• Veraticus@lib.lgbtEnglish
    172·
    1 year ago

    noo you don’t understand it’s going to the moon noooo hodl hodl hodl nooooooooo plz buy my crypto thank you :(

  • TootSweet@lemmy.worldEnglish
    4·
    1 year ago

    Way back when Bitcoin was first being talked about on Slashdot, I mined for a while. On my processor. For like a month. I got about 1/20 of a Bitcoin out of it.

    And then I lost interest for a long time. And then it became clear blockchain is an infinite self-similar fractal of scams and ponsis.

    I haven’t done anything with my 1/20 of a Bitcoin. I don’t have any expectation it will go up or down. If the bubble takes back off and inflates so much 1/20 of a Bitcoin becomes life-changing money, I might try to sell it. Maybe if a bunch of crypto-owning crypto-skeptics organize a mass sell event to drive it to zero, I’ll take part. Otherwise, it’ll stay where it is for the forseeable future.

    Ironic that someone like me who believes wholeheartedly that blockchain is snake oil is such a model hodler.

    • Custoslibera@lemmy.worldOP
      5·
      1 year ago

      You’ve basically explained why crypto can’t work.

      Deflationary currencies don’t make sense to spend because their future value will be higher.

      The outcome is people hold onto them in the hopes they gain value. The exact opposite of what you want for a currency.

      • Gigan@lemmy.world
        31·
        1 year ago

        A deflationary currency would simply cause people to be more careful with their spending. You still need food, shelter, transportation, entertainment, etc. An inflinflationary currency encourages overconsumption, because material things hold value better than money.

        • Custoslibera@lemmy.worldOP
          2·
          1 year ago

          If you’d like a world with zero discretionary spending then yeah, deflationary currency is for you.

          I don’t think that’s an economy you want to live in though.

      • infernalaudit@kbin.social
        1·
        1 year ago

        As a counterpoint: From the perspective of the Bitcoin network, Bitcoin is not inherently deflationary as long as mining continues to introduce new coins. Mining rewards do drop over time, but new Bitcoin will continue to be generated until the year ~2140.

        I think the view of Bitcoin being deflationary now is based on its increasing/volatile value against other currencies which does encourage people to hold with the expectation that they can sell for more in the future. I’d argue that this is price discovery and not deflation. If it remains where it is now, then I agree that it will just be another casino. If the value stabilizes eventually, then it does offer some benefits, especially in countries where the local currency is a less reliable way to hold money.

        Disclosure: I do hold some crypto and obviously would prefer it to go up but it won’t change my life. I just think it’s an interesting experiment at the end of the day.

      • rastilin@kbin.social
        3·
        1 year ago

        This makes perfect sense in theory, but after multiple years of 8% to 10% inflation I’m not so keen on the “inflation always” line of thinking. Some kind of “generally stable” currency that alternates unpredictably would be best.

      • TootSweet@lemmy.worldEnglish
        12·
        1 year ago

        For sure. Also, the inherent unscalability of blockchain as a technology makes for a payment system far too slow for your typical payment scenarios, which makes transferring Bitcoin a pain in the ass, further incentivising hodling.

        (Just to address some of the "akshully"s I’m probably going to get for the above, you can make blockchain fast if you centralize it like Solana does, but if you’re going to centralize it, you’re better off using Postgres than blockchain.)

        I think largely the argument that convinces some people that cryptocurrency is worth “investing in” is that it’s going to revolutionize the way we pay for things. In which case the fact that it doesn’t work as a currency completely robs it of any legitimacy as a security.

        If you want something that does have potential to improve the way we go about buying groceries, look into GNU Taler.

  • foggy@lemmy.world
    9·
    1 year ago

    I have invested a total of $2000 in crypto.

    I took out $2000 when I had like $12000.

    I have no idea how much what is left is now. Probably $500-$700. Definitely less than a months rent.

    Imma let it ride. I have rss feeds that’ll let me know if any of the coins I own spike for some reason. Otherwise, whatever.

    • Ataraxia@sh.itjust.works
      1·
      1 year ago

      Same. I had the money to spare and the means to mine so why not? We made more doing that than I have in working for the last few years and even if it were gone tomorrow it wouldn’t affect our livelihood. It’s just so nice thing to have when we are old.

    • db2@sopuli.xyz
      3·
      1 year ago

      This is the way to do it. What I’ve got is all profit too, whether that means a million dollars or just one.

  • atx_aquarian@lemmy.world
    64·
    1 year ago

    Not arguing about the merits of blockchain, but if your money is in a bank, it is on a computer that depends on cryptography (TLS) for controlling access.

    edit: Well, ok, at least then it’s not just crypto standing between your assets and someone else. Then there’s going to be at least another layer, like multifactor authentication, VPN/MPLS, etc., depending on the point being attacked.

    • krellor@kbin.social
      3·
      1 year ago

      I think generally the big issue that people have with crypto is that there are so many irreversible mistakes you can make, not that the underlying security is worse/better than a bank. There are lots of ways to securely manage crypto, but most people don’t have the tools, expertise, and discipline to do so. Even simple things like being diligent about randomly generating strong passwords, hardening your accounts and devices against account theft and social engineering, etc.

      At the end of the day if you lose your bank password, account details, etc, you can go to a branch with your id and get access. If you are scammed and money is transferred from your account, the bank will generally make you whole or be able to reverse the transaction. None of those safeguards exist in crypto, and many would say that is a feature, not a bug. Which is fine, I get it, I was a crypto early adopter because I liked the math side of it. But it’s not what most people need or can integrate into their life.

      I will also say that I laughed long and hard about reports of NFT smart contracts being used to execute malicious code sent as an NFT, which is a massive security issue, but I don’t think it’s fair to lump the whole crypto ecosystem into the NFT cesspool.

      • Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
        1·
        1 year ago

        I wish the technology itself was used to replace the stock market, i.e. blockchain to take care of transactions in a truly transparent fashion, coins as a replacement for stocks. Other than that there isn’t much that crypto can do better and more efficiently than the systems in place right now except maybe international money transfers in certain countries…

      • confusedbytheBasics@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        1 year ago

        I kinda love cryptocurrency but you nailed the problem. For me all of the features sound like power. To others they sound like risk.

  • who8mydamnoreos@lemmy.world
    25·
    1 year ago

    I was one of the lucky ones who bought bitcoin so I could buy acid on the internet. Years later I put a down payment on a house with the change that I forgot about. DARE was wrong.

    • moosetwin@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      4·
      1 year ago

      crypto might have a few benefits

      Sorry, you must be new to Lemmy. Here, talking about cryptocurrencies in any positive light is considered bad taste, and you absolutely deserve any flak you may receive for this transgression.

      /s

      the text is sarcastic but the circlejerk is real

      edit: I agree cryptocurrency is not good but people here act like it’s going to personally shoot your dog

  • anakin78z@lemmy.world
    2·
    1 year ago

    I sleep well at night knowing nobody will steal my thing I don’t care about because I don’t own any. I just wanted you all to know that.

  • Beowulf@unilem.org
    22·
    1 year ago

    I can understand monero since you can actually use it as a currency on some certain websites, but that’s basically it. I do not care about crypto anymore because of the almost toxic culture it can brew.

    Back when reddit was a thing, I asked how to even start with crypto (what type of wallet, general set up general use etc) and just didn’t even talk about the actual mining (I remember saying something around the lines of “I’m looking to mine because it’s supposed to get extra cold this winter, I do not care about actually getting any crypto” and those dense mfers kept linking a website that calculates how much I would make with the cost of electricity and the efficiently of it all… like… I didn’t even care about making anything, I just didn’t want it going into the ether)

    Anyways that’s my rant