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Any economic activity is basically actively destroying the environment though. The big difference is that there are a few supply chain steps that get bypassed b

Any economic activity is basically actively destroying the environment though. The big difference is that there are a few supply chain steps that get bypassed before value is created. I know I know, someone will take issue with that and say that no value is created with crypto when a coin gets minted and the rewards are distributed while value is created along each supply chain step when you manufacture a car. But if it wasn't creating value people wouldn't do it at this scale.

acdha 5y ago
Who outside of the cryptocurrency industry would notice if they disappeared? Who outside of the automotive industry would notice if cars disappeared? That's your answer: pollution is still a concern but only one of those is balanced against significant real-world benefits for people other than the sellers.
- BLKNSLVR 5y ago
  The automotive industry is 100+ years old whilst Bitcoin is only 13 years old, so you can't fairly compare them on the basis of "who would notice". My previous skepticism of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency was due to short-sightedness. You almost have to dip your toes in, in order to understand its potential.
  - acdha 5y ago
    Okay, use the web. Within a couple of years of its creation it had transformed businesses in all kinds of industries, government, education, recreational activities, etc. By the time it was as old as Bitcoin, the world was completely different and people were walking around with web clients in their pockets; in contrast, the most impact Bitcoin has had outside of its own community seems to be that it can be slightly cheaper than Western Union to send money to another country.
    - BLKNSLVR 5y ago
      I'm going to disagree with your timescale, mainly in the use of 'web' rather than 'internet'. The 'internet', which set the foundation for the 'web' started its existence in the 70's, and the 'web' wasn't really invented until the late 80's / early 90's. Memory of time passing seemingly gets very compressed the further back you go. Additionally, Bitcoin is an attempt at disrupting elements of the financial world (and cryptocurrencies as-a-whole are going after ALL of finance, not just elements of it). This is _the most powerful and well-funded aspect of modern civilisation_, so there's going to be severe resistance (to put it mildly) to any threat. It's also difficult to understand the concepts that are foundational to cryptocurrencies, and the average persons eyes glaze over (personal terminology my wife uses when I try to explain technologically difficult things that she really has no interest in) at the slightest dip into its technicalities. Better examples may be smart phones, but mobiles have been around since the mid-80's at least (that suitcase-sized portable phone in Lethal Weapon), and laptops are of a similar vintage (my argument being that smart phones are a combination of these two existing technologies). Smart phones also have that immediate-dopamine-hit working for their adoption rate whilst Bitcoin and cryptocurrency are a 'longer game' (arguably you could say those already on the 'inside' for crypto get the dopamine hit of profit or potential riches - rightly or wrongly, healthily or otherwise). Think of cryptocurrency as building a brand new Central Banking and Wall Street infrastructure. 13 years is still breast-feeding against that behemoth.
      - WA 5y ago
        Smartphones, internet, web – these things had perceived value without complicated language. Bitcoin, crypto, NFTs, it's always the same: "You don't get it, because you don't understand the fundamentals. <Insert obscure lingo here>". It's just wrong. There is no real value for most people. That's why crypto bros hide behind complicated terminology. That's why the value proposition of Bitcoin changed a couple times. That's why the terminology shifts all the time as well. "DeFI" wasn't mainstream until like a year ago or two. The next bullshit terminology is "web3".
        deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
- jkhdigital 5y ago
  The automotive industry, and the machines they create, produce orders of magnitude more pollution than crypto. It’s a poor choice of comparison for whatever point you’re trying to make.
  - acdha 5y ago
    Note that I didn’t say otherwise but rather that cars have beneficial effects for people outside of the automotive industry. I’d love to ban them personally but that would negatively impact millions of people unless we first made massive investments in transit, bike/pedestrian infrastructure, etc. - quite the contrast with cryptocurrency, which could disappear tomorrow without any noticeable impact outside of speculators.
- cinntaile 5y ago
  I was thinking about miners, they get bitcoins as a reward for helping to keep the network secure. So what I'm saying is that they get rewarded for their work in much the same way that all the cogs in the supply chain machine get rewarded for their work. There are just fewer steps. There's interplay with other actors of course, the people that trade bitcoin are one of those actors. This kind of interaction also exists for physical objects like cars, they also only get their value by interacting with the rest of the world. But yes if cars would disappear this would have an impact on more people simply because there are more people involved in the manufacturing process.
  - acdha 5y ago
    > But yes if cars would disappear this would have an impact on more people simply because there are more people involved in the manufacturing process. I was thinking more about the impact on users, not just producers. There are millions of people living in low-density housing where they have limited alternatives to go to work, shop, etc. – maybe e-bikes could be an option for some but in most cases you’d be talking redesign of entire cities. Many, many businesses would be disrupted - some fatally. That’s what it looks like for people outside of an industry to depend on a technology. This can be seen especially in the case of the web: 30 years ago, a company in San Francisco making a mistake would not have meant that people in cities around the world would have trouble communicating or taking orders from customers. People find WhatsApp so useful that they based their daily life on it. Repeat for online ordering, advertising, support, etc. Contrast with Bitcoin: statistically, almost nobody uses it for business or personal transactions and the few who do almost always have alternatives — usually cheaper and faster, if ideologically unsatisfying. If it disappeared tomorrow, there would be no lines at stores, no accountants wondering how to pay suppliers, nobody waiting for their paycheck or unable to get a mortgage.

acdha 5y ago

Who outside of the cryptocurrency industry would notice if they disappeared? Who outside of the automotive industry would notice if cars disappeared? That's your answer: pollution is still a concern but only one of those is balanced against significant real-world benefits for people other than the sellers.

BLKNSLVR 5y ago
The automotive industry is 100+ years old whilst Bitcoin is only 13 years old, so you can't fairly compare them on the basis of "who would notice". My previous skepticism of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency was due to short-sightedness. You almost have to dip your toes in, in order to understand its potential.
- acdha 5y ago
  Okay, use the web. Within a couple of years of its creation it had transformed businesses in all kinds of industries, government, education, recreational activities, etc. By the time it was as old as Bitcoin, the world was completely different and people were walking around with web clients in their pockets; in contrast, the most impact Bitcoin has had outside of its own community seems to be that it can be slightly cheaper than Western Union to send money to another country.
  - BLKNSLVR 5y ago
    I'm going to disagree with your timescale, mainly in the use of 'web' rather than 'internet'. The 'internet', which set the foundation for the 'web' started its existence in the 70's, and the 'web' wasn't really invented until the late 80's / early 90's. Memory of time passing seemingly gets very compressed the further back you go. Additionally, Bitcoin is an attempt at disrupting elements of the financial world (and cryptocurrencies as-a-whole are going after ALL of finance, not just elements of it). This is _the most powerful and well-funded aspect of modern civilisation_, so there's going to be severe resistance (to put it mildly) to any threat. It's also difficult to understand the concepts that are foundational to cryptocurrencies, and the average persons eyes glaze over (personal terminology my wife uses when I try to explain technologically difficult things that she really has no interest in) at the slightest dip into its technicalities. Better examples may be smart phones, but mobiles have been around since the mid-80's at least (that suitcase-sized portable phone in Lethal Weapon), and laptops are of a similar vintage (my argument being that smart phones are a combination of these two existing technologies). Smart phones also have that immediate-dopamine-hit working for their adoption rate whilst Bitcoin and cryptocurrency are a 'longer game' (arguably you could say those already on the 'inside' for crypto get the dopamine hit of profit or potential riches - rightly or wrongly, healthily or otherwise). Think of cryptocurrency as building a brand new Central Banking and Wall Street infrastructure. 13 years is still breast-feeding against that behemoth.
    - WA 5y ago
      Smartphones, internet, web – these things had perceived value without complicated language. Bitcoin, crypto, NFTs, it's always the same: "You don't get it, because you don't understand the fundamentals. <Insert obscure lingo here>". It's just wrong. There is no real value for most people. That's why crypto bros hide behind complicated terminology. That's why the value proposition of Bitcoin changed a couple times. That's why the terminology shifts all the time as well. "DeFI" wasn't mainstream until like a year ago or two. The next bullshit terminology is "web3".
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
jkhdigital 5y ago
The automotive industry, and the machines they create, produce orders of magnitude more pollution than crypto. It’s a poor choice of comparison for whatever point you’re trying to make.
- acdha 5y ago
  Note that I didn’t say otherwise but rather that cars have beneficial effects for people outside of the automotive industry. I’d love to ban them personally but that would negatively impact millions of people unless we first made massive investments in transit, bike/pedestrian infrastructure, etc. - quite the contrast with cryptocurrency, which could disappear tomorrow without any noticeable impact outside of speculators.
cinntaile 5y ago
I was thinking about miners, they get bitcoins as a reward for helping to keep the network secure. So what I'm saying is that they get rewarded for their work in much the same way that all the cogs in the supply chain machine get rewarded for their work. There are just fewer steps. There's interplay with other actors of course, the people that trade bitcoin are one of those actors. This kind of interaction also exists for physical objects like cars, they also only get their value by interacting with the rest of the world. But yes if cars would disappear this would have an impact on more people simply because there are more people involved in the manufacturing process.
- acdha 5y ago
  > But yes if cars would disappear this would have an impact on more people simply because there are more people involved in the manufacturing process. I was thinking more about the impact on users, not just producers. There are millions of people living in low-density housing where they have limited alternatives to go to work, shop, etc. – maybe e-bikes could be an option for some but in most cases you’d be talking redesign of entire cities. Many, many businesses would be disrupted - some fatally. That’s what it looks like for people outside of an industry to depend on a technology. This can be seen especially in the case of the web: 30 years ago, a company in San Francisco making a mistake would not have meant that people in cities around the world would have trouble communicating or taking orders from customers. People find WhatsApp so useful that they based their daily life on it. Repeat for online ordering, advertising, support, etc. Contrast with Bitcoin: statistically, almost nobody uses it for business or personal transactions and the few who do almost always have alternatives — usually cheaper and faster, if ideologically unsatisfying. If it disappeared tomorrow, there would be no lines at stores, no accountants wondering how to pay suppliers, nobody waiting for their paycheck or unable to get a mortgage.