It is annoying semi annoying maybe but like I use it to do black market things, anarchy stuff, getting medicine where gov provides shit. It is such a crutch
But you dare to mention it on mainstream media and you will get lynched or banned for whatever reason nowadays.
Kinda irks me because it helps with my disability so much to get stuff I need, medicine. I couldn’t function without it
Just ranting I guess, I do too much of rants admittedly
Edit: So I see all the scams created bias about this tech which is unfortunate. But looking aside this tech is pretty rad though maybe too much resource intensive depending on implementation
From an IT perspective, blockchain technology is a solution in search of a problem. From an environmental perspective, crypto is a disaster. From an economical perspective it’s too unstable to be anything but gambling.
Buying drugs over the internet is the only real reason crypto currencies can be useful. Hell even in person it’s better to use cash.
Maybe that’s the only use case but it is fucking good at it. Amazingly good
Besides cash could be removed by govs to ‘protect us’
And obviously cash cannot be used over distance
Cryptography gives power to the people. US even wanted cryptography banned at some point but it turned out not feasible so they pretended they changed mind
Lemmy is another thing that gives me hope in the future
Re: your edit
Scams are a visible problem, but even if they don’t scam outright, it ends up becoming a pyramid scheme by default. Late game you have people trying to convince people to use x coin because they’ll get rich, when they’re just trying to boost the coin in their own wallet.
Digital, hard to track cash has it’s place.
As far as the tech, yeah it’s cool AF, we keep trying to find ways engaging enough to make people run the ledgers but nothing but get rich quick schemes seems to have enough drive.
Outside of the very small niche use as payment for illegal services, it’s basically a scam.
When it is mentioned in mainstream media it’s almost always by some asshole trying to get more people into their scam, thus the negative reaction.
There are several reasons why I ignore anything crypto related.
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The barrier to entry is daunting. Where do I buy it that isn’t going to scam me? Where do I store it that isn’t going to just steal it? How do I use it?
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Almost everytime I hear about it, it is related to a scam. I recieve texts from strangers wanting to scam me with it. I read about people like Bankman-Fried being seemingly legit but then stealing it. I read about Musk’s on-again/off-again love for Doge and it feels like just a way to pump up his own investment that would be illegal of it were normal investments.
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The freedom it gives you to get what you need is the same freedom that allows organized crime, terrorist organizations, and sanctioned countries avoid scrutiny a lot easier.
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Most are a risky investment. The price swings greatly on the biggest ones and never goes up on most of the others. The only ones that don’t seem to have that problem are the ones that peg their value to a real currency.
Before the inevitable downvotes: I do not endorse crypto, but I understand it better than most people because I work with it every day at my job. I am forced to understand it simply because my job requires it. So I will address the points you made and why I think they are weak arguments against crypto.
The barrier to entry is daunting
Is it? You go to one of the many mainstream crypto brokers like Kraken or Binance and you make an account and start trading. Is that any more daunting than going to a bank website and opening up a new checking account?
Almost everytime I hear about it, it is related to a scam.
Okay? I hear about scams involving the US Dollar every single day. I’m not boycotting the US Dollar because it is commonly involved in scams. Every single unit of currency is subject to this problem; crypto is not special or unique in this regard.
The freedom it gives you to get what you need is the same freedom that allows organized crime, terrorist organizations, and sanctioned countries avoid scrutiny a lot easier.
This is the same argument the feds use to argue against cryptography as a whole. “Bad people can use this technology for bad things, so we should be against it.”. The cartels murder thousands of people every year over the US Dollar but nobody’s boycotting that for some reason.
Most are a risky investment
Anyone getting into crypto who thinks it isn’t a risky investment has been lied to. No different from a shitty financial advisor (not a fiduciary) telling you to invest in meme stocks and blindly believing them.
IMO the best genuine argument against crypto is that proof-of-work models are an environmental fucking disaster (which is not to say that printing paper money does not also have a disastrous environmental impact). Proof-of-stake models are better but are not perfect. Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. Crypto was founded under idealistic principles but it has been implemented in very flawed ways. But I say don’t throw the baby out with the bath water.
People don’t like nuance. A lot of scammers, a lot of pump and dump schemes, a lot of unregulated market exploitation took place " on the blockchain ". That’s what most people think about. So the PR is terrible.
For monero, which is trying to be digital cash, not an asset you hold, not a speculation, just a transactional currency. It’s great. I advocate it to the people I associate with, and I use it for legitimate services all the time, VPNs, donations to nonprofits, domain registration, hosting, many things.
The main thing you have to focus on, is the utility, don’t worry about the popularity contest online. If there is utility, and it’s better than other options, people will use it. So you have to make sure the ecosystem is friendly, usable, and practical for people. Once that exists the rest will fall into place.
As a crypto noob, how does monero avoid being a speculative asset like all the other coins?
Hey by the way because I am admittedly quite green. Do you have anything other worth advocating from the same vein? You know decentralized, hard to shut down, privacy focused. I am sure there is ton of things I haven’t heard about
Lemmy, is decentralized, federated, hard to kill, censorship resistant. You’re living the dream right now.
Join !monero@monero.town
Look at graphene OS, look at the tor community forums.
See what services you use regularly, that you could find a privacy provider for, here’s a nice list of crypto accepting service providers https://kycnot.me/
Check out privacy guides https://www.privacyguides.org/en/
