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A comment on The New ‘Gold Rush in Space’. Parent comment

Re:The New ‘Gold Rush in Space’ by chii on Friday August 14, 2020 @04:11AM (#24155208)
if gold becomes common, it's value drops, as it has no inherent uses (other than as decoration, and minor electrical/industrial uses, for which there is plenty here on earth already). Ditto with platinum - 'cept may be more valuable than gold for use as catalysts in industry.

I would imagine that asteroids would hold value with rare-earths instead of currency metals.

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Re:The New ‘Gold Rush in Space’ by dodobirdlord on Friday August 14, 2020 @04:27AM (#24155319)
> as it has no inherent uses (other than as decoration, and minor electrical/industrial uses, for which there is plenty here on earth already)

This is extremely wrong. Gold is the preferred material for a huge variety of industrial applications, it's just not used because it's too expensive.

Silver and platinum are probably even bigger industrial wins though. Platinum is used a lot in industrial chemical reactors, and silver would entirely replace copper in electronics and heat-sinks if it were cheaper.

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Re:The New ‘Gold Rush in Space’ by fastball on Friday August 14, 2020 @04:19AM (#24155273)
I think you severely underestimate the usefulness of gold in electronics.
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Re:The New ‘Gold Rush in Space’ by imtringued on Friday August 14, 2020 @08:09AM (#24156821)
You're ignoring the problem. The electronics industry would love it if they could gold plate every single PCB but for that to happen the price of gold would have to drop. Gold mining is probably only profitable at current gold prices so the electronics industry won't benefit from expensive space gold.
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Re:The New ‘Gold Rush in Space’ by garmaine on Friday August 14, 2020 @11:44AM (#24159410)
> Gold mining is probably only profitable at current gold prices

There is no reason to make this assumption.

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