5 ms·

Not surprising, actually. Gold is very easy to keep locked away because it's a physical object. But that also means it's very difficult to move around. As with

Not surprising, actually. Gold is very easy to keep locked away because it's a physical object. But that also means it's very difficult to move around. As with all things, there are tradeoffs and one must decide what is best for each. Even if the "15x" figure is true, there might still be a use case for Bitcoin.

jstanley 9y ago
Why can't you lock away your bitcoin keys with the same degree of care you use to lock away your gold, but at a fraction of the size?
- DennisP 9y ago
  You can, and Coinbase and other competent exchanges do. You can also store the keys redundantly and apply cryptographic as well as physical protections.
- 21 9y ago
  Because locking is just half of the problem. A thief in a gold vault still has to carry the gold out, and that is difficult. A thief in a vault with a bitcoin wallet just needs to write the private keys/seeds on a piece of paper (yes, I know about secret sharing schemes) So bitcoin is much more vulnerable to a single person who fucks up or is malicious.
  - spiorf 9y ago
    2 of 3 multisig. Now the thief has to compromise two sites, at the same time. Or password protect the seed. Or both.
    - TheCoelacanth 9y ago
      Still easier than carting away thousands of pounds of gold without getting caught.
- cup-of-tea 9y ago
  You have to put a lot more care into locking away keys. Locking away gold is easy. You just lock it away. Keys have to be properly generated with no other copies that could be compromised and printed on archival quality paper in a fireproof safe. And even then, a key only has to be compromised, not physically removed. Two of three multisig, while clever, means you now need three locations instead of one, and you might not even know that the first key was compromised. But this probably only boils down to the fact that we've got pretty good at storing gold by now. I don't think Bitcoin is any easier to store, though.

jstanley 9y ago

Why can't you lock away your bitcoin keys with the same degree of care you use to lock away your gold, but at a fraction of the size?

DennisP 9y ago
You can, and Coinbase and other competent exchanges do. You can also store the keys redundantly and apply cryptographic as well as physical protections.
21 9y ago
Because locking is just half of the problem. A thief in a gold vault still has to carry the gold out, and that is difficult. A thief in a vault with a bitcoin wallet just needs to write the private keys/seeds on a piece of paper (yes, I know about secret sharing schemes) So bitcoin is much more vulnerable to a single person who fucks up or is malicious.
- spiorf 9y ago
  2 of 3 multisig. Now the thief has to compromise two sites, at the same time. Or password protect the seed. Or both.
  - TheCoelacanth 9y ago
    Still easier than carting away thousands of pounds of gold without getting caught.
cup-of-tea 9y ago
You have to put a lot more care into locking away keys. Locking away gold is easy. You just lock it away. Keys have to be properly generated with no other copies that could be compromised and printed on archival quality paper in a fireproof safe. And even then, a key only has to be compromised, not physically removed. Two of three multisig, while clever, means you now need three locations instead of one, and you might not even know that the first key was compromised. But this probably only boils down to the fact that we've got pretty good at storing gold by now. I don't think Bitcoin is any easier to store, though.