Re:A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency
by yownie on Monday February 18, 2019 @11:39PM
(#19196634)
It also doesn't use as much energy as the country of Iceland (living in Iceland here). You what we use the MOST electricity for here? Aluminum smelting. No one seems to care a lot about that waste, it seems.
Re:A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency
by ForHackernews on Tuesday February 19, 2019 @06:09AM
(#19198144)
Making aluminum isn't a waste! You can build airplanes out of aluminum. You can also relatively easily recycle aluminum into more aluminum things, so it's not like you have to pay that smelting cost every single time you want to purchase anything.
Re:A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency
by ric2b on Tuesday February 19, 2019 @07:37PM
(#19204530)
It's still subjective. We can argue all night about what does or doesn't deserve to have energy used on it, that doesn't change the fact that Bitcoin is a rounding error in terms of global warming.
If the purpose is to limit environmental impact, why are we choosing by subjective value instead of actual impact?
Oh wait, you're bringing sin into the argument. My bad, I thought we were being rational.
And just a side-note, it irks me when people say that bitcoin uses as much energy as the country of Iceland like that's some kind of horror. Iceland is pretty damn small, with a population smaller than the mid-sized city I live in.