Topic: BITCOIN VS ETHEREUM (Read 2500 times)

bitcoin is still considered worldwide as something extremely geeky.
Just talk to your relatives or co-workers about it, and see how much adoption it has... not very much.

Etherium is even ten times geekier than that. It's for the select few bitcoin geeks who actually know how the bitcoin protocol works an who want to build new stuff on top of the blockchain.

So I don't see etherium as competition for bitcoin, ...  more like coopetition.

There are 1000x (not an exaggeration) more smart minds working on BTC improvement features/technologies than people working on Ethereum.  There will be millions $ invested in BTC related companies this year by legitimate US VC firms.  Realistically, Ethereum won't launch until 2015, assuming they are even allowed to hold an IPO by government regulators, and their creators are at risk because they are public figures.  BTC will always hold an advantage because there is no centralized authority.

As of right now Bitcoin exists and Ethereum doesn't.  So any pro-Ethereum argument comes down to, "my hypothetical and theoretical platform is better than your real one".  IF IF IF Ethereum delivers on its promises and someday does become live, what will be born from it will be magnitudes more robust than bitcoin.   

I agree with you
another scam coin

@jibble: So you're saying you want to create an autonomous wallet for all tradeable cryptocurrencies and then code that into ethereum scripts which then copies your wallet across the globe. You'd better be damn sure not a single one of those copies figures out how to get your private keys then or your profitability will end up being very short lived.

Also think about trading speed, you're going through several layers each with their own problems, quirks, bugs and latencies. Honestly I very much doubt an interpreted language with the added lag of global distribution and the blockchain-security-model will be in any way competitive with compiled solutions like for example the one being built into NXT, let alone the optimized solutions with ripple like speeds such as bitsharesX (novel solution for an exchange that could possibly work on bitcoin as well, albeit more slowly) promises to deliver.

Even the fastest ones of those will have some serious trouble matching the speed and trust of the existing exchange and bank systems in the eye of the general public. Plus Ripple and OpenTransactions will work just fine for the current existing financial systems, still not as fast as centralized solutions, but faster than just about any blockchain solution out there. (just to be sure, I don't own and I'm not involved with Ripple or OT).

@Equate: Agreed.

Bitcoin is the boss.

Ethereum would give more value to bitcoin.

This is an example of the way it is intended to work.

For example you could set up a completely automated and decentralised crypto currency exchange. Each and every single contract would be tied to a   specific trading pair. BTC/LTC for example.  Kept live and up to date with the current market value. I have a receive address, Now i have written a "contract" to pay out the litecoin market value equivalent of the bitcoin i have just received. This contract is fully automated, this contract is not always on, this contract only turns on when money is deposited into that address, once it has got the bitcoin and given out the litecoin equivalent it shuts off. Ether is used when the contract is running. the more it runs the more ether i use, the more it runs the more trades i am doing and the more money i am earning. Ether is what i pay for running my contract, yet i am able to trade whatever crypto i like. 

do that same example 100 more times with 100 different contracts on 100 other different trading pairs and i have a fully automated crypto currency exchange ( i obviously have to stock the crypto's i am selling)

This is also great because this is where my ether's derive their value from. If each of my contracts are making me on average 1 btc a week, then the cost of ether will be related to the amount i can earn thru using it. Not more or as much as my profit, why would i run contracts at a loss i am running a business after all. But ether's value will be in relation to the money they can generate thru the contracts they run.

Now say you have a business owner who was to accept crypto currency for the goods/services he is offering. Now he has the ability to be able to deal in every single crypto currency while only ever having to deal in bitcoin.

He runs his main bitcoin contract, taking in payments in bitcoin. While in the background he has set up 200 other contracts, all accepting the 200 other crypto currencies. But what these contracts do is instantly convert the crypto they are built to accept and convert them into bitcoin, he never has to touch anything other than bitcoin yet he can accept every single crypto currency that has trade value, and other than the initial contracts he doesn't have to do anything else because they are automated.  Plus the only time he will ever need to pay for those contract is when they are being used, which is making him money. the only time he has to pay for them is when he makes money using them. the rest of the time they are not being charged because they are not running.

I am only ever paying for my contract when it is in use and when my contract is in use it is making me money.


I am guessing the trust element that is gained through offering reliable services and making a name from yourself will give you the ability to command certain percentages per service you offer. Because lets face it nothing is free from scammers, you will get people attempting to steal from you no matter where you are or what you do. it's the way of life, and if its harder to catch someone because its based completely online behind a computer then more people are going to be drawn towards it, less risk, greater reward. 

I say this because with ethereum lets say a bank decides to convert to the way of ethereum and tries to put its business into the blockchain, they offer services, they have their own contracts. They now offer a decentralised way to get fiat and crypto . i could quite easily offer the exact same service and under cut them in every aspect of their business. every contract they have i could make and offer it for less cost.

Obviously the banking institute would have many million or billions of dollars more than me, so the amount of volume they could offer would be huge in comparison, they would also already have customers, giving them a much higher trust rating. Meaning most people would still pay for trust and reliability (Yes using trust and reliability in the same sentence as banking is an oxymoron, but just purely based off the trust system of ethereum previous atrocities aside) But it also allows for competition, without restriction. If i tried to compete with a bank currently....well i simply couldn't, it would be impossible for me to even consider trying it.   

I could offer the same service as the bank and then build my own trust rating up, taking on more business and more profits allowing me to deal in greater volumes. Once i have reached a high enough trust rating i could simply either do as the banks do and offer a higher fee for using my service and running my contracts, or i can be robin hood and offer the same service at the same cost under cutting the banks but giving your average individual the choice to use someone reliable and cheaper than the banks.






If ethereum is built the way it is intended to be. then it will add value to bitcoin and all other crypto currencies.

It was also the way the OP started this "discussion" in a bit flamebate-ish manner.

The thing that ticks me off with some of the fanboyish remarks about Ethereum is that they paint a misleading picture for non-technical people. It also doesn't help that quite a few bitcoin-media-sites seem to be really happy to be a fanboy instead of taking a more objective approach, or even mentioning other possible solutions to the same problem(s).

I'm also uncomfortable with the way the E-team is selling their idea, centering around the buzzword "Turing-completeness" suggesting that they can do absolutely everything, while all other coins are somehow "incomplete" or incapable of doing what's theoretically possible in Ethereum. That does not make them a scam, but I do feel they are deceiving people when they do not make the limitations and risks very clear.

To give one ridiculous example I've heard a E-spokesperson say, is how they could "easily" replicate Wall Street with a few basic math-functions in an Ethereum script. The way it was said gives people the idea that you could run Wall Street and everything else on top of Ethereum, which is of course completely unrealistic if you consider bandwidth, speed, reliability, etcetera, especially if you want to use the E-network for other things as well. Another one I've heard is that you could run all other alt-coins on top of Ethereum, which also makes no sense at all.

YarkoLs' naming it another experiment for smart-contracts on top of a blockchain, is one of the most accurate ones I've heard and also makes the target niche-market very clear. Mastercoin and Ethereum could be considered competitors in the same market. Still I don't think this will make the limitations of Ethereum clear to everyone, nor that Ethereum cannot and will not do everything people are ascribing to it. Most of the pie-in-the-sky ideas I've heard as examples of things-you-could-do on Ethereum seem to be more efficiently written in a couple of Turing-complete languages on their own blockchain either via merged mining (not only in line with Satoshis ideas, but seems to be the consensus among the current bitcoin-devs as well), written from scratch, or with the help of something like the DAC-toolkits in development at Invictus/Bitshares.

EDIT
Somewhat related to this subject, I just took a look at bitshares.org and even though it appears to be wip, it does look like a nice effort to combine and discuss ideas to create practical decentralized solutions. From a quick scan of their website-in-construction and most forum posts by the devs, they appear to be fairly neutral and willing to look at all solutions, even ones not developed by them. One big plus in my book is how the projects-website lists "competitors" (Namecoin, Ripple, NXT, Ethereum and probably others) in the respective categories at the bottom, without belittling them or subjective connotations (that I could see at first glance anyway). Some of the projects being discussed on their forums also looked very interesting, especially their discussion about an alternative proof of stake that seems to be a mix of ripple, nxt and decentralized mining-pools.

Debates are always more popular than speeches.

Where do you guys get the idea that there is rivalry between Ethereum and Bitcoin?

Ethereum is not trying to be "new" bitcoin.. it is a different concept altogether. Bitcoin is excellent for transferring monetary value, whereas Ethereum,
like Mastercoin or Counterparty is aimed at enabling smart contracts etc. But unlike them, it is based on its own blockchain, which is probably for the best, since building another layer on Bitcoin chain does not really add value for BTC users.

If Ethereum takes off, it will be good publicity for Bitcoin too, since it is basically an expansion of bitcoin technology.

Really, that's inevitable. Every new innovation begins with promise, self-hype and Utopian visions. Then the real world sets in, and the exciting hopes turn into a daily grind with the hope and promise keeping your morale up.

The true winner, long term, is the solution that has the talent willing to slog through the scut work during the lean years. In my biased in-the-tank opinion, Nxt has that talent on-board.

The interesting question is, will NEM? To be counterintuitive, I hope it does. Rivalry drives innovation, and friendly rivalry makes for a nice race.  I really don't give a damn if Nxters complain about NEM sucking away $ from Nxt; there's a bigger picture in play.

And no, I have no stake in NEM.   

It's really a shame about Etherium. When it was first announced, there was a lot of excitement - but as the teamwork slowed to committee-work speed, the excitement faded. So has the momentum. If you're excited by Etherium's vision, you can do something with that excitement right now by joining the NXT world or pitching in with the development of NEM. All you need is Java skills and you can "start today!" If you like running with an established federation of devs, NXT is the place to be. If you're thrilled at the chance to build from the ground floor up, you belong with NEM. Either way, you can pitch in whenever you're ready to instead of cooling your heels waiting for a pushed-back IPCO.

Etherium? You wait...and wait...and wait...

As I said, it's really a shame but Etherium seems destined to become Ripple 2.0. Other than the long-term hope of hooking up to the mainstream payments systems, Ripple's a backwater.

Ethereum is not a scam. It works and is under development. Just because somebody does not hastily release unfinished code does not mean it is a scam. I will buy Ethereum over NXT, NEM or Ripple any day.

Bitcoin rules, Ethereum?? what is it? a junk coin

> I don't have an agenda
> I urge you to not rely on 100% trust in people

Based on this response, it appears that your agenda is in sync with ours: to see to the development of next generation consensus-based applications platforms that enable distributed services.  And to build trustless systems that are impervious to corruption, co-option, censorship or other centralized manipulations, and which serve to raise the standards of living of people in developed and less developed regions of the world.  In short, to do work that we are proud of in every aspect.


> What I was trying to do was to point out that there are some things people should consider and be sure of, before putting their money on the line.

If you have faith in the full vision when it is published, or the people behind it, it makes sense to get involved early and buy some ether or contribute in some other way.   For others, it makes sense to watch from a distance and see what emerges.  There will be plenty of time to get involved if you like what you see.


> I'm not alone in being ticked off by rhetoric tricks like putting words in Satoshis mouth which go against the actual things Satoshi said and that has been pointed out by people other than me multiple times, without much effect. I'll give you that he does not represent the entire Ethereum team, but he did make those statements as well as a number of the things I listed in my post as the representative of the Ethereum-team.

While we aren’t always in sync in our communications, I think it is fair to say that Charles does speak for us in nearly all of his communications, just as I or any of the founders do.  We will make mistakes sometimes.  But these will be quickly noticed, discussed and corrected.  I am not aware of any substantive thing that Charles has communicated about Ethereum that I disagree with.  (And, btw, Charles has read nearly everything that Satoshi is known to have written.)

If you are hinting that Satoshi never said that he didn’t want to complicate his experiment with the addition of a Turing-complete engine, you may be correct.  But I think it is reasonable to imply this.

Also, please note that there were things we said in the past that are no longer part of the plans.  In particular, numbers released early regarding pre-mines and monetary inflation rates are now out of date.  We believe a pre-mine to endow the development of the project and to compensate early volunteer contributors makes more sense than issuing all of the ether through miners and generating a lot of waste heat in their parent’s basements.  Bitcoin worked well this way (but still effectively had an enormous “pre-mine” before people became aware of it), but Ethereum has to hit the ground running and can only develop a deep, useful ecosystem with resources sufficient to feed and house the talented people that are drawn to the project.  It can be argued that Bitcoin development currently suffers from not having an endowment or a large cadre of active developers.


> I'm glad you came here to put my mind at ease and defuse/refute some of the statements that Charles made, but you cannot blame me for taking the words of your spokesperson as being representative of the ambitions of the team as a whole.

I don’t blame you for that.  That is exactly what you should do.  And I am glad that you responded to clarify some of your positions. 


> And before anyone asks. I've tried discussing these points repeatedly on various public channels with the Ethereum team and proponents on open channels, but since these remarks were either ignored or avoided, it did not leave me much else to go on. Before I came to these points I also discussed them with various other persons in the hope that I was wrong, from what I'm told and have seen they also tried discussing them with the Ethereum team with similar results, some of them mentioning having been banned from some of those channels, which I'm unable to confirm.

I am sorry to hear that you have had some frustration in communicating with us.  It is a big project, with limited personnel and we are all busy all the time, so sometimes we can’t scan all forums to try to address issues which are expressed.

Feel free to contact me anytime with your thoughts or concerns: my email is joseph at the main ethereum domain.

We are an open project, so we would be happy to have you contribute in any way you see fit.


> So while I might have stated things a bit strongly (hardly as strong as we normally do in my country) I did not come up with them on my own and since they were the complete opposite of how I thought about your project at the start, I did try to get them defused by your team long before posting them here. I still stand by my position that people should be convinced by the project itself on it's own merits and not trust in hype or a single person or promises of how things will be in the future. Also if your project is as you describe it is, a nobody like me should not be able to affect it in any way.

Agreed.  A pessimist is a disappointed optimist.  I hope and expect that your original excitement will return as the details of the projects are finalized and released for evaluation by the community.

I don't have an agenda, other than that I have been repeatedly burned and scammed by team-members with initially well hidden egocentric motivations, which has led to the destruction of many similar idealistic projects as some of the ones in this space and which have resulted in me being somewhat more distrustful. You might consider that as not constructive, but I urge you to not rely on 100% trust in people even if you do sleep together, because that has proven to be destructive 10 times out of 10 in my experience.

Reading my post back I can see how it could be observed as such and maybe I should have chosen a more careful way of wording it. I also admit that I posted that around 3 o'clock in the morning in a foul mood and English is not my native language, so in my attempt to make my points as clear as possible I was not as circumventive as usual in English. Still I don't think my points are that disturbing or unmentionable, but that could be a cultural/lingual difference.

What I was trying to do was to point out that there are some things people should consider and be sure of, before putting their money on the line. In my defense most of the points I mentioned where things said or posted by members of the Ethereum team (and that includes the statement about hardware), although I did put a little twist on some of them. I don't really think calling Charles Hoskinson similar to a car-salesman is an ad-hominem, unless you're trying to say he isn't trying to sell Ethereum and being somewhat liberal in how he does that. The rest of that sentence is also true and I've heard him say those things more than once. I'm not alone in being ticked off by rhetoric tricks like putting words in Satoshis mouth which go against the actual things Satoshi said and that has been pointed out by people other than me multiple times, without much effect. I'll give you that he does not represent the entire Ethereum team, but he did make those statements as well as a number of the things I listed in my post as the representative of the Ethereum-team. I'm glad you came here to put my mind at ease and defuse/refute some of the statements that Charles made, but you cannot blame me for taking the words of your spokesperson as being representative of the ambitions of the team as a whole.

And before anyone asks. I've tried discussing these points repeatedly on various public channels with the Ethereum team and proponents on open channels, but since these remarks were either ignored or avoided, it did not leave me much else to go on. Before I came to these points I also discussed them with various other persons in the hope that I was wrong, from what I'm told and have seen they also tried discussing them with the Ethereum team with similar results, some of them mentioning having been banned from some of those channels, which I'm unable to confirm.

So while I might have stated things a bit strongly (hardly as strong as we normally do in my country) I did not come up with them on my own and since they were the complete opposite of how I thought about your project at the start, I did try to get them defused by your team long before posting them here. I still stand by my position that people should be convinced by the project itself on it's own merits and not trust in hype or a single person or promises of how things will be in the future. Also if your project is as you describe it is, a nobody like me should not be able to affect it in any way.

their initial 50% premine AND IPO was a huge turnoff when they first announced here ...

dont understand their pay to play model, they want the community to build the contracts but you have to pay to use their blockchain? ...

they have dozens and dozens of partners and founders and staff, and everyone knows no one works for free that's what the massive IPO and premine are for.  

I guess if you like hail marys you could invest, buy it'd be best to wait to see how it pans out and just mine it.

fantastic! look: http://nxtra.org/nxt-client/  (type: "1" as a password)

Tell me, what is it now? I see it with a really bright future, don´t you?

nxt was supposed to overcome bitcoin...and look what it is now..