Learned something new. Bitcoin

[Handloader109]

Not a bitcoin fan, rather deal with money that I can touch when I need or want to and isn't really a speculative gamble. But I never knew or thought about the electric power consumption necessary to support bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

Terrawatts.... Not watts, or kilowatts, or even megawatts, but terrawatts. More electricity than several countries in the world use..... It ain't a green currency at all.

BBC News - Bitcoin consumes 'more electricity than Argentina'
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-56012952

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[Joe504]

Yeah, trust none of that.
How much power does the banking industry use to maintain its operations?
How much power and fuel is used to make and transport currency?

This is an attack on crypto, for whatever reason, take your pick.

Dont trust the media just because they suddenly support your world view.

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[GOPHER SLAYER]

I have several question about these so called COINS, what ever they choose to call them. # 1, who guarantees their value? #2 can you change it into currency, either part or all. #3, Who dreamed up these coins. #4, Is our government in any way involved? # 4, And last, are they just another scam.

[Plate plinker]

Yeah, trust none of that.
How much power does the banking industry use to maintain its operations?
How much power and fuel is used to make and transport currency?

This is an attack on crypto, for whatever reason, take your pick.

Dont trust the media just because they suddenly support your world view.

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

I have not studied this by any measure, but I have a uncle that was a bitcoin miner and he could NOT get the heat the computers generated out of his house. They are burning energy for what? That heat is all energy being consumed.

[JimB..]

There is good reason that the big miners are located in locations with cheap power.

The math will eventually work itself out. With the price of bitcoin growing the miners are motivated to spend $30,000 or more to mine a coin. When is stabilizes, at whatever level, or drops sharply the miners will either stop or more likely shift to a new “currency” and crypto pushers will hype something new.

I’m not anti crypto, I think that the underlying tech has interesting potential, but today it’s a terrible currency. It’s a poor store of value and it is not widely used for commerce. I expect that Bitcoin will fade, but no idea when.

[bakerjw]

Bit coin is no different than assigning value to paper.

A few years back when my son and I rode from Banff Ab. to Helena Mt., we stopped by Lewis and Clark brewing. I'll strike up a conversation with anyone, so while we were at their tap room and my son was ordering us a pizza, I went over and started to talking to 2 guys in the hallway. One was the head brewer and the other the shipping manager. Since I work on a 1099 as a consultant for our local oldest brewery we got talking keg cleaners and other automation equipment and got a complete behind the scenes tour. One room where they took us used to be a server room where the owner had racks of servers mining bitcoins. He ended up moving them and expanding into a larger facility that produced more revenue than the brewery and it was a BIG craft brewery.

A lot of money in virtual wealth. Myself, I'll take livestock and self sufficiency in case thing go to hell in a handbasket. Which I believe will happen sooner rather than later.

[ryanmattes]

I'm in software, so I know a bit about this. To give you just a little bit of reason why you should trust my word, my job for the past several decades has been to evaluate new technologies as they come to exist, and tell non-technical people (C-level executives) why they want nothing to do with them. I don't work for a big company making big software, I work for a small company that consults for big companies to help them make technology decisions. My job is to understand these technologies, and get to the bottom of the real costs and benefits of them.

Bitcoin is weird. It is a revolution, but not for the reasons most people (and all the media) thinks. It actually involves two technologies; cryptocurrency and blockchain.

So everybody thinks they know what banks do, but most people are wrong. People who never spent any time thinking about it say "I pay them a fee to hold my money," but that's not right. People who have thought about it more say "What they really do is loan money to make interest, and all the people depositing money is just their way of getting money to lend." But that also not right. They do both of those things, but those are just profitable side jobs. The main job of a bank is to maintain a ledger.

Banks don't sell financial products, they sell trust. Trust in their ledger. The ledger says who has how much money and when. They employ thousands of people and billions in technology to audit and maintain that ledger. But at the end of the day, you're trusting the ledger. When I log into the bank, the number in my account is what I expect it to be because their ledger is trustworthy.

Blockchain is a ledger. But it's a ledger that cannot be cheated. You can't insert fake transactions to hide shady deals, or push money around. Without getting into the details, every transaction both depends on and contains information about every other transaction, for all of time. So any attempt to fake an entry wouldn't work, because of hard math. They're doing crazy things with very large numbers and some really unintuitive math, which makes it literally impossible to fake. So it's a perfectly trustworthy ledger. And it requires zero people, and especially zero banks, to maintain. Don't think of Blockchain of living on a computer some where, blockchain lives in the same place as the number 4. It *is*, just as assuredly as 2+2=4. In fact, exactly like 2+2=4. Transaction A happened and then transaction B happened, and you can trust that implicitly because if it didn't, 2+2 would equal 5. You can look at any entry in the ledger and verify both it's authenticity, as well as he authenticity of any other entry, from any point in time. An all entries are available to the public all the time. So no one can cheat.

So that's blockchain. It could revolutionize banking. But obviously the banks don't like anyone to be able to magically create a perfectly trustworthy ledger, because they just spent decades or centuries building trust in their ledgers. But they're not directly opposed to it, because it also works for them.

Then there's cryptocurrency. It's similar in that first, there exists one coin, which is basically a very, very large, and completely unique number. From that one, you can create more, but it's expensive. For the longest time, it cost a whole lot more to create one than it was worth. This goes back to that complex math. To make another coin, you have to do computations so complex, that you see it in your electricity bill. That's a lot of processing, for sure. So what they did was tie the creation of new coins to the processing of transactions in the ledger. You can't create Bitcoin without recording a transaction.

So what Bitcoin "miners" actually do is process transactions for other people who are using Bitcoin. I don't know what the exchange is now, but in simple terms it looks like this. I want to send you $300 in Bitcoin, for which there is a small processing fee. I send that transaction off to be processed, and an unknown 3rd party, who can't read it and has no idea who it's for, starts processing the transaction. Their computer does tons of complex math, using your new transaction and the previous one on the ledger as variables in that math, and when they're done, two things happen. First, our transaction becomes part of the permanent ledger, and second, they get a little Bitcoin, from that processing fee, and another transaction showing the creation of that Bitcoin becomes part of that ledger.

The idea, from the beginning, is that a currency that didn't cost you anything doesn't hold any intrinsic value. But if it cost you on your electric bill, now it has at least some kind of intrinsic value. At least as much as it cost you to create it. So Bitcoin aren't just fictional currency with not cost or value, being played with by investors. It actually does have an intrinsic cost and value, by nature if how it is "printed." Just like USD, bitcoin can be worth "more than the paper it's printed on," even if it's only "printed" in ones and zeros.

Now, whether it's worth it for you or I to mess around with them is outside of my area of expertise. My expertise is in telling companies whether they should be messing around with it, and the answer is almost always "no." I don't personally have any Bitcoin, and I don't generally recommend my clients get into cryptocurrency or blockchain. But it does have a place, and there are good reasons, under the right circumstances, to use them.

Hope that helps clear up at least what it is.

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[Burnt Fingers]

Don't think of Blockchain of living on a computer some where, blockchain lives in the same place as the number 4. It *is*, just as assuredly as 2+2=4. In fact, exactly like 2+2=4. Transaction A happened and then transaction B happened, and you can trust that implicitly because if it didn't, 2+2 would equal 5.

That's racist math based in white supremacy.

Yeah, that's a real thing now. https://farleftfacts.org/white-people/math-yes-math-is-racist/ and https://www.foxnews.com/us/california-racism-math-framework and https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2021/02/why-math-is-racist.php

Apparently thinking there's only one right answer to a math problem discriminates against minorities, who knew????

The second link could possibly make ya physically ill when ya read it.

Bitcoin is a scam IMHO. You can't carry it around, you can't see it, you can't hold it, you're supposed to just believe it's there.

[ryanmattes]

Apparently thinking there's only one right answer to a math problem discriminates against minorities, who knew????



Texas just passed legislation making it illegal to include that, or any of Critical Race Theory, in the curriculum. No teacher can be made to reach that nonsense. Thank God.



Bitcoin is a scam IMHO. You can't carry it around, you can't see it, you can't hold it, you're supposed to just believe it's there.

When a bank transfers a million dollars of equity from one holding account to another, you can't see or hold that either. The majority of the money on earth is entirely digital these days already.

Bitcoin makes sense for *institutions*. It is not something everyday people need to bother with. Although I have to admit, I wish I had bought $100 worth when it was like $0.30 each, since they're now over $40,000 each. That's... quite a return on investment.


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[john.k]

The intrinsic value of bitcoin is that transactions are untraceable......this is of great value to some ,and fluctuations in value for the instant the transfer takes is of no consequence..........and as you might imagine ,banks are developing their own cryptocurrency to eventually replace the SWIFT system they use now.

[ryanmattes]

Well, they're all traceable to an account. It's just that accounts aren't traceable to a person. Every account transaction is traceable all the way back to the first. There's just no way to know who owns each of those accounts unless the owner makes it known.

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[Iron369]

Yeah, trust none of that.
How much power does the banking industry use to maintain its operations?
How much power and fuel is used to make and transport currency?

This is an attack on crypto, for whatever reason, take your pick.

Dont trust the media just because they suddenly support your world view.

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

What do you mean “...for whatever reason .”? The reason is obvious. Money. As long as fiat currency controlled by the federal reserve, and to a lesser extent, huge banking companies, they ultimately have control over how you can move YOUR wealth. The media is a manipulation tool; there’s no integrity in media or finance.

[Iron369]

I have several question about these so called COINS, what ever they choose to call them. # 1, who guarantees their value? #2 can you change it into currency, either part or all. #3, Who dreamed up these coins. #4, Is our government in any way involved? # 4, And last, are they just another scam.

There are many different types of coins and the first step in investing in crypto is to determine your reason.
1) No one. That’s the reason for such volatility in a developing world economy.
2) any coin can be made back into fiat currency or (as a much better option in my opinion) transferred to a stable coin
3) The project engineers decide on the coin produced
4) absolutely no scam. It will be the way all business is conducted in the future. It’s faster and cheaper for the consumer. How long this process takes will depend on when the federal reserve realizes it’s losing it’s control and pushes Congress to regulate it. Just like gun rights, they will try to regulate it out of existence, but inflation being created now will cause 1 of 2 things to happen; our economy will be allowed to collapse like Venezuela’s or the people will be able to continue thriving economically because our currency is not controlled by the feds. It will be the ultimate factor between the have and the have nots.

[Iron369]

I have not studied this by any measure, but I have a uncle that was a bitcoin miner and he could NOT get the heat the computers generated out of his house. They are burning energy for what? That heat is all energy being consumed.

Everyone constantly mentions the energy consumed mining Bitcoin. There are FAR more wasteful institutions than mining operations. Like Vegas. Like Christmas lights. Soon like electric vehicles. I’m not saying that it’s not a problem if fossil fuels are being used to mine it, but even in China, they are building renewable power infrastructure for the mining industry.
Oh yeah... plus 18m of the 21m Bitcoin that can ever exist have already been mined. As computers become faster and more efficient, the power necessary will be reduced to coincide with the renewable energy effort globally.

[Iron369]

Bit coin is no different than assigning value to paper.

.
This, my friend, is the fundamental flaw with most people’s understanding of our economy.
Our money is assigned a value from an institution that doesn’t have your interest in mind. If you have $100 today, it will have $80 in purchasing power next year and maybe $50 the next once the feds get done inflating the economy with “free money “. YOU HAVE NO SAY IN WHAT THEY SAY YOUR MONEY IS WORTH.
The value of Crypto (some, not all) is based on what you are willing to pay for it. Henceforth, the fluctuation. It doesn’t have a central entity determining what your $100 can buy today, tomorrow, or any other day. It is worth what you can get for it. Ever bought a collectible that went up in value?

[Iron369]

I'm in software, so I know a bit about this. To give you just a little bit of reason why you should trust my word, my job for the past several decades has been to evaluate new technologies as they come to exist, and tell non-technical people (C-level executives) why they want nothing to do with them. I don't work for a big company making big software, I work for a small company that consults for big companies to help them make technology decisions. My job is to understand these technologies, and get to the bottom of the real costs and benefits of them.

Bitcoin is weird. It is a revolution, but not for the reasons most people (and all the media) thinks. It actually involves two technologies; cryptocurrency and blockchain.

So everybody thinks they know what banks do, but most people are wrong. People who never spent any time thinking about it say "I pay them a fee to hold my money," but that's not right. People who have thought about it more say "What they really do is loan money to make interest, and all the people depositing money is just their way of getting money to lend." But that also not right. They do both of those things, but those are just profitable side jobs. The main job of a bank is to maintain a ledger.

Banks don't sell financial products, they sell trust. Trust in their ledger. The ledger says who has how much money and when. They employ thousands of people and billions in technology to audit and maintain that ledger. But at the end of the day, you're trusting the ledger. When I log into the bank, the number in my account is what I expect it to be because their ledger is trustworthy.

Blockchain is a ledger. But it's a ledger that cannot be cheated. You can't insert fake transactions to hide shady deals, or push money around. Without getting into the details, every transaction both depends on and contains information about every other transaction, for all of time. So any attempt to fake an entry wouldn't work, because of hard math. They're doing crazy things with very large numbers and some really unintuitive math, which makes it literally impossible to fake. So it's a perfectly trustworthy ledger. And it requires zero people, and especially zero banks, to maintain. Don't think of Blockchain of living on a computer some where, blockchain lives in the same place as the number 4. It *is*, just as assuredly as 2+2=4. In fact, exactly like 2+2=4. Transaction A happened and then transaction B happened, and you can trust that implicitly because if it didn't, 2+2 would equal 5. You can look at any entry in the ledger and verify both it's authenticity, as well as he authenticity of any other entry, from any point in time. An all entries are available to the public all the time. So no one can cheat.

So that's blockchain. It could revolutionize banking. But obviously the banks don't like anyone to be able to magically create a perfectly trustworthy ledger, because they just spent decades or centuries building trust in their ledgers. But they're not directly opposed to it, because it also works for them.

Then there's cryptocurrency. It's similar in that first, there exists one coin, which is basically a very, very large, and completely unique number. From that one, you can create more, but it's expensive. For the longest time, it cost a whole lot more to create one than it was worth. This goes back to that complex math. To make another coin, you have to do computations so complex, that you see it in your electricity bill. That's a lot of processing, for sure. So what they did was tie the creation of new coins to the processing of transactions in the ledger. You can't create Bitcoin without recording a transaction.

So what Bitcoin "miners" actually do is process transactions for other people who are using Bitcoin. I don't know what the exchange is now, but in simple terms it looks like this. I want to send you $300 in Bitcoin, for which there is a small processing fee. I send that transaction off to be processed, and an unknown 3rd party, who can't read it and has no idea who it's for, starts processing the transaction. Their computer does tons of complex math, using your new transaction and the previous one on the ledger as variables in that math, and when they're done, two things happen. First, our transaction becomes part of the permanent ledger, and second, they get a little Bitcoin, from that processing fee, and another transaction showing the creation of that Bitcoin becomes part of that ledger.

The idea, from the beginning, is that a currency that didn't cost you anything doesn't hold any intrinsic value. But if it cost you on your electric bill, now it has at least some kind of intrinsic value. At least as much as it cost you to create it. So Bitcoin aren't just fictional currency with not cost or value, being played with by investors. It actually does have an intrinsic cost and value, by nature if how it is "printed." Just like USD, bitcoin can be worth "more than the paper it's printed on," even if it's only "printed" in ones and zeros.

Now, whether it's worth it for you or I to mess around with them is outside of my area of expertise. My expertise is in telling companies whether they should be messing around with it, and the answer is almost always "no." I don't personally have any Bitcoin, and I don't generally recommend my clients get into cryptocurrency or blockchain. But it does have a place, and there are good reasons, under the right circumstances, to use them.

Hope that helps clear up at least what it is.

Sent from my Pixel 3a using Tapatalk

While I differ from your opinion on encouraging people to invest in it, your explanation is very good in my opinion, of course.

[Iron369]

Bitcoin is a scam IMHO. You can't carry it around, you can't see it, you can't hold it, you're supposed to just believe it's there.

You mean like your direct deposited paycheck that you spend with your debit card, the wind, your rights, or God? Doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

[Iron369]

Bitcoin makes sense for *institutions*. It is not something everyday people need to bother with. Although I have to admit, I wish I had bought $100 worth when it was like $0.30 each, since they're now over $40,000 each. That's... quite a return on investment.





But you won’t buy it today at (less than) $40k when it’s projected to be $12.6m in 2030?

[Iron369]

Well, they're all traceable to an account. It's just that accounts aren't traceable to a person. Every account transaction is traceable all the way back to the first. There's just no way to know who owns each of those accounts unless the owner makes it known.

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Sort of. There’s a public key and private key. The public one allows complete transparency of the transactions made with that Bitcoin, satisfied, whatever. The private key is held by the owner of the digital property and allows it to be transferred from one private key to another.

[1I-Jack]

What happens to Bitcoin if there is an EMP attack and electronics are fried? There already are cases of Bitcoin exchanges being hacked and people "losing" their Bitcoin wallet.

[Iron369]

The intrinsic value of bitcoin is that transactions are untraceable......this is of great value to some ,and fluctuations in value for the instant the transfer takes is of no consequence..........and as you might imagine ,banks are developing their own cryptocurrency to eventually replace the SWIFT system they use now.

The intrinsic value of Bitcoin is its transparency. The fed reserve can tell you what your dollar is worth based on whatever metrics they choose to value it. Bitcoins value is what you are willing to pay for it and EVERY transaction it recorded and verified. If Congress wants to print $2.3t dollars to pay for stimulus payments, can YOU see and verify where every dollar went? Can YOU determine how much inflation will occur to your current dollars as a result of what the feds do?

[ryanmattes]

Everyone constantly mentions the energy consumed mining Bitcoin. There are FAR more wasteful institutions than mining operations. Like Vegas. Like Christmas lights. Soon like electric vehicles. I’m not saying that it’s not a problem if fossil fuels are being used to mine it, but even in China, they are building renewable power infrastructure for the mining industry.
Oh yeah... plus 18m of the 21m Bitcoin that can ever exist have already been mined. As computers become faster and more efficient, the power necessary will be reduced to coincide with the renewable energy effort globally.

But... You can't beat physics. Computation has a cost, no matter what. Even if you're doing it in your head. It's been shown that someone solving a difficult problem burns more calories powering their brain than someone who isn't. So there is a baseline energy cost to computation, whether that's $1 on your electric bill or an extra taco for dinner. Fundamentally, you can't get around that essential energy cost.

And no one is doing these computations on paper, it would take too long. So once you take care of all the inefficiencies, the heat loss, and all of that, there is still a cost. It will never be free, because physics.

The question, which is the same one Elon Musk raised recently, is does it need to cost this much? Bitcoin is more inefficient than others intentionally. It's built in to that particular currency.

I'm under no illusions about cryptocurrency; it is the future. Eventually. But not necessarily Bitcoin. There are hundreds of others, of varying cost to produce, and there will be many more in the future. At some point, banks will switch to blockchain, or something like it, and all currency will be cryptocurrency, of one sort or another. You likely won't even notice when it happens.

My layman's investing advice, if you want to get into cryptocurrency, is to buy a small amount when it's new and forget about it. Buy $20 or $50 or $100 of it, and just forget you have it. A few years later, if you hear in the news that it went up 40,000% you can cash out and thank me (I accept Paypal, money orders, and personal checks. 8-D ). But if it doesn't, you're only out $20. Over time this will shake out and become stable, and then it won't seem like such a big deal.

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[ryanmattes]

But you won’t buy it today at (less than) $40k when it’s projected to be $12.6m in 2030?No, because it barely existed 10 years ago, no one thought it would be worth $40k today, and I have absolutely zero trust in their predictions about ten years from now.

More likely than it breaking a million is for it to be completely supplanted by something else that we haven't even thought of yet.

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[Iron369]

But... You can't beat physics. Computation has a cost, no matter what. Even if you're doing it in your head. It's been shown that someone solving a difficult problem burns more calories powering their brain than someone who isn't. So there is a baseline energy cost to computation, whether that's $1 on your electric bill or an extra taco for dinner. Fundamentally, you can't get around that essential energy cost.

And no one is doing these computations on paper, it would take too long. So once you take care of all the inefficiencies, the heat loss, and all of that, there is still a cost. It will never be free, because physics.

The question, which is the same one Elon Musk raised recently, is does it need to cost this much? Bitcoin is more inefficient than others intentionally. It's built in to that particular currency.

I'm under no illusions about cryptocurrency; it is the future. Eventually. But not necessarily Bitcoin. There are hundreds of others, of varying cost to produce, and there will be many more in the future. At some point, banks will switch to blockchain, or something like it, and all currency will be cryptocurrency, of one sort or another. You likely won't even notice when it happens.

My layman's investing advice, if you want to get into cryptocurrency, is to buy a small amount when it's new and forget about it. Buy $20 or $50 or $100 of it, and just forget you have it. A few years later, if you hear in the news that it went up 40,000% you can cash out and thank me (I accept Paypal, money orders, and personal checks. 8-D ). But if it doesn't, you're only out $20. Over time this will shake out and become stable, and then it won't seem like such a big deal.

Sent from my Pixel 3a using Tapatalk

No understand there is a power cost associated. There’s also a power cost associated behind every credit/debit card swipe and nobody puts those figures out, because it would bring attention to the irresponsible actions of burning coal to make the energy for it. I have (honestly) worked in the super cooled warehouses to process credit cards. I’ve installed multiple services just to supply power for bank transactions. (I’m an electrician). Big banks can make sure the inefficiency light is shone on crypto because ultimately, they have the most to lose. Everyone has to be able to see we are only fed the knowledge the powerful want us to know.

[ryanmattes]

What happens to Bitcoin if there is an EMP attack and electronics are fried? There already are cases of Bitcoin exchanges being hacked and people "losing" their Bitcoin wallet.Interesting question. It depends on if anyone ever hit print. I'm absolutely certain that the original transaction is protected; copied, bunkered, hardened, etc. So that one ismost likely safe.

If any future transaction is still readable, say because you had it on a thumb drive in your pocket, so the emp wouldn't destroy it since it wasn't powered up when the blast went off, then the entire ledger of all transactions between the original and that one can theoretically be recovered.

Like I said, it exists, not in a computer, but in the fact that 2+2=4. It's pure, abstract math. So if you have any 2 transactions, every transaction in between is knowable, because they always "add up". Not really add up, as in just a sum, but there is only one possible set of transaction that can lead from one to the other. That's what makes it uncheatable. Cheating wouldn't add up. It also makes it recoverable between any two transactions.



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[Iron369]

No, because it barely existed 10 years ago, no one thought it would be worth $40k today, and I have absolutely zero trust in their predictions about ten years from now.

More likely than it breaking a million is for it to be completely supplanted by something else that we haven't even thought of yet.

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Maybe, maybe not. One of us is going to be right. lol. I didn’t buy Amazon 10 years ago either and wish I would have. Now I own it and it’s growth potential is greatly diminished, but I still own it because it will have a higher value in the future, probably, maybe, as long as Elon doesn’t tweet about hating Amazon. Lol

[Iron369]

Interesting question. It depends on if anyone ever hit print. I'm absolutely certain that the original transaction is protected; copied, bunkered, hardened, etc. So that one ismost likely safe.

If any future transaction is still readable, say because you had it on a thumb drive in your pocket, so the emp wouldn't destroy it since it wasn't powered up when the blast went off, then the entire ledger of all transactions between the original and that one can theoretically be recovered.

Like I said, it exists, not in a computer, but in the fact that 2+2=4. It's pure, abstract math. So if you have any 2 transactions, every transaction in between is knowable, because they always "add up". Not really add up, as in just a sum, but there is only one possible set of transaction that can lead from one to the other. That's what makes it uncheatable. Cheating wouldn't add up. It also makes it recoverable between any two transactions.



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Crypto blockchains are not stored in one central location. No bank or entity has control over it. A world wide emp destroying every digital institution would be the only way to destroy crypto assets ultimately making anything other than food,water and bullets a luxury.

[ryanmattes]

No understand there is a power cost associated. There’s also a power cost associated behind every credit/debit card swipe and nobody puts those figures out, because it would bring attention to the irresponsible actions of burning coal to make the energy for it. I have (honestly) worked in the super cooled warehouses to process credit cards. I’ve installed multiple services just to supply power for bank transactions. (I’m an electrician). Big banks can make sure the inefficiency light is shone on crypto because ultimately, they have the most to lose. Everyone has to be able to see we are only fed the knowledge the powerful want us to know.I don't disagree. Banks are certainly covering up their current energy usage, while simultaneously villianizing cryptocurrencies for being inefficient. No argument there.

But there is a legitimate question to be asked about cryptocurrencies: do they need to be as inefficient as they are. And that's an especially important question if we're talking about the world standardizing on them, because the power needs could be enormous. Imagine 1.5 billion Chinese using it every day.

I don't subscribe to the apocalyptic fantasies of the global warming doomsayers, but it is a fact that we are using oil faster than it's being made. At some point, whether 50 or 5000 years in the future, we will have to have a better plan than dead dinosaurs (I know it's not really dead dinosaurs, but you get my point). My assumption is that we'll solve that problem before too long anyway. But for things that seem likely to eventually become global standards, it worthwhile to ask the question: could we do this better?

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[JimB..]

Texas just passed legislation making it illegal to include that, or any of Critical Race Theory, in the curriculum. No teacher can be made to reach that nonsense. Thank God.


If you mean HB3979, it did not pass. It was taken down today on a point of order, it is dead.

[ryanmattes]

Crypto blockchains are not stored in one central location. No bank or entity has control over it. A world wide emp destroying every digital institution would be the only way to destroy crypto assets ultimately making anything other than food,water and bullets a luxury.That's actually what I'm saying. As long as *anyone* has a copy of two transactions, the whole ledger of transactions in between could be recovered. And a copy of the original transaction is absolutely in a physical location, heavily guarded, hardened against EMP, and being protected from tampering. Somewhere.

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[ryanmattes]

If you mean HB3979, it did not pass. It was taken down today on a point of order, it is dead.Crap. I thought it would make it through.

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[Iron369]

I don't disagree. Banks are certainly covering up their current energy usage, while simultaneously villianizing cryptocurrencies for being inefficient. No argument there.

But there is a legitimate question to be asked about cryptocurrencies: do they need to be as inefficient as they are. And that's an especially important question if we're talking about the world standardizing on them, because the power needs could be enormous. Imagine 1.5 billion Chinese using it every day.

I don't subscribe to the apocalyptic fantasies of the global warming doomsayers, but it is a fact that we are using oil faster than it's being made. At some point, whether 50 or 5000 years in the future, we will have to have a better plan than dead dinosaurs (I know it's not really dead dinosaurs, but you get my point). My assumption is that we'll solve that problem before too long anyway. But for things that seem likely to eventually become global standards, it worthwhile to ask the question: could we do this better?

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We can do it better. Bitcoin was developed in 2009. Look how much more technologically advanced cars are in 2021 than 2009. There are constantly new projects developed everyday. Bitcoin is the O.G. People still hang on to fiat even though a better,faster alternative Bitcoin is available. Eventually, Bitcoin will reach the end of its life cycle just like fiat is today, but it’ll be outside my lifetime.

[Iron369]

That's actually what I'm saying. As long as *anyone* has a copy of two transactions, the whole ledger of transactions in between could be recovered. And a copy of the original transaction is absolutely in a physical location, heavily guarded, hardened against EMP, and being protected from tampering. Somewhere.

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Not somewhere... everywhere.

[Iron369]

Crap. I thought it would make it through.

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With big cities like Austin pushing the gay agenda and EVERYONE scared of offending EVERYONE, you really thought it would pass? I’ve lived in Texas. Currently living in Kentucky. I’ve never seen the disconnect from city dwellers and country folk like there is in Texas. As long as the city population continues to rise, it’ll get more lop-sided.

[JimB..]

Crap. I thought it would make it through.

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I guess that it’s still up in the air. The Senate had made amendments, the bill was killed on a point of order when the senate version went back to the house, and that should have ended it. In a unique move the Senate decided to reconsidered the bill, stripping off all the amendments and passing the house version. If they’d passed the house version the first time it would have been routine, but passing one version and then backing up after it has been sent to the other chamber and failed has constitutional issues. No idea if it’ll be challenged, but it looks like Patrick will be sending the original house version to the Governor, we’ll see what happens.

[GhostHawk]

I looked at it years ago, back when I was buying silver at 14$ and change per oz.

That 4 exists only as long as there is power. If the power ever went out over a wide area like an EMP attack or a big solar flare.
It becomes unrecoverable. That killed it for me right there.

Stuff happens. If it is not in my hands it does not exist for all practical purposes.

[William Yanda]

"Bitcoin is a scam IMHO. You can't carry it around, you can't see it, you can't hold it, you're supposed to just believe it's there." Burnt Fingers

I don't see a lot of difference between that and "full faith and credit of the US Government".

[bakerjw]

Very good discussion and explanations.
I work for Siemens DI FA in R&D where security, encryption and certificates are of paramount importance so I follow what is happening behind the scenes. I just never got interested in the mining or transaction processing.

I especially like the discussions about how value is determined. In a collapse scenario, descent into a barter system, value is only what is accepted by the seller or the buyer. An example that I use is someone who bought silver for $30.00 an ounce. That someone comes to me to buy a chicken and expects to buy $30.00 worth of chicken. I explain that 1 chicken is worth 1 ounce of silver. BUT... "I paid $30.00 for this coin!" I'd have to explain "Ok. This chicken costs $30.00"

I have little doubt that the US dollar will collapse and we will have a world wide currency in one form or another. Most likely a crypto one and I've no doubt that it will not have the interests of the people in mind rather it will be of most benefit to the bankers, oligarchs and others in seats of power.

Myself, I believe that the best investments are plumbum related. Boolets and such.

[JimB..]

I looked at it years ago, back when I was buying silver at 14$ and change per oz.

That 4 exists only as long as there is power. If the power ever went out over a wide area like an EMP attack or a big solar flare.
It becomes unrecoverable. That killed it for me right there.

Stuff happens. If it is not in my hands it does not exist for all practical purposes.

How is this any different than your bank ledger? Physical money is such a tiny part of the money supply, and probably your wealth, that not only doesn’t it matter today but in a collapse it’ll mean nothing at all.

[Plate plinker]

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2021/05/28/bitcoin-mine-discovered-by-uk-police-on-cannabis-farm-raid-.html

And today I stumbled onto this. Just a interesting little article about the energy consumption of crypto currency.

[Burnt Fingers]

If you mean HB3979, it did not pass. It was taken down today on a point of order, it is dead.

It was saved. Headed to the Governor.

[ryanmattes]

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2021/05/28/bitcoin-mine-discovered-by-uk-police-on-cannabis-farm-raid-.html

And today I stumbled onto this. Just a interesting little article about the energy consumption of crypto currency.Wow.

"Bitcoin has a carbon footprint comparable with that of New Zealand..."

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[perotter]

I looked at it years ago, back when I was buying silver at 14$ and change per oz.

That 4 exists only as long as there is power. If the power ever went out over a wide area like an EMP attack or a big solar flare.
It becomes unrecoverable. That killed it for me right there.

Stuff happens. If it is not in my hands it does not exist for all practical purposes.

Shortly after Bitcoins were create when I seen the headlines were Chuck Schumer said that Bitcoins had to be made illegal because the government couldn't control what people bought or sold, I bought Bitcoins for $0.13 each.

One had to figure that the black market was going to love Bitcoins and use them. I've never understood why more people didn't see that right away that Bitcoins would have value because of it being desired by the black marketeers.

After buying a book with over half of them, I kept the rest for several years and still have a few. Decided to sell most of what I had a few years back when they first went $10,000 each. I got over $14,000 for each $0.13 I put into Bitcoins. But hung on to a few just in case they went real high, had to go on the lam or something.

By the why, a few weeks ago when they were around $60,000 I was joking with people that "In today's Bitcoins I paid over $23,000,000 for one of my books".

[bakerjw]

It was saved. Headed to the Governor.

Not to derail the thread, but our Governor Lee signed legislation like this last week.

[perotter]

Almost nobody mines Bitcoins any more, because there are hardly any left to be found. Just like nobody is packing up and heading to California to pan for gold.

But what people are mining now is Ethereum. I know a guy is netting(after electric expense) anywhere from $12.00 to $49.00 a day doing that with just three video cards.

He monitors how much electricity is used and it is less than $2.00. So I don't believe what the media says about how much power is used. Just another something to scare people or divert peoples attention from important things that are happening. Those news items never have any detailed facts in them, which is always a tip off that it's just intended to be propaganda.

How much he makes depends on the price of Ethereum on that day. Also make money 24/7 without working. Well there was getting set up and on going moving of money.

[starbits]

I have several question about these so called COINS, what ever they choose to call them. # 1, who guarantees their value? #2 can you change it into currency, either part or all. #3, Who dreamed up these coins. #4, Is our government in any way involved? # 4, And last, are they just another scam.

#1 No one, except the guy who buys your coins from you.

#2 Yes, No, Maybe. If you buy crypto from a place like Robinhood you are buying a derivative instead of the actual coins and can't remove the coins from the exchange. You are then at the mercy of the exchange. For instance Robinhood shut down all Gamestop trading for a period and could do the same for crypto if it felt the need. For security you need to be able remove any coins from the exchange to a cold storage wallet. That way if you decide to sell or redeem to currency you can go to what ever exchange is open and functioning normally.

#3 Some really smart computer nerds. Something I bear no resemblance too.

#4 Only in the sense that they have their hand out. The USA treats crypto as if it were a stock and every time you sell or trade crypto it wants its unfair share in long or short term capital gains. The 1040 tax form now includes questions about whether you own or trade crypto currency and lying about it is a felony.

#4 I thought so when bitcoin was $200 and you couldn't buy anything with it. I didn't buy any. Today crypto is more than a currency. The block chain it is built on has real world applications in security, data storage, communications, etc. So scam or not it is not going away any time soon.

[JimB..]

It was saved. Headed to the Governor.

See post #35. I’ve been traveling all day so have no new info, but I understand that at least some lawyers believe that once it gets off the floor the constitutional argument about how it got passed becomes moot. Not sure what’s going to happen, heck I can even imagine Abbott vetoing it because that’ll hurt Patrick’s reelection while helping his own.

[Handloader109]

The intrinsic value of Bitcoin is its transparency. The fed reserve can tell you what your dollar is worth based on whatever metrics they choose to value it. Bitcoins value is what you are willing to pay for it and EVERY transaction it recorded and verified. If Congress wants to print $2.3t dollars to pay for stimulus payments, can YOU see and verify where every dollar went? Can YOU determine how much inflation will occur to your current dollars as a result of what the feds do?
It's worth what you are willing to pay for it which is zero for me, so it is worth zero.....

[Burnt Fingers]

Almost nobody mines Bitcoins any more, because there are hardly any left to be found. Just like nobody is packing up and heading to California to pan for gold.




There was an article in the Dallas Morning News recently about a company that makes portable BitCoin mining trailers. You haul them to a wellhead and use the flare gas to power them.

So there are still people mining them.

[kerplode]

Almost nobody mines Bitcoins any more, because there are hardly any left to be found.
There are absolutely people still mining Bitcoin. Mining is how new blocks are validated and added to the blockchain. It's essential to the process.

The rate at which new coins are minted to reward mining is much less now than it was at the beginning, but each transaction pays a per-bit mining fee. So yeah, it's still very profitable. It's just not practical for a guy with an old video card to compete with the huge clusters of dedicated mining equipment anymore. For BTC anyway. Ethereum uses different algorithms.


It's worth what you are willing to pay for it which is zero for me, so it is worth zero.....

So don't buy any...

[kerplode]

If you do get into crypto remember these three things:

1) ALWAYS control your own private key. ALWAYS. Move your coins off the exchange and into a wallet you own as soon as their available for transfer.
2) Keep your seed and any passphrases closely guarded secrets. Store them separately and never expose them to the internet in any fashion. Letter stamp them on stainless steel and bury it in your back yard or something.
3) Generate a new receive address EVERY TIME you move money into your wallet. DO NOT use receive addresses more than once, and if you need to move a large quantity of coin, move it in smaller chunks, each to a different receive address generated by your wallet.

If you don't control the keys, you don't own the coins. It's as simple as that.

[popper]

ledger that cannot be cheated Not really. Blockchain is a distributed encrypted methodology where each and every transaction re-encrypts the ENTIRE chain. Mining is a math process equal to calculating PI to the 27th decimal. Both take enormous amounts of electricity. Personally IMHO HE decided to NOT take bitcoin as $ for Teslas as the value changes and HE doesn't want to lose any. When Gov. gets involved there are TAXES. If a Co. gets involved with Gov. there are lawyer fees.

[AlHunt]

The problem I have with Bitcoin in actual use is that the fees are unpredictable, hard to determine and, in my experiences, usually very high for every day types of transactions.

[dverna]

I am not smart enough to understand it....it is the same problem I have understanding God. But at least I can see what God has created.

I like things like silver, food, land, tools, guns, ammunition and components. I cannot get rich from what I have, but I should be able to survive the last couple of decades I have left.

I plan on buying $5-8k of primers/powder when things get back to normal and replenishing the inventory I sold in the last few months. Figure I can triple my investment in less than four years, but if not, the stuff will not lose any value. If I was smarter and more sophisticated, I would not have to be a hoarder/scalper. Funny how someone buying crypto currency and making a huge profit is admired, but I get labeled a scalper.

Wish I had the smarts...but just a Michigan hillbilly.

[kerplode]

I am not smart enough to understand it....it is the same problem I have understanding God. But at least I can see what God has created.

I like things like silver, food, land, tools, guns, ammunition and components. I cannot get rich from what I have, but I should be able to survive the last couple of decades I have left.

I plan on buying $5-8k of primers/powder when things get back to normal and replenishing the inventory I sold in the last few months. Figure I can triple my investment in less than four years, but if not, the stuff will not lose any value. If I was smarter and more sophisticated, I would not have to be a hoarder/scalper. Funny how someone buying crypto currency and making a huge profit is admired, but I get labeled a scalper.

Wish I had the smarts...but just a Michigan hillbilly.

It's all good, man. Crypto is a weird new world. I'm still learning a bunch about it myself. For better or worse, I do think blockchain tech will be the future of many things, including US and world currency. Plus, there will only ever be 21 million Bitcoin so eventually, I can see the price being astronomical. At this point, I look at Bitcoin more like digital gold and less like a functional currency for every day things. An every day crypto will need to have a faster/cheaper transfer verification process (i.e. mining) and more stable value. It'll come, though. But for now, it's interesting to toss a few extra dollars at Bitcoin here and there just to see what happens. Some people bet a few bucks on the lottery, I toss those couple bucks into BTC. Nothing big, so if I lose it all, NBD. If it's $10M/BTC in 20 years, then that's a bonus.

Anyway...

As to "scalping", I fully support you getting as much as you can for anything you sell. Really.

Something is worth what people are willing to pay. It's as simple as that. $200/1000 of primers is no different than $65000/BTC. If you have it and can do without, and someone who wants it is willing to pay "market" price, then sell it and use the funds as you see fit.

You're not the Primer Welfare Department...Ignore those fools that cry scalping and live your life. How many times have we done this shortage thing now? They will still fail to prepare for the next shortage and still expect someone to bail them out with a brick at 1/10 market price cause "that's what they used to cost".

[popper]

Bitcoin is like all currency, the Gov. will manipulate it. EU tried same thing with the Euro. At this time it is like the stock market, with the 'big boys' computer trades making $ off each swing.

[perotter]

Bitcoin is like all currency, the Gov. will manipulate it. EU tried same thing with the Euro. At this time it is like the stock market, with the 'big boys' computer trades making $ off each swing.

Yup. When there always somebody who will make money on the swings and that is the real money to be made with it.

IMO, that is way there are such huge swings in it now. They are to big to be coming from just the people who are using it as currency for to go down in 1/2 in a couple of days and then right away to up.

[perotter]

I am not smart enough to understand it....it is the same problem I have understanding God. But at least I can see what God has created.

I like things like silver, food, land, tools, guns, ammunition and components. I cannot get rich from what I have, but I should be able to survive the last couple of decades I have left.

I plan on buying $5-8k of primers/powder when things get back to normal and replenishing the inventory I sold in the last few months. Figure I can triple my investment in less than four years, but if not, the stuff will not lose any value. If I was smarter and more sophisticated, I would not have to be a hoarder/scalper. Funny how someone buying crypto currency and making a huge profit is admired, but I get labeled a scalper.

Wish I had the smarts...but just a Michigan hillbilly.

I don't claim to fully understand it, just the basics. I too prefer what you do, but every once in a while opportunity knocks. Not everyone thinks you are a scalper. I sure don't. Unless you were charging your brother who was ammoless big money.

Better to have a few calling one a scalper than having others call one a fool for selling something to cheap.

[perotter]

Assuming that all the crypto market dropped a lot during the last few weeks, now it's the perfect time to buy, during the deeps.

Maybe. I had a good friend last who figured that shorting the market because of covid make him rich. Now his a 75 year old who went from having several million dollars to living on social security.

I really don't know why somebody his age had that much desire to have a 100's of millions of dollars. But some of the best advice my old man gave me was 'Most people go broke from being greedy. When you can take a profit do it.'.

[perotter]

There are absolutely people still mining Bitcoin. Mining is how new blocks are validated and added to the blockchain. It's essential to the process.

The rate at which new coins are minted to reward mining is much less now than it was at the beginning, but each transaction pays a per-bit mining fee. So yeah, it's still very profitable. It's just not practical for a guy with an old video card to compete with the huge clusters of dedicated mining equipment anymore. For BTC anyway. Ethereum uses different algorithms.



So don't buy any...

It's not essential at all to keep mining. Bitcoin would continue on just fine without more being mined. Otherwise it would all be worthless the same day the last Bitcoin was mined.

That is why they are mining Ethereum. There haven't been many Bitcoin left to be mined for the last few years. And they aren't using old video cards to mine Ethereum either. A couple of weeks ago the good video cards that the retail price is about $600 were going for $3000 to $4000 each. Guys are buy brand new gaming PC's just to pull out the video card to use for mining.

[kerplode]

It's not essential at all to keep mining. Bitcoin would continue on just fine without more being mined. Otherwise it would all be worthless the same day the last Bitcoin was mined.

That is why they are mining Ethereum. There haven't been many Bitcoin left to be mined for the last few years. And they aren't using old video cards to mine Ethereum either. A couple of weeks ago the good video cards that the retail price is about $600 were going for $3000 to $4000 each. Guys are buy brand new gaming PC's just to pull out the video card to use for mining.

"Mining" is fundamentally the process of validating new blocks on the chain. Minting and distribution of new coins is a reward for mining on BTC. The miners aren't really "discovering" new bitcoins. The protocol mints them at a determined rate as new blocks are hashed and then the new coins are awarded to miners. The rate at which new BTC is minted steadily decreases to an eventual cap of 21 million coins. But the mining pool is also paid a per byte fee for each transaction in addition to receiving portions of newly minted coins for their work.

No mining = no new blocks = dead blockchain. The fees are how BTC will keep going once the last Bitcoin is minted. The main reason that Bitcoin mining isn't profitable for the little guy anymore is that there are massive commercial operations running millions of dollars worth of dedicated hardware. As a result, the little guy with a video card will almost never be the first to validate a block, so will almost never get rewarded for the work.

As you noted, Ethereum works slightly differently

[Hometek]

What happens to all the lost bitcoins?
https://www.investopedia.com/news/20-all-btc-lost-unrecoverable-study-shows/

[GOPHER SLAYER]

When I read or hear about mining Bitcoins, my mind congers up an image of old Seldom Seen Slim and his faithful burro "Bessie", leaving Barstow heading for the desert searching for the motherload.

[MaryB]

If you can't hold it you don't own it! I can't "hold" a physical bitcoin. It is digital data that can go POOF/be outlawed and become worthless.

My gold and silver I can hold, it can't go poof into nowhere, they outlaw it I bury it and only use a tiny bit as needed for barter. When gold coins were made illegal to own many got melted down and recast as jewelry that was legal to own. And that jewelry was used to barter... necklaces with removable links for example. Make a link weigh a gram, I now have a $~50 bill per link...

[Jaaymar]

The fed is not and never has been part of the federal government.
It is a private bank.

It took several years for the people to be willing to accept the fed reserve note.
On the order of 15+ years and the only reason it was so fast was because it was backed by gold & silver PROMISES.

The current currency system has lost over 80% of its purchasing power on luxury services.
In 1971 the cost of a movie ticket was $1.65.
In 2021 the cost was $9.16.

I assert that the loss regarding necessities is more substantial.

Having a central authority controlling our currency has been a complete disaster for the average person, 2% inflation is the fed telling you it is stealing from your savings.

I suppose the saying is true, no one cares about your money except for you.

Removing central control and returning the control of the money to the people, to whom it rightfully belongs, will go a long way towards rectifying many of the issues we face.

[MUSTANG]

Hello, this news is ridiculously stupid. Let's count how much electricity consumes the bank industry all over the world? I bet it would be no less than 2 Argentinas in common. They up the ecology question because they want to control the cryptocurrency and try to find a solid excuse for that. I know already that crypto exchange services like Eveningstar (https://eveningstar.io/best-bitcoin-wallet/) have already switched to eco methods of gaining electricity for their services, so I don't find any arguments in these talks about the danger to ecology from the cryptocurrency industry.


One of my grandson's is into "Magic". He collects and practices "Magic Tricks" like a little fiend. Basis of all the "Magic Tricks" he has are - the Diversion of attention away from what one is doing and getting the audience to "Watch Closely" the area where the slight of hand IS NOT occurring.

"Green Companies employ these same "Wizard Practices". There are no "Green Electrons" coming down the electrical wire to replace those "Dirty Black Electrons". The "Green Energy Provider" these companies say they use; are simply a diversion from the fact the the Electrical Grid is made of many provides using Coal, Natural Gas, Hydro, Nuclear; and to a much lesser level Wind and Photo voltaic. Any "Crypto" company or other entity stating they only use "Green Energy" is simply playing an old time Carnival Shell Game about"Which Shell is the Pea Under? When in reality "There is NO Pea"!!. My Grandson let me in on that secret Magician Trick last Christmas. (Please keep this secret)

[savagetactical]

I was initially interested in Crypto , but what most do not understand is that the government has been ratcheting down the ability to convert it to cash without taxation coming in so the dreams of the cypher punks and many who want to create an economy which exists outside of the mainstream are restricted to conducting transactions among themselves which are still taxable events . Plus the amount of theft and fraud in the crypto sphere is mind boggling. Even hardware wallets which were thought to be immune to theft have now been reported as being compromised. I personally believe that many of these crypto currencies were funded quietly by the US government and other nations as proof of concept platforms to demonstrate the viability of an electronic currency. Look at how many nations are working to release centralized digital currencies . The US government is pushing hard to do this and issue money directly to the individual, keep this in mind .

A coin issued by a centralized authority can be taken at will by the issuer, and colored so that you can't spend them . A blacklisted coin would unable to be spent by you no many how much of the coin you have, no need to "seize an account"

Also there is no anonymity on the block chain and the IRS has been developing software to track transactions to their source and pair it to humans.

The dollar is already largely digital for the most part and has been priming people for this push for quite some time now, almost everyone gets direct deposit now, and we spend our funds via online transfers and transactions. Very few people are using actual cash these days which provides real privacy ...

The convenience of technology is a yoke that is taking your liberty folks. Chose what you use carefully

[scattershot]

I’m admittedly a dinosaur, but Bitcoin strikes me as a Ponzi scheme, not backed by anything.

[fixit]

It's called fiat currency....it has value because the guarantuers say it does. A scam?.... there's a little bit of scam in almost every currency out there!

[MUSTANG]

It's called fiat currency....it has value because the guarantuers say it does. A scam?.... there's a little bit of scam in almost every currency out there!


Not exactly; I have some dimes, quarters, 1/2 dollars and dollars that are easily exchanged at varying rates depending on what Buyer and seller agree on - although the US Government's FACE VALUE is considerably less than I would take.

[Cosmic_Charlie]

My son and his wife bought 500 worth for their daughter who is 5. I have never had much interest in it. If the internet ever disappears, it is gone. My wife likes silver money so i buy that for her from time to time.

[dpaultx]

295413

[bedbugbilly]

I'm old and cute honestly, both my wife and I can't get grasp or understand why of this. The other day, Dr. Pho did a segment on this . . . . pro and con . . . and in the end, no determination or judgement on "good or bad" - "legit or scam" . . . . and I'm certainly am not going to pass judgement on something that I don't understand. We watched the show and the young fellow explaining his side of it - trying to explain how it works and how it was legitimate . . . well . . . I guess both my wife and I, both with college educations and Masters, we still aren't savvy enough to understand it.

I know that "age" has nothing to do with the ability to understand any of it . . . but it's been interesting to read the posts. I think it would be interesting though . . . if a poll are made to show the ages . . or age spans . . . of those who are in to all of this.

Like I said . . . I'm older . . . but if things like this are "the future" . . . then I'm glad that I'm on the downhill side of life. As it is now, we have a bunch of loonies who seem to think that there are many more "sexes" than male and female, we have whole generations who can't walk without staring into a "smart phone", they can't establish meaningful relationships or even communicate with others in a meaningful way and a generation who thinks they are entitled to not have to work but instead, be handed everything . . . . .

In what looking I have done and after listening to the show on it the other day . . perhaps someone here who "is in to all of this bitcoin" can answer a question . . . .

"Who" started all of this? I still don't grasp the concept of how it "uses" so much "energy" . . . but obviously it is something that somehow is not good for not leaving a "carbon footprint" . . . so why are so many of those who lean Left and want to push the "new green deal" so involved in it? Kind of hypocritical isn't it? I'n really not casting stones . . just curious about it like a lot of folks who made our wy in this world the "old fashioned way" . by working. And I'm not saying that all of those involved in this don't work hard . , . I'm sure they do . . . but 'm also sure that not "all" do. Nothing in life is "free" . . . it comes with a price . . so who started all of this and who is actually making cold hard cash that can be held in their hand . . . I'm assuming that from several of the posts that if you buy one of these bitcoins and then sell it, you receive traditional currency in exchange that goes into a bank account? And of course . . with the new $600 IRS transaction reporting that the Socialist Left put into effect, that when you actually "sell" a butciub you are going to have to pay what taxes are due on the capital gain just like every other American Citizen?

[Wag]

Part of this that I still don't understand is:

You pull money out of your bank account.
You "buy" some bitcoin.

Where does your cash go? Who gets it from you? Can you rely on them to actually buy the bitcoin in your name? Where's the trust?

--Wag--

[kerplode]

Part of this that I still don't understand is:

You pull money out of your bank account.
You "buy" some bitcoin.

Where does your cash go? Who gets it from you? Can you rely on them to actually buy the bitcoin in your name? Where's the trust?

--Wag--
Fundamentally, it's really not any different than buying stocks with your broker...

You take your money out of your bank and transfer it to a crypto exchange such as Coinbase. There, you can either just buy your bitcoin at the BTC-USD exchange rate at that instant (a market order), or you can specify a maximum price you'd like to pay (a limit order, which is not guaranteed to execute).

Who gets your money is simple...It goes to the people who sold the BTC you purchased (minus a small cut to the exchange for facilitating the transaction). Remember, this is an exchange market and for every buyer, there is a seller.

So you make your order, Coinbase matches that with a seller or sellers on their order book, they fill the order (Transfer your USD to the sellers and their BTC to you), and your wallet on Coinbase gets credited for the quantity of the BTC you bought. Later, if you desire, you can transfer this BTC (minus a mining fee) to a wallet address that you own the keys to.

The "wallets" themselves are simply just cryptographic key pairs. A public key (or address), to which the ownership of the tokens is credited on the blockchain, and a private key that allows the owner (hopefully only you) to reassign ownership of some or all of the token quantity owned by the associated public key or keys to another address. This can be spending the BTC to buy something physical, sending it to another address you own, sending it to your exchange account to sell or trade, or sending it to Russia to pay off hackers that locked your computer.

The blockchain itself is nothing more than an immutable leger that tracks the movement and ownership of the tokens (some blockchains such as Ethereum are are much more complicated, but for Bitcoin this is accurate). The miners compete with each other to solve a math problem, and the winner gets to add a new block of transactions to the end of the chain. Each new block is based on all the blocks before it, so after the block recording your transaction is behind a couple others, it's basically impossible to alter. For their efforts, the winning miner is rewarded with freshly minted BTC. It is created from the air by the algorithm and credited to the winning miners public address. The miner then sells the BTC to pay their electric bill, which injects new liquidity into the markets.

Now, sure, if you just find some rando on the internet and send the money for the promise of them returning BTC, then you are on your own. Same risk as sending money to someone you don't know for anything else, really.

[kerplode]

I’m admittedly a dinosaur, but Bitcoin strikes me as a Ponzi scheme, not backed by anything.

What backs your US Dollar? Fundamentally nothing but the willingness for someone else to accept it in return for something they have. I get that it's a tangable thing, so it seems more "real", but it's just a piece of green paper sporting the picture of a dead politician. It's intrinsic value is basically nothing. You could wipe with it, or maybe start a fire, but that's about it as far as "actual" value.

At least BTC is scarce...There will only ever be 21 million minted. The treasury is printing the dollar into oblivion. In that regard, the crypto most like the USD is Dogecoin...

[kerplode]

One last thing, and I think this should be obvious to the audience here...

Many crypo tokens are indeed hot garbage. If you want to dip your toe in crypto do your research and find something that has an actual useful purpose laid out in its whitepaper. Or keep it simple and stick with BTC and ETH (BTC is meant to be a means of exchange and is the granddaddy crypto. ETH runs a flexible computing platform on its blockchain). Only spend what you are willing to lose, and EXPECT crazy volatility. 60K to 20K to 60K to 20K over the course of a few months is not unusual for BTC at this point. If you sell, it counts as selling "property", so Uncle Sugar is gonna want his cut of your capital gains. (I lol at all these kids on TikTok and Robinhood when the tax implications of their crazy crypto day trading sinks in...)

There are a lot of alt-coins (also called ****coins) that are indeed scams. I also think NFTs are almost all a scam.

Do research, start small, use limit orders, buy low, own the keys, keep records. It's only a loss if you sell (or the coin goes to 0, but that is a risk with stocks too...)

[Wag]

Thank you for the details, kerplode. I was missing the exchange facilitator part of the equation.

--Wag--

[sparky45]

I don't know why Warren Buffett recently switched stratedgy and heavily got into Crypto banking; anyone?

[jonp]

Modern banking and crypto systems are advanced enough that they can be trusted

Until the Fed decides negative interest rates are needed to fight inflation or the bank reports you for too many $600 withdrawals and the FBI freezes your accounts and knocks on your door.

[john.k]

Reported in the finance papers that one of the big funds crashed a crypto and made billions from the deal ,while ruining small investors who lost 98% of their money .

[Hannibal]

I have never trusted the value of anything that I can not physically touch and that includes cash from anywhere. I invest in tangible things that historically appreciate. Yes, even tangible items can devalue for different reasons but look around the globe and you'll see examples of money that has become essentially worthless everywhere.
No way will I ever knowingly make any investment or consider any crypto currency worth anything at all.
Those of you who do I have no quarrel with, do whatever you believe is best for you. But it is not something I'm interested in at all.

[MaryB]

I have never trusted the value of anything that I can not physically touch and that includes cash from anywhere. I invest in tangible things that historically appreciate. Yes, even tangible items can devalue for different reasons but look around the globe and you'll see examples of money that has become essentially worthless everywhere.
No way will I ever knowingly make any investment or consider any crypto currency worth anything at all.
Those of you who do I have no quarrel with, do whatever you believe is best for you. But it is not something I'm interested in at all.

Friend of mine worked for the US government doing statistical analysis and she brings back currency from around the world. She gave me a 1,000 Indonisian Rupiah bill... 6.7 cents in US money!!!! When she gave it to me it was 25 cents... that was 10 years ago...

[jonp]

Friend of mine worked for the US government doing statistical analysis and she brings back currency from around the world. She gave me a 1,000 Indonisian Rupiah bill... 6.7 cents in US money!!!! When she gave it to me it was 25 cents... that was 10 years ago...

I happened to be easing my way around Africa doing stuff and picked up a $1,000,000 Zimbabwe note. It's in my hunting camp so i can always claim i have a million dollar hunting lodge

[MUSTANG]

In the original Maverick TV Shows, for the first few episodes the recurring theme was Maverick (James Garner) always pinning a $1,000.00 bill into the inside of a pocket so he would always have a stake for his next gambling opportunity. Back in 2009 a friend gave me a paper Zimbabwee currency (Bill). I have carried that bill in my pocket ever since; as a reminder of how our US Currency could be devalued by our elected officials through bad fiscal policy. The note appears in the following photos:

304472
304473

Notice the value on the face of the note! That's 100 Trillion Zimbabwe Dollars!.


If you've wondered what a Zimbabwe One Hundred Trillion Dollar Banknote looks like, you have come to the right place. Zimbabwe experienced a period of hyperinflation spanning a few decades that culminated in 2008 with the introduction of the 100,000,000,000,000 banknote. Currency in Zimbabwe was so devalued that you needed a big stack of high denomination bills to buy a loaf of bread! Only a few million copies of the banknote were ever produced up until 2009.

A little history lesson behind the banknote: The Zimbabwe Dollar was established to replace the Rhodesian Dollar and to signify the nation’s independence from the UK in 1980. It was redenominated 3 times until its eventual collapse in 2009 due to hyperinflation caused by the unregulated printing of money, the Land reform program, and involvement in the Second Congo War. Today, Zimbabwe has a multi-currency economic system set in a place where money from around the world has become legal tender.

On the obverse of the 100 Trillion Zimbabwe Dollar we can see the famous Chiremba Balancing rocks from Epworth, a Harare Province. These rocks are said to represent the delicate balance between man and nature. This banknote also has a hidden watermark that displays a complete denomination when held up to a light source.

The letters RBZ repeat along the left side of the banknote and are printed in gold color-shifting ink. Lastly, we can see an underprint of a cow with grains and a color-shifting security ink featuring the country’s official emblem, the Zimbabwe Bird.

The reverse of the banknote features Victoria falls and a cape buffalo. Victoria Falls, or known by the locals as the Smoke that Thunders, was named in honor of Queen Victoria by David Livingstone in the mid-1800’s.

On certain months, the river’s current becomes low enough that visitors can swim near the edge on what has been dubbed “ the Devil’s Pool”.

The cape buffalo is an African bovine that can reach a length of 10 feet, a height of 5 feet, and weigh almost a ton! The cape buffalo is infamous for attacking hunters and reports claim that they kill or injure more hunters than any other animal in Africa.

The Zimbabwean Reserve Bank printed different variants of the 100 Trillion note, each with the same Chiremba balancing rocks on the obverse.

I noted that on the Internet; there are offers of $384.00 for a new/good condition for these notes. I would not part with mine for any amount; because it is a constant reminder to always be distrustful of Politicans and that governments can be corrupt and steal the chicanery all that the populace owns.

[sparky45]

Article from back in June, but more relevant today. It's a video of what is deemed to be the "new" world reserve currency. BRICS anyone?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CtzZADnea0