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Yours is the top comment on this thread and it's a bit surprising. When you say less than 5%, what are you talk about? Can you point to any sources that back th

Yours is the top comment on this thread and it's a bit surprising. When you say less than 5%, what are you talk about? Can you point to any sources that back that up?

ceilingcorner 5y ago
HN has a well known hatred for anything crypto. I’m not really sure why, to be honest. Very odd that an authoritarian action by an extremely centralized government is being applauded on here.
- salawat 5y ago
  You have not been looking hard if you haven't the crypto fawns here.
  - ceilingcorner 5y ago
    No, actually this has been a known thing for years. There have even been topics asking why HN hates crypto so much, which appear every six months or so.
    - Jensson 5y ago
      Every crypto thread has lots of crypto lovers and lots of crypto haters. If you only see the hater then you are probably a lover.
    - Applejinx 5y ago
      I'm thinking the answer to such topics would be 'HN has large numbers of poster who are either smart and ethical, or smart, unethical, and not convinced the scam of crypto is safe to work on people for your personal gain'. With China turning against bitcoin (regardless of their motivation), the latter category has even more reason to think cryptocurrency is a lousy way to fleece people for your personal gain. You don't have to be ethical to be against crypto, you can be a scammer yourself and simply be unsatisfied with the quality of the exploit being proposed. "There is no future in this" is a fine reason to be against a thing even if you have no ethical qualms about exploiting people's foolishness. You have to be able to build a plausible case for why somebody ought to buy into it, and that just got observably harder.
- wsc981 5y ago
  I think a lot of people that like big government, people that tend to call themselves liberals, these people generally don't like (or even hate) crypto. Maybe these people feel this way because they feel the government needs to protect people against themselves. Or maybe because they somehow fear central banks losing power and they feel central banks are needed in a monetary system. Or maybe they are concerned with the energy use for mining some crypto currencies (mainly Bitcoin). On the other hand there's the libertarians that want as little government as possible. Libertarians tend to feel that people should be free to make their own choices as long as it doesn't harm other people. And that it's ok to make mistakes and learn from them and government doesn't need to protect people from mistakes. I believe the tech sector has plenty of people on either side. I myself am on the libertarian side and think crypto is a force of good. I do wonder if this crypto crackdown in China could somehow be related to the situation with Evergrande.
  - bobthechef 5y ago
    "The road from libertarianism" [0] [0] https://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-road-from-libertarianism.html https://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-road-from-liber...
- BobbyJo 5y ago
  Even bad people can do good things. It's not strange at all that we can applaud an action of an authoritarian regime. Xi is an evil dictator, but I think this particular action is positive for the world.
  - roenxi 5y ago
    > It's not strange at all that we can applaud an action of an authoritarian regime But this is the authoritarian regime being authoritarian. HN isn't praising them doing something unusual, this is authoritarian China acting in its most normal manner. It wouldn't be surprising if Xi dictated this course of action either, although if he did I'm sure it was with support of China's wealthy elites.
  - ceilingcorner 5y ago
    So authoritarian action is okay if it’s against bad things? We are in for a scary future, enabled by the attitudes in this thread.
    - BobbyJo 5y ago
      > So authoritarian action is okay if it’s against bad things? You're adding context that isn't really being discussed. If the discussion is 'Should we support actions by Xi, as an authoritarian, even if we agree with them?', then I'd say no. We shouldn't support actions by Authoritarian regimes. That's not what discussed here. The discussion here is 'Is this action net positive or net negative?'. I believe it is net positive. I can acknowledge the beneficial aspects of an action independent of it's executor. Bringing the executor into the conversation changes the topic. Think of it like discussing rocketry advancements in the 20th century. Nazis played a big role, but you can talk about how awesome rockets are without invoking them.
- koonsolo 5y ago
  The gains I get from cryptocurrency investing outweigh the downvotes on my posts ;).
- MrPatan 5y ago
  Because they didn't buy. And because they're very smart, there must have been a reason why they didn't buy, so they find one. So next time, next opportunity, they can't buy, or they would have been Wrong about it before. Stop it! Break the cycle! Changing your mind says nothing bad about you. Let the past go, and think it through today, as if you saw it for the first time.
  - techsupporter 5y ago
    I think you're doing a disservice to the dissenting voices. Sure, some of it is probably jealousy due to missing out in MaSsSiVe GaInZ but I think there's a lot of room to say that something is a bad idea regardless of whether you have a stake in it. I own some Bitcoin I mined myself in the early days. By luck or stupidity, I lost it for years and then found it in an old backup and now it is worth a number that would afford me a healthy retirement if I could get over my analysis paralysis. But I still think Bitcoin, as it embodies the idea of "crypto currency," is a terrible idea as a store of value, as an impact on our planet's environment, and as financial policy. I feel the same way about housing policy (I own a house in Seattle), about transportation (I used to own two cars, but now none), about tax policy (I benefit greatly from Washington State having no income tax and relying mostly on flat-rate taxes that don't take up much of my income), and several more. Even though they're personally good for my family and me, they're terrible for the society at large and we have to live in a society so I'd like something better. So, yeah, I think it's a bit reductive to distill the dissenting voices on HN down to "well, they didn't buy and hodl so they're just grouchy."
pskiba 5y ago
Maybe if he meant less than 5% of miners make money. I could potentially believe this, given the competitive nature of mining. However, as an investment, as of right now, there is only a span of a few months where if you bought Bitcoin you would not be in the green right now.
- cecilpl2 5y ago
  Just because an asset is near an all-time high doesn't make it a good investment.
- marcosdumay 5y ago
  Every bubble does that all the time until it bursts. Did people find a useful reason to buy Bitcoin already? Something that creates value, instead of hopping to sell higher for the next sucker?
  - AuryGlenz 5y ago
    My stocks are worthless to me, other than hoping to sell high for the next sucker.
    - marcosdumay 5y ago
      It's not whether they are useful for you, it's whether they are useful for anybody at all. If they did never and will never pay a dividend or have a buyback, then yes, they are a pyramid. But it was just a matter of thinking a bit about it. Everybody knows what Bitcoin is useful for: cyber-extortion and evading capital restrictions. There are even good reasons for practicing the last one... With that in mind, BTC still behaves like a bubble, but proving it's actually one depends on a quite laborious process of comparing the volumes and estimating how they will evolve.
  - plokiju 5y ago
    Crypto != Bitcoin. There’s a lot of exciting innovation happening in defi and other areas. The argument that crypto is only used for trading is well out of date

Yours is the top comment on this thread and it's a bit surprising. When you say less than 5%, what are you talk about? Can you point to any sources that back that up?

ceilingcorner 5y ago

HN has a well known hatred for anything crypto. I’m not really sure why, to be honest. Very odd that an authoritarian action by an extremely centralized government is being applauded on here.

salawat 5y ago
You have not been looking hard if you haven't the crypto fawns here.
- ceilingcorner 5y ago
  No, actually this has been a known thing for years. There have even been topics asking why HN hates crypto so much, which appear every six months or so.
  - Jensson 5y ago
    Every crypto thread has lots of crypto lovers and lots of crypto haters. If you only see the hater then you are probably a lover.
  - Applejinx 5y ago
    I'm thinking the answer to such topics would be 'HN has large numbers of poster who are either smart and ethical, or smart, unethical, and not convinced the scam of crypto is safe to work on people for your personal gain'. With China turning against bitcoin (regardless of their motivation), the latter category has even more reason to think cryptocurrency is a lousy way to fleece people for your personal gain. You don't have to be ethical to be against crypto, you can be a scammer yourself and simply be unsatisfied with the quality of the exploit being proposed. "There is no future in this" is a fine reason to be against a thing even if you have no ethical qualms about exploiting people's foolishness. You have to be able to build a plausible case for why somebody ought to buy into it, and that just got observably harder.
wsc981 5y ago
I think a lot of people that like big government, people that tend to call themselves liberals, these people generally don't like (or even hate) crypto. Maybe these people feel this way because they feel the government needs to protect people against themselves. Or maybe because they somehow fear central banks losing power and they feel central banks are needed in a monetary system. Or maybe they are concerned with the energy use for mining some crypto currencies (mainly Bitcoin). On the other hand there's the libertarians that want as little government as possible. Libertarians tend to feel that people should be free to make their own choices as long as it doesn't harm other people. And that it's ok to make mistakes and learn from them and government doesn't need to protect people from mistakes. I believe the tech sector has plenty of people on either side. I myself am on the libertarian side and think crypto is a force of good. I do wonder if this crypto crackdown in China could somehow be related to the situation with Evergrande.
- bobthechef 5y ago
  "The road from libertarianism" [0] [0] https://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-road-from-libertarianism.html https://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-road-from-liber...
BobbyJo 5y ago
Even bad people can do good things. It's not strange at all that we can applaud an action of an authoritarian regime. Xi is an evil dictator, but I think this particular action is positive for the world.
- roenxi 5y ago
  > It's not strange at all that we can applaud an action of an authoritarian regime But this is the authoritarian regime being authoritarian. HN isn't praising them doing something unusual, this is authoritarian China acting in its most normal manner. It wouldn't be surprising if Xi dictated this course of action either, although if he did I'm sure it was with support of China's wealthy elites.
- ceilingcorner 5y ago
  So authoritarian action is okay if it’s against bad things? We are in for a scary future, enabled by the attitudes in this thread.
  - BobbyJo 5y ago
    > So authoritarian action is okay if it’s against bad things? You're adding context that isn't really being discussed. If the discussion is 'Should we support actions by Xi, as an authoritarian, even if we agree with them?', then I'd say no. We shouldn't support actions by Authoritarian regimes. That's not what discussed here. The discussion here is 'Is this action net positive or net negative?'. I believe it is net positive. I can acknowledge the beneficial aspects of an action independent of it's executor. Bringing the executor into the conversation changes the topic. Think of it like discussing rocketry advancements in the 20th century. Nazis played a big role, but you can talk about how awesome rockets are without invoking them.
koonsolo 5y ago
The gains I get from cryptocurrency investing outweigh the downvotes on my posts ;).
MrPatan 5y ago
Because they didn't buy. And because they're very smart, there must have been a reason why they didn't buy, so they find one. So next time, next opportunity, they can't buy, or they would have been Wrong about it before. Stop it! Break the cycle! Changing your mind says nothing bad about you. Let the past go, and think it through today, as if you saw it for the first time.
- techsupporter 5y ago
  I think you're doing a disservice to the dissenting voices. Sure, some of it is probably jealousy due to missing out in MaSsSiVe GaInZ but I think there's a lot of room to say that something is a bad idea regardless of whether you have a stake in it. I own some Bitcoin I mined myself in the early days. By luck or stupidity, I lost it for years and then found it in an old backup and now it is worth a number that would afford me a healthy retirement if I could get over my analysis paralysis. But I still think Bitcoin, as it embodies the idea of "crypto currency," is a terrible idea as a store of value, as an impact on our planet's environment, and as financial policy. I feel the same way about housing policy (I own a house in Seattle), about transportation (I used to own two cars, but now none), about tax policy (I benefit greatly from Washington State having no income tax and relying mostly on flat-rate taxes that don't take up much of my income), and several more. Even though they're personally good for my family and me, they're terrible for the society at large and we have to live in a society so I'd like something better. So, yeah, I think it's a bit reductive to distill the dissenting voices on HN down to "well, they didn't buy and hodl so they're just grouchy."

pskiba 5y ago

Maybe if he meant less than 5% of miners make money. I could potentially believe this, given the competitive nature of mining. However, as an investment, as of right now, there is only a span of a few months where if you bought Bitcoin you would not be in the green right now.

cecilpl2 5y ago
Just because an asset is near an all-time high doesn't make it a good investment.
marcosdumay 5y ago
Every bubble does that all the time until it bursts. Did people find a useful reason to buy Bitcoin already? Something that creates value, instead of hopping to sell higher for the next sucker?
- AuryGlenz 5y ago
  My stocks are worthless to me, other than hoping to sell high for the next sucker.
  - marcosdumay 5y ago
    It's not whether they are useful for you, it's whether they are useful for anybody at all. If they did never and will never pay a dividend or have a buyback, then yes, they are a pyramid. But it was just a matter of thinking a bit about it. Everybody knows what Bitcoin is useful for: cyber-extortion and evading capital restrictions. There are even good reasons for practicing the last one... With that in mind, BTC still behaves like a bubble, but proving it's actually one depends on a quite laborious process of comparing the volumes and estimating how they will evolve.
- plokiju 5y ago
  Crypto != Bitcoin. There’s a lot of exciting innovation happening in defi and other areas. The argument that crypto is only used for trading is well out of date