5 ms·

It makes sense to me about as much as the trade in ancient coins, stamps, and other collectibles. These are reasonable asset classes if you like gambling, with

by ridaj 6y ago

It makes sense to me about as much as the trade in ancient coins, stamps, and other collectibles. These are reasonable asset classes if you like gambling, with a somewhat fixed supply, not a lot of industrial applications, and wild price fluctuations based entirely on subjective appreciation. Bitcoin is more liquid but otherwise the price dynamic looks about the same...

sesuximo 6y ago
AFAIK, stamps don’t use our resources enough to move prices for energy/chips/etc
- ridaj 6y ago
  Right. It's scaled up. I suppose that if people became suddenly interested in old stamps to the tune of billions of dollars, stamp-dealing would also start competing for resources with the rest of the economy.
  - sesuximo 6y ago
    I think that’s wrong for a few reasons.... - a stamp uses a small amount of resources no matter how many stamps you want (more stamps may even be cheaper from economies of scale). - Bitcoin inherently relies on expensive computation to provide safety - each Bitcoin is more expensive than the last due to increasingly difficult nonces. - (dumb edge case) you can’t make old stamps so it’s hard to image using a lot of resources to find/make them. Obv not true for other products
    - bawolff 6y ago
      > each Bitcoin is more expensive than the last due to increasingly difficult nonces. Bitcoin difficulty can change in either direction.
- toolz 6y ago
  bitcoin uses less resources than traditional banking. I think people should stop judging it in a vacuum and instead speak in relative terms. If energy use is a concern then fiat is the greater offender. https://bitcoinist.com/banks-consume-energy-bitcoin/ https://bitcoinist.com/banks-consume-energy-bitcoin/ further crypto would be a much more flexible domain at working towards reducing carbon emission than deeply embedded and slow changing fiat systems
  - root_axis 6y ago
    Bitcoin does not replace traditional banking even if you view it as a legitimate currency.
    - bingbong123 6y ago
      Why not? Do you think every financial service offered by traditional banks can't be coded and made more efficient using internet-native money (bitcoin)? If so, what services can't? People already use BTC as collateral for loans/mortgages ...which are two of the riskiest activities traditional banks engage in.
  - sesuximo 6y ago
    Banks use way less energy per customer
    - yownie 6y ago
      8 years vs 150 years of technology though
    - bingbong123 6y ago
      I've walked into many semi-empty downtown brick and mortar banks with 5-10 idle employees, you want to continue paying that "innefficiency tax" in every transaction/loan/wire/credit-card/etc...? I don't think people really think through the reason there is a 20% tax on financial activity that goes through traditional banking system.
scoopertrooper 6y ago
I guess the key difference is that less startups have bilked investors by peddling fantastical dreams of post-fiat ancient coin based economies.
- bawolff 6y ago
  Maybe less tech startups, but im pretty sure a bunch of people popped up to bilk other people out of their money during the beenie baby craze.
  - scoopertrooper 6y ago
    I'm not sure if you're defending bitcoin or comparing people buying it to crazed beanie baby collectors. At least, nobody was talking about a beanie baby based financial system at the time - however adorable it may have been.
    - bawolff 6y ago
      I don't think bitcoin should be entirely dismissed as a scam (its more complex than that), but if we're going to compare it to a scam (and there are definitely plenty of scammers in the bitcoin ecosystem), i think its important to remember that neither scams nor speculative bubbles are new to human history.
      - scoopertrooper 6y ago
        The important innovation of Bitcoin (and the like) was that it democratised the ability to scam. A band of techno-utopians created a technology (ideology?) that made it much easier and cheaper to empty the pockets of the gullible.
  - SrslyJosh 6y ago
    That's a pretty good comparison, because, like the energy and custom hardware thrown at bitcoin, beanie babies are also intrinsically useless at the scale they were sold.
- 6y ago

by ridaj 6y ago

sesuximo 6y ago

AFAIK, stamps don’t use our resources enough to move prices for energy/chips/etc

ridaj 6y ago
Right. It's scaled up. I suppose that if people became suddenly interested in old stamps to the tune of billions of dollars, stamp-dealing would also start competing for resources with the rest of the economy.
- sesuximo 6y ago
  I think that’s wrong for a few reasons.... - a stamp uses a small amount of resources no matter how many stamps you want (more stamps may even be cheaper from economies of scale). - Bitcoin inherently relies on expensive computation to provide safety - each Bitcoin is more expensive than the last due to increasingly difficult nonces. - (dumb edge case) you can’t make old stamps so it’s hard to image using a lot of resources to find/make them. Obv not true for other products
  - bawolff 6y ago
    > each Bitcoin is more expensive than the last due to increasingly difficult nonces. Bitcoin difficulty can change in either direction.
toolz 6y ago
bitcoin uses less resources than traditional banking. I think people should stop judging it in a vacuum and instead speak in relative terms. If energy use is a concern then fiat is the greater offender. https://bitcoinist.com/banks-consume-energy-bitcoin/ https://bitcoinist.com/banks-consume-energy-bitcoin/ further crypto would be a much more flexible domain at working towards reducing carbon emission than deeply embedded and slow changing fiat systems
- root_axis 6y ago
  Bitcoin does not replace traditional banking even if you view it as a legitimate currency.
  - bingbong123 6y ago
    Why not? Do you think every financial service offered by traditional banks can't be coded and made more efficient using internet-native money (bitcoin)? If so, what services can't? People already use BTC as collateral for loans/mortgages ...which are two of the riskiest activities traditional banks engage in.
- sesuximo 6y ago
  Banks use way less energy per customer
  - yownie 6y ago
    8 years vs 150 years of technology though
  - bingbong123 6y ago
    I've walked into many semi-empty downtown brick and mortar banks with 5-10 idle employees, you want to continue paying that "innefficiency tax" in every transaction/loan/wire/credit-card/etc...? I don't think people really think through the reason there is a 20% tax on financial activity that goes through traditional banking system.

scoopertrooper 6y ago

I guess the key difference is that less startups have bilked investors by peddling fantastical dreams of post-fiat ancient coin based economies.

bawolff 6y ago
Maybe less tech startups, but im pretty sure a bunch of people popped up to bilk other people out of their money during the beenie baby craze.
- scoopertrooper 6y ago
  I'm not sure if you're defending bitcoin or comparing people buying it to crazed beanie baby collectors. At least, nobody was talking about a beanie baby based financial system at the time - however adorable it may have been.
  - bawolff 6y ago
    I don't think bitcoin should be entirely dismissed as a scam (its more complex than that), but if we're going to compare it to a scam (and there are definitely plenty of scammers in the bitcoin ecosystem), i think its important to remember that neither scams nor speculative bubbles are new to human history.
    - scoopertrooper 6y ago
      The important innovation of Bitcoin (and the like) was that it democratised the ability to scam. A band of techno-utopians created a technology (ideology?) that made it much easier and cheaper to empty the pockets of the gullible.
- SrslyJosh 6y ago
  That's a pretty good comparison, because, like the energy and custom hardware thrown at bitcoin, beanie babies are also intrinsically useless at the scale they were sold.
6y ago