10 ms·

As a bitcoin fan, I think that's missing the point. Bitcoin is about ending US monetary hegemony over the world. That dominance allows the US to grossly abuse

by javert 5y ago

As a bitcoin fan, I think that's missing the point. Bitcoin is about ending US monetary hegemony over the world. That dominance allows the US to grossly abuse its own citizens (future generations in particular) and people around the world (e.g. borrowing and throwing away trillions of dollars on unjust foreign wars). Bitcoin is about hard money. It's about eliminating the Fed, but it's not about ending banking middlemen like Visa. Those will always exist, but they are "small fry."

jeroenhd 5y ago
I think that was definitely the initial intention of bitcoin when it was launched. Perhaps not specifically to fight off USA influences, but definitely to end government control over the monetary system, be it the dollar, the yen or the euro. However, I don't think that goal has been relevant for a few years now. Bitcoin has turned into an uncontrolled speculation adventure for people with more money than sense or access to cheap electricity. Just the transaction costs alone make it infeasible to use Bitcoin to order pizza. External payment networks related to but not affiliated with Bitcoin have spun up to battle these transaction costs, but Bitcoin itself is nothing like it was way back when. I don't think Bitcoin will ever reach its potential as the initial activists thought it had. However, it has cleared the way for other cryptocurrencies to step up and replace it as a payment system for common people.
- qecez 5y ago
  > Just the transaction costs alone make it infeasible to use Bitcoin to order pizza. Blatantly false. Transacting on the Lightning Network (Bitcoin L2) costs next to nothing and the settlement is final and immediate. Screw pizza, top-of-mind, you can pay a fraction of a cent's worth for an API call with Bitcoin (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28459713 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28459713)... or pay 66 satoshis (~$0.03) / hour for a VPS instance (https://www.bitclouds.sh https://www.bitclouds.sh)... or buy gift cards for any amount (https://www.bitrefill.com/buy/ https://www.bitrefill.com/buy/)... or tip anyone as little as 1 satoshi (~$0.00046) (here's 5 cents worth https://ln.cash/tFVDMpUMRQPYwyj9DZHMqg https://ln.cash/tFVDMpUMRQPYwyj9DZHMqg)... or hell, if you're feeling like pizza, DM me on Twitter and I'll get you one, paid for in Bitcoin (https://ln.pizza https://ln.pizza).
jmt_ 5y ago
But can Bitcoin eliminate the Fed and have any meaningful impact on the US financial system if the big actors of such a system are steadily centralizing and controlling it? How would Bitcoin be able to change anything if its "enemies" are embracing it and applying traditional banking approaches to it? I can't help but wonder if crypto will be the victim of embrace-extend-extinquish schemes. I'm not sure Visa is small fry. Regular people will want the easiest way to utilize crypto and if they can go through means familiar to them, they probably will. If companies like Visa end up having a hand in the majority of crypto transaction some day then crypto is effectively owned by the system it's trying to fight.
- thebean11 5y ago
  Building centralized things on top of it is not the same as centralizing Bitcoin itself. None of it allows them to print more, or prevent you from making on chain transactions.
  - lottin 5y ago
    > None of it allows them to print more What stops an exchange from crediting an account with newly created bitcoins just like commercial banks do?
    - thebean11 5y ago
      You mean giving out more BTC IOUs than they actually own BTC? Nothing does, but creating IOUs is not the same thing as printing actual currency/gold/BTC. edit: And by "nothing", I mean there's no technical barrier. There are certainly legal barriers if they are lying about reserves and falsifying audits..
      - lottin 5y ago
        No, I mean crediting an account with an amount of bitcoins that came from nowhere. This is how commercial banks create money, and I don't see the reason why crypto exchanges can't do the same with bitcoin.
Geee 5y ago
Not really. The idea is to cut all middlemen and controlling entities. Quote from Satoshi: "The root problem with conventional currency is all the trust that's required to make it work. The central bank must be trusted not to debase the currency, but the history of fiat currencies is full of breaches of that trust. Banks must be trusted to hold our money and transfer it electronically, but they lend it out in waves of credit bubbles with barely a fraction in reserve. We have to trust them with our privacy, trust them not to let identity thieves drain our accounts. Their massive overhead costs make micropayments impossible. A generation ago, multi-user time-sharing computer systems had a similar problem. Before strong encryption, users had to rely on password protection to secure their files, placing trust in the system administrator to keep their information private. Privacy could always be overridden by the admin based on his judgment call weighing the principle of privacy against other concerns, or at the behest of his superiors. Then strong encryption became available to the masses, and trust was no longer required. Data could be secured in a way that was physically impossible for others to access, no matter for what reason, no matter how good the excuse, no matter what. It's time we had the same thing for money. With e-currency based on cryptographic proof, without the need to trust a third party middleman, money can be secure and transactions effortless. " Source: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com/forum/topics/bitcoin-open-source http://p2pfoundation.ning.com/forum/topics/bitcoin-open-sour...
- inter_netuser 5y ago
  "The central bank must be trusted not to debase the currency" "not to debase" hard money?
  - Geee 5y ago
    Yes, bitcoin is predictably hard money.
    - arcticbull 5y ago
      Which history has shown us is bad. But by all means let’s re-learn our lessons the hard way.
JumpCrisscross 5y ago
> borrowing and throwing away trillions of dollars on unjust foreign wars Because the era preceding fiat currencies was peaceful and devoid of hegemony and global power struggles?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

by javert 5y ago

jeroenhd 5y ago

I think that was definitely the initial intention of bitcoin when it was launched. Perhaps not specifically to fight off USA influences, but definitely to end government control over the monetary system, be it the dollar, the yen or the euro. However, I don't think that goal has been relevant for a few years now. Bitcoin has turned into an uncontrolled speculation adventure for people with more money than sense or access to cheap electricity. Just the transaction costs alone make it infeasible to use Bitcoin to order pizza. External payment networks related to but not affiliated with Bitcoin have spun up to battle these transaction costs, but Bitcoin itself is nothing like it was way back when. I don't think Bitcoin will ever reach its potential as the initial activists thought it had. However, it has cleared the way for other cryptocurrencies to step up and replace it as a payment system for common people.

qecez 5y ago
> Just the transaction costs alone make it infeasible to use Bitcoin to order pizza. Blatantly false. Transacting on the Lightning Network (Bitcoin L2) costs next to nothing and the settlement is final and immediate. Screw pizza, top-of-mind, you can pay a fraction of a cent's worth for an API call with Bitcoin (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28459713 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28459713)... or pay 66 satoshis (~$0.03) / hour for a VPS instance (https://www.bitclouds.sh https://www.bitclouds.sh)... or buy gift cards for any amount (https://www.bitrefill.com/buy/ https://www.bitrefill.com/buy/)... or tip anyone as little as 1 satoshi (~$0.00046) (here's 5 cents worth https://ln.cash/tFVDMpUMRQPYwyj9DZHMqg https://ln.cash/tFVDMpUMRQPYwyj9DZHMqg)... or hell, if you're feeling like pizza, DM me on Twitter and I'll get you one, paid for in Bitcoin (https://ln.pizza https://ln.pizza).

jmt_ 5y ago

But can Bitcoin eliminate the Fed and have any meaningful impact on the US financial system if the big actors of such a system are steadily centralizing and controlling it? How would Bitcoin be able to change anything if its "enemies" are embracing it and applying traditional banking approaches to it? I can't help but wonder if crypto will be the victim of embrace-extend-extinquish schemes. I'm not sure Visa is small fry. Regular people will want the easiest way to utilize crypto and if they can go through means familiar to them, they probably will. If companies like Visa end up having a hand in the majority of crypto transaction some day then crypto is effectively owned by the system it's trying to fight.

thebean11 5y ago
Building centralized things on top of it is not the same as centralizing Bitcoin itself. None of it allows them to print more, or prevent you from making on chain transactions.
- lottin 5y ago
  > None of it allows them to print more What stops an exchange from crediting an account with newly created bitcoins just like commercial banks do?
  - thebean11 5y ago
    You mean giving out more BTC IOUs than they actually own BTC? Nothing does, but creating IOUs is not the same thing as printing actual currency/gold/BTC. edit: And by "nothing", I mean there's no technical barrier. There are certainly legal barriers if they are lying about reserves and falsifying audits..
    - lottin 5y ago
      No, I mean crediting an account with an amount of bitcoins that came from nowhere. This is how commercial banks create money, and I don't see the reason why crypto exchanges can't do the same with bitcoin.

Geee 5y ago

Not really. The idea is to cut all middlemen and controlling entities. Quote from Satoshi: "The root problem with conventional currency is all the trust that's required to make it work. The central bank must be trusted not to debase the currency, but the history of fiat currencies is full of breaches of that trust. Banks must be trusted to hold our money and transfer it electronically, but they lend it out in waves of credit bubbles with barely a fraction in reserve. We have to trust them with our privacy, trust them not to let identity thieves drain our accounts. Their massive overhead costs make micropayments impossible. A generation ago, multi-user time-sharing computer systems had a similar problem. Before strong encryption, users had to rely on password protection to secure their files, placing trust in the system administrator to keep their information private. Privacy could always be overridden by the admin based on his judgment call weighing the principle of privacy against other concerns, or at the behest of his superiors. Then strong encryption became available to the masses, and trust was no longer required. Data could be secured in a way that was physically impossible for others to access, no matter for what reason, no matter how good the excuse, no matter what. It's time we had the same thing for money. With e-currency based on cryptographic proof, without the need to trust a third party middleman, money can be secure and transactions effortless. " Source: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com/forum/topics/bitcoin-open-source http://p2pfoundation.ning.com/forum/topics/bitcoin-open-sour...

inter_netuser 5y ago
"The central bank must be trusted not to debase the currency" "not to debase" hard money?
- Geee 5y ago
  Yes, bitcoin is predictably hard money.
  - arcticbull 5y ago
    Which history has shown us is bad. But by all means let’s re-learn our lessons the hard way.

JumpCrisscross 5y ago

> borrowing and throwing away trillions of dollars on unjust foreign wars Because the era preceding fiat currencies was peaceful and devoid of hegemony and global power struggles?

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]