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You do know who Charles Stross is, right? Influential sci-fi author, early web user, old school programmer? You may not agree with him, but it's not trolling, h

You do know who Charles Stross is, right? Influential sci-fi author, early web user, old school programmer? You may not agree with him, but it's not trolling, he raises many valid points and he's not the first to do it.

dcc1 13y ago
His main point is along the lines of "OMG <insert_bad_actors> can/may use <technologyXYZ>" Bitcooin like any tool from the invention of fire to tools like a hammer to "the web" can be used for good or bad, you think someone who writes sci-fi and programs would understand this.
- nicholassmith 13y ago
  His point is he's sick of the inherent drum-beating that BitCoin is the salve to the financial issues present in the gold backed/regulated traditional economy because it's just as broken, if not potentially more so.
  - dcc1 13y ago
    There is a lot of pumping by those who want "bitcoin to go to the moon" for their own financial gain. That still does not make bitcoin technology inherently evil. The distributed ledger and proof of work pioneered by Bitcoin does have incredible potential to change the way people transfer "value" between themselves. The problem is a subset of bitcoin users who want to get rich quick, that does not make this technology evil or worthy of death. Cash can also be used by all sorts of criminals for all sorts of shit, if anything its much easier to use for nefarious purposes than bitcoin. It was anonymity provided by TOR that gave rise to silk road, pseudo-anonymity provided by bitcoin was just a bonus.
- SideburnsOfDoom 13y ago
  No, his main point is that the ratio of good to bad uses is even worse in Bitcoin compared to the nasty banking system that we already have.
  - dcc1 13y ago
    I don't remember Bitcoin nearly collapsing the world economy and leading to misery for millions worldwide as the Banking sector has done in the past few years.
    - wmf 13y ago
      Bitcoin is still in beta; give it time.
    - SideburnsOfDoom 13y ago
      A worse ratio of uses, but a much smaller total magnitude.
- gottasayit 13y ago
  Meh, and you'd think that a singer as popular as Justin Bieber actually produced good music. Bitcooin like any tool from the invention of fire Well, yeah... Mr. Stross doesn't trust people to make their own decisions about using something like bitcoin, but he seems to advocate trusting those same people to vote for government overlords who will create rules that all of us should live by.
arethuza 13y ago
Also a fairly regular HN user: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=cstross https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=cstross
FatalLogic 13y ago
>it's not trolling, he raises many valid points and he's not the first to do it. Though he has done much fine writing before, I was really disappointed by this post by Charlie Stross. The arguments are weak and poorly supported. * The whole power consumption debate is based on a single out-of-date estimation at a bitcoin site. * The Gini Coefficient argument is based on a small survey from 2011 when Bitcoin was new and practially unknown with a tiny userbase of early adopters. * The point about malware mining is also outdated, and it refers to a problem that is going away fast. 99% of Bitcoin mining is now done with custom ASIC chips, which are vastly better at it than PC CPU/GPU hardware. Using a botnet for mining is becoming more and more pointless every week. [Botnets can still make a little money mining scrypt-based Litecoin, but that is also become less and less profitable, and ASIC chips are now on their way to that market, too.] * Many of his opinions about the "evil" of the Bitcoin network are just laughable. The world is evil. Nations go to war and millions die for no good reason. Millions of lives and entire nations are destroyed by the drug trade and the 'war' on drugs. International banks, like HSBC, launder hundreds of billions in drug funds. That is the status quo. In that context, Bitcoin is a tiny drop in a big and toxic ocean.

dcc1 13y ago

His main point is along the lines of "OMG <insert_bad_actors> can/may use <technologyXYZ>" Bitcooin like any tool from the invention of fire to tools like a hammer to "the web" can be used for good or bad, you think someone who writes sci-fi and programs would understand this.

nicholassmith 13y ago
His point is he's sick of the inherent drum-beating that BitCoin is the salve to the financial issues present in the gold backed/regulated traditional economy because it's just as broken, if not potentially more so.
- dcc1 13y ago
  There is a lot of pumping by those who want "bitcoin to go to the moon" for their own financial gain. That still does not make bitcoin technology inherently evil. The distributed ledger and proof of work pioneered by Bitcoin does have incredible potential to change the way people transfer "value" between themselves. The problem is a subset of bitcoin users who want to get rich quick, that does not make this technology evil or worthy of death. Cash can also be used by all sorts of criminals for all sorts of shit, if anything its much easier to use for nefarious purposes than bitcoin. It was anonymity provided by TOR that gave rise to silk road, pseudo-anonymity provided by bitcoin was just a bonus.
SideburnsOfDoom 13y ago
No, his main point is that the ratio of good to bad uses is even worse in Bitcoin compared to the nasty banking system that we already have.
- dcc1 13y ago
  I don't remember Bitcoin nearly collapsing the world economy and leading to misery for millions worldwide as the Banking sector has done in the past few years.
  - wmf 13y ago
    Bitcoin is still in beta; give it time.
  - SideburnsOfDoom 13y ago
    A worse ratio of uses, but a much smaller total magnitude.
gottasayit 13y ago
Meh, and you'd think that a singer as popular as Justin Bieber actually produced good music. Bitcooin like any tool from the invention of fire Well, yeah... Mr. Stross doesn't trust people to make their own decisions about using something like bitcoin, but he seems to advocate trusting those same people to vote for government overlords who will create rules that all of us should live by.

arethuza 13y ago

Also a fairly regular HN user: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=cstross https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=cstross

FatalLogic 13y ago

>it's not trolling, he raises many valid points and he's not the first to do it. Though he has done much fine writing before, I was really disappointed by this post by Charlie Stross. The arguments are weak and poorly supported. * The whole power consumption debate is based on a single out-of-date estimation at a bitcoin site. * The Gini Coefficient argument is based on a small survey from 2011 when Bitcoin was new and practially unknown with a tiny userbase of early adopters. * The point about malware mining is also outdated, and it refers to a problem that is going away fast. 99% of Bitcoin mining is now done with custom ASIC chips, which are vastly better at it than PC CPU/GPU hardware. Using a botnet for mining is becoming more and more pointless every week. [Botnets can still make a little money mining scrypt-based Litecoin, but that is also become less and less profitable, and ASIC chips are now on their way to that market, too.] * Many of his opinions about the "evil" of the Bitcoin network are just laughable. The world is evil. Nations go to war and millions die for no good reason. Millions of lives and entire nations are destroyed by the drug trade and the 'war' on drugs. International banks, like HSBC, launder hundreds of billions in drug funds. That is the status quo. In that context, Bitcoin is a tiny drop in a big and toxic ocean.