Topic: If Bitcoin became the sole reserve currency... - page 2. (Read 4340 times)

Exactly! Bitcoin is like Napster. After Napster there was Morpheus, Grokster, Kazaa, Limewire, etc. etc. which were then supplanted by eDonkey and BitTorrent. It's never going to stop. People who think Bitcoin will remain the major cryptocurrency on the crypto markets are just naive. The use of technology on the Internet is rapidly evolving. eMunie is a highly advanced cryptocurrency and can be the next big thing.

But you can't have it both ways. There is nothing I did that made me potentially deserve anything when I bought a bitcoin. I simply exchanged one method of storing value for another. Sure, bitcoin has some usefulness as a tool for barter, but why would we attribute a value to it, when bitcoins being traded for bitcoins is pointless. If there is only a finite amount of value just as there is a finite amount of resources and people, then where is that value coming from? 

If the banks had to buy them from people, you think they would buy them at whatever the speculative (out of thin air) value is? They would run it to the ground before they would 'buy' a single coin, and at that point it would be useless. The government and/or media can destroy Bitcoin at any time. They've never redistributed their wealth and they're not going to start now because of cryptos-- nothing will force them into that situation, they are the ones in charge and there is no way in hell they will allow competition-- for them, everything is at stake.

This is why I mentioned Bitcoins simply disappearing. My question is a hypothetical/philosophical one.

Most people with some ideals see Bitcoin as a way for the banks/govt to stay out of our pockets-- to not allow them to take more than they already have-- this is seen as unjust. Bitcoin is seen as revolutionary by these people because of its ability to accomplish this. I happen to think that these same people acquiring so much of something for pretty much next to nothing, is also inherently unfair to those that don't, and won't do anything to redistribute the wealth from the ultra rich to the ultra poor. It is a potential revolution for the 'haves' in denial but not for the 'have nots'. They will not actually be taking anything from the super rich, and the wealth (because of the very nature of 'wealth') has to come from somewhere or be in relation to something else. That relation will only cause the poor to become poorer because they didn't gain anything of value, even if they didn't actually 'lose' anything.

No, see, you are missing some steps.  Bitcoin won't "become the sole reserve currency" with the current distribution.  The Federal Reserve, the ECB and the PBOC aren't going to put out press releases saying "We've adopted bitcoin as the reserve currency.  We don't have any.  Can you sell us some?"

The banks need to acquire them first.  That means buying them from people.  That means changing the bitcoin distribution.  In particular, the central banks would need to gather many, many bitcoins before they could consider using it as a reserve.

Your analysis is very static.  You don't see the system as being a living, moving thing.  But I figure your post is much more political than it is analytical.

True, but that still wouldn't change the fact that the richest Bitcoiners came upon an extreme amount of wealth and others did not. In fact, they came about the coins by attributing a value to them that literally comes from thin air, much in the same way as printed money.

if it ever comes that far, the current owners of bitcoin can only gain goods by spending their bitcoins.

unlike the current wealthy elite, they can not just print more money.

eventually even the richest bitcoiners will go broke if they keep spending their bitcoins.

Anybody can aquire bitcoins now, there is not lower limit. If you planned to go to the pub and buy a pint of beer, you could buy bitcoins for the corresponding amount. It is your choice. If you do, you might be able to buy a hundred pints later. Maybe. Anyway, even the very last adoptor of bitcoin will be able to reap the benefits. It is a money designed to not loose value, forchrissake.

Bitcoin is sound money. In a world with sound money, everybody will win. Some will be richer than the others, but so what? In case of no government intervention, the riches of any individual will depend only of his merit. If one individual is good at making money, it means prosperity to everyone, not only to the one earning the extra profits.

A prosperous societey means individual rights, private property AND the general understanding that being rich, not by being friend of the government types, but by the merit of making useful products or services for the consumer, is respectable and deserved.

This was the situation during the industrial revoulution in England. If there is a country or area that have this attitude towards the makers of wealth now, tell me, and I will move there.

Oops sorry, you Asic communist.

You have to add "Asic communist" so that I will feel really insulted )))))

You idiot OF COURSE bitcoin will solve world hunger, world peace too, otherwise what's the point?!!?!

You're sooo wrong.
Somebody  cursed me and called me a non - believer (not the actual word he used) , because I said that bitcoin won't solve the problems of poverty and hunger in Africa.

I don't think anybody should have any delusions that bitcoin "solves" disparities in wealth.  There will always be wealth disparities, that is just a reality.  If the only value bitcoin was touted to bring to the world was no more wealth disparity than your point is valid and bitcoin will be pointless.

The world can change dramatically and still have rich and poor people, not sure why you would think otherwise.

If anything I think bitcoin can bring somewhat reduced unfairness in wealth distribution long term.  Sure there will be some wealth concentrations around the smart and business saavy, around the ruthless and psychopathic, and around some due to early adoption for awhile.  However this is true with our current system, and with bitcoin you get the benefit of not allowing the rich and powerful to crony up to the money printers and get first dibs like you see with most fiat.

So my prediction would be somewhat more fair wealth distribution, as well as all the other advatages that comes with sound AND programmable money.  Sounds pretty good to me.

Edit: My personal belief is that current wealth distribution is not 100% "fair" but that neither is !00% uniform distribution of wealth.

Bitcoin = GO BIG or GO HOME

Newsflash for noobs, bitcoin isn't about fulfilling your socialist fever dreams of "wealth distribution". It never will be, and we don't care. Nor do we think wealth distribution the way you are talking about it is a particularly good idea.

there are like 9 million coins left to mine,,, everyone has there chance.... people are going to learn how to be different. savers instead of spenders. its a needed flush of the system. Yes of course 20% going to own 80% thats nature... research 20-80 rule... its universal you cant change it. Best thing to do is protect your coins and protect your family and blood line... Why do you think the rich are so strick on who they associate with and they push out trash... they dont wanna be infected!

I think you're underestimating the utility of being able to transfer money across international borders nearly instantaneously and without paying fees to a financial institution.

Bitcoin doesn't have to solve the socioeconomic problems of the world to be a big deal. It just has to provide a useful service that people will want to use.

I share your idealistic desire for a more egalitarian distribution of wealth. However, I don't see bitcoin as the solution to that social issue. I just see it as a useful technology that can enable people to transfer money through the internet without a middleman.

Did the smart also stay away from buying stock in Microsoft or Apple, pre-IPO?

Bitcoin is currently like a pre-IPO tech stock. You can't even buy it in your online brokerage account yet. And, like tech stocks, it is based on a specific technological innovation. People who are buying bitcoin are betting that the innovation of cryptocurrency is going to catch on and be used much more widely. I think that's a smart position, and I don't think there's any reason to believe that bitcoin's current valuation is just a bubble.

Yeah, that's why it's still a good buy. Because the usage isn't going to be minimal for much longer. It's a very useful technology.

I think that is being extremely optimistic, but even if your scenario were to prove true-- nothing in the world would change at all, so what would the point of the currency be? Maybe I'm asking too much, but in other words-- what would be so revolutionary about it?

The usage of Bitcoin, on a world scale, and relative to everything else is minimal. It has for most of its history been used for 'off the books' transactions. These transactions were often made to purchase illegal goods. Sure more people are adopting it, but mostly they are doing so to profit somehow from the Bitcoin phenomenon, not because of some profound philosophy or practical future implications. And whatever the tiny % of businesses that have adopted it is, they do not justify the attributed 'value' of any cryptocurrency, because nothing justifies a pricetag (based on fiat, btw) on what is supposed to be a method of exchange. The pricetag is nothing more than speculation.