The Crypto Thread

That’s possible, but why?

We may be talking past each other; FWIW I think for most casuals, trying to time an NFT/crypto boom is going to end badly for the same reason people get rocked every other bubble. Maybe there are “sharps” who have a valid reason for knowing that BTC at $50k is a buy/sell moment but I think it’s hard to separate that from results-oriented thinking.

Warren isn’t necessarily anti-crypto, she just wants it regulated and more consumer protection.

In fact, she’s spoken favorably about the ability of crypto as a check on big banks and a way to expand the financial industry to those currently underserved.

Turns out is was sell.

A band can issue paper tickets or mobile tickets or other ways too without using Ticketmaster. How is NFT going to get around Ticketmaster controlling the venues?

Am I wrong in thinking that regulations with teeth would kill the appeal of crypto for a significant percentage of users? What happens to crypto if you can strangle its ability to be used as a vehicle for tax evasion?

Which is it? Are most people getting wrecked or is the boom fueled by people making millions evading taxes?

FWIW the UP discord has lots of discussion about how to pay taxes on this stuff. I think not paying taxes on crypto is enormously dumb because literally every transaction you have ever done is on a public ledger. Now NFT/crypto tax law is evolving and so there probably are ways to structure when you pay taxes on your assets just like there are with every other asset class.

True regulation would need to be comprehensive to not kill crypto. The issue with taxes and crypto is that right now every transaction is a taxable event, so if people actually file the way they are required, you’re going to get people filing thousands (if not tens or hundred of thousands) of taxable events. Don’t think the IRS actually wants that.

And sure, maybe some will not use crypto with more regulation, but people said same thing about poker and it seems to have survived in countries that legalized and regulated it.

Regulate crypto and if being regulated kills crypto, I have no problem with crypto dying.

A tiny group is making millions partly due to tax evasion and a bunch of dummies are potentially getting wrecked trying to follow. Not really sure because I’m uninterested in that aspect as much as I am interested in strangling the libertarian political dreams that they think crypto will enable.

Buying into BTC significantly at $50k doesn’t seem very wise to me, but that isn’t really what anyone here is advocating anyway. What’s smart is queueing up for the few thousand Top Shot packs that tens of thousands of people wanted back in Feb/March. Buying the first Funko packs was bigly profitable as was the recent ADIDAS NFT. There’s a basic formula here of “buy under-supplied shit that people want and will pay a lot of money for.”

It’s sort of like flipping Playstations with two key differences: (1) There are way more “consoles” (now) and you don’t know for certain which ones will be popular in advance, but (2) you can sell easily by clicking buttons in your underwear which isn’t true for physical product. Sometimes it involves binking a queue, but sometimes it’s having foresight / good luck in snapping up things that get popular a little later than immediately after the sale ends.

This stuff isn’t trivial and the learning curve would be considered fairly steep for anyone starting completely from scratch. Like, assuming a person has no crypto at all and no experience in the space, getting ETH into a Metamask wallet that’s set for Alchemy mainnet, setting the gas, minting, etc. is a lot of steps that aren’t going to make much sense at first if “ape gifs cost a million” doesn’t make sense to you.

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I hate libertarians also. I also hate cryptobros. My goal is to make enough to peace out from society because I hate the current iteration.

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I think this and your other post are the correct take, but this thread is full of x is going to rise/moon because of y logical reason that would be the same for a stock. Then we see Tesla or Doge or whatever. For the most part, shit hasn’t “made sense.” The people who have made the most on crypto devote a lot of their time to it. It’s hard to tell someone to just dip their foot in.

This is kind of the crux of the whole thing. The things being built are (in my poor person, dumb opinion) really fucking stupid Ponzi schemes. Bad games with de-fi and NFT structure? Randomly generated cartoon pictures? Pretentious art projects? None of it is interesting to me or justifies the obscene energy usage and bag holding.

Crypto and NFTs have interesting real world theoretical applications. The fact that the only thing they’re really being used for is wild speculation and pump and dumps centered around influencers is an indictment of late stage capitalism, not an utopian alternative.

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This is why I advise everyone who asks me if they should do it to not do it unless you can devote a lot of time to it. Casually buying NFTs is a disaster.

Which is why the arguments for “we need to find a way for casuals to enter then rocket ships” just seem so hollow to me. Your aunt or gf are never going to be huge into crypto. And like poker and dfs and so many other things, casuals get crushed by the sharps.

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It is? If that’s the message you’re getting you’re not reading very closely.

just a perspective thing imo. you see it as people wanting to dump their bags on friends & family. i see it as people wanting to help friends & family achieve the success they’ve personally realized. i tried to get my friends into online poker too, i wasn’t looking for someone to beat in a game of holdem for money

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I’m willing to believe there are sharps who have a valid thesis for getting in early on Funko-style fads, but it seems like a bad idea for the other 99% of us.

yep the building stuff in alex post got me too. i stand firm at crypto has built just about nothing with almost endless funding and tons of brilliant people.

also really weird take that this thread is full of x is gonna moon. if anything it full of harolds and other lame jokes from people who already made it instead