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Bitcoin used to be an alternative currency that was anonymous, but with a current $7 transaction fee it's clearly not going to be used as a currency to buy a mo
by alwillis 6y ago
Bitcoin used to be an alternative currency that was anonymous, but with a current $7 transaction fee it's clearly not going to be used as a currency to buy a morning coffee (i.e. it fails the transferability requirement of a currency).
Not sure why bitcoin skeptics keep pointing to these transaction fees. As I write this, it takes 3 sats/byte to get into a block in 30 minutes and 1 sat/byte for 1 hour.
And as I write this, 1 sat = $0.00027210. A typical transaction is about 250 bytes, so to get a transaction into a block in 30 minutes costs about 7 cents. If it's more important, you could pay $1 or something.
Of course, Lightning Network is faster and cheaper than using bitcoin's blockchain for every transaction, which cost a fraction of a sat for every hop the transaction has to travel.
- Closi 6y agoBecause a 30 minute transfer time, or $1 fee means you can’t do small and fast transactions (which are the vast majority of transactions for a traditional currency). This means Bitcoin is simply not a good currency for most transactions.
- alwillis 6y agoFirst, it usually doesn't make sense to buy coffee with bitcoin. Why would I do that if I had the choice to use depreciating fiat instead? As a currency, the dollar is great for quick, low-cost transactions. But it's no longer a good store of value. Besides, I can use my Cash App debit card or app and get cash back in bitcoin, which is rapidly appreciating in value [1]. As I already mentioned, lightning network provides fast (less than a few seconds) and cheap (fractions of pennies) off-chain bitcoin transactions—http://lightning.network/ http://lightning.network/. [1] https://cash.app/help/us/en-us/30982-bitcoin-boost https://cash.app/help/us/en-us/30982-bitcoin-boost