9 ms·

The "Killer App" for a cryptocurrency would be the ability to use it as a currency.

by shuntress 3y ago

maxcoder4 3y ago
As the OP said, the cryptocurrency you're looking for is Monero.
- shuntress 3y ago
  "Bitcoin but its anonymous" does not make Monero a real currency. I guess it helps that its value is relatively stable. But I still can't realistically use it. I can't walk in a store, buy something, then pay with Monero which is obviously disqualifying on it's own. But in addition to that, if I want to give a friend some Monero I would have to walk them through making a new account with some new app which they won't do because it's pointless anyways.
  - 486sx33 3y ago
    Shopify for monero is an idea being kicked around, there are also monero marketplaces for non- illegal things Monero could be used in a store and some stores do take monero! Its quick, with low fees
    - shuntress 3y ago
      It's maybe quick with low fees now while no one is using it. It has the exact same practical problems every other distributed cryptocurrency has preventing it from being useful as an actual currency. If Monero ever started seeing adoption as an actual currency it would fall apart just like Bitcoin.
    - tayo42 3y ago
      Is moner just quick for now but as it scales it'll be slow like bitcoin? Or is there something unique about monero that makes it fast?
      - arcticbull 3y ago
        > Or is there something unique about monero that makes it fast? The fact people aren't using it. It's just a PoW coin with some special sauce. Same grey goo energy and equipment dynamics.
  - arandomusername 3y ago
    "I can't realistically use credit cards. I can't walk in a store and pay using my credit card. And if I want to send some money to my friend, I have to walk them through of opening a bank account which they won't do because it's pointless anyway and I can just hand them the $50 dollar bill" - Someone years ago. Do you expect every store to start accepting it instantly? Your argument does not disqualify Monero as a real currency. It is a real currency, it's used every day for transactions. Just because you don't find use for it in your life does not disqualify it.
    - DJHenk 3y ago
      Monero is nine years old, Bitcoin is fifteen years old. I looked up the history of the credit card on Wikipedia to see how fast that caught on. It seems it had a slow start as well. Things only changed when a big bank put all of its weight behind it. I don;t think something like that will ever happen with cryptocoins, since there are no big institutions that would benefit from it becoming widespread.
    - shuntress 3y ago
      This is not an appropriate comparison. > I can't realistically use credit cards. I can't walk in a store and pay using my credit card That was true at some point and I would agree that as long as it remained true "Why should I carry a credit card that I can't use anywhere?" would be a perfectly reasonable thing to say. > And if I want to send some money to my friend, I have to walk them through of opening a bank account which they won't do because it's pointless anyway and I can just hand them the $50 dollar bill" This is completely disconnected from reality. People very commonly use bank accounts and checks. I know they must exist but I cant think of a single person in my life who would need my help dealing with a check. > It is a real currency, it's used every day for transactions. Just because you don't find use for it in your life does not disqualify it. You could say the same thing about V Bucks but that doesn't make it a real currency.
      - arandomusername 3y ago
        > That was true at some point and I would agree that as long as it remained true "Why should I carry a credit card that I can't use anywhere?" would be a perfectly reasonable thing to say. But using it as an argument against credit cards is dumb. > People very commonly use bank accounts and checks Yes, now they do. Used to be that most people held their wealth in gold or literal cash. > You could say the same thing about V Bucks but that doesn't make it a real currency. V Bucks (to my knowledge) can only be used to buy Fortnite stuff. Can I even send it to anyone I want? Guessing not. And I'm pretty sure I can't sell it on a market to anyone else either.
  - maxcoder4 3y ago
    I can't walk into a store and pay with USD either. It doesn't mean USD is not a currency, it's just not usually accepted by stores in my country. I use Monero semi-regularly to pay for things online (usually privacy products, because sadly nobody is interested in selling me groceries in exchange for xmr). You can absolutely buy things with it.
    - abnercoimbre 3y ago
      > usually privacy products Could you offer examples? Straight-up curious.
      - prussia 3y ago
        Njalla (domain names, VPSes, VPN), and Mullvad (VPN) both accept Monero.
      - monero-xmr 3y ago
        https://kycnot.me/ https://kycnot.me/
    - shuntress 3y ago
      You can pay for things online with V Bucks as regularly as you like that doesn't make it a real currency.
evantbyrne 3y ago
imo this is less of a technical issue and more of a regulatory one in 2024. Sending and receiving large amounts of btc/eth for instance might take a minute. For lower value point of sale transactions you don't really have to wait. And that's money in your pocket at that point not an IOU like a pending transaction at a US bank. Paying capital gains on transactions and constantly changing value dampens adoption quite a bit though
- shuntress 3y ago
  You could maybe call it a technical issue or an issue of adoption but the fact is that no one is scanning Monero wallet QR codes to buy coffee.
  - evantbyrne 3y ago
    Capital gains tax is not a technical issue per se. People also don't buy coffee with wire transfers, but nobody says wire transfers are a failure. btc/eth are better at doing what wire transfers were designed to do. The point is the tech is much better than people who have been sleeping on crypto seem to realize
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - hunter-gatherer 3y ago
      This was my use case for bitcoin years ago when my wife and I had just got married. She is a foreigner and was finishing school, so I'd sometimes send her bitcoin instead of wire. Back then bitcoin was only worth a few hundred, and sending her a 1-3 hundred a month is what she needed. To wire 300 dollars is simply not worth it, at least back then. I'm not sure if it has changed at all now though.
    - joshspankit 3y ago
      Something that has likely slowed down adoption: Current payment methods (CC, debit, tap, chip, etc) artificially appear faster than they are. When someone taps, 99% of the time the payment processor is not waiting for the funds. It’s all trust and calculations of acceptable risk (that’s why the tap limit). Crypto can adopt that approach as well. Yes, CCs/debit went through a period (as did cheques) where that trust was wildly abused and it’s likely any trust layer on top of crypto would have to go through the same period of abuse, but solutions [c|w]ould be implemented fairly quickly since it’s all tech.
lesuorac 3y ago
I'm really surprised sellers aren't trying to use it at all. There was a small push awhile ago ~2015/16 where a bunch of online stores started accepting bitcoin but IIRC they all stopped once the BTC/USD started to decrease. I guess credit card fees are <4% so there might not be a big enough discount to offer consumers to make them figure out how to get crypto (without paying more than 4% fees somewhere). Perhaps a chargeback heavy industry such as porn or political groups could benefit from non-chargebackable transactions.
- SamPatt 3y ago
  The high bitcoin fees killed adoption more than the price drop. I worked on OpenBazaar, a decentralized marketplace using bitcoin, and no one wants to spend $5 just to buy something. Artificially reducing block sizes killed adoption.

The "Killer App" for a cryptocurrency would be the ability to use it as a currency.

maxcoder4 3y ago

As the OP said, the cryptocurrency you're looking for is Monero.

shuntress 3y ago
"Bitcoin but its anonymous" does not make Monero a real currency. I guess it helps that its value is relatively stable. But I still can't realistically use it. I can't walk in a store, buy something, then pay with Monero which is obviously disqualifying on it's own. But in addition to that, if I want to give a friend some Monero I would have to walk them through making a new account with some new app which they won't do because it's pointless anyways.
- 486sx33 3y ago
  Shopify for monero is an idea being kicked around, there are also monero marketplaces for non- illegal things Monero could be used in a store and some stores do take monero! Its quick, with low fees
  - shuntress 3y ago
    It's maybe quick with low fees now while no one is using it. It has the exact same practical problems every other distributed cryptocurrency has preventing it from being useful as an actual currency. If Monero ever started seeing adoption as an actual currency it would fall apart just like Bitcoin.
  - tayo42 3y ago
    Is moner just quick for now but as it scales it'll be slow like bitcoin? Or is there something unique about monero that makes it fast?
    - arcticbull 3y ago
      > Or is there something unique about monero that makes it fast? The fact people aren't using it. It's just a PoW coin with some special sauce. Same grey goo energy and equipment dynamics.
- arandomusername 3y ago
  "I can't realistically use credit cards. I can't walk in a store and pay using my credit card. And if I want to send some money to my friend, I have to walk them through of opening a bank account which they won't do because it's pointless anyway and I can just hand them the $50 dollar bill" - Someone years ago. Do you expect every store to start accepting it instantly? Your argument does not disqualify Monero as a real currency. It is a real currency, it's used every day for transactions. Just because you don't find use for it in your life does not disqualify it.
  - DJHenk 3y ago
    Monero is nine years old, Bitcoin is fifteen years old. I looked up the history of the credit card on Wikipedia to see how fast that caught on. It seems it had a slow start as well. Things only changed when a big bank put all of its weight behind it. I don;t think something like that will ever happen with cryptocoins, since there are no big institutions that would benefit from it becoming widespread.
  - shuntress 3y ago
    This is not an appropriate comparison. > I can't realistically use credit cards. I can't walk in a store and pay using my credit card That was true at some point and I would agree that as long as it remained true "Why should I carry a credit card that I can't use anywhere?" would be a perfectly reasonable thing to say. > And if I want to send some money to my friend, I have to walk them through of opening a bank account which they won't do because it's pointless anyway and I can just hand them the $50 dollar bill" This is completely disconnected from reality. People very commonly use bank accounts and checks. I know they must exist but I cant think of a single person in my life who would need my help dealing with a check. > It is a real currency, it's used every day for transactions. Just because you don't find use for it in your life does not disqualify it. You could say the same thing about V Bucks but that doesn't make it a real currency.
    - arandomusername 3y ago
      > That was true at some point and I would agree that as long as it remained true "Why should I carry a credit card that I can't use anywhere?" would be a perfectly reasonable thing to say. But using it as an argument against credit cards is dumb. > People very commonly use bank accounts and checks Yes, now they do. Used to be that most people held their wealth in gold or literal cash. > You could say the same thing about V Bucks but that doesn't make it a real currency. V Bucks (to my knowledge) can only be used to buy Fortnite stuff. Can I even send it to anyone I want? Guessing not. And I'm pretty sure I can't sell it on a market to anyone else either.
- maxcoder4 3y ago
  I can't walk into a store and pay with USD either. It doesn't mean USD is not a currency, it's just not usually accepted by stores in my country. I use Monero semi-regularly to pay for things online (usually privacy products, because sadly nobody is interested in selling me groceries in exchange for xmr). You can absolutely buy things with it.
  - abnercoimbre 3y ago
    > usually privacy products Could you offer examples? Straight-up curious.
    - prussia 3y ago
      Njalla (domain names, VPSes, VPN), and Mullvad (VPN) both accept Monero.
    - monero-xmr 3y ago
      https://kycnot.me/ https://kycnot.me/
  - shuntress 3y ago
    You can pay for things online with V Bucks as regularly as you like that doesn't make it a real currency.

evantbyrne 3y ago

imo this is less of a technical issue and more of a regulatory one in 2024. Sending and receiving large amounts of btc/eth for instance might take a minute. For lower value point of sale transactions you don't really have to wait. And that's money in your pocket at that point not an IOU like a pending transaction at a US bank. Paying capital gains on transactions and constantly changing value dampens adoption quite a bit though

shuntress 3y ago
You could maybe call it a technical issue or an issue of adoption but the fact is that no one is scanning Monero wallet QR codes to buy coffee.
- evantbyrne 3y ago
  Capital gains tax is not a technical issue per se. People also don't buy coffee with wire transfers, but nobody says wire transfers are a failure. btc/eth are better at doing what wire transfers were designed to do. The point is the tech is much better than people who have been sleeping on crypto seem to realize
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - hunter-gatherer 3y ago
    This was my use case for bitcoin years ago when my wife and I had just got married. She is a foreigner and was finishing school, so I'd sometimes send her bitcoin instead of wire. Back then bitcoin was only worth a few hundred, and sending her a 1-3 hundred a month is what she needed. To wire 300 dollars is simply not worth it, at least back then. I'm not sure if it has changed at all now though.
  - joshspankit 3y ago
    Something that has likely slowed down adoption: Current payment methods (CC, debit, tap, chip, etc) artificially appear faster than they are. When someone taps, 99% of the time the payment processor is not waiting for the funds. It’s all trust and calculations of acceptable risk (that’s why the tap limit). Crypto can adopt that approach as well. Yes, CCs/debit went through a period (as did cheques) where that trust was wildly abused and it’s likely any trust layer on top of crypto would have to go through the same period of abuse, but solutions [c|w]ould be implemented fairly quickly since it’s all tech.

lesuorac 3y ago

I'm really surprised sellers aren't trying to use it at all. There was a small push awhile ago ~2015/16 where a bunch of online stores started accepting bitcoin but IIRC they all stopped once the BTC/USD started to decrease. I guess credit card fees are <4% so there might not be a big enough discount to offer consumers to make them figure out how to get crypto (without paying more than 4% fees somewhere). Perhaps a chargeback heavy industry such as porn or political groups could benefit from non-chargebackable transactions.

SamPatt 3y ago
The high bitcoin fees killed adoption more than the price drop. I worked on OpenBazaar, a decentralized marketplace using bitcoin, and no one wants to spend $5 just to buy something. Artificially reducing block sizes killed adoption.