ash

this one's excellent, been using it for years. I'm at continuous moral odds w the Winklevi these days tho so I look forward to meaningful competition

this screams 'Coverd sells user data to advertisers'

the bitcoin network turns 17 years old in January.

both retrospectively. I was in adtech & vibes started to feel off leading up to GDPR launch, but 2016-2019 still felt like peak innovation in the moment so it was easy to write off as escape velocity. when 2020 chaos hit tho I watched a lot of 'values' turn into 'liabilities' practically overnight

as a girl techbro I thought the same. it was 2020ish when I realized I'd continued straight while everyone else had veered hard Right

I live on crypto; there are options. alas, I have never once in 15 years successfully convinced a financial advisor to consider crypto lol. cheers all the same

btc may be too volatile rn for daily txns in USD, but billions live w currencies more volatile than btc. w continued institutional liquidity 10-15% annualized vol in 15 yrs isn’t unrealistic. the q will then be if deflation can mentally offset residual vol enough for ppl to transact instead of hold

the same could be said for the post-gold dollar, no?

but for non-meme crypto at least, speculation's grounded in a bet on global utility as an open financial network -- a use case imo being proven in real time by both retail & institutions. speculation funds infra, adoption validates the bet. I agree it's not risk free, but the utility is very real

very importantly tho: not all crypto has meaningful utility & some is very much so memetic casino credit for the terminally online -- which I suppose has its place socioculturally

there's an endless amount of nuance in the "what qualifies as crypto" debate that's very tough to capture in short form

people def use bitcoin/crypto as currency. retail adoption's happening globally for its p2p payment utility, especially in underbanked or high-inflation regions but also among groups who need fast, borderless settlement: freelancers, remote teams, e-merchants, digital creators, global NGOs, etc

some Libertarians for sure. I sometimes feel like the further Libertarian Right you go, the more freedom means protection from the tyranny of regulation .. & the further Libertarian Left you go, the more freedom means protection from the tyranny of the Right’s idea of freedom. hah

not an unfair summary tbh. many crypto originalists hold that true liberty means accepting it will sometimes be misused .. that the moment a free society starts deciding who may act freely, it rebuilds the coercive authority it was meant to escape

absolutely agreed

free banking's an acquisition tool for deposits; no need to charge for accounts & transfers when the real profit's made by rehypothecating our money into recursive leverage. a debt-built economy inflates everything it supports while debasing the currency beneath it. it works fine, until it doesn't

Square Brings Bitcoin to Main Street with First Integrated Payments and Wallet Solution for Local Businesses

ppl in Colorado have been able to pay their state taxes w crypto for awhile. it's certainly taken broader payment infra awhile to catch up, but: squareup.com/us/en/press/...

if you look at the price of btc on any date (n) since Jan 2009, then add 4 yrs to that date (n+4), the btc price at n+4 is always higher than the price at n. btc is not at all a pump & dump scam; solana shitcoins like $melania sure as hell are tho

imho the entire point of crypto is financial autonomy no matter what your government says, & that single issue voting for Trump on this was for many people just an excuse to vote for socially regressive policy wo looking like an overt bigot. truly decentralized projects would've survived just fine

maybe, tho I'd argue against crypto folks being a political monolith -- not everyone in crypto is here for the hypercapitalist exploitation & liberal/leftist ideals are not uncommon

ah. so it's only you that's misogynistic. 10-4 comrade

is this misogyny for the ai era? what a time to be alive

if the internet shuts down tomorrow we'll have substantially larger issues to worry about than the value of bitcoin

bitcoin is a neutral protocol. people are racist.

ur both right. btc's fundamentally neutral, sovereign, transparent & also crypto's been exploitatively co-opted by bad actors that're none of those things. by design btc's integrity still stands as the network can't be co-opted, but the ecosystem w/in which adoption currently exists certainly can be

TNS is voluntary: anyone can found a microsociety, ppl can join if values align, crypto serves as infra for economy & governance

it's a theory for peaceful tech-enabled secession but I agree it still warrants awareness, scrutiny -- bc unfortunately even if the model's neutral ppl inherently are not

TNS is def interesting; Balaji’s vision is less abt dismantling nations, more abt enabling voluntary exit from legacy governance wo becoming stateless. he theorizes decentralized (not private) digital communities as alternative; values-aligned microsocieties that could eventually negotiate statehood

I love to see it, but the success of institutional adoption is still predicated on the success of consumer adoption. our need for positive consumer sentiment rn isn't helped by an inarguably divisive figure politicizing sth that's supposed to be fundamentally apolitical

this is the problem tho .. btc's still esoteric & there's not enough retail adoption to pretend its reputation isn't still fragile. Trump & his exploitative casino bs now frames all crypto, indiscriminately, as illegitimate. critics aren't wrong here, & that's on the bitcoiners who voted for Trump

I also think those of us who understand what we're watching are accountable for parsing truth from noise. things are accelerating whether we like it or not; we can either contribute to the chaos, or serve as beacon through the storm

my 2 sats as a crypto anarchist grounded in radical humanism (2/2)

Balaji's provocative, but I'd argue that has more to do w his rejection of reform than sinister motive. he's v post-political, pragmatic, & anti-institution -- but he's not anti-human (tho many in his orbit inarguably are). I agree his ideas should be held to public scrutiny, but... (1/2)