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rhollerith_dot_com comments on General Bitcoin discussion thread (June 2011) - Less Wrong Discussion

4 Post author: SilasBarta 10 June 2011 11:21PM

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Tags: bitcoin cryptography money

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Comment author: rhollerith_dot_com 11 June 2011 09:38:57PM *  -1 points [-]

the jump in interest generally comes when you explain that there will only ever be 21 million. this seems to completely change the character of the conversation.

Only 21 million bitcoins, but there is nothing preventing other "issuers" from copying the design of Bitcoin and creating "Cryptotokens", and "Liberty Hashes," "Stealth Gold," "African Bitcoins," etc.

Comment author: Alicorn 11 June 2011 09:47:58PM 2 points [-]

"Cryptotokens"

Cryptokens, surely?

Comment author: gwern 12 June 2011 09:49:10PM 0 points [-]

That's not a bad thing. Bitcoin is going to have to be majorly upgraded with a new blockchain when SHA-256 is broken, and money is not the only scarce things to be decentralizedly allocated - I previously commented on Namecoin.

Comment author: rhollerith_dot_com 12 June 2011 10:21:10PM *  0 points [-]

Bad thing or good thing, it makes a huge difference to the expected long-term value of a bitcoin, which is of interest to anyone thinking of holding bitcoins.

Comment author: nazgulnarsil 11 June 2011 09:47:13PM 0 points [-]

Not insurmountable but it is the chicken and egg problem. Bitcoins are the most secure by virtue of having the most hashing power.

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