[tomputer]

> Ethereum is already much better at it's core

What you and many others seem to overlook is first mover advantage, network effects and most important: trust. Bitcoin is not Yahoo or Facebook, it is not a company product which has to improve and break things all the time.

In the long run Bitcoin is a store of value. That requires trust, which takes time. To gain trust over time it has to move slow and steady because there can be no mistakes.

When it comes to money and trust it is almost impossible to get a second chance (see Terra UST). Just one mistake could result in everyone distrusting Bitcoin.

[jrm4]

What I think others overlook is that in practice (and despite what the retconners are trying to say about bitcoin is gold or some nonsense) -- is that Bitcoin was NOT designed to be a blockchain platform. It was designed to be fungible currency. And it's an excellent proof-of-concept...but with severe flaws that will kill it, especially in light of the fact that we're talking about *open source software, which begs to be forked, and effectively has been.

Your argument strikes me as very odd -- you seem to suggest that nothing can beat Bitcoin in theory, but Ethereum is already beating it in practice.

[tomputer]

> Your argument strikes me as very odd -- you seem to suggest that nothing can beat Bitcoin in theory, but Ethereum is already beating it in practice.

In theory everything is possible. I do not follow the beating really. They can both exist with different use cases.

Bitcoin wants to be digital gold (and money) and Ethereum wants to be a smart contract world computer running dapps. They solve different problems.

[jrm4]

But Ethereum is a technically superior option for both cases. It does what Bitcoin can't do, but it also does what Bitcoin does better, and has a roadmap to improvement beyond that. Bitcoin is still wildly slow and destroys the environment, and Ethereum is on track to mostly not do that, to say nothing of "post-Eth" projects like Pulsechain.

Now, I'm sure Bitcoin will enjoy name recognition for some time, but in my experience, always bet on the tech.

[djschnei]

Bitcoin slow? I make virtually free, instant, micro-payments on Bitcoin hundreds of times every day (Podcasting 2.0). I also accept Bitcoin payments on my e-commerce site that settle instantly for fractions of a percent in fees. I also route hundreds of Bitcoin payments per day using a raspberry pi which draws an extremely low amount of energy. Not sure which "reality" you're referring to...

[jrm4]

Man, your use case is one I hope I'm wrong about. I love the idea of microtransactions and tipping and such. But, I never much paid attention to Lightning given that the BTC price didn't really move when it came out, which strongly suggested to me that not enough people really cared.

[djschnei]

It's impossible to consider Bitcoin without considering lightning. Two sides of the same coin. It's still early in its adoption curve for sure, but it has been gaining traction.

- Twitter uses lightning for its tipping mechanism

- The Podcasting 2.0 standard is all lightning based

- NCR is integrating lightning

- Blackhawk is integrating lightning

- Kraken has enabled lightning

- Robinhood is integrating lightning

- Square/block is investing heavily into lightning development and enablement

I'm probably missing some big ones...