7 ms·

whenever people tell me they don't understand the use for crypto, they don't seem to accept the explanation 'you use it to pay for things over the internet', an

by mjfl 4y ago

whenever people tell me they don't understand the use for crypto, they don't seem to accept the explanation 'you use it to pay for things over the internet', and they'll point to alternatives, like Paypal. I'm glad that Paypal continues to vindicate crypto's necessity.

pyuser583 4y ago
Do you recommend crypto for people who are technically illiterate?
- drewrv 4y ago
  Well maybe a trusted third party can make crypto accessible for the masses /s
  - Scoundreller 4y ago
    You mean like... a marketplace with its own dispute resolution mechanism and reviews of buyers and merchants?
- quickthrower2 4y ago
  For payment. Just use your credit card. Most countries have consumer credit protection that is pretty good if you need to get your money back.
- seydor 4y ago
  everyone was internet-illiterate once
  - Paraesthetic 4y ago
    Except Tim Berners-Lee
- weberer 4y ago
  Yeah, I normally just point them to Coinbase.
benhurmarcel 4y ago
Most people won't use a system without buyer's protection for buying on the internet.
- ynbl_ 4y ago
- sn_master 4y ago
  Depending on what they're buying, where they are from (PayPal and CC aren't very common outside the West), and the reputation of the seller, plenty people will take the risk.
noirbot 4y ago
And yet, when I just went to close my Paypal account, I remembered my final use for it was helping out a friend in need who sometimes needed money to cover their bills. They barely have a functioning bank in their town, they're definitely not gonna be able to pay their local bill with whatever fad blockchain currency for a while. So I do all the work to buy and transfer crypto and hope it doesn't lose 20% of its value while I'm doing that because Elon Musk had a bad day and shit-tweeted. They what? Drive a few hours to work out where to get cash from BTC to pay their real world bills?
- throwaway81523 4y ago
  > And yet, when I just went to close my Paypal account, I remembered my final use for it was helping out a friend in need who sometimes needed money to cover their bills. I had a friend in that situation once (sudden emergency), and I used snail mail to send one of those pictures of Benjamin Franklin that are printed by the US Treasury. It worked fine, no internet needed, no crypto, no blockchain, and no scam artist coin exchanges were needed to convert the Ben Franklin back into cash, since it was already cash. It beat Bitcoin in almost every regard, as far as I could tell.
  - noirbot 4y ago
    That would be my fallback, yes, but that's also a pretty large risk of theft or loss if you get unlucky. Not to mention the added time involved in sending it thousands of miles by mail.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - throwaway81523 4y ago
      It takes a couple days to cross the country, and snail mail is pretty safe. 1% loss rate on a Ben Franklin picture would equal a George Washington picture. The transaction fees for the 3 bitcoin transactions (cash to btc, btc transfer, and btc to cash) are probably way more than that. And you can always use money orders, registered mail, overnight express, or whatever.
jasonlotito 4y ago
Crypto is not a better alternative for customers. Crypto is a better alternative for merchants, but primarily because it generally protects merchants against fraud. There are other reasons, but mostly it's a result of credit card companies, banks, and regulations, rather than PayPal itself. No one wants to actually be responsible for credit card processing, but they want to reap the rewards of it. So PayPal is what you get. As a consumer though, until crypto offers a compelling reason for me to use, it's nothing but risk for me.
- RichardCNormos 4y ago
  I use crypto as a consumer so that I can self-custody a form of electronically transmissible currency. After seeing the Canadian government, certainly what anyone would call a "free, developed country" extrajudicially freeze citizens' bank accounts because of their political beliefs, I believe it's more important than ever to self-custody one's finances.
  - Eisenstein 4y ago
    > extrajudicially freeze citizens' bank accounts because of their political beliefs When did this happen?
    - eru 4y ago
      Maybe they are referring to this https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-60383385 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-60383385 ?
      - nomel 4y ago
        I believe that was just a potential. Perhaps they’re referring to: https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/td-bank-freezes-two-accounts-that-received-funds-support-canada-protests-2022-02-12/ https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/td-bank-freezes-two-a...
        4y ago
canoebuilder 4y ago
I think the better response here is, demand that the institutions in your free society operate based on the principles of freedom and free expression. Not, no biggie, we’ve got an interesting in theory, largely impractical in practice alternative, crypto!
- eru 4y ago
  > I think the better response here is, demand that the institutions in your free society operate based on the principles of freedom and free expression. What PayPal is doing is entirely consistent with that. In a free society, suppliers are free to decide whether they want to do business with you, and under what conditions. And you are free to make the same choice. (Of course, we'd hope that in a free society competition would take care of providing suppliers that offer conditions that customers can agree with. But there's no guarantee of that.)
  - Dylan16807 4y ago
    That's not what they mean. Institutions need to protect the freedom of their users. You're talking about a completely different kind of freedom. Competition is one solution to the problem, by avoiding incumbent institutions, but it often fails and it's not the only solution.
    - eru 4y ago
      Institutions only need to protect the freedoms that their users care about. For example, (many) Germans expect to be free to drink alcohol in public or eat Kinder Surprise. (Many) Americans expect to be free to shoot guns, but can live with bans on public drinking.
Spivak 4y ago
Crypto needs an out of band method of establishing trust which is the big difference. You can safely buy, well anything, with PayPal G&S and be as sure as one can be that no matter unscrupulous the seller you will be made whole. The product they’re selling is insurance and peace of mind to buyers and increased sales because of that to sellers. Anything you invent that does this will become PayPal even if it’s backed by crypto.
- Zak 4y ago
  An escrow service is a way to solve that problem without turning into Paypal. Of course the fees would likely be larger.
  - ynbl_ 4y ago
bonestamp2 4y ago
Don't get me wrong, I like crypto, but it's not perfect either. You make a good point that crypto solves some of these problems that these centralized payment services can't or won't solve.
RajT88 4y ago
I would still prefer "something like PayPal, just not paypal" over Crypto. Technical merits aside, volatility is considered a negative feature of a currency. At least until that gets sorted out the "Not Paypal" options are what I will stick to.

by mjfl 4y ago

pyuser583 4y ago

Do you recommend crypto for people who are technically illiterate?

drewrv 4y ago
Well maybe a trusted third party can make crypto accessible for the masses /s
- Scoundreller 4y ago
  You mean like... a marketplace with its own dispute resolution mechanism and reviews of buyers and merchants?
quickthrower2 4y ago
For payment. Just use your credit card. Most countries have consumer credit protection that is pretty good if you need to get your money back.
seydor 4y ago
everyone was internet-illiterate once
- Paraesthetic 4y ago
  Except Tim Berners-Lee
weberer 4y ago
Yeah, I normally just point them to Coinbase.

benhurmarcel 4y ago

Most people won't use a system without buyer's protection for buying on the internet.

ynbl_ 4y ago
sn_master 4y ago
Depending on what they're buying, where they are from (PayPal and CC aren't very common outside the West), and the reputation of the seller, plenty people will take the risk.

noirbot 4y ago

And yet, when I just went to close my Paypal account, I remembered my final use for it was helping out a friend in need who sometimes needed money to cover their bills. They barely have a functioning bank in their town, they're definitely not gonna be able to pay their local bill with whatever fad blockchain currency for a while. So I do all the work to buy and transfer crypto and hope it doesn't lose 20% of its value while I'm doing that because Elon Musk had a bad day and shit-tweeted. They what? Drive a few hours to work out where to get cash from BTC to pay their real world bills?

throwaway81523 4y ago
> And yet, when I just went to close my Paypal account, I remembered my final use for it was helping out a friend in need who sometimes needed money to cover their bills. I had a friend in that situation once (sudden emergency), and I used snail mail to send one of those pictures of Benjamin Franklin that are printed by the US Treasury. It worked fine, no internet needed, no crypto, no blockchain, and no scam artist coin exchanges were needed to convert the Ben Franklin back into cash, since it was already cash. It beat Bitcoin in almost every regard, as far as I could tell.
- noirbot 4y ago
  That would be my fallback, yes, but that's also a pretty large risk of theft or loss if you get unlucky. Not to mention the added time involved in sending it thousands of miles by mail.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - throwaway81523 4y ago
    It takes a couple days to cross the country, and snail mail is pretty safe. 1% loss rate on a Ben Franklin picture would equal a George Washington picture. The transaction fees for the 3 bitcoin transactions (cash to btc, btc transfer, and btc to cash) are probably way more than that. And you can always use money orders, registered mail, overnight express, or whatever.

jasonlotito 4y ago

Crypto is not a better alternative for customers. Crypto is a better alternative for merchants, but primarily because it generally protects merchants against fraud. There are other reasons, but mostly it's a result of credit card companies, banks, and regulations, rather than PayPal itself. No one wants to actually be responsible for credit card processing, but they want to reap the rewards of it. So PayPal is what you get. As a consumer though, until crypto offers a compelling reason for me to use, it's nothing but risk for me.

RichardCNormos 4y ago
I use crypto as a consumer so that I can self-custody a form of electronically transmissible currency. After seeing the Canadian government, certainly what anyone would call a "free, developed country" extrajudicially freeze citizens' bank accounts because of their political beliefs, I believe it's more important than ever to self-custody one's finances.
- Eisenstein 4y ago
  > extrajudicially freeze citizens' bank accounts because of their political beliefs When did this happen?
  - eru 4y ago
    Maybe they are referring to this https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-60383385 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-60383385 ?
    - nomel 4y ago
      I believe that was just a potential. Perhaps they’re referring to: https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/td-bank-freezes-two-accounts-that-received-funds-support-canada-protests-2022-02-12/ https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/td-bank-freezes-two-a...
      - 4y ago

canoebuilder 4y ago

I think the better response here is, demand that the institutions in your free society operate based on the principles of freedom and free expression. Not, no biggie, we’ve got an interesting in theory, largely impractical in practice alternative, crypto!

eru 4y ago
> I think the better response here is, demand that the institutions in your free society operate based on the principles of freedom and free expression. What PayPal is doing is entirely consistent with that. In a free society, suppliers are free to decide whether they want to do business with you, and under what conditions. And you are free to make the same choice. (Of course, we'd hope that in a free society competition would take care of providing suppliers that offer conditions that customers can agree with. But there's no guarantee of that.)
- Dylan16807 4y ago
  That's not what they mean. Institutions need to protect the freedom of their users. You're talking about a completely different kind of freedom. Competition is one solution to the problem, by avoiding incumbent institutions, but it often fails and it's not the only solution.
  - eru 4y ago
    Institutions only need to protect the freedoms that their users care about. For example, (many) Germans expect to be free to drink alcohol in public or eat Kinder Surprise. (Many) Americans expect to be free to shoot guns, but can live with bans on public drinking.

Spivak 4y ago

Crypto needs an out of band method of establishing trust which is the big difference. You can safely buy, well anything, with PayPal G&S and be as sure as one can be that no matter unscrupulous the seller you will be made whole. The product they’re selling is insurance and peace of mind to buyers and increased sales because of that to sellers. Anything you invent that does this will become PayPal even if it’s backed by crypto.

Zak 4y ago
An escrow service is a way to solve that problem without turning into Paypal. Of course the fees would likely be larger.
- ynbl_ 4y ago

bonestamp2 4y ago

Don't get me wrong, I like crypto, but it's not perfect either. You make a good point that crypto solves some of these problems that these centralized payment services can't or won't solve.

RajT88 4y ago

I would still prefer "something like PayPal, just not paypal" over Crypto. Technical merits aside, volatility is considered a negative feature of a currency. At least until that gets sorted out the "Not Paypal" options are what I will stick to.