Bitcoin Isn’t Dead But It Might As Well Be

Bitcoin is dead

Bitcoin is the Future

The crypto evangelicals have preached that “Bitcoin is the Future” for more than a decade now. They weren’t wrong. The future is a bleak place filled with technology for technology’s sake. It has become very Bauhausian and form over function seems to be the mantra of the day. Bitcoin is no different. But does it need a function or utility? No, not if it is simply a wealth storage device…. and that alone is keeping it alive. It has value and you can put money into it. If a thing’s value dictates its legitimacy, I have a freakin’ POG that I bought for 10¢ and sold for $10.

IRL

I’m not here to rain on any parades. Yes, BTC is trading around $20K at the moment and that’s nothing to (can I say this without sounding 92?) shake a stick at. But here are the real world examples that have convinced me of my stance.

  • My company recently chose to wire payments to coders in Bolivia. The fees for making the transfer with ANY crypto were 10x the cost of the wire. The “you can send money all over the place for cheap” argument for crypto, after a decade of trying, has not materialized and I’m guessing won’t happen.
  • WordPress, the biggest web dev platform on the internet, has plugins for everything you can think of. Seriously, why the F am I even writting this when there are AI plugins that will do it for me? Anyway, the (3) crypto payment plugins in the vast WordPress depository are all 1-star reviewed and not reliable. Thankfully I’m a veteran coder and was able to custom code my own solution for my clothing site, www.IdiotCult.com. But without that, there are VERY FEW options for making payments with crypto on the internet. A currency you can not spend is destined for failure.
  • I accepted crypto payments for merch at a booth I ran during a tradeshow. Having to wait 10 minutes for the block to post to the chain was a nightmare and inconvenient to say the least. Because there are instant online payment options like PayPal, Venmo, Stripe, and so on, there is little argument to use crypto for its expedience.

A currency you can not spend is destined for failure.

Cutting through the meat and potatoes, to summarize, crypto is not as cheap, fast, or usable as what its been competing against since its inception in 2008. The breakthrough simply hasn’t happened. So to play it safe, you can catch me shrink wrapping my POGs.

Thanks for reading,
Morgan

Please email me at OceanAndCakeCreative@gmail.com with any comments, questions, or criticisms.