Let me ask you this. If the hard drive that contains the private keys for your wallet is melted down to a liquid and allowed to cool, what is the value of that hard drive?
What would be the value of a gold coin given the same treatment?
If you burn down a library do the books still have any value?
The thing is, if I have a pile of gold coins, and a bunch of crypto in a private wallet on a hard drive and the house those things are in burns down, I’ll still have the gold. It just won’t be in coins.
All of that is kind of pointless because again, both of these things are terrible investments. You’re quite astute to point out the flaws in gold but what’s incredible is that you fail to see those same flaws, using the same logic, apply to crypto only in a more exaggerated form.
If you’re worried about the dollar collapsing, crypto will not save you from that, any more than a pile of gold will. Do you think the banks will just lock their doors one day and everyone will still go to work in the morning? Do you expect that trade will still function in a normal, civilized way?
Crypto is built on so many dependant layers of technology that if the dollar collapses, crypto will be as valuable as a library on fire.
Ah, but if you can find the book in thousands upon thousands of libraries spread all around the world, has anything been lost?
Bitcoin is crypto. Crypto is not Bitcoin. I strongly encourage you to look into the history of money. What has been used as money in the past, why it was used as money…rai stones are my favorite example.
Bitcoin, if you are able to understand the mechanics of it, is the “hardest” form of money that has ever existed. History shows money always flows into the hardest asset available. It also shows what happens when that asset loses its hardness. This is why gold has been king for a long, long time.
Then along came Bitcoin (NOT crypto, there was crypto before and crypto after), and it used game theory, the internet, math, cryptography and programming to become the most elegant store of value ever invented, which is also the hardest form of money ever created.
I actually loathe Bitcoin, even if I admire it and buy it. It’s an energy nightmare. No one will ever convince me that it’s “green” in any meaningful way. And I’m a huge environmentalist. But I’m not an idiot. It’s inevitable. It’s already started. Fiat currencies are going to start inflating uncontrollably and the money is going to go somewhere. If Bitcoin is superior as a store of value to gold, and more importantly is harder than gold, it’s got a long, long way to go.
Maybe you should look in to the history of money. Gold has not been king for a long time. It never really was.
Silver has always been more common as a standard. Gold and silver were frequently used in conjunction with each other, and neither of them have served as a standard intentionally since 1971. Well before any crypto. Using gold and gold alone as the standard is actually quite rare, and one time happened by accident.
Fun fact, at one point the Spanish thought they’d found an incredible amount of silver only to discover halfway across the Atlantic that it was some other shiney silver metal. They proceeded to dump tons of worthless plantinum overboard so as to not pollute the silver supply.
On Yap Island, giant circular stones were used as a form of currency. Everyone kind of just agreed on who owned what stones. At one point one fell off a boat and sunk, but because everyone knew that stone was still there, they could still assign value to it, and so it still stood in as currency. This single example is the closest real world example to crypto you’re going to find. And even obscure rocks on a remote island are a better investment because pretending a giant rock has value doesn’t depend on the Internet continuing to exist.
Salt, in various forms, has been used as currency and a standard of value. This is literally the origin of the word Salary. Roman soldiers were paid in salt. In Ethiopia they used bars of it as recently as the 1900s. In West Africa they even used bottle caps when coinage was scarce.
As it happens, bottle caps are a pretty good currency. They’re scarce, labeled, not super common, light and easy to carry, and easy to count. Notably, they also do not require the infrastructure that created them to continue to exist to retain value. None of the currencies I’ve mentioned, and to be clear these were currencies not commodities, require any of the technology that created them to exist to retain value. Bracelets, bricks of tea, tally sticks, seashells, even fucking Parmesan cheese all have functioned as a form of standard currency and all of them were better currencies than any crypto ever has been.
Crypto is a commodity. Except it only has value within is existing infrastructure. It will be like never getting able to check a book out of the library. Quite honestly if you’re going to trade commodities, it’s one of the least monstrous commodities to trade. The exorbitant energy costs notwithstanding.
So it’s made of fairy dust, got it
What a wild thing to say about gold when you’re arguing in favor of cryptocurrency.
It would be wild, if that’s what actually happened
Edit: Do you have a charity picked out? Or shall I just go ahead and buy more Bitcoin?
Fairy dust, don’t be ridiculous. It’s Pixie dust.
Let me ask you this. If the hard drive that contains the private keys for your wallet is melted down to a liquid and allowed to cool, what is the value of that hard drive?
What would be the value of a gold coin given the same treatment?
I answered your question so maybe you’ll do me the honour of answering mine.
If someone breaks into your house and steals your gold coins, what value do they have to you?
If it burns down, how much will it cost to recoup all your gold back into a manageable, tradeable form?
If you burn down a library do the books still have any value?
The thing is, if I have a pile of gold coins, and a bunch of crypto in a private wallet on a hard drive and the house those things are in burns down, I’ll still have the gold. It just won’t be in coins.
All of that is kind of pointless because again, both of these things are terrible investments. You’re quite astute to point out the flaws in gold but what’s incredible is that you fail to see those same flaws, using the same logic, apply to crypto only in a more exaggerated form.
If you’re worried about the dollar collapsing, crypto will not save you from that, any more than a pile of gold will. Do you think the banks will just lock their doors one day and everyone will still go to work in the morning? Do you expect that trade will still function in a normal, civilized way?
Crypto is built on so many dependant layers of technology that if the dollar collapses, crypto will be as valuable as a library on fire.
Ah, but if you can find the book in thousands upon thousands of libraries spread all around the world, has anything been lost?
Bitcoin is crypto. Crypto is not Bitcoin. I strongly encourage you to look into the history of money. What has been used as money in the past, why it was used as money…rai stones are my favorite example.
Bitcoin, if you are able to understand the mechanics of it, is the “hardest” form of money that has ever existed. History shows money always flows into the hardest asset available. It also shows what happens when that asset loses its hardness. This is why gold has been king for a long, long time.
Then along came Bitcoin (NOT crypto, there was crypto before and crypto after), and it used game theory, the internet, math, cryptography and programming to become the most elegant store of value ever invented, which is also the hardest form of money ever created.
I actually loathe Bitcoin, even if I admire it and buy it. It’s an energy nightmare. No one will ever convince me that it’s “green” in any meaningful way. And I’m a huge environmentalist. But I’m not an idiot. It’s inevitable. It’s already started. Fiat currencies are going to start inflating uncontrollably and the money is going to go somewhere. If Bitcoin is superior as a store of value to gold, and more importantly is harder than gold, it’s got a long, long way to go.
Maybe you should look in to the history of money. Gold has not been king for a long time. It never really was.
Silver has always been more common as a standard. Gold and silver were frequently used in conjunction with each other, and neither of them have served as a standard intentionally since 1971. Well before any crypto. Using gold and gold alone as the standard is actually quite rare, and one time happened by accident.
Fun fact, at one point the Spanish thought they’d found an incredible amount of silver only to discover halfway across the Atlantic that it was some other shiney silver metal. They proceeded to dump tons of worthless plantinum overboard so as to not pollute the silver supply.
On Yap Island, giant circular stones were used as a form of currency. Everyone kind of just agreed on who owned what stones. At one point one fell off a boat and sunk, but because everyone knew that stone was still there, they could still assign value to it, and so it still stood in as currency. This single example is the closest real world example to crypto you’re going to find. And even obscure rocks on a remote island are a better investment because pretending a giant rock has value doesn’t depend on the Internet continuing to exist.
Salt, in various forms, has been used as currency and a standard of value. This is literally the origin of the word Salary. Roman soldiers were paid in salt. In Ethiopia they used bars of it as recently as the 1900s. In West Africa they even used bottle caps when coinage was scarce.
As it happens, bottle caps are a pretty good currency. They’re scarce, labeled, not super common, light and easy to carry, and easy to count. Notably, they also do not require the infrastructure that created them to continue to exist to retain value. None of the currencies I’ve mentioned, and to be clear these were currencies not commodities, require any of the technology that created them to exist to retain value. Bracelets, bricks of tea, tally sticks, seashells, even fucking Parmesan cheese all have functioned as a form of standard currency and all of them were better currencies than any crypto ever has been.
Crypto is a commodity. Except it only has value within is existing infrastructure. It will be like never getting able to check a book out of the library. Quite honestly if you’re going to trade commodities, it’s one of the least monstrous commodities to trade. The exorbitant energy costs notwithstanding.
Yes, you’re correct. A melted hard drive would not have the same value as a gold coin melted down.
What is your point?