On November 17th I wrote up a big post about bitcoin. The price then was around $500 per bitcoin. It was a little bit crazy then. Between then and now has been quite a roller coaster. Up to like $1200, down below $500, now sitting precariously around $600 something on most exchanges.
Between then and now there has been crazy good news and scary news. We are on the precipice of some potentially bad news. And all this news does on the internet is create opinions. There is only so much "action" that can be taken when it comes to bitcoins, so all of the energy that people invest into it just turns into opinions. They are trying to make rational decisions, and rationalize decisions they made in the past, or might make in the future. So people everywhere are writing what they think down and it is being spewed constantly everywhere on the internet. Even right now, at this moment, I am doing the exact same thing. This has caused the internet to be absolutely overflowing with opinions about bitcoins.
And I know all the best places to look for it. On reddit , and twitter and some different forums it's easy to find. I've figured out how to do searches that try to avoid the opinions that are obviously going to be positive. Of course the people who own bitcoins, or bitcoin companies are going to be positive, so I don't need to know what they think.
So what I end up finding are all sorts of people who think that the whole bitcoin thing is a bad idea. They know a few of the negative things that are true about bitcoin, or they spout off something completely negative, but baseless about bitcoin. More recently, I've been finding more and more opinions about bitcoin that aren't just about the technology itself, but more about the community of people who own bitcoins. Usually it comes down to the idea that we are all delusion cult members who have gotten ourselves into a pyramid scheme and are annoyingly trying to get everybody else to buy into a useless and baseless fad. Some people go so far as to think that the deflationary ideas of bitcoin are so contrary to the fantastic inflation system that keeps the world running that it will lead to economic collapse. The far off idea of bitcoins ruining the economy sure is more of a threat then the banks and big businesses that have already done so.
I try to be objective about things, to look at both sides of arguments and see all aspects of a topic. I usually avoid any ideas of faith, of just accepting something as fact even though the evidence isn't there.
But this is a really difficult topic because I'm pretty sure that the only way to mentally hold through these rough patches of bitcoins existence, to stick with what my gut was telling me before, is to actually give up on my usual methodology of looking for evidence.
Regular old searching on the internet just isn't going to cut it. There is so much noise, and so much opinion that it is indecipherable. And I guess the price of bitcoins reflects that, the roller coaster charts represent the whole world trying to figure out what is going to happen, and if this whole bitcoin thing is the future.
Some people say yes, some people say no, the short-term charts are crazy looking. The media gets excited. Bitcoin is declared "dead", the bubble definitely burst this time. Random people say that it is terrible and to get out right now. And then other random people think it's literally the best thing since the internet, will fix all the worlds problems and will make them fantastically rich.
And I guess I feel fairly conflicted because I'm siding with the people on the get rich, drink the koolaid, this is going to work, "to the moon", best thing since the internet side. Or at least I'm siding with them in that I am going to hold on to my bitcoins.
I'm not going to suggest to anyone that they should invest in bitcoins. I don't even really want to bring it up with other people, because then I am grouping myself in with all the other crazy believers. But I am going to stick with it.
I reread my paper about memes and there is so much in that paper that is deeply aligned with the growth of Bitcoin, that I have to go with my long term gut/nerdy brain/love of scifi feelings and stick with it.
And I'm pretty sure that isn't a stupid thing to do.
Pretty sure...
Kyler
No comments:
Post a Comment