Scrutable

What we have now is bad, crypto is way way worse and can fix non of the existing financial system has. The entire point of it is to get around any constraints we currently have. So all the bad things we have now, cranked up to 11 with a whole extra load of badness ontop.

lpm wrote: ↑

Tue Nov 29, 2022 1:23 pm

Plodder: You should drink your own urine.

LPM: What the f.ck, why?

Plodder: Because you drink 5 cans of coke a day. That's terrible stuff, causing you all sorts of problems.

LPM: Why urine though?

Plodder: *waffles on endlessly about how bad coke is, with some valid sounding stuff mixed in with obvious exaggerations and weird claims*

LPM: Right, yeah, I get there might be a problem with my 5 cans of coke but why should I drink my own urine?

Plodder: Because it will undermine your coke drinking habit.

LPM: But what is good about urine?

Plodder: DRINK. YOUR. OWN. URINE.

LPM: DIET COKE IS A SCAM

plodder: Well, you might not like the taste, but it's a thing, no?

LPM: DIET COKE WON'T MAKE YOU THIN, YOU NEED TO EXERCISE. DIET COKE IS A SCAM.

plodder: Look LPM, it might not be great stuff but it's popular and seems to work for some people. For example,

LPM: ARE YOU MAD? WHY ARE YOU TRYING TO MAKE ME DRINK MY OWN URINE? ARE YOU MAD? ARE YOU MAD???

plodder: OK, maybe lay off the tartrazine a bit, fair enough

Oh get a room you two. With a rubber floor.

bjn wrote: ↑

Tue Nov 29, 2022 1:44 pm

What we have now is bad, crypto is way way worse and can fix non of the existing financial system has. The entire point of it is to get around any constraints we currently have. So all the bad things we have now, cranked up to 11 with a whole extra load of badness ontop.

This is a collection of very strong absolutist positions.

plodder wrote: ↑

Tue Nov 29, 2022 5:05 pm

bjn wrote: ↑

Tue Nov 29, 2022 1:44 pm

What we have now is bad, crypto is way way worse and can fix non of the existing financial system has. The entire point of it is to get around any constraints we currently have. So all the bad things we have now, cranked up to 11 with a whole extra load of badness ontop.

This is a collection of very strong absolutist positions.

It's a statement of fact.

No matter how hard you wish to overthrow the financial system to build something more to your liking, crypto doesn't actually do that.

It’s not a statement of fact at all, it’s a series of assumptions and opinions from people who (I am guessing) may have been burned by some poorly considered investments.

I’ve never put a penny into crypto.

plodder wrote: ↑

Tue Nov 29, 2022 6:39 pm

It’s not a statement of fact at all, it’s a series of assumptions and opinions from people who (I am guessing) may have been burned by some poorly considered investments.

What are the assumptions that you want to challenge?

bjn wrote: ↑

Tue Nov 29, 2022 1:44 pm

What we have now is bad, crypto is way way worse and can fix non of the existing financial system has. The entire point of it is to get around any constraints we currently have. So all the bad things we have now, cranked up to 11 with a whole extra load of badness ontop.

Here’s the specific post I was talking about but in general this thread is full of “it’s a scam” or “the tech can never work” or “it can never improve on the lousy system we currently have” which are very opiniony opinions without balance or much thought.

I’m being shouted down for presenting some of the actual reasons why some people think crypto can offer some genuine solutions to some big problems we have (the untouchable power of banks, for starters). Rather than shouting this down it would be more interesting if people did a bit of reading and said “I think they’re wrong because…” or even “do you know, I’d never thought about it like that, they’ve got a point, you know.”

What problems does crypto solve? List a few and how they do it.

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 7:41 am

I’m being shouted down for presenting some of the actual reasons why some people think crypto can offer some genuine solutions to some big problems we have (the untouchable power of banks, for starters).

The only 'actual reasons why some people think crypto can offer some genuine solutions' I have seen in this thread (and I have re-read your posts in it just to check, FML) are that it avoids government regulations and banks. That's it. If there was a more specific and detailed reason I missed then please, please point it out.

So it doesn't seem unreasonable to ask for an example, just one, of a specific thing that is wrong with government regulated money and banks and a specific way in which cryptocurrencies make it better. Just one. Then we can discuss it.

nekomatic wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 9:44 am

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 7:41 am

I’m being shouted down for presenting some of the actual reasons why some people think crypto can offer some genuine solutions to some big problems we have (the untouchable power of banks, for starters).

The only 'actual reasons why some people think crypto can offer some genuine solutions' I have seen in this thread (and I have re-read your posts in it just to check, FML) are that it avoids government regulations and banks. That's it. If there was a more specific and detailed reason I missed then please, please point it out.

So it doesn't seem unreasonable to ask for an example, just one, of a specific thing that is wrong with government regulated money and banks and a specific way in which cryptocurrencies make it better. Just one. Then we can discuss it.

The only potentially useful specific reason I have spotted in the discussion is that banks charge us too much, require too much trust, and behave too riskily. But crypto has failed to improve on any of that. It costs a ridiculous amount to process transactions - but they hide the cost; it has much higher risk embodied in the high volatility; and it has relocated rather than removed the trust problem.

Meanwhile the headline article in today's Metro, the London free-sheet newspaper, is the suspicious death of a third Russian crypto boss in a short period of time. A helicopter crashed into a hillside in the south of France for no apparent reason. I did suggest that organised crime might be upset with with crypto bosses at the moment. Though quite a few prominent rich Russians are losing their lives at the moment for not supporting the regime sufficiently enthusiastically. So it is hard to distinguish whether it is to do with crypto, or just being an unenthusiastic prominent Russian. And it is also hard to distinguish the FSB and organised crime.

Well, traditional high finance doesn’t exactly have clean hands. It’s just they don’t have to crash helicopters, they can do things like have a gulf war or whatever. If you can’t imagine why some people think there’s something overwhelmingly suffocatingly awful about the system that props up governments and the stupifyingly wealthy then that’s nice for you, but don’t pretend there isn’t a line of thought there. The people looking to undermine this are ambitious with a capital A.

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 11:19 am

Well, traditional high finance doesn’t exactly have clean hands. It’s just they don’t have to crash helicopters, they can do things like have a gulf war or whatever.

Again, as I pointed out in the other thread on this, that's largely not due to the currency, and changing to a non fiat currency does not change that.

High finance was also dodgy while most of the world was on the gold standard, which is the basic thing that crypto is trying to reproduce.

It’s cutting out the central banks for starters.

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 11:24 am

It’s cutting out the central banks for starters.

What problem does that solve, and what problems does it introduce?

Note that you do not need crypto to cut out the central banks. You can just use stocks, commodities, precious metals, etc. as currency. Or issue non-crypto specie. You could use beanie babies if you want.

IvanV wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 10:59 am

I did suggest that organised crime might be upset with with crypto bosses at the moment.

I expect there will some that see the name "Bankman-Fried" and think "Well there's an idea..."

Traditional financial systems did not, in fact, cause the Gulf War.

dyqik wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 11:25 am

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 11:24 am

It’s cutting out the central banks for starters.

What problem does that solve, and what problems does it introduce?

Note that you do not need crypto to cut out the central banks. You can just use stocks, commodities, precious metals, etc. as currency. Or issue non-crypto specie. You could use beanie babies if you want.

They need a stock exchange, crypto is potentially independent.

It introduces lots of problems, and solves things you may not think are problems. Bypassing banks is seen as a potential solution to the problem of the established financial elites who spin our money for their gain. I'm not a huge proponent of crypto so I'm not here to argue strongly for it, other than to say there is an argument to be made and it might be interesting to have it instead of a stonewall pig headed refusal to engage.

EACLucifer wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 11:47 am

Traditional financial systems did not, in fact, cause the Gulf War.

No, nothing to do with money at all.

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 12:08 pm

dyqik wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 11:25 am

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 11:24 am

It’s cutting out the central banks for starters.

What problem does that solve, and what problems does it introduce?

Note that you do not need crypto to cut out the central banks. You can just use stocks, commodities, precious metals, etc. as currency. Or issue non-crypto specie. You could use beanie babies if you want.

They need a stock exchange, crypto is potentially independent.

It introduces lots of problems, and solves things you may not think are problems. Bypassing banks is seen as a potential solution to the problem of the established financial elites who spin our money for their gain. I'm not a huge proponent of crypto so I'm not here to argue strongly for it, other than to say there is an argument to be made and it might be interesting to have it instead of a stonewall pig headed refusal to engage.

It doesn't bypass banks because distributed ledgers are dreadful at what they do. So on the whole you have to trade on an exchange, which is effectively a bank.

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 12:08 pm

EACLucifer wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 11:47 am

Traditional financial systems did not, in fact, cause the Gulf War.

No, nothing to do with money at all.

Of course. Nothing to do with Saddam Hussein's territorial ambitions against his neighbours, just (((International Finance)))

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 12:08 pm

dyqik wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 11:25 am

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 11:24 am

It’s cutting out the central banks for starters.

What problem does that solve, and what problems does it introduce?

Note that you do not need crypto to cut out the central banks. You can just use stocks, commodities, precious metals, etc. as currency. Or issue non-crypto specie. You could use beanie babies if you want.

They need a stock exchange, crypto is potentially independent.

You don't need an exchange to trade stocks. Private trades happen all the time. A stock exchange is also not part of the central banks you want to do away with.

EACLucifer wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 12:13 pm

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 12:08 pm

EACLucifer wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 11:47 am

Traditional financial systems did not, in fact, cause the Gulf War.

No, nothing to do with money at all.

Of course. Nothing to do with Saddam Hussein's territorial ambitions against his neighbours, just (((International Finance)))

Wait a minute Mr logic fail. No one said just finance or nothing to do with anything else. These people are clever, remember?

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 12:20 pm

EACLucifer wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 12:13 pm

plodder wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 12:08 pm

No, nothing to do with money at all.

Of course. Nothing to do with Saddam Hussein's territorial ambitions against his neighbours, just (((International Finance)))

Wait a minute Mr logic fail. No one said just finance or nothing to do with anything else. These people are clever, remember?

Something you'd do well to remember.