Does anyone think critics will ever stop criticizing BTC? Whether it's about those who do it professionally, or those who are just jealous that they didn't invest on time and want the whole thing to fail, it doesn't matter at all - it's important not to pay too much attention to such things. I wouldn't say that those critics were completely right, because you have to remember that many of them said that BTC would disappear in a few years, and it's strange that some stick to that same story even today.
Of course, BTC as a currency is not something we can say has succeeded yet, but I think many people are under the misconception that BTC was supposed to replace fiat currencies, when in fact it was supposed to be an alternative to the existing financial system - and I think that for the minority that has accepted it in that way, it is doing an excellent job. The fact is that anyone can make a transaction at any time without depending on a bank, an agency, or seeking permission from anyone, and that is actually a great success.
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Bitcoin remains hard to use, mining continues to be environmentally damaging to a very large extent while it also becomes more centralized and scalability remains an issue. This price boom changes nothing in terms of fundamentals. Bitcoin's price went up mostly due to external factors but that doesn't solve the issues related to adoption.
Maybe though in the end, adoption doesn't matter? What are your thoughts?
I would disagree that the difficulty of use is a problem that prevents people from using BTC in everyday life, because anyone can install a BTC wallet on their smartphone in a few steps, buy BTC on CEX/DEX or some third-party method, and then send it to a BTC address - is it that hard to choose the amount, copy the address, and click send? Maybe for some people it's difficult, but realistically it's something that an average intelligent person can master in 5-10 minutes.
What surprises me is that you, as a senior member of this forum, think that BTC mining is a process that harms the environment, while it has been proven countless times that this impact is minimal and that more than 50% of the energy used by mining farms comes from renewable sources. 5-6 years ago, BTC consumed about 0.2% of the total consumption of electricity, which was somewhere around 200 TWh, while the losses in the electricity network were around 50 000 TWh globally.
As for centralization, once the problem was China, today it might be the USD - but I think we can never achieve perfect hash rate distribution around the world, because miners always go where the conditions are more favorable for them. In addition, in about 5 years (a little more) the amount of BTC that will remain for mining will approach 1%, so this current fever will probably stop.
In my opinion, fewer miners in the future could be a much bigger problem than the fact that today 35%+ of them are stationed in one country.
Many critics are shutting up right now, it's no longer joke how btc have elevated since it's inception, critics must have been tired by now seeing that it is now global. Bitcoin has risen beyond what may of us imagined am happy i was once a critic but see me now defending it.