Crypto catastrophe

[ubuysa]

The linked NYT article is worth a read. Bitcoin mining is unnecessary, expensive, and out of control. Thoughts?

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/09/business/bitcoin-mining-electricity-pollution.html

 

[Martinr36]

Some staggering figures in that article, to think that some of those mines use as much power as the major cities close by to them

 

[ubuysa]

Yes, but the ways they make money for agreeing not to use power, even if they do, staggered me. And being paid huge sums to not use power at all! I wish I was paid when I didn't use power....

 

[SpyderTracks]

Yes, but the ways they make money for agreeing not to use power, even if they do, staggered me. And being paid huge sums to not use power at all! I wish I was paid when I didn't use power....

It's this typical approach in the west where Money = all important and has more value than human life or well being.

If you have money or generate money, laws and normal boundaries just don't exist.

It's high time we start valuing common decency and moral fiber as being far more important than any monetary wealth.

 

[ubuysa]

It's high time we start valuing common decency and moral fiber as being far more important than any monetary wealth.

I rather think that politicians the world over are swayed more by big business than by the common people - until it's election time of course.

What scares me most about crypto-mining is that it's expensive in terms of electricity, and seemingly expensive even when it's not using any(!), and yet it creates nothing that helps the common people, most of whom don't know what crypto-currency even is.

It seems to me that it's criminals who benefit most from crypto-currency, because of its guarantees and its anonymity. Why then, are we wasting resources and supporting businesses that really only help criminals?

It's mad.

 

[SpyderTracks]

I rather think that politicians the world over are swayed more by big business than by the common people - until it's election time of course.

What scares me most about crypto-mining is that it's expensive in terms of electricity, and seemingly expensive even when it's not using any(!), and yet it creates nothing that helps the common people, most of whom don't know what crypto-currency even is.

It seems to me that it's criminals who benefit most from crypto-currency, because of its guarantees and its anonymity. Why then, are we wasting resources and supporting businesses that really only help criminals?

It's mad.

100% agree. It was a get rich quick thing for a short time, and a handful of people have ammassed huge wealth.

But at the core of it, it's nothing more than a digital pyramid scheme and shouldn't be legal by that rationale anyway.

I do think the underlying construct of the Blockchain is hugely important from a security perspective for almost any institution that needs secure transactions like banks, but I also think that it will be short-lived even from that perspective once quantum computing takes ground.

But actual digital currency mining is completely meaningless imho.