Topic: Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP. - page 1057. (Read 2032266 times)

BitcoinTangibleTrust: You're cherry picking the data.  Where were you when coin dropped to 560 and gold held in the mid 1290s yesterday?

I'll agree that it's a volatile investment opportunity What makes people so certain that Bitcoin will remain the champion with so many cryptocurrency sharks circling?

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It should be somewhat clear that 99% of existing alts will lose 99% of their value over the next few years. Most alt "innovations" either aren't innovations (like tweaking blocktime or supply), don't work, don't scale, or don't matter. Furthermore, ninja-mining, pre-mining, ugly emission curves, 51%s, NaS attacks, etc, can all kill coins even if there *were* actual innovation. And further still, it's probably the case that if any meaningful, viable innovation ever gets done in the alt-space, bitcoin could eventually incorporate it, making the separate chain irrelevant.

You have to understand that bitcoin's innovation was 30yrs in the making. Solving distributed global consensus was a breakthrough in computer science. There has not been a single innovation in the alt space that even sorta compares to that. Not one. Which is why bitcoin is highly likely to remain dominant.

Furthermore, it's been well understood for the past 20-30yrs that if you could solve distributed global consensus, you could do digital cash, and it would be a big deal. It's just that no one had figured out how to solve double-spending (global consensus) prior to Satoshi. There is no similar known problem being attacked in the alt-space for which a solution would be a breakthrough of similar magnitude. So an alt would have to luckbox into some completely unforeseen yet incredible innovation.

So bitcoin likely remains the primary crypto-coin. That said, there *are* potential niches to be filled by alt-coins. The only one I can clearly identify is anonymity. It's clear that bitcoin does not offer meaningful anonymity unless the user is technically skilled enough and motivated enough to obfuscate their transaction chains sufficiently. Furthermore, bitcoin is becoming a global asset class, fit for corporate balance sheets and HNW portfolios. It's also obviously seeing high-profile merchant adoption, and tacit acceptance/approval by various governments and regulatory bodies. If bitcoin offered technically pure anonymity that required zero user effort, governments would probably be a lot more directly hostile towards it. Thus, it seems unlikely that the bitcoin community would embrace full-anon tech in bitcoin core; lest governments react harshly and reduce existing ecosystem investment value dramatically.

So that leaves the anonymity niche open to an alt. As I've previously noted, ever since Zerocoin was published, I thought that when it came out as a functional implementation, it'd be the first actually interesting alt-coin. Well, it looks like these CryptoNote coins have beaten it to the punch of functional anonymity. Which CN coin will win is a different matter. XMR seems out in front, but the waters are muddy still.

I don't see any other obvious niches for alts. Turing completeness is interesting in theory, but I wouldn't trust the security of such a chain for a quite a while, and much of the benefits may be possible in bitcoin anyway. Other than that.... ?

Now that's not to say you couldn't make a killing if you play the alt market perfectly, and jump from coin to coin as they fall in and out of favor. But good luck not losing your shirt.



tl;dr: Alts suck, with very few even theoretical exceptions.

Cypher, you're the circle jerk ring-leader in this thread.  You've no moral high ground and cherry pick data with the best of them.  Spare me ..

While I generally agree that starting a business is the best way to reliably create/increase wealth, I still think bitcoin, while quite volatile and ultimately binary, is one of the most asymmetric investment opportunities we're likely to see in our lifetime. This lays out the bull case decently: http://honestnode.com/bitcoin-fair-value-a-first-assessment/ .

sad 

...Start a business.  That's what I did.

... Amazing what can happen after pondering and finding better ways to accumulate wealth. ...

And I really don't give a crap about your thread rules ..

downgold getting you a little testy?

And I do apologize for referring to Bitcoin as "garbage".  It's not, but I could really use the real estate more than the coins right now.  Running out of space.  Back to work ..

BitcoinTangibleTrust: You're cherry picking the data.  Where were you when coin dropped to 560 and gold held in the mid 1290s yesterday?

This Bitcoin phenomenon is interesting.  It really is an experiment in mass psychology.  The value of Bitcoin depends solely on confidence, since it is backed by nothing (dissipated power doesn't count!).  I can tell you this from personal experience.  I had a considerable stake in Bitcoins during the April crash, having bought in at the low $100s.  I eventually liquidated my position and considered giving up on this altogether.  Admittedly, I was in it for the wrong reasons (get in, get out, get rich).  I decided to throw caution to the wind and daytrade.  It was quite easy double or even triple a stash post crash, to my delight (high volatility and no real trends to speak of, just sloshing back and forth - easy coins!).  Then, I was caught up in the second Bitfloor fiasco, where the exchange closed its doors.  I panicked and sold my Bitcoins minutes before the exchange went offline (I expected a massive price correction across all exchanges - stupid, stupid, stupid).  I had to wait several months to get my fiat out (I have to hand it to Roman, he held up his end of the bargain).  A few months ago, I went all in sub $200 and have been very pleased with the performance.  The experience gave me a much stronger hand.  Whales feed off of weak hands.  Plus, the earlier you jump in, the deeper the market has to correct before you'll get heartburn (generally).  My advice to newbies is this: Take everything you can afford to lose and either go all in on Bitcoin or spread a portion of your stash across the ocean of altcoins out there (everything from Litecoins to Quarkcoins, Stablecoins, etc).  Then, forget about cryptocoins for a few months.  Watching charts does you no good if you don't plan on daytrading.

I've been lurking around these forums for about a year and there are many subhuman people here who are interested in nothing more than spreading unsubstantiated fear, doubt, and negativity.  You see the same people popping up and humping that Bitcoin doomsday leg, hoping for some cheap coins.  What a sad existence.  If you want a good laugh, go back several months and look at all of the failed predictions, hunches and "security flaws".  Regarding Bitcoin's future, nobody knows what will happen.  No one person or group can match wits with hundreds of millions of entrepreneurs.  We are all along for the ride .. some will get lucky with their guesses.  One thing is for certain.  As the price increases, the technology and surrounding infrastructure becomes increasingly robust (think of money flooding into a developing nation).  Thus, the likelihood of a deep crash becomes increasingly improbable as the days march on.  There will be bugs, glitches, scares, etc. and people will panic sell, losing their shirts in the process.  Problems will be fixed.  Fears will be dispelled.  The price will recover.

Regarding $10k, I'd say the price will (over the "long term") either go to basically $0 or will run far beyond $10k.  For it to go to $0, I think there would have be a global cataclysmic event or a competing technology so obviously superior in every way that no one would ever use a Bitcoin again.  This reminds me of Facebook vs Myspace, but you know what?  There are still millions of people who use Myspace for some reason.  Being the Myspace of the cryptocurrency world wouldn't be all that bad for a worst case scenario

Can't do the math yourself?  Fuck's sake 

Zerg, would you please post an update?