5 ms·

At this point is BTC a good idea? Does it actually provide any damn value at all at a macro level?

reaperducer 5y ago
Does it actually provide any damn value at all at a macro level? It provides macro value to coinbros and wantrapreneurs who think that bragging on social media about fake money is the same thing as owning real money. I guess that's something.
newaccount74 5y ago
The only real use case that people keep mentioning is transferring large-ish amounts of money (>1000 USD) internationally.
- thallium205 5y ago
  Which is not hard if you have a bank account that is in any tier above poor person consumer level.
  - rabuse 5y ago
    Unless you're Russian now
ipaddr 5y ago
It provided a great way to buy weed before it was legalized and transaction fees skyrocketed. Bitcoin at $5,000 a coin was extremely useful for transactions. Bitcoin at $50,000 make it less useful because of scaling issues.
- doomroot 5y ago
  Have you tried lightning network its extremely fast and cheap and pretty reliable these days. Many great mobile wallets support it now, Blue wallet, Muun, Phoenix. Hell even Cash App supports outgoing lightning payments now. Scan a QR code few seconds later done, final, irreversible.
  - ipaddr 5y ago
    I haven't I'm use to having an account on an exchange and moving money directly to the account. Is there a way I could use the lightening network directly if my exchange doesn't use it behind the scene?
    - beardog 5y ago
      You're not supposed to be using an exchange for payments, you are meant to have a wallet, ideally a non-custodial one.
      - ipaddr 5y ago
        I worry about malware finding my wallet or my drive dying and losing the wallet more than using an exchange.
        beardog 5y ago
        Malware on your PC can take control of your exchange account as much as it can a normal wallet. The drive dying is why you're supposed to backup your wallet or at least record the seed. On an exchange you're vulnerable to compromise both from your end and on the exchange's end
- mccorrinall 5y ago
  You currently pay about 10 pennies for a transaction which is included in the next block. Using Lightning is even cheaper.
  - CJefferson 5y ago
    Really, googling around, average transaction fee looks about $1.70? Which is much more than I pay through any other service.
    - mccorrinall 5y ago
      Average transaction does not equal a normal human's transaction. Those include arbitrary data being embedded into the blockchain, smart contracts, paying to a lot of recipients (e.g. exchanges batching payments) etc. Just take a look at the most recent blocks, and check the one to one or one to two transactions. https://blockchair.com/bitcoin/transactions?s=fee_usd(asc)&q=block_id(725073)#f=hash,output_total_usd,fee_usd,id https://blockchair.com/bitcoin/transactions?s=fee_usd(asc)&q... You will see that those transactions cost ~0.10 USD :)
Finnucane 5y ago
No.
abi 5y ago
Say you're a Ukrainian fleeing refuge and you want store your life's savings somewhere safe. Pretty damn useful there. If you don't want to deal with the price fluctuations of BTC or ETH, buy stablecoins instead.
- pfooti 5y ago
  there's also banks.
  - nmilo 5y ago
    But which bank are you trusting in a time of war? We've seen countries have the power to subvert savings accounts, e.g. Greece limited bank withdrawls to £5000/month. Do you trust these banks more than a distributed ledger? This is a question that needs real thought and evaluation, and crypto might be a useful option. Diversification is important.
  - esosac 5y ago
    i don't know about ukraine, but i live in venezuela and i can't do an international wire transfer here. so some people can't rely on banks, but i probably can rely on someone around here wanting to take my cash or car or house and give me bitcoin if i needed to go away. i use localbitcoins a lot of buy local currency in exchange for bitcoin... and i'm not a "crypto person", but it happened to be super useful for me here in that way
  - rosndo 5y ago
    My Ukrainian bank card still works, but yesterday when I had to send a friend 40k UAH I had to split it into 8 transfers.
    - loyl 5y ago
      What bank are you using I am trying to send money to my family and no transaction works
      - rosndo 5y ago
doomroot 5y ago
It's a permission-less payment network, can you not think of a single thing that would be useful for?
- rabuse 5y ago
  Xi angrily joins the chat.
EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK 5y ago
Well, my friend in Russia just yesterday donated $10,000 in Bitcoin to Ukrainian defense fund. Had he done that using paypal, he'd already be in Gulag being raped with a broken bottle. Now he wants to leave Russia, but Russia is being banned from the SWIFT network, so he can't get any of his savings out. Enter Bitcoin again.

Does it actually provide any damn value at all at a macro level? It provides macro value to coinbros and wantrapreneurs who think that bragging on social media about fake money is the same thing as owning real money. I guess that's something.

newaccount74 5y ago

The only real use case that people keep mentioning is transferring large-ish amounts of money (>1000 USD) internationally.

thallium205 5y ago
Which is not hard if you have a bank account that is in any tier above poor person consumer level.
- rabuse 5y ago
  Unless you're Russian now

ipaddr 5y ago

It provided a great way to buy weed before it was legalized and transaction fees skyrocketed. Bitcoin at $5,000 a coin was extremely useful for transactions. Bitcoin at $50,000 make it less useful because of scaling issues.

doomroot 5y ago
Have you tried lightning network its extremely fast and cheap and pretty reliable these days. Many great mobile wallets support it now, Blue wallet, Muun, Phoenix. Hell even Cash App supports outgoing lightning payments now. Scan a QR code few seconds later done, final, irreversible.
- ipaddr 5y ago
  I haven't I'm use to having an account on an exchange and moving money directly to the account. Is there a way I could use the lightening network directly if my exchange doesn't use it behind the scene?
  - beardog 5y ago
    You're not supposed to be using an exchange for payments, you are meant to have a wallet, ideally a non-custodial one.
    - ipaddr 5y ago
      I worry about malware finding my wallet or my drive dying and losing the wallet more than using an exchange.
      - beardog 5y ago
        Malware on your PC can take control of your exchange account as much as it can a normal wallet. The drive dying is why you're supposed to backup your wallet or at least record the seed. On an exchange you're vulnerable to compromise both from your end and on the exchange's end
mccorrinall 5y ago
You currently pay about 10 pennies for a transaction which is included in the next block. Using Lightning is even cheaper.
- CJefferson 5y ago
  Really, googling around, average transaction fee looks about $1.70? Which is much more than I pay through any other service.
  - mccorrinall 5y ago
    Average transaction does not equal a normal human's transaction. Those include arbitrary data being embedded into the blockchain, smart contracts, paying to a lot of recipients (e.g. exchanges batching payments) etc. Just take a look at the most recent blocks, and check the one to one or one to two transactions. https://blockchair.com/bitcoin/transactions?s=fee_usd(asc)&q=block_id(725073)#f=hash,output_total_usd,fee_usd,id https://blockchair.com/bitcoin/transactions?s=fee_usd(asc)&q... You will see that those transactions cost ~0.10 USD :)

Finnucane 5y ago

No.

abi 5y ago

Say you're a Ukrainian fleeing refuge and you want store your life's savings somewhere safe. Pretty damn useful there. If you don't want to deal with the price fluctuations of BTC or ETH, buy stablecoins instead.

pfooti 5y ago
there's also banks.
- nmilo 5y ago
  But which bank are you trusting in a time of war? We've seen countries have the power to subvert savings accounts, e.g. Greece limited bank withdrawls to £5000/month. Do you trust these banks more than a distributed ledger? This is a question that needs real thought and evaluation, and crypto might be a useful option. Diversification is important.
- esosac 5y ago
  i don't know about ukraine, but i live in venezuela and i can't do an international wire transfer here. so some people can't rely on banks, but i probably can rely on someone around here wanting to take my cash or car or house and give me bitcoin if i needed to go away. i use localbitcoins a lot of buy local currency in exchange for bitcoin... and i'm not a "crypto person", but it happened to be super useful for me here in that way
- rosndo 5y ago
  My Ukrainian bank card still works, but yesterday when I had to send a friend 40k UAH I had to split it into 8 transfers.
  - loyl 5y ago
    What bank are you using I am trying to send money to my family and no transaction works
    - rosndo 5y ago

doomroot 5y ago

It's a permission-less payment network, can you not think of a single thing that would be useful for?

rabuse 5y ago
Xi angrily joins the chat.

EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK 5y ago

Well, my friend in Russia just yesterday donated $10,000 in Bitcoin to Ukrainian defense fund. Had he done that using paypal, he'd already be in Gulag being raped with a broken bottle. Now he wants to leave Russia, but Russia is being banned from the SWIFT network, so he can't get any of his savings out. Enter Bitcoin again.