- Linus Torvalds, creator of Linux, does not believe in cryptocurrencies, calling them a vehicle for scams and a Ponzi scheme.
- Torvalds was once rumored to be Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto, but he clarified it was a joke and denied owning a Bitcoin fortune.
- Torvalds also dismissed the idea of technological singularity as a bedtime story for children, saying continuous exponential growth does not make sense.
Is this going to be the most replied to post on the Fediverse? 635 in 2 days and still going strong.
Edit: since it’s now at 666 replies, please nobody make any more comments
Is there a way to check?
There’s a few with a thousand on top of all time for Lemmy. It would have to break those before it gets there. But since we’ve got a perfect storm of Linux, crypto, and anti ai discussions going, all we need is @PugJesus@lemmy.world to make a top level comment about how not voting for Biden is voting for Trump to really push it over the top.
I didn’t realize I was so famous.
You and downpunxx are my most frequent mentions from my kbin days. Not that I particularly want to compare you.
Well, I do appreciate not being compared to THAT particular user, so thank you.
Holy shit, the crypto bros are really triggered by this, out in full force in the comments. If the only argument you can bring for crypto is that you make/made money on it, that sounds a lot like a Ponzi scheme
It is a Ponzi scheme. Very clearly one. How that garbage is legal, I will never know. I could have gotten into crypto from the ground floor eons ago and made tons of money but I didn’t because I knew it was illegal and figured the whole thing was going to collapse as soon as governments found out about it. Imagine my shock when most legitimized the damn thing. Still wouldn’t bother even if I could go back and do it again knowing the brain dead, money-greedy idiots are going to legalize a literal Ponzi scheme because I have values and morals.
Yeah, it’s relatively easy to make good money in crypto if you understand investing. There are a lot of things that are illegal in regulated securities markets that are not yet illegal with crypto.
I intentionally don’t invest in crypto, because it doesn’t produce anything. Any money you make is just taken from another investor, usually because they don’t know what they’re doing. When you invest in a company, you make products and sell them to customers. Something is created and rarely are people cheated.
The people investing in crypto are intentionally cheating uninformed investors in a way that is not possible in regulated securities markets.
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I agree. Every crypto except XMR seems to be only seen as an investment to make more money.
Why XMR and not BTC? Do the privacy defaults change how it’s seen?
BTC is solely a mode of investment, it offers no real benefits over fiat except decentralization. At least XMR is as or even more anonymous than cash, whereas Bitcoin has zero utility.
If there was a way to use Bitcoin more privately than USD cash, would that give it utility?
Alright, as a crypto entrepreneur myself, I’ll bite and try to break down exactly what the appeal of crypto is. But b4 I do I would appreciate some updoots since I have a new account. Anyway, crypto, it’s a way to do transactions anonymously. You know how when your wife frequently accesses your bank account to meticulously track every offbrand sex toy you get on temu (at least mine does, filing a divorce at the time of writing, just trying to keep custody of the kids even though they hate me) so you can feel the sensation of plastic child labor alone in your bedroom? But yeah I don’t really use crypto that much personally, too many scams.
Cryptocurrencies in general are not anonymous. There might be exceptions, but all I’ve seen is pseudonymity. And an eternal backlog of every transaction ever, i.e., if your identity gets revealed for a single transaction, it will get you revealed for every transaction you ever did.
This is what Monero is designed to fix.
No, given that privacy can be turned off.
No, it can’t. It’s built into the protocol and enforced. On other currencies such as Zcash, you can turn off privacy if you wish. But on Monero, it’s not possible to opt out at all. You either have privacy or you don’t use it at all.
They downvote because they hate what they don’t understand, not because you’re incorrect.
To the crypto haters, take a real 5-10 minutes to learn about Monero and see if you can apply the same hate afterwards.
Oh, I know. And for pointing that out, you will get downvoted as well.
The fuck is a crypto entrepreneur?
It sounds a bit like when arbitrage entrepreneurs were hoarding toilet paper during covid.
Crypto is a textbook example of why we as a society can’t have nice things. To many people are selfish and self serving, and not enough people are willing to ostracize those types of people from society for such actions.
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I fucking hate that the crypto currency ghouls have captured the word “crypto”. When I first read this I was wondering why in the fuck would Linus not like cryptography. My brain is old and crypto will always mean cryptography.
I think there was a potential future where cryptocurrency could’ve actually been useful, but it was ruined by scammers, rug pullers, and of course, speculators.
I’ll still hold a little bit of Monero, since it holds the most potential for being a real currency in my opinion. But otherwise, I fully agree with the sentiment.
Its just a big money laundering scheme
Linus Torvalds, creator of Linux, does not believe in cryptocurrencies, calling them a vehicle for scams and a Ponzi scheme.
To be fair, that’s because Crypto is a vehicle for scams, and a Ponzi scheme.
How are you asking Linus about crypto and not about the blockchain.
I actually considered a non-governmental, community regulated currency as a pretty good idea.
Problem is, crypto is too ecologically expensive and wasteful to fit the bill.
While there were some interesting ones, that actually used the processing power for something useful, most are not. So for now, I’ll just go with governmental currencies.
crypto is too ecologically expensive and wasteful
Only some (proof of work) crypto is ecologically expensive and wasteful.
I actually considered a non-governmental, community regulated currency as a pretty good idea.
That goes against the entire history of currencies. Every successful currency in history has been controlled by either the state or a religion (which was effectively state-like).
That goes against the entire history of currencies.
How come? Decentralized currencies were in place long before the dictators enforced their own private currencies on to all their subjects.
Decentralized currencies were in place
Uh huh… like when?
gold
Gold isn’t a currency, it’s a commodity.
You can use it as a currency. The fact that the metal has a material use case isn’t really relevant.
It doesn’t meet the requirements to be a currency. It’s a commodity.
Cryptocurrency is a useful technology that has some real-world use cases - for example, living in Russia, I use it to circumvent sanctions to donate to some of the crypto-friendly creators, pay for a VPS abroad, and I keep calm knowing I can transfer money to my relatives abroad.
However, it is obviously not the answer to how we should build the financial system. The problem is not environment, actually - many Proof-of-Stake blockchains allow to transfer crypto with minimal environmental impact - but the poor on-chain regulation (including taxation, too) and potentially excessive infrastructure, as well as little protections against malicious and fraudulent actors.
Besides, inability to control emission, while helping maintain the value of the currency over the long run, also means that many interventions that can save economy in a crisis are simply not available. And a deflationary nature is known to cause bubbles.
Exactly! My usecase is exactly the same as yours.
While massively flawed, for now it is the most viable alternative financial system we have.
And a deflationary nature is known to cause bubbles.
I mean centuries of inflationary monetary policy also caused bubbles, sooo…
Who the fuck tell their kids bedtime stories about the idea of technological singularity??
I fell asleep to that by myself.
Getting digital cable in my bedroom as a kid was both a blessing and a curse, and I listened to Michio Kaku a lot. Didn’t understand half of it, but hey, it was cool.
Keep in mind, this was when I was a kid and thought all adults were good people and didn’t understand that Kaku and Tyson were dickheads or that Discovery Science was junk food borderline scifi.
If Torvalds was Satoshi he would have done a lot more with those untouched bitcoin than let them sit around for more than a decade
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Crypto is just a waste of resources, similar to AI
