FWIW, I was into crypto during the previous peak, and transferring it around involved copy-pasting strings of gibberish and sacrificing chickens to the gods so I wouldn't mess up and nuke it all. As far as I can tell things have gotten worse, not better, since.
Crypto is a big space and there's a lot of variety, but yes. Not that many banks where I am offer effectively free and quick transfers with the ease of scanning a QR code, which I have done with crypto.
Even better is the experience of using ripple on keybase chat, which is far superior to anything I've seen offered by a bank in my area.
Sure, some cryptocurrencies are more painful, but that's not a necessary characteristic of the whole space, and perhaps even more important - we can innovate in the crypto space more easily than we can innovate in the traditional payments space.
Actually traditional banking has got a lot better at payments recently, and I think it's to some extent because they realize that they need to compete.
2. In poor countries where monthly phone bills or lack of banking is an issue they often have prepaid.
3. Almost every adult in the world has a phone, you don’t even need a smartphone for some of these payment systems.
4. If you’re a poor Kenyan farmer that has been using your phone to pay anonymously for over a decade, I highly doubt you care that you need “permission” from Safaricom to do it.
So no, I really really don’t see the point. And I am someone that raised (a tiny amount of) seed money for a crypto based money transfer system for Africa in 2012. There could be improvements on the margins but there’s really no disruptive advantage to it being “decentralised”.
Registering phone numbers with the state is the global standard for a majority of humans, so don’t give me that “I don’t have to register”. Try that in China, Brazil, India, etc. With permissionless systems, as long as I have an internet connection, I can send and receive money.
If you don’t see this value, I’m sorry.
You are arguing for a state run centralized closed system of monetary control, and I am arguing for a non-state open monetary system in which anyone can participate. Do you understand how vastly different these two things are?
I'm not "arguing" for anything, I'm just stating the fact that you can already transfer money peer to peer, and it isn't controlled by "the state" just because in some countries your phone number has to be registered. Or are you saying they also register each transfer?
How would your "permissionless" money transfer system work, do you have any ideas or is it just slogans?
And if you don't want to use a phone, you would presumably need a computer. That seems less inclusive, not more.
I know I’m rare in my beliefs and paranoid understanding of geopolitics. Phones and cellular networks are not technologies to liberate the soul, no, far from it.
Tons of people said the internet was a fad too and where are we now? It’s ok if you don’t get it, you will, or your kids will. The main point of crypto is that traditional finance is insanely bad ux. It’s just not internet native and never will be because of the entrenched forces.
Crypto is internet native money and we’re not going back.