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Comment by sebleon | Hacker News Reader

> remmitances, paying remote employees, collecting donations

Blockchain seems like overkill here. Hardest parts are converting cash into bits and back on both ends, transmitting bits from one account to another is easy with, say, a MySQL db

> store of value

volatility makes bitcoin an interesting speculative investment. But without any backing or federal insurance, seems like a poor store of value compared to a bank account (though many currencies no longer have backing...)

> b2b, peer to peer payments

Again, solutions to these (ie. Venmo, Square Cash, Facebook Cash for p2p) do not require blockchain. How does blockchain tech help in these use cases?

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> Hardest parts are converting cash

There is a powerful network effect taking place: the more people accept Bitcoin, the smaller the need to convert to cash, causing Bitcoin's convenience to increase bit by bit, causing more people to use it, etc. That is what we have been seeing over the last 7 years. And Bitcoin ATMs are becoming the most convenient way to convert to cash. They are popping up around the world at an impressive rate: https://coinatmradar.com/charts/#growth

> poor store of value compared to a bank account

On the contrary, savings accounts are a terrible store of value as they lose value over time: a 1% interest rate is eaten by a 3% inflation rate.

> powerful network effect taking place is this actually happening, or is this wishful thinking?

> bitcoin ATMs cool concept, unclear when there will be enough of these outside of USA to make a dent in the remittance market

> savings accounts are terrible agreed, losing 2% annually sucks. however, BTC literally dropped 14.88% today 0_0 unclear if it will continue to grow or drop, only volatility seems inevitable

>Again, solutions to these (ie. Venmo, Square Cash, Facebook Cash for p2p) do not require blockchain. How does blockchain tech help in these use cases?

Bitcoin is the only decentralized one. I don't think it means everyone needs to use it, but I think the role it fills is a very important one.

I feel like this criticism is like criticizing torrents or personal NAS media devices when fileplanet.com and dropbox already exist, or criticizing email when Facebook Messenger exists.

> role it fills is a very important one what role does it fill?

> criticizing torrents p2p file sharing fills a real need: quickly download large files for free, even when no single entity wants to pony up enough free bandwidth to make this happen

> criticizing email when fb messenger exists email is useful too. it is more formal and already part of the protocol of business communication. fb messenger is great for casual chats with friends, with a heavier focus on GIFs, games, etc. they fulfill different, but real, needs

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