Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

Usefulness is quite relative. Do we really need jewelry to signal out social status to others ? I personally don't think so. (Industry only uses small amounts of gold)


That's not quite what I'm saying. Gold is intrinsically useful because you can do things with it, regardless of what those things are. Whereas literally the only thing you can do with Bitcoin is trade it to someone else.


What can you do with Music?

Art?

Movies?

all of these things are inherently not about intrinsic utility but they all weigh heavily into human societies.

If I can utilize Bitcoin as a store of value against inflation or as free speech money or even just as a middle finger to the USD then it has utility.


Means of exchange has a use value.


Anything can be a means of exchange. Bitcoin just happens to have zero other uses.


Not anything can be a means of exchange. For that it has to have some physical properties (transportability, fungibility for example) and social properties (value !) or else you are relying on third party procedures to keep count ... or a public unfalsifiable record like a blockchain.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: