Major fall in BTC price (16th Jan)

TheBigShort said:
Championing the 'free' world. :rolleyes:
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I was not commenting on the rights or wrongs of that, merely pointing it out. If governments work in tendem to destroy Bitcoin, nothing will happen. If they tried it with the Dollar, something would most definitely happen.
 
Gordon Gekko said:
I was not commenting on the rights or wrongs of that, merely pointing it out. If governments work in tendem to destroy Bitcoin, nothing will happen. If they tried it with the Dollar, something would most definitely happen.
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I agree. Threaten the US dollar position as the worlds reserve currency and the consequences can be dire - Libya, Iraq for instance.
China, Russia and Iran are also considered threats but not as easy to target. But NK is a valuable pawn to be played.

Im not sure who would be targeted for bitcoin though? The internet?
 
Gordon Gekko said:
tecate, Bitcoin is allegedly a currency, the internet is a network. We may end up using digital currencies, but my best guess is that we’d be using crypto-Dollars (for example) and not 21 million units of unregulated nonsense dreamed up by some fella in his bedroom.

The US Dollar is most certainly backed by something: the largest and most powerful military force ever assembled.
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Err, of course Bitcoin is a network!
Dollars and Euros are digital enough already, it has little to do with Bitcoin adoption.
 
Bitcoin is networked money. As regards someone 'dreaming something up in their bedroom', you mean someone had an idea and it led to something significant?...how many examples do you need?....or can that Eureka moment only happen in a corporate office somewhere?

In terms of a nation state crypto, do you understand the distinction between a centralised cryptocurrency being hacked and a decentralised crypto being hacked? Good luck with the fallout in those circumstances!
 
Gordon Gekko said:
this scam will have 21 million units in circulation...until it doesn’t.
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Well nearly, somewhere between 2.8 & 3.8 million bitcoin have already been lost forever. Over enough time, the probability of all bitcoin being lost approaches certainty.
 
Leo said:
Well nearly, somewhere between 2.8 & 3.8 million bitcoin have already been lost forever. Over enough time, the probability of all bitcoin being lost approaches certainty.
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I don't think so.

An estimated of 1 million is rumoured to be Satoshi's coins. We do not know if and why Satoshi lost those but I doubt it was an accident.
Then you got the old hard drives back when it was worth pennies.
And pretty much all the coins were lost when they were cheap. Hundreds of bitcoin in the old hard drive in the attic?? Thats not happening anymore!

With Bitcoin becoming more valuable people secure it properly. They make backups, they inform their next of kin. Not to mention custodians like Coinbase holding a lot of it anyway!
I believe coins being lost nowadays are approaching zero.
Of course dementia or sudden death accidents will still cause coins to be lost but nothing that will significantly add to those 3-4 million already lost.

Add to all that the 8 decimal point divisibility...
 
Leo said:
Being pedantic it's an open ledger system and associated software running on nodes that rely on the internet for its network :D
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Ah well...
Ill be pedantic also and suggest it can work without the internet :D

Come to think of it... oh the amount of forks there would be without broadband...
Maybe that's why they keep the blocksize limit low!
 
ant dee said:
An estimated of 1 million is rumoured to be Satoshi's coins. We do not know if and why Satoshi lost those but I doubt it was an accident.
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True, but Chainalysis took those into account in their 2.8-3.8M estimate. Ultimately, is just that, an estimate, but they

ant dee said:
Of course dementia or sudden death accidents will still cause coins to be lost but nothing that will significantly add to those 3-4 million already lost.
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That will indeed be the most likely cause of more significant losses while they retain significant value, but you will still have occurrences of people losing access to their private keys on a small scale. It's human nature afterall.
 
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Technically speaking, there isn't anything that would prevent rule changes that nix all of Satoshi's holdings.

Or to stretch it out a little more, rules that would nix all bitcoins that have not moved since X date (that's what FAIT currency does when new notes are issued).

Very unlikely that the rest of the network would agree; but technically possible.
 
Gordon Gekko said:
The US Dollar is most certainly backed by something: the largest and most powerful military force ever assembled.
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I think that's the gist of it too.
As to why the USD would have more value than say, the Chinese Yuan.
But brute force is an anachronism in today's world.

Countries, companies and individuals just need to switch to something else, some of the time; like open source digital currency, to bypass and undermine US hegemony.

It's like an entirely peaceful way to turn the lion into a household kitty.
 
jman0war said:
Technically speaking, there isn't anything that would prevent rule changes that nix all of Satoshi's holdings

Or to stretch it out a little more, rules that would nix all bitcoins that have not moved since X date (that's what FAIT currency does when new notes are issued).

Very unlikely that the rest of the network would agree; but technically possible.
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That’s why for a change in the protocol hash power consensus is necessary or the network will fork, hence without the consensus of the network nobody can “nix” anything at all
 
BTC passed a key level of resistance 9,090 USD earlier today. It is comfortably holding above this. This is technically very bullish.
HODL....
Hold
On (for)
Dear
Life
 
Reminder: No one shown why Bitcoin has any monetary value at all or what that value should be.

The blind faithful will see this eventually.

The only resistance point is zero.

Brendan
 
Brendan Burgess said:
Reminder: No one shown why Bitcoin has any monetary value at all or what that value should be.

The blind faithful will see this eventually.

The only resistance point is zero.

Brendan
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Ah this reminds me, I came accross this a few days ago.
https://ftalphaville.ft.com/2018/02/01/2198292/nobody-puts-bitcoin-in-the-corner/

"Suppose for a moment bitcoin never existed. And ethereum never existed. And the whole crazy world of cryptocurrencies never happened.

Someone comes along and tells you to imagine an electronic network, for moving money anywhere in the world, that no-one owns. It’s an intriguing idea. It’s an unprecedented idea. In the entirety of human history such a thing has literally never existed.

Would your response really be: ‘lol the true value of bitcoin is zero’?"
 
ant dee said:
Ah this reminds me, I came accross this a few days ago.
https://ftalphaville.ft.com/2018/02/01/2198292/nobody-puts-bitcoin-in-the-corner/

"Suppose for a moment bitcoin never existed. And ethereum never existed. And the whole crazy world of cryptocurrencies never happened.

Someone comes along and tells you to imagine an electronic network, for moving money anywhere in the world, that no-one owns. It’s an intriguing idea. It’s an unprecedented idea. In the entirety of human history such a thing has literally never existed.

Would your response really be: ‘lol the true value of bitcoin is zero’?"
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But bitcoin isn't the network. I still haven't heard anyone confirm what drives the value of bitcoin other than pure speculation. If someone comes along and creates a cryptocurrency that is actually better than bitcoin, can be used for small transactions, have faster confirmation times, use less energy, remove the need for large mining operations etc etc, then what value does Bitcoin have? It will be defunct.
 
Hello,

I'd love if we could split the debate more clearly across a few independent discussion threads, so as to more clearly discuss:
  • Bitcoin
  • Other coins such as ETH, LTC, XRP, XLM etc.
  • The Blockchain and other infrastructure and technology being developed or used by the cryptos

Not only would it make things a little more clear for those trying to learn, or follow ongoing discussions, but it might also help people find clarity and even agreement on the potential for some of the technology, or that there may well be a value in certain crypto coins (not specifically BTC) for a particular reason etc.

As things stand, I think there's occasional confusion and even unnecessary mild conflict appearing in this thread, which could be avoided if we had separate discussion threads.





Now, getting back to Bitcoin....


BTC is worth whatever someone is willing to pay for it. As long as there are willing buyers and it's available for sale, it's got a value. The fact that it's not regulated, backed by gold or government, heavily contributes to the volatility in it's price, and the risk that some day no one will want to buy it - so it would then be worthless. We don't know if that day will ever come given it's popularity and potential uses, but it's a possibility, and one that none of us can ignore or completely dismiss.

Hopefully that's something that most of us can agree on :)


.
 
Sunny said:
But bitcoin isn't the network. I still haven't heard anyone confirm what drives the value of bitcoin other than pure speculation. If someone comes along and creates a cryptocurrency that is actually better than bitcoin, can be used for small transactions, have faster confirmation times, use less energy, remove the need for large mining operations etc etc, then what value does Bitcoin have? It will be defunct.
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Unlikely.
Bitcoin has the longest mathematically prove-able, secure chain.
Companies can and probably will start hashing say, their own database state, then anchor that information into the bitcoin blockchain.
That would be a great way to securely store critical information off-site, nearly free of charge into a decentralized network that is resistant to take-down orders or attackers.
 
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