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My view: The entire cryptocurrency ecosystem is fundamentally a grift, so it's not surprise that we see lots of unsavory behavior: power grabs, people cashing

by harryh 7y ago

My view: The entire cryptocurrency ecosystem is fundamentally a grift, so it's not surprise that we see lots of unsavory behavior: power grabs, people cashing out early, an unwillingness to work together, a lack of coherent vision. And that's not even getting into the outright fraud and massive theft we've seen at other crypto exchanges. When there is no long term, because it's all just a scam, you do whatever you've got to do to make your money in the short time available to you.

bdamm 7y ago
I think lots of people are in it for the benefits - I know I got excited for bitcoin partially because I know what an immense pain international money transfer is and that market is ripe for capturing. However bitcoin seems to go up when there’s a big improvement in ransomware and other scams. You might be right that bitcoin’s basis could significantly be scams.
repomies691 7y ago
Oh, please tell me how that kind of activity is nonexistant in non-crypto companies. Come on, this same stuff happens everywhere where money is involved.
- CharlesW 7y ago
  > Oh, please tell me how that kind of activity is nonexistant in non-crypto companies. It's not that unethical and illegal activities don't happen at non-cryptocurrency companies, but you don't have to be paying a lot of attention to see that it's happening at a very different scale among cryptocurrency companies.
  - repomies691 7y ago
    If you look for example at this story, it is not about being unethical. More like leadership problems with coinbase. What would you consider vastly unethical that coinbase has done? And vastly different scale than traditional finance companies? To me as their customer their have been always simple and transparent, the fees have been simple to understand and visible, etc. Can't say same about traditional finance companies I have been using.
    - CharlesW 7y ago
      > What would you consider vastly unethical that coinbase has done? I was responding to harryh's thread about the cryptocurrency ecosystem in general rather than Coinbase specifically, which I perceive to be about as trustworthy as cryptocurrency exchanges get. That may not be a super high bar :^) so I appreciate you sharing your experience.
    - harryh 7y ago
      Well, they bought earn/21 for 100M just as a favor to bail out some investors that had money in both companies. It was a completely failed company that had burned through 100M+ in capital. That was pretty weird.

by harryh 7y ago

bdamm 7y ago

I think lots of people are in it for the benefits - I know I got excited for bitcoin partially because I know what an immense pain international money transfer is and that market is ripe for capturing. However bitcoin seems to go up when there’s a big improvement in ransomware and other scams. You might be right that bitcoin’s basis could significantly be scams.

repomies691 7y ago

Oh, please tell me how that kind of activity is nonexistant in non-crypto companies. Come on, this same stuff happens everywhere where money is involved.

CharlesW 7y ago
> Oh, please tell me how that kind of activity is nonexistant in non-crypto companies. It's not that unethical and illegal activities don't happen at non-cryptocurrency companies, but you don't have to be paying a lot of attention to see that it's happening at a very different scale among cryptocurrency companies.
- repomies691 7y ago
  If you look for example at this story, it is not about being unethical. More like leadership problems with coinbase. What would you consider vastly unethical that coinbase has done? And vastly different scale than traditional finance companies? To me as their customer their have been always simple and transparent, the fees have been simple to understand and visible, etc. Can't say same about traditional finance companies I have been using.
  - CharlesW 7y ago
    > What would you consider vastly unethical that coinbase has done? I was responding to harryh's thread about the cryptocurrency ecosystem in general rather than Coinbase specifically, which I perceive to be about as trustworthy as cryptocurrency exchanges get. That may not be a super high bar :^) so I appreciate you sharing your experience.
  - harryh 7y ago
    Well, they bought earn/21 for 100M just as a favor to bail out some investors that had money in both companies. It was a completely failed company that had burned through 100M+ in capital. That was pretty weird.