gansmaltz t1_jeam0et wrote on March 30, 2023 at 4:58 PM

Reply to comment by voice-of-reason_ in It's becoming increasingly clear that fintech has a fraud problem by marketrent

True, bitcoins are resilient for crypto, but why is it that, proportionally, so many of its users are scammers? I can't think of many situations where digital dollars would fail where Bitcoin is even accessible much less a useful medium of exchange where cash wouldnt be more useful.

Bitcoin wants to be the dollar bill of the internet but it can't even remain anonymous. By design every transaction becomes part of the blockchain for everyone, right?

SlowMotionPanic t1_jeaqps5 wrote on March 30, 2023 at 5:28 PM

> True, bitcoins are resilient for crypto, but why is it that, proportionally, so many of its users are scammers?

How do you know so many use it for illegal purposes—specifically scams? Over 1 million people own at least some Bitcoin. Most of its use is for investment, which is why wallet activity is chronically low. People buy and hold it like gold or any other asset they think will appreciate.

>I can’t think of many situations where digital dollars would fail where Bitcoin is even accessible much less a useful medium of exchange where cash wouldnt be more useful. >

That doesn’t have anything to do with the claims that a disproportionate number of Bitcoin users are scammers.
People don’t necessarily get into Bitcoin because they think a fiat currency is going to fail. They hold it like an investment because it tends to appreciate over time.
Bitcoin’s strength has never had to shine thankfully. That is, governments you and I live under haven’t failed and experienced currency collapse. But, for an example here, it is cheaper and much faster for me to convert cash into Bitcoin and hold in my wallet and travel internationally than engage an international wire transfer. There’s risk involved, of course. But one thing I don’t risk is having any cash I’m traveling with summarily seized without any recourse. I don’t have to worry about my government turning fascist and freezing my accounts to prevent me from leaving. It’s a hedge, like any decent investment.

> > Bitcoin wants to be the dollar bill of the internet but it can’t even remain anonymous.

What an odd pivot. The USD isn’t even anonymous unless you pay in cash. Bitcoin was never founded to be anonymous. It was founded to be a trustless system with a fixed amount of currency. It cracks me up that so many people in this thread are asserting that Bitcoin is private which is why criminals use it, when it is ridiculously easy to track transactions. People even put watches on wallets for fun to write articles about dormant wallets becoming active again, and the world governments have caught criminals when they try to use or move funds after a crime, even years later, because it is all part of the public ledger.

And our bank accounts are equally not private. Bitcoin is at best pseudo anonymous because of how it spawns various wallets by default and doesn’t have a central database of users to lookup real world info about.

>By design every transaction becomes part of the blockchain for everyone, right?

Yes, that’s how it remains trustless and secure. Do you know my bank account number? No? Do you know my Bitcoin wallet address? I could send a payment right now and use a one-time wallet. This isn’t as big of an argument as you think. If anything, it disproves that Bitcoin is an attractive target for criminals because it isn’t truly anonymous. You have workarounds at best.

400921FB54442D18 t1_jeatgdr wrote on March 30, 2023 at 5:45 PM

I don't know or care enough about Bitcoin to address any of your technical points -- I'm sure /u/gansmaltz will take that on -- but there are at least two obvious flaws in your claims here:

> People buy and hold it like gold or any other asset they think will appreciate.

I'm old enough to remember when my grandparents were certain that buying a bunch of silver and hiding it in their garage would pay for my college education. When they died, we cleaned it out and sold it for about $20.

... I don't think I need to spell out where I'm going with this. Those who cannot learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.

> People don’t necessarily get into Bitcoin because they think a fiat currency is going to fail.

In the early days of Bitcoin, this was the major argument that enthusiasts were using to try to encourage people to get into crypto -- being isolated from the risks of a state-backed fiat currency. So, to hear the crypto community now say that that isn't and wasn't the point, means that some substantial fraction of that community must be lying. Either they're lying now when they say that isn't the purpose, or they were lying 10-15 years ago when they said that that was the purpose, but either way, this doesn't say anything good about whether we should trust the crypto community with our money.

voice-of-reason_ t1_jebw3a0 wrote on March 30, 2023 at 9:52 PM

Have you read the Bitcoin white paper? It states it’s purpose in their.

You can’t judge a technology based on what some people on a subreddit say, you base it off of what the creator says.

Bitcoin is a decentralised peer to peer payment network - as described by the creator - that has been operating with no significant downtime (I.e. 0.000x%) 24/7 365 since 2009. If you don’t see how that is a good investment I don’t know what to tell you.

In you’re example you talk about silver being essentially worthless even though lots of people thought it had value. The reality is that this is the situation of the USD, GBP ETC. These currencies are seen by essentially everyone as safe but they have been collapsing slowly for the last 50 or so years, I’m sure as an older person you remember and have actively experienced this with the cost of everything increasing over your lifespan.

To me, in 2023 Bitcoin is the cash of your example and cash is the silver. It’s fine to disagree with that but every year and every recession more and more people realise the value of a neutral asset like Bitcoin.

Inflation over the past year has been bad, but hyperinflation (which is inevitable for all regular currencies) will kill your nations economy, Bitcoin doesn’t suffer that issue.

gansmaltz t1_jeasn4n wrote on March 30, 2023 at 5:40 PM

Nfts are good for artists too, right?

Edit: buy the dip! To the moon!