I found Natalie Brunell's remarks today pretty insightful...
Here's Jordi Visser, the Bitcoin IPO-moment guy, trying to make sense of the exchange rate implosion a few days ago:
"The implication was subtle but revealing: something that doesn’t move feels broken, especially after a year of positive news in crypto since Trump’s election. That frustration says far more about how humans experience time than it does about Bitcoin."
Bitcoin is often discussed as a speculative asset, a monetary revolution, or a technological breakthrough. But psychologically, it behaves like something else entirely:
"Bitcoin is a time-weighted asset masquerading as a price-based one.""Bitcoin is a time-weighted asset masquerading as a price-based one."
Early adopters who bought for ideological reasons, decentralization, censorship resistance,opting out, now find their asset embraced by the institutions they were escaping. The ETF approval and political endorsement validated the investment thesis while diluting the original ethos.
Mechanic rage-quitting (and Luke quietly quitting?) took the right actions but for the wrong reasons. This was never about some arcane setting at the bottom of node implementations, but about a revolutionarily novel money being tamed and dulled by the institutions it meant to overthrow (and thus losing its way and price-appreciation purpose). Bitcoin has, in this sense, failed.
The financial engineering party last year was just fuel for the fire, finalizing that top.
L0la, for good measure, rocking it:
If we continue down this path, bitcoin will be nothing but a glorified pet rock you can use to prop up your portfolio. It’s time to get your priorities straight anon."
"Currently Bitcoin sits at the same price as November 2024 just days after the election result."
So everybody who traded, who bought or sold something for sats, who made personal finance decisions involving bitcoin, got scammed. Yes, gradual fiat debasement is bad, but it's unidirectional and predictable, whereas Bitcoin fooling everybody who uses it isn't.
It's like the tradfi volatility-chanting economists had a point all along.
TLDR;
This is more about people than bitcoin. This is more about psychology and culture than economics (though real econ is about that too).
I'M SOOOWWIEE... Wanna re-classify it to some other territory and deprive @Undisciplined of territory income?!
I need that income to pay my best writers
That'd be Mr @Scoresby and @SimpleStacker. I just blabber and spam, quantity over quality etc
Lol 🤣 no. Just say'n is all.
When you see the same patterns of human behaviour over and over it gets old when people act like their community is special. It's not.
We special!
Oof. Has bitcoins ability to send and receive value with censorship resistance changed? The implication that if you sold something for sats in the last two years you’ve been scammed is just insane NGU misinformation. Are the people who use bitcoins network for remittances or cross-boarder business because there’s no better alternative scammed? Are the now many countries @anita has onboarded scammed? She’s built a growing social network that stands on the legs of bitcoin simply working in places where other options just don’t.
That’s all bitcoin has ever promised and that promise has remained unbroken. You’re right, if you were sold bitcoin NGU and the only reason you’re here is for a portfolio application. You got scammed. You’re the fool. These bullshit institutions are just noise and I know, they’re loud as fuck. But it’s just the fucking price man! Bitcoin doesn’t owe you anything or care about your fiat gains and it never will.
People will never stop being scammed. Bitcoin isn't a scam. Humans are the scammers and the scammed. If bitcoin has utility (it does) and if it has value (it does) every institution will either die or use/hold/try to control it eventually. Price is a function of human action. Humans do dumb things. Fall for dumb narratives and scam people.
I still think of myself as a newer bitcoiner but clearly that can't be solely measured in years. We have a long way to go as a species before we get to anything close to a collection of sovereign individuals using bitcoin as the standard. Its not a failure of bitcoin that this has yet to happen. Its a failure of humans.
Modernity has little patience and even less of an attention span. Those who don't fall into these two traps will be rewarded in due time. That's my two sats at least.
if they sat on their sats, believing the Bitcoiner protect-against-debasement story, then yes, they were scammed. If, more likely, they swapped it pretty quickly for local fiat -> local goods and services, less so. (But then those people, in turn got scammed. So I guess I'm saying: yes, have fun staying scammed)
Dang. Love this title. I don't care if I hate everything in the article and disagree. The title is on point.
Wrote about this back in 2023.
#179556
Bitcoin price on the day that was published was $26,999.96
wait, mechanic rage quit ? when ?
not sure it's real, or he actually did it (so very low confidence in this statement), but I recall seeing a tweet a while back
You claim to be a Bitcoiner but fail to attach a spending wallet...
Are you just here to arsemilk sats or something else?
https://twiiit.com/natbrunell/status/2018110596412289458