Elon Musk Conveniently Ignored Bitcoin's Inconvenient Truth Where does the future of money end and t

[Budi]

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-05-13/elon-musk-conveniently-ignored-bitcoin-s-inconvenient-truth

Elon Musk Conveniently Ignored Bitcoin's Inconvenient Truth
Where does the future of money end and the “hustle” begin?

When electric carmaker Tesla Inc. said in February it would buy $1.5 billion worth of Bitcoin and start accepting it as payment, billionaire boss Elon Musk had little to say about the cryptocurrency’s wasteful energy consumption — despite the obvious inconsistency with his firm’s green credentials.

And when fellow Bitcoin bulls Jack Dorsey and Cathie Wood last month backed a report claiming that combining cryptocurrency mining and renewable-energy projects could be good for the environment, Musk praised the paper as “true,” even though its optimistic and overconfident assumptions smacked of greenwashing.

So while it’s an encouraging development to see Musk’s latest tweet acknowledging Bitcoin’s inconvenient truth, namely that energy-inefficient mining algorithms by some measures consume more power than entire countries, the speed of his overnight conversion is a little discombobulating. Not least for the crypto fans hanging on Musk’s every word, who were stung by the $365 billion or so wiped off the market’s value following Musk’s decision to halt support for Bitcoin payments.


Taking the tweet at face value — which is dangerous with a Pied Piper character like Musk — suggests that the alternative energy facts being pumped into the room by Bitcoiners weren’t gaining traction.

SNIP
Cheap and abundant power is essential to crypto miners, with coal accounting for an estimated 38% of their supply, according to the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance. Estimates of the Bitcoin network’s total energy consumption vary widely but run from 20-80 terawatt hours in 2019 to more than 100 this year. Despite the efforts of celebrity backers such as Dorsey and Wood in pushing narratives about renewable mining, the laser-eye crowd never came close to debunking energy concerns.

Musk’s move may also indicate that Teslas weren’t flying off the shelves as a result of accepting Bitcoin payment.
Another inconvenient truth about Bitcoin is that its huge price swings and artificially limited supply make it much better as a tool for speculative hoarding than for buying things — which can be a taxable event.
In late March a Tesla representative told CoinDesk it wasn’t clear if any cars had been paid for with the cryptocurrency.
The company later disclosed it had netted $101 million in income from selling about 10% of its own Bitcoin holdings.
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(This article may be behind a paywall with one freebie. I linked thru my incognito tab.)

[Budi]

1. The harder it will be, "to detect where the future of money ends and the "hustle" begins."

Cont.. to last paragraph of article:
It's an interesting read. Eyeopening as well.


SNIP
Musk has left just enough gas in the tank to avoid abandoning his crypto disciples completely. By leaving the door open to using tokens that are less wasteful than Bitcoin, he’s hedging his bets on the future of money — and reserved the right to keep trolling the internet as a result.

On Tuesday he asked his followers whether Tesla should accept satirical Bitcoin spin-off Dogecoin, shortly after calling it a “hustle” on Saturday Night Live. Ethereum, meanwhile, aims to move away from a mining model based on computational “work” toward one powered by existing coin “stakes.” Alternative models are out there.

Still, the more Musk blends payment U-turns, social-media memes and stand-up comedy, the harder it will be to detect where the future of money ends and the “hustle” begins. Which might be the whole point.

[samsingh]

2. i don't trust musk at all - he's very unpredictable and playing with forces that could hurt us

and he takes no accountability.

- he can't be stupid enough not to have known bitcoin's impact on the environment
- his brainchips have no ethical boundaries
- Mars aspirations, but how many will die during the process

[KPN]

3. He may be a relative genius and visionary,

but he’s also mentally unstable. He’s got all the makings of a “mad scientist” in my view. As the article noted, he also likes playing the pied piper. Put all that together with his money and, to me, that makes him potentially dangerous. (Being transparent, I have already dropped the word potentially from that sentence in my mind.)

[ColinC]

6. He wants to incorporate crypto, and bitcoin was the most acceptable option

He doesn't single handedly make these decisions for Tesla, as a board has to approve it. He chose bitcoin to ease the company into crypto which had broad support, and it appears now they realized that wasn't the best decision -even if he might have been against using that particular cryptocurrency to begin with.

Dogecoin is an option that uses far less than 1% of bitcoins energy usage for a transaction, and would qualify as a reasonable alternative currency. That being said, I think cryptocurrency mining only constitutes about a percentage or less of overall energy consumption. So either way, trying to blame crypto mining for environmental pollution is sort of ridiculous.

[TreasonousBastard]

4. Since Musk himself has admitted to probably being bipolar...

although we haven't seen a diagnosis yet, it would probably be best to ignore most of what he says.

Lots of people, from Hemingway to Selena Gomez have done great things with it. But, be wary.

(Vivien Leigh was bipolar, and said to consequently have every STD known, plus two or three of her own making)

[dalton99a]

5. Kick