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this post was submitted on 17 Oct 2025
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Should get rid of crypto while we're at it.
I would Like to see you try.. How would you bann blockchain tech? The reason why bitcoin exists, believe it or not, is for you. To have an alternative to current world banking, which is screwing us all over with fake valuta. A factional number on your bank account, that is worth whatever the banks say it is. Bitcoin is an alternative to world banking, so we wouldn't end up in a financial crisis like 2008 again.
Bitcoin was supposed to be an anonymous, secure, digital currency.
If you actually want that, its called monero, not bitcoin, and even it has problems.
Bitcoin, ethereum, all the forks and clones of them with different stupid names?
Not anonymous, not secure.
Oh, right, and they're all massively tied into that financial/monetary speculation machine that they were supposed to be an alternative to.
Now, you just have a crypto balance that is whatever your coin exchange says it is, untill oops, turns out they were double holding 'your' coins in some way, you actually have none, or, a market swing or crash wipes out your 'store of value', because you actually invested in a complicated ponzi scheme.
For all the bullshit fraud and dangerous speculation of traditional finance, the crypto space is a million times worse.
Crypto now largely just is a speculative asset.
It never took off as an actual medium of exchange for anything other than basically illegal guns and drugs... its just a new, more insane kind of stock market, a new kind of speculative asset.
Every crypto video game is a fucking joke.
NFTs are a fucking joke.
Everything you dislike about traditional banking and finance?
Crypto is that, but much worse.
The very moment you can get more coins by wasting energy, disk space or "digging" it in any kind of way means that will be used to speculate.
Why?
Bitcoin alone uses more electricity than the entire country of Norway.
It's a REALLY REALLY wasteful way to do transactions and is terrible for the environment.
Other than that, it's fueled the black market and illegal business, it doesn't really have any real world benefits you can't get from regular banking for the vast majority of people.
One bitcoin transaction is estimated to use between 50 and 700kwh of electricity. Your average dutch household uses ~2000kwh, so ~10 transactions burn more electricity than a whole household.
And to add to how bad that is, Norway is a small country, but we use really, really much energy per capita, since our energy has always been so cheap due to hydro power and politicians in 1905 going all in on that the benefits of our nature should benefit us all. Only in the last few years, prices have aligned more with the rest of the continent, though that price hike is supported for the many by the government, since the continental standard is so foreignly high for us.
Bitcoin is basically a prototype, though. (Some) other cryptos are far more efficient.
The illegal transactions complaint is legit, but there's cases where that's not a bad thing.
I get that it's very nice during a revolution or something like that, but there are also massive downsides and to me it looks like it mostly benefits criminals and people taking advantage of others.
Trump has made a fortune on his shit-coin, it's a great way for people to get around regulations and hide things they usually wouldn't get away with.
I'm open to have my opinion changed, it's just what it looks like to me
I'm not going to directly argue with that, since I don't have more than a personal guess about if the world needs more technologies of control, or less.
I will point out that that stance leads to a lot of conclusions Lemmy wouldn't like. Or at least seems like it could. For example, isn't mass surveillance actually good because it can stop crime? And maybe computer hardware should all be locked down and accessible only with a licence.
Yea I get that argument, and thought Lemmy might feel Crypto = Good (because fuck the system)
I think as with everything it's not black and white and and needs to be studied properly.
Mass surveillance would stop crime sure, but the price you pay for that is privacy and a concentration of power which will likely be abused. Meaning it's not worth the price/risk.
What benefits has crypto given us? and are they worth the metric shit-ton of electricity that it uses along with all the crime and dodgy dealings it facilitates?
Stopping crime is concentration of power - even defining what it is is a function of some kind of center. All technology can really do is shift the opportunity for evil from one end of the power spectrum to the other. And breaking off from Lemmy's typical jerk a bit, I'll venture that too far to either end is bad, and that the problem of not enough central control was widespread in the distant past.
Anyway, you're asking what crypto has already done, but then you're talking about what surveillance might, and I think that's the main/only thing I can fault. Since the electricity is an easily surmountable technical issue, I'd ask we set it aside for a moment. (Basically if we're pretending we can make crypto disappear let's also pretend we can rewrite the code)
So do we just not stop crime?
We need some concentration of power as long as there are checks and balances to keep them in place.
The police in the Netherlands have a concentration of power. But they can't abuse that power because other powers keep them in place.
You want a separation of powers holding each other accountable.
No concentration of power is just anarchy
Did you read all the way through? I think I made that exact point, although in less detail.
I don't understand the point you were trying to make in the message I responded to.
I fail to see the benefit Crypto brings us. It gives us some desensitisation, but we already have that, I can open bank accounts in different counties, even have secret bank accounts etc.
I get that the internet is for fighting, but can't I just point out the pros and cons of both sides? That's what I was going for.
The only thing I was really arguing with is the specific way you compared banning (?) crypto and surveillance.
https://coinshares.com/nl-en/insights/research-data/closer-look-environmental-impact-of-bitcoin-mining/ https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/jul/26/climate-hero-villain-fossil-fuel-frenzy-challenges-norway-green-image https://www.dw.com/en/norways-big-green-lie/audio-74144534
Bitcoin is a far superior way to control your own finances. Transactions are more transparent helping to prevent corruption for one thing. As long as we let the banks control everything, we will never be able to fix most of the problems causing climate damage. If you are still intent on complaining that Bitcoin is evil, it is a necessary evil. It has unfortunately been adopted by the big companies at this stage so they will benefit immensely from it, but taking everything and the alternatives into account, it should actually help the environment in the long run.
Bitcoin doesn't have the arbitration that banks can offer. Bitcoin also uses ridiculous amounts of energy, so much so that I don't think the network could even handle taking over the volume that the banks currently handle. The idea that it is somehow a saviour for the environment is laughable.
I don't think that anyone claimed it is somehow the saviour for then environment. There is a lot more to bitcoin than was possible to reply.
Sorry but I'm not reading 3 whole articles. (can't even reject the cookies on some of them)
What does bitcoin solve? And what about risks like you(or your vendor) getting hacked and literally your whole life savings just vanishing into a puff of smoke?
Traditional banks protect you against things like that.
It makes me wonder how you came to your superior opinion when you won't even read a partial article. I use blockers so I didn't see any cookie popups etc. (firefox/chrome - Ghostery, privacy badger, ublock origin)
The honest and best answer that I can give is far too long for little old me to be typing out while trying to cover everything. Your vendor getting hacked - Never keep your bitcoin on the exchange.
Not your keys - not your crypto.
The problem you propose there happens today with banks and our identification being cloned. With EU Chat Control attempting to be passed, it has the potential to get 100 times worse for everyone.
I am not being smart, but you should read up on what Bitcoin (not crypto) solves and how it is more secure. There are a plethora of articles out there that don't require a lot of reading, that you could skim over.
Key points for most articles were you to search "what does bitcoin solve?"
The Bitcoin blockchain is decentralized, permissionless, and reliable.
Bitcoin increases access to basic financial services and facilitates cross-border payments.
The Bitcoin blockchain is open and transparent. Every transaction on the network can be traced.
Bitcoin's creator, Satoshi Nakamoto, imposed a hard-capped supply of 21 million BTC, creating a provably-scarce asset.
I'm on firefox with uBlock, will look into adding the others
I still don't see what bitcoin solves?
Sure it's decentralized and transparent and all those things, but how does that benefit us? And is it worth ~5% the household electricity usage per transaction?
You say people shouldn't keep all their money in an exchange, should they protect it themselves then? People aren't tech literate and old people will DEFINITELY get scammed out of their crypto.
Someone can break into your house, hold a gun to your head and make you transfer your whole life savings to them. Traditional banks protect against this, you will get your money back if someone does this.
Can I take a mortgage in crypto?
Again, what problems does bitcoin solve? It creates many so it better be something good