Topic: Bitcoin is unsustainable, according to Vice - page 4. (Read 4852 times)
There are so many people attacking Bitcoin, one of the clear signs that this coin is set to succeed... watch for the signs folks.
This article shows that we are still in the very very early stage of adoption. When people eventually realize that money without free entry of production and a production cost will worth nothing, they will not question bitcoin's production costs
In principle, anything without a production cost will worth nothing, so should fiat money. But why fiat money still have some value is totally a historical phenomenon that is inherited from the gold standard, where each piece of fiat money was a presentation of corresponding amount of gold. Now fiat money is backed by nothing so it should worth nothing
Or you can say like this, if the fiat money that costs almost nothing to produce can worth so much, then bitcoin which costs magnitudes higher than fiat money to produce will worth at least magnitudes more
In principle, anything without a production cost will worth nothing, so should fiat money. But why fiat money still have some value is totally a historical phenomenon that is inherited from the gold standard, where each piece of fiat money was a presentation of corresponding amount of gold. Now fiat money is backed by nothing so it should worth nothing
Or you can say like this, if the fiat money that costs almost nothing to produce can worth so much, then bitcoin which costs magnitudes higher than fiat money to produce will worth at least magnitudes more
philosophically i disagree. its not the cost of production that makes it valuable...its the scarcity and utility.
Gold didn't cost anything to mankind, it was already on the planet.
Whether it got here by nuclear fusion or from a magic genie is
irrelevant.
Fiat currency is created out of thin air but people use it (has utility)
and its (somewhat) scarce, therefore it has value.
However, a cryptocurrency that costs energy is perceived as more fair.
IF proof of stake currencies like NxT were widely used, perceived as
fair in distribution, and as secure as Bitcoin, they would be as valuable.
If it cost nothing to dig out gold, then it will worth nothing. Scarcity is only a means to increase the cost of production. But if the cost of production is zero then even it is very scarce it will not command any value, because the arbitraging will make sure the value will always equal to its cost: If it costs $0.1 to produce a POS coin while the market price is $100, everyone will mine coin and immediately sell, to pocket a 1000x profit, or to borrow lots of POS coins to sell, and mine them back to return the loan, to pocket a 1000x profit
Another reason why cost-less fiat money would still have some value is because people are forced to use them to pay tax, so even if everyone uses bitcoin all the time and never touch USD, when the time comes that you need to pay the tax, you would still need to purchase USD, that gives it some value
legendary
Activity: 1302
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Core dev leaves me neg feedback #abuse #political
This article shows that we are still in the very very early stage of adoption. When people eventually realize that money without free entry of production and a production cost will worth nothing, they will not question bitcoin's production costs
In principle, anything without a production cost will worth nothing, so should fiat money. But why fiat money still have some value is totally a historical phenomenon that is inherited from the gold standard, where each piece of fiat money was a presentation of corresponding amount of gold. Now fiat money is backed by nothing so it should worth nothing
Or you can say like this, if the fiat money that costs almost nothing to produce can worth so much, then bitcoin which costs magnitudes higher than fiat money to produce will worth at least magnitudes more
In principle, anything without a production cost will worth nothing, so should fiat money. But why fiat money still have some value is totally a historical phenomenon that is inherited from the gold standard, where each piece of fiat money was a presentation of corresponding amount of gold. Now fiat money is backed by nothing so it should worth nothing
Or you can say like this, if the fiat money that costs almost nothing to produce can worth so much, then bitcoin which costs magnitudes higher than fiat money to produce will worth at least magnitudes more
philosophically i disagree. its not the cost of production that makes it valuable...its the scarcity and utility.
Gold didn't cost anything to mankind, it was already on the planet.
Whether it got here by nuclear fusion or from a magic genie is
irrelevant.
Fiat currency is created out of thin air but people use it (has utility)
and its (somewhat) scarce, therefore it has value.
However, a cryptocurrency that costs energy is perceived as more fair.
IF proof of stake currencies like NxT were widely used, perceived as
fair in distribution, and as secure as Bitcoin, they would be as valuable.
This article shows that we are still in the very very early stage of adoption. When people eventually realize that money without free entry of production and a production cost will worth nothing, they will not question bitcoin's production costs
In principle, anything without a production cost will worth nothing, so should fiat money. But why fiat money still have some value is totally a historical phenomenon that is inherited from the gold standard, where each piece of fiat money was a presentation of corresponding amount of gold. Now fiat money is backed by nothing so it should worth nothing
Or you can say like this, if the fiat money that costs almost nothing to produce can worth so much, then bitcoin which costs magnitudes higher than fiat money to produce will worth at least magnitudes more
In principle, anything without a production cost will worth nothing, so should fiat money. But why fiat money still have some value is totally a historical phenomenon that is inherited from the gold standard, where each piece of fiat money was a presentation of corresponding amount of gold. Now fiat money is backed by nothing so it should worth nothing
Or you can say like this, if the fiat money that costs almost nothing to produce can worth so much, then bitcoin which costs magnitudes higher than fiat money to produce will worth at least magnitudes more
They made this article without really know what they write. Some of what they said aren't true.
That's true decentralized system needs higher resource to run it, but there's no way Bitcoin needs about 5,033 times more energy intensive, per transaction, than VISA.
Bitcoin nework can process much more transaction than now with exactly same miners, mining power & full nodes. The problem is with block size.
Also, with better ASIC for mining & bigger block size, electricity usage for bitcoin transaction will be much more efficient that now.
That's true decentralized system needs higher resource to run it, but there's no way Bitcoin needs about 5,033 times more energy intensive, per transaction, than VISA.
Bitcoin nework can process much more transaction than now with exactly same miners, mining power & full nodes. The problem is with block size.
Also, with better ASIC for mining & bigger block size, electricity usage for bitcoin transaction will be much more efficient that now.
Also, with better ASIC for mining ... electricity usage for bitcoin transaction will be much more efficient that now.
Not true. The total power/energy consumption of the Bitcoin mining system is independent of miner efficiency. You do have a point concerning the number of transactions. Larger blocks with more transactions per block will lower the ratio of Total Energy per Transaction.
There is a whole thread about it here:
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/estimating-the-energypower-consumption-of-the-bitcoin-network-694401
Basically, for a given price per BTC, a given era (BTC per block) and a given fee rate (BTC/hour) the miners together can "afford" and will spend most of the block reward + fees on energy. This is by design. If equipment gets more efficient then the miners will just buy more equipment until they are consuming as much energy as they can afford.
The formula I previously derived for the amount of power, P, consumed by the Bitcoin mining network is:
P = (6(50/2e) + f)(x)(1 - g)/c [kW]
where:
x = exchange rate [USD/BTC]
e = era [0..32] (we are currently in era 1)
f = average fees per hour [BTC/hour]
c = cost of energy [USD/kWh]
g = average gross profit margin [unitless ratio]
Note that the total power consumption is not dependent on efficiency.
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/estimating-the-energypower-consumption-of-the-bitcoin-network-694401
Basically, for a given price per BTC, a given era (BTC per block) and a given fee rate (BTC/hour) the miners together can "afford" and will spend most of the block reward + fees on energy. This is by design. If equipment gets more efficient then the miners will just buy more equipment until they are consuming as much energy as they can afford.
The formula I previously derived for the amount of power, P, consumed by the Bitcoin mining network is:
P = (6(50/2e) + f)(x)(1 - g)/c [kW]
where:
x = exchange rate [USD/BTC]
e = era [0..32] (we are currently in era 1)
f = average fees per hour [BTC/hour]
c = cost of energy [USD/kWh]
g = average gross profit margin [unitless ratio]
Note that the total power consumption is not dependent on efficiency.
...
The 25 BTC for each block is a fair way to distribute 21 million Bitcoins over time, and has nothing to do with cost of transaction.
BTW if miners are allowed to include more than about 1000 transactions into the block, these pennies they charge per tx would definitively sum up, and as long as the tx fees are worth more than loses from orphan risk, it is win-win situation to include many more txs (both for user waiting for 1st confirmation and miner getting more fees).
The 25 BTC for each block is a fair way to distribute 21 million Bitcoins over time, and has nothing to do with cost of transaction.
BTW if miners are allowed to include more than about 1000 transactions into the block, these pennies they charge per tx would definitively sum up, and as long as the tx fees are worth more than loses from orphan risk, it is win-win situation to include many more txs (both for user waiting for 1st confirmation and miner getting more fees).
"If miners are allowed"?!
Friend, miners are allowed, they don't wanna. Arguments are being made that Bitcoin doesn't need more tps, that it's not for
Impasse. For over a year. Devs are quitting. Devs are calling each other poopy-head.
See blocksize drama.
Good luck.
It's so much greener to put a check in the mail so that it can be driven to the recipient. The recipient can then drive it to the bank and the bank can fire up their computer and enter the data. 
Actually yeah, by far. Let me break it down for you:
An average block contains 2.7 * (takes 600 seconds to mine a block) = 1620 transactions. At most (some blocks are mined empty, as in "no* transactions).
For this, miners receive 25 BTC, which, at current rate, is roughly 12,000 dollars.
Meaning ~$7.40 PER TX.
Assuming that 1/3 of that is electrical cost (let's be generous), that's about $2.50 in energy cost, PER TRANSACTION.
Unless you think US Post Office is spending $2.50 in gas alone to deliver a check...
Hmmm. That is interesting. I would have thought actual delivery would be much more inefficient. But $2.50 per Tx is a lot. I wonder how miners can be profitable charging only pennies per Tx?
Because their costs have nothing to do with the number of transactions they are processing but rather the blocks they solve.
This. The actual cost of Bitcoin transactions are pennies, and only orphan increase determine the cost of Bitcoin transaction for rational miner.
Because they get paid 25BTC for each block they solve. The few pennies they charge per tx are almost irrelevant. Many miners chose to mine *empty blocks* -- blocks containing *no* transactions.
That's why Bitcoin has 10% yearly base money inflation
That's why Bitcoin has 10% yearly base money inflation
The 25 BTC for each block is a fair way to distribute 21 million Bitcoins over time, and has nothing to do with cost of transaction.
BTW if miners are allowed to include more than about 1000 transactions into the block, these pennies they charge per tx would definitively sum up, and as long as the tx fees are worth more than loses from orphan risk, it is win-win situation to include many more txs (both for user waiting for 1st confirmation and miner getting more fees).
How many $$ does it take for the bnanking institution to pen-test their systems?
Probably a lot more t han the cumulative power costs to run Bitcoin.
Probably a lot more t han the cumulative power costs to run Bitcoin.
I don't like the idea of forecasts based on power usage per transaction, or cost per transaction because nothing's fixed. Computers may become much more efficient in the future. When Intel launched its latest microprocessor for laptops, it was saying exactly that, giving users more autonomy when running on battery.
Coming increase in block size will also change a lot of things.
The total amount of energy used for Bitcoin mining is independent of the efficiency of the mining equipment used.Coming increase in block size will also change a lot of things.
Why is that? For a given hashing power, total amount of energy used should decrease if the efficiency of the mining equipment used improves.
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/estimating-the-energypower-consumption-of-the-bitcoin-network-694401
Basically, for a given price per BTC and a given era (BTC per block) the miners together can "afford" and will spend most of the block reward + fees on energy. This is by design. If equipment gets more efficient then the miners will just buy more equipment until they are consuming as much energy as they can afford.
The formula I previously derived for the amount of power, P, consumed by the Bitcoin mining network is:
P = (6(50/2e) + f)(x)(1 - g)/c [kW]
where:
x = exchange rate [USD/BTC]
e = era [0..32] (we are currently in era 1)
f = average fees per hour [BTC/hour]
c = cost of energy [USD/kWh]
g = average gross profit margin [unitless ratio]
Note that the total power consumption is not dependent on efficiency.
There seems to be an awful rush to declare bitcoin dead/unsustainable/scary of late - even moreso than usual. And none of it's been particularly credible or convincing so far.
Well, thank you everyone for pointing that out. Being a novice in the bitcoin world, I'm still learning how to apprehend all this FUD about our beloved coins.
While it's pretty clear news like this one have an impact on bitcoin price (in a larger or smaller scale) what is left unasked is: how could we discover who's behind this negative fuzz? Is there any way to monitor the performance of big players and plot it against such "news"?
I don't like the idea of forecasts based on power usage per transaction, or cost per transaction because nothing's fixed. Computers may become much more efficient in the future. When Intel launched its latest microprocessor for laptops, it was saying exactly that, giving users more autonomy when running on battery.
Coming increase in block size will also change a lot of things.
The total amount of energy used for Bitcoin mining is independent of the efficiency of the mining equipment used.Coming increase in block size will also change a lot of things.
Why is that? For a given hashing power, total amount of energy used should decrease if the efficiency of the mining equipment used improves.
New articles making bold statements that never seem to deliver.......
Go argue with Investopedia, from whence the quoted text was gleaned, irrelevant to my point.
Which I'll repeat:
"Does BitFury lend money? Can it help me refinance my house? Doe it engage in underwriting? No? Then it's not a bank."
banks create money
banks control the circulation of money
banks process and ensure transactions are settled.
why are you obsessed with talking about lending which has no relevance to bitcoins function..
ELY2:
1. You claim BitFury is analogous to a bank office.
2. I point out that BitFury doesn't do anything that the bank does: It doesn't lend money, it doesn't underwrite, it doesn't help me buy a house or finance a business. That's what banks do.
Bitcoin will need things like banks, because people don't have a million dollars to buy a new house -- they need a mortgage. There were several flegling Bitcoin "banks," from Pirateat40's Bitcoin Savings and Trust to Danny Brewster's Neo Bee, with many in between.
Unfortunately, they didn't work out so well...
Remember the funky ads?
http://s2.postimg.org/onlche5ft/neo2.jpg
TL;DR: No. Those buildings with people in them that are called banks are no more similar to BitFury than they are to aardvarks.
Now go play your vidya.
Go argue with Investopedia, from whence the quoted text was gleaned, irrelevant to my point.
Which I'll repeat:
"Does BitFury lend money? Can it help me refinance my house? Doe it engage in underwriting? No? Then it's not a bank."
banks create money
banks control the circulation of money
banks process and ensure transactions are settled.
why are you obsessed with talking about lending which has no relevance to bitcoins function..
You clearly don't understand what banks do.
"... raise capital from investors or lenders, and then use that money to make loans, buy securities and provide other financial services to customers. These loans are then used by people and businesses to buy goods or expand business operations ..."
Also see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underwriting
When you buy your first house, you go to a bank.
Does BitFury lend money? Can it help me refinance my house? Doe it engage in underwriting? No? Then it's not a bank.
Now you know.
when you get a mortgage. you are not given funds from other peoples bank accounts.."... raise capital from investors or lenders, and then use that money to make loans, buy securities and provide other financial services to customers. These loans are then used by people and businesses to buy goods or expand business operations ..."
Also see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underwriting
When you buy your first house, you go to a bank.
Does BitFury lend money? Can it help me refinance my house? Doe it engage in underwriting? No? Then it's not a bank.
Now you know.
money is created!! .. same as miners.. they create funds too (block reward)
here straight from the horses mouth
http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Documents/quarterlybulletin/2014/qb14q1prereleasemoneycreation.pdf
create money through loans
Learn more
please
Go argue with Investopedia, from whence the quoted text was gleaned, irrelevant to my point.
Which I'll repeat:
"Does BitFury lend money? Can it help me refinance my house? Doe it engage in underwriting? No? Then it's not a bank."
but now Bitcoin enthusiasts have also given up on the idea of Bitcoin becoming A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System.
only certain misguided smallblockers have.
The rest of us are as excited as ever about Bitcoin.
It won't happen. The recent dev drama is nothing new -- was always there. Bitcoin depends on consensus. Consensus is hard to reach, and, as it became painfully clear, even agreeing on what "consensus" means can't be agreed on.
The Hitchhiker's Guide tells us that flying is simple: it involves learning to throw yourself at the ground and missing.
"Clearly, it is this second part,
It already happened! We already have a peer to peer currency. Pretty amazing if you think about it.
And I believe that the economic majority will force us through the impasse on scalability should consensus prove to be illusive.
"Economic Majority" is the people in fiat. The folks hodling shitloads of BTC don't count -- no mechanism exists for them to enforce their decision, or even *to voice it*.
Scalability's as elusive as consensus. Remember, the blockchain keeps growing by a block every ~10 minutes. No way to prune it, currently -- just keeps growing and growing
And a system which claims to respond to the wants of "economic majority," with no clear path for this "economic majority" to make a change? "No worries brah, the market will fix everything, invisible hand lol"?
*OVER A YEAR* of arguing over this -- the most predictable, technically trivial problem -- *and still no solution*?!
Color me impressed.
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