6 ms·

Here's something I've never seen addressed by bitcoin apologists. Tell me why I should "adopt" BTC if I'm not: (a) speculating (b) interesting in buying drugs

by wsxcde 13y ago

Here's something I've never seen addressed by bitcoin apologists. Tell me why I should "adopt" BTC if I'm not: (a) speculating (b) interesting in buying drugs or circumventing regulations around international money transfers. I see no utility in paying for software or coffee in BTC. Getting hold of bitcoin is not a straightforward process, and even once you acquire them, your coins are fluctuating in value all the time. What am I gaining in return for all this trouble? It simply doesn't make any sense to me.

21echoes 13y ago
currently, sending money over the internet without getting charged fees is non-trivial. with the number of players in the payment space, i don't expect that to be the case for very much longer, and i don't think it will be bitcoin that solves this problem.
- marcell 13y ago
  Curious--how/who will solve this problem?
  - alwillis 13y ago
    This is exactly what Ripple is attempting to solve, acting as a open, global payment network where transactions are nearly free and you can use any currency (including bitcoin) you want. More at https://ripple.com/about-ripple/ https://ripple.com/about-ripple/.
    - goldenkey 13y ago
      Ripple is a petty scam. Please don't advertise that horse dung to HN, we are smarter than that. Ripple generated 10 billion coins, they call them XRP. Of course this amount and even XRP aren't mentioned on that page you linked, an obvious bait. Ripple started giving away millions to generate buzz and use, they've yet to even give away 10% though, and the idea is to create enough value that they can eventually dump all their "genesis" currency and reap the rewards. They recently started giving away a few thousand a day with their ComputingForGood campaign, a pittance to create buzz for their scamware. Mastercoin's done the same thing with no real benefits over Bitcoin itself. Seriously getting tired of these fiat fiascos. I guess creating derivative cryptocurrencies is the new version of the classic pyramid scheme. Some people call Bitcoin a pyramid scheme because of the speculative bubble, fair enough. But these currencies, Ripple and Mastercoin, are true pyramid schemes. Founders plan to get mega-rich based on the illicit adoption of their scamware.
      - alwillis 13y ago
        I already wrote my fact checking piece today on Ripple today: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6867324 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6867324. But let me quickly say: * there's no mining in Ripple, so Ripple isn't pre-minded and there's no "genesis" currency * they created 100 billion XRP, not 10 billion as you wrote * they're committed to give away 55 billion XRP to non-profits, users and business partners for the foreseeable future: https://ripple.com/ripple_primer.pdf https://ripple.com/ripple_primer.pdf * XRP certainly isn't derivative of Bitcoin, but the original Ripple system that this is partially based on started in 2004: http://archive.ripple-project.org/Main/HomePage http://archive.ripple-project.org/Main/HomePage * Apparently you don't actually know what a pyramid scheme is or how one works, otherwise you would know that Ripple isn't one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid_scheme http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid_scheme. * It's also not a Ponzi Scheme, incase you wanted to go there next: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ponzi_scheme http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ponzi_scheme What Ripple is: a company, an approach and a currency you don't like and you clearly have an agenda to spread misinformation about it for reasons that are not clear. I have no affiliation with Ripple Labs, other than being impressed with their approach of addressing our archaic, fragmented payment system that works almost exactly the same as it did 20 years ago. I also have received XRP in a couple of giveaways. Don't get me wrong—I think Bitcoin is an incredible technology that changed the way we think about money, in ways we're just starting to grok. What Ripple enables—being able to pay anyone anywhere anytime with whatever currency you wish to use for essentially for free--is the killer app right now. This is what I mean by essentially free: I paid 0.000025 XRP to exchange USD for XRP: https://ripple.com/graph/#2EF43881B82AE8FBA31A2C3272E61CBC2EEDFF3F61F248FF16626BE99D6F81CF https://ripple.com/graph/#2EF43881B82AE8FBA31A2C3272E61CBC2E...). That's $0.00075 USD. :: drops the mic ::
        goldenkey 13y ago
        * they're committed to give away 55 billion XRP to non-profits, users and business partners for the foreseeable future: https://ripple.com/ripple_primer.pdf https://ripple.com/ripple_primer.pdf 'Committed' Heh. I guess Ripple is a religion, because you've got to have ulterior motives or faith in demons.. Enough said. It's a friggin' scam. Enjoy that free XRP that OpenCoin started you off with, like a baby nursing on a milk bag.
  - 21echoes 13y ago
    main ones that come to mind: clinkle, dwolla, venmo. but the particular company doesn't matter so much as the clear market trend: fees are in a race-to-the-bottom mode right now, and within 10 years i fully expect them to be effectively 0, if not actually 0.
- ashray 13y ago
  Unfortunately the barrier to this has been counterparty risk management. The players in the payment space are limited by their contracts with Visa/Mastercard/etc. and therefore have to manage risk accordingly. This is what increases the fees. (chargebacks almost always honored, etc. etc.) Paypal offers micropayments and their rates are by far the most competitive. You know what happens ? I get paid $2 per subscription and Paypal pays me $1.83. That's an 8.5% commission! It's the best rate in the industry! (right now..) It's just that the more middle men you add, the more fees you're going to need. The current financial system is a truckload of middlemen and yes, they do have their utility and run immensely large networks (visa/mastercard/etc.). The only way to lower fees is to cut them out, whether that's going to be bitcoin or someone else is anyone's guess. But bitcoin is definitely a viable prototype.
ashray 13y ago
You're doing well with your credit card because your bank allows you to do so. Just a few days ago my debit card was blocked because I was traveling internationally and the bank suspected that it was stolen. That's great, they're trying to protect me. But then, the only way to get it unblocked was to visit the bank in person.. but I was 10,000 miles away! I tried to reason with them over the phone but they wouldn't listen. So here I was, far away from home, without access to my money because my bank was trying to protect me but had a retarded system in place for that. Eventually, I spent a few hours on the phone, got someone to pull some local stunts in my city (went to speak to the manager in person, etc.) and then got my card unblocked. You see the problem ? I don't own my money. I can't pay for my coffee with my debit card unless my bank lets me. I couldn't pay for anything, I had to apologize to my hotel and ask them to wait until this got sorted out. I run a website that is sustained by online advertising. I usually have two options to get paid by advertisers. Paypal or Bank Wire. Paypal charges huge fees, so I opt for wire. Bank Wires take 5 days to clear (2 if I'm lucky..) and due to multiple different advertisers I end up paying over $200 in wire fees each month. I think of that as the 'cost of doing business' but really, it shouldn't be. I used to live in Dubai two years ago and send money back home. Every time I transferred money, I would get hit with huge fees. This is a reality for immigrant workers all over the world. Western Union caters to this audience right now. Yes, banks are good at what they do - to a certain extent. We all know them and use them. But that doesn't mean that I want to be at their mercy all the time. Things are always fine, until they are not. That's what happens to me with banks all the time. Volatility isn't a feature of bitcoin, it's a market reality - for now. You don't have to pay for your coffee using bitcoin right now, you are right, bitcoin isn't ready for that yet. But when it is, you'll be able to pay for your coffee, and no single 3rd party in the world (bank, western union, visa, mastercard, federal reserve, etc.) will have a say in it. Not a single entity in the world will stand between you and that delicious brew.
- drakaal 13y ago
  >Not a single entity in the world will stand between you and that delicious brew. Except the exchange rate. Your 1/300th of a coin might buy you coffee if it is a good day, but the next day it might cost 1/100th of a coin. I just bought in because I'm hoping that what I can buy with 1/100th of a coin will only cost 1/300th by Christmas. Bitcoin is having a bad day and I hope to capitalize on it. Having bought at $650 I will be sad if it turns out that the new price is $500, and happy if BAML was right and we are off to $1300. But All of your arguments fall down in that you are either using an exchange to get from currency to BTC. Or you are keeping coins in a wallet and they could swing 50% in value in a day.
alwillis 13y ago
>Getting hold of bitcoin is not a straightforward process Actually, it's pretty straightforward these days: http://howtobuybitcoins.info http://howtobuybitcoins.info. By now, everyone should know the advantages of bitcoin: * low or no fees * transactions are nearly instant; confirmations take a few minutes * payments are irrevocable - no chargeback issues * you can pay anyone anywhere at anytime - no bank holidays, no paying Western Union fees to send money oversees and have it still take days * pseudo anonymous - you don't have to provide personal information to a financial organization to make payments * many vendors give a discounts for users willing to pay in bitcoin vs. dollars
- wsxcde 13y ago
  It's about 5 business days for coinbase to enable your account, not to mention the risk of giving a vendor access to your bank out. And I think each buy/sell transaction also takes a few days to apply? > transactions are nearly instant; confirmations take a few minutes This is true for my credit card too. > payments are irrevocable - no chargeback issues As a customer, I prefer the ability to make a chargeback. > you can pay anyone anywhere at anytime - no bank holidays, no paying Western Union fees to send money oversees and have it still take days I specifically excluded international transfers in my question. Anyway, these are heavily regulated and risk and volatility of bitcoin simply aren't worthwhile in comparison to the few dollars I would save. > pseudo anonymous - you don't have to provide personal information to a financial organization to make payments Could possibly be an advantage but isn't really true because coinbase would know all about me and all my transactions could be traced back to them by just traversing the block chain. > many vendors give a discounts for users willing to pay in bitcoin vs. dollars I would think about using bitcoin for this reason if I could convert USD -> BTC and quickly buy whatever I needed using BTC. But again this is something that takes days and who knows what the USD->BTC rate would be when I eventually do get my bitcoin. It's simply not worth it.
nl 13y ago
I put some money into Bitcoin recently. I'm speculating.
bdcravens 13y ago
There's some value in press/notoriety, if you think you'd be reaching eyes and ears for those who care about that sort of thing.
warfangle 13y ago
You can send a single satoshi* to an address that cannot spend said satoshi with the cryptographic signature of a document as the notation on it. Once the transaction is validated in the blockchain, you can prove mathematically that the document (while keeping secret the contents of the document) was published (created) on a given datetime. *1 satoshi = 5.8e-6 USD @ current coinbase exchange, Sat Dec 07 2013 02:59:12 GMT-0500
GeneralMayhem 13y ago
Your (b) sounds suspiciously similar to "if you've got nothing to hide, then why do you want privacy?" Having control over your money is valuable on its own merits for a lot of people.
- wsxcde 13y ago
  Actually that is a perfectly good argument except the people who make it are always being dishonest. When Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft or the NSA say "why do you want privacy?", they specifically mean us and not them. It's not like we can look into Apple's servers and make sure they aren't abusing all the the private data they store about us. It's not like we're allowed to analyze the NSA's hitlist to determine if there's racial profiling going on there. These companies won't let us look at their source code to see if there are backdoors in supposedly secure products. And we're never going to be able determine exactly where a politician's campaign funding is coming from. I would buy the argument "if you've got nothing to hide, then why do you want privacy?" if people making that argument were willing to apply those standards to themselves. They never want to do that, so I'm forced to conclude it's just a rhetorical device used to trick the naive into giving up their information for free.

by wsxcde 13y ago

21echoes 13y ago

currently, sending money over the internet without getting charged fees is non-trivial. with the number of players in the payment space, i don't expect that to be the case for very much longer, and i don't think it will be bitcoin that solves this problem.

marcell 13y ago
Curious--how/who will solve this problem?
- alwillis 13y ago
  This is exactly what Ripple is attempting to solve, acting as a open, global payment network where transactions are nearly free and you can use any currency (including bitcoin) you want. More at https://ripple.com/about-ripple/ https://ripple.com/about-ripple/.
  - goldenkey 13y ago
    Ripple is a petty scam. Please don't advertise that horse dung to HN, we are smarter than that. Ripple generated 10 billion coins, they call them XRP. Of course this amount and even XRP aren't mentioned on that page you linked, an obvious bait. Ripple started giving away millions to generate buzz and use, they've yet to even give away 10% though, and the idea is to create enough value that they can eventually dump all their "genesis" currency and reap the rewards. They recently started giving away a few thousand a day with their ComputingForGood campaign, a pittance to create buzz for their scamware. Mastercoin's done the same thing with no real benefits over Bitcoin itself. Seriously getting tired of these fiat fiascos. I guess creating derivative cryptocurrencies is the new version of the classic pyramid scheme. Some people call Bitcoin a pyramid scheme because of the speculative bubble, fair enough. But these currencies, Ripple and Mastercoin, are true pyramid schemes. Founders plan to get mega-rich based on the illicit adoption of their scamware.
    - alwillis 13y ago
      I already wrote my fact checking piece today on Ripple today: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6867324 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6867324. But let me quickly say: * there's no mining in Ripple, so Ripple isn't pre-minded and there's no "genesis" currency * they created 100 billion XRP, not 10 billion as you wrote * they're committed to give away 55 billion XRP to non-profits, users and business partners for the foreseeable future: https://ripple.com/ripple_primer.pdf https://ripple.com/ripple_primer.pdf * XRP certainly isn't derivative of Bitcoin, but the original Ripple system that this is partially based on started in 2004: http://archive.ripple-project.org/Main/HomePage http://archive.ripple-project.org/Main/HomePage * Apparently you don't actually know what a pyramid scheme is or how one works, otherwise you would know that Ripple isn't one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid_scheme http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid_scheme. * It's also not a Ponzi Scheme, incase you wanted to go there next: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ponzi_scheme http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ponzi_scheme What Ripple is: a company, an approach and a currency you don't like and you clearly have an agenda to spread misinformation about it for reasons that are not clear. I have no affiliation with Ripple Labs, other than being impressed with their approach of addressing our archaic, fragmented payment system that works almost exactly the same as it did 20 years ago. I also have received XRP in a couple of giveaways. Don't get me wrong—I think Bitcoin is an incredible technology that changed the way we think about money, in ways we're just starting to grok. What Ripple enables—being able to pay anyone anywhere anytime with whatever currency you wish to use for essentially for free--is the killer app right now. This is what I mean by essentially free: I paid 0.000025 XRP to exchange USD for XRP: https://ripple.com/graph/#2EF43881B82AE8FBA31A2C3272E61CBC2EEDFF3F61F248FF16626BE99D6F81CF https://ripple.com/graph/#2EF43881B82AE8FBA31A2C3272E61CBC2E...). That's $0.00075 USD. :: drops the mic ::
      - goldenkey 13y ago
        * they're committed to give away 55 billion XRP to non-profits, users and business partners for the foreseeable future: https://ripple.com/ripple_primer.pdf https://ripple.com/ripple_primer.pdf 'Committed' Heh. I guess Ripple is a religion, because you've got to have ulterior motives or faith in demons.. Enough said. It's a friggin' scam. Enjoy that free XRP that OpenCoin started you off with, like a baby nursing on a milk bag.
- 21echoes 13y ago
  main ones that come to mind: clinkle, dwolla, venmo. but the particular company doesn't matter so much as the clear market trend: fees are in a race-to-the-bottom mode right now, and within 10 years i fully expect them to be effectively 0, if not actually 0.
ashray 13y ago
Unfortunately the barrier to this has been counterparty risk management. The players in the payment space are limited by their contracts with Visa/Mastercard/etc. and therefore have to manage risk accordingly. This is what increases the fees. (chargebacks almost always honored, etc. etc.) Paypal offers micropayments and their rates are by far the most competitive. You know what happens ? I get paid $2 per subscription and Paypal pays me $1.83. That's an 8.5% commission! It's the best rate in the industry! (right now..) It's just that the more middle men you add, the more fees you're going to need. The current financial system is a truckload of middlemen and yes, they do have their utility and run immensely large networks (visa/mastercard/etc.). The only way to lower fees is to cut them out, whether that's going to be bitcoin or someone else is anyone's guess. But bitcoin is definitely a viable prototype.

ashray 13y ago

You're doing well with your credit card because your bank allows you to do so. Just a few days ago my debit card was blocked because I was traveling internationally and the bank suspected that it was stolen. That's great, they're trying to protect me. But then, the only way to get it unblocked was to visit the bank in person.. but I was 10,000 miles away! I tried to reason with them over the phone but they wouldn't listen. So here I was, far away from home, without access to my money because my bank was trying to protect me but had a retarded system in place for that. Eventually, I spent a few hours on the phone, got someone to pull some local stunts in my city (went to speak to the manager in person, etc.) and then got my card unblocked. You see the problem ? I don't own my money. I can't pay for my coffee with my debit card unless my bank lets me. I couldn't pay for anything, I had to apologize to my hotel and ask them to wait until this got sorted out. I run a website that is sustained by online advertising. I usually have two options to get paid by advertisers. Paypal or Bank Wire. Paypal charges huge fees, so I opt for wire. Bank Wires take 5 days to clear (2 if I'm lucky..) and due to multiple different advertisers I end up paying over $200 in wire fees each month. I think of that as the 'cost of doing business' but really, it shouldn't be. I used to live in Dubai two years ago and send money back home. Every time I transferred money, I would get hit with huge fees. This is a reality for immigrant workers all over the world. Western Union caters to this audience right now. Yes, banks are good at what they do - to a certain extent. We all know them and use them. But that doesn't mean that I want to be at their mercy all the time. Things are always fine, until they are not. That's what happens to me with banks all the time. Volatility isn't a feature of bitcoin, it's a market reality - for now. You don't have to pay for your coffee using bitcoin right now, you are right, bitcoin isn't ready for that yet. But when it is, you'll be able to pay for your coffee, and no single 3rd party in the world (bank, western union, visa, mastercard, federal reserve, etc.) will have a say in it. Not a single entity in the world will stand between you and that delicious brew.

drakaal 13y ago
>Not a single entity in the world will stand between you and that delicious brew. Except the exchange rate. Your 1/300th of a coin might buy you coffee if it is a good day, but the next day it might cost 1/100th of a coin. I just bought in because I'm hoping that what I can buy with 1/100th of a coin will only cost 1/300th by Christmas. Bitcoin is having a bad day and I hope to capitalize on it. Having bought at $650 I will be sad if it turns out that the new price is $500, and happy if BAML was right and we are off to $1300. But All of your arguments fall down in that you are either using an exchange to get from currency to BTC. Or you are keeping coins in a wallet and they could swing 50% in value in a day.

alwillis 13y ago

>Getting hold of bitcoin is not a straightforward process Actually, it's pretty straightforward these days: http://howtobuybitcoins.info http://howtobuybitcoins.info. By now, everyone should know the advantages of bitcoin: * low or no fees * transactions are nearly instant; confirmations take a few minutes * payments are irrevocable - no chargeback issues * you can pay anyone anywhere at anytime - no bank holidays, no paying Western Union fees to send money oversees and have it still take days * pseudo anonymous - you don't have to provide personal information to a financial organization to make payments * many vendors give a discounts for users willing to pay in bitcoin vs. dollars

wsxcde 13y ago
It's about 5 business days for coinbase to enable your account, not to mention the risk of giving a vendor access to your bank out. And I think each buy/sell transaction also takes a few days to apply? > transactions are nearly instant; confirmations take a few minutes This is true for my credit card too. > payments are irrevocable - no chargeback issues As a customer, I prefer the ability to make a chargeback. > you can pay anyone anywhere at anytime - no bank holidays, no paying Western Union fees to send money oversees and have it still take days I specifically excluded international transfers in my question. Anyway, these are heavily regulated and risk and volatility of bitcoin simply aren't worthwhile in comparison to the few dollars I would save. > pseudo anonymous - you don't have to provide personal information to a financial organization to make payments Could possibly be an advantage but isn't really true because coinbase would know all about me and all my transactions could be traced back to them by just traversing the block chain. > many vendors give a discounts for users willing to pay in bitcoin vs. dollars I would think about using bitcoin for this reason if I could convert USD -> BTC and quickly buy whatever I needed using BTC. But again this is something that takes days and who knows what the USD->BTC rate would be when I eventually do get my bitcoin. It's simply not worth it.

nl 13y ago

I put some money into Bitcoin recently. I'm speculating.

bdcravens 13y ago

There's some value in press/notoriety, if you think you'd be reaching eyes and ears for those who care about that sort of thing.

warfangle 13y ago

You can send a single satoshi* to an address that cannot spend said satoshi with the cryptographic signature of a document as the notation on it. Once the transaction is validated in the blockchain, you can prove mathematically that the document (while keeping secret the contents of the document) was published (created) on a given datetime. *1 satoshi = 5.8e-6 USD @ current coinbase exchange, Sat Dec 07 2013 02:59:12 GMT-0500

GeneralMayhem 13y ago

Your (b) sounds suspiciously similar to "if you've got nothing to hide, then why do you want privacy?" Having control over your money is valuable on its own merits for a lot of people.

wsxcde 13y ago
Actually that is a perfectly good argument except the people who make it are always being dishonest. When Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft or the NSA say "why do you want privacy?", they specifically mean us and not them. It's not like we can look into Apple's servers and make sure they aren't abusing all the the private data they store about us. It's not like we're allowed to analyze the NSA's hitlist to determine if there's racial profiling going on there. These companies won't let us look at their source code to see if there are backdoors in supposedly secure products. And we're never going to be able determine exactly where a politician's campaign funding is coming from. I would buy the argument "if you've got nothing to hide, then why do you want privacy?" if people making that argument were willing to apply those standards to themselves. They never want to do that, so I'm forced to conclude it's just a rhetorical device used to trick the naive into giving up their information for free.