4 ms·

Pretty regularly [1], depending on the bank. Every year, there will be several hour-long outages or out right data loss incidents (not all get publicized). htt

Pretty regularly [1], depending on the bank. Every year, there will be several hour-long outages or out right data loss incidents (not all get publicized). https://www.wcjb.com/2020/08/05/bank-of-america-glitch-accounts-show-0-balance/ https://www.wcjb.com/2020/08/05/bank-of-america-glitch-accou... Would you also class going to pay for something and not being able to because the payment network is down as "forgetting your bank balance"? Because those happen even more frequently; the cause being the POS terminal not being able to check your balance, so naievely defaulting it to $0 and giving an error about the network not being available.

knorker 5y ago
Having an outage is not the same as forgetting your bank balance, even if you see a scary $0 when you log in during the outage. But I agree it's definitely a thing that can prevent you accomplishing the thing you want to do with your money, during the outage. But if we're talking "outage" then bitcoin fees going over $25 is probably also fair to classify as an outage as a currency. And that happens too.
- randomhodler84 5y ago
  High fees In 2017 during an explicit attack on the network with spam, such that the spammer doesn’t have much BTC anymore. I haven’t paid over 1sat/vB for years. It’s the cheapest it can be onchain. Negligible. Ethereum on the other hand is broken with it’s gas calculation model with the unit of account being worth so much. Don’t touch ethereum these days, it’s bad.
  - knorker 5y ago
    2017 is not the only time this has happened. It was $62 in Apr 2021, for example. CC payments and bank transfers are also way faster than bitcoin, even when bitcoin isn't having an outage. In the US bank transfers are slow, for some reason, but in Europe they're not.
    - randomhodler84 5y ago
      Bitcoin has not had an outage since 2013. Actually, you will find settlement time is actually much longer than instant SEPA, and other methods have 1 and 2 and 3 day transfer times too. The instant thing is an illusion granted by centralization. But of course your are talking about banks because you are missing the point of the exercise.
      - knorker 5y ago
        > not had an outage You just said 2017. I said 2021. And there's also at least 2018. > You will find that I will not find that, because i told you what my experience is. > Illusion Illusion or not, it's real. /s > Missing the point of the exercise The point being lying and contradicting ir sequential sentences to pump a pyramid scheme. Cryptocurrency on is not fit for any of the stated purposes, and HN will ban us both if we continue, so i bid you good day.
- jimmydorry 5y ago
  And what about the first kind of failure I mentioned, that we see pretty regularly in the news? That the banks are usually pretty good at reconstructing your balance from secondary sources, does not cover for the fact that they can still lose your balance in the first place. >Having an outage is not the same as forgetting your bank balance I wouldn't class a high fee as an outage. If your transaction was important enough that it warranted being settled immediately and at a higher priority than every other transaction during peak rush, then a higher fee might be a pretty good trade-off. Keep in mind that the banks do not offer this feature, so in their case your transaction would simply not go through giving you no choice in the matter.
  - knorker 5y ago
    For a $10 purchase a $62 fee is in my opinion certainly an outage. But also there have been hours-long transaction times. I wouldn't say that banks "lose your balance" at all. It's a failure in availability. If the bank fails or does the extremely common cryptocurrency thing of "rugpull" then you still have your money because FDIC. You say "immediately", but i regularly do inter-bank transfers that go through faster than any Bitcoin transaction can go through, no matter what transaction fee offered. And that's not even talking about CC payments, which are done in milliseconds.
    - jimmydorry 5y ago
      Those transactions that appear to go through "immediately", are not settled for many days or weeks. That third parties are willing to take on the settlement risk is beside the point as the same could be offered by third parties working on top of the Bitcoin blockchain.
      - knorker 5y ago
        > Those transactions that appear to go through "immediately", are not settled for many days or weeks. The thing about that is that end users don't care, not even a little bit. It's about as interesting as whether the banks runs Linux, BSD, or OS/400. The service provided is immediate. I don't care if the two banks need to ship physical checks around on the backend. > the same could be offered by third parties working on top of the Bitcoin blockchain. But that defeats the whole point of the bitcoin blockchain. It does not defeat the point of traditional banking.

knorker 5y ago

Having an outage is not the same as forgetting your bank balance, even if you see a scary $0 when you log in during the outage. But I agree it's definitely a thing that can prevent you accomplishing the thing you want to do with your money, during the outage. But if we're talking "outage" then bitcoin fees going over $25 is probably also fair to classify as an outage as a currency. And that happens too.

randomhodler84 5y ago
High fees In 2017 during an explicit attack on the network with spam, such that the spammer doesn’t have much BTC anymore. I haven’t paid over 1sat/vB for years. It’s the cheapest it can be onchain. Negligible. Ethereum on the other hand is broken with it’s gas calculation model with the unit of account being worth so much. Don’t touch ethereum these days, it’s bad.
- knorker 5y ago
  2017 is not the only time this has happened. It was $62 in Apr 2021, for example. CC payments and bank transfers are also way faster than bitcoin, even when bitcoin isn't having an outage. In the US bank transfers are slow, for some reason, but in Europe they're not.
  - randomhodler84 5y ago
    Bitcoin has not had an outage since 2013. Actually, you will find settlement time is actually much longer than instant SEPA, and other methods have 1 and 2 and 3 day transfer times too. The instant thing is an illusion granted by centralization. But of course your are talking about banks because you are missing the point of the exercise.
    - knorker 5y ago
      > not had an outage You just said 2017. I said 2021. And there's also at least 2018. > You will find that I will not find that, because i told you what my experience is. > Illusion Illusion or not, it's real. /s > Missing the point of the exercise The point being lying and contradicting ir sequential sentences to pump a pyramid scheme. Cryptocurrency on is not fit for any of the stated purposes, and HN will ban us both if we continue, so i bid you good day.
jimmydorry 5y ago
And what about the first kind of failure I mentioned, that we see pretty regularly in the news? That the banks are usually pretty good at reconstructing your balance from secondary sources, does not cover for the fact that they can still lose your balance in the first place. >Having an outage is not the same as forgetting your bank balance I wouldn't class a high fee as an outage. If your transaction was important enough that it warranted being settled immediately and at a higher priority than every other transaction during peak rush, then a higher fee might be a pretty good trade-off. Keep in mind that the banks do not offer this feature, so in their case your transaction would simply not go through giving you no choice in the matter.
- knorker 5y ago
  For a $10 purchase a $62 fee is in my opinion certainly an outage. But also there have been hours-long transaction times. I wouldn't say that banks "lose your balance" at all. It's a failure in availability. If the bank fails or does the extremely common cryptocurrency thing of "rugpull" then you still have your money because FDIC. You say "immediately", but i regularly do inter-bank transfers that go through faster than any Bitcoin transaction can go through, no matter what transaction fee offered. And that's not even talking about CC payments, which are done in milliseconds.
  - jimmydorry 5y ago
    Those transactions that appear to go through "immediately", are not settled for many days or weeks. That third parties are willing to take on the settlement risk is beside the point as the same could be offered by third parties working on top of the Bitcoin blockchain.
    - knorker 5y ago
      > Those transactions that appear to go through "immediately", are not settled for many days or weeks. The thing about that is that end users don't care, not even a little bit. It's about as interesting as whether the banks runs Linux, BSD, or OS/400. The service provided is immediate. I don't care if the two banks need to ship physical checks around on the backend. > the same could be offered by third parties working on top of the Bitcoin blockchain. But that defeats the whole point of the bitcoin blockchain. It does not defeat the point of traditional banking.