The case of Bitcoin — 2018

I’m writing this to give many of the newer members here a concise and easy to understand argument for why bitcoin is important now and in the future. Many of the points I’ll make here for you to read have likely been made in various posts around the group, but I’m attempting to put them all into one “easy to understand” package. So…let’s talk about that old, dead & useless technology that is bitcoin…

1. Bitcoin is THE brand. Full stop. Bitcoin is the gold standard of crypto. While some may claim that is SHOULDN’T be…. It is. Without bitcoin, no other coin would be able to have believers. Bitcoin paved the way for all others and if it goes… all others go. You can’t have bitcoin collapse and other cryptos not get destroyed. Bitcoin is the backbone of crypto.

2. Bitcoin brings all the boys to the yard. It’s milkshake is better than yours. I could teach you, but I’d have to charge. The fact that bitcoin has lasted for so long and done so well…that attracts people to crypto. They may venture into alts later on…but they get here on that big yellow bus called bitcoin.

3. Bitcoin is NOT for buying candy bars. Yes…. Transaction times and fees are currently high and long. But for the vast majority of BTC owners, it’s not an issue. Google “Gershwin’s Law” and you’ll realize that nobody who owns bitcoin is trying to spend it for silly stuff like candy or dinner. Yes, I realize many have been told the silly story about “satoshi’s original intent”…. As if its not valid for the marketplace to determine the best use for something…which It has… and the best use for Bitcoin is a decentralized store of wealth. And guess what…that is one of the most valuable functions in any economy. There is a DAMN good reason that BTC has gained the value it has. It’s safe and secure and can’t be controlled by central parties. That is unprecedented. It is by far, the most important use a crypto can serve. Much more important than buying a movie ticket.

4. If you want to buy a movie ticket…take some of your BTC and trade it into Litecoin… or some other cheap and fast transaction coin. I have most of my fiat in my savings account. When I want to buy beer…I move it to my checking account and pay for beer. Bitcoin is no different. It is the savings account for wealth. LTC, ETH, DASH or Monero… or a host of others…. They are useful for that purpose currently. It’s not a big deal that BTC isn’t currently a great coin for microtransactions….there are NOT that many people begging to use crypto for microtransactions anyway.

5. Bitcoin has over 500 developers who have contributed to its’ code. I know you hear people say it’s an old technology that is outdated… but that’s simply not true. The beauty is its simplicity. It’s never been hacked and even the most powerful of it’s miners were not able to control it…hence the Bcash fork….. It serves It’s function beautifully today… and has a team of developers working on future tech as we speak. Lightning network and Onion are coming… and while they have their drawbacks, I trust in the bitcoin dev team more than any other. They’ve got us this far and they are not in it for the money. They are true to the goal of decentralized and secure storage of wealth….

6. Bitcoin is the only coin with the history, brand name, and security to attract Wall Street. Wall street money is SUPER cautious. And VERY sophisticated. The prime directive on wall street is not to MOON… it is to not LOSE money. Bitcoin is about as risky as wall street wants to get. And most other coins don’t have a large enough market cap to absorb the kind of money wall street has.

7. Futures and ETF’s. As I posted a few weeks ago… Wall Street dipped it’s toe into bitcoin with the first round of futures contracts. They are 30 day contracts and most of the money is waiting to see if reserves are set properly before entering…. So the real money is a week or two away…. And ETF’s are coming soon. Exchange Traded Funds are like the dow 500. You buy a share of the ETF and your money goes up or down based on the entire crypto space. Bitcoin is the anchor for that space. And the futures market for Bitcoin adds legitimacy to that space.

8. You can’t talk BTC without talking a bit about BCash. And those who support Bcash are at this point frothing at the mouth to scream at me…. But the truth is…. There are already multiple crypto coins that do what Bcash does… and do it better. Bcash is where it is currently only because it’s attempting to steal the brand. It it were called Btrash, it would be trading at pennies. If you go back and look at the history of Bitcoin…when it had the same volume of transactions that Bcash has today…it was just as fast…. SO… I’m not a fan of Bcash. But I am a fan of coins that serve that role better… I do NOT buy into the narrative that Bitcoin is useless unless you can use it to buy a big mac. If that were true, it wouldn’t be trading for the amount it is today. Litecoin has been doing a much better job of microtransactions for a much longer time… but the market wants decentralized and secure value storage. Nothing is better than bitcoin for that.

And that’s the reason Bitcoin is important and will continue on. Another crypto will exist… many will… but don’t think that bitcoin will be overtaken. That’s doubtful. It has way too much going for it