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I see the ability of an individual or group to transfer wealth to another group in the world without criminal or political interference is still an unsolved pro

I see the ability of an individual or group to transfer wealth to another group in the world without criminal or political interference is still an unsolved problem. Aside from the PoW environmental show-stopper, this "Freedom Convoy" failure looks like the death-knell for many ideological aspects of Bitcoin. Not to be negative. We should redouble our efforts. Freedom and democracy may depend on our ability to fund it, and the Ukraine crisis may be the first of coming examples. Perhaps a useful approach is to start breaking the problem space into transfer, storage, spending, and other social utility/tasks as separate concerns rather than keeping focus on a single electronic currency system that solves all of these at once as a replacement for everyday "cash". I've no idea what this "Freedom Convoy" was really all about, and suspect I would not personally support "anti-vax crazies", but wasn't this actually about the weakness of centralised coordination? Couldn't people have, theoretically, just sent paper bitcoin wallets through the regular mail to people they want to support? What other anonymous digital value systems can solve this?

dane-pgp 5y ago
> the PoW environmental show-stopper You make some great points, so I'm sorry to focus on this one minor aspect, but I don't think the carbon footprint of Bitcoin is a show-stopper. We accept the CO2 emissions of other industries and inventions, from air travel to air conditioning, and perhaps if those were invented today some people would want to ban them, but "the show must go on", and it looks like Bitcoin will sooner be replaced by a cryptocurrency with better scalability (and possibly privacy) than being meaningfully banned because of environmental reasons. For the record, it looks like Ethereum's switch to Proof of Stake has been successful on the testnet, and the live launch should occur in June or July this year.[0] If the "Freedom Convoy" had only waited a few months, they could have avoided the criticism of Bitcoin's environmental impact entirely. [0] https://www.trustnodes.com/2022/03/15/ethereum-successfully-merges-to-proof-of-stake-on-testnet https://www.trustnodes.com/2022/03/15/ethereum-successfully-...
- nonrandomstring 5y ago
  > For the record, it looks like Ethereum's switch to Proof of Stake has been successful on the testnet, and the live launch should occur in June or July this year.[0] That's kinda the good news I have been waiting to hear. People much smarter than I have been saying PoS will never work, Politically I am for digital currencies so long as they - are in the control of the people not central banks or big corporations - offer small transaction anonymity - remain a complement to cash, not a replacement which would be dangerously irresilient. - Use a PoS scheme and don't require gigawatt datacentres to work I am always told these aims are mutually incompatible, but intuitively at least I reckon it's solvable.

dane-pgp 5y ago

> the PoW environmental show-stopper You make some great points, so I'm sorry to focus on this one minor aspect, but I don't think the carbon footprint of Bitcoin is a show-stopper. We accept the CO2 emissions of other industries and inventions, from air travel to air conditioning, and perhaps if those were invented today some people would want to ban them, but "the show must go on", and it looks like Bitcoin will sooner be replaced by a cryptocurrency with better scalability (and possibly privacy) than being meaningfully banned because of environmental reasons. For the record, it looks like Ethereum's switch to Proof of Stake has been successful on the testnet, and the live launch should occur in June or July this year.[0] If the "Freedom Convoy" had only waited a few months, they could have avoided the criticism of Bitcoin's environmental impact entirely. [0] https://www.trustnodes.com/2022/03/15/ethereum-successfully-merges-to-proof-of-stake-on-testnet https://www.trustnodes.com/2022/03/15/ethereum-successfully-...

nonrandomstring 5y ago
> For the record, it looks like Ethereum's switch to Proof of Stake has been successful on the testnet, and the live launch should occur in June or July this year.[0] That's kinda the good news I have been waiting to hear. People much smarter than I have been saying PoS will never work, Politically I am for digital currencies so long as they - are in the control of the people not central banks or big corporations - offer small transaction anonymity - remain a complement to cash, not a replacement which would be dangerously irresilient. - Use a PoS scheme and don't require gigawatt datacentres to work I am always told these aims are mutually incompatible, but intuitively at least I reckon it's solvable.