting it down. And they can.
Without a centralised authority it cannot pivot to even "work" with the authorities. It's completely alien and could even be an existential threat to FIAT hegemony.
It may never come to pass, and BTC a limited co-existence, but that's far short of the maximalist who thinks it should replace FIAT.
Should Trump get in (looking likely - grrr), he's going to do something epically dumb, that makes a great case for the use of BTC. He is gunning for control of the Fed. I get all the arguments (before techno mumbo jumbo), why BTC is superior - but you cannot avoid the ever present risk of the system shutting it down. And they can.
Without a centralised authority it cannot pivot to even "work" with the authorities. It's completely alien and could even be an existential threat to FIAT hegemony.
It may never come to pass, and BTC a limited co-existence, but that's far short of the maximalist who thinks it should replace FIAT.
OoopsVoss said:
Just because BTC is better than FIAT (sic), avoids currency debasement etc, is kinda mute when dealing with politics/government. Just because it's obvious regulators / OFAC / pick your enforcement agency can cause it to collapse, doesn't mean you support those actions. But it's a 20,000lb gorilla in the room.
Should Trump get in (looking likely - grrr), he's going to do something epically dumb, that makes a great case for the use of BTC. He is gunning for control of the Fed. I get all the arguments (before techno mumbo jumbo), why BTC is superior - but you cannot avoid the ever present risk of the system shutting it down. And they can.
Without a centralised authority it cannot pivot to even "work" with the authorities. It's completely alien and could even be an existential threat to FIAT hegemony.
It may never come to pass, and BTC a limited co-existence, but that's far short of the maximalist who thinks it should replace FIAT.
I'd be interested to hear how you think it can be shut down, because from my reading there would only be two likely survivors of even a nuclear mass extinction event: cockroaches and BTC.Should Trump get in (looking likely - grrr), he's going to do something epically dumb, that makes a great case for the use of BTC. He is gunning for control of the Fed. I get all the arguments (before techno mumbo jumbo), why BTC is superior - but you cannot avoid the ever present risk of the system shutting it down. And they can.
Without a centralised authority it cannot pivot to even "work" with the authorities. It's completely alien and could even be an existential threat to FIAT hegemony.
It may never come to pass, and BTC a limited co-existence, but that's far short of the maximalist who thinks it should replace FIAT.
BandOfBrothers said:
I'd be interested to hear how you think it can be shut down, because from my reading there would only be two likely survivors of even a nuclear mass extinction event: cockroaches and BTC.
It can't be shutdown just like 100 years ago they couldn't make you hand in your Gold.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102
On April 6, 1933, The New York Times wrote, under the headline Hoarding of Gold, "The Executive Order issued by the President yesterday amplifies and particularizes his earlier warnings against hoarding. On March 6, taking advantage of a wartime statute that had not been repealed, he issued Presidential Proclamation 2039 that forbade the hoarding 'of gold or silver coin or bullion or currency', under penalty of $10,000 fine or ten years' imprisonment or both
Scootersp said:
BandOfBrothers said:
I'd be interested to hear how you think it can be shut down, because from my reading there would only be two likely survivors of even a nuclear mass extinction event: cockroaches and BTC.
It can't be shutdown just like 100 years ago they couldn't make you hand in your Gold.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102
On April 6, 1933, The New York Times wrote, under the headline Hoarding of Gold, "The Executive Order issued by the President yesterday amplifies and particularizes his earlier warnings against hoarding. On March 6, taking advantage of a wartime statute that had not been repealed, he issued Presidential Proclamation 2039 that forbade the hoarding 'of gold or silver coin or bullion or currency', under penalty of $10,000 fine or ten years' imprisonment or both
There is no way for the government to take your BTC unless you give them your (digital number) key.
Similarly, if you have just say 3 surviving PCs, BTC works.
BandOfBrothers said:
There is no way for the government to take your BTC unless you give them your (digital number) key.
Similarly, if you have just say 3 surviving PCs, BTC works.
It's entirely useless if you can't spend it though. Similarly, if you have just say 3 surviving PCs, BTC works.
The government could easily control the on/off ramps and at which point the whole thing becomes a load of 1s and 0s in cyberspace. You can't spend it without swapping it for £ or $, nobody is able to buy more, and nobody can sell what they own.
Of course the government can - and has - seized BTC, so the argument they can't take it wouldn't appear to hold water. I doubt many criminals hand over their keys, but the government can still confiscate them.
Condi said:
BandOfBrothers said:
There is no way for the government to take your BTC unless you give them your (digital number) key.
Similarly, if you have just say 3 surviving PCs, BTC works.
It's entirely useless if you can't spend it though. Similarly, if you have just say 3 surviving PCs, BTC works.
The government could easily control the on/off ramps and at which point the whole thing becomes a load of 1s and 0s in cyberspace. You can't spend it without swapping it for £ or $, nobody is able to buy more, and nobody can sell what they own.
Of course the government can - and has - seized BTC, so the argument they can't take it wouldn't appear to hold water. I doubt many criminals hand over their keys, but the government can still confiscate them.
Sending and receiving BTC is spending it!
You transfer to the seller he gives you a goat, drugs, a car, gun, bread, whatever you are buying.
No government can stop that, even if everyone on the planet agreed to band together to try to stop it, they couldn't.
All you need is a mobile phone, a PC, or other type of computer for each party to the transaction and ideally one more. That's it.
Even if those weren't available, the BTC doesn't disappear or get taken, it just sits there until someone with the correct hardware fires it up again.
It is without question that BTC cannot be moved without your digital key. It is simply not possible.
People may have disclosed their key, or kept their BTC on an exchange and had it seized from the exchange, but again that is them giving away their key.
BandOfBrothers said:
With all due respect, you don't know what you're talking about.
Sending and receiving BTC is spending it!
You transfer to the seller he gives you a goat, drugs, a car, gun, bread, whatever you are buying.
No sSending and receiving BTC is spending it!
You transfer to the seller he gives you a goat, drugs, a car, gun, bread, whatever you are buying.
t. But the food for the goat, the ingredients for the drugs, the metal for the car, the bullets for the gun, and the wheat for the bread are all usually traded in £ or $ or € or Yen or whatever it may be. At some point someone is going to need to turn those BTC into £ to pay someone, and if they say they won't accept BTC because they can't cash it out then the whole chain falls apart. What use does the farmer have for BTC if he needs to buy diesel for his tractor but Shell won't accept BTC? BTC is then useless to him, so he refuses to accept it. The pet food supplier then doesn't want BTC because he can't pay the farmer with it. He says to the goat farmer he will only accept £, so why is the goat farmer going to take BTC from you he can't easily spend? It's not complicated.
Until the government allows you to pay taxes in Bitcoin you CANNOT exist without using the existing financial system, and if any government wants to make using BTC difficult they're certainly not going to allow you to send BTC to HMRC now are they?!
Edited by Condi on Friday 17th May 00:34
Condi said:
BandOfBrothers said:
With all due respect, you don't know what you're talking about.
Sending and receiving BTC is spending it!
You transfer to the seller he gives you a goat, drugs, a car, gun, bread, whatever you are buying.
No sSending and receiving BTC is spending it!
You transfer to the seller he gives you a goat, drugs, a car, gun, bread, whatever you are buying.
t. But the food for the goat, the ingredients for the drugs, the metal for the car, the bullets for the gun, and the wheat for the bread are all usually traded in £ or $ or € or Yen or whatever it may be. At some point someone is going to need to turn those BTC into £ to pay someone, and if they say they won't accept BTC because they can't cash it out then the whole chain falls apart. What use does the farmer have for BTC if he needs to buy diesel for his tractor but Shell won't accept BTC? BTC is then useless to him, so he refuses to accept it. The food supplier then doesn't want BTC because he can't pay the farmer with it. He says to the goat farmer he will only accept £, so why is the goat farmer going to take BTC from you he can't easily spend? It's not complicated.
Until the government allows you to pay taxes in Bitcoin you CANNOT exist without using the existing financial system, and if any government wants to make using BTC difficult they're certainly not going to allow you to send BTC to HMRC now are they?!
So what if Shell won't accept BTC and you need petrol. I guarantee you someone will sell it to you for BTC, especially if the government start restricting what you can do with their fiat currency.
And how is the government going to stop you trading BTC for £ or $?
You know that multiple governments have tried that with USD and their local currency, right? How well did that go?
Condi said:
BandOfBrothers said:
And how is the government going to stop you trading BTC for £ or $?
Very easily, they can control the on/off ramps via restrictions on the banking sector. Simply say that no banks are allowed to send or receive funds from any crypto exchanges. It seems you're unaware that dollar bills and pound notes exist.
Who is going to stop me selling my BTC for a stack of pound notes to my mate?
we're past the stage of 'The Gov' can control it
1/ they can't stop peer to peer
2/ if you look at the 13f filings that have just come out - there'd be some mighty big pissed off institutions (obvs US based)
3/ kind of related - Eu is pushing ahead fast to lay out rules for MICA, to have clear legislation for stable coins
as for 'other Gov's' - well a number are already mining BTC, so they're hardly likely to try and block access!
the way that part of the narrative is playing out hints that there's a much larger wave of adoption coming. Given how conservative pension funds are - interesting to see the state of wisonsin has just bought $160M worth!
unless a black swan rears its head, with the money printing going on and the rising adoption/interest in BTC, should make for an interesting year ahead....
1/ they can't stop peer to peer
2/ if you look at the 13f filings that have just come out - there'd be some mighty big pissed off institutions (obvs US based)
3/ kind of related - Eu is pushing ahead fast to lay out rules for MICA, to have clear legislation for stable coins
as for 'other Gov's' - well a number are already mining BTC, so they're hardly likely to try and block access!
the way that part of the narrative is playing out hints that there's a much larger wave of adoption coming. Given how conservative pension funds are - interesting to see the state of wisonsin has just bought $160M worth!
unless a black swan rears its head, with the money printing going on and the rising adoption/interest in BTC, should make for an interesting year ahead....
BandOfBrothers said:
So what if Shell won't accept BTC and you need petrol. I guarantee you someone will sell it to you for BTC, especially if the government start restricting what you can do with their fiat currency.
Where can you pay for petrol in Bitcoin?How could the government restrict what you can do with currency in the form of cash? It's easily portable and transactions are anonymous
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YT8RXgFDbA4
funinhounslow said:
BandOfBrothers said:
So what if Shell won't accept BTC and you need petrol. I guarantee you someone will sell it to you for BTC, especially if the government start restricting what you can do with their fiat currency.
Where can you pay for petrol in Bitcoin?How could the government restrict what you can do with currency in the form of cash? It's easily portable and transactions are anonymous
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YT8RXgFDbA4
Condi I really suggest you read more deeply into the game theory behind bitcoin. Particularly around prohibition/bans. Game theory suggests everything is competition, therefore any self serving actions such as regulation or prohibition made by player A may represents opportunities or threats to player B.
If we take the suggestion that a government may not allow taxes to be paid in bitcoin as a move by player A, we already have player B (legal tender bitcoin jurisidictions) capitalising on that by eliminating taxes on income from abroad. El Salvador has legal tender bitcoin and US dollar, it is positioning itself to be the Switzerland of crypto. Lets see how this game plays out over the next 30-40 years.
If we take the suggestion that a government may not allow taxes to be paid in bitcoin as a move by player A, we already have player B (legal tender bitcoin jurisidictions) capitalising on that by eliminating taxes on income from abroad. El Salvador has legal tender bitcoin and US dollar, it is positioning itself to be the Switzerland of crypto. Lets see how this game plays out over the next 30-40 years.
g4ry13 said:
Currently out of stock, but here was one way.
It's bks anyway, you're not paying with Bitcoin. Your swapping Bitcoin for GBP, paying that GBP to Morrisons (with Bitrefill taking a cut) and locking that GBP in a way which can only be spent at Morrisons. Paying with Bitcoin would mean you giving Morrisons Bitcoin, which clearly isn't happening. It would make far far more sense to sell your Btc for GBP and put that into a bank account at which point the GBP can be used in any shop anywhere across the land using a Visa card. Condi said:
It's bks anyway, you're not paying with Bitcoin. Your swapping Bitcoin for GBP, paying that GBP to Morrisons (with Bitrefill taking a cut) and locking that GBP in a way which can only be spent at Morrisons. Paying with Bitcoin would mean you giving Morrisons Bitcoin, which clearly isn't happening. It would make far far more sense to sell your Btc for GBP and put that into a bank account at which point the GBP can be used in any shop anywhere across the land using a Visa card.
I don't think you understand that when you pay with GBP you are simply swapping a promisory note from a bank for an IOU from the King which is backed only by nostalgia and promises.ks anyway, you're not paying with Bitcoin. Your swapping Bitcoin for GBP, paying that GBP to Morrisons (with Bitrefill taking a cut) and locking that GBP in a way which can only be spent at Morrisons. Paying with Bitcoin would mean you giving Morrisons Bitcoin, which clearly isn't happening. It would make far far more sense to sell your Btc for GBP and put that into a bank account at which point the GBP can be used in any shop anywhere across the land using a Visa card. Of course these silly fantasy 'pounds' weren't always so silly. They used to be backed by gold. Gold was something people found that looked shiny and we liked it. We shoehorned it into its role as a reserve asset. Shiny stuff good shiny stuff can be money. Contrary to this, bitcoin is the first ever provably scarce asset designed specifically to function as money. I know which I prefer
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