Having sent $100k via traditional banks as well as crypto, I can add my anecdote that the latter was far easier. Some would argue that it shouldn't be that easy, and I agree to some extent.

Setting up our tax system to be transparent and auditable by any citizen would be the greatest benefit to a distributed ledger, but something tells me that the current institutions would heavily resist that transition, so you are correct that it has little current value.

With online payments I had a different experience. Tried to pay in a store that had coinbase payments with a binance account. So many issues:

- The QR code to pay didn't work with the binance app

- Had to find a way to copy the hash tag of the account from desktop to mobile to pay (luckily if you have a macbook pro and iphone this is easy)

- Initially chose the incorrect network for payments on binance so the transfer didn't go through. Had to read online which network to select.

With a card payment is normally just putting the cards details and in a few cases do an additional authentication.

> there is no reason why crypto has any value. Given that bitcoin transaction times are nowhere near VISA or cash times,

You interchanged crypto with bitcoin, but bitcoin is not all crypto. The value of crypto comes from them being decentralized and independent of a financial bank. This has the negative side effect of it being very valuable to illegal and fradulent activity, too.

> The value of crypto comes from them being decentralized and independent of a financial bank.

The value of that is exactly zero when you live in a stable and developed country, and you are not engaged in criminal activity.

Cryptocurrency has value because people are willing to trade for it, whether money or goods. I don't understand why people are willing to trade for it, but to say it has literally zero value isn't exactly accurate.

Who is willing to trade it other than exchanges to purchase fiat currency? I've never found an item that I can actually buy with crypto, where the seller is not simply using crypto as a money transfer service. If a seller 'accepts' crypto via an exchange that converts it to fiat... that's not really crypto. That's just using it for money transfer, but we have way better solutions for that.

Other than one off gags, I've never actually seen anything being sold for crypto. Perhaps things are different where you live

If it can be exchanged for money that can be exchanged for stuff, it has value. I can't spend gold or equities at the grocery store but those are priced in dollars and have value as well.

Equities are not currency. Equities have value because of the dividends they pay (or retain).

Gold has value because it is scarce and can easily be verified, and has industrial uses. Moreover, you don't need a third party to check for gold. It is straightforward to ensure that gold is real if you have basic tools. However, if gold brokers did not exist and gold were not also easily divisible, gold would have little utility.

Bitcoin has value because of the exchanges. If there are no exchanges, then it has no value.

But, what all three of the above have in common is that the only reason they currently have any value in our markets is because they can be exchanged for pieces of paper that governments will throw you in jail for should you fail to pay them upon transfer of any of the above assets.

Which many people do not, and here we are.

I can't believe it's been 5 minutes and no one has said 'lightning network' yet.

It's because the ones who would have said it now know.

I'm fully aware of the lightning network. I'm also aware of something called VISA and American express. Which number do I call to get concierge service with bitcoin? That's what I thought.