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I'll be upfront with you: bitcoin is probably the worst "tech" ever mass-adopted. That's my bias. 1. The banking industry is thousands of times more important

by boc 3y ago

I'll be upfront with you: bitcoin is probably the worst "tech" ever mass-adopted. That's my bias. 1. The banking industry is thousands of times more important that crypto for everyday Americans. It's what literally makes our entire economy run. Crypto is used for speculation. What you should be comparing bitcoin against is the energy it takes to list a few ETFs on an exchange, which is essentially the cost of a few hundred servers, aka nothing. Bitcoin is ungodly inefficient and will only become more inefficient. 2. "It could be less, much less, or much less," This is a filler argument. Study says "around" a number, so you're arguing it could be a really broad definition of "around"? Not a serious take. 3. The absolute number matters because it's showing the economic activity is being concentrated in the pockets of just 137 entities. This is NOT a broad-base economic phenomenon that helps employ people in communities around the country, like say running gas stations (another polluting industry). If you're going to use 2% of the nation's electricity, you'd want the benefits spread across at least 2% of the population. Not 0.00002%. 4. Net energy consumption pulls from our current energy grid. Within a grid, if you use more clean electricity in one area, it'll pull more supply from dirtier sources elsewhere. Saying that bitcoin mining helps "green" the grid is a myth because you have to mine it 24/7/365, which means intermittent sources like wind and solar are at a big disadvantage. Battery storage tech is not there yet, thus gas plants and dirtier sources have to kick-in to keep up with 24/7 consumption.

digging 3y ago
I'm not sure if I was unclear or if the people debating me are too charged to read my precise meaning, or both. > "It could be less, much less, or much less," This is a filler argument. Actually my argument is, "This article claims it could be much less, and that we aren't even sure of the range given, but the title definitively claims the maximum value." I'm saying this article is bad and is FUD, that's why I said the thing about specifically criticizing the article. (Yeah I don't think I was that unclear actually.) I'm actually ambivalent on the rest of your arguments. They would have made good talking points in TFA, which made none of them.
brvsft 3y ago
I disagree with your first point mainly because this is more of a symptom of what Americans want, not necessarily some sort of virtuous result of the banking industry. I'd also argue that it doesn't "make our entire economy run." What makes the economy run is people going to work and performing work, producing goods and services. Banking is merely an aspect of that, and it's perhaps propped up into a bigger piece than it may need to be because people prefer being able to (or in some cases need to) access credit to buy stuff. I also somewhat disagree with (3) because it's ambiguous how many people constitute these mining facilities referenced in the article. You write it as though it means 137 individuals. But overall I only dislike crypto because it has become a space for charlatans and people who want to get rich quick. Any original principles behind creating a new currency outside of fiat and actually using that for transactions have been forgotten since then and crowded out by people who pretend those principles still mean something but really just want XCOIN to moon.

by boc 3y ago

digging 3y ago

I'm not sure if I was unclear or if the people debating me are too charged to read my precise meaning, or both. > "It could be less, much less, or much less," This is a filler argument. Actually my argument is, "This article claims it could be much less, and that we aren't even sure of the range given, but the title definitively claims the maximum value." I'm saying this article is bad and is FUD, that's why I said the thing about specifically criticizing the article. (Yeah I don't think I was that unclear actually.) I'm actually ambivalent on the rest of your arguments. They would have made good talking points in TFA, which made none of them.

brvsft 3y ago

I disagree with your first point mainly because this is more of a symptom of what Americans want, not necessarily some sort of virtuous result of the banking industry. I'd also argue that it doesn't "make our entire economy run." What makes the economy run is people going to work and performing work, producing goods and services. Banking is merely an aspect of that, and it's perhaps propped up into a bigger piece than it may need to be because people prefer being able to (or in some cases need to) access credit to buy stuff. I also somewhat disagree with (3) because it's ambiguous how many people constitute these mining facilities referenced in the article. You write it as though it means 137 individuals. But overall I only dislike crypto because it has become a space for charlatans and people who want to get rich quick. Any original principles behind creating a new currency outside of fiat and actually using that for transactions have been forgotten since then and crowded out by people who pretend those principles still mean something but really just want XCOIN to moon.