I mean, is he wrong? Genuinely the only other application I’ve seen which seems plausible is for use in places like Venezuela where the official currency is worthless.
The other use is providing online payments to people who aren't in the banking system. The banking system requires trust, and shuts untrustworthy people out - both at the level of individuals and entire regions. Bitcoin eliminates the need for trust (on the monetary layer) and can thus reach more people.
Both are great applications. They are largely irrelevant in the West because only a tiny fraction of us experience those problems, but that doesn't mean they don't exist elsewhere.
Oh, and it’s actually neither of those but if you wish _reaaaaly_ hard and ignore all the practical problems, it might be, someday.
> helps people without access to banking but with a stable, constant internet connection and perfect operational security
You don't need constant internet connection unless you are mining or want to verify a payment right now. And mobile internet and smartphones are surprisingly prevalent in the third world (and among homeless in the first world).
Maybe not a lot, but people literally do use it for this purpose everyday. You can't just wave that away, given that it is working to some extent now.
So as a store of value Bitcoin actually has a good track record and is trending towards lower volatility as adoption grows.
People really need to stop thinking in absolute terms regarding value storage. It’s analogous to energy storage. Batteries leak energy over time, but we don’t sit around yelling about how they are not stores of energy.
Oh, and gambling/speculating of course.
Yes.
This was done in USD. Maybe crime wouldn't be whitelist only on a transparent blockchain and that is what is feared? Money is the root of most activity in this world, criminal or good. Transparent transactions bring all crime into the spotlight and for some that is problematic.
That doesn't change the fact that the only killer app is criminal activity. Of course you -can- do non-criminal things with it, but frankly as a currency it's terrible. It's way too volatile, and transactions are both too expensive and too slow.
I get the goals - decentralisation, limited money supply (which in theory is supposed to limit inflation, but doesn't) and so on. Unfortunately the volatility dwarfs any inflation hedging etc. It's also super-risky right now, so I recommend holding your own coins. Not your keys not your money.
Sure it's different. Sure it's idealistic. But it's also, well, a terrible currency.
Which means mostly it serves as a nice way to do criminal transactions.