[shp0ngle]

Nobody actually uses bitcoin for payment.

There is more or less the same places where to spend it as there was 4, 5 years ago. And they all have about the same traffic, which is nearly zero.

Most people only use it for speculation. This can't end well.

[knocte]

I disagree, I use it for booking flights and hotels everytime I travel (e.g. Expedia, Destinia; 9flats, CryptoCribs). Smooth experience, much better than paying with {credit|debit} cards.

I also get paid in bitcoin thanks to bitwage. It's easier to get good (figurative) raises this way instead of depending on your boss x-) If you're wondering how the hell I'm so crazy to "bet" my salary on this, check this shower thought: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/79zy2d/shower_thou...

[panarky]

> Nobody actually uses bitcoin for payment

Is anyone else fatigued by repeating the same arguments over and over forever? If I just state them here once maybe we can talk about new ideas (pro or con, doesn't matter).

1) There are no "real" cryptocurrency transactions

2) It's all speculation

3) There's no intrinsic value

4) Tulips I say, TULIPS!

5) If you can't pay taxes with it, it's not "real money"

6) Governments will shut it down

7) Transactions aren't really private

8) Mining uses more energy than entire nations

9) Nobody will ever spend a deflationary currency

10) It's only useful for drugs, assassinations, gambling and ransoms

11) It doesn't scale, not enough transactions per second, blockchain will get too big

12) It's too volatile to be useful

13) Since the exchange rate keeps rising it's not useful for payments

14) Since I can't buy coffee with it it's not useful

15) Since fees are high it's not useful

16) It's a scam, Ponzi, pyramid

17) The "market cap" is (a) too small to be relevant, (b) evidence of a bubble

18) Will never completely replace gold / national currencies / corporations so there's no value

19) There are a lot of shady exchanges that (a) get hacked, (b) steal customer deposits, (c) are secretly insolvent

20) If the cryptography gets broken / bugs or exploits are discovered and the whole thing goes to zero

Maybe so many new people are just now getting involved that we keep rehashing a decade of stale thinking?

Let's talk about some new ideas!

[lucozade]

What may be more helpful that a definitive list of arguments is a definitive list of valid responses to those arguments.

As a random example, mining does use more energy than some nations. Why this may be a good thing in a medium of exchange/value store tends to receive somewhat hand wavy responses. If you have a great answer then it might be helpful to share it.

[panarky]

You're right, many of these are valid criticisms.

It's just that we've been having the identical arguments over and over for nearly ten years now. We're not advancing our understanding by re-hashing the same tired ideas.

Maybe I'll make a page with common responses to these arguments.

To use your example ... it's true that mining cryptocurrencies consumes a lot of energy. So do casinos. So does Facebook and Starbucks. So does manufacturing weapons.

The world's televisions consume a lot of energy.

Bank office buildings and the millions of bank workers who drive to work every day also use a lot of energy.

The question isn't how much energy a thing uses, it's how much value is derived per watt-hour of energy.

[justifier]

Can you point me to comprehensive and conclusive discourse on each of these; or even just:

> 20) If the cryptography gets broken the whole thing goes to zero

I bring it up often here and each time I am met with a similar argument that you are making, but loudly ignoring is different from discussing

It's like going to a doctor and each time saying 'ugh, the tired old cancer conversation..can we just talk about something new?!' until the cancer just kills you

[panarky]

That's the thing - there's no "comprehensive and conclusive" answer to these arguments, just a never-ending parade of the same discussions repeated ad infinitum.

As for breaking the cryptography, it's been nearly 10 years now, with all the code in the public domain and massive incentives to find a flaw.

That's why some people call Bitcoin "anti-fragile" since it seems to get stronger the more it's attacked.

But of course it's theoretically possible that the NSA / GCHQ / FAPSI will (or has already) broken the cryptography. What happens then? Do miners stop until the flaw is fixed? Do they roll back to before the compromise? Does the blockchain fork into a new, fixed coin?

I guess that's the beauty of financial assets defined by open-source software. Bugs and exploits happen, they get fixed, and we move ahead on a new version.

[justifier]

But your reply only covers a small aspect of a single possible perspective on the question: 'a bug in only sha256 was disclosed publically'

Perhaps you are having 'the same discussions repeated ad infinitum.' because of your input stead the actual subject matter

> I guess that's the beauty of financial assets defined by open-source software. Bugs and exploits happen, they get fixed, and we move ahead on a new version.

I am unconcerned with the 'move ahead' bit

My concern is with the assets currently in the blockchain

When I warn those that ask me if they should 'get Bitcoin' that the technology is propped up on unsolved math problems

It is to protect their finances stead attempt to disparage Bitcoin

If the cryptography is broken then the entire blockchain is suspect and needs to be discarded along with the record of any assets locked in it

[shp0ngle]

That's great, but the availability of services accepting bitcoin and the general usage as a payment didn't increase nearly as much as the value did. There is a minor usage, but that doesn't explain the rise in value.

[0bsidian]

I'm going to repeat myself here, but please bear with me if you haven't heard this argument before.

I respectfully disagree with the idea that Bitcoin's killer-app is to be used as a currency for transactional purposes.

I can't really think of many reasons why you would use crypto to pay for a coffee or a sandwich if you live in the West (or frankly, even most developing nations).

On the other hand, I can definitely see the utility in a censorship-resistant digital medium to store wealth. To me, this latter use case has much, much more potential to serve the unbanked (as well as the banked).

Some use cases I can think off the top of my head:

(1) You are from Syria and need to flee war and escape into Europe – however bank transfers into Europe are almost impossible if you are a common Syrian. Bitcoin allows you to take your wealth with you, in your brain, as you escape across the border, by just memorising your twelve word private key.

(2) You are from Venezuela or Zimbabwe – The government has issued capital controls and is devaluing currency by the day. You transfer your wealth into Bitcoin in order to offset capital erosion due to hyper-inflation. When the situation stabilises, you transfer your Bitcoin back into fiat.

(3) You are Saudi billionaire Al-Waleed bin Talal. The government freezes all your assets in a political coup. If you have a portion of your wealth in Bitcoin, you could protect them from government expropriation and anonymously transfer them to associates or family members abroad.

(4) You are whistleblower Julian Assance and have been cut off from the financial system as a way to censor your speech. Bitcoin allows you to have an unbreakable digital "Swiss bank account" that the authorities are not able to reach.

This reminds me of Peter Thiel's recent words about Bitcoin: "it's like a reserve form of money, it's like gold, and it's just a store of value. You don't need to use it to make payments."

Reference

[1]: https://www.cnbc.com/2017/10/26/bitcoin-underestimated-peter...

[jcfrei]

All of your proposed use cases depend on the authorities approving your actions. Governments can and will at some point request standard AML procedures when you are depositing large sums of crypto currency into an exchange. If a state decides to introduce capital controls it would also be pretty easy to shutdown access to such an exchange. You can be forced to hand over your private keys or your public addresses could be simply black listed, making them unusable. I would think of bitcoin more like an insurance (like gold) which you need to buy in calm times. Once shit hits the fan it's most likely too late to buy or send bitcoin.

[jstanley]

> I can't really think of many reasons why you would use crypto to pay for a coffee or a sandwich if you live in the West

I can think of one: if you get paid in Bitcoin, having to buy some GBPs just so you can buy a coffee or a sandwich is a hassle.

[aninhumer]

But getting paid in Bitcoin is already a way bigger hassle than getting paid in GBP in the first place.

[albedoa]

According to your other comments, you opt in to getting paid in bitcoin. That's your choice. So you're creating the hassle.

Do you think your answer is in the spirit of the question?

[aninhumer]

I am sceptical that Bitcoin would be able to hold its value in the absence of state support. If major world governments decided to ban Bitcoin exchanges, then how useful is your "censorship resistant wealth"? People accept its value at the moment because they know they can turn it back into more widely accepted currency if and when they need to. But if that becomes substantially more difficult, I think a lot of people would prefer something more liquid.

[Cthulhu_]

You forgot the use case where you're a drug dealer or other shady character and would like a means of transferring money internationally without relying on a regulated payment system. This group was responsible for the most payment-related bitcoin transfers a couple of years ago, at least until that exchange site was shut down. Also, ransomware.

[Klathmon]

I'm so tired of seeing this trucked out as a response anytime someone talks about how bitcoin is used.

Cash is used for some pretty shitty stuff too, so are credit cards, and checks, and just about every other form of payment.

And funnily enough, Bitcoin is about the dumbest thing to use for illicit things, as it's so easily trackable and records of the money's movement is forever carved into the blockchain (so even if it takes someone 10 years to track the money, or even realize it needs to be tracked, it's still going to be there).

But what about the valid and legal use cases of:

1. paying for goods and services without having to give the company i'm paying access to my account information in a way that they can charge more whenever they want, or lose my information and put my financials at risk

2. Receiving payment for goods and services in a form of money that you don't need to worry about "chargebacks", "reversals", or any kind of way of taking money back after it's been sent

Combine both of those things, and I could see a very real reduction in costs of doing business in just about every area.

[189723234]

>I can't really think of many reasons why you would use crypto to pay for a coffee or a sandwich if you live in the West (or frankly, even most developing nations).

If you had the choice between a form of currency not controlled by a bunch of extremely corrupt entities that is much more convenient and cheaper in terms of storage and transactions, why would you use traditional money? I can't even transfer money to my friend overseas, it is too difficult.

[0bsidian]

You're preaching to the choir, I love BTC.

I realise that I haven't been clear.

The point I was trying to make is only that you don't need for Bitcoin to be a replacement to visa in order to justify current skyrocketing valuation.

I would venture that Bitcoin's censorship-resistant store of value use case is enough to justify current valuation.

[viridian]

This simply isn't true. If you pointed out that adoption and price aren't growing in a correlated manner I'd be inclined to agree, but steam, whole foods, and subway weren't accepting bitcoin 4 years ago.

At least three of those payment acceptors also make to US top 25 list for traffic (Microsoft's bing, reddit, wikipedia) so they aren't exactly zero traffic, either.

https://99bitcoins.com/who-accepts-bitcoins-payment-companie...

I don't even have a dog in this fight, as I don't own any, but this is blatant misinformation.

[ryanlol]

I’ve been paying salaries for a while using bitcoin. My volumes aren’t entirely insignificant and using Bitcoin is far more convenient than wire transfers.

I just paid my 25k rent deposit using bitcoin too, it was much easier than dealing with a SWIFT wire. It took only minutes for the landlord to be confident that he’s got the money.

I’ve been living without personal bank accounts for multiple years now, and thanks to bitcoin it’s been pretty great.

And no, I won’t be crying if bitcoin drops back to $300.

[jstanley]

I use bitcoin for payment. I get paid in bitcoin and I pay in bitcoin wherever possible.

[Cthulhu_]

Does your pay get adjusted according to the current price of BTC? It's got to be strange to have money in your account that is worth 20% more over the weekend.

[jstanley]

I'm self-employed. I occasionally adjust my prices when the value of BTC changes.

[koheripbal]

You can buy drugs with it online. ...and also pay ransomware ransoms.

[ssanders82]

Nobody really pays for anything with gold Krugerrands either.

[mdgrech23]

Why? Gold is used for speculation. So is land...

[cvsh]

You can't build an apartment complex on a bitcoin

[jstanley]

And you can't transfer an apartment complex to the other side of the world within minutes without asking for permission. What's your point?