What are your thoughts on BitCoin?

[innonimatu]

The problem is more fundamental that a speed up. A problem that quantum computers are likely to be very good at is finding the prime factors of large numbers. Most modern encryption schemes, including those used to authorise transactions on the blockchain rely on people not being able to find these factors. If you can find the prime factors of a wallets key you can spend the money, and the whole system of trust falls apart.

No, you really do not. Intermediaries really help for exchange, but multi sig wallets do solve the problem if you have a small amount of trust. Most crypto transactions have no recourse to the courts, or they would not be using crypto.

I'm clearly not up do date with the latest tweaks to bitcoin.

Wallets would not be vulnerable if you kept single possession of them I think? But most use of cryptocurrencies now (all?) entrusts the wallets to some middleman that acts as payments agent?

 

[Samson]

I'm clearly not up do date with the latest tweaks to bitcoin.

Wallets would bot be vulnerable if you kept single possession of them I think? But most use of cryptocurrencies now (all?) entrusts the wallets to some middleman that acts as payments agent?

There always vulnerabilities, even if it is to rubber-hose cryptanalysis. You have to be pretty bad with computers or under significant personal threat for the vulnerabilities of a personally held wallet to be worse than getting someone else to hold them (cf. Mount Gox and Gerald Cotten). People do make use of these services, I do not understand why. The bitcoin blockchain has got pretty big (1/3rd of a TB), but you do not need to download it to hold your own wallet. You need the blockchain to read what is happening (and you can use other peoples copies that they host), but you need the wallet to make payments.

 

[innonimatu]

Thought it would be bigger that 1/3rd of a TB by now, that was one of the looming problems. But then with transactions moving into those third-party services that growth has slowed?
And people are generally holding their own wallets now? Good for them.

Even if understanding and care with the use generally improved there re built-in flaws, the horrible inefficiency and the inherent value volatility, that make this doomed as a currency.But I'll be repeating myself to insist in that. Anyway it's an interesting data point, seeing here that there are people still happy to use it for occasional transactions despite the volatility.

 

[Samson]

Thought it would be bigger that 1/3rd of a TB by now, that was one of the looming problems. But then with transactions moving into those third-party services that growth has slowed?
And people are generally holding their own wallets now? Good for them.

Even if understanding and care with the use generally improved there re built-in flaws, the horrible inefficiency and the inherent value volatility, that make this doomed as a currency.But I'll be repeating myself to insist in that. Anyway it's an interesting data point, seeing here that there are people still happy to use it for occasional transactions despite the volatility.

I do not know what other people are doing, just that there is no good reason to get someone else to hold them. I do not disagree about the horrible inefficiency and the inherent value volatility, but they do serve a function.

In a cashless society, where the only options were VISA (which the state has free access to) and crypto, I think a lot of people would put up with the problems.

 

[Narz]

As long as people don't trust the dollar/fiat currency crypto will thrive

The banks can just print money but supposedly coinbase has a similar scheme. They don't actually hold your coins they only actually have to provide them if you sell.

 

[innonimatu]

In a cashless society, where the only options were VISA (which the state has free access to) and crypto, I think a lot of people would put up with the problems.

But everyone has free access to crypto, it's even worse! The record is there in the blockchain.
To hide it you must use intermediaries anyway. To which the state of course has access. They might have been slow to notice this was a thing and get it but you can bet they have access now.
That was a bitcoin selling point that I always thought the most absurd.

 

[Samson]

But everyone has free access to crypto, it's even worse! The record is there in the blockchain.
To hide it you must use intermediaries anyway. To which the state of course has access. They might have been slow to notice this was a thing and get it but you can bet they have access now.
That was a bitcoin selling point that I always thought the most absurd.

Look at monero. You cannot link transactions to wallets, so no-one can see who is spending what, and who has what. You can also be your own intermediary, and the transactions are really cheap (1/50th of a penny last time I checked) so you can really be as secure as you like.

 

[innonimatu]

Look at monero. You cannot link transactions to wallets, so no-one can see who is spending what, and who has what. You can also be your own intermediary, and the transactions are really cheap (1/50th of a penny last time I checked) so you can really be as secure as you like.

Perhaps some day don't have the time now.
One other funny (ironic?) thing with cryptocurrencies is that while each may be designed to be finite, there are an infinite number of cryptocurrencies and there goes the value through scarcity argument, really.

 

[innonimatu]

This kind of piece about blockchain is not new by now but it's funny and on the issue, so I want to leave a link:
Blockchain, the amazing solution for almost nothing

 

[Moriarte]

One of the big crypto-lifting news of late 2020 - PayPal’s adoption of Bitcoin, Ether, Litecoin and BCH into the line up of available payment methods, first for US customers, potentially for the rest of it’s ~400 mil world wide user base. The service is going to roll out in spring and marks a milestone in the eyes of those who has long hoped for serious institutional support.

More here: https://cointelegraph.com/news/will...ion-bring-crypto-to-the-masses-experts-answer

Another major tailwind is the fact that world governments are printing money like crazy, for obvious reasons, and likely to keep doing it in the near future, eroding value of national currencies. As the time passed, major developments made some of the top cryptos “greener”, aka “Proof of Stake”, did your opinions shift in any direction?

In case you’re sitting in a cozy chair and wondering “the hell is proof of stake..?”, here’s a little youtube video, explains it briefly:

Spoiler PoS :

 

[Samson]

One of the big crypto-lifting news of late 2020 - PayPal’s adoption of Bitcoin, Ether, Litecoin and BCH into the line up of available payment methods, first for US customers, potentially for the rest of it’s ~400 mil world wide user base. The service is going to roll out in spring and marks a milestone in the eyes of those who has long hoped for serious institutional support.

More here: https://cointelegraph.com/news/will...ion-bring-crypto-to-the-masses-experts-answer

Another major tailwind is the fact that world governments are printing money like crazy, for obvious reasons, and likely to keep doing it in the near future, eroding value of national currencies. As the time passed, major developments made some of the top cryptos “greener”, aka “Proof of Stake”, did your opinions shift in any direction?

In case you’re sitting in a cozy chair and wondering “the hell is proof of stake..?”, here’s a little youtube video, explains it briefly:

Spoiler PoS :

Interesting, but it seems to me that crypto is a prime competitor to paypal, I am not sure why you would use paypal if you were paying with crypto?

 

[Moriarte]

Interesting, but it seems to me that crypto is a prime competitor to paypal, I am not sure why you would use paypal if you were paying with crypto?

I see them as natural allies. Both PP, alternative payment platform, and crypto, enfant terrible of fintech, compete with visa, mastercard and the rest of conventional banking by offering alternative avenues for settling commercial deals. Paypal is willing to absorb some of the market and charge it’s mark up in the process. All the same to them if clients deal in greenbacks or Litecoin. I don’t see the conflict.

Plenty of merchants accept paypal, a fraction of those accept crypto. Having a settling platform enables to pay through paypal using crypto. A kind of a gateway into the real world for those sitting on stashes of unrealisable crypto.

 

[Hygro]

Decentralized finance, or DeFi, is extremely interesting.

So is Kraken, the crypto exchange, becoming a chartered US bank.

 

[Samson]

America says banks can now transact using so-called stable crypto-coins.

The US Treasury Department's Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) on Monday published a letter clarifying how federally chartered banking groups can use cryptocurrency and associated technology to manage financial transactions.
The letter endorses the use of independent node verification networks (INVN), such as blockchain distributed ledgers, and stablecoins – cryptocurrencies tied to fiat currencies, like Ethereum-based USD Coin (USDC) – as a means to settle customer transactions.

The policy change is not entirely surprising given that Brooks served as chief legal officer for cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase for two years before being nominated by President Trump to serve as Acting Comptroller of the Currency. Coinbase and digital payments biz Circle are the creators of USDC, a cryptocurrency pegged to the US dollar.
Circle co-founder and CEO Jeremy Allaire expressed enthusiasm for the OCC letter, calling it "a huge win for crypto and stablecoins." Coincidentally, it's likely to be a huge win for Allaire's firm.​

 

[sendos]

I'd say too high to buy, but Bitcoin has indeed proven itself worthy.

 

[Samson]

Bitcoin blamed for air pollution across Iran

Cities across Iran have been cloaked in thick layers of toxic smog and darkened by blackouts, as the alleged use of low-quality fuel and power-sucking cryptocurrency mining deepen the country’s hardships.
Power plants have been forced to switch to burning low-grade fuel oils to generate electricity because high levels of domestic consumption have led to natural-gas shortages, the semi-official Iranian Students’ News Agency reported. Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh denied earlier this week that any of Iran’s power stations are using fuel oil to generate electricity.
Other plants have shut down, resulting in blackouts in various cities including the capital, Tehran. Officials there said on Wednesday that pollution levels had become “dangerous,” ISNA reported.
Gas has become scarce because it’s used to heat most Iranian homes, and temperatures have been especially cold this winter. Household use has also increased as people stay at home to avoid coronavirus infection, while travel in private vehicles has shot up as people shun mass transport.
Household gas consumption was up by 30% in late November from a month earlier, Mohammadreza Joulaei, director of supply at the National Iranian Gas Co., told state TV.
The outages have been compounded by the mining of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, which uses banks of high-powered computers to verify the legitimacy of transactions and create units of digital coin, government officials have said.
U.S. sanctions that have isolated Iran from global financial institutions have fueled a surge in cryptocurrency mining in the Islamic Republic, which has some of the cheapest electricity in the world.​

 

[EnglishEdward]

Two thoughts:

(1)

Bitcoin: Newport man's plea to find £210m hard drive in tip

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-55658942

(does AmazonQueen know that person?)

(2) Bitcoin causes global warming and should be illegal.

On that one the Iranians are right.

 

[El_Machinae]

I read that 2/3rds of mining is now done in China. This means that (a) USD are directly subsidizing the Chinese high-tech industry through demand stimulus and (b) a force hack of the blockchain is technically possible if we imagine supernatural dictatorial powers.

I'll reiterate that buying bitcoin creates price-support for mining, which is now damaging the planet in significant ways.

 

[innonimatu]

Bitcoin is one of the dumbest ideas ever, waste resources needlessly to enforce artificial scarcity of a fictional thing... of course it had to have come from libertarians!

 

[Kaitzilla]

The appeal is that it is a currency system where the currency cannot be created at will by some central bank.

It is electronic unlike gold or silver (which avoids problems like "paper" gold being more numerous than physical) and has the desirable feature of keeping the users anonymous when they perform transactions. The total amount of bitcoins will end up around 21 million as designed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin


Many would argue that not being able to arbitrarily adjust the money supply is a major weakness of a currency. Back during the gold standard, inflation and deflation would set in based on mining activities and the flows of precious metals and mercantilist policies.


The current popularity of bitcoin is most likely a fad. There is no FDIC insurance on bitcoin accounts that I am aware of, so they are risky to hold.

Assuming the entire world economy switched to bitcoins, each would be worth about $2 million I think, so doubtless many early adopters are hoping they will get rich if the idea takes off.


Here is a bitcoin ATM
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-5...his-atm-takes-dollars-and-funds-your-account/

No, I don't own any.

8 years later now and they are $40,000 a bitcoin!

When every central bank monetizes the debt, guess this was possible.