Yet Another Reminder That Many Bitcoin Critics Are Subpar

The funny thing is that Bitcoin is going to win in such a fantastic way because it is rooted in proof of work.

The below is a direct excerpt of Marty’s Bent Issue #1076: “Yet Another Reminder That Many Bitcoin Critics Are Subpar.” Sign up for the newsletter here.

via NYT

via NYT



The above snippet comes from the Opinions section of the New York Times, and it is a stark reminder of just how bad many Bitcoin “critics” turn out to be. In his piece that dropped today, Binyamin Appelbaum claims that the gold standard – something humanity used for THOUSANDS of years – was disastrous, called private keys passwords, claimed that the US Government can easily brute force ECDSA and confiscate anyone’s bitcoin, and that individuals don’t use bitcoin in a non-custodial self-sovereign fashion because it is “too hard”. A pretty impressive streak of objectively wrong statements.

The frustrating part isn’t that Binyamin was so terribly wrong, it is that he was so very confident while spreading his fake news in the New York Times. Confident enough to exclaim that bitcoiners are nothing more than “Libertarian cosplay” participants. I usually wouldn’t waste a day’s issue of this dirty rag on one particular critique from a single New York Time Opinions piece writer, but pointing out the juxtaposition of this article with the New York Times’ coverage of the Met Gala was irresistible.

The New York Times likes to paint itself as a leader pushing forward social justice and progressive values while speaking truth to power during chaotic times. However, if you look closely – particularly at this bitcoin hit piece and the Met Gala coverage – you will find that it’s the New York Times that is engaged in cosplay and not bitcoiners.

Since January 3rd, 2009 bitcoiners have been working diligently; writing code, building businesses, educating, and erecting physical infrastructure to provide the world with a peer-to-peer digital cash system that will serve anyone who can access the software. In the process, the network has provided billions of unbanked and those already banked with the opportunity to access a digital app where they can store their wealth. Not only that, but the Bitcoin network gives you the ability to have an extremely high degree of certainty that your share of the overall network cannot be debased. The app has only gotten easier to use over time as more and more people are drawn to the network and work to make it more efficient and user friendly. The same can not be said for the incumbent monetary system, which is only getting harder to use.

As central bankers and governments around the world continue to lose their grip on the very interconnected monetary systems of the world – causing social in-cohesion – they are getting more serious about the monitoring of who is sending money to who and how much they can spend. A result of this is increased data collection and filtering that is making it harder for individuals to interact with the economy. It’s getting harder to use in this technical sense, but it’s also getting harder to use in a practical sense as the amount of overall units of money increases rapidly, pushing the prices of many good up as a result. Either completely boxing individuals out from the digital monetary system all together, or decreasing their quality of life materially by making things more expensive.

Bitcoin fixes this problem by giving individuals the world over an open and sound monetary system, yet the New York Times, which is supposed to be cheerleading the advancement of human rights, chooses to bash bitcoin while running this article during the same day…

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Legitimate gushing over an elite costume party where celebrities and politicians alike signal their support for social justice while dawning outfits worth tens of thousands of dollars to hundreds of thousands of dollars with a full life cycle of 12-hours. And the wardrobe wasn’t the only thing the celebrities at the Met Gala were waving in the face of the poors, they were also waving their actual maskless faces right in front of them too. Apparently if you adorn an outfit worth more than your average annual salary in the United States you are naturally immune to COVID. And as long as you signal your disdain for the state of the world by including political phrases like “Tax the Rich” and “Peg the Patricarchy” on your costume, you are absolved from not actually doing anything. That is enough effort. You can go on feeling good about yourself.

The funny thing is that Bitcoin is going to win in such a fantastic way because it is rooted in proof of work. A proof of work that the LARPing elites dependent on the Cantillon Effect cannot compete with in the long run. We’re going to wake up one day, Bitcoin is going to be as easy to use as the mobile phone or laptop you are reading this rag on, the incumbent monetary system is going to be more burdensome and less reliable, and those who the progressives think they are helping are going to thank Satoshi for Bitcoin for providing them with the opportunity to build themselves a better life.

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Nifty News: NYT says NFTs in pandemic-fueled bubble, Polkamon eggs produce $1M gas …

Having just flogged an NFT column for half a million dollars, the New York Times is now wondering if perhaps the whole scene is in a bit of a bubble?

In a March 30 article, Art’s NFT Question: Next Frontier in Trading, or a New Form of Tulip? author Scott Reyburn questioned the sustainability of the current NFT bubble in prices and drew comparisons with the Dutch “tulip mania” of the 1630s.

Tulip mania for anyone who doesn’t hodl flowers, was a bubble in the Netherlands that saw prices for a single tulip bulb rocket up to a high of 6,700 guilders in February 1637 — enough to purchase a house at the time.

The NYT suggested that perhaps history was rhyming, given the similarity between the COVID-19 adjacent NFT bubble and the bubonic plague-driven Tulip bubble:

“It should also be pointed out that febrile speculation in assets that have no physical existence has flourished during epidemics, when people spend a lot of time indoors. Tulip mania coincided with an outbreak of bubonic plague in the Netherlands that killed a fifth of Amsterdam’s population between 1635 and 1636.”

The response from financial authorities to the pandemic has, of course, also inflated asset prices across the board, so perhaps NFTs have also been a beneficiary of people having too much money and time on their hands.

The article concluded with an apt quote from 1637 Tulip mania satire, The Rise and Decline of Flora:

“It has been a madness.”

SuperRare raises $9 million

NFT marketplace SuperRare has has raised $9 million from its series A financing round.

The platform announced on March 31 that the round had been led by Velvet Sea Ventures and saw investment from popular figures such as Mark Cuban, Chamath Palihapitiya, and Ashton Kutcher. SuperRare noted:

“In just three years, the crypto art market has already grown to be a global phenomenon over $400M in size. This investment will allow SuperRare to accelerate growth, serving significantly more artists and collectors as digital collecting nears more mainstream adoption”

The platform intends to use the funding to expand “the core features of SuperRare into more scalable, social elements like chat and personalized feeds”. It also intends to improve market mechanics and auction functionality, extend “supported artwork formats further into VR and programmable media” and hopes to implement layer-two scaling.

Polkamon Eggs, the latest NFT craze

Decentralized exchange Polkastarter has joined the NFT mania with the launch of “Polkamon” animated digital monster collectibles.

Early adopters of the project were offered the chance to participate in the “claim your eggs contest”, which saw 125,000 users claim a tokenized egg that had a chance of being “hatched” or minted into a Polkamon NFT.

“In gas fees alone, we estimate Polkamon fans have spent more than $1 million claiming eggs for their chance to participate in our upcoming IDO on Polkastarter,” a blog post noted.

The project is now verified on OpenSea, and the highest sale at the time of writing is for a silver “Moonrock x Morningstar Babydragon” at 22 ETH, worth around $39,000.

Another OpenSea user appears confident in the project. After buying a “Polkastarter Babydragon” for 14.94 ETH, they currently have it listed for 54.99 ETH (worth roughly $100,000).

Second crack at NFT house sale

Property investor Ivan Malpica has sold a 50% share in a St Louis house that he put up for sale as an NFT on Mintable in early March.

You can buy half this home in St Louis via Mintable for less than 30 ETH

Unfortunately, he tells Cointelegraph he sold it offline to a “new partner who did not have crypto or ETH” and instead sold it for cash.

“I received a lot of interest in the first real estate NFT, but the new buyers wanted to partner traditionally,” he says. “Since there was a lot of interest I decided to create a second NFT to try again on a new property.” He has just listed a 50% share in another St Louis property as an NFT on Mintable for 29.7 ETH.

From NFL to NFT

Former NFL-star turned actor Veron Davis, has followed Rob Gronkowski and Partick Mahomes into tokenized collectibles with a drop on Rarible today.

Davis played in the NFL for 14 seasons and won the Super Bowl with the Denver Broncos in 2016. The drop consists of five open editions and a one of one which depict career highlights from Davis’ career including trophies, Super Bowl action shots, and even a tokenized “rookie season” action figure of the star.

The auction is due to close on April 4.