Forbes Says “Bitcoin is Done” Again. Why They Don’t Get It.

[UPDATE] The article by Forbes has now been deleted and removed from the author’s article roll. The Decentral’s work is done for the day.

The main stream media are at it again, making as much noise about this week’s price crash as they can and telling their readers once more, bitcoin is dead.

“Bitcoin — Stick A Fork In It — It’s Done”, Peter Tchir a Contributor at Forbes writes yesterday. [article now removed]

His reasons? Rather tired ones unfortunately, so one more time let’s debunk this MSM rubbish about bitcoin.

Tchir starts off his enlightened rhetoric:

Bitcoin is too confusing. These forks and new cryptocurrencies confuse the casual investor. The spread of Bitcoin spinoffs does little to attract new investors. For a product that relies heavily on new users adopting it, the confusion and price action is slowing adoption or in some cases, causing people to reverse prior decisions to buy it.

Source: Forbes

This is Tchir’s first and presumably most compelling argument — “Bitcoin is too confusing.” I don’t think that one is going to age very well given that almost all technology was confusing before entrepreneurs built businesses around the problem, making the use of the technology seamless.

Andreas Antonopoulos (@aantonop) explains it probably the best when he talks about how hard it was to send an email in the early days of the internet. It required advanced computing skills and line commands. Now our parents send cat memes to one another with the swipe of a finger on their iPads.

Nevertheless, he is the one confusing the issue by using the in-fighting and hard fork debacle over at Bitcoin Cash to attack the original Bitcoin (BTC) chain.

So, let’s move on from that shall we…

I want to focus on one particular aspect that is problematic for a lot of potential investors. That problem is that one of the alleged benefits of Bitcoin is its ‘decentralization’.

Source: Forbes

Tchir then goes on to comment that he’s been skeptical about this decentralized concept crypto-enthusiasts are so passionate about.

I’ve questioned that from the start and now I see at least two problems with this alleged benefit.

Source: Forbes

Tchir’s problems with decentralization:

Forks (again):

It makes it easy to create forks, which are confusing enough, but it also makes it easy to create new cryptocurrencies.

He’s getting confused again. Anyone can fork bitcoin, therefor a fork of bitcoin is not bitcoin and does not have the same (or any) value. Copied Nike’s are not Nike’s and cannot be sold as Nike’s.

And Mining:

For all the talk of decentralization it seems as though the miners carry a lot of weight.

Tchir then goes on to write that the miners and early holders have too much power.

Why do miners want to pursue a certain path? For the public good? Hmmm. Not only are the miners very powerful, have their own self-interest to serve, they are strongly held views that the largest mining enterprises are based in countries or regions of the world not known for pristine business practices (to say the least).

Yes there are some early holders with a lot of money. There are also early holders of FIAT who still hold lots of FIAT. Miners can fork bitcoin, but they can’t censor the network or change the coin supply. Anyone can mine and point their hash power to a pool. Mining (Proof of Work) is what keeps the whole system honest.

At no point are any of these concerns balanced with a positive word about Bitcoin. For instance the ability to transact securely across the world or store value with the guarantee that no one can make more than 21 million coins. What people like Tchir don’t understand is that Bitcoin is not going anywhere. It does not care about the price and offers billions of people a viable exit should their leaders, banks and economies fail them.

Who you’re reading:

David Black is a staff writer at The Decentral, living and writing in Chiang Mai, Thailand. He’s also the author of both fiction and non fiction books and likes to debate the finer parts of crypto currency and politics to anyone who will listen.

For questions or story ideas, you can contact David

Email: david.black@thedecentral.com

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Disclaimer: Any and all opinions expressed here are those of David Black alone. The article is for educational and/or entertainment purposes only, so please use it at your own risk.

Originally published at www.thedecentral.com on November 25, 2018.