Merged Bitcoin - Part 3

[TurkeysGhost]

Yeah, I don't think you are wrong here.

Bitcoin and NFTs seem to have been created by people whose ideology I find totally misguided to say the least, but I'm not going to question their sincerity to their cause. Now, there is a crapton of shady stuff going in within that space because it's unregulated and just a sweet trap for the unwary, but that's more a side issue no matter how foreseeable it is.

I don't really see how this could be described as a side issue. The true believers wanted exactly this, a deregulated, decentralized libertarian dream world. The fact that it has rapidly devolved into a den of scammers and people profiteering off deliberately wasting energy and creating mountains of e-waste is the realization of the true believer's vision.

I don't know if this is what the true believers imagined their project would look like, but this is a pure manifestation of the techno-libertarian ideology. The plain fact that it's a totally unworkable, nightmare scenario that rewards the most unscrupulous... well I leave it to the reader to draw their own conclusions about libertarianism as a political philosophy.

 

[Suddenly]

The point is that, if you buy an Bitcoin or an NFT off me, for $x, the reason you are doing it is only because you think you can sell it to some bigger fool later for $x+Δ.

I doubt there are a bunch of people around owning Amazon stock because they feel all fuzzy inside about the nature of that business.

I mean, there are valid criticisms of speculative economic behavior and I'm on board with that all day, but it isn't all that relevant to this specific class of asset just because it's value is abstract even as absurd as that abstraction may be. That people own weird pictures of apes or bitcoin because to them it has symbolic value as a statement against the present order is a valid a basis for value as anything else. The layers of speculation building on that can happen with anything.

 

[Suddenly]

I don't really see how this could be described as a side issue. The true believers wanted exactly this, a deregulated, decentralized libertarian dream world. The fact that it has rapidly devolved into a den of scammers and people profiteering off deliberately wasting energy and creating mountains of e-waste is the realization of the true believer's vision.

That the free market would solve all of this were there no government to interfere being basically axiomatic for these people means never having to accept responsibility for foreseeable consequences.

I don't know if this is what the true believers imagined their project would look like, but this is a pure manifestation of the techno-libertarian ideology. The plain fact that it's a totally unworkable, nightmare scenario that rewards the most unscrupulous... well I leave it to the reader to draw their own conclusions about libertarianism as a political philosophy.

We arguably live in a "nightmare scenario that rewards the most unscrupulous" as it is. A lot of Libertarians seem to think think that if money were divorced totally from government that the unscrupulous would have less control.

Which is nuts IMO because all it would do is give the unscrupulous direct control without having to worry about pesky things like democracy and the rule of law getting in the way.

 

[jeremyp]

I doubt there are a bunch of people around owning Amazon stock because they feel all fuzzy inside about the nature of that business.

I mean, there are valid criticisms of speculative economic behavior and I'm on board with that all day, but it isn't all that relevant to this specific class of asset just because it's value is abstract even as absurd as that abstraction may be. That people own weird pictures of apes or bitcoin because to them it has symbolic value as a statement against the present order is a valid a basis for value as anything else. The layers of speculation building on that can happen with anything.

Amazon is a company with assets, revenue and customers. When you buy Amazon stock, you own a small piece of that. When you buy an NFT, you aren't buying anything except a token. Some NFTs are effectively just URLs. There's nothing to say that the URL points to the ape picture or meme that you thought it did. There's nothing to stop the originator of the NFT from "minting" more NFTs that point to the same picture. There's no transfer of copyright. So what are you buying? Only the possibility of selling it later for more money to an even more gullible idiot.

 

[JoeMorgue]

I doubt there are a bunch of people around owning Amazon stock because they feel all fuzzy inside about the nature of that business.

Yeah but again at least Amazon's stock value is (ostensibly) linked to their ability to do something. Amazon's stock is worth value because Amazon provides good and services and people are making guesses (way more random guesses then they admit in 99% of the cases but that's another topic) as to how much its goods and services are worth now and in the future.

An NFT or a Crypto coin is like buying stock in... nothing. They are not going to provide goods and services tomorrow that they aren't today or pretending that they might. There value is completely arbitrary.

Again it's the financial equivalent to the difference between being famous and being famous for being famous.

Amazon stock is like a celebrity. You can argue it's over or under valued or that celebrity is problematic but you understand why you've heard of their name.

Crypto and NFTs are Paris Hilton. Someone else just went "They they are famous now because we say so" and idiots went "Okay sure."

 

[JoeMorgue]

That's also why Crypto isn't a currency.

Yes the dollar is "fiat" but that's not the same thing as "Because I say so."

The dollar has value because the American economy and government have value and, we're back to this, they do things.

Crypto does not.

 

[psionl0]

An NFT or a Crypto coin is like buying stock in... nothing.

This dissimilarity with a baby rattle is what the Luddites fear most. It is the reason why the same made-up BS is constantly recycled over and over again year in and year out.

Cryptos actually have utility. You can transfer large amounts of wealth to almost anywhere in the world without interference and in many cases, in complete privacy.

Of course, anybody wishing to do this will be branded "criminals" regardless of why they might want to this because that's what Luddites do.

 

[ponderingturtle]

I doubt there are a bunch of people around owning Amazon stock because they feel all fuzzy inside about the nature of that business.

But amazon has assets that they own a percentage of. There is something that is backed by something, the tangible assets and business revenue. When bitcoin starts paying out dividends then it will be a fair comparison.

Owning a percentage of a lot of things is still owning something. ANd for intellectual property it also fails because that would require bitcoin to be backed by government laws.

 

[TurkeysGhost]

Yeah but again at least Amazon's stock value is (ostensibly) linked to their ability to do something. Amazon's stock is worth value because Amazon provides good and services and people are making guesses (way more random guesses then they admit in 99% of the cases but that's another topic) as to how much its goods and services are worth now and in the future.

An NFT or a Crypto coin is like buying stock in... nothing. They are not going to provide goods and services tomorrow that they aren't today or pretending that they might. There value is completely arbitrary.

Again it's the financial equivalent to the difference between being famous and being famous for being famous.

Amazon stock is like a celebrity. You can argue it's over or under valued or that celebrity is problematic but you understand why you've heard of their name.

Crypto and NFTs are Paris Hilton. Someone else just went "They they are famous now because we say so" and idiots went "Okay sure."

The crypto market is speculation without pretense.

Plenty of overt speculation and market manipulation happens on wall street, but like you describe, at the root of it all there is actually something of some value. People can play dumb games, like pumping up GameStop stocks as a meme, but there is at least something with some value. A business with assets and liabilities and future earning potential and etc. So while there is plenty of shady, purely speculative market game playing on the stock markets, there is also real value there.

Likewise with fine art. Sure, art pieces are used as money laundering vehicles or tax evasion vehicles, but at the core of all this is a real asset that has real value. People like art, will pay money to see and own art, and these things have some real value even if they are frequently used as financial vehicles.

Cypto is answering the question "what if we could have all the scammy horse-**** without having a core of real value". Different people may look at expensive art pieces and disagree on their artistic worth and value, but everyone agrees that algorithmically generated pictures of apes have 0 artistic value. There is no pretense at all in these schemes, just pure speculative fantasy. A truly spectacular accomplishment.

 

[Dr.Sid]

The crypto market is speculation without pretense.

Plenty of overt speculation and market manipulation happens on wall street, but like you describe, at the root of it all there is actually something of some value. People can play dumb games, like pumping up GameStop stocks as a meme, but there is at least something with some value. A business with assets and liabilities and future earning potential and etc. So while there is plenty of shady, purely speculative market game playing on the stock markets, there is also real value there.

Likewise with fine art. Sure, art pieces are used as money laundering vehicles or tax evasion vehicles, but at the core of all this is a real asset that has real value. People like art, will pay money to see and own art, and these things have some real value even if they are frequently used as financial vehicles.

Cypto is answering the question "what if we could have all the scammy horse-**** without having a core of real value". Different people may look at expensive art pieces and disagree on their artistic worth and value, but everyone agrees that algorithmically generated pictures of apes have 0 artistic value. There is no pretense at all in these schemes, just pure speculative fantasy. A truly spectacular accomplishment.

Nonsense. Art may have quality. But no intrinsic value. Certainly not the value it sells for. That's all in eyes of beholder. If you just want to look at pretty picture, copy would have perfectly the same value. One thing art has common with crypto is scarcity, and how it is difficult to counterfeit. But that's not value by itself, that's more like prerequisite for any investment. With art, most, if not all of the value is just hype.

 

[Suddenly]

But amazon has assets that they own a percentage of. There is something that is backed by something, the tangible assets and business revenue. When bitcoin starts paying out dividends then it will be a fair comparison.

Owning a percentage of a lot of things is still owning something. ANd for intellectual property it also fails because that would require bitcoin to be backed by government laws.

That's not why people own Amazon. The criticism was that most people who owned bitcoin were pure speculators, and the same is true with most people who own Amazon.

Amazon has never paid a dividend and has no plans to. Everyone is trying to come up with metrics to value a stock of companies that really aren't trying to be profitable as much as dominate all world commerce. Which, really, means that the difference between bitcoin and Amazon would be that Bitcoin hasn't managed to cause nearly as much misery or overall damage by reinventing their particular wheel to avoid checks on exploitative behavior.

The whole value of bitcoin is that it doesn't need to be backed by government laws. That's the point.

 

[Chanakya]

I doubt there are a bunch of people around owning Amazon stock because they feel all fuzzy inside about the nature of that business.
I mean, there are valid criticisms of speculative economic behavior and I'm on board with that all day, but it isn't all that relevant to this specific class of asset just because it's value is abstract even as absurd as that abstraction may be. That people own weird pictures of apes or bitcoin because to them it has symbolic value as a statement against the present order is a valid a basis for value as anything else. The layers of speculation building on that can happen with anything.

As far as the highlighted, actually there are. I mean, this is Investments 101. People do buy stocks because they feel fuzzy about the business, that is to say about the financial potential of the business and well as the dividends they'll pay out. They also take into consideration the speculation value, and there are those that are solely speculators, but that is probably the case with just about any asset, including even something like real estate.

As an asset class, bitcoins suck --- unless you're a speculator, that is. Seen as an asset class, absolutely and without a shadow of a doubt they're a scam. Do they have any real worth as currency, is the question. After all that's what they were intended to be.

 

[carlitos]

Do they have any real worth as currency, is the question. After all that's what they were intended to be.

It's completely subjective, but to this day no one has ever told me the value of anything in bitcoin or ETH. Every news article has to have the parenthetical (dollars) in order to make it understandable what 0.017ETH is worth in the real world.

 

[ponderingturtle]

That's not why people own Amazon. The criticism was that most people who owned bitcoin were pure speculators, and the same is true with most people who own Amazon.

Amazon has never paid a dividend and has no plans to. Everyone is trying to come up with metrics to value a stock of companies that really aren't trying to be profitable as much as dominate all world commerce. Which, really, means that the difference between bitcoin and Amazon would be that Bitcoin hasn't managed to cause nearly as much misery or overall damage by reinventing their particular wheel to avoid checks on exploitative behavior.

The whole value of bitcoin is that it doesn't need to be backed by government laws. That's the point.

And it doesn't need to have a stake in world commerce or anything else, it is pure speculation without all that ownership, and property BS.

The unendingly increasing stock value is certainly bubbleish and could well be driven by mostly speculation but there is still something there. Being the backbone of much of the internet is something, crypto does not have that something.

 

[Suddenly]

That's also why Crypto isn't a currency.

Yes the dollar is "fiat" but that's not the same thing as "Because I say so."

The dollar has value because the American economy and government have value and, we're back to this, they do things.

Crypto does not.

The value of anything is not so much "because I say so" as much as "because we say so." We can allow that the American government and economy is the basis for saying that about the dollar, but this doesn't fix that there isn't any sort of concrete connection between the two. People I guess feel better about thinking in those terms but really it is a strong currency because of confidence and it works because it is totally abstract and not tied to anything concrete. That the US government could wreck it tomorrow is exactly why it works... the same reason a car is better with a driver even if that driver could decide to just swerve into oncoming traffic.

We've learned that tying the medium of exchange to something tangible (gold, etc.) causes some bad effects because the volume of currency can not be controlled to correspond with economic growth to avoid runaway inflation and more importantly any significant level of deflation.

The irony being that bitcoin would be a lousy currency not because the value is too abstract but because it is too concrete as math problems and a ledger is the same driverless car as is the gold standard.


The store of value asset is a different thing. It is exactly like beanie babies or art or baseball cards or whatever. The value is in the eye of the holder and solely depends on demand. It isn't like the raw materials making up the Mona Lisa have all that much utility were people to decide it is just a silly picture.

 

[JoeMorgue]

The crypto market is speculation without pretense.

It's speculations without anything to actually speculate on. It's speculating on other people's speculation at best.

Cypto is answering the question "what if we could have all the scammy horse-**** without having a core of real value".

It's like someone looked at high end Wall Street Capitalism and went "You know what the worst part of this is? The part where you actually produce things. Can we get rid of that?"

High finance has always been a wizards duel puppet theater, but crypto is that without even the vaguest pretense that anything it is doing is connect to any real world factor or value.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Nonsense. Art may have quality. But no intrinsic value. Certainly not the value it sells for. That's all in eyes of beholder. If you just want to look at pretty picture, copy would have perfectly the same value. One thing art has common with crypto is scarcity, and how it is difficult to counterfeit. But that's not value by itself, that's more like prerequisite for any investment. With art, most, if not all of the value is just hype.

We're not going to explain the difference between naturally occurring scarcity and artificially produced scarcity.

If you need this concept explained to you I will require you buy all of my 90s Image and McFarlane Comics for what people were telling me they were going to be worth in the future as a consultant fee before I continue.

 

[plague311]

An NFT or a Crypto coin is like buying stock in... nothing. They are not going to provide goods and services tomorrow that they aren't today or pretending that they might. There value is completely arbitrary.

This is wrong, and shows your complete and total ignorance of how NFTs and Crypto works. I'm not going to piss into the wind, which is what debating you on this topic is the equivalence of, but I just want you to know that this is a ******** statement.

 

[JoeMorgue]

This is wrong, and shows your complete and total ignorance of how NFTs and Crypto works. I'm not going to piss into the wind, which is what debating you on this topic is the equivalence of, but I just want you to know that this is a ******** statement.

This isn't like the second pissy "I'm not going to talk to" post you've made today.

Then ******* don't. Nobody is trying to make you talk to anyone.

 

[plague311]

This isn't like the second pissy "I'm not going to talk to" post you've made today.

Oh good, another Joe Morgue "I make **** up and put it in between quotations to imply that people who disagree with me are saying **** that they aren't saying to imply they're unreasonable, and for some reason I can't post a single post without doing this same format of throwing words in quotations because it's super ******* witty and totally not excessively played out" type of post.

Then ******* don't. Nobody is trying to make you talk to anyone.

I will post whenever I ******* feel like it Joe. Whenever I feel like it.

The fact is you are completely and entirely unable to understand that NFTs are more than just artwork. You're like...******* stuck on just thinking that when there are a ton of NFTs that have services and uses. Some as simple as just playing a video game. The same video games you can find other places, except you won't need to buy the whole game, you can just dabble. There are airdrops that provide more facets to an NFT to use in metaverses that are just like every MMO in the world, and can generally cost the user less to play than a standard MMO (for full service anyway).

Anyway, I'll be ready and waiting your next nonsensical phrase shoved between quotes. It seriously never gets old. Ever.