Bitcoin has a Brand Problem \ stacker news ~bitcoin

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Bitcoin has a Brand Problem mikecldi.substack.com/p/bitcoin-has-a-brand-problem

1325 sats \ 56 comments \ @k00b 16h bitcoin

The author points out some interesting problems with bitcoin's perception, but admits that they don't have a solution. I can imagine the slope of negative perception being slippery, but I'm also not sure there's anything honest people can do other than continuing to be honest and hoping they out power everyone else.

Though, I might be projecting bitcoin's technical properties onto its social layer:

The system is secure as long as honest nodes collectively control more CPU power than any cooperating group of attacker nodes.

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832 sats \ 8 replies \ @SimpleStacker 16h

These are the kinds of discussions I want to see more on stacker.news.

I sort of agree that Bitcoin has a branding problem. But the beauty of Bitcoin is that it isn't controlled... and thus no one controls the brand. Thus, the brand will evolve as it will, according to the decentralized forces that influence its image.

But ultimately, I do believe that truth has a way of surfacing, even if it takes a long time.

So despite the lack of branding control, Bitcoin's image will gradually become more aligned to its true properties, even if it takes many hype cycles to get there.

Lastly, I want to respond to this point from the author:

Why are so many of Bitcoin’s loudest supporters the people I least want to be aligned with? Trump. Bukele. Putin. Musk, Ken Sim.

I think these people are the "loudest" bitcoin supporters simply because they're just the loudest people overall. And again, because Bitcoin is decentralized... it doesn't have an acting head... the loudest overall people who support bitcoin will be seen as the loudest bitcoiners. And one should also take heart that a great number of bitcoiners don't even see Trump and Musk as bitcoiners, but shitcoiners.

Again, the beauty of Bitcoin is no one controls who is and isn't a bitcoiner, or who can and can't talk about bitcoin. If one believes in the virtues of decentralization, then this should be seen as a feature not a bug.

107 sats \ 0 replies \ @Undisciplined 14h

Why are so many of Bitcoin’s loudest supporters the people I least want to be aligned with? Trump. Bukele. Putin. Musk, Ken Sim.

I think statements like this warrant some introspection, because they say more about the person making the statement than they do about reality. Those are less the loudest supporters of Bitcoin than they are the voices the author is presented. I hear very little from any of those five and I know the three of them are not even bitcoin supporters.

I also think authors of this sort of piece should think about how bad the branding problem can really be, when bitcoin is the most rapidly appreciating asset in human history. Maybe, just maybe, it's the person who doesn't like the brand who needs to adjust to reality.

12 sats \ 5 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 10h

The truth however is that while Bitcoin IS a better form of money from the point of view of the individual, it is not necessarily better from the POV of governments and bankers.

The adjoining factor to then consider is the importance of governments in the wealth of nations and the citizens who live under them.

Fiat extends the war making capacity of nation states therefore enhancing their power projection capacity- would a Bitcoin Standard nation be able to resist a Fiat nation when the fiat nation state can effectively debase all its citizens savings to zero to advance its military projection?

Bitcoin maximalists seldom ask let alone answer such inconvenient questions. its mostly just self serving NGU hopium which is not a great brand image.

21 sats \ 2 replies \ @028559d218 9h

Fiat is not going away. Not only is fiat 'going away' probably not possible...

Even if it were possible, we are a very, very, long way away from realizing this.

Stacker News and Nostr are a huge bubble, the vast majority of people know nothing about Bitcoin, except for what they've seen on CNBC (if they're into stocks) and if they're not into stocks or CNBC then what they've heard on the internet is superficial/paper thin.

We are nowhere near a Bitcoin Standard - in large US cities I can barely find one business that takes Bitcoin. Barely any.

To 'get rid of fiat' we would need masses of businesses accepting it, and even then I think Bitcoin's transactional model much more closely aligns with Ideas on the internet, rather than meatspace products and trinkets.

'Tip me' for a good idea - 'tip me' to encourage better content, 'tip me' to prove you're not a bot etc etc... Lightning micro-transactions makes way more sense and is way more likely imo than buying lunch everywhere.

Government is not going to 'give up' fiat without an overwhelming draw and acceptance of Bitcoin by populations... which we are nowhere near. Outside of the SN/Twitter/Nostr bubble... ask the 'man on the street' about Lightning.

What does he say???

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @Solomonsatoshi 8h

Most Bitcoiners (even here on SN) hugely under estimate the degree of obstruction bankers and governments have imposed. Here in New Zealand if a business (or individual) seeks to open a bank account they will be asked do you have any involvement with 'crypto'. If you answer yes the chances of getting an account are minimal. The very few businesses who bravely accept Bitcoin risk losing their banking if the bank becomes aware they accept Bitcoin- it is a risk few businesses except the brave will accept. On the positive side we now have a business here ( lightningpay.nz ) that enables businesses to accept BTC payments but only receive fiat as the conversion is done from BTC to fiat before the accepting business receives it, but even with this available very few businesses accept BTC...because perhaps so few consumers are available and wanting to pay with LN to make it worth the business to accept. We face a dual challenge of insufficient general knowledge and understanding in the consumer and concerted and determined obstruction and FUD orchestrated by banks and governments. Where banks and governments are allowing Bitcoin it is almost always with a strategy to concentrate institutional custody and make Bitcoin a taxed and KYCed speculative commodity plaything...which diffuses any real threat Bitcoin presents to fiats MoE monopoly. We definitely have a 'branding' problem as most people do not have enough information and knowledge to begin to realise the importance and true value of Bitcoin...instead the vast majority have bought the FUD and misinformation from fiat protagonists. Bitcoin is freedom from state and banker market control. . . and the banks and governments will not give up that control without a significant uprising demanding it.

14 sats \ 0 replies \ @028559d218 8h

Everywhere, in every newspaper and online comments section, people complain about inflation. It's common everyone knows what it is.

Shouldn't the solution be obvious? That doesn't mean Bitcoin isn't volatile (it is) but the inflation rate is steady... the supply capped, the network as a whole transparent...

As a solution to inflation it should be obvious to anyone with the curiosity. Here in the United States people are becoming more interested in Bitcoin - obviously the US ETFs have helped and the financiers are taking it more seriously.

However, the 'man on the street' knows practically nothing about it. And self-custody? Running a node? Forget it.

We should have blocks just teeming with transactions like 6 days of the week if not all the time with relatively high fee rates, to include closing and opening lightning channels 24/7 a vibrant fee market.

But fees right now... Like 2 sats/vb.

It doesn't make any sense to me. I don't know if the information is better/worse about Bitcoin in the general public in NZ vs the US... but the information here is low and some of the political involvement hasn't gotten people interest the right way.

We definitely have a 'branding' problem as most people do not have enough information and knowledge to begin to realise the importance and true value of Bitcoin

Yup

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @SimpleStacker 9h

Bitcoin maximalists seldom ask let alone answer such inconvenient questions.

Asked and answered.

#745057

Lastly, Section 5 throws some cold water on some of Bitcoiners' more optimistic predictions. In this section, the author evaluates the claim that Bitcoin can make it harder for the state to finance wars. He points out that, historically, being on a gold standard didn't prevent governments from finding creative ways to finance wars, and therefore he believes that governments will similarly find creative ways to finance wars even on a Bitcoin Standard.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 9h

All the Great Powers of Europe resorted to fiat money at the start of WW1. None of them ever successfully returned to a hard money gold standard and subsequently as we can observe have all become monetarily and military subservient tribute states to the USA...which also eventually succumbed to the seductive monetary leverage of fiat.

Therefore believing 'governments will similarly find creative ways to finance wars even on a Bitcoin Standard' is not a reasoned or logical argument given the historical facts. It is actually a baseless hopium assertion with no credible reasoning to support it..

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @PictureRoom 6h

Nobody directly owns the internet either. There's also not a face behind it (other than us, the network). You can see what the advent of the internet has done, which has been a proliferation of information, and even "truth", as far as we can understand it to be.

As the Chinese say, "may you live in interesting times..."

54 sats \ 27 replies \ @fiatbad 10h

As you say, the author admits they don't have a solution.

I have a proposal for a solution: Take a few lessons from the big-blockers. Listen to what they have to say, and find a middle ground. They are correct that there was more momentum toward adoption in 2015 than there is now. They are correct that using Bitcoin as a medium-of-exchange is what it will take for it to "succeed" the way Satoshi intended. They are in-correct in their technical implementations. They misunderstand a lot and have a lot of blind-spots. But for fuck's sake, as the author of this article articulates, BTC maxis also have some serious blind spots and bias. I agree.

The solution to the author's dilemma is to push harder toward scaling Bitcoin as a MoE. Stop pushing for ossification!!!. Bitcoin is NOT ready to ossify. A few more scaling-focused upgrades need to happen.

I really enjoyed this article. It articulates what has been swirling around in my mind for the past few months. I'm starting to get very worried about the future of Bitcoin. The louder the NGU maxis get, the more worried I become. To me, the problem is starting to get dire. Not "increase the block-size" level of dire.... but way more fucking dire than the average Bitcoiner seems to think.

12 sats \ 25 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 10h

Lightning Network is now at a point where its easy to use by most people with a minimum of technical know how...but a few years ago it was not. Many potential users may have been put off by the early difficulty of using LN- I nearly was but SN helped me get past that...but still the vast majority of people are not going to be easily adopting LN use. The fact that using it is in most cases/jurisdictions technically breaching tax code compliance doesn't help either! There are huge obstacles to greater MoE use and I agree MoE use is the key to realising Satoshis vision of what Bitcoin can be, but instead the speculative commodity plaything narrative of Micro-strategy and co is now predominant. NGU hopium is a trap. ETFs and Microstrategy type use is concentrating custody that excludes MoE use and diminishing MoE scope. Bitcoiners who deny these are problems have sold out to a NGU sell out narrative.

7 sats \ 18 replies \ @028559d218 8h

I don't think that 'speculative commodity' and 'medium of exchange' have to be mutually exclusive.

Some people can have their speculative commodity... and others their medium of exchange right?

Let's say that Bitcoin achieved its maximum 'store of value' value - it's maxed out 'store of value' threshold realistically... how much would it be worth?

Until it realistically achieves that, it's reasonable that the number will 'go up' and if people think it's 'going up' they won't spend it not in any reasonable quantities. No fulfilled store of value... too early for medium of exchange at least for most people.

Comparing Bitcoin with Gold, or Real Estate or Stocks even (just as a store of value) has it fulfilled its potential???

50 sats \ 4 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 7h

'I don't think that 'speculative commodity' and 'medium of exchange' have to be mutually exclusive.'

Agree. Good money is ideally both a SoV and MoE.

But imo the narrative casting of Bitcoin as a primarily or even exclusively speculative commodity (SoV hyper-charged) as voiced by Saylor etc, undermines its use as a MoE as you describe as people hodl and not spend, and this narrative is being used to both support and increase institutional custody where it cannot be used as a P2P payments protocol.

This combined with the sly but very effective obstruction of use as a MoE via tax obligations (and especially for businesses the threat of debanking) which effectively make everyday MoE use impractical unless you break the law, plus comprehensive MSM FUD has succeeded in almost completely preventing the use of Bitcoin as a P2P payments protocol with sufficient adoption to be any real threat to the state-banker fiat hegemony...and that is the point.

If Bitcoin fails to provide a viable and popular alternative to the fiat MoE monopoly it has imo failed. And so far 'they' have largely succeeded in preventing Bitcoin from being, in practice, a viable MoE alternative. Where its not outlawed for MoE it is quasi outlawed via tax obligations.

The inertia in a monetary system makes regime change difficult, unlikely and usually only taking place during or after a revolution or war.

The digital gold narrative has succeeded in achieving capture and control of the protocol preventing MoE use and satisfying the peasants with another KYCed, taxed and tracked and traced speculative commodity packaged, promoted, custodied and largely controlled by the bankers...avoiding any real threat to their precious fiat MoE hegemony.

47 sats \ 0 replies \ @fiatbad 7h

Bitcoin as a P2P payments protocol with sufficient adoption to be any real threat to the state-banker fiat hegemony...and that is the point. If Bitcoin fails to provide a viable and popular alternative to the fiat MoE monopoly it has imo failed.

Music to my ears. Glad to see someone else voicing this opinion.

0 sats \ 2 replies \ @028559d218 6h

What... is the alternative? A different crypto? A new one?

Any and all crypto should it become 'big enough' would run into the same kinds of issues, no?

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @Solomonsatoshi 6h

Bitcoin is the only truly decentralised protocol that treats all participants equally without fear or favour. There is no obvious alternative- if Bitcoin participants allow themselves to be lured into the digital gold narrative and the P2P payments potential of Bitcoin is lost then that is due to our lack of ability to comprehend, appreciate and ultimately fight for the freedom that Bitcoin makes possible. The freedom of P2P payments. The classic strategy of a cartel faced with a new competitor, if it cannot be outlawed, is to capture and control it- ETFs and the KYCed, tracked and traced, taxed speculative commodity narrative are that capture and control strategy in operation, in plain sight, Bitcoiners are only blind to it from of short sighted greed, naivety or laziness.

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0 sats \ 12 replies \ @fiatbad 7h

I would agree with you except......

... The problem I'm seeing is that medium-of-exchange is simply not possible without extreme centralization. I'm willing to wait for a future where it comes, if it's technically possible. But I'm starting to disbelieve that it is possible. Roger Ver's "Hijacking Bitcoin" points might actually hold some water. A nefarious group has worked hard to ensure that BTC can never, ever become a MoE.

I say this as someone who has fought hard for layer 2's. I've been running my own LN node for years, and I have used it to spend Bitcoin at hundreds of locations around the world, using Zues connected to my own node.

But I am rare. I've realized that we need to build a digital currency for the masses.... not for nerds like me. For example, I set my bother up recently with his own LN node. But every time he tries to connect Zues when he's away from home, he gets an RPC connection error! Even on my node, I get the same error often, and have to restart Lightning Terminal on my node. It's unreliable, mostly. It's semi-reliable... IF you're already super tech savvy. But for those who aren't, it's just never going to work.

So that leaves centralized, custodial Lightning. Which is worse than Fedimints, and yet, people here like @justin_shocknet are massively against the public using Fedimints (which I happen to view as the only serious scaling option available and we should be figuring out more ways to make it work instead of demonizing it). I can't believe we're going to funnel people into custodial Lightning instead of supporting Fedimint. I also can't believe we're going to refuse to upgrade the base layer with obvious things like CTV. We're going to ossify, and simultaneously demonize Fedimints. This is the end of Bitcoin.

We're shooting ourselves in the foot. Centralization/custodians are everything we are against. But without some centralization/custodians, Bitcoin will never, EVER be anything more than SoV.

There were dozens of attempts to create digital currency before Bitcoin, and they all failed because they lacked some key elements. Bitcoin solves so many of the issues they were dealing with. But I'm starting to think that we still need one or two more breakthroughs. Bitcoin is not going to cut it. And Bitcoiners have grown arrogant and complacent. The ground is starting to look shaky to me.

I'm not a big-blocker. I believe Bitcoin's goal should be to replace base money, not necessarily replace coffee money. But in its current form, it won't even be able to support 2% of the world using it as SoV, savings tech! We can handle a few more upgrades before ossifying, and we should.

17 sats \ 0 replies \ @028559d218 6h

Bitcoin is nowhere near being the 'base money' of the world... in my opinion because people aren't interested enough in it.

The technology exists, in my opinion and Lightning is 'good enough'... it's the laziness of crowds and the lack of intellectual curiosity, the willingness to 'do the work', and put in 'just a little more' effort to discover something and imagine something new.

In my opinion we are nowhere near the limits of 'throughput' for people to open Lightning channels, self-custody their UTXOs, and ultimately transact when and where they want to. We are at 2 sats/vb... and for a cup of coffee, or a beer much less dinner out, the channels can be opened.

In my opinion it's an educational, human interest, motivational, and if nothing else 'reputational' problem.

Too many voices have been centralized to Twitter/X... which frankly doesn't have a great reputation. And some of the most 'toxic' people, who you wouldn't want advertising your 'lemonade stand', are the absolute loudest on Twitter with their pro-Trump or alt-right or political BS.

Bitcoin isn't political... and the voices that 'make it so' on Twitter don't help things.

Like I posted earlier, I'm a liberal democrat and I still believe that Bitcoin is the best tool for individual empowerment - it's not about politics or what some "eat meat" a$$hole says on Twitter. It's your node and transparent rules that if the recent arguments have demonstrated are very difficult to change.

But you can't 'explain' that to someone in five minutes, much less on twitter in few characters next to crypto-bots or pro-trump Memecoin advertisements.

I'm not on Twitter, but obviously I care about Stacker News and its foward-looking incentives. Those in my opinion are worth fighting for.

0 sats \ 10 replies \ @justin_shocknet 7h

Fedimint are still centralized custodial lightning, but with scam added in

71 sats \ 9 replies \ @fiatbad 6h

Lots of things are scams. Fedimint is a protocol. It can be used to scam, but it's not inherently a scam.

If setup properly, it can be 1000x less of a scam than local banks are today. It can be done in a manner that brings the risk to users down to nearly zero. Better than most fiat systems we have today.

Sure, it's not base-layer Bitcoin level of security. But for fuck's sake, if you people aren't going to allow SOME centralization in the L2's and L3's, then I guess Roger Ver was right and it's time to start talking about scaling the block-size. Something's gotta give.

edit: (I consider Fedimint an L3 and LN an L2.). We're talking about scaling to the people who would never run their own nodes, even if their lives depend on it. We're talking about making Bitcoin a MoE without all the control and centralization the fiat system has today. It's not going to be perfect or pretty. You're going to have to allow some room for "rug-pulls", even if the risk is low. It's still 1000x better than what 99% of people have today and you're actively working against it.

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7 sats \ 5 replies \ @fiatbad 10h

I agree. I'm more concerned, and I'm more bearish than I've ever been since I got in, years ago.

0 sats \ 4 replies \ @028559d218 8h

Because of the lack of MoE and the presence of ETFs?

1035 sats \ 3 replies \ @fiatbad 7h

Honestly, because the revolutionary spirit that created Bitcoin seems to have died out.

The end of fiat is and must be the goal. Is that what you see Bitcoiners working toward today? Or are they too busy using Visa debit cards that give Bitcoin rewards, and developing fiat loan businesses using Bitcoin as collateral, and developing ETF's. How many Bitcoiners have used BTCmap.org? How many are actually running their own nodes, including managing their own LN channels? How many are actively working to support local businesses accepting Bitcoin instead of ones that don't? How many are willing to take up arms against their government for attempting to tax Bitcoin transactions? There's no revolution anymore..... peaceful, or otherwise.

"The colonies would gladly have borne the little tax on tea and other matters, had it not been that England took away from the colonies their money, which created unemployment and dissatisfaction. The inability of the colonies to get power to issue their own money permanently out of the hands of George III the international bankers was the prime reason for the revolutionary war."

Benjamin Franklin's autobiography

Maybe the next generation will have the guts to STOP using fiat and take up arms if need be. But this one doesn't.

29 sats \ 2 replies \ @028559d218 6h

How many Bitcoiners have used BTCmap.org? How many are actually running their own nodes, including managing their own LN channels? How many are actively working to support local businesses accepting Bitcoin instead of ones that don't?

Dude I have done all of these things. I have traveled long distances to 'try Lightning out' and it worked. Was it absolutely perfect? No.

#838975

It felt like internet in 1998 or something. But it fundamentally did what it was supposed to do, all my transactions went through, and imo it's way better than fiat money, paper money that is printed up at no cost.

I too am concerned about blockspace 'utilization' and the demand for blockspace long term... but this is year 16 of 130.

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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @028559d218 8h

I'm not on Twitter... I don't have a Twitter account and think the signal/noise ratio there is... low so that's why.

However I do live in meatspace and I don't think Bitcoin has a 'scaling' problem. It has an educational problem. Everyone has heard of email. Everyone has heard of gold. Everyone has heard of inflation...

Bitcoin is like combining all three (sort of) and there are enough wallets and apps available right?

How much does it cost to open a Lightning channel?

100 sats \ 0 replies \ @tedthizzy 13h

Interesting article. There are quite a few statements used as assumptions I would disagree with including:

s-curve doesn't factor in laggards (it does)
consumers decide on narrative (partly)
worsening associations & venn overlap (my personal experience is the opposite)

Read: Rogers' Diffusion of Innovation Theory & five attributes that effect adoption: (1) relative advantage, (superior asset) (2) compatibility, (improving rapidly) (3) complexity, (easier for younger people) (4) trialability, (how well bitcoin integrates or can be experimented with) (5) observability (how obviously it helps you)

Despite disagreeing with much of the author's premise I do agree with the conclusion that appealing to mainstream audiences increases adoption but I think that IS happening organically.

One more controversial thought I've had on this S-Curve adoption topic is that perhaps for monetary technologies the Y-axis* shouldn't be percentage of world population but perhaps its percentage of net world asset value or something like that. Evolution doesn't distribute evenly and thats a difficult truth.

127 sats \ 1 reply \ @grayruby 16h

Bitcoin is a major problem for the collectivist mindset that permeates much of Western politics and media. This contingent requires the perpetuation of the fiat system and the ever growing powers of redistribution given to the government in order for their worldview to not crumble to pieces.

Couple that with the fact they are preaching to an audience who are suffering from serious consistency bias because they likely heard about bitcoin years ago and dismissed it as a scam, ponzi scheme, bubble etc and need to double down or admit they were wrong and missed out on being in on an early wave of adoption. That is another issue with the modern collectivist mindset, they are never willing to admit they are wrong. It is always someone else's fault.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 11h

You have however just confirmed what the article is arguing- that Bitcoin has a Branding problem.

45 sats \ 0 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 12h

Deny it all you like but this article is largely correct. There is a strong tendency in Bitcoin circles to deny any viewpoint that does not support a self serving NGU hopium narrative. This tendency is understandable as those who 'get' Bitcoin already have already invested in it.

I am constantly amazed at the fear and hostility that most 'ordinary' (non Bitcoiner) people I encounter express regarding Bitcoin. IMO it is a combination of fear based on ignorance, and strongly presented misinformation/FUD.

Money is a human construct - it is not real except for our acceptance and perception of it- remember the first time you made a Bitcoin transaction- for me it blew me away that this was possible, but was also a little scary- because- it required me to dismantle my lifelong perception of money as the thing until that time was controlled by the government and banks.

I believe that for most people this shift in perception and trust is very difficult to achieve and so they remain in ignorance and fear. The FUD aims to keep them there.

Trump, Bukele, Musk - are all disrupters, rebels and non conformists prepared to question the orthodoxy. I have mixed opinions of them but respect their willingness to disrupt, as in some cases disruption is required.

Bitcoiners are generally more prepared to question authority and the status quo, but most people are not. Bitcoin frightens most people, IMO, because most people do not understand fiat money but have nevertheless accepted it as a very important power structure and concept shaping their lives and they naturally struggle to shift to a Bitcoin paradigm.

Unless you first understand fiat it is difficult to appreciate Bitcoins true value.

10 sats \ 0 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 11h

Fiat money is a question of trust and faith. Most people do not understand it - they do not understand the workings and mechanisms of fiat money and yet it is a huge factor in their everyday lives, enabling transactions and creating the context and framework within which they make many of their life decisions and actions. Fiat money is not a free market mechanism- it is the complete opposite- it is a state imposed monopoly- franchised out to private for profit bankers who operate under a central bank that arbitrarily sets the price of money and the issuance of money. Fiat money is overt and powerful market intervention. Bankers have come to possess demi god like status and have significant leverage over most elected governments if not actually being elected as representatives or leaders such as Carney in Canada and many other 'ex' bankers who have been elected to positions of political power. Voters willingly transfer their blind faith in bankers and fiat money to the politicians who are nominees from the banking hierarchy. Given this huge faith in fiat money and the fiat banking system and considerable behind the scenes lobbying and leverage fiat bankers exercise it is not surprising that the anti Bitcoin FUD has been hugely successful. Very few people have sufficient knowledge of fiat to understand the significance of Bitcoin. Most Bitcoiners I suspect were and are mostly attracted to it by the NGU factor more than by any deep understanding of the inherently dysfunctional anti free market coercive nature of fiat money. Bitcoin invited people to question the mythology and narrative around fiat money and if you take the time to study this you realise Bitcoins value- but most people simply do not have the time or inclination to study enough to realise the truth. Bitcoin definitely does have a 'branding' problem. The bankers and governments know and understand the power and importance of controlling the narrative- their power and wealth is based upon it. They have already succeeded in shifting the narrative around Bitcoin to that of a speculative commodity held by 'trusted' custodians and not used as a P2P payments protocol- ire they have already succeeded in largely obstructing Bitcoins revolutionary utilisation and captured and controlled it into a taxed, KYCed, institutionalised, custodied, speculative commodity plaything. Bitcoiners often fail to see or recognise the size, scale and determination of the opposition Bitcoin faces. Fiat money is the most wealthy powerful and organised cartel on the planet. What is required is a huge process of education regarding what fiat truly is and what Bitcoin is and to get that you have a huge barrier of FUD and vested interests in opposition.

42 sats \ 6 replies \ @028559d218 13h

Every time I see the Trump name tied with Bitcoin or “crypto” it kills me — not because I doubt the protocol, but because I know what that does to the “brand”. It reinforces the idea that Bitcoin is just another plaything of the powerful.

I am a rainbow-flag-waving liberal democrat who voted for Kamala... and I obviously am a huge fan of Bitcoin (or otherwise I wouldn't be on Stacker News).

You can't guess my private keys, you can't tell me which node implementation to run, or how and where to transact... Bitcoin provides transparent freedom based on predictable inflation channeling energy.

Who wouldn't want some of that?

I realized what Bitcoin was before I ever used twitter, based on life experience and education... and people get it when they are ready. It has nothing to do with Elon or Trump give me a break.

I'm not a fan of Elon or Mr Trump, they aren't 'bitcoiners' anyway and people are let's be honest overwhelmingly resistant to Bitcoin today.

The real global Bitcoin adoption today is something like 1%, we are nowhere near 'mainstream adoption'. We're more like 1993-1994 of the internet. So how do we know when we reach 'mainstream'?

When Youtube Lightning comes out and you can easily and seamlessly tip your favorite 'content creator' on Lightning. Or email them. Or receive 'tips' yourself all to the same LNAddress. And it's basically as common as email is today.

THAT's when we have real adoption, sometime in the next 10 years.

0 sats \ 5 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 11h

The problem is that to use LN to pay for services like Youtube the vast majority of users would in practice be breaching their respective tax assessment obligations.

Youtubes legal team cannot and will not endorse such a massive enabling of tax code violation.

Fiats operators have very slyly succeeded in effectively obstructing mass adoption.

7 sats \ 4 replies \ @028559d218 11h

Governments will get over it

0 sats \ 3 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 11h

Why would they both deny themselves tax revenue and encourage and enable a competitor to their state sponsored fiat MoE monopoly?

0 sats \ 2 replies \ @028559d218 10h

Because the citizens will demand it. See - De-segregation Women's Voting Firearm's Rights The US Constitution... Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Assembly, Freedom from Unlawful Search and Seizure etc etc...

All of these things are/were inherently 'unpopular' with governments because they restrict their influence and ability to exert it

However the citizens demanded accountability in one way or another and so things changed. Like we see them changing now

21 sats \ 1 reply \ @Solomonsatoshi 10h

Yes I hope this will happen - if enough citizens demand it it is possible.

To get there we need to get people on board and understanding how a Bitcoin Standard economy could be much better than the current state imposed fiat debt slavery monopoly system.

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0 sats \ 1 reply \ @longlifelearner20 13h

that is somehow true as bitcoin is an ecosystem that uses more electricity and top notched Gpu power to mine just a handful satoshi, you can add this to the list but where does Bitcoin's beauty come to existeences is where it enable the peer 2 peer process goes so well unless there is a trust contract.

7 sats \ 0 replies \ @028559d218 13h

It's both peer to peer... and a store of energy.

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @Nzowashua 14h

Bitcoin still in fire

21 sats \ 0 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 12h

And yet as the article points out the vast majority of people have never used it, do not trust it and do not understand it.

That surely is a branding problem!

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @standardcrypto 13h

"Why are so many of Bitcoin’s loudest supporters the people I least want to be aligned with?

Trump. Bukele. Putin. Musk, Ken Sim."

Cause you're a moron?

If trump and bukele liked fresh air and babies, are you going to want to live like an incel in a basement?

Anyway if your enemy likes bitcoin that makes it all the more urgent that you get bitcoin before they do.

Hitler liked gold, lol.

IDK, maybe he's not wrong.

But maybe the branding problem is if you are selling to idiots you got to lie and say what idiots want to hear.

Bitcoin doesn't lie. I'm going to say that that's not actually a problem.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @supratic 1h

‘HIGHLIGHT’

Entering into the space is overwhelming for even the most astute

It’s not just about explaining money. Or explaining tech. It’s about catching someone at the intersection of two very difficult spaces:

They have to already be questioning how our financial system works. They have to not get overwhelmed by the technical layer Bitcoin requires.

That's a small Venn diagram overlap — and it's getting even smaller.

With more and more people living paycheck to paycheck, convincing them to invest in a “new monetary system” is a tough sell. Most people aren't looking for revolution. They're looking to pay rent next month. The pitch for Bitcoin — sovereignty, decentralization, hard money — sounds abstract when you’re staring down bills and inflation.

And even if someone is curious, they run headfirst into the second wall: tech overwhelm.

And continues with

Even the communities that should be onboarding newcomers — like Nostr, or the Bitcoin subreddit — often feel closed off. There’s still a culture of arrogance, memes, and inside jokes. Instead of welcoming the curious, it sometimes ridicules them.

The irony is brutal: Bitcoin is supposed to be for everyone. But today, it still feels like it’s for insiders.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @OT 8h

Well... There's no marketing department is there?