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UX mainly. It seems to me that both Polymarket and Hyperliquid have created a set of APIs and contract templates that make it really easy to build a slick and self-custodial trading experience on top of. Granted these are relatively centralized protocols but the key point is they work. There are probably other examples, I'm just dipping my toes in here and having fun after years of ignoring most of non-bitcoin crypto (which honestly is 99% garbage).
I would add to your list Wall Street adopting Bitcoin through derivatives, ETF's, treasury companies, etc. It's muddied the narrative around Bitcoin, and if we've learned anything, Bitcoin needs a good, strong narrative to survive.
Unadulterated, peer-to-peer payments on a scarce digital asset was what made Bitcoin so exciting to build on. Sadly, doing any of that in a legal, corporate framework is effectively impossible. Most "Bitcoin companies" do not fit into that shape without severely compromising the freedom of users. We could also blame the regulatory environment, egregious fraudsters, and general lack of adoption that's soured most of the public on it. A small user base doesn't really encourage builders either.
I still think Bitcoin has a good chance of winning in the long run. I just think that day is much longer out than most of us think.
This "fiat-mindset" bullshit is so patronizing and self-superior. I totally agree that people have busy lives and often don't have time or energy to spend thinking about economic systems and monetary theory. But to assume that they're somehow naive to how the world works because you "get" bitcoin and they don't is delusional. Bitcoin is not a panacea and just because you have some doesn't make you a genius. It might make you lucky, but even that's uncertain in the long term.
I wonder how repeatable these types of outcomes are. My experience with LLM's has been that they are non-deterministic by nature, so of course it will spit out some weird stuff randomly sometimes.
We really should stop treating these tools as being intelligent in any way. These are outputs based on probabilities, not anything that has been reasoned about.
Yes, at least. This is a very long game we're playing here and it's possible the initial adopters of this tool never get to see its full benefits.
A "free market" is not the same as a fair one. The US does not have a fair market. Even the Austrian school believed in a level playing field. Regulation is not the issue, it's what the government chooses to regulate.
It is an interesting thought exercise to imagine what a Bernie presidency would have evolved into given the environment of the last decade. Unfortunately I think the vast inequality coupled with the bipolar extremism fueled by social media still brings us to a similar inflection point of outrage and violence.
That's an intriguing idea in that video, of Trump and MAGA being the heirs of the 60s counterculture and civil rights movements. Thanks for the share
the US are attempting to route around national governments by selling their treasuries indirectly to their citizens, who either want access to dollars for store of value (over their own inflationary currencies) or for international trade and remittances, they intend to uphold demand for US treasuries, meaning they can continue the Ponzi scheme by paying off old creditors with the income from new ones, thereby exporting US inflation
Thanks for this reply, this section especially makes a ton of sense
Not every person who owns bitcoin adheres to cypherpunk ideals. And the way things are going self-custody could become a pretty niche behavior.
"We are so early."
...as if bitcoin is inevitable (another one I disagree with). I always read this as a rationalization for bad UX, lack of user adoption, or a lack of awareness by the general public.
Bitcoiners are gambling too, just on a longer time horizon.