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> My hypothesis for this is in the original sin of Bitcoin: choosing currency as its use case. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you but Bitcoin's entire purpose was

> My hypothesis for this is in the original sin of Bitcoin: choosing currency as its use case. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you but Bitcoin's entire purpose was to be p2p cash. What other use case would you have suggested if you were advising Satoshi in 2008?

JumpCrisscross 9y ago
> Bitcoin's entire purpose was to be p2p cash Put another way, the blockchain's original sin was Bitcoin. It started the conversation in a scummy way.
- Erlich_Bachman 9y ago
  Bitcoin is the least scammy of all cryptocurrencies. Clear design, clear values, clear future (in terms of money minted), clear rules. Where is the scam??
- beaner 9y ago
  There's nothing inherently scummy about money itself. It's just a tool for human organization.
  - Retra 9y ago
    There's nothing inherently scummy about a market, either. But black markets can get pretty scummy. What's the difference? The Clientele?
- tylersmith 9y ago
  Bitcoin seems to me to be the least scummy of all these new distributed ledger ideas. What kind of use cases for a blockchain do you see as better/more useful/less scummy than currencies?
snowwrestler 9y ago
If p2p cash was the purpose of Bitcoin, it was spectacularly poorly designed for that purpose. I don't mean the cryptographic properties which enabled distributed trust--that's cool. I mean the deflationary combination of a fixed total number of bitcoins, and ever-increasing amounts of energy and time to create new bitcoin. This creates tremendous incentive to create or buy bitcoins and then hold, hold, hold, hold. That's the opposite of what you want for a currency! You want people to spend a currency, and hold assets. Bitcoin today works like an asset, not currency. I don't know if this was the actual idea, and early adopters essentially lied about the currency aspects to prime the bubble; or if the early adopters actually did think it would be a great currency and just got hugely lucky.
- tylersmith 9y ago
  The topic I was responding to was that currencies were a poor use case for blockchains, so yes i was talking about the distributed trust aspects. I'm not an economist so I can't speak to what token economics Bitcoin may have gotten wrong. I do know that there is at least some usage of it as a currency because I work on a p2p marketplace and talk to people that buy and sell things almost every day.
- oillio 9y ago
  Bitcoin currently has almost 4% inflation per year of its token count and it has been higher in the past. While this will go down over time, I don't think you can blame any existing issues with the economics of Bitcoin on its long term deflationary nature. If you were around the Bitcoin community in the early years, you will remember that the community took a very dim view of ICOs. They were called "pre-mined" back then, and it was basically a slur that was synonymous with scam. It is the newer generation of enthusiasts that have embraced the ICO. Again, I don't think you can blame this on the fundamental design or original community around Bitcoin.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]

JumpCrisscross 9y ago

> Bitcoin's entire purpose was to be p2p cash Put another way, the blockchain's original sin was Bitcoin. It started the conversation in a scummy way.

Erlich_Bachman 9y ago
Bitcoin is the least scammy of all cryptocurrencies. Clear design, clear values, clear future (in terms of money minted), clear rules. Where is the scam??
beaner 9y ago
There's nothing inherently scummy about money itself. It's just a tool for human organization.
- Retra 9y ago
  There's nothing inherently scummy about a market, either. But black markets can get pretty scummy. What's the difference? The Clientele?
tylersmith 9y ago
Bitcoin seems to me to be the least scummy of all these new distributed ledger ideas. What kind of use cases for a blockchain do you see as better/more useful/less scummy than currencies?

snowwrestler 9y ago

If p2p cash was the purpose of Bitcoin, it was spectacularly poorly designed for that purpose. I don't mean the cryptographic properties which enabled distributed trust--that's cool. I mean the deflationary combination of a fixed total number of bitcoins, and ever-increasing amounts of energy and time to create new bitcoin. This creates tremendous incentive to create or buy bitcoins and then hold, hold, hold, hold. That's the opposite of what you want for a currency! You want people to spend a currency, and hold assets. Bitcoin today works like an asset, not currency. I don't know if this was the actual idea, and early adopters essentially lied about the currency aspects to prime the bubble; or if the early adopters actually did think it would be a great currency and just got hugely lucky.

tylersmith 9y ago
The topic I was responding to was that currencies were a poor use case for blockchains, so yes i was talking about the distributed trust aspects. I'm not an economist so I can't speak to what token economics Bitcoin may have gotten wrong. I do know that there is at least some usage of it as a currency because I work on a p2p marketplace and talk to people that buy and sell things almost every day.
oillio 9y ago
Bitcoin currently has almost 4% inflation per year of its token count and it has been higher in the past. While this will go down over time, I don't think you can blame any existing issues with the economics of Bitcoin on its long term deflationary nature. If you were around the Bitcoin community in the early years, you will remember that the community took a very dim view of ICOs. They were called "pre-mined" back then, and it was basically a slur that was synonymous with scam. It is the newer generation of enthusiasts that have embraced the ICO. Again, I don't think you can blame this on the fundamental design or original community around Bitcoin.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]