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I've been into Bitcoin since 2010 and it is very obvious to me crypto currencies are making the world better. Fundamentally, because they are censorship-resista

by mrb 9y ago

I've been into Bitcoin since 2010 and it is very obvious to me crypto currencies are making the world better. Fundamentally, because they are censorship-resistant and permissionless financial networks, they allow people to have access to economic opportunities they wouldn't otherwise have. Concrete examples: escaping hyperinflation in Venezuela, donating to charities censored by authorities, escaping unethical laws (eg. civil forfeiture in the US), removing financial transaction friction (no more "sorry the bank is closed on weekends!"), finally being able to TRULY send money internationally near instantly (absolutely no other system does this!). And so on. It's like the invention of the internal combustion engine. In the early days (late 19th century) someone might look at it and wonder how noisy polluting engines can make the world better. A hundred years later, it's very obvious that making transportation easier and faster enormously contributed to improving the world's economy.

demxzy 9y ago
Give bitcoin another 5 - 10 years, and it will be centralize into the hands of a very very few powerful players (crypto equivalence of Facebook, Google, Amazon etc) making it easier for government to track/monitor/censor etc. On escaping hyperinflation, while this is possible and also a good thing, you can still loose a huge part of your savings by running to a currently speculative currency/commodity. In Nigeria, a lot of people did that and Bitcoin crashed in value and the local currency appreciated about 30% in the black market where a lot of common folks source their foreign currencies. It is still interesting to see where all these developments lead.
- freeflight 9y ago
  Isn't this already an issue due to the massive Chinese influence on the BC market? I remember reading an article a while ago detailing how the network could work transactions faster if some value was changed, but Chinese farmers refused to change the value for whatever reason and because they represent such a large share of the network the whole network is stuck with those sub-optimal values.
- mrb 9y ago
  I think you don't understand how Bitcoin works. It's already possible to fully "track/monitor" (without centralization) because all transactions are recorded permanently in the blockchain. As to "censor" it would not be possible even if Bitcoin was mostly centralized (I assume you are talking about miners centralization). As long as some miners are honest, even if it's a small fraction, your transactions that others attempt to censor will still eventually be confirmed, whenever these honest miners find a block, because given the P2P nature of the Bitcoin protocol, all transactions can reach all nodes.
majidazimi 9y ago
And it also gives power to drug dealers, child porn websites, illegal workers to escape tax system, ...
- mrb 9y ago
  Nothing new. Any technology can be used for evil purposes. What matters is that more people use it for good than evil.
- cableshaft 9y ago
  So does physical fiat currency, and physical fiat currency is virtually untraceable, unlike bitcoin, which has a public ledger for every transaction (although it is pseudo-anonymous). You want to ban that so drug dealers have to find a more creative way to make money? (And they'll find a way. I'm still surprised they managed to find a way to use Tide detergent as currency to sell drugs). http://nymag.com/news/features/tide-detergent-drugs-2013-1/ http://nymag.com/news/features/tide-detergent-drugs-2013-1/ What point are you trying to make? Sounds an awful lot like the "Let's ban peer-to-peer filesharing, because it's used for copyright infringement" argument.

by mrb 9y ago

demxzy 9y ago

Give bitcoin another 5 - 10 years, and it will be centralize into the hands of a very very few powerful players (crypto equivalence of Facebook, Google, Amazon etc) making it easier for government to track/monitor/censor etc. On escaping hyperinflation, while this is possible and also a good thing, you can still loose a huge part of your savings by running to a currently speculative currency/commodity. In Nigeria, a lot of people did that and Bitcoin crashed in value and the local currency appreciated about 30% in the black market where a lot of common folks source their foreign currencies. It is still interesting to see where all these developments lead.

freeflight 9y ago
Isn't this already an issue due to the massive Chinese influence on the BC market? I remember reading an article a while ago detailing how the network could work transactions faster if some value was changed, but Chinese farmers refused to change the value for whatever reason and because they represent such a large share of the network the whole network is stuck with those sub-optimal values.
mrb 9y ago
I think you don't understand how Bitcoin works. It's already possible to fully "track/monitor" (without centralization) because all transactions are recorded permanently in the blockchain. As to "censor" it would not be possible even if Bitcoin was mostly centralized (I assume you are talking about miners centralization). As long as some miners are honest, even if it's a small fraction, your transactions that others attempt to censor will still eventually be confirmed, whenever these honest miners find a block, because given the P2P nature of the Bitcoin protocol, all transactions can reach all nodes.

majidazimi 9y ago

And it also gives power to drug dealers, child porn websites, illegal workers to escape tax system, ...

mrb 9y ago
Nothing new. Any technology can be used for evil purposes. What matters is that more people use it for good than evil.
cableshaft 9y ago
So does physical fiat currency, and physical fiat currency is virtually untraceable, unlike bitcoin, which has a public ledger for every transaction (although it is pseudo-anonymous). You want to ban that so drug dealers have to find a more creative way to make money? (And they'll find a way. I'm still surprised they managed to find a way to use Tide detergent as currency to sell drugs). http://nymag.com/news/features/tide-detergent-drugs-2013-1/ http://nymag.com/news/features/tide-detergent-drugs-2013-1/ What point are you trying to make? Sounds an awful lot like the "Let's ban peer-to-peer filesharing, because it's used for copyright infringement" argument.