Do stories about Bitcoin cause you to feel anger?
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- Do stories about Bitcoin cause you to feel anger? Posted on December 12th, 2024 | 80 comments
- Do you still use cash? Posted on December 12th, 2024 | 54 comments
I feel ... (Score:5, Interesting)
... CowboyNeal.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm having trouble imagining the Cowboy Neal option for this one...
But I feel more sadness than anger. Bugs me to watch suckers getting exploited by their human natures. Did you know that you can train monkeys to gamble? And that young chimps will gamble for bigger stakes than the older ones?
Some CowboyNeal options for Yes/No questions (Score:1)
* Yes
* No
* Not as much as CowboyNeal
* More than CowboyNeal
* Ask CowboyNeal [how I feel]
* I [feel the same way] as CowboyNeal
Rising Concern (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Concurrence. Perhaps the poll should have offered emotional options (or groups of emotions)?
However we're already deep into fantasy-based economics, especially as regards stock prices and the related market caps. On that side, I think a transaction fee for every trade would be a really good thing and might create some pressure for normalization...
As a general solution, I think economics needs to be reconsidered. My own version would be ekronomics based on time >> money. (Talk about imaginary values...
Re: Rising Concern (Score:2)
Bitcoin has no intrinsic value
The same is true for literally every fiat currency.
Re: Rising Concern (Score:1)
Re: Rising Concern (Score:2)
The vast majority of fiat currency doesn't exist either. Somebody actually has made physical bitcoins before though, see the casascias coin.
Re: Rising Concern (Score:2)
You can print the Bitcoin hash. There's intrinsic value there (and it is worth more than the paper it is printed on).
Re: (Score:2)
All fiat currencies are backed by their governments. Who is backing bitcoin exactly? Money launderers and criminals is the answer generally to that.
Re: Rising Concern (Score:2)
Government backing only means as much as you trust the particular government with your stored value to properly manage its central bank. Cryptocurrency trust is only on the actual protocols involved, and whether you trust that they will work as designed.
Re: (Score:2)
Government is a system based on weapons.
Re: Rising Concern (Score:2)
FOMOCoin, a more useful name.
Re: (Score:1)
A paper bill has (almost) no intrinsic value yet people have agreed it communicated value.
Annoyance (Score:2)
Re:Annoyance (Score:4, Insightful)
I feel a bit of regret that I didn't run up some bitcoins when it was the early days, but it is what it is.
Re: Annoyance (Score:5, Interesting)
Best time was a decade ago. Second best time is now.
Re: (Score:3)
Sorry, the electricity bill will outshine the profit.
Re: (Score:2)
In the short term. I had the same answer over ten years ago. In the long term it could work out as profitable... but you can't know that for sure.
I don't like to gamble... so I don't.
Re: (Score:1)
I remember when bitcoin was $30 (Score:2)
Re: I remember when bitcoin was $30 (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Anger? (Score:5, Interesting)
Of course I'm angry (Score:5, Informative)
The criminal activity I'm going to focus on is: ransomware. As Nicholas Weaver has correctly observed, The Ransomware Problem Is a Bitcoin Problem [lawfaremedia.org]. And it's a big problem because the sociopaths behind ransomware attacks aren't just going after large corporations who could pay the ransom out of petty cash, they're going after small organizations, underfunded government agencies, nonprofits, hospitals, and other institutions that provide services for the public good -- and in many cases, to the poorest, most disadvantaged, most vulnerable people. One example of many: Lincoln College to close after 157 years due ransomware attack [bleepingcomputer.com].
I've volunteered my time and expertise to help out some nonprofit organizations with infosec, and I'll volunteer to help out more. But even the efforts of a thousand people like me aren't going to be enough. The people behind these attacks don't care who they hurt, or how badly; they don't care what they damage or destroy. They're consumed by greed, and that greed is fueled by the cryptocurrency ecosystem and the ceaseless hype of its advocates.
It's an epidemic, it's getting worse, and the cumulative damage is enormous. It's undoing the work of underpaid, dedicated people who have spent (in many cases) their entire professional lives trying to do some good in this world, and it's hurting people who don't have the luxury of options. So every time I read about crypto-this or crypto-that I don't picture someone buying a sports car or taking a vacation: I picture the people who were lined up outside the free clinic waiting for it to open on a Wednesday morning...when it never did, because that was the day it was forced to close forever -- because of crypto.
Re: (Score:1)
I don't understand how that's different than a ransomware attack. People need to learn how to keep backups of all their data. Never trust just the cloud. You
Re:Of course I'm angry (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
The people being targeted are running cobbled-together operations on shoestring budgets. They don't have you or me, or any other IT people. They have what little infrastructure they could manage to afford, and every dollar they spent on that was a dollar they couldn't put into medical care or books or daycare or food or counseling or whatever their real mission/service is. They work long hours, they face incr
Re: (Score:3)
> Cryptocurrency has been described as "fake money for criminals", and that's entirely apt.
Nit-pick, this doesn't change the spirit or meaning of your post, but I would posit that there isn't a such thing as "fake" money as long as people are using it for trade.
Historically everything from notches on wood (tally sticks) to salt and pepper has been used as currency. Money is just a commodity that is used for intermediary trade. The idea being that if you had to barter your services as a software developer
Re: Of course I'm angry (Score:2)
To paraphrae Don Draper (Score:3)
To paraphrase Don Draper: "I don't even think about bitcoin"
What angers me is the obviously divisive agenda the eds here have. What they post, how they frame it. Clearly trying to stir shit up.
The "feel" of slashdot since bees-Ex bought them is much like The View.
How's your mobile hits lately, suckers? Your ad crusade is failing. Instead of circumventing the mobile ad shit I simply stopped reading slashdot on the phone
Fuck you and and your ads. You really want all of us gone, don't you, eds?
Re: (Score:1)
The "feel" of slashdot since bees-Ex bought them is much like The View.
Maybe because their parent company might see Bitcoin as a competitor to their own products; they apparently also offer credit lines payable only in their own company digital currency.
Note: now I see why you spelled the company name the way you did. Whenever I tried posting the Wikipedia article about them, or any quote with their name, I got the "Lameness Filter" lock. So apparently, Thou Shalt Not Mention Daddy.
Uses for bitcoin (Score:3, Insightful)
Bitcoin has multiple disadvantages (as per $800 million in hard drive thrown in garbage dump). It does have a few advantages, mainly secrecy from all - even the government.
While clearly this is advantageous to people hated by the government, this is not always just criminals, terrorists and other evil doers. There are places where there is no effective government - such as War Zones, and governments that any just person would object to - such as North Korea.
If you are trying to get out of such an area with your life savings or send money to those trapped in it, bitcoin is the perfect method.
Re: (Score:2)
It does have a few advantages, mainly secrecy from all - even the government.
Um [reddit.com], nope [acfcs.org]. That said, if you use mixers it's a lot harder to track, and if you use some cryptocurrencies that are designed to be "harder to track [than BC]" it's harder to track. But a public ledger is just that: Public.
If you are trying to get out [a war zone or North Korea or a similar place] with your life savings or send money to those trapped in it, bitcoin is the perfect method.
If you can get your life savings converted to/
2010 (Score:5, Insightful)
Because I found bitcoin in 2010. It was around $.1 per coin. I had a 'CUDA' nvidia video card and mine'd some in hardware. Probably about $1 total. So I thought, I should just spend $10 and buy some of this stuff. But we were living paycheck to paycheck and I'd have to explain to my wife why I was wasting money on 'digital money' that couldn't yet be spent anywhere. Even buying it seemed shady/scammy. If I couldn't convince myself it was a good idea there's no way I'd convince someone else.
They cause me to feel stupidity (Score:2)
for all the people buying a worthless token, right now it has value. Value is not worth.
Two problems with bitcoin... (Score:2)
Re:Two problems with bitcoin... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:1, Informative)
nope, bitcoin is mined with 80 percent fossil energy in these United States, similar in rest of world.
bitcoin is very black.
Re: (Score:3)
It sucks as a currency because of the TX fees and transaction delays (and no "muh lightning" is no fix) Imagine if you had to pay at McDonalds with 0.00043 BTC, but you had to wait 40 mins for the next block to confirm, and due to congestion on the blockchain the fees are now ~15 USD per TX.
Litecoin is better, it typically confirms within 5 minutes and TX fees are less than a cent.
It's useful for buying things our rulers deem "verboten"
Re: (Score:2)
Ponzi scheme (Score:2)
Application (Score:2)
I had seen stories in the early days of cyrpto of how ledger technologies could be used to reduce fraud and improve efficiency, removing a layer of overhead to transactions.
Where are we now?
For all the promise of bitcoin and the like, it has done the opposite and for what? A future currency more suspect than the ones we have now?
That's a future I want no part in.
Bitcoin is the new gold (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: Bitcoin is the new gold (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
So get out there and short it if you think it's a fail. If not, you are not very confident in your viewpoint.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Yes (Score:4, Interesting)
It makes me angry to be reminded that we live in a world stupid enough to allow cryptocurrency trading to be legal. The same world that has all these laws against gambling and unqualified investing and money laundering to the point that legit international money transfers between certain places are nearly impossible also allows a payment system to exist that makes ransomware payments not only practical but arguably convenient. The legality of cryptocurrency is a long-running mockery of all those laws, many of which existed for very good reasons.
It makes me angry that we live in a world stupid enough to allow an anti-efficient technology to exist, arguably when we can least afford it from a CO2 emissions standpoint. There's never been anything as anti-efficient as proof-of-work mining before in humanity's history. It's a pointless ecological disaster.
in short, it makes me angry that we've allowed the growth of this market that does little more than enable criminal finance and enable grifters to fleece the ignorant all while wasting vast amounts of energy on what could otherwise be very energy-efficient operations.
Re: Yes (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3)
You must've missed my whole post being about cryptocurrency having all these problems the dollar doesn't have, and being able to do very little good that the dollar can't do. Technologies don't all have equal potential for good and evil, and they need to be weighed against existing options. Cryptocurrency's potential for evil is powerful and novel and its potential for good is almost completely redundant.
It's like a staple gun that runs on bunker fuel via wireless charging and lays staples OK, but can also
Re: (Score:2)
Like what? The possibility of a government printing too much causing libertarian bad feels? How does that weigh against the perverse incentives of an inherently deflationary currency? Or the potential for 51% attacks? Or the impossibility of any authority reversing any transactions no matter how plainly fraudulent or criminal?
Seriously, the dollar has zero problems for level-headed and mostly-law-abiding people. There is little to nothing cryptocurrency is better at that such people would see as an improvem
Sort of. Seems like a waste of resources (Score:3)
Anger perhaps not, but I feel it is a massive waste of energy and resources that could have been put to better use.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Not anger, its something else.. (Score:3)
I feel a combination of pity and schadenfreude.
As if Slashdot cared (Score:2)
Cute of you to ask, but we all know you don't actually care. [slashdot.org]
Re: (Score:2)
That's cute Slashdot staff - writing up anonymous trolling replies instead of putting your energy into implementing a 'cryptocurrency' story filter. [slashdot.org]
Real cute.
Everything is Worth What Someone Will Pay for it. (Score:2)
I wouldn't say it makes me angry. It makes me confused... or rather it re-affirms that I don't understand other people enough to ever attempt to speculate on the market (any market). Bitcoin's one value is that other people will buy it from you; the hope is that they will pay more than you did. You can argue that you can use it to buy products, but as long as those products are priced in USD (or some other currency), you're actually trading your Bitcoin for USD at the current exchange rate and then buying t
No more than other bubbles (Score:2)
Do stories about South Sea shares, tulips, or meme stocks make me angry? Of course these other ones have to do with things having at least SOME intrinsic value.
Because it's a sick joke (Score:4, Insightful)
A fake currency, created by consuming lots of energy and spending a lot of money on servers, whose value ebbs and flows like shit backing up in a sewer of fatburgs, that scam artists use to dupe people with money into pouring all their savings into, that only really creates wealth for tech bro hucksters, and has promoted moronic ideas like Web 3.0 and NFTs. It's not really anonymous, its value is schizophrenic, it can't be used for any real goods or investments (other than drugs, ransomware, child porn, or hits-for-hire), It's a fucking scam, and yet it gets talked about by the financial press in the same breath as IBM stock.
So yeah. Manipulative predatory insanity masquerading as a good fiscal tool makes me angry.
It's been discussed over and over (Score:3)
None of the original goals have been reached. It has long since transformed into a worse version of what the original idea tried to prevent.
More like slight regret (Score:2)
If I had invested just 50 euro then, at a few cents per bitcoin, now I'd be very wealthy. But chances are that almost anyone who bought bitcoin at cents would have sold them when they reached 1.000, or 10.000 euro. So chances are, I would have sold them much
Anger? No. Bemusement? Maybe. (Score:3)
Bitcoin is, in a way, a magnifying glass into the modern human psyche. Not the individual human psyche, the aggregate human psyche. It takes tremendous amounts of energy, used by extremely expensive hardware, hardware that has had its value escalate at least partially on the back of Bitcoin itself, to produce, and the end-result is something utilized mostly for crime, and crime-related activities. Give us the opportunity to do good and helpful things, and the aggregate human response is a horribly whiny, "But that sounds hard." Give us something that wastes tremendous resources but *MAY* pay off at some theoretical point in the future in an increase in wealth, and we fall all over ourselves trying to make it happen.
I'm well past anger at human aggregate stupidity. It's bemusing, in the way that kid that keeps trying to jump the creek and keeps landing dead-center in it is bemusing. He may break his leg or arm eventually, and you and his parents have both told him he should knock it off, but he's determined for some reason to just keep pushing his luck. That's us as a species. Just keep trying to jump that creek. We don't know why. We don't know what the payoff is even if we make it. But by the gods, we're not going to stop trying!
Not yet (Score:2)
But if bitcoin uses significantly more electricity than banking in general, I'm not going to be too thrilled the most efficient banking methods are not being used: https://www.nasdaq.com/article... [nasdaq.com]
Daily life... (Score:2)
Not in for the long haul (Score:1)
Not mad about it. I think people don't understand what it is and how the rug can be yanked out from under them at any time. I've already seen people lose six figures on a pullback. They panicked and sold. Bought high and sold low. It's not for the faint of heart, that's for sure.
Bitcoin was great as a start. Proof of concept. It was set up intentionally to be very computationally intensive. Starting it up was also very risky. If they ever find out who Satoshi is, he could be in for some tough times. That co
Disappointment (Score:2)
I really wanted cryptocurrency to work out. There is such a need for digital cash that lets people pay for things online without credit card companies charging exorbitant processing fees and then on top of that tracking every transaction and selling your purchase history to anyone willing pay. In addition to making existing purchases better, I thought cryptocurrency had a chance of becoming Clay Shirky's micropayments, enabling business models that can't exist now. Reading about far away lands (SV) where th
Angry? (Score:2)
I have bought Bitcoin every week since 2015.
I am not angry. I am very rich.
It is still early.
Cheers
No. (Score:1)
here, yes (Score:2)
I'm angry that cryptoscammers took over a site I cared about and started posting piles of bullshit about these scams as if they weren't scams.