Topic: Will Bitcoin become antiquated and lose its first mover advantage? - page 2. (Read 395 times)

Let's take Nokia as an example here. They came from a small rubber manufacturing plant in the 70's to a global giant in a few years and they are almost non-existent now. Why did this happen? Well, they could not keep up with the competition

Bitcoin on the other hand are constantly being updated and improved and they are staying in front of their competition. If they can sustain the status quo with development and innovation, then Bitcoin will stay in front. 

lol

It's not anything like tech companies, that's like assuming a bank will build a better bitcoin....

POW, Decentralization, Security are the VALUABLE things someone else needs to somehow make better. Then create a bigger network effect with all of the infrastructure and adopters already in the space.

Good luck searching for something that isn't coming....

I like this ideology the most, out of all. The fact that Satoshi is completely unknown- the fact that there couldn't be a better figure (or lack thereof) to represent a true and decentralized project.. it's enormous. You can see the level of unrelenting heroism that people see, and cult-like respect for certain project leaders (like Vitalik Buterin for Ethereum) and the amount of power they hold in their word regarding the project(s) they've created..



Fair enough. Are there any certain companies that you visualize doing this? Amazon? Facebook? Any particular traditional tech giant? With Bitcoin being open source, do you think that these companies are just waiting for the right moment to utilize the code that developers before them have created in order to build something better, in an easier fashion?

For bitcoin to become "antiquated", another cryptocurrency needs to come up with better fundamentals. The fundamentals of Bitcoin are:
1. A solid, constantly evolving codebase and team.
2. Proof of Work.

It can be argued that over time, Proof of Work has created mining centralization. The biggest mining equipment manufacturers, miners as well as cheap providers of Hydroelectricity are in China. Even then, the economic incentive for honest mining is too high for miners to go against their self-interest. In a way, any system can be gamed. What is clear from evidence is that PoW is the one which is hardest/ costliest to game, especially when established with a network effect of Bitcoin's scale. Can someone come up with a better consensus mechanism? Or is there a better one? Hard to say for future but looking at how Nano and IOTA have devolved, it can be said safely that PoW is not getting trumped anytime soon.

The other most important thing is the entities behind the codebase. It is often argued that the reference implementation is too guarded and rights are concentrated within an elite circle. But then, every other alternate cryptocurrency will have a team behind it. Can those teams be trusted more than the group behind Bitcoin who have established their reputation through timely interventions and commitments over the past 10 years? In my opinion, any other cryptocurrency will find it hard, nearly impossible to create such a trusted team and open-source codebase. (Something with which individuals and institutions can trust their fiat billions).

As long as these factors remain, there is hardly any chance for another cryptocurrency to take away the crown of being the most dependent and usable digital currency. In terms of alternate blockchain uses, well that is a completely different market. Those areas are still open waiting for their own crown-bearers.

the advantage of bitcoin has never been the "first mover" thing at all. in fact bitcoin is not even the first of its kind! the advantage has always been that bitcoin is working as it should because it is designed with those purposes (decentralization, being a currency, being permissionless,...) in mind.
meanwhile the competition which you think is competition has mostly been created with money making purposes in mind which is why there has never been any serious competition apart from pumpers that come close and then fall down to oblivion.

That and the massive network effect that doesn't "automatically" move because a better widget was built.

The products and services using bitcoin would all have to move to a new coin

The owners of bitcoin would have to move to this new coin

The wallets everyone uses would have to store this new coin

Making all of the people and businesses that value bitcoin as a decentralized store of wealth, somehow value a new coin on the block, would be almost impossible.

The projects basically needs to beat bitcoin in the categories it is good at:

Decentralization: Bitcoin is simply far more decentralized compared to most, if not all projects. The fact that bitcoin doesn't even have a CEO and an "official" team, hence there isn't a single point of failure, is a big factor that's often overlooked.

Adoption & Network effect: Bitcoin is simply the most globally adopted cryptocurrency we have right now; probably followed by ETH(which is a coin that's not made for payments in the first place); and also that bitcoin is definitely the project that has actually real innovation taking place. 

..and some other things


Of course. It's definitely not impossible for someone to create a better technology that can beat bitcoin in most categories. Though it's definitely quite unlikely in the near future; simply because bitcoin is far ahead over most if not all cryptocurrencies that has the same goal as bitcoin.

It's been just about 10 years since the introduction of Bitcoin, the introduction of blockchain technology, and the introduction of a digital and decentralized currency (thanks Satoshi & his inspirations). Bitcoin has held dominance since its inception. We know this. There are tons of extremely bright and passionate core developers who have been there since the near beginning and continue to develop. Large companies/corporations, successful technology entrepreneurs continue to advocate Bitcoin, so on and so forth.

It seems as though not only the need for a decentralized digital currency is there, but an increasing want for it too. Let's try to put the market aspect of things aside, for the sake of this topic.

How could new companies/projects render Bitcoin obsolete?

The desire is there, for some. Those who think that Bitcoin is a dinosaur, and want it to be an antiquated technology.

Do you think it's possible? Very likely? I'd love to hear opinions and insights.