Bitcoin and almost every other cryptocurrency crashed hard today

Re:Bitcoin and almost every other cryptocurrency crashed har... by sireat on Friday December 22, 2017 @01:19PM (#15989620)

I am still trying to find fundamental cryptocurrency developments in 2017.

2011 were the first steps in BTC usability. 2013 was the rise of alt-coins and also BTC became actually usable(mostly due to Bitpay and Gyft) 2017 it seems all speculation.

So let's take top (by market value on 12/22/2017) crypto-currencies:

  1. Bitcoin - first mover, slow, expensive to use pivoted to store of value
  2. Ethereum - smart contracts enabling ICO craze despite horrible contract programming language
  3. Bitcoin Cash - moving to replace BTC in usability(Bitpay), but large single entity(Bitmain) influence
  4. Ripple - building backbone for financial institutions, but otherwise just speculation
  5. Litecoin - my 2nd love after BTC has not really advanced since 2013 and lead dev just sold all -> just speculation still
  6. Cardano - smart, open, unusable -> just speculation
  7. IOTA - IoT currency, premined, again why does this need high value?
  8. Dash - at least has some merchant acceptance, but still pitiful
  9. NEM - buzzwords but again unusable -> just speculation
  10. Bitcoin Gold - BTC fork with ASIC resistance -> just speculation
  11. Monero - black market usability rising
  12. EOS - impressive buzzwords, unclear on why tokens should have high value
  13. Stellar - a few name drops but unclear on usability
  14. NEO - what a name pivot, otherwise just a vision and speculation
  15. QTUM - smart apps, plus a few DAPPS, any good?
  16. Ethereum Classic - the one that honors badly written smart contracts

Out of these, BTC and Ethereum seem likely to stay at some value despite their flaws just because of their originality.

Out of rest, Dash, Monero and Bitcoin Cash seem like potentially useful for the general public.

The rest, what use are they for the general public?

Even if we assume all are honest and produce something useful for many of these tokens it is unclear why should general public care about buying tokens.

For example why should Ripple be valued by public and speculated upon when it is only its backbone that is to be used by bigbanks?

Disclaimer: despite mining some since 2011 I am really sceptical about most crypto currencies.

TLDR; besides white papers what actually became usable in 2017?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Bitcoin and almost every other cryptocurrency crashed har... by lurr on Friday December 22, 2017 @02:40PM (#15990268)

I wonder if crypto currency will survive, or if we end up with Blockchain being a useful technology and smart contracts having niche applications and still worth a lot.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Bitcoin and almost every other cryptocurrency crashed har... by anthony_barker on Sunday December 24, 2017 @07:52AM (#15999316)

Ripple - no documented consensus mechanism. Banks aren't using XRP to settle. Stellar - a better rewrite of Ripple targeting smaller Money Transmission companies.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Bitcoin and almost every other cryptocurrency crashed har... by gremlinsinc on Friday December 22, 2017 @01:53PM (#15989900)

Mark my words -- by the end of 2018, Ardor will be in the top 5 list if it doesn't unseat Ethereum.

[ Parent | on HN ]