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That doesn't make it wrong, though. - that BTC is volatile is, hopefully, non-controversial. Do you want your stock to be volatile? (if you have large BTC asse

That doesn't make it wrong, though. - that BTC is volatile is, hopefully, non-controversial. Do you want your stock to be volatile? (if you have large BTC assets, it should be...) - I won't comment on deflationary/inefficient, I feel the article didn't focus too much on that. But it's a questionable store of value because it doesn't have intrinsic value - this, again, should be uncontroversial. The article lists multiple events that might absolutely destroy BTC (the section "BTC is really risky"). It's easy to imagine more (e.g. war or other catastrophic events that would make the BTC network "less interesting" and would make it really easy for a committed player to do a 51% attack, destroying all remaining trust). It definitely feels like a fancy ponzi scheme - at the very least, BTC ticks a lot of boxes for "how to identify a ponzi scheme" (definitely 1 & 5; arguably most others, except for 2): 1. Abnormally high investment returns. The most obvious sign of any investment skulduggery is the promise of an abnormally high investment return. ... 2. Guaranteed returns. ... 3. Consistently high performance. ... 4. Vague business model. ... 5. The need for more investors. ... 6. Pressure to reinvest. ... 7. The pressure to act now. ... 8. Credibility through association. --- Note that I'm not claiming that BTC was created with the intention of being a Ponzi scheme!!! I'm just saying it appears to have many such characteristics, and one may reasonably assume that a similar eventual outcome is not unlikely.

gruez 6y ago
> That doesn't make it wrong, though. I never claimed that. The point is that for most hn readers, these arguments would have been brought up already and therefore as a whole the article as a whole isn't really interesting. It's like being in 2020 reading a "mongodb is bad because it's not ACID compliant" article.
- virgilp 6y ago
  That's actually a worse argument, if I understand it correctly (are you claiming that the article is not interesting for HN readers?? It's frontpage position - currently at #3 - seems to be a pretty convincing counter-argument. The article might not be interesting for you personally, but... that's not very relevant)
  - gruez 6y ago
    >That's actually a worse argument, if I understand it correctly (are you claiming that the article is not interesting for HN readers?? Yes? Not every comment has to be pigeon holed into "This article is right" and "This article is wrong". >It's frontpage position - currently at #3 - seems to be a pretty convincing counter-argument A long time hn reader such as yourself must know about the phenomena of "upvoted not because of article content, but because of discussion"? >The article might not be interesting for you personally, but... that's not very relevant) It's not only that, the article doesn't even bother going into the most basic of rebuttals (as evidenced by the replies here). Overall it's a very shallow article. It might be fine for 2013 but not for 2021.
hanniabu 6y ago
> That doesn't make it wrong, though. This is no different than covid deniers being presented with evidence and then completely ignoring it.
WrtCdEvrydy 6y ago
1. Abnormally high investment returns. The most obvious sign of any investment skulduggery is the promise of an abnormally high investment return. ... I'd argue there's no promise of any investment return. Bitcoin just allows the transfer of money nearly instantly. 2. Guaranteed returns. ... There are no returns since it just a currency to be used. 3. Consistently high performance. ... Bitcoin isn't a stock, it's a currency. If you're using it to invest, you're gonna have a bad time. 4. Vague business model. ... Not a business, just a currency. 5. The need for more investors. ... There is no need for anyone to invest in Bitcoin, there are plenty of hedge funds putting their money into it. 6. Pressure to reinvest. ... You can go in and out of Bitcoin as you please. 7. The pressure to act now. ... This is probably FOMO, noone's forcing you to purchase Bitcoin and I would not purchase Bitcoin during a rally unless I was doing a Monday-Friday trading run (buy Monday, sell Friday) 8. Credibility through association. Noone is associated to Bitcoin, it's an anonymous currency.
- virgilp 6y ago
  It's not a currency. It lacks "acceptability", by design - you can never pay for your subway trips with BTC, it just wouldn't scale not even to a city like NY.
  - WrtCdEvrydy 6y ago
    Coinbase Card would allow you pay for anything using a credit card. https://www.coinbase.com/card https://www.coinbase.com/card It's just another way to spend money.
    - virgilp 6y ago
      ... by changing the BTC offline into fiat currency. Doesn't change anything, using the same mechanisms you could create a similar card backed by any commodity. A coinbase card transaction is not actually a BTC transaction.
      - WrtCdEvrydy 6y ago

gruez 6y ago

> That doesn't make it wrong, though. I never claimed that. The point is that for most hn readers, these arguments would have been brought up already and therefore as a whole the article as a whole isn't really interesting. It's like being in 2020 reading a "mongodb is bad because it's not ACID compliant" article.

virgilp 6y ago
That's actually a worse argument, if I understand it correctly (are you claiming that the article is not interesting for HN readers?? It's frontpage position - currently at #3 - seems to be a pretty convincing counter-argument. The article might not be interesting for you personally, but... that's not very relevant)
- gruez 6y ago
  >That's actually a worse argument, if I understand it correctly (are you claiming that the article is not interesting for HN readers?? Yes? Not every comment has to be pigeon holed into "This article is right" and "This article is wrong". >It's frontpage position - currently at #3 - seems to be a pretty convincing counter-argument A long time hn reader such as yourself must know about the phenomena of "upvoted not because of article content, but because of discussion"? >The article might not be interesting for you personally, but... that's not very relevant) It's not only that, the article doesn't even bother going into the most basic of rebuttals (as evidenced by the replies here). Overall it's a very shallow article. It might be fine for 2013 but not for 2021.

hanniabu 6y ago

> That doesn't make it wrong, though. This is no different than covid deniers being presented with evidence and then completely ignoring it.

WrtCdEvrydy 6y ago

1. Abnormally high investment returns. The most obvious sign of any investment skulduggery is the promise of an abnormally high investment return. ... I'd argue there's no promise of any investment return. Bitcoin just allows the transfer of money nearly instantly. 2. Guaranteed returns. ... There are no returns since it just a currency to be used. 3. Consistently high performance. ... Bitcoin isn't a stock, it's a currency. If you're using it to invest, you're gonna have a bad time. 4. Vague business model. ... Not a business, just a currency. 5. The need for more investors. ... There is no need for anyone to invest in Bitcoin, there are plenty of hedge funds putting their money into it. 6. Pressure to reinvest. ... You can go in and out of Bitcoin as you please. 7. The pressure to act now. ... This is probably FOMO, noone's forcing you to purchase Bitcoin and I would not purchase Bitcoin during a rally unless I was doing a Monday-Friday trading run (buy Monday, sell Friday) 8. Credibility through association. Noone is associated to Bitcoin, it's an anonymous currency.

virgilp 6y ago
It's not a currency. It lacks "acceptability", by design - you can never pay for your subway trips with BTC, it just wouldn't scale not even to a city like NY.
- WrtCdEvrydy 6y ago
  Coinbase Card would allow you pay for anything using a credit card. https://www.coinbase.com/card https://www.coinbase.com/card It's just another way to spend money.
  - virgilp 6y ago
    ... by changing the BTC offline into fiat currency. Doesn't change anything, using the same mechanisms you could create a similar card backed by any commodity. A coinbase card transaction is not actually a BTC transaction.
    - WrtCdEvrydy 6y ago