Topic: Why bitcoin supply will NOT cap at 21M BTC [NOT PLAUSIBLE] - page 2. (Read 4391 times)

Why would anyone operate a business under these circumstances?  Deflation is bad for business

The old deflation problem. We have solved that problem, the dominators are wrong. Proof: There are always two parties to a trade. The seller would not wait, he will hurry to sell his warez. Why, because later he will get only 2. Maybe he proposes 2 1/2, and maybe you accept. It's only a half more, and you need not wait.

The protocol could be changed in the event that the miners were to agree to the changes.

Now the question of would the miners agree to this type of change, no almost certainly not.

The question of is this a realistic scenario, also no.

When the mainstream come on board and recognise the benefits of decentralised currency, they'll also recognise the ideology that made it work and want to defend that.  They'll know by then that printing masses of fiat money out of thin air by banks and governments was just a con.  The only ones to see any benefit from the creation of fiat money were the ones reaping all the interest because the money was, in reality, just debt.  A continuous loop of theft to transfer wealth from the bottom to the top.  They won't want to go back to that once they've seen the light.

Thanks.  We will see how it goes.

governments will not have that kind of power once a large enough group of people realize that the infinite printing of fiat money causes almost all the problems in the world.

Once bitcoin reaches mass adoption, or even before that, a lot of people will know that the 21 limit and the decentralization are what makes bitcoin have value, and what makes it different from fiat.

I think most people would rather fight to keep bitcoin as it is than to fall from one fiat to the next fiat. As fiat is essentially worthless and people are starting to gradually wake up to this fact.

Alright. Call it what you like. If you define bitcoin as the thing that works exactly like satoshi designed it, then I agree. It doesn't matter what you name it, the OP applies all the same.

I wish you good luck. Where will the security come from? If 90% of the hashpower goes to the legal fork, how easy will it be for those miners to perform 51% attacks on the genuine-bitcoin chain that now only has 10% of the original hashpower?
There is no chance that multiple bitcoin forks or altcoins based on the same mining algorithms can coexist long term. The biggest one will win because it's the only secure network.

Not true. Value comes from trust. Some people's trust will drop to zero if the money supply formula is changed in the source code and a hard fork has taken place. Those can stick to the old code and run the 'old' chain.

But other people will trust a centrally controlled BTC fork, because:

• they don't care about centralization (or just don't understand what all the fuss is about)
• it would be the only fork that can be used for purchasing goods legally

This is true if you see bitcoin only as a store of value or a medium of exchange. But it doesn't make sense if you want to use it as a unit of account.

If a good costs 3 BTC today and you expect it to cost 2 BTC tomorrow, you'll probably wait until tomorrow with purchasing that good if you can. Today's central banks are doing what they can to avoid such a deflation. And that is why they will certainly want to regulate crypotocurrencies if they become relevant.

As discussed in this very thread and in hundreds of other threads just like this one:  The total number of Bitcoins specified in the Bitcoin protocol cannot be changed.  Bitcoin will end up with (slightly less than) 21 million coins, end of story.  The only thing you, the government or anyone else can do to get more is to change the protocol to allow more coins but in doing so a hard branch will be created.

Even if there are only a handful of people left in the entire world mining, using and doing transaction on the original blockchain - the one with the 21 million coin limit - that chain is still Bitcoin by definition.  Even if the value goes to $2.00 per BTC some of us will still mine it, use it, and support it, just like we did the last time it was $2.00 per BTC.

There are already what, over 100 alt coins?  There will be more and maybe someday a government controlled and backed one.  It is all good.  Let the market decide which coins live and which coins die.

The day we create more than 21Million BTC is the day the first 21Million are valueless. There is no need whatsoever to change the total number of coins. It is an arbitrary number and does not matter. Even if there were only 1 BTC it would work.
Think of bitcoin as more like a pie we are cutting into slices. The number of slices is irrelevant. 

Don't forget that bitcoin is nominally a HIGHLY inflationary currency today (~11%). Is its real value declining? Sometimes ;-), but not in general. And certainly not "by design".

Real value of a unit of currency does not solely depend on nominal inflation of money supply. You need to consider the growth of the market the currency serves.

Ok. got me there. ;-) However, my OP intends to be judgement free.

You're certainly not short of arrogance.

I disagree. Your title is of course a possible scenario. But as I'm talking about bitcoin, this is covered by:


What you suggest (gov starts its own altcoin) will only open a possibility for bitcoiners to flee the sinking boat

As long as there is an inflation safe alternative, both mechanisms will depress the value. Inflation of supply will depress the value, and people running away from it will also depress the value.

It already has.

Now that you have learned a little more about how Bitcoin actually works perhaps it is time to change the title of your thread.  At this point you must agree that "Why bitcoin supply will NOT cap at 21M BTC" is very misleading.  A more accurate thread title would be:

"What if the government(s) started their own alt coin?"

All that drama about forcing the current Bitcoin devs to do their bidding is totally unnecessary.  All the code is open source.  Anyone, including the goobermint, can hire a bunch of programmers and create their own alt coin to compete with Bitcoin.  The goobermint can do this fairly and let the market decide or they can do it unfairly by outlawing all competition.  They can create their new alt "UsCoin" or "UnCoin" as either a brand new alt or as a hard fork of the Bitcoin blockchain.

But, if they are going to create a centrally controlled alternative to Bitcoin they do not need to go through all the trouble of creating a decentralized solution.  They can simply create a new form of electronic fiat currency that acts kind of like Bitcoin.  In fact there is no reason to do that because, except for a very small amount of cash left in the system, the entire world fiat currency system is exactly that:  a centrally controlled electronic fiat currency system.

So this entire thread boils down to the one single question:  Will the goobermint attempt to outlaw Bitcoin and all other decentralized currencies or not?

You still don't get it.  Something like this might cause a setback and create a great buying op that is true.  However in the long run oldBTC would recover its value and more and newBTC would be inflated to nothing just like every other fiat inflation currency.

Probably t The real value of newBTC will also drop by design because all the hoarders see no point in hoarding anymore as an inflationary policy will be applied to newBTC.

Fixed that one for you.


Not true.  You made the following judgment:

I don't know anything about programming cryptocurrencies, but I'll upload it to some place like piratebay for people to download for sure, I wouldn't be surprised if someone has already done this regardless but I'm keeping the code on hand just in case the U.S actually tries something because they might target torrents as well if they get angry enough, it's good to be prepared for anything.

I do believe that as the devs go deeper to the point of no return with the U.S government that eventually they'll be threatened into making changes, they'll either be forced to make them or they'll go down fighting and bring down the whole site with them, just like with what happens regularly to Bittorrent sites.

Interesting point. I myself learned a lot about the nature of money and the mechanics of money supply since I first learned about bitcoin. But "we" early bitcoiners are avantgarde and think more about its nature than anyone who starts to use Bitcoin when it already has become mainstream.

I doubt that this education you mention will change the way of the world.

OK, got your point. But I think, you're missing one important point:

Let's say you've got N BTC now. You would be cheering because after such a hard fork you will have N oldBTC plus N newBTC. You're wrong if you think that this makes you more wealthy. If the majority uses newBTC, then this will mean that the real value of your oldBTC will pop to close to nothing, because no one will want to buy those coins because no goods can be legally bought with them anymore. Of course, some illegal trade could continue using oldBTC. But this will be a small fraction of the original market (For those, something like zerocoin would be more attractive anyway).

Probably the real value of newBTC will also drop because all the hoarders see no point in hoarding anymore as an inflationary policy will be applied to newBTC.

I just want to make clear that this is not "my ideal scenario". I'm not judging anything of this with my liking or disliking. All I say is what I think could happen.

A few months learning about bitcoin will teach people more about money and politics than twenty years studying under the present educational system will. That done, there is no going back to trusting governments and banks. It won't even be a matter of ideology.