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by danShumway 1477 days ago
I'm curious how you expect Bitcoin to obsolete every single alternative currency/value-store we have today including longstanding systems like gold, when you're telling me that Bitcoin's price stabilizing is reliant on it being the only possible currency that people can use.
1 comments
rglover 1477 days ago
> I'm curious how you expect Bitcoin to obsolete every single alternative currency

I didn't say that.

> you're telling me that Bitcoin's price stabilizing is reliant on it being the only possible currency that people can use

Nor did I say that.

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Obsoletion of the incumbent options will come through a few means:

1. Hyperinflation (where I think we're headed). Basically, what happened in Germany in the 1920s. Instead of a Rentenmark, though, we'll get CBDCs which are a hyper-limited, state-issued digital currency that's used as a political weapon. They'll give it to people for "free" to encourage adoption (because they can mint as much as they want) but not tell them that it expires or can't be used for certain purchases the regime disagrees with. This will create a financial caste system where free/wealthy people use Bitcoin and the proletariat use the CBDC (i.e, they become slaves of the state). I think this is most likely as state power will fight to the death to not give up control of money (that's their only control against the people) but they will tolerate an "elite" class that can bribe their way out of control.

2. Natural transition. As more options for accepting Bitcoin (e.g., if Square/Block add lightning payments to their terminals, circumventing Visa/MC/etc.) become available and people understand it, they'll be incentivized to use it via discounts, perks, etc. Think early days of "order online" and how a lot of people scuffed at that.

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danShumway 1472 days ago
> 1. Hyperinflation (where I think we're headed)

It would be unfortunate then if there was a large amount of evidence that Bitcoin's price was partially tied to the stock market's health, and that global volatility and market issues in general affected the value of cryptocurrency just like they affect the price/value of everything else.

> 2. Natural transition

I think this is what a lot of us are getting at; Bitcoin as it stands is worse at transactions then pretty much every other currency and platform today. It's not competitive with those platforms for most people. That's not to say that it has no usecase at all, but for mass-market adoption and for the average person's use-case, Bitcoin is an awful transaction method.

So when people tell me that I need to think long term, I'm curious how they expect to get to the long term given that in the short term Bitcoin is basically awful for mass-market usage and isn't going to be adopted by ordinary people for ordinary transactions until after its fundamental problems like volatility are solved. So it all feels pretty circular.

You're telling me that stabilization requires increased use. In your words, "a system like Bitcoin if adopted at a standard-level (i.e., long-term prospects) would not see fluctuations in price because it wouldn't be able to".

I am telling you that Bitcoin won't get increased use if it doesn't (at least) stabilize. So it doesn't really matter whether Bitcoin would have fluctuations at that point, because nobody who's not a speculative investor, dedicated to the cause, or an extremely niche user wants to deal with the fluctuations in order to use it as a currency today.

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