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The very clear and main thing it brings is getting rid of the middleman, at least for transactions, whether it be governments or businesses. This is a bigger d
by colordrops 5y ago
The very clear and main thing it brings is getting rid of the middleman, at least for transactions, whether it be governments or businesses. This is a bigger deal than it sounds, as the middle man defines most policy around transactions, whether it be who can trade, when, and how, which creates huge imbalances in fairness and accessibility, and also can be enforced at nation state borders. These may be seen as cons by many, but to be frank, many find great value in these properties, and because it's a more efficient marketplace it will naturally take root.
- endisneigh 5y agoThere’s still a middle man - the blockchain. If you truly want no middlemen you can barter.
- marcosdumay 5y agoWell, it doesn't. It replaces a fuzzy set of middleman with another. And there isn't enough attention to the Bitcoin governance to make it better than the government-based system. Cryptocoin people don't even want to discuss governance, because they like to believe there's nothing to govern and nobody governing.
- colordrops 5y agoThat isn't really a fair representation. The amount of leeway to affect policy and transactions on a blockchain by whomever you think these middlemen are is negligible compared to things like stocks and bank accounts. No middle man can stop you from sending BTC to someone in Asia. No middleman can force your transaction to take 5 days. No middleman can stop your transaction. No middleman can stop transactions at night and weekends. No middleman can trade afterhours while you are stuck waiting until the next day.
- marcosdumay 5y agoHum... Yeah, the different middleman come with different problems, not the same ones. We don't have much clarity on what those new problems are (we know very few of them), but what is perfectly clear is that every interested party is actively avoiding creating some mechanism for solving them.
- bob33212 5y agoI want a middle man in most of my transactions. Just imagine if a gas station changed their prices to ounces instead of gallons and you filled up your gas tank for $3000 before you realized the scam. With no middle man that money is gone. With a credit card you can refuse the charge and tell the credit card company who will ban that seller from their network and not charge you.
- colordrops 5y agoSure, you do for some things, as most people do. And many people find a lot of value in no middleman for other things. This is not contradictory.
- bob33212 5y agoThe only transactions where a middle man are a problem for me is the government and taxes. I would like to be able to give someone money without reporting it to the IRS. I would like to be able to buy weed in the mail, but the government doesn't allow that. Crypto doesn't stop laws from existing. People love to bring up Venezuela, but what happens when that government finds out someone has bought a house with crypto?
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- s7atic 5y agoThere are escrow services for blockchain transactions; the difference to digital fiat is that you are not forced to use a middleman.