[esja]

I've just dug a hole in my back garden, and created 21 million tiny slices of air that now occupy that space. It took work to dig this hole, so it definitely has value. And I'm only digging one hole, ever, I promise.

I've also made a list of people who own the different bits of air in the hole. I'm using pencil and paper, but it works. If you give me some money I can write your name on there and you can "store value". Later if you tell me to write someone else's name, I can rub yours out and you can "exchange large values".

If you or your friends want the money back later, I can give it to you. Probably... mostly. But don't ask me for more money than you gave me in the first place, because I won't have it.

p.s. I lied when I said I dug the hole by myself. I really dug up a billion tonnes of coal and used it to power a microscopic spaghetti noodle which dug the hole. For some reason this gave a lot of people confidence that my hole is the One True Hole.

[me_me_me]

That's such a crude reductionist argument that I can smell the sent of arrogance and mockery, and I am not sure if response is warranted.

Especially since your simile has rather gaping holes in it.

Actually thinking about it... ironically your example is better description of fiat currency than btc.

Use low resource output to generate cheap tokens that will be loosely tracked by 'One True Government', and people agree that they have value. People can exchange it for goods and even can go back to the 'One True Government' to exchange their gold back token back to gold... oh wait... right we got rid of that whole gold backing while back...

[esja]

Is there a reason you believe Bitcoin has value, aside from "other people believe it has value"?

[me_me_me]

Is there a reason you believe USD, EUR etc. has value, aside from "other people believe it has value"?

Bitcoin at least has a utility built into it, facilitating transfers and 100% guarantee that limited amounts of btc can be created.

Fiat currencies and btc are not the same but the underlying principle is the same. Demand and supply. If there is no demand its value will plummet.

2007 crash cause swiss frank to sky rocket in value. For no other reason then international crowd started buying franks to store their wealth in it not USD.

[esja]

There are many obvious reasons to believe fiat currencies have value. But perhaps the most obvious one is that having and using fiat currency is required by 99.9% of people in order to stay alive. Staying alive is quite valuable.

[me_me_me]

No, to stay alive you need oxygen, water and food.

eh... you are shifting the goalposts and not addressing any of my points. I am done continuing fighting another windmill.

you win btc is scam usd is real. Have a great day.

[esja]

In the real world 99.9% of people require fiat currency to obtain water, food, shelter, and the rest of the things required to keep them alive. This is actual real-world value, as opposed to the theoretical value that Bitcoin might possess some day if everyone buys into it and nothing goes wrong.