5 ms·

Show me one cryptocurrency that has driven real world industry more than financial speculation and scamming.

deadalus 5y ago
Monero because its untraceable(real world industry - underground drug markets) IRS wants to crack it and awarded $1.25 million contract: https://cointelegraph.com/news/chainalysis-and-texas-firm-win-million-dollar-irs-contract-to-crack-monero https://cointelegraph.com/news/chainalysis-and-texas-firm-wi...
- toomuchtodo 5y ago
  Do you need to crack it if the government can be a majority hashrate of the miner pool? One need not crack it to control it. You'd be able to double spend, mine empty blocks, orphan blocks from other miners, etc. Just need to get to and sustain 51% of the hash pool, which sounds trivial considering nation state compute resources.
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- beaconstudios 5y ago
  This doesn't really shift my priors that the only practical use of crypto is illegal transactions.
  - politician 5y ago
    El Salvador legalized Bitcoin for use in fee-free cross-border remittances.
    - mdoms 5y ago
      Fee free bitcoin transactions? How does that work?
      - politician 5y ago
        Bank fee free.
        mdoms 5y ago
        So, not fee free?
cinntaile 5y ago
You're moving the goal posts. It's fine to be against cryptocurrencies, but I think it damages your credibility when you claim bitcoin is a ponzi scheme. Since it shows a lack of understanding of what a ponzi scheme actually is. By you I don't mean you in particular, I mean it in a more general sense.
- rsstack 5y ago
  From Wikipedia: A Ponzi scheme (/ˈpɒnzi/, Italian: [ˈpontsi]) is a form of fraud that lures investors and pays profits to earlier investors with funds from more recent investors.[1] The scheme leads victims to believe that profits are coming from legitimate business activity (e.g., product sales or successful investments), and they remain unaware that other investors are the source of funds. A Ponzi scheme can maintain the illusion of a sustainable business as long as new investors contribute new funds, and as long as most of the investors do not demand full repayment and still believe in the non-existent assets they are purported to own.
  - everfree 5y ago
    > The scheme leads victims to believe that profits are coming from legitimate business activity (e.g., product sales or successful investments), and they remain unaware that other investors are the source of funds. I think that's the key part that contradicts Bitcoin. Nobody believes that Bitcoin is a business that generates profits, and everyone is aware that when they cash out, other investors are the source of funds. There's no illusion of a business, and no assets that are promised to exist but don't.
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- shock-value 5y ago
  We can argue about what constitutes a proper Ponzi scheme, but the idea that the promotion of crypto thus far has existed to allow early adopters to cash out at the apparent expense of later adopters, while bringing essentially no other utility to any of its backers or the public at large, is pretty obvious.
Tenoke 5y ago
I see no scamming in say Link (bringing offchain data on-chain for other projects to use) or SNX (on-chain synthetic assets). There's a ton of examples of projects that have nothing to do with scams and are more akin to normal companies providing blockchain-related services.
- beaconstudios 5y ago
  That may be true, but I was looking for positive outcomes from the industry as a whole. Of course there are companies like metamask as well that just provide services within the crypto industry.
TimJRobinson 5y ago
Alchemix, Axie Infinity, Balancer, Aave, Pool Together, DyDx, Sorare. Hundreds more too, I list them in most of these threads and yet every time, same question. The amount of people who confidently proclaim crypto does nothing useful without actually looking into the cool things that are happening is getting old.

Monero because its untraceable(real world industry - underground drug markets) IRS wants to crack it and awarded $1.25 million contract: https://cointelegraph.com/news/chainalysis-and-texas-firm-win-million-dollar-irs-contract-to-crack-monero https://cointelegraph.com/news/chainalysis-and-texas-firm-wi...

toomuchtodo 5y ago
Do you need to crack it if the government can be a majority hashrate of the miner pool? One need not crack it to control it. You'd be able to double spend, mine empty blocks, orphan blocks from other miners, etc. Just need to get to and sustain 51% of the hash pool, which sounds trivial considering nation state compute resources.
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beaconstudios 5y ago
This doesn't really shift my priors that the only practical use of crypto is illegal transactions.
- politician 5y ago
  El Salvador legalized Bitcoin for use in fee-free cross-border remittances.
  - mdoms 5y ago
    Fee free bitcoin transactions? How does that work?
    - politician 5y ago
      Bank fee free.
      - mdoms 5y ago
        So, not fee free?

cinntaile 5y ago

You're moving the goal posts. It's fine to be against cryptocurrencies, but I think it damages your credibility when you claim bitcoin is a ponzi scheme. Since it shows a lack of understanding of what a ponzi scheme actually is. By you I don't mean you in particular, I mean it in a more general sense.

rsstack 5y ago
From Wikipedia: A Ponzi scheme (/ˈpɒnzi/, Italian: [ˈpontsi]) is a form of fraud that lures investors and pays profits to earlier investors with funds from more recent investors.[1] The scheme leads victims to believe that profits are coming from legitimate business activity (e.g., product sales or successful investments), and they remain unaware that other investors are the source of funds. A Ponzi scheme can maintain the illusion of a sustainable business as long as new investors contribute new funds, and as long as most of the investors do not demand full repayment and still believe in the non-existent assets they are purported to own.
- everfree 5y ago
  > The scheme leads victims to believe that profits are coming from legitimate business activity (e.g., product sales or successful investments), and they remain unaware that other investors are the source of funds. I think that's the key part that contradicts Bitcoin. Nobody believes that Bitcoin is a business that generates profits, and everyone is aware that when they cash out, other investors are the source of funds. There's no illusion of a business, and no assets that are promised to exist but don't.
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shock-value 5y ago
We can argue about what constitutes a proper Ponzi scheme, but the idea that the promotion of crypto thus far has existed to allow early adopters to cash out at the apparent expense of later adopters, while bringing essentially no other utility to any of its backers or the public at large, is pretty obvious.

Tenoke 5y ago

I see no scamming in say Link (bringing offchain data on-chain for other projects to use) or SNX (on-chain synthetic assets). There's a ton of examples of projects that have nothing to do with scams and are more akin to normal companies providing blockchain-related services.

beaconstudios 5y ago
That may be true, but I was looking for positive outcomes from the industry as a whole. Of course there are companies like metamask as well that just provide services within the crypto industry.

TimJRobinson 5y ago

Alchemix, Axie Infinity, Balancer, Aave, Pool Together, DyDx, Sorare. Hundreds more too, I list them in most of these threads and yet every time, same question. The amount of people who confidently proclaim crypto does nothing useful without actually looking into the cool things that are happening is getting old.