5 ms·

> I honestly hope that it's high enough to deter a nation state sized attacker. What's the point though? Bitcoin has no real use case apart from speculation.

witweb 6y ago
So people living in countries without a stable currency due to hyperinflation don't count as a real use case? It's sometimes the only way they can secure their capital. I think that we need to think outside of our elitist western bubble more often. Not all people live in a stable democracy with (semi-)stable currencies.
- afiori 6y ago
  But for them there are better alternatives to BTC, one being BCH for example
  - orwin 6y ago
    And even if they do use BTC (they don't really, at least in Africa, i don't know about Venezuela), they do not trade using BTC but a second layer anyway.
    - hfsp 6y ago
      This is either an uninformed or misleading take. It isn't necessarily "Africa" or "Americas". The heuristic is "is my local fiat shitcoin stealing my purchasing power". Counter to your claim and easily provable with a basic search Nigeria is one of, if not the leading in BTC adoption %. https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/news/nigeria-is-the-second-largest-bitcoin-market-after-the-us/ar-BB1c1U1C https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/news/nigeria-is-the-second-l... https://www.statista.com/statistics/1194735/bitcoin-online-search-interest-country/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1194735/bitcoin-online-s...
      - imtringued 6y ago
        Is it the shitcoin or is it the fact that the economy itself is gone and thus your currency isn't worth anything because nobody is selling things to you? Here is an interesting article: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/venezuelas-paradox-people-are-hungry-but-farmers-cant-feed-them/2017/05/21/ce460726-3987-11e7-a59b-26e0451a96fd_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/venezuelas...
  - hfsp 6y ago
    BCH is trending to 0 in BTC. How does this solve Venezuelans or Lebanese store of value problem? https://www.tradingview.com/symbols/BCHBTC/ https://www.tradingview.com/symbols/BCHBTC/
    - uncletammy 6y ago
      Yet they just passed BTC's daily transaction volume (regularly) . Like it or not, BCH is about to eat BTC's lunch and good for them. They've earned it.
      - ad31mar 6y ago
        SoV first and only then medium of exchange. Not the other way around.
    - afiori 6y ago
      That is because BTC extremely unstable, which is good for speculation but not for a currency
- lottin 6y ago
  BTC isn't a stable currency in case you haven't noticed. Do you actually have evidence of BTC being used as currency in any of these dysfunctional countries you talk about or is it just a supposition that you're making?
  - will_pseudonym 6y ago
    https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/dec/16/venezuela-bitcoin-economy-digital-currency-bolivars https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/dec/16/venezuela...
    - p_l 6y ago
      In Venezuela, BTC is heavily restricted towards friends of the regime, for whom it serves similar experience as having hoards of "hard foreign currency" did in USSR...
    - lottin 6y ago
      They say nobody uses it but a "tiny minority". So basically what we already knew, BTC adoption as a currency is anecdotal even in those dysfunctional places where according to its proponents it's particularly suited for.
    - joubert 6y ago
      The article you linked to is from 2016 so I found something more recent: https://www.coindesk.com/bitcoin-adoption-venezuela-research https://www.coindesk.com/bitcoin-adoption-venezuela-research The article I linked to is from crypto folks, so caveat emptor.
- imtringued 6y ago
  What we need is a global organization that ensures that every nation will be self sufficient in regards to nutrition and only imports non essential foods for varieties sake. That's how you solve hyperinflation. The problem isn't that the currency is bad. The problem is that the government is utter garbage and since when did Bitcoin market itself as a political tool to subvert authoritarian leadership? No, it's just another "currency" like the dollar.
Nextgrid 6y ago
Besides speculation there is a minority who does use it as an actual currency, often in countries where their domestic currency is unusable (sanctions, inflation, etc). Also, just because there isn't a use-case now doesn't mean it isn't valuable to keep a currency immune to government interference around just in case you end up having a use-case for it later.
- loceng 6y ago
  Okay, so then how do we protect ourselves, security services, where normally we'd use financially penalty against known bad actors via the Magnitsky Act - but can't do so through Bitcoin?
- Leherenn 6y ago
  There certainly are some valid use cases. But the current usefulness/energy consumption ratio is pretty dreadful, and from my point of view it's future is not looking very good either. If energy was free, then who cares; otherwise I think it's legitimate to question whether the valid use cases of a few thousand people (total shot in the dark here, numbers appreciated) is worth using the same amount of electricity as Argentina, a country with 45M people.
- imtringued 6y ago
  I am dreaming of a crazy world where instead of foreign aid the US government simply enacts a bill that the largest agriculture companies have to expand into foreign markets with food shortages instead of exporting their food to them and replace the incompetent local farmers. It would be far more effective at solving inflation than a crappy cryptocurrency.

witweb 6y ago

So people living in countries without a stable currency due to hyperinflation don't count as a real use case? It's sometimes the only way they can secure their capital. I think that we need to think outside of our elitist western bubble more often. Not all people live in a stable democracy with (semi-)stable currencies.

afiori 6y ago
But for them there are better alternatives to BTC, one being BCH for example
- orwin 6y ago
  And even if they do use BTC (they don't really, at least in Africa, i don't know about Venezuela), they do not trade using BTC but a second layer anyway.
  - hfsp 6y ago
    This is either an uninformed or misleading take. It isn't necessarily "Africa" or "Americas". The heuristic is "is my local fiat shitcoin stealing my purchasing power". Counter to your claim and easily provable with a basic search Nigeria is one of, if not the leading in BTC adoption %. https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/news/nigeria-is-the-second-largest-bitcoin-market-after-the-us/ar-BB1c1U1C https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/news/nigeria-is-the-second-l... https://www.statista.com/statistics/1194735/bitcoin-online-search-interest-country/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1194735/bitcoin-online-s...
    - imtringued 6y ago
      Is it the shitcoin or is it the fact that the economy itself is gone and thus your currency isn't worth anything because nobody is selling things to you? Here is an interesting article: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/venezuelas-paradox-people-are-hungry-but-farmers-cant-feed-them/2017/05/21/ce460726-3987-11e7-a59b-26e0451a96fd_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/venezuelas...
- hfsp 6y ago
  BCH is trending to 0 in BTC. How does this solve Venezuelans or Lebanese store of value problem? https://www.tradingview.com/symbols/BCHBTC/ https://www.tradingview.com/symbols/BCHBTC/
  - uncletammy 6y ago
    Yet they just passed BTC's daily transaction volume (regularly) . Like it or not, BCH is about to eat BTC's lunch and good for them. They've earned it.
    - ad31mar 6y ago
      SoV first and only then medium of exchange. Not the other way around.
  - afiori 6y ago
    That is because BTC extremely unstable, which is good for speculation but not for a currency
lottin 6y ago
BTC isn't a stable currency in case you haven't noticed. Do you actually have evidence of BTC being used as currency in any of these dysfunctional countries you talk about or is it just a supposition that you're making?
- will_pseudonym 6y ago
  https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/dec/16/venezuela-bitcoin-economy-digital-currency-bolivars https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/dec/16/venezuela...
  - p_l 6y ago
    In Venezuela, BTC is heavily restricted towards friends of the regime, for whom it serves similar experience as having hoards of "hard foreign currency" did in USSR...
  - lottin 6y ago
    They say nobody uses it but a "tiny minority". So basically what we already knew, BTC adoption as a currency is anecdotal even in those dysfunctional places where according to its proponents it's particularly suited for.
  - joubert 6y ago
    The article you linked to is from 2016 so I found something more recent: https://www.coindesk.com/bitcoin-adoption-venezuela-research https://www.coindesk.com/bitcoin-adoption-venezuela-research The article I linked to is from crypto folks, so caveat emptor.
imtringued 6y ago
What we need is a global organization that ensures that every nation will be self sufficient in regards to nutrition and only imports non essential foods for varieties sake. That's how you solve hyperinflation. The problem isn't that the currency is bad. The problem is that the government is utter garbage and since when did Bitcoin market itself as a political tool to subvert authoritarian leadership? No, it's just another "currency" like the dollar.

Nextgrid 6y ago

Besides speculation there is a minority who does use it as an actual currency, often in countries where their domestic currency is unusable (sanctions, inflation, etc). Also, just because there isn't a use-case now doesn't mean it isn't valuable to keep a currency immune to government interference around just in case you end up having a use-case for it later.

loceng 6y ago
Okay, so then how do we protect ourselves, security services, where normally we'd use financially penalty against known bad actors via the Magnitsky Act - but can't do so through Bitcoin?
Leherenn 6y ago
There certainly are some valid use cases. But the current usefulness/energy consumption ratio is pretty dreadful, and from my point of view it's future is not looking very good either. If energy was free, then who cares; otherwise I think it's legitimate to question whether the valid use cases of a few thousand people (total shot in the dark here, numbers appreciated) is worth using the same amount of electricity as Argentina, a country with 45M people.
imtringued 6y ago
I am dreaming of a crazy world where instead of foreign aid the US government simply enacts a bill that the largest agriculture companies have to expand into foreign markets with food shortages instead of exporting their food to them and replace the incompetent local farmers. It would be far more effective at solving inflation than a crappy cryptocurrency.