[gambiting]

The issue is not that the process has to be expensive. You are correct - we could generate billions of crypto coins within couple hours and beat bitcoin right away. But people want bitcoin. The same why people are willing to pay the price for a labour-intensive painting that took years to make over an identical reproduction that took 5 minutes to print.

[amalag]

This is now shifting the goalposts. Before it was PoW is necessary to secure the network. Now it is we don't need PoW but it is artisanal.