Can you point to a single post where the top, say, 5 comments aren't completely negative toward crypto as a whole? They typically mention gambling, fraud, ponzi schemes and (like yours) Mt Gox, in a rant that isn't specifically tied to the post at hand. Look at the top comments on this article:

>Investing in crypto is like a gambling addiction

>cryptocurrency is the new Gold Rush

>I remember the .com-bubble...But this one; it is just stupid

>It's hard not to think of tulips

If the shills are out there, they must not be getting paid very well.

And reading them I have gotten impression of a lot of people invested in these technologies trying to irrationally argue for them.

Everybody skeptical does not understand the potential of smart contracts which are just like internet in the 80s/early 90s and will take over the world.

I think skeptical replies are a natural push back against this recent wave.

Someone intentionally or not is doing a really good job of that.

I believe blockchain will be implemented by industries where it is useful and can improve many processes.

I believe it will change international capital allocation, via token sales. Worldwide investment in the best & brightest.

So, it's easy to have altcoin without speculation. Suppose your alt coin has 4+% inflation / year built into the coin. It could become the worlds main currency without making anyone rich. Adoption would increase because transaction costs could be extremely low promoting it's use for a lot of transactions.

EX: Initial adoption would be small purchases like vending machines where CC/other coins have much higher transaction costs. This could extend to things like cheap subscriptions etc, and then work up the value chain until people are using it to pay rent.

'Value chain' has a specific meaning in business. It's a set of activities done to create a product.

PS: English is not that restrictive of a language. Speed limit is generally thought in terms of velocity, but you could use those same words to refer to the drug. 'With a dosage entering LD50 territory Jim was clearly approaching the speed limit.'

The digital currency landscape is still in kind of a 'Here be Dragons' unmapped territory situation. No one knows exactly where it's going to end up, but they know there's riches to be had if you can figure out how to maneuver through it, or get lucky.

I'm pretty obsessed with both bitcoin and several altcoins, and I admit that I'm gambling with them, possibly more than I should, but I don't trust ICOs at all. Almost all of them seem to be money raising (for the company) schemes for what's essentially total vaporware. I'm sure some will manage to hit it big and make people a lot of money, but I fully expect a large percentage of them to crash and burn once the initial novelty and exuberance wears off and a lot of those companies to take that money and vanish, and there doesn't seem to be any decent method to evaluate which ones are the good ones and which ones are the total stinkers.

There are routinely four or five posts on the front page about cryptos and they usually lack substance. It seems like an entire industry with a lack of morals, ignorant about law and too often tech, but with the smug self-assuredness that they are on the verge of changing everything as only 20 somethings and extremists possess.

It doesn't really bother me that people are dumb, but it's not cool when you see this constant shilling you speak of, looking to pull in another taker who doesn't understand the tech or the financial implications of what they are doing.

I made and lost more money in a weekend than I'd ever made in a year speculating on cryptos, and this was 3 years ago, can't imagine the community or the possible winnings now. After my initial investment had been lost, I felt that very real pull of putting in just a little more from this paycheck because you know tomorrow you can win everything back. I've never gambled but I was certain that's the pull gamblers feel and I knew at least for me there was no difference. It's funny to watch friends repeat the cycle with Ethereum and ICOs. "Hey, ether is up, just made a profit :)". Of course that was a month ago at the peak, wonder how their investment is doing now?

It's an industry full of bozos and con-artists. Something good might come out of it, but I'm not investing a dollar more into that when I know that same dollar is probably going to fuck somebody else over. Besides, what good is building a fortune out of something you didn't really earn? Cool, you won the lottery, anybody can do that.

I guess this is the feeling gamblers have. I managed to use my will power and cash out my remaining investment and just stay away from this as I understand now how it can become addictive just like gambling in casino.

I know people who didn't resist and threw in their whole life savings into crypto. And they have lost massive amounts of money. I'm sure there are some "lottery winners" that have become millionaires based on early investment in crypto but they are very small minority. Most people end up losing money.

Like take the stock market downturn that happened in 2008. People who sold lost their shirts, but people who held onto it for a few years saw the market completely rebound and reach even more all time highs.

I'm not saying it's always smart to have this behavior, and there was a period where it looked like Bitcoin might not ever recover in price, but if you only invest what you can afford to lose (and I have, I could lose everything I invested and I'd be sad but not destitute), then you should be able to weather these storms.

I guess I am not a type of person who can take the stress of investing in something so volatile. I am trying to live a fiscally responsible and frugal life and this was probably the riskiest investment I have ever made.

I only invested a small amount. I could have easily lost all of it and it would make almost no difference to me. But I'm trying to save money to buy a property now so I will stay away from any kind of investments until I buy a house/apartment.

It is probably best to wait until you've bought the property. That property is an investment as well. I don't mean in the "buy a house and sell it later for big bucks" variety, it's an investment for more comfort in your life and future. I'm about ready to start saving up for a house as well, and it's going to be hard to stop throwing in $100 here, $100 there towards crypto and only put it towards a downpayment, but I need to start doing that.

Also stop buying video and board games for awhile. I'll have to only play the stuff I already have and never got around to playing for awhile. It's going to be hell :)

So I felt sad for a while but I have forgotten about it relatively soon. And it was a good lesson to learn.

I am planning to probably buy a property either end of this year or early next year so I am nearly there. My saving discipline will soon pay off!

Yes I think if you stop throwing $100 here and there at crypto, over 2-3 years that will translate into a nice lump sum of cash. Can be a basis for a deposit to buy a house.

With games, I'd suggest buying games which you'll be able to play for a long time so you minimize these costs. For example, I bought Starcraft 2 for £35 and you can play that game for years.

It was a deal including all 3 single player campaigns which are fun and then there is a massive multiplayer world where you can incrementally improve and challenge yourself playing tougher and tougher opponents.

Also congrats on having the savings discipline to save up for the house!

I might play Heart of the Swarm and Legacy of the Void later. There is also 4th campaign called Nova Covert Ops. But the pack I bought only contained WoL, HofS and LofV so I will probably skip that one.

That being said, I didn't have a ton of money to invest at the time, so I'm not rich or anything, and I tend to be a long term holder, but I highly doubt it's ever going to get all the way back down to $11 a coin.

I could have bought Bitcoin when it was $4 a coin, as I was paying attention to it back then, although the infrastructure for it wasn't in place and it was really difficult to buy, so I gave up on it. If I had, I would have made 625x whatever I put into it by now. And Bitcoin is not likely to ever get back down to $4 a coin. There will be buyers for sure if it ever gets that cheap (or the landscape will have changed so obviously that I probably would have sold a long time ago).

These sorts of statements explain a lot. You hear the same thing in every bull market, as investors conflate luck or the point in the cycle with investment acumen.

I'm not making any judgement on the usefulness or future of the blockchain et al, but this ico craze has a lot of similarities with the penny stock market, where many investors are simply relying on the greater fool to make them rich. Ultimately someone is always left holding the bag, and it is very often one without value.

The issuers and promoters always make out well. Many of the activities in the current ico market would be quite illegal if they were done in regulated markets.

I'm using the concept of dollar cost averaging and holding long term to help minimize the risk I'm taking, but I am certainly taking a risk. I did make a larger purchase early on with Ethereum but I'm still buying now.

My point is, if you bought two months ago when it was near its peak, and panic sold two weeks ago during the middle of the crypto downturn, you might be looking at things a bit too short term. I made a larger investment during a downturn two years ago and watched my investment go down to 25% of what I paid, and stay there for over a year, but now two years later it's up 300%.

You need to be patient and only invest what you can afford to lose, just like any other investment.

That being said, I don't disagree with you in regards to ICOs or the speculation on some altcoins feeling like the penny stock market. It absolutely does, and I mostly stay out of that (I have put small investments into some 'penny altcoins'). But I mostly stick to the big three (Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin).

It was also known that MtGox was having problems months before they halted withdrawals.