unnamedhorse

I run a Bitcoin lightning node on a small Raspberry Pi, and I use Bitcoin for p2p payments. So from my perspective, Bitcoin is both a great store of value and a good currency.

But since this thread is about an altcoin: Almost no other altcoin enables me to run my own fully-validating node on cheap hardware. And that is 100% a requirement I have since the whole point of crypto to reduce trust to a minimum. I don't know about the details of Chia, but as far as I know most coins with "smart contracts" built into the blockchain require expensive full nodes, so I personally do not see much appeal.

Disclaimer: I'm a Bitcoiner, which seems to be an unpopular stance here. I'll do my best to explain some of my motivation and answer to your questions.

Q1: Why would people accept these currencies in the first place? I want to hold Bitcoin because of its monetary policy. It has a fixed, capped supply of 21 million BTC, whereas fiat can be printed at will. This property is what fuels the current hype, and the fact that central banks around the world are inflating money supply as we speak certainly helps the narrative. So for bitcoiners, money saved in fiat is likely to lose buying power over time, but in Bitcoin we see, on average, a steady increase. Since I see Bitcoin as a superior form of money, I would certainly prefer getting paid in Bitcoin than in fiat.

Q2: Why do people that accept Bitcoin still denominate prices in USD? Bitcoin is far from being an established currency, and it is still very volatile (though far less than a few years ago). Most of the population are not bitcoiners. The US are denominated in USD. So, until Bitcoin is both more stable and more popular, it is the most convenient to do what we're used to and denominate things in USD.

Q3: Is speculation the primary reason for Bitcoin's rise in popularity? We're in the middle of a bull run right now, so probably? But if you zoom out and look at the price evolution over 5 years it looks different, and there is a steady growth.

Q4: Do people just want to increase their USD? ("spend 10,000 [...] and then extract 15,000 fiat") Some do for sure, but I don't see much appeal in exchanging hard money into money with arbitrary monetary policies. Bitcoin tripling in value does not change the initial motivation I had to buy it, so why sell? Of course, if I want to buy something with btc then that amounts to selling some. But my motivation to be in Bitcoin is to protect my time, the most limited resource I have in my life, from inflation, and that does not change with price.