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Worked great in 2008.

celticninja 9y ago
It's like people assume the current financial system is perfect and bitcoin is not. Bitcoin never pretended to be, it's still an experiment 10 years in, but its a fun expierment.
- IntronExon 9y ago
  It’s fun while it’s worth a bucketload. When people start losing their shirts and dumpster loads of ASICS are being burned for cooking fires... less fun. (Some hyperbole engaged above)
  - conanbatt 9y ago
    There's a massive difference in crypto over fiat. In the US, if you have a debt they can take back your home, you can get harassed and taken to court. The stakes are not that high for crypto wealth. Its unenforceability makes the stakes a lot lower for tragedy.
luckydata 9y ago
You know what? It did. You still have running water. Government employees like cops and firefighters and teachers are getting paid (sometimes not enough). So yeah, it worked great.
- acct1771 9y ago
  "People in Africa are starving, so you're having a great day!" Bullshit argument, I'm sorry.
monktastic1 9y ago
I didn't say it was perfect. I doubt that whatever "organic" solution we're hoping the crypto community will self-enforce will be either.
- acct1771 9y ago
  If something bad happens, it will be the will of the 51%, not the .01%.
jzymbaluk 9y ago
It actually did. The market was on it's way to crashing harder than the great depression, but it didn't, probably thanks in some part to government being able to intervene and control monetary policy
- sixQuarks 9y ago
  Have you ever heard of the phrase "kicking the can down the road"?
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - stouset 9y ago
    You can play this argument ad infinitum without actually adding anything of value to this conversation. Central banking is not perfect, but it has a better track record of stability and growth than any other system that’s been tried at a large scale. Try and remember that the alternatives aren’t optimal economic systems that are immune to bubbles, recessions, depressions, hyperinflation, corruption and manipulation. If anything the Bitcoin experiment is reinforcing why we have existing regulations in place.
    - tooltalk 9y ago
      How do you know that it has a better track record of "stability" and "growth" than any other system at a large scale? Much of America's growth in the late 19th happened without any central banks in 1913. Most of "depressions" happened prior to that -- and there were 4 such major ones in the 19th century and many of them were directly caused by the govt policy changes -- were nowhere as severe as the Great Depression occurred after the creation of the central banking in the US.
- tooltalk 9y ago
  You mean the gov't regulation prevented the GD that it created?
- jebeng 9y ago
api 9y ago
It did and it didn't. On one hand, we stopped a panic that would have led to a true depression. On the other hand we did so by actually increasing the power and wealth of many of the people and organizations responsible for creating the conditions that led to the panic. Do that long enough and you get a civilization run by overconfident incompetents and shielded fraudsters. That build up of delusional bozos at the top is one of the things that eventually leads to collapse. Bitcoin was in some ways a protest in code form. Why can't we create a software defined monetary system that is transparent and where corrupt and incompetent human orgs can be replaced by algorithms? I like that idea, but Bitcoin itself was really just a proof of concept. We're not there yet. In the meantime we've gotten a silly bubble that's starting to look like a parody of the project's original goals.
Slansitartop 9y ago
>> You could say that humanity has repeatedly and organically come to a solution broadly known as government and regulation. > Worked great in 2008. Wasn't 2008 at least partially the result of having banking regulations withdrawn/weakened over the prior decades? If so, isn't it pretty bogus and misleading judge the effectiveness of financial regulation from that event? It's like saying airbags don't help in a crashes, because yours was removed and you smacked your face against the steering wheel in a crash.
- hndamien 9y ago
  You still had a system that decided removing airbags was a good idea. Then, when getting smacked in the face, doing nothing to the people involved in removing the airbags or causing the face smacking.
  - Slansitartop 9y ago
    That doesn't really reflect on the suitability or effectiveness of regulation to address the problem. Greedy, ignorant people who failed to study and learn from the past can be the decision-makers, too.
    - hndamien 9y ago
      Then you have a systemic problem allowing greedy ignorant people to be decision makers. Not sure how to fix this, but I believe there is a solution.

It's like people assume the current financial system is perfect and bitcoin is not. Bitcoin never pretended to be, it's still an experiment 10 years in, but its a fun expierment.

IntronExon 9y ago
It’s fun while it’s worth a bucketload. When people start losing their shirts and dumpster loads of ASICS are being burned for cooking fires... less fun. (Some hyperbole engaged above)
- conanbatt 9y ago
  There's a massive difference in crypto over fiat. In the US, if you have a debt they can take back your home, you can get harassed and taken to court. The stakes are not that high for crypto wealth. Its unenforceability makes the stakes a lot lower for tragedy.

luckydata 9y ago

You know what? It did. You still have running water. Government employees like cops and firefighters and teachers are getting paid (sometimes not enough). So yeah, it worked great.

acct1771 9y ago
"People in Africa are starving, so you're having a great day!" Bullshit argument, I'm sorry.

monktastic1 9y ago

I didn't say it was perfect. I doubt that whatever "organic" solution we're hoping the crypto community will self-enforce will be either.

acct1771 9y ago
If something bad happens, it will be the will of the 51%, not the .01%.

jzymbaluk 9y ago

It actually did. The market was on it's way to crashing harder than the great depression, but it didn't, probably thanks in some part to government being able to intervene and control monetary policy

sixQuarks 9y ago
Have you ever heard of the phrase "kicking the can down the road"?
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- stouset 9y ago
  You can play this argument ad infinitum without actually adding anything of value to this conversation. Central banking is not perfect, but it has a better track record of stability and growth than any other system that’s been tried at a large scale. Try and remember that the alternatives aren’t optimal economic systems that are immune to bubbles, recessions, depressions, hyperinflation, corruption and manipulation. If anything the Bitcoin experiment is reinforcing why we have existing regulations in place.
  - tooltalk 9y ago
    How do you know that it has a better track record of "stability" and "growth" than any other system at a large scale? Much of America's growth in the late 19th happened without any central banks in 1913. Most of "depressions" happened prior to that -- and there were 4 such major ones in the 19th century and many of them were directly caused by the govt policy changes -- were nowhere as severe as the Great Depression occurred after the creation of the central banking in the US.
tooltalk 9y ago
You mean the gov't regulation prevented the GD that it created?
jebeng 9y ago

api 9y ago

It did and it didn't. On one hand, we stopped a panic that would have led to a true depression. On the other hand we did so by actually increasing the power and wealth of many of the people and organizations responsible for creating the conditions that led to the panic. Do that long enough and you get a civilization run by overconfident incompetents and shielded fraudsters. That build up of delusional bozos at the top is one of the things that eventually leads to collapse. Bitcoin was in some ways a protest in code form. Why can't we create a software defined monetary system that is transparent and where corrupt and incompetent human orgs can be replaced by algorithms? I like that idea, but Bitcoin itself was really just a proof of concept. We're not there yet. In the meantime we've gotten a silly bubble that's starting to look like a parody of the project's original goals.

Slansitartop 9y ago

>> You could say that humanity has repeatedly and organically come to a solution broadly known as government and regulation. > Worked great in 2008. Wasn't 2008 at least partially the result of having banking regulations withdrawn/weakened over the prior decades? If so, isn't it pretty bogus and misleading judge the effectiveness of financial regulation from that event? It's like saying airbags don't help in a crashes, because yours was removed and you smacked your face against the steering wheel in a crash.

hndamien 9y ago
You still had a system that decided removing airbags was a good idea. Then, when getting smacked in the face, doing nothing to the people involved in removing the airbags or causing the face smacking.
- Slansitartop 9y ago
  That doesn't really reflect on the suitability or effectiveness of regulation to address the problem. Greedy, ignorant people who failed to study and learn from the past can be the decision-makers, too.
  - hndamien 9y ago
    Then you have a systemic problem allowing greedy ignorant people to be decision makers. Not sure how to fix this, but I believe there is a solution.