That’s why it’s called a “natural-occuring” Ponzi, not an overt Ponzi. That’s how Bitcoin started to have surging value, as a “Ponzi”. For it to pay profit to a holder for higher value, newer investors must enter the system and buy them from those holders. BUT, like Gold, it stopped being a “Ponzi” when it was started to be used as currency in the dark markets, creating a circular economy.
Before bitcoin was started to be used as a currency of dark markets, it had no market value, and couldn't give any profit to early holders because newer investors had no reason to invest in something with no market value.
Is that a fact? It had market value if it had a market.
Plus what did the market look like for Bitcoin before its acceptance in the Silk Road? I believe the chart would be like some pumps, some crashes, like illiquid shitcoins.
Moreover, even if they wanted to invest in bitcoin, they couldn't do it anyway because early adopters saw no reason to "sell" their bitcoin. Those who wished to obtain bitcoin didn't buy it but rather invested their money to buy hardware with which to acquire useless (priceless) bitcoin. It was but an indirect purchase that didn't involve other people except for the miner himself.
There wasn’t a market to buy, or sell Bitcoin?
No one could have predicted that bitcoin would transform into something that has a non-zero value, but the fact that did happen doesn't make early adopters somehow look like nefarious creators of Ponzi schemes. This is an example of the natural-occurring evolution of money when it starts its journey as being collectible/commodity and ends up being used as a universal unit of measurement.
But how did Bitcoin start to have value before the Silk Road? It didn’t start with investors coming into the system to bid, and holders to sell, and as new investors came in, the market and the value of the coin didn’t become larger?