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The moment I learned that people want to buy crypto as a means to get rich in (evil ;)) fiat money, I knew I had a ponzi scheme in front of me. The interesting

The moment I learned that people want to buy crypto as a means to get rich in (evil ;)) fiat money, I knew I had a ponzi scheme in front of me. The interesting idea behind crypto once was to have a totally different system. Yet in reality, with greedy apes on a spacerock, it was an unreachable Utopia

nathias 4y ago
different systems historically come about by extreme violence, genocides and migrations of peoples, a little icky shills and ponzis is a very low price
- OtomotO 4y ago
  It would be a low price if it would reach the goal. I am pretty sure they won't though.
  - nathias 4y ago
    as I see it it's past the goal, as it's already a viable alternative to state and corporate powers
    - OtomotO 4y ago
      Only if you invested many years ago
      - nathias 4y ago
        as infrastructure/tech not wealth
- withinboredom 4y ago
  Like contributing heavily to global climate change?
chii 4y ago
> The interesting idea behind crypto once was to have a totally different system. the problem with this idea is that this idea of a "different" system is just merely going to evolve back into what we have today. The fundamental needs of a financial system doesn't change much, and what we have today is fit for purpose (mostly - there's efficiency to be had and red tape to cut).
- OtomotO 4y ago
  It is until you're on a list, for whatever reason. When states and countries can just block your access to your bank accounts, because you're on the other side of interests, it gets...Interesting With a decentralised approach, such actions would've needed to be implemented in the real world, not merely by the flick of a virtual lever.
  - Nursie 4y ago
    What’s truly decentralised? Miners are increasingly centralised and can effectively block/ignore transactions if they like. They may conceivably end up compelled to blacklist certain wallets, as some exchanges already do. And that’s before we get to stuff like Luna, where the decentralised authorities took the centralised action of halting the chain entirely
    - eudoxus 4y ago
      I'm curious what makes this a centralized action? Many independent (decentralized?) entities debated and used social consensus to come to the decision to halt the chain to isolate further potential damage. Like them or hate them, I'm intrigued where the centralized line in the sand was crossed
      - Nursie 4y ago
        A relatively small group of powerful people shut the chain down. This was not a consensus action amongst token holders, network users or any other group, their consent was not required. Power is held by this group of (130?) people, it seems pretty centralised to me, basically an oligarchy.
seydor 4y ago
yep. bitcoin has been, from the start, about replacing the whole fiat financial system, not interfacing with it, depending on it, and being regulated.
danijelb 4y ago
It's impossible to have a totally different system while the fiat system exists in parallel. Even if people used crypto just for payments and didn't assign a dollar value to it, it would still have a dollar value because if you know that 0.0001 BTC buys 1 kg of something then you can infer the dollar value
dubswithus 4y ago
With so many startups how can you be sure all of them will fail to provide value? It’s totally possible the whole thing is unworkable and dies out. Another option is that it survives in some niche area that provides value or just becomes entrenched like HFT. And it’s possible a world changing blockchain startup hasn’t been invented yet. Any tech breakthroughs with processing power or storage could have a huge effect on blockchain.

nathias 4y ago

different systems historically come about by extreme violence, genocides and migrations of peoples, a little icky shills and ponzis is a very low price

OtomotO 4y ago
It would be a low price if it would reach the goal. I am pretty sure they won't though.
- nathias 4y ago
  as I see it it's past the goal, as it's already a viable alternative to state and corporate powers
  - OtomotO 4y ago
    Only if you invested many years ago
    - nathias 4y ago
      as infrastructure/tech not wealth
withinboredom 4y ago
Like contributing heavily to global climate change?

chii 4y ago

> The interesting idea behind crypto once was to have a totally different system. the problem with this idea is that this idea of a "different" system is just merely going to evolve back into what we have today. The fundamental needs of a financial system doesn't change much, and what we have today is fit for purpose (mostly - there's efficiency to be had and red tape to cut).

OtomotO 4y ago
It is until you're on a list, for whatever reason. When states and countries can just block your access to your bank accounts, because you're on the other side of interests, it gets...Interesting With a decentralised approach, such actions would've needed to be implemented in the real world, not merely by the flick of a virtual lever.
- Nursie 4y ago
  What’s truly decentralised? Miners are increasingly centralised and can effectively block/ignore transactions if they like. They may conceivably end up compelled to blacklist certain wallets, as some exchanges already do. And that’s before we get to stuff like Luna, where the decentralised authorities took the centralised action of halting the chain entirely
  - eudoxus 4y ago
    I'm curious what makes this a centralized action? Many independent (decentralized?) entities debated and used social consensus to come to the decision to halt the chain to isolate further potential damage. Like them or hate them, I'm intrigued where the centralized line in the sand was crossed
    - Nursie 4y ago
      A relatively small group of powerful people shut the chain down. This was not a consensus action amongst token holders, network users or any other group, their consent was not required. Power is held by this group of (130?) people, it seems pretty centralised to me, basically an oligarchy.

seydor 4y ago

yep. bitcoin has been, from the start, about replacing the whole fiat financial system, not interfacing with it, depending on it, and being regulated.

danijelb 4y ago

It's impossible to have a totally different system while the fiat system exists in parallel. Even if people used crypto just for payments and didn't assign a dollar value to it, it would still have a dollar value because if you know that 0.0001 BTC buys 1 kg of something then you can infer the dollar value

dubswithus 4y ago

With so many startups how can you be sure all of them will fail to provide value? It’s totally possible the whole thing is unworkable and dies out. Another option is that it survives in some niche area that provides value or just becomes entrenched like HFT. And it’s possible a world changing blockchain startup hasn’t been invented yet. Any tech breakthroughs with processing power or storage could have a huge effect on blockchain.