Bitcoin update.

[lardy]

Re: Bitcoin update.

Are you familiar with Bernie Madoff?

Yes, but he wasn't the entire stock market.

[OurManFlint II]

Re: Bitcoin update.

That's the similarity with a Ponzi. When you buy, you need more people to want to buy it. Just as in a Ponzi you need investors underneath you in the pyramid.

Traditional stocks move on company profits, etc, external factors affect it. With crypto, it's only how many people want to buy it. So as soon as you've bought a coin, you need to encourage others to buy.

I'm not trying to be down on crypto, but its value is solely in how many potential buyers there are. At the moment anyway.

In Bitcoin, who is Ponzi?

[lardy]

Re: Bitcoin update.

In Bitcoin, who is Ponzi?

Nobody is, as far as I know. I said it was similar to a Ponzi.

[lardy]

Re: Bitcoin update.

Nobody is, as far as I know. I said it was similar to a Ponzi.

Or to be more precise with what I said in #69, as I think people are going to jump on this, the current reliance on getting new investors is the similarity with a Ponzi.

[Rock_Flock_of_Five]

Re: Bitcoin update.

I gave an example, the stock market, which is not a Ponzi scheme.

In the future, crypto probably won't be so much like a Ponzi as there will be other uses for it.

You use the word 'crypto' as if in the singular. There are many cryptocurrencies and a lot of them already have a practical use, other than as a store of value.

[Rjk]

Re: Bitcoin update.

You use the word 'crypto' as if in the singular. There are many cryptocurrencies and a lot of them already have a practical use, other than as a store of value.

such as?

[lardy]

Re: Bitcoin update.

You use the word 'crypto' as if in the singular. There are many cryptocurrencies and a lot of them already have a practical use, other than as a store of value.

I was replying to someone who also used crypto that way - I guess it's the same as when someone says footballers earn too much money. They don't mean literally every single pro player.

You know more about this than me, and there's thousands of coins, so yes I'm sure it doesn't apply to all.

[Rock_Flock_of_Five]

Re: Bitcoin update.

No equipment required. You can usually commit your stake to the liquidity pool directly from your wallet. In the case of zilliqa, you can use zillet or moonlet.

such as?

Okay, off the top of my head and coins which I already own.... 'Theta' has been adopted by Sony and tackles the problem of bandwidth when streaming videos (buffering). It allows peer-to-peer sharing of bandwidth. Any smart TV can be integrated with Theta.

'XRP' has been adopted by a number of banks for the use of cross-border payments. Currently, the use of SWIFT or SEPA can take a number of working days to clear and can be costly (I recently paid 48 GBP to transfer money from the UK to China). XRP on the other hand can make such payments in seconds/minutes and costs pennies.
XRP (Ripple Labs) blows other payment methods such as Western Union and PayPal out of the water.

[OurManFlint II]

Re: Bitcoin update.

Or to be more precise with what I said in #69, as I think people are going to jump on this, the current reliance on getting new investors is the similarity with a Ponzi.

But its nothing like a ponzi.

Miners mine the bitcoin. Existential arguments aside for now, we assume IT is a thing, it is on the bitcoin ledger and thus now existing. The miner now has a thing, the miner goes to the market and sells it, and then that thing is bought, sold and traded and exists (again putting aside the question exist). A Ponzi is robbing peter to pay paul, where nothing exists i fail to see the similarity.

[lardy]

Re: Bitcoin update.

But its nothing like a ponzi.

Miners mine the bitcoin. Existential arguments aside for now, we assume IT is a thing, it is on the bitcoin ledger and thus now existing. The miner now has a thing, the miner goes to the market and sells it, and then that thing is bought, sold and traded and exists (again putting aside the question exist). A Ponzi is robbing peter to pay paul, where nothing exists i fail to see the similarity.

But why are people buying, selling and trading?

Imagine if you bought one bitcoin for £1,000 and you knew that it would still cost £1,000 in five years (hypothetical, ignoring inflation, etc). How much interest would there be in buying it today?

Probably very little. Most people only want it because they think it'll go up in value, and the only way that happens is if more new buyers increase demand.

That's the similarity with the Ponzi. When new buyers 'run out' the value drops as there's nothing to sustain it, which I think we're seeing now.

Like I said, I'm not shitting on it. Bitcoin will have an upward trend again.

[Rjk]

Re: Bitcoin update.

But its nothing like a ponzi.

Miners mine the bitcoin. Existential arguments aside for now, we assume IT is a thing, it is on the bitcoin ledger and thus now existing. The miner now has a thing, the miner goes to the market and sells it, and then that thing is bought, sold and traded and exists (again putting aside the question exist). A Ponzi is robbing peter to pay paul, where nothing exists i fail to see the similarity.

but the question remains over the value of "the thing"
If you mine up a load of gold, the price will go up or down, but you'd expect there to be a floor below which it won't go, because the gold itself has some use.

At the moment many people want bitcoin, but only because they think the price will go up. If everyone thinks the price will go down then it will go down, everyone will sell and it will become completely worthless. There is no floor.

It is relying on enough people believing they can make money out of having it to retain any value. like tinkerbell coming back to life in peter pan.
If enough people lose faith in that then its dead.

[Eric Cartman]

Re: Bitcoin update.

Investment goes up when more people want to buy it and down when less people want to buy it.

How is that different to buying Amazon or Google stock?

[OurManFlint II]

Re: Bitcoin update.

But why are people buying, selling and trading?

Imagine if you bought one bitcoin for £1,000 and you knew that it would still cost £1,000 in five years (hypothetical, ignoring inflation, etc). How much interest would there be in buying it today?

Probably very little. Most people only want it because they think it'll go up in value, and the only way that happens is if more new buyers increase demand.

That's the similarity with the Ponzi. When new buyers 'run out' the value drops as there's nothing to sustain it, which I think we're seeing now.

Like I said, I'm not shitting on it. Bitcoin will have an upward trend again.

All those things you say could well be true and happen, who knows. However, Bitcoin and Blockchain is the antithesis of a Ponzi, it literally sits on a public ledger...that is the whole point.

[OurManFlint II]

Re: Bitcoin update.

but the question remains over the value of "the thing"
If you mine up a load of gold, the price will go up or down, but you'd expect there to be a floor below which it won't go, because the gold itself has some use.

At the moment many people want bitcoin, but only because they think the price will go up. If everyone thinks the price will go down then it will go down, everyone will sell and it will become completely worthless. There is no floor.

It is relying on enough people believing they can make money out of having it to retain any value. like tinkerbell coming back to life in peter pan.
If enough people lose faith in that then its dead.

And so it may come to pass, I have no idea but it's not a Ponzi, that's all I'm arguing.

If people questioned the real banking system as ****ing hard as they do Bitcoin it would never have been invented