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Topic: What Litecoin means for Bitcoin (and crypto in general) once it's on Mt.Gox - page 5. (Read 8600 times)

legendary
Activity: 892
Merit: 1013
litecoin is 99% like bitcoin and we are 99% like chimpanze
what matter is the remaining 1% !
vip
Activity: 1316
Merit: 1043
👻
full member
Activity: 141
Merit: 100
I think the asic industry is exactly what bitcoin needed - cryptocurrency directly tied to manufacturing, jobs and trade in the real world. i think this further cements bitcoin as the de-facto cc, and leaves little room for alt coins.
legendary
Activity: 1623
Merit: 1608
crazy_rabbit is continuosly promoting alternative currencies, including Bitcoin testnet coins. He strives to put his ads in the Bitcoin discussion thread, instead of the alt-coins thread, where it should really stay.

In my opinion, this behavior does no good to the cryptocurrency world. Currently, all alt-coins are just forks any guy can create in one afternoon, and just dilutes the focus on Bitcoin.

Anyway, I will personally abandon Mt Gox if this happens and I will join some other exchange.
sr. member
Activity: 2282
Merit: 470
Telegram: @jperryC
If we don´t need litecoin, we don´t need dolar or euro too, (why do we use more than a fiat currency?) each one will choose wich one is comfortable for him.

Besides,Im afraid that Bitcoin has the risk of being monopolised by Asicminer or a handful od companies. In the other hand I like mining cryptocurrencies and soon I wont be able to do so, with bitcoin.
legendary
Activity: 1036
Merit: 1000
My impression is that both Bitcoin and Litecoin are set up so as for the mining power to always be well ahead of the amount necessary to make a 51% attack unprofitable. A bit more worrisome is some kind of catastrophic technical failure in Litecoin, which is more likely than with Bitcoin since LTC has much less dev support.

But hopefully MtGox will limit LTC trading volume to a sensible level to allow for such risks.
legendary
Activity: 1204
Merit: 1002
RUM AND CARROTS: A PIRATE LIFE FOR ME
What I'ld like to know is who suffers if Mt. Gox offers Litecoin trading and there is a 51% attack against Litecoin in which those funds were then double spent against Mt Gox.

Mt. Gox was asked this question, but they declined to provide an answer:
 - http://pastebin.com/RVe7LbH9

As a result, it must be presumed that funds are not safe when left with an exchange that trades alt coins and doesn't have a policy or other protections regarding a 51% attack:

Your Bitcoins Are Not Safe At Alt-coin Exchanges
 - http://www.bitcoinmoney.com/post/53207712103

They people who would suffer are the same as those who would suffer if bitcoin was attacked. Although that's become harder to do, it's still possible- and it's become more worthwhile then ever before if you could pull it off.

Litecoin however is smartly slightly more difficulty to attack in terms of expense. At this point it's becoming about as secure as bitcoin pre-asic
hero member
Activity: 772
Merit: 501
In case you don't know Bitcoin's code is open source. It's not proprietary. It's designed so that anyone can view, use, copy or alter it for free. The same goes for Litecoin, and in fact something similar happened to Litecoin called FeatherCoin. The fact that the code can be largely used as is speaks to how good the original design is.

Just to make absolutely clear: I believe people have a right to create any derivative of Bitcoin that they want, and no one should use physical force or threats to prevent them from doing so.

Respecting the right of others to compete does not mean having to refrain from trying to beat them in the market through legitimate means, like non-violent persuasion and technical innovation.

I think Bitcoin and Bitcoin-based currency in general could benefit if the community works to make Bitcoin out-compete any new derivative that emerges.

Competing could mean debunking hype that Bitcoin-alt promoters spread, adopting new protocol features (e.g. a shorter block time) that are found to be advantageous, choosing to make Bitcoin the exclusive cryptocurrency traded on an exchange, etc. I'm not advocating >50% attacks against, or lying about, Bitcoin-alts to stifle them. The Bitcoin community using legitimate means to compete against competitors is GOOD for the market.

We don't have to have a fully functional parallel network with its own ecosystem of exchanges to have a backup hashing algorithm. Using a backup hashing algorithm is a matter of changing the Bitcoin code to swap out SHA256 for something else.

"Swapping" something out, like the hashing algorithm, isn't like flipping some switch. Any protocol change in Bitcoin is inherently hard, and gets harder the larger the group is which uses Bitcoin because there are more opinions about what change should be made, if any at all, and how and when to go about it.

We're talking about a flaw in the hashing algorithm, I'm assuming. If there is a flaw, then the whole community will support changing it, because the network can't function otherwise.

A currency's viability is not just about technology. It's also about value. We need to work to preserve and protect the value of bitcoins, which requires not encouraging the adoption of additional blockchains that add to the total number of coins and provide the same currency function.

No we don't need to preserve and protect the value of bitcoins. That's not how a free market works. The free market will assign the value where it should be.

The free market is our decisions, absent compulsion. You're not being forced to maintain and protect the value of bitcoins, but if people choose to do so, using legitimate voluntary means, that is just as much part of the free market as your decision to not care about the limit on the coin supply.

You don't get it. 21 million bitcoins isn't less than 7 billion. A bitcoin is equal to 100,000,000 Satoshis.

No you don't get it. A dollar is equal to 100 pennies. That doesn't make the dollars in your pocket worth less. Only more whole dollars in the money supply does that.

No you still don't get it.

We're not talking about dividing bitcoins up into smaller pieces. We're talking about changing the proportion of the total currency supply that each individual has.

By increasing the supply to above 21 million coins, a person who has a certain number of coins sees their share of the total supply decrease.

Going from 21 million to 106 million coins (21 million bitcoins + 84 million litecoins) would mean inflating the money supply by 400%. That is all that matters.

No it doesn't mean that. You can't inflate Bitcoin's money supply, nor Litecoin's, and the two are not the same money supply. Now what you can do is increase the total cryptocurrency money supply.

I didn't claim it's inflating Bitcoin's money supply. It's inflating the total cryptocurrency money supply, as you point out.

But from the point of view of someone who wants their bitcoins to maintain their value, an almost identical peer-to-peer currency, with virtually identical properties, and with its own set of 84 million coins, seeing adoption has the same effect as the supply of bitcoins increasing.

It is almost exactly the same as Bitcoin, and will be used in almost exactly the same roles. More coins = each coin has less value. Supply and demand is an iron-clad economic law.

That's true, but I don't believe there will be much more than Bitcoin and Litecoin accepted at a global scale; that means a total money supply measured in millions, not trillions like what the world is used to now.

We'll see. I think that if litecoin gains any level of acceptance, it will not be the last derivative of Bitcoin to do so.

It's a Bitcoin market when it's all based on Bitcoin technology.

Like I said above, Bitcoin is open source, not proprietary. And the name "Bitcoin" is arbitrary. You could call Litecoin Bitcoin an call the blockchain trading now on MtGox SatoshiCoin.


I choose to call it 'Bitcoin technology', as that is what makes sense to me. I'm not asking for law enforcement to break down your door for using a different name, but I have a right to call it whatever I want.
legendary
Activity: 2506
Merit: 1010
What I'ld like to know is who suffers if Mt. Gox offers Litecoin trading and there is a 51% attack against Litecoin in which those funds were then double spent against Mt Gox.

Mt. Gox was asked this question, but they declined to provide an answer:
 - http://pastebin.com/RVe7LbH9

As a result, it must be presumed that funds are not safe when left with an exchange that trades alt coins and doesn't have a policy or other protections regarding a 51% attack:

Your Bitcoins Are Not Safe At Alt-coin Exchanges
 - http://www.bitcoinmoney.com/post/53207712103
sr. member
Activity: 462
Merit: 250
PXC Research Team
I think LTC is gonna compete with BTC. Any thing is possible. At the start BTC was also the same price almost.
legendary
Activity: 1036
Merit: 1000
hero member
Activity: 541
Merit: 500
Actually if anything, I think getting LTC recognized more could only help crypto-currency to becoming more well used.  And I honestly believe neither Bitcoins/Litecoins or any of the other current alts are going to be able to take over as a mainstream currency.  There are far to many flaws with each one.  But by bringing the 2 coins closer together will help.  Bitcoins are good for slow moving big transactions.  Litecoins are better for faster smaller transactions.  Neither yet are great if you were to have them go mainstream and have the 50 people standing in a Starbucks line waiting for all the Bitcoin transactions to process and confirm before they could leave with their lattes.

Also the conversation that 2 crypto-currencies can not exist side by side in a global marketplace is plain silly.  Fiat has been doing so easily.  Or does it really mess up the value of the US dollar if some people are using Mexican Pesos?  No one ever said Litecoin would automatically be trading at the value of a Bitcoin.  They will remain at totally different values for all times.  Lastly, having more then 1 crypto-currency means more people in the crypto using pool.  Many miners have already begun to move away from Bitcoins, and the crazy difficulty rates, and the prices of ASIC miners will ensure not everyone will jump into the coin.  But giving the people leaving, and a lot of latecomers a way into the game only adds to the total market.
legendary
Activity: 1050
Merit: 1002
Seeing as how you could combine the sum total of both currencies and not even get 100 million they are both rare enough to be valuable. There is easily more than 100 million ounces of gold in the world and yet its still considered extremely rare.

Actually, there are an estimated 10 billion ounces of gold which would be around 100 times more than BTC/LTC combined.

Let's say 1 ounce of gold is now $1,000. That means BTC/LTC valued on par with gold would be around $100,000 per unit. Of course, some people believe gold could/should actually be worth $10,000 or more considering its scarcity as compared to fiat currency like dollars.
sr. member
Activity: 341
Merit: 250
being a silver hoarder i was naturally attracted to litecoin from the beginning.  The fact is that crypto currency is such a good idea that there is room for more than 1 blockchain in the world.  If the fear is that it will somehow dilute bitcoin i believe thats unfounded. Seeing as how you could combine the sum total of both currencies and not even get 100 million they are both rare enough to be valuable. There is easily more than 100 million ounces of gold in the world and yet its still considered extremely rare.   Sure there are a gazillion alt coins now basically ripping off litecoin but thats the cool thing about the free market, it decides what has merit and what doesn't.  Thats why bitcoin will be king, ltc will be the queen and i believe theres room for a prince or two thats yet undecided.  The coins that spring up just because someone with a little coding knowledge wants to get rich off bein an early miner *cough* sc io ix *cough* will never gain any traction.    

Im kind of surprised namecoin hasn't really gained ground. I guess its because there is no gui wallet for it and pretty much no community/dev support.  I could see them being incredibly valuable in the next five years just because they allow ppl to circumvent costly domain registration services.  kind of how palladium wasn't worth a whole lot until  it was found to be  an inexpensive way to dilute platinum in catalytic converters etc...

i had a big debate about this over a campfire the other weekend with a friend who is a bitcoin snob.  So its still in my mind.  I think its just human nature that there will always be people that want 50 of something versus 1 of something even if the values are similar.
legendary
Activity: 1050
Merit: 1002
What it means is a never ending stream of BUY THIS NEW ONE perpetual annoyance that really devalues the whole idea of digital currency to me

A never ending stream of alt-coins has already happened. The majority of them are either dead or have value measured so low as not to be taken seriously.

Really, Bitcoin spinoffs were seen far ahead of time. I was never bothered by their possibility, even before I supported Litecoin (even before it existed), because I knew there were some things spinoffs couldn't easily duplicate. That's why they are permissible without undermining the entire concept.
sr. member
Activity: 378
Merit: 250
Born to chew bubble gum and kick ass
Adding LTC to MtGox means:

1. More transactions routed via MtGox = bigger income for MtGox

2. More opportunities for traders = traders are happy

I see no negatives.
legendary
Activity: 1611
Merit: 1001
no to brag but it feels pretty cool to be responsible for Ł being the litecoin symbol, I hope gox implements it's use.

what was your responsibility with it ?

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/as-the-litecoin-symbol-79849
sr. member
Activity: 1078
Merit: 254
^ LTC threatens MtGox's entire business. It will absolutely destroy investor confidence in Bitcoin, and by extension, all cryptocurrencies derived from Bitcoin. Only those looking to pump their litecoins can't see that.

If it threatens their business why are they doing it? There business is based on a comission for exchanges and LTC will raise their volume a shitload. LTC does have a place, to try to say you can predict everything about BTC is ridiculous and we need a back up. also i think LTC further decentrilization is great. I profited enough on my LTC, and i dont need to pump , yet i dont have so much that i cant dump( I could sell at profit and not kill the market), yet i keep them cause I think they are going to 30 before BTC goes to 1000. And I think BTC has a lot o attention LTC needs some more. Having LTC, r another readily available substitute, will keep the BTC rulers in check, miners and Devs wont be able to do wtvr they want
sr. member
Activity: 277
Merit: 250
What it means is a never ending stream of BUY THIS NEW ONE perpetual annoyance that really devalues the whole idea of digital currency to me
legendary
Activity: 1050
Merit: 1002
Right, it's not Bitcoin. It's a near duplicate of Bitcoin, with 99.99% of the same code, and three superficial innovations through two changed parameters.

In case you don't know Bitcoin's code is open source. It's not proprietary. It's designed so that anyone can view, use, copy or alter it for free. The same goes for Litecoin, and in fact something similar happened to Litecoin called FeatherCoin. The fact that the code can be largely used as is speaks to how good the original design is.

We don't have to have a fully functional parallel network with its own ecosystem of exchanges to have a backup hashing algorithm. Using a backup hashing algorithm is a matter of changing the Bitcoin code to swap out SHA256 for something else.

"Swapping" something out, like the hashing algorithm, isn't like flipping some switch. Any protocol change in Bitcoin is inherently hard, and gets harder the larger the group is which uses Bitcoin because there are more opinions about what change should be made, if any at all, and how and when to go about it. Indeed I don't see much chance for any successful protocol change once Bitcoin reaches a near global user base. Protocol changes wouldn't be impossible, but I'd say extremely difficult.


A currency's viability is not just about technology. It's also about value. We need to work to preserve and protect the value of bitcoins, which requires not encouraging the adoption of additional blockchains that add to the total number of coins and provide the same currency function.

No we don't need to preserve and protect the value of bitcoins. That's not how a free market works. The free market will assign the value where it should be.


You don't get it. 21 million bitcoins isn't less than 7 billion. A bitcoin is equal to 100,000,000 Satoshis.

No you don't get it. A dollar is equal to 100 pennies. That doesn't make the dollars in your pocket worth less. Only more whole dollars in the money supply does that.

Going from 21 million to 106 million coins (21 million bitcoins + 84 million litecoins) would mean inflating the money supply by 400%. That is all that matters.

No it doesn't mean that. You can't inflate Bitcoin's money supply, nor Litecoin's, and the two are not the same money supply. Now what you can do is increase the total cryptocurrency money supply. However, that has already happened. There are a lot more cryptocurrencies than Bitcoin and Litecoin. And that creation hasn't ended, I assure you.

And you really think litecoin will be the last cryptocurrency with an enthusiastic group of early adopters claiming it's a necessary 'silver to Bitcoin's gold'? No of course not. There will be others, and they will be push until MtGox puts them on the exchange too.

No I don't think that. Like I said above there will be other new coins regardless to what you or I say. However, those new coins while being able to duplicate the code of Bitcoin or Litecoin can't as easily duplicate their user base. That's the key.

At this rate, cryptocurrency will have an inflation rate far above any fiat currency. This is already the criticism that Bitcoin's harshest critics are making against it, and now we see that it potentially has some merit, with late-comers to Bitcoin pushing for the addition of 84 million coins, on their Bitcoin 2 network, to the currency supply.

I understand your fear, but I believe it's unwarranted. As I describe above the inflation of cryptocurrency is inevitable as the code is open source. However, that doesn't mean every unit of cryptocurrency created has value.

It is almost exactly the same as Bitcoin, and will be used in almost exactly the same roles. More coins = each coin has less value. Supply and demand is an iron-clad economic law.

That's true, but I don't believe there will be much more than Bitcoin and Litecoin accepted at a global scale; that means a total money supply measured in millions, not trillions like what the world is used to now.

It's a Bitcoin market when it's all based on Bitcoin technology.

Like I said above, Bitcoin is open source, not proprietary. And the name "Bitcoin" is arbitrary. You could call Litecoin Bitcoin an call the blockchain trading now on MtGox SatoshiCoin.
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