etr-strike

All coins built upon PoW suffer the same scaling issues as bitcoin. Since Bitcoin is the most popular, it hit the limitations first. Second layer technologies such as Lightning Network and Rootstock do solve various problematic use cases. Bitcoin is the most widely held cryptocurrency and is the only cryptocurrency with second layer technologies being rolled out into production as we speak.

As they should -- Lightning Network is the correct technological solution for small frequent payments such as game purchases on Steam.

Lightning Network exceeds the throughput of VISA. The scaling problem is being addressed -- just not in the naive "let's throw away decentralization and increase the blocksize" way.

> Bitcoin effectively froze when Blockstream decided against increasing block size.

You mean when the Bitcoin Core implementation of the Bitcoin protocol decided decentralization was an important feature of the currency and transaction compression should be the prioritized means of scaling.

That’s a cute theory, but housing costs are much more related to the cost of money. When the federal reserve makes money cheap, asset prices increase. Since mortgage rates are at historic lows, people simply borrow as much as possible until their monthly payment is at some threshold. If you want housing prices to return to historic norms, you need to ask the Fed to first return the cost of money to normal.

And back to C we go.

I can buy USDs with my bitcoin. Lots of them.

Yes? Confirmations in bitcoin were never instant...

No, I think blockchains provide many useful functions. However, providing a token with value is a necessary feature. I’m very excited about things like Rootstock which add smart contract functionality to the bitcoin blockchain.

A blockchain is a decentralized trustless ledger. If the operators are trusted, you can just use a database. It’s much more efficient. It’s pretty clear from the comment that you don’t understand Bitcoin or why, when people say “we like blockchain but not bitcoin”, that they’re talking nonsense.

You can’t have a blockchain without a Bitcoin. The two are inseparable. Every blockchain needs a token reward which has monetary value to secure it.

Sure, if you don’t consider a decentralized and trustless currency a use. If you don’t consider a store of value a use. If you don’t consider a public ledger of transactions a use. If you don’t consider programmable money a use. If you don’t consider permissionless payments a use. If you don’t consider a financial system wich never close a use. If you don’t consider instant payments a use. Then sure, no use has been found.

They’ve been fighting deflation, not inflation. Asset prices need to correct and they refuse to let them. There’s a reason young people are buying so few homes.