- Linus Torvalds, creator of Linux, does not believe in cryptocurrencies, calling them a vehicle for scams and a Ponzi scheme.
- Torvalds was once rumored to be Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto, but he clarified it was a joke and denied owning a Bitcoin fortune.
- Torvalds also dismissed the idea of technological singularity as a bedtime story for children, saying continuous exponential growth does not make sense.
If after 16 years you still have to be asked if you believe in crypto, then chances are that it is a scam.
Good point, I always wondered if there is a way the technology will evolve and somehow find a niche that’s unexpected. But you’re right, 16 years is a long time to be meandering.
It’s such a first-world thing to not understand all the good that crypto has done. There are countless lives that have been financially saved by having a safe place to hold wealth while their countries’ fiat collapsed. It’s just a short matter of time until many first world folks understand this as well.
Evading paying taxes is a good thing? Well no.
Paying taxes is one thing, and of course it is necessary. Extra value is extracted by printing more and more money. USD used to be backed by gold, but they took that away. In addition to corrupt governments extracting value by printing more and more currency, counterfeitters also do the same. Bitcoin fixes both of these issues. There is absolutely no reason why Bitcoin and taxes can’t coexist.
Furthermore, with bitcoin we can electronically transfer exactly how much value we want to without having to trust every single vendor with our credit/debit card numbers. Have you ever had to cancel a card because of fraudulent spends? Well, millions of Americans do every year and this also doesn’t happen with Bitcoin. You send exactly how much you want to, you don’t hand indefinite access to your funds to every single vendor to sell your information or steal from you whenever they want. In the last 2 weeks I’ve had over $400 stolen from my debit card because of this idiotic system.
Even if you live under a genocidal regime?
There was promise for people in Argentina livig under extreme inflation but I never heard it go anywhere.
Look closer, it’s saving lives down there.
I’m from Argentina, if you can pass me some articles I’d love to read them. It’s something I’ve been interested in
Traditionally clever Argentinians have used USD to escape the collapsing currency, but over the last couple of years, there has been a massive shift to doing this with Bitcoin and some stablecoins. Personally, I would just go for Bitcoin, but I do understand that there is less variance with stablecoins, so they may be a bit more practical for some people. Here is an article that goes into this.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-03-19/bitcoin-gains-dim-argentines-dollar-refuge-with-276-inflation?embedded-checkout=true
Sounds like the same shit those rare metal guys are always yapping about but with extra scams…
On the other hand, scams rarely last 16 years.
No clue how long scams usually last, but famous ones easily last multiple decades, though funny how unclear if is when the scam started:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madoff_investment_scandal?wprov=sfla1
Madoff was hidden. Bitcoin is out in the open.
I think “bubble” could be a better description. Bitcoins bubble pops regularly every 4 years.
Yeah I don’t believe in smartphones, I just have one. I don’t believe in crypto, I acknowledge it’s pointless.
It’s not pointless. It was invented for a very good reason. You’ll find out one day. It’s a shame it’s been co-opted the way it has.
Well, on the other hand, it’s still there after 16 years…
For all the reasons that crypto is a scam, every “value” stock - stock which does not now, and never has any intention of ever paying dividends - is also a scam.
Except, you know, the stock being tied to ownership in a company that sells real goods or services. Definitely problems with how stocks are traded, but they’re quite different from crypto.
That’s the scam: without dividends, or at least the reasonable prospect of dividends, it is not tied to the company in any tangible way. Shareholders benefit only from speculation by other investors, and not from actual business operations.
Behind a value stock is a profitable company. Behind crypto-tokens is a hilariously inefficient database with no application in real life.
Gamble away your money, I’ll take the stock - or “have fun staying poor” like crypto-token morons like to say.