5 ms·

Solving trust is the only benefit of Bitcoin, but I think you’re underestimating the importance of financial sovereignty.

arcticbull 8y ago
Lack thereof is currently working for 7.5 billion people. Bitcoin works for basically nobody.
- thinkmassive 8y ago
  If you think present financial systems are working well for every inhabitant on the planet, you probably spend a lot of time in a very comfortable bubble. Besides, talking worked well for thousands of years, what use would humanity have for the Internet? /s
  - arcticbull 8y ago
    Well, that depends, is the internet worse than writing letters? Because bitcoin is worse than money. The reality is that for the rest of the world bitcoin is missing the initial distribution problem. Nobody in Venezuela has bitcoin. How are they going to get it? If they can trade with other countries, they would just get USD and be better off. If not, then net, it's zero sum. That's really all there is to it. Even after that, it's like cash if cash had a $1.50 transaction fee for handing it to your buddy. Not exactly tenable in countries where thats basically a daily wage.
    - thinkmassive 8y ago
      You might have a point if that were true, but it’s not... https://twitter.com/btcven https://twitter.com/btcven Edit: ...and LN transactions are essentially instantaneous and free. Also you can’t program cash without a middleman.
      - arcticbull 8y ago
        Nothing about the twitter account refutes what I'm saying about Venezuela. There's a certain quantity of BTC there already, and it's not nearly enough to replace all the money down there. They can't mine any because any big clusters of compute get nationalized [1], [2] and rewards are going down. That means they can either trade with outsiders, and in that case, doing so for USD they'd be 5X better off over the last two years. Or they trade with each other, in which case, it remains zero sum. Unless they are somehow more efficient at mining BTC than the Chinese who control more than 51% of the hashpower? Nothing in that twitter account refutes that in Venezuela the minimum wage is $6.70USD per MONTH [3] so a single transaction fee is nearly a WEEK of wages. And that's up from $2.20 per MONTH so a single transaction fee was THREE WEEKS of wages. LN transactions are "instantaneous and free" once you open a channel ($1.50) and lock in your balance, then close out your channel ($1.50). Again, two weeks wages. Bitcoin is not a solution to the problems of Venezuela. Changing the government is. They're totally disconnected. [1] https://bitcoinist.com/venezuela-now-requires-bitcoin-miners-register-government/ https://bitcoinist.com/venezuela-now-requires-bitcoin-miners... [2] https://www.newsbtc.com/2018/05/31/officials-in-venezuela-begin-confiscating-imported-bitcoin-mining-hardware/ https://www.newsbtc.com/2018/05/31/officials-in-venezuela-be... [3] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-wage/venezuelas-maduro-hikes-minimum-wage-300-percent-idUSKCN1P82E2 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-wage/v...
        thinkmassive 8y ago
        You claimed "Nobody in Venezuela has bitcoin." I provided evidence of a group making a difference in Venezuela using Bitcoin, so it does refute your previous statement. I pity someone who is so offended by a simple technology.
        arcticbull 8y ago
        Again, if they can trade with foreigners, they're better off with real currencies. I'm not offended, I'm exasperated. Bitcoin has been a solution in search of a problem for a decade, and each time it stumbles on an idea it's proven not to be effective and it's off to the next goalposts. This time it's Venezuela for some reason. They have real problems, and they need real solutions, not magic internet beans. If they really wanted to help the Venezuelans they'd do it using the best system, not their system -- this helps them, and hey, if the Venezuelans are better off for it, I guess that's fine too.

arcticbull 8y ago

Lack thereof is currently working for 7.5 billion people. Bitcoin works for basically nobody.

thinkmassive 8y ago
If you think present financial systems are working well for every inhabitant on the planet, you probably spend a lot of time in a very comfortable bubble. Besides, talking worked well for thousands of years, what use would humanity have for the Internet? /s
- arcticbull 8y ago
  Well, that depends, is the internet worse than writing letters? Because bitcoin is worse than money. The reality is that for the rest of the world bitcoin is missing the initial distribution problem. Nobody in Venezuela has bitcoin. How are they going to get it? If they can trade with other countries, they would just get USD and be better off. If not, then net, it's zero sum. That's really all there is to it. Even after that, it's like cash if cash had a $1.50 transaction fee for handing it to your buddy. Not exactly tenable in countries where thats basically a daily wage.
  - thinkmassive 8y ago
    You might have a point if that were true, but it’s not... https://twitter.com/btcven https://twitter.com/btcven Edit: ...and LN transactions are essentially instantaneous and free. Also you can’t program cash without a middleman.
    - arcticbull 8y ago
      Nothing about the twitter account refutes what I'm saying about Venezuela. There's a certain quantity of BTC there already, and it's not nearly enough to replace all the money down there. They can't mine any because any big clusters of compute get nationalized [1], [2] and rewards are going down. That means they can either trade with outsiders, and in that case, doing so for USD they'd be 5X better off over the last two years. Or they trade with each other, in which case, it remains zero sum. Unless they are somehow more efficient at mining BTC than the Chinese who control more than 51% of the hashpower? Nothing in that twitter account refutes that in Venezuela the minimum wage is $6.70USD per MONTH [3] so a single transaction fee is nearly a WEEK of wages. And that's up from $2.20 per MONTH so a single transaction fee was THREE WEEKS of wages. LN transactions are "instantaneous and free" once you open a channel ($1.50) and lock in your balance, then close out your channel ($1.50). Again, two weeks wages. Bitcoin is not a solution to the problems of Venezuela. Changing the government is. They're totally disconnected. [1] https://bitcoinist.com/venezuela-now-requires-bitcoin-miners-register-government/ https://bitcoinist.com/venezuela-now-requires-bitcoin-miners... [2] https://www.newsbtc.com/2018/05/31/officials-in-venezuela-begin-confiscating-imported-bitcoin-mining-hardware/ https://www.newsbtc.com/2018/05/31/officials-in-venezuela-be... [3] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-wage/venezuelas-maduro-hikes-minimum-wage-300-percent-idUSKCN1P82E2 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-wage/v...
      - thinkmassive 8y ago
        You claimed "Nobody in Venezuela has bitcoin." I provided evidence of a group making a difference in Venezuela using Bitcoin, so it does refute your previous statement. I pity someone who is so offended by a simple technology.
        arcticbull 8y ago
        Again, if they can trade with foreigners, they're better off with real currencies. I'm not offended, I'm exasperated. Bitcoin has been a solution in search of a problem for a decade, and each time it stumbles on an idea it's proven not to be effective and it's off to the next goalposts. This time it's Venezuela for some reason. They have real problems, and they need real solutions, not magic internet beans. If they really wanted to help the Venezuelans they'd do it using the best system, not their system -- this helps them, and hey, if the Venezuelans are better off for it, I guess that's fine too.