Crypto Currency Thread
Discussion
What is complex? Bitcoin is a perfect, or near perfect, solution to a problem - how do you make payments from one computer to another with absolute trust and assuming anonymity and without allowing that payment to be copied (double spent)?
It's an incredible accomplishment. IT WORKS!! It's hardly complex, it's beautifully simple.
Alt coin innovations, enterprises and businesses could maybe be described as complex...but bitcoin is a standard and as such it is a basis for complex developments but is not in itself complex.
I don't really understand all the hand wringing, stress and worry about alts...they're a sideshow. Of course some are interesting, but if you bet your house on them you're going to lose more than you win. The only real threat* to bitcoin is quantum computing which will require a fork to ensure private keys can't be reverse engineered from public keys. The threats to alt coins are unimaginably varied.
It's an incredible accomplishment. IT WORKS!! It's hardly complex, it's beautifully simple.
Alt coin innovations, enterprises and businesses could maybe be described as complex...but bitcoin is a standard and as such it is a basis for complex developments but is not in itself complex.
I don't really understand all the hand wringing, stress and worry about alts...they're a sideshow. Of course some are interesting, but if you bet your house on them you're going to lose more than you win. The only real threat* to bitcoin is quantum computing which will require a fork to ensure private keys can't be reverse engineered from public keys. The threats to alt coins are unimaginably varied.
- legislation/governance can be considered a threat if you buy into that. I don't.
Thesprucegoose said:
So liquidity is a big one, as an exchange can drop the coin you are left with nothing (happened to me)
[/footnote]
Can you explain this a little more ?[/footnote]
Was the coin available on other exchanges ?
And there was no warning from the exchange that the following xxx, yyy, zzz alt coins will be dropped from trading on such and such a date ?
Or are you saying you had x number of altcoins on an exchange, they then stopped making the coin available for trade and you just lost them all without a chance to exchange them for something else ?
Genuine question.
Bluedot said:
Can you explain this a little more ?
Was the coin available on other exchanges ?
And there was no warning from the exchange that the following xxx, yyy, zzz alt coins will be dropped from trading on such and such a date ?
Or are you saying you had x number of altcoins on an exchange, they then stopped making the coin available for trade and you just lost them all without a chance to exchange them for something else ?
Genuine question.
During the sWas the coin available on other exchanges ?
And there was no warning from the exchange that the following xxx, yyy, zzz alt coins will be dropped from trading on such and such a date ?
Or are you saying you had x number of altcoins on an exchange, they then stopped making the coin available for trade and you just lost them all without a chance to exchange them for something else ?
Genuine question.
tfork season there was a wallet called Bitpie that allowed you to access many of them and had an in wallet exchange. For certain ones no exchange would let you deposit them from elsewhere, you had to have Bitcoin on your balance when it forked for them to credit you with it.
One day Bitpie updated their wallet and removed the exchange without any notice whatsoever. They instantly became worthless. There was nowhere else that would accept them and eventually Bitpie itself announced they were no longer running nodes for certain coins.
Zoon said:
Which is one of the reasons bitcoin Et Al is rapidly becoming a joke
There is a teensy weensy difference between Bitcoin, something mined, traded and held by millions of people, and a piece of poo copied and pasted out of nowhere and run on a handful of graphics cards in basements which is what most alts consist of. If people choose to dabble in them then there should be no surprise if they wither away to nowt.
dimots said:
What is complex? Bitcoin is a perfect, or near perfect, solution to a problem - how do you make payments from one computer to another with absolute trust and assuming anonymity and without allowing that payment to be copied (double spent)?
Nobody engaging in legitimate business wants anonymity. In fact, the complete opposite is true and to comply with anti money laundering and due diligence laws most companies need to know more not less, about their counterparties. You can disagree with that statement all you like, but its a fact, and non of these coins (inc Bitcoin) will ever be in widespread use until that changes. Facebook's coin is no different to Bitcoin in the way it works, and they stand 0 chance of getting it past regulators unless with each transaction there is a bit of data recording who the buyer and seller are, which will have to include real life bank or passport details. - legislation/governance can be considered a threat if you buy into that. I don't.
Condi said:
Nobody engaging in legitimate business wants anonymity.
Cash.Condi said:
In fact, the complete opposite is true and to comply with anti money laundering and due diligence laws most companies need to know more not less, about their counterparties.
https://www.blockchain.com/explorerBitcoin has all the solutions built in, and all the transactions are stored for eternity on the blockchain. You just need to build applications to run whatever checks you need to do. You can make tumblers illegal, you can run KYC crypto services, coutries/governments can do what they want to keep the population under their control.
dimots said:
Condi said:
Nobody engaging in legitimate business wants anonymity.
Cash.Condi said:
In fact, the complete opposite is true and to comply with anti money laundering and due diligence laws most companies need to know more not less, about their counterparties.
https://www.blockchain.com/explorerBitcoin has all the solutions built in, and all the transactions are stored for eternity on the blockchain. You just need to build applications to run whatever checks you need to do. You can make tumblers illegal, you can run KYC crypto services, coutries/governments can do what they want to keep the population under their control.
And your second point doesnt make much sense. You say Bitcoin is good because it is anonymous, and yet go on to say that you can run Know Your Customer systems, which makes the whole thing open and transparent and not anonymous? Either the anonymity is important, or its not? If so it will never get regulatory approval and acceptance, if not then is it any better than the multitude of existing ways of paying people? IMO, not really. Increased competition is already driving down prices in FX markets, speed of transactions are improving, and Bitcoin is not a stable place to hold value for any period of time.
Dimots, allannis morisette loves your post.
Of course it is groundhog day. Partly because e.g..
"It's the perfect solution to a.problem". Except that as time goes on that problem seems to move to whatever isn't discredited yet. It started by being a good way to do illegal suff. Then silkroad was shut and it moved mainstream. Claims have included: It's annonymous. It's transparent. (Make your mind up). It's perfect for sub saharan africans with no banks. Who have no internet. But it's secure! Just not when in an online wallet. Only noobs do that. Use an offline wallet like that guy who was brutally tortured with a drill in holland. Oh wait, it's sub saharan africa. If the kind, chilled dutch use drills, what do the lawless child soldier countries do for a grand?
Ok lets backtrack on all of that as well. It's for despot escaping countries. Like venezuela. Who all used the dollar because that stays on when ghere's no electricity. But then America sanctioned them. So now they finally use bitcoin not to escape their own government, but to smuggle in dollars to the country (because the country at large is still using dollars as the "alt coin"... So we're back at square 1: it's a tool to use to launder money / break laws.
The moon boys, the moon! Maduro gets another tem it'll be 15k by summer...
Meanwhile Dimots has about 3-4 weeks to create another potential problem that this is a solution to and post Bill Murray again...
Of course it is groundhog day. Partly because e.g..
"It's the perfect solution to a.problem". Except that as time goes on that problem seems to move to whatever isn't discredited yet. It started by being a good way to do illegal suff. Then silkroad was shut and it moved mainstream. Claims have included: It's annonymous. It's transparent. (Make your mind up). It's perfect for sub saharan africans with no banks. Who have no internet. But it's secure! Just not when in an online wallet. Only noobs do that. Use an offline wallet like that guy who was brutally tortured with a drill in holland. Oh wait, it's sub saharan africa. If the kind, chilled dutch use drills, what do the lawless child soldier countries do for a grand?
Ok lets backtrack on all of that as well. It's for despot escaping countries. Like venezuela. Who all used the dollar because that stays on when ghere's no electricity. But then America sanctioned them. So now they finally use bitcoin not to escape their own government, but to smuggle in dollars to the country (because the country at large is still using dollars as the "alt coin"... So we're back at square 1: it's a tool to use to launder money / break laws.
The moon boys, the moon! Maduro gets another tem it'll be 15k by summer...
Meanwhile Dimots has about 3-4 weeks to create another potential problem that this is a solution to and post Bill Murray again...
If it was useful as a currency, (ie something to spend), then why are people not using it?
Bitcoin was released in 2009, and its all time high price was in Dec 17, when there were adverts on the tube, there were full page articles in all the papers, it was all over the internet. Say 40 of the 60+ million people in the UK saw the adverts, and 0.01% of those (1 in 10,000 people) wanted to use it to buy things, then there should be 40,000 people in the UK spending bitcoin, buying their pizzas, etc - but there aren't. Its been around 10 years; in the world of technology its not new, its older than Instagram, older than Snapchat. Unless someone wants to show otherwise it has totally and utterly failed as currency.
Jam tomorrow will only go on for so long!
Bitcoin was released in 2009, and its all time high price was in Dec 17, when there were adverts on the tube, there were full page articles in all the papers, it was all over the internet. Say 40 of the 60+ million people in the UK saw the adverts, and 0.01% of those (1 in 10,000 people) wanted to use it to buy things, then there should be 40,000 people in the UK spending bitcoin, buying their pizzas, etc - but there aren't. Its been around 10 years; in the world of technology its not new, its older than Instagram, older than Snapchat. Unless someone wants to show otherwise it has totally and utterly failed as currency.
Jam tomorrow will only go on for so long!
Condi said:
If it was useful as a currency, (ie something to spend), then why are people not using it?
Bitcoin was released in 2009, and its all time high price was in Dec 17, when there were adverts on the tube, there were full page articles in all the papers, it was all over the internet. Say 40 of the 60+ million people in the UK saw the adverts, and 0.01% of those (1 in 10,000 people) wanted to use it to buy things, then there should be 40,000 people in the UK spending bitcoin, buying their pizzas, etc - but there aren't. Its been around 10 years; in the world of technology its not new, its older than Instagram, older than Snapchat. Unless someone wants to show otherwise it has totally and utterly failed as currency.
Jam tomorrow will only go on for so long!
Behemoth will be along in a moment with a load of techno guff about why you're wrong and it's a huge success. Bitcoin was released in 2009, and its all time high price was in Dec 17, when there were adverts on the tube, there were full page articles in all the papers, it was all over the internet. Say 40 of the 60+ million people in the UK saw the adverts, and 0.01% of those (1 in 10,000 people) wanted to use it to buy things, then there should be 40,000 people in the UK spending bitcoin, buying their pizzas, etc - but there aren't. Its been around 10 years; in the world of technology its not new, its older than Instagram, older than Snapchat. Unless someone wants to show otherwise it has totally and utterly failed as currency.
Jam tomorrow will only go on for so long!
General currency use to buy things day to day isn't going to happen on the main chain. It's become far too valuable for that & transaction costs will quickly get out of reach. Not to mention the fact that no retailer is going to hang about for 10 or so minutes whilst blocks confirm. However, day to day currency use is happening and will continue to develop on upper layers.
You are right about the contradiction between transparency and privacy. There's a battle looming there & a major fork splitting opposing factions is still quite possible. I think the blockchain must remain transparent if bitcoin is to remain provably scarce and fungible (meaning each coin is the same as every other coin, regardless of who's touched it). Mixing technologies are moving ahead rapidly - look up whirlpool, wasabi, coinjoin & confidential transactions.
You are right about the contradiction between transparency and privacy. There's a battle looming there & a major fork splitting opposing factions is still quite possible. I think the blockchain must remain transparent if bitcoin is to remain provably scarce and fungible (meaning each coin is the same as every other coin, regardless of who's touched it). Mixing technologies are moving ahead rapidly - look up whirlpool, wasabi, coinjoin & confidential transactions.
Condi said:
If it was useful as a currency, (ie something to spend), then why are people not using it?
Bitcoin was released in 2009, and its all time high price was in Dec 17, when there were adverts on the tube, there were full page articles in all the papers, it was all over the internet. Say 40 of the 60+ million people in the UK saw the adverts, and 0.01% of those (1 in 10,000 people) wanted to use it to buy things, then there should be 40,000 people in the UK spending bitcoin, buying their pizzas, etc - but there aren't. Its been around 10 years; in the world of technology its not new, its older than Instagram, older than Snapchat. Unless someone wants to show otherwise it has totally and utterly failed as currency.
Jam tomorrow will only go on for so long!
Anyone who owns them will be long dead before bitcoin will ever actually ‘happen’. I don’t think it ever will, but it certainly won’t be for decades if it does. Bitcoin was released in 2009, and its all time high price was in Dec 17, when there were adverts on the tube, there were full page articles in all the papers, it was all over the internet. Say 40 of the 60+ million people in the UK saw the adverts, and 0.01% of those (1 in 10,000 people) wanted to use it to buy things, then there should be 40,000 people in the UK spending bitcoin, buying their pizzas, etc - but there aren't. Its been around 10 years; in the world of technology its not new, its older than Instagram, older than Snapchat. Unless someone wants to show otherwise it has totally and utterly failed as currency.
Jam tomorrow will only go on for so long!
Behemoth said:
General currency use to buy things day to day isn't going to happen on the main chain. It's become far too valuable for that & transaction costs will quickly get out of reach. Not to mention the fact that no retailer is going to hang about for 10 or so minutes whilst blocks confirm. However, day to day currency use is happening and will continue to develop on upper layers.
And BTC needs a minimum of six confirmed blocks to be considered a secure transaction, so you are looking at an hour minimum before a transaction is complete. Not sure many retailers are going to be happy to wait an hour to receive payment before allowing you to take your goods. So we both agree that due to time and transaction costs it is useless as a currency.Some Gump said:
Dimots, allannis morisette loves your post.
Of course it is groundhog day. Partly because e.g..
"It's the perfect solution to a.problem". Except that as time goes on that problem seems to move to whatever isn't discredited yet. It started by being a good way to do illegal suff. Then silkroad was shut and it moved mainstream. Claims have included: It's annonymous. It's transparent. (Make your mind up). It's perfect for sub saharan africans with no banks. Who have no internet. But it's secure! Just not when in an online wallet. Only noobs do that. Use an offline wallet like that guy who was brutally tortured with a drill in holland. Oh wait, it's sub saharan africa. If the kind, chilled dutch use drills, what do the lawless child soldier countries do for a grand?
Ok lets backtrack on all of that as well. It's for despot escaping countries. Like venezuela. Who all used the dollar because that stays on when ghere's no electricity. But then America sanctioned them. So now they finally use bitcoin not to escape their own government, but to smuggle in dollars to the country (because the country at large is still using dollars as the "alt coin"... So we're back at square 1: it's a tool to use to launder money / break laws.
The moon boys, the moon! Maduro gets another tem it'll be 15k by summer...
Meanwhile Dimots has about 3-4 weeks to create another potential problem that this is a solution to and post Bill Murray again...
Totally agree, as I have said on here many times it is a solution to a problem that doesn't actually exist. BTC has been around for ten years now, surely that is long enough for it to actually be useful for something? But nobody can actually explain to me what any of the 2413 coins listed on CoinMarketCap are actually used for, yet people are clearly "investing" in them and believe they are useful for something.Of course it is groundhog day. Partly because e.g..
"It's the perfect solution to a.problem". Except that as time goes on that problem seems to move to whatever isn't discredited yet. It started by being a good way to do illegal suff. Then silkroad was shut and it moved mainstream. Claims have included: It's annonymous. It's transparent. (Make your mind up). It's perfect for sub saharan africans with no banks. Who have no internet. But it's secure! Just not when in an online wallet. Only noobs do that. Use an offline wallet like that guy who was brutally tortured with a drill in holland. Oh wait, it's sub saharan africa. If the kind, chilled dutch use drills, what do the lawless child soldier countries do for a grand?
Ok lets backtrack on all of that as well. It's for despot escaping countries. Like venezuela. Who all used the dollar because that stays on when ghere's no electricity. But then America sanctioned them. So now they finally use bitcoin not to escape their own government, but to smuggle in dollars to the country (because the country at large is still using dollars as the "alt coin"... So we're back at square 1: it's a tool to use to launder money / break laws.
The moon boys, the moon! Maduro gets another tem it'll be 15k by summer...
Meanwhile Dimots has about 3-4 weeks to create another potential problem that this is a solution to and post Bill Murray again...
Aside from all of the reasons above I can only think this is greater fool theory and people believe they will go up in value and they will sell them for more. I am sure a few people have made a lot of money and have bought Lambos, but this will be funded by the 98% of people who have actually lost money on this rubbish.
Actually amazed that more people have not seen through the lies and the whole thing has collapsed. I guess when you have a constant stream of people who believe the lies and are throwing money at it the truth is unimportant.
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