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681 points Anon84 | 3 comments | | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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mozarella ◴[] No.46189252[source]
https://vitalik.eth.limo/general/2024/01/31/end.html#section...

Vitalik touched upon this briefly in an other-wise long and wide-reaching essay. I think its a good treatment of the topic that the author is talking about. He categorizes the ecosystem broadly into 4 cohorts- [token holders] (which includes investors, speculators, etc.), [pragmatic users] (actual end-users who spend crypto to buy stuff), [intellectuals] (who give the vision and ideology), [builders] (of blockchains, apps, etc.) - These 4 groups come together but with different motivations and there is a gap in understanding between them. Indeed, there is even resistance against trying to reach an understanding - one which plays out in the comments section of every crypto-related post on hn. The author of this twitter-post clearly falls under [intellectual, builder] and has been disillusioned by the speculators from [token-holders]. Yet the [token-holders] are a vital component (as are the other groups) as they fund most of the development and adoption. Ultimately these 4 groups have more in common than not. The challenge going forward is to balance the occasionally conflicting needs of all the 4 groups, which includes checking the excesses of each group, while try to achieve a consensus. (Vitalik provides a nice diagram that maps out what that would look like). Crypto is an experiment in economics and economics is a science as well as a social-science. Anyone looking for a good solution must seek to understand and address the psychology of all the actors involved.

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hshdhdhj4444 ◴[] No.46190887[source]
The only buyers are criminals, sanction evaders, and probably the dumbest people in the world given that the entire crypto ecosystem is focused on one thing and one thing only. Creating the most deflationary monetary system in history.
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SirMaster ◴[] No.46192879[source]
So it was dumb of me to buy my bitcoins back when they were less than $100 a coin just in the slim chance that it completely blew up? I don't see what was dumb about a decision to put less than $1000 into 10 coins just in case. Worked out really well for me in the end and a less than $1000 gamble doesn't seem like that crazy of a gamble, at least to me.
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jakelazaroff ◴[] No.46193903[source]
"So it was dumb of me to buy my lottery tickets just in the slim chance that I won? Worked out really well for me in the end and a less than $1000 gamble doesn't seem like that crazy of a gamble, at least to me."

(See also: https://xkcd.com/1827/)

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SirMaster ◴[] No.46194399[source]
I don't see how that relates to me. I made a singular choice. I am going to put in $1000 one time and leave it alone because there seems to be some potential here.

I made the choice basically saying OK this $1000 I am putting in will either be worthless in 10+ years or it will be worth a lot.

I am not continuing to buy, I am not dumping loads of money into it. I spent less than 1% of my yearly salary one time knowing full well it could go to 0. The potential seemed well worth the tiny risk.

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1. jakelazaroff ◴[] No.46195642[source]
You are the lottery winner, extolling the virtues of the lottery. There are many other people who also made singular choices, that — by pure chance — did not pan out.

It's good that you were in a financial position such that you could easily spend $1000 on a dumb investment, but that doesn't make it less of a dumb investment.

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2. SirMaster ◴[] No.46218263[source]
I guess my argument is that turning $1000 into 1 million was probably a significantly more probable outcome than winning 1 million in a lottery which is specifically why I decided to put my money into bitcoin instead of lottery tickets.

I just don't see the equivalence in comparing it to buying a lottery ticket.

There are way way way more bitcoin winners than there are lottery winners.

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3. jakelazaroff ◴[] No.46227408[source]
The lottery analogy is reductio ad absurdum analogy — like, yeah, your odds of doing basically anything are better than winning the lottery (that's why the comic is funny). The point is that the positive outcome doesn't retroactively make your risky investment decision less risky. That's survivorship bias!