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Yes. Similarly, you can totally rely on your gold or fiat money being yours. Ok, there was this small incidence in 1933 where the US government took most of you

by FabHK 5y ago

Yes. Similarly, you can totally rely on your gold or fiat money being yours. Ok, there was this small incidence in 1933 where the US government took most of your gold, but that was a one off event [1]. And then during the hyperinflation in Germany your money actually became worthless, but that was a growing mistake. Of course, that was multiple generations ago, not a few years. Conclusion: On the dimension of reliability and censor resistance, crypto might be as good as gold or fiat (while on all other axes it remains much worse). [1] Executive Order 6102 required all persons to deliver on or before May 1, 1933, all but a small amount of gold coin, gold bullion, and gold certificates owned by them to the Federal Reserve in exchange for $20.67 (equivalent to $413 in 2020)[5] per troy ounce. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102

notahacker 5y ago
This. Ultimately the defence blockchain has against hard forks is exactly the same as the defence other monetary systems have against things like hyperinflation and mass asset seizure which cryptoenthusiasts worry about: generally the people with the [hash]power have strong incentives not to do so. Except when those incentives change. In both cases, how much confidence you can place in that theoretical incentive structure protecting you varies widely according to who and why (you can be pretty confident that your US dollars won't be hyperinflated, the contents of your Swiss bank account won't be seized to balance another government's books and nobody with significant hashpower cares that you scammed Joe Sixpack out of BTC. You can't be so confident your Venezuelan Bolivars or shitcoins won't become worthless next month or that you'll get to spend gains from a heist against an Ethereum Foundation or US government flagship project.
alisonkisk 5y ago
newswasboring 5y ago
> On the dimension of reliability and censor resistance, crypto might be as good as gold or fiat (while on all other axes it remains much worse). I completely agree. My only point was its bizarre that people choose the DAO incident to bash crypto people. They have plenty of evidence that the community learned from the incident.

by FabHK 5y ago

notahacker 5y ago

This. Ultimately the defence blockchain has against hard forks is exactly the same as the defence other monetary systems have against things like hyperinflation and mass asset seizure which cryptoenthusiasts worry about: generally the people with the [hash]power have strong incentives not to do so. Except when those incentives change. In both cases, how much confidence you can place in that theoretical incentive structure protecting you varies widely according to who and why (you can be pretty confident that your US dollars won't be hyperinflated, the contents of your Swiss bank account won't be seized to balance another government's books and nobody with significant hashpower cares that you scammed Joe Sixpack out of BTC. You can't be so confident your Venezuelan Bolivars or shitcoins won't become worthless next month or that you'll get to spend gains from a heist against an Ethereum Foundation or US government flagship project.

alisonkisk 5y ago

newswasboring 5y ago

> On the dimension of reliability and censor resistance, crypto might be as good as gold or fiat (while on all other axes it remains much worse). I completely agree. My only point was its bizarre that people choose the DAO incident to bash crypto people. They have plenty of evidence that the community learned from the incident.