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> Wasn't Crypto supposed to solve this like a decade ago? In a purely technical "I can send/receive payments without worrying about charge backs or random midd

> Wasn't Crypto supposed to solve this like a decade ago? In a purely technical "I can send/receive payments without worrying about charge backs or random middleman restrictions", it has solved it. But it hasn't solved the issue of having the vast majority of merchants accepting crypto, the issue of crypto price volatility (or associated risk of stable coins), or the friction/unreliability of turning cash into crypto. Particularly, the last 2 issues go hand-in-hand as an issue. You can get around cash->crypto friction/unreliability by only having to do it infrequently, but that exposes you to the volatility of the crypto price. And that's not even getting into the issues of crypto UX as a form of common currency for the average person. It is not a simple process to know how you should create wallets, manage your wallets, what information should you or should you not expose, what networks can/can't you send certain coins over, what coins should you be using, why are there hundreds of different coins, etc, to not fall for scams.

AnthonyMouse 1y ago
> But it hasn't solved the issue of having the vast majority of merchants accepting crypto, the issue of crypto price volatility (or associated risk of stable coins), or the friction/unreliability of turning cash into crypto. The price volatility seems like a red herring. If you're using it as a currency then you're not holding it for significant periods of time and the entire point is to make it an automated process, so you're buying some cryptocurrency for cash and then immediately spending it. How much volatility do you really expect in the timespan of a fraction of a second? Meanwhile the conversion shouldn't be a hard problem. You have a service that allows you to buy cryptocurrency with a credit card or bank transfer and then an app that uses that service to buy cryptocurrency and transfer it to a merchant that accepts cryptocurrency, and then any merchants being unfairly targeted by the payment networks can do that. And the cash to cryptocurrency service can be operated by a different party than the app so the former can't be assaulted for having the wrong customers and the later isn't directly interacting with the payment networks. I suspect the real problem is this: The chargeback process for credit cards isn't compatible with anything where the merchant is delivering fungible goods to the customer that they can't feasibly recover if the customer was using a stolen card or issues a fraudulent chargeback, and cryptocurrency is one such thing. So then the service that allows you to buy cryptocurrency with a a credit card gets screwed, because customers issue a chargeback to them or use stolen cards on their service even though they actually provided the cryptocurrency as promised. Which is a huge existing problem with the payments system. The payment networks dump the cost of fraud onto innocent merchants and then lose the incentive actually prevent it even though they're the only ones in a position to do it, e.g. by issuing chip cards that could be read by any ordinary PC/phone via open standards and therefore enable "card present" transactions to happen over the internet. And then if you expect cryptocurrency to solve that problem, it can't do that on the side of the transaction where the cryptocurrency is the thing you're buying.
- andy99 1y ago
  > The price volatility seems like a red herring. If you're using it as a currency then you're not holding it for significant periods of time and the entire point is to make it an automated process, so you're buying some cryptocurrency for cash and then immediately spending it. How much volatility do you really expect in the timespan of a fraction of a second? Maybe I don't understand how people use bitcoin but I wouldn't call your description that of a currency but more like a payment processor. I want a currency, e.g. USD to be stable enough that I can comparison shop in it, quote prices to customers in it, and hold some as "cash or cash equivalents" on my balance sheet without undue risk from price fluctuation. USD achieves this, BTC doesn't, which is assume is why people are using the get-in-get-out model being mentioned here of only holding it for as short as possible.
  - AnthonyMouse 1y ago
    You shouldn't be using any currency as a long-term store of value. Even if you want to be denominated in USD and minimize risk, the interest rate on cash in a mattress is zero and the interest rate on US treasuries is non-zero. Meanwhile the historical purpose of holding cash as "spending money" (i.e. liquid assets) is from a time before computers could allow you to keep it as actual investments until the instant you do actually want to spend it. As for using it for pricing, things are typically priced in USD because it's the world reserve currency, or in the dominant local currency in a given country. That doesn't mean that other currencies aren't currencies. Shops in many countries will often accept both local currency and USD even if prices are only listed in one of those, and so what? Anybody can look up the current exchange rate in real time on the internet. Why is it a problem to list prices in USD and then accept that amount of cryptocurrency (or Euros or Yen) at the current exchange rate?
    - what-the-grump 1y ago
      Because if it worked better then we’d be doing it already. But no amount of cryptobro podcasts are going to fix the shortcomings of digital currencies. And everyone knows this. My dollar will be worth a dollar tomorrow and will sit in my wallet. My crypto currency is worthless on most of the planet. Do you take payments in LoL skins or vbucks?
beeflet 1y ago
Cryptocurrencies are volatile specifically because they are used as a speculative investment rather than a means of exchange. It is a self-fulfilling prophecy. >And that's not even getting into the issues of crypto UX as a form of common currency for the average person. The conventional banking system is just as complicated and less secure, yet people have adapted to its flaws. What's the difference between FedWire and ACH? Why does it take time for checks to clear, and why does it show that I have a balance immediately? What are money orders? Why are banks only open on weekdays when the entire economy relies on them to function?
- disgruntledphd2 1y ago
  Why do banks refuse to clear transactions over a weekend? There's lots of problems with current payment infrastructure, but I'm not convinced that crypto would solve them. For the thing in the OP though, some kind of crypto rail for these kinds of transactions probably would make a difference. The trouble is that Visa/MC don't just impose these restrictions for moral reasons, it's mostly because of higher charge-back rates and fraud.
ranger_danger 1y ago
> In 2022, more Salvadorians had Bitcoin Lightning wallets than bank accounts. I guess that means they solved the UX problem... but from what I have read, its actual usage in practice is basically a failed experiment at this point.

AnthonyMouse 1y ago

> But it hasn't solved the issue of having the vast majority of merchants accepting crypto, the issue of crypto price volatility (or associated risk of stable coins), or the friction/unreliability of turning cash into crypto. The price volatility seems like a red herring. If you're using it as a currency then you're not holding it for significant periods of time and the entire point is to make it an automated process, so you're buying some cryptocurrency for cash and then immediately spending it. How much volatility do you really expect in the timespan of a fraction of a second? Meanwhile the conversion shouldn't be a hard problem. You have a service that allows you to buy cryptocurrency with a credit card or bank transfer and then an app that uses that service to buy cryptocurrency and transfer it to a merchant that accepts cryptocurrency, and then any merchants being unfairly targeted by the payment networks can do that. And the cash to cryptocurrency service can be operated by a different party than the app so the former can't be assaulted for having the wrong customers and the later isn't directly interacting with the payment networks. I suspect the real problem is this: The chargeback process for credit cards isn't compatible with anything where the merchant is delivering fungible goods to the customer that they can't feasibly recover if the customer was using a stolen card or issues a fraudulent chargeback, and cryptocurrency is one such thing. So then the service that allows you to buy cryptocurrency with a a credit card gets screwed, because customers issue a chargeback to them or use stolen cards on their service even though they actually provided the cryptocurrency as promised. Which is a huge existing problem with the payments system. The payment networks dump the cost of fraud onto innocent merchants and then lose the incentive actually prevent it even though they're the only ones in a position to do it, e.g. by issuing chip cards that could be read by any ordinary PC/phone via open standards and therefore enable "card present" transactions to happen over the internet. And then if you expect cryptocurrency to solve that problem, it can't do that on the side of the transaction where the cryptocurrency is the thing you're buying.

andy99 1y ago
> The price volatility seems like a red herring. If you're using it as a currency then you're not holding it for significant periods of time and the entire point is to make it an automated process, so you're buying some cryptocurrency for cash and then immediately spending it. How much volatility do you really expect in the timespan of a fraction of a second? Maybe I don't understand how people use bitcoin but I wouldn't call your description that of a currency but more like a payment processor. I want a currency, e.g. USD to be stable enough that I can comparison shop in it, quote prices to customers in it, and hold some as "cash or cash equivalents" on my balance sheet without undue risk from price fluctuation. USD achieves this, BTC doesn't, which is assume is why people are using the get-in-get-out model being mentioned here of only holding it for as short as possible.
- AnthonyMouse 1y ago
  You shouldn't be using any currency as a long-term store of value. Even if you want to be denominated in USD and minimize risk, the interest rate on cash in a mattress is zero and the interest rate on US treasuries is non-zero. Meanwhile the historical purpose of holding cash as "spending money" (i.e. liquid assets) is from a time before computers could allow you to keep it as actual investments until the instant you do actually want to spend it. As for using it for pricing, things are typically priced in USD because it's the world reserve currency, or in the dominant local currency in a given country. That doesn't mean that other currencies aren't currencies. Shops in many countries will often accept both local currency and USD even if prices are only listed in one of those, and so what? Anybody can look up the current exchange rate in real time on the internet. Why is it a problem to list prices in USD and then accept that amount of cryptocurrency (or Euros or Yen) at the current exchange rate?
  - what-the-grump 1y ago
    Because if it worked better then we’d be doing it already. But no amount of cryptobro podcasts are going to fix the shortcomings of digital currencies. And everyone knows this. My dollar will be worth a dollar tomorrow and will sit in my wallet. My crypto currency is worthless on most of the planet. Do you take payments in LoL skins or vbucks?

beeflet 1y ago

Cryptocurrencies are volatile specifically because they are used as a speculative investment rather than a means of exchange. It is a self-fulfilling prophecy. >And that's not even getting into the issues of crypto UX as a form of common currency for the average person. The conventional banking system is just as complicated and less secure, yet people have adapted to its flaws. What's the difference between FedWire and ACH? Why does it take time for checks to clear, and why does it show that I have a balance immediately? What are money orders? Why are banks only open on weekdays when the entire economy relies on them to function?

disgruntledphd2 1y ago
Why do banks refuse to clear transactions over a weekend? There's lots of problems with current payment infrastructure, but I'm not convinced that crypto would solve them. For the thing in the OP though, some kind of crypto rail for these kinds of transactions probably would make a difference. The trouble is that Visa/MC don't just impose these restrictions for moral reasons, it's mostly because of higher charge-back rates and fraud.

ranger_danger 1y ago

> In 2022, more Salvadorians had Bitcoin Lightning wallets than bank accounts. I guess that means they solved the UX problem... but from what I have read, its actual usage in practice is basically a failed experiment at this point.