4 ms·

Are we talking about Bitcoin or all crypto?

JumpCrisscross 9y ago
> Are we talking about Bitcoin or all crypto? Either. Spinning up a cryptocurrency may become as mundane as creating up a database, as silly (or illegal) as trying to market a Ponzi-based hedge fund, or simply a pedagogical tool for CS students. There is nothing inherent to crypto that says it must hold value. Markets are moody.
- chocolatebunny 9y ago
  There's nothing inherent to anything that says that anything must hold value.
  - JumpCrisscross 9y ago
    > There's nothing inherent to anything that says that anything must hold value Yet you will find claims, on this thread, that Bitcoin becoming worthless is not possible.
    - adamnemecek 9y ago
      I'm not saying it's not possible, like that the possibility is zero, all I'm saying is that it's not that much more likely that the same happening with other things. And like Bitcoin is actually resistant to some of the factors that could make other things go to zero. All I'm saying, there's a little too much "BTC will be zero, I was it in a Hollywood movie" and not enough of "BTC will go to zero if the following scenarios happened. It will go to the moon if these happened". I wont see these since these don't go with the preconceived notions and one might actually have to understand "economics of online", international relations, cryptography, networking and like so much other shit. The people who I think are qualified to write about crypto is maybe Satoshi Nakamoto but even he didn't quite nail all of it.
  - prostoalex 9y ago
    It’s not about holding, it’s about backstop. A company’s stock (or bond) is a right to get some compensation in case of dissolution, bankruptcy, or liquidation sale. A precious metal like gold still has a backstop value - it can be sold to electronics manufacturers to make those beautiful gold-plated audio cables. Diamonds have a backstop value of being used in boring and drilling. Vacated real estate can be converted to other uses. All of those assets (when owned outright and not pledged) are unlikely to go to $0.
twblalock 9y ago
It applies to any kind of asset that derives 100% of its price from network effects rather than intrinsic value.
- adamnemecek 9y ago
  Ok. Would you say the same thing about Google stock? If people stop using Google tomorrow, the stock will plunge right?
  - twblalock 9y ago
    Only because the value of the underlying company would plunge as well, due to loss of revenue. But it wouldn't hit zero. Google would still have other products than search, a lot of valuable IP and patents, real estate, etc.
    - adamnemecek 9y ago
      I meant google as a company. Very little of Google's value is in real estate. Do they even own all of their offices?
      - cableshaft 9y ago
        I can tell you for sure that they don't. I know people in corporate real estate that won a bid to lease corporate real estate to Google recently. But that's true of almost all offices of major corporations. Very few of them own their own buildings, except maybe a headquarters here or there. They pretty much all lease.
      - twblalock 9y ago
        > I meant google as a company. I'm not sure what difference this makes. As you can see here, Google has billions of assets, of which $19.7 billion are buildings.
        adamnemecek 9y ago

> Are we talking about Bitcoin or all crypto? Either. Spinning up a cryptocurrency may become as mundane as creating up a database, as silly (or illegal) as trying to market a Ponzi-based hedge fund, or simply a pedagogical tool for CS students. There is nothing inherent to crypto that says it must hold value. Markets are moody.

chocolatebunny 9y ago
There's nothing inherent to anything that says that anything must hold value.
- JumpCrisscross 9y ago
  > There's nothing inherent to anything that says that anything must hold value Yet you will find claims, on this thread, that Bitcoin becoming worthless is not possible.
  - adamnemecek 9y ago
    I'm not saying it's not possible, like that the possibility is zero, all I'm saying is that it's not that much more likely that the same happening with other things. And like Bitcoin is actually resistant to some of the factors that could make other things go to zero. All I'm saying, there's a little too much "BTC will be zero, I was it in a Hollywood movie" and not enough of "BTC will go to zero if the following scenarios happened. It will go to the moon if these happened". I wont see these since these don't go with the preconceived notions and one might actually have to understand "economics of online", international relations, cryptography, networking and like so much other shit. The people who I think are qualified to write about crypto is maybe Satoshi Nakamoto but even he didn't quite nail all of it.
- prostoalex 9y ago
  It’s not about holding, it’s about backstop. A company’s stock (or bond) is a right to get some compensation in case of dissolution, bankruptcy, or liquidation sale. A precious metal like gold still has a backstop value - it can be sold to electronics manufacturers to make those beautiful gold-plated audio cables. Diamonds have a backstop value of being used in boring and drilling. Vacated real estate can be converted to other uses. All of those assets (when owned outright and not pledged) are unlikely to go to $0.

twblalock 9y ago

It applies to any kind of asset that derives 100% of its price from network effects rather than intrinsic value.

adamnemecek 9y ago
Ok. Would you say the same thing about Google stock? If people stop using Google tomorrow, the stock will plunge right?
- twblalock 9y ago
  Only because the value of the underlying company would plunge as well, due to loss of revenue. But it wouldn't hit zero. Google would still have other products than search, a lot of valuable IP and patents, real estate, etc.
  - adamnemecek 9y ago
    I meant google as a company. Very little of Google's value is in real estate. Do they even own all of their offices?
    - cableshaft 9y ago
      I can tell you for sure that they don't. I know people in corporate real estate that won a bid to lease corporate real estate to Google recently. But that's true of almost all offices of major corporations. Very few of them own their own buildings, except maybe a headquarters here or there. They pretty much all lease.
    - twblalock 9y ago
      > I meant google as a company. I'm not sure what difference this makes. As you can see here, Google has billions of assets, of which $19.7 billion are buildings.
      - adamnemecek 9y ago