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Quote from: JamesNZ on April 26, 2024, 09:58:56 AM

Bitcoin is the dumbest thing ever invented.

If you think Bitcoin is dumb then why you're present on this forum? If you don't like the idea of Bitcoin and find it useless then I believe someone like you should not be part of the forum that's a place for Bitcoin community. You need some research I believe, no I think you may need some treatment so you can understand Bitcoin properly.

For me I think he is just a troll that needs people to actually notice him just like the other fella who always shares post about how he is the original Satoshi Nakamoto and the owner of the forum. Sometimes when I see post like this, ignoring them is probably the best thing but with that being said how can someone even think of uttering such nonsense that Bitcoin is the dumbest thing created, well it's simple if you like being a financial slave to the system then you are free to go but other who don't know the importance of BTC.

How is investing in something that people need being a slave, but investing in something no one needs being free? If I invest in dollars I hold something that masses of people need for paying off debt owed to banks. I am the master, not the slave. On the other hand, if you traded dollars for Bitcoin you are the slave because you need other people to invest and buy your Bitcoin otherwise you cannot get your dollars back. It's hilarious how you Bitcoin evangelists think that you're the masters while in reality you're the slaves.

Let me say that I appreciate your wisdom and insightfulness about words from the main OP and your subsequent replies. Many take the ideology of Bitcoin to the extreme even though it is not perfect and I think I am one of the few who tells some facts about it here since I've been in the world of investment before the crypto era, unlike many of them who's eyes are just being opened to investment due to cryptocurrency.

But from the main OP, your narration was not without faults but I still say that I give you 85%, you are indeed a thinker. Well, you might be wondering why the denial of the remaining 15%, it's because (though risky) whether physical or virtual, anything could be related and referred to as an asset. All the things that are being labelled assets today are because of the importance/relevance people place on them, and whether virtual or not, once people appreciate it to the point of investing and holding their money in it, they are assets and valuable, which is also applicable to Bitcoin in this context.

That said, Bitcoin as an asset can do almost everything that fiat money can do as well, all you need to do is to convert it one way or the other and the debt, loan, and mortgage as you cited them in the main OP will all be paid. Obligations can be fulfilled with Bitcoin, for real! About the bonds and other collateralized arrangements/agreements, what is happening in the crypto space is not any different, only that it is not so popular in governance and since many centralised systems have nothing to do with cryptocurrency but fiats, the popularity of such arrangements/agreements, and dependency in such can't be as though you are dealing with the fiat currencies like the USD.

Lastly, I give you 100% in this current OP, and my reason is simple, I 100% agree with you (in summary) that the fiat can do without Bitcoin but Bitcoin can't do without fiat which makes the fiat the master regardless of whatever anyone interprets to it. I've always indicated this even as some always preach Bitcoin as the supreme of them all. Let's be realistic!

But the whole point is that Bitcoin is not an asset.
-snip-

I disagree with you in its strong terms to the point that I didn't even bother to read the rest of what you wrote. Bitcoin is an asset and nothing will change that. I've lived in the world of financial markets, payments and settlements long enough to know the difference in this regard. It is so plain and obvious but I wonder why you have not seen it. Maybe you should do your independent research about it and not rely on your wisdom alone.

Even Investopedia called Bitcoin an asset among other renowned business, trading and investment websites/outlets. There is no controversy here as Bitcoin is a virtual/digital asset, this is unless you do not even know what asset means. Fine, Bitcoin might be guilty of some of what you narrated in the main OP, but certainly, it's an asset. If it is not an asset, why are people buying and holding it? Don't you know that anything you invest your money in is an asset?

For short, an asset is a store of value and Bitcoin perfectly fits into that fact/narration without mincing words. For it to be a "digital" asset doesn't make it less of an asset. The world is revolving and it's high time you accept this easy fact.

This is like saying that an empty box is an asset. No, that what is inside the box, that what the box holds is an asset. Bitcoin box holds nothing. So there's no asset in the Bitcoin system. But understandably, people like to believe the opposite. If someone spend $70K on an empty box they obviously won't admit they bought nothing. They would say that they bought an asset. A digital gold. A precious intangible commodity. Whatever. It's a Freudian defence mechanism.

I think I know where your confusion is coming from, you just do not want to accept that there is a virtual or digital asset simply because they are not what you can see with your eyes physically, but you are so wrong. First, I would like you to perish the idea that you will have to be able to touch something valuable before you can label it an asset. Ordinary papers and drawings that were worthless before are being sold for millions of dollars today, this is not because they suddenly became gold or diamond, but because people place relevance/importance on it. Take for instance the Monalisa paint, it is worth a fortune ($100m in 1962, and now over a billion dollars), but do you think the material used to paint it is worth up to $100? Nevertheless, it's being sold for millions of dollars, why? It's simple, people place a relevance on it, which makes it an asset. This principle is what stocks and even bank cheques and notes/bonds work with. There are values placed on them because liquidity is backing them up.

Also, do not think that the operations of the companies you buy their stocks is the worth of the stocks and the company itself, no, people are buying stocks of companies without having anything to do with the company in any way, and that keeps adding value to the company to the point that people can fulfil financial obligations with stocks (virtual/digital). Asset is all about people's money, and nothing more. The same goes for Bitcoin which has a market capitalization of over $1T, this is huge and many physical assets do not even have up to that and they exist as assets. Today, you may buy your Lamborgini and tell the seller you will clear the bills with a certain amount of Bitcoin. Can a valueless entity as you claim do that? Only an asset can do that just like bonds, cheques and other financial settlement means do. It is you who needs to change your orientation about the virtual/digital assets, for them to have been created empty doesn't mean they will remain empty. The moment people are moving money in to back it up and place importance on it, it becomes an asset. Besides, anything you trade in the financial market is an ASSET. Thankfully, Bitcoin is one of them.

I know that you people need Freudian rationalizations, you need to play dumb to justify your purchases of empty units. But these rationalizations look pretty hilarious in the context of the OP. The distinction between a unit that holds an asset and a unit that holds nothing is obvious. If I were to ask you what asset is held by the BTC unit what would you say? Debt? Equity of a company? A picture like Mona Lisa? A patent, copyright, software license? Wheat, silver, oil? You couldn't say any of that because BTC units hold neither intangible (digital or whatever) nor tangible asset. They are literally like empty envelopes or boxes. They are containers that hold nothing. That's why you are forced to use Freudian rationalizations like the above. Just imagine the stupidity: a guy wrote a protocol to tell that you hold a non-existent asset, you paid a lot of money for that and now you comfort yourself that this is like buying Mona Lisa. Crazy. It's no wonder people view you as a cult.

You are still moving around the same circle, but on one fault, and that is the fact that you do not accept Bitcoin for what it is, and neither do you agree/believe that there can be a digital asset. This is archaic!

Mind you, an asset is an asset whether you like it or not and in case you do not know, Bitcoin is being used as collateral these days, and maybe it will quench most of the questions you asked thus; "If I were to ask you what asset is held by the BTC unit what would you say? Debt? Equity of a company? A picture like Mona Lisa? A patent, copyright, software license? Wheat, silver, oil?" In as much as an entity can fulfil financial obligations, you do not call it empty anymore. Of course, unless you do not even know what you are talking about.

Fine, Bitcoin was created as an empty unit, which I so much agree with you, but the empty unit was later assigned /units/value, which makes it not empty again (digital or not). That value is the liquidity in Bitcoin which gives it the power to settle debts which you always buttress upon without showing concern that Bitcoin can clear debts as well. Just like a human being, you become dead when your spirit leaves you, but when the spirit enters you again, you are alive and have become a living creature that can function perfectly like any other human being.

All these fiat assets you called out are so (living as in my human example) because of people's relevance and liquidity, once that is withdrawn from them, they become irrelevant (dead as in my human example). The same is applicable to Bitcoin, people's liquidity makes an asset worthy, and the moment people withdraw their money, it becomes worthless. So why do you now want us to segregate Bitcoin even as it has the value of people's money and can fulfil financial obligations like fiat assets?