7 ms·

The problem with Bitcoin and is that it creates real negative effects, with little positive effects to show for it. The most prominent negative effect is the h

The problem with Bitcoin and is that it creates real negative effects, with little positive effects to show for it. The most prominent negative effect is the huge energy waste, which doesn't help when we are trying to cut on our carbon footprint The second one is that it makes illegal activities easier, and at a larger scale. It's quite common right now for companies to be coerced pay millions of dollars to anonymous criminals, all enabled with cryptocurrencies. Unless equally sized positive effects would emerge, it creates a growing pressure on governments to regulate and potentially criminalize the usage of cryptocurrencies. If that happens, the monetary value will naturally fall down.

immigration311 6y ago
Making (certain) illegal activities easier is one of the primary positive effects.
- codyb 6y ago
  I'll assume you're referring to obtaining drugs which many consider to be something that at the very least should not be punished by prison time (myself included), as opposed to say... the distribution of child pornography, ordering hit men, arms trafficking, or the selling of hacked credit card numbers, passwords, and zero days. If that was your idea, wouldn't we be better served by lobbying our politicians to move the needle on the drug war (seems to be happening) instead of creating volatile whale controlled crypto "currencies" which use huge amounts of electricity as our planet faces a climate change crises and which also enables all of the other really terrible illegal things listed?
  - postingpals 6y ago
    Personally I assumed they meant exchanging money in secret if you are a whistleblower and the government is after you.
    - bitxbitxbitcoin 6y ago
      Same. Or maybe you're someone who was born in a country embargoed by the United States and you want to accept payment for freelance work.
  - BurningFrog 6y ago
    Consider that there are many other countries than the US, where laws are often oppressive and should be broken.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
    > If that was your idea, wouldn't we be better served by lobbying our politicians to move the needle on the drug war (seems to be happening) instead of creating volatile whale controlled crypto "currencies" which use huge amounts of electricity as our planet faces a climate change crises and which also enables all of the other really terrible illegal things listed? What would really be better is to push politicians to stop using the banking system as a mass surveillance apparatus and allow there to be above-board systems for the anonymous digital transfer of modest amounts of cash. Then you destroy the demand for cryptocurrency by out-competing it, and eliminate the energy waste problem.
- roenxi 6y ago
  Although true, philosophically speaking the governments of the world take on powers that exceed what is reasonable. The US, for example, will happily assert its ability to intercede when Iran and China trade. It isn't at all obvious why that should be the case, and it is profoundly unclear why China and Iran should cooperate. It is plausible that countries should be trading using a decentralised system like a bitcoin-style cryptocurrency. US law really should stop at the US border.
- mdoms 6y ago
  Ah yes, nothing more positive than making the exchange of child pornography easier and safer for the peddlers involved.
  - bingbong123 6y ago
    "Think of the children" when all other arguments fail. Kids would benefit if their parents' savings in USD wasnt debased at an accelerating rate aka 50% loss of purchasing power every 8-10 years (soon to be 5-10 years).
throw1234651234 6y ago
"with little positive effects to show for it" It's an efficient store of value. Here is a dilemma - you have 10 million dollars. You need somewhere to park your money. Do you follow the Chinese businessman pattern and buy real estate in Toronto? That seems complicated - picking a property, being subject to the real estate market, etc. Often these houses sit empty, since you are on the topic of wasted resources. Do you buy gold? Gold is as useless as Bitcoin, in terms of intrinsic value, your special snowflake "industrial applications" of coating McLaren F1 engines as a heatshield and superconductivity aside. Buy stocks? How do you pick them? A financial advisor certainly won't do it properly for you. And the fed is pumping out USD. Of course USD is going to deflate. So, Bitcoin suddenly doesn't seem so useless. "is the huge energy waste" Gold takes a lot to store, secure, and transport. BTC replaces that with mining. "The second one is that it makes illegal activities easier, and at a larger scale. It's quite common right now for companies to be coerced pay millions of dollars to anonymous criminals, all enabled with cryptocurrencies." Every single transaction is on the chain. At this point they are worried that Monero is insecure. There are even conspiracy theorists saying that "the man" wants blockchain currencies as the norm due to the "nowhere to hide" policy. And yes, you can create a wallet on some hotspot, and it is "anon". But let's be honest. "Unless equally sized positive effects would emerge" It's a secure place to park cash that doesn't deflate by nature. edit: If you downvote, try to explain what you disagree with.
- dmitriid 6y ago
  > It's an efficient store of value. Here is a dilemma - you have 10 million dollars It's not a dilemma. At all. If you have 10 million dollars just lying around, chances are, uo already know what to do with your money. So your entire premise is based on a combination of assumptions that make it entirely laughable: - that if you have 10 million dollars, you have a problem with storing them - that in order to defend bitcoin you have to come up with an example involving no less than 10 million dollars > Do you buy gold? Gold is useless. Buy stocks? How do you pick them? Of course USD is going to deflate. Ah, I feel so sad for people who have 10 million dollars which they have to just "park". How did they ever manage to do that in the past? Oh, right. Stocks, property, securities, bonds, investments, diversified portfolios.
beaner 6y ago
Money is a self-organizing system of resource management. Bitcoin is better money, because it allows for more pure self-organization, as a result of its money supply being predetermined by hard-coded algorithm, rather than by fiat decree. This single benefit far outweighs the mentioned negatives. It has the potential to completely eliminate the boom/bust cycle, eliminate currency manipulation that facilitates international trade imbalances, and free hyperinflated jurisdictions from that aspect of their poverty. Many think these expectations are unreal, and that's fine. I'll see you when we get there.
- sesuximo 6y ago
  I don’t think any of these things come close to paying for the energy cost Bitcoin used circa 2018 (I haven’t looked recently — has it decreased?). And that cost would skyrocket if everyone used it day to day
  - beaner 6y ago
    I have commented on this elsewhere but because energy is not just a cost for bitcoin mining but essentially the only cost outside initial capital investment, Bitcoin's POW will in the long-term drive all mining to off-grid self-power by renewables.
- SrslyJosh 6y ago
  > Bitcoin is better money, because it allows for more pure self-organization, as a result of its money supply being predetermined by hard-coded algorithm, rather than by fiat decree. Because bitcoin requires substantial inputs (hardware, energy), if it actually has legs, it will end up being controlled by whoever controls the most capital. That's not self-organization, that's just replicating the same broken economic system we have right now, but (ironically) with much lower efficiency. > It has the potential to completely eliminate the boom/bust cycle Citation needed. =) > eliminate currency manipulation "A single anonymous market manipulator caused bitcoin to top $20,000 two years ago, study shows" https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/04/study-single-anonymous-market-manipulator-pushed-bitcoin-to-20000.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/04/study-single-anonymous-marke... > free hyperinflated jurisdictions from that aspect of their poverty. I'm sure that'll work great for folks who can afford to buy (or would be payed in increments of) approximately 0.0005 BTC at a time. What are transaction fees these days, anyway? =)
siwatanejo 6y ago
> The second one is that it makes illegal activities easier, and at a larger scale. It's quite common right now for companies to be coerced pay millions of dollars to anonymous criminals, all enabled with cryptocurrencies. For the vast majority of businesses/individuals, it is governments and banking cartels the ones stealing your money (via inflation and fractional reserve respectively) without recourse. Switching to a world in which, instead of all of us, but only a few, are stolen money, is a bit better. > The most prominent negative effect is the huge energy waste, which doesn't help when we are trying to cut on our carbon footprint Debunked. Sources: * https://newmoneyreview.com/index.php/2020/09/03/big-oil-goes-for-bitcoin/ https://newmoneyreview.com/index.php/2020/09/03/big-oil-goes... * https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2017-12-07/bitcoin-is-greener-than-its-critics-think https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2017-12-07/bitcoi... * https://blog.bitcoin.org.hk/bitcoin-mining-and-energy-consumption-4526d4b56186 https://blog.bitcoin.org.hk/bitcoin-mining-and-energy-consum... * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2T0OUIW89II https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2T0OUIW89II * https://cointelegraph.com/news/study-over-74-of-bitcoin-mining-is-powered-by-renewable-energy https://cointelegraph.com/news/study-over-74-of-bitcoin-mini... * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5JQfZdJLjY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5JQfZdJLjY * https://youtu.be/nPt51vxTUFM?t=1025 https://youtu.be/nPt51vxTUFM?t=1025
- tomerico 6y ago
  Re: Money transfer - it's not clear why money going to criminal organization is better than the government. Also, since most people actually have negligible savings, it's not clear that inflation actually "steals" money from the people. Re: Energy use - A single Bitcoin transaction is around $8 today. If you assume an efficient market, where the cost to compute Bitcoin is roughly equivalent to the energy cost, that's a crazy 80kWh in US energy cost for a single transaction (and probably more, since Bitcoin mining is done where energy cost is lower). The claim that a fraction of that comes from renewable is silly, this renewable energy could go to other means.
  - yownie 6y ago
    yes but that tranfer fee is the same for 100 or 1 billion in value, and lightning correctly implemented pushing that fee down to the subcent number. One of the biggest misconceptions around Bitcoin is somehow that it was supposed to sort all this out before it bootstrapped to a large enough network, but we all know that´s impossible.

immigration311 6y ago

Making (certain) illegal activities easier is one of the primary positive effects.

codyb 6y ago
I'll assume you're referring to obtaining drugs which many consider to be something that at the very least should not be punished by prison time (myself included), as opposed to say... the distribution of child pornography, ordering hit men, arms trafficking, or the selling of hacked credit card numbers, passwords, and zero days. If that was your idea, wouldn't we be better served by lobbying our politicians to move the needle on the drug war (seems to be happening) instead of creating volatile whale controlled crypto "currencies" which use huge amounts of electricity as our planet faces a climate change crises and which also enables all of the other really terrible illegal things listed?
- postingpals 6y ago
  Personally I assumed they meant exchanging money in secret if you are a whistleblower and the government is after you.
  - bitxbitxbitcoin 6y ago
    Same. Or maybe you're someone who was born in a country embargoed by the United States and you want to accept payment for freelance work.
- BurningFrog 6y ago
  Consider that there are many other countries than the US, where laws are often oppressive and should be broken.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- AnthonyMouse 6y ago
  > If that was your idea, wouldn't we be better served by lobbying our politicians to move the needle on the drug war (seems to be happening) instead of creating volatile whale controlled crypto "currencies" which use huge amounts of electricity as our planet faces a climate change crises and which also enables all of the other really terrible illegal things listed? What would really be better is to push politicians to stop using the banking system as a mass surveillance apparatus and allow there to be above-board systems for the anonymous digital transfer of modest amounts of cash. Then you destroy the demand for cryptocurrency by out-competing it, and eliminate the energy waste problem.
roenxi 6y ago
Although true, philosophically speaking the governments of the world take on powers that exceed what is reasonable. The US, for example, will happily assert its ability to intercede when Iran and China trade. It isn't at all obvious why that should be the case, and it is profoundly unclear why China and Iran should cooperate. It is plausible that countries should be trading using a decentralised system like a bitcoin-style cryptocurrency. US law really should stop at the US border.
mdoms 6y ago
Ah yes, nothing more positive than making the exchange of child pornography easier and safer for the peddlers involved.
- bingbong123 6y ago
  "Think of the children" when all other arguments fail. Kids would benefit if their parents' savings in USD wasnt debased at an accelerating rate aka 50% loss of purchasing power every 8-10 years (soon to be 5-10 years).

throw1234651234 6y ago

"with little positive effects to show for it" It's an efficient store of value. Here is a dilemma - you have 10 million dollars. You need somewhere to park your money. Do you follow the Chinese businessman pattern and buy real estate in Toronto? That seems complicated - picking a property, being subject to the real estate market, etc. Often these houses sit empty, since you are on the topic of wasted resources. Do you buy gold? Gold is as useless as Bitcoin, in terms of intrinsic value, your special snowflake "industrial applications" of coating McLaren F1 engines as a heatshield and superconductivity aside. Buy stocks? How do you pick them? A financial advisor certainly won't do it properly for you. And the fed is pumping out USD. Of course USD is going to deflate. So, Bitcoin suddenly doesn't seem so useless. "is the huge energy waste" Gold takes a lot to store, secure, and transport. BTC replaces that with mining. "The second one is that it makes illegal activities easier, and at a larger scale. It's quite common right now for companies to be coerced pay millions of dollars to anonymous criminals, all enabled with cryptocurrencies." Every single transaction is on the chain. At this point they are worried that Monero is insecure. There are even conspiracy theorists saying that "the man" wants blockchain currencies as the norm due to the "nowhere to hide" policy. And yes, you can create a wallet on some hotspot, and it is "anon". But let's be honest. "Unless equally sized positive effects would emerge" It's a secure place to park cash that doesn't deflate by nature. edit: If you downvote, try to explain what you disagree with.

dmitriid 6y ago
> It's an efficient store of value. Here is a dilemma - you have 10 million dollars It's not a dilemma. At all. If you have 10 million dollars just lying around, chances are, uo already know what to do with your money. So your entire premise is based on a combination of assumptions that make it entirely laughable: - that if you have 10 million dollars, you have a problem with storing them - that in order to defend bitcoin you have to come up with an example involving no less than 10 million dollars > Do you buy gold? Gold is useless. Buy stocks? How do you pick them? Of course USD is going to deflate. Ah, I feel so sad for people who have 10 million dollars which they have to just "park". How did they ever manage to do that in the past? Oh, right. Stocks, property, securities, bonds, investments, diversified portfolios.

beaner 6y ago

Money is a self-organizing system of resource management. Bitcoin is better money, because it allows for more pure self-organization, as a result of its money supply being predetermined by hard-coded algorithm, rather than by fiat decree. This single benefit far outweighs the mentioned negatives. It has the potential to completely eliminate the boom/bust cycle, eliminate currency manipulation that facilitates international trade imbalances, and free hyperinflated jurisdictions from that aspect of their poverty. Many think these expectations are unreal, and that's fine. I'll see you when we get there.

sesuximo 6y ago
I don’t think any of these things come close to paying for the energy cost Bitcoin used circa 2018 (I haven’t looked recently — has it decreased?). And that cost would skyrocket if everyone used it day to day
- beaner 6y ago
  I have commented on this elsewhere but because energy is not just a cost for bitcoin mining but essentially the only cost outside initial capital investment, Bitcoin's POW will in the long-term drive all mining to off-grid self-power by renewables.
SrslyJosh 6y ago
> Bitcoin is better money, because it allows for more pure self-organization, as a result of its money supply being predetermined by hard-coded algorithm, rather than by fiat decree. Because bitcoin requires substantial inputs (hardware, energy), if it actually has legs, it will end up being controlled by whoever controls the most capital. That's not self-organization, that's just replicating the same broken economic system we have right now, but (ironically) with much lower efficiency. > It has the potential to completely eliminate the boom/bust cycle Citation needed. =) > eliminate currency manipulation "A single anonymous market manipulator caused bitcoin to top $20,000 two years ago, study shows" https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/04/study-single-anonymous-market-manipulator-pushed-bitcoin-to-20000.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/04/study-single-anonymous-marke... > free hyperinflated jurisdictions from that aspect of their poverty. I'm sure that'll work great for folks who can afford to buy (or would be payed in increments of) approximately 0.0005 BTC at a time. What are transaction fees these days, anyway? =)

siwatanejo 6y ago

> The second one is that it makes illegal activities easier, and at a larger scale. It's quite common right now for companies to be coerced pay millions of dollars to anonymous criminals, all enabled with cryptocurrencies. For the vast majority of businesses/individuals, it is governments and banking cartels the ones stealing your money (via inflation and fractional reserve respectively) without recourse. Switching to a world in which, instead of all of us, but only a few, are stolen money, is a bit better. > The most prominent negative effect is the huge energy waste, which doesn't help when we are trying to cut on our carbon footprint Debunked. Sources: * https://newmoneyreview.com/index.php/2020/09/03/big-oil-goes-for-bitcoin/ https://newmoneyreview.com/index.php/2020/09/03/big-oil-goes... * https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2017-12-07/bitcoin-is-greener-than-its-critics-think https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2017-12-07/bitcoi... * https://blog.bitcoin.org.hk/bitcoin-mining-and-energy-consumption-4526d4b56186 https://blog.bitcoin.org.hk/bitcoin-mining-and-energy-consum... * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2T0OUIW89II https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2T0OUIW89II * https://cointelegraph.com/news/study-over-74-of-bitcoin-mining-is-powered-by-renewable-energy https://cointelegraph.com/news/study-over-74-of-bitcoin-mini... * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5JQfZdJLjY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5JQfZdJLjY * https://youtu.be/nPt51vxTUFM?t=1025 https://youtu.be/nPt51vxTUFM?t=1025

tomerico 6y ago
Re: Money transfer - it's not clear why money going to criminal organization is better than the government. Also, since most people actually have negligible savings, it's not clear that inflation actually "steals" money from the people. Re: Energy use - A single Bitcoin transaction is around $8 today. If you assume an efficient market, where the cost to compute Bitcoin is roughly equivalent to the energy cost, that's a crazy 80kWh in US energy cost for a single transaction (and probably more, since Bitcoin mining is done where energy cost is lower). The claim that a fraction of that comes from renewable is silly, this renewable energy could go to other means.
- yownie 6y ago
  yes but that tranfer fee is the same for 100 or 1 billion in value, and lightning correctly implemented pushing that fee down to the subcent number. One of the biggest misconceptions around Bitcoin is somehow that it was supposed to sort all this out before it bootstrapped to a large enough network, but we all know that´s impossible.