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You're missing the point. If we're going to start legislating how we're all allowed to use energy that civilization has made available, who gets to decide what

You're missing the point. If we're going to start legislating how we're all allowed to use energy that civilization has made available, who gets to decide what's allowed? Numbers I've seen suggest that global PC gaming alone (excluding consoles) currently uses about as much electricity as bitcoin. Should we ban that too since playing cards are readily available and use almost no energy? Maybe we can make a concession and only allow low powered handheld consoles? If bitcoin mining actually becomes problematic, then by all means we can definitely ban it or add some sin taxes to it, and we probably will in a lot of jurisdictions. I'm actually kind of eager for that to happen, because it will force miners to actually become novel/stranded energy ventures. They'll be the capital drive that builds out energy sources that not enough humans live around to justify tapping and/or we can't economically justifying building without expensive transmission infrastructure. And once it's built out and paid off, it may be a lot easier to justify investing in building out long distance transmission infrastructure so the rest of civilization can also tap into these sources.

mathnmusic 5y ago
> If we're going to start legislating how we're all allowed to use energy that civilization has made available, who gets to decide what's allowed? We already legislate different pricing for different applications. Household electricity has a different price than industrial usage. A 1000x price of electricity for certain applications is just a small extension of what we currently have.
- neuroma 5y ago
  In the UK electricity costs are essentially the same for all users with discounts applied for volume and time/ demand. Is this not the case elsewhere?
  - sudosysgen 5y ago
    That is very much not the case here, no, nor in most of the world.
luckydata 5y ago
"who gets to decide" it's called "we the people" or democracy if you will. We as a society decide that cryptocurrency aren't worth destroying the world over, and that's about it.
- trompetenaccoun 5y ago
  It's funny "we the people" always decide this when it's about something that would actually empower us. Meanwhile, "we" didn't only not ban cars, "we" destroyed public transport in the US and lobbied the government to massively subsidize roads and cars. Just as an example. It's curious how much agitation there is concerning the energy consumption of PoW. I don't see nearly as many articles calling for restricting AWS & co. Coincidentally Bitcoin is the base layer of a decentralized finance world completely out of the control of traditional elites and banks.
  - tsimionescu 5y ago
    Bitcoin is the base layer of a decentralized finance world completely out of the control of the traditional elites and banks, yes. It's also a new finance world completely under the control of an even smaller elite of devs and mining pool owners (see the hard fork of Ethereum that happened a long time ago, and the upcoming fork of Ethereum that will move it to PoS; sure, Ethereum isn't Bitcoin, but there is nothing fundamentally different to prevent Bitcoin taking a similar step whenever the devs and miners decide). What Bitcoin definitely is not is a new currency where the people have any kind of control. It is actively opposed to that goal, and takes away even the slight chance of a benevolent leader that exists with central bank controlled currencies.
    - floatboth 5y ago
      > elite of devs and mining pool owners You forgot a (perhaps even more) crucial part: the exchanges/stablecoins! They're the whole reason this clown show is considered "finance" rather than funbux. And they're all extremely suspicious. And by suspicious I mean obviously fraudulent. The value of Bitcoin (!) is propped up by Tether printing fake dollars backed by nothing.

mathnmusic 5y ago

> If we're going to start legislating how we're all allowed to use energy that civilization has made available, who gets to decide what's allowed? We already legislate different pricing for different applications. Household electricity has a different price than industrial usage. A 1000x price of electricity for certain applications is just a small extension of what we currently have.

neuroma 5y ago
In the UK electricity costs are essentially the same for all users with discounts applied for volume and time/ demand. Is this not the case elsewhere?
- sudosysgen 5y ago
  That is very much not the case here, no, nor in most of the world.

luckydata 5y ago

"who gets to decide" it's called "we the people" or democracy if you will. We as a society decide that cryptocurrency aren't worth destroying the world over, and that's about it.

trompetenaccoun 5y ago
It's funny "we the people" always decide this when it's about something that would actually empower us. Meanwhile, "we" didn't only not ban cars, "we" destroyed public transport in the US and lobbied the government to massively subsidize roads and cars. Just as an example. It's curious how much agitation there is concerning the energy consumption of PoW. I don't see nearly as many articles calling for restricting AWS & co. Coincidentally Bitcoin is the base layer of a decentralized finance world completely out of the control of traditional elites and banks.
- tsimionescu 5y ago
  Bitcoin is the base layer of a decentralized finance world completely out of the control of the traditional elites and banks, yes. It's also a new finance world completely under the control of an even smaller elite of devs and mining pool owners (see the hard fork of Ethereum that happened a long time ago, and the upcoming fork of Ethereum that will move it to PoS; sure, Ethereum isn't Bitcoin, but there is nothing fundamentally different to prevent Bitcoin taking a similar step whenever the devs and miners decide). What Bitcoin definitely is not is a new currency where the people have any kind of control. It is actively opposed to that goal, and takes away even the slight chance of a benevolent leader that exists with central bank controlled currencies.
  - floatboth 5y ago
    > elite of devs and mining pool owners You forgot a (perhaps even more) crucial part: the exchanges/stablecoins! They're the whole reason this clown show is considered "finance" rather than funbux. And they're all extremely suspicious. And by suspicious I mean obviously fraudulent. The value of Bitcoin (!) is propped up by Tether printing fake dollars backed by nothing.