I'm not trying to be snarky, but wtf did I just read?<p>The article:<p>* people are beginning to take bitcoin more seriously.<p>* there are multiple cryptocurrencies<p>* bitcoin is the biggest<p>* namedropping for blockstream<p>* namedropping for stellar<p>* ¯\_(ツ)_/¯<p>* maybe the real competition between cryptocurrencies is still to come<p>I'm not sure of the message or the point here. My guess would be to namedrop blockstream, but the whole thing is unfocussed and confusing to me.
Blockstream's eleven (!) founders include the majority of Bitcoin's core developers—they're also the ones pushing most fervently for a fork of the Bitcoin protocol. Is there anything to be worried about here? (That is, besides the perplexing nature of a startup raising a $21 million “seed round” for its multitudinous founders to develop an entirely new and unproven technology stack.)
"I suspect most people who have heard of Bitcoin don’t even know alternatives exist." True.<p>In a world with fiat, bitcoin is king due to liquidity. In a world without fiat, it's much easier to consider alternatives. Personally I'd like to see a wallet that holds many currencies, and can do all the conversion automatically.<p>"priced in ___coin? okay"<p>"You want to pay with ____coin? sure!"<p>"You only accept ___coin? no probs!"<p>And apps like <a href="http://shapeshift.io" rel="nofollow">http://shapeshift.io</a> can help with background conversions.<p>Thus, the long-tail of crypto becomes more relevant.<p>For me, it's not a battle of bitcoin, rather it's a battle of "either/or" (now) vs "both/and" (future.)<p>I also think the future is coming faster than we think. People will want bitcoin alternatives, especially people that want to make money and think there are better coins that can do that (and will give them a try.)<p>add:<p>to give an example of this war, I placed a link to <a href="http://snapcard.io" rel="nofollow">http://snapcard.io</a> in reddit-bitcoin for a shop owner in France wanting to accept digital currencies. Result: -1 downvotes, 4 hours ago. Why? I presume because they are a multi-crypto POS startup.<p>Bitcoin is full of the same people that were trashing it when it first came out. Now they are trashing any alternatives. I don't want to be part of that. They're neither cool, nor smart.
>>Lest you think I’m taking sides already, let me stress that it’s not at all clear that AC is actually better than DC<p>No, it has been settled for almost a hundred years that AC, for long distance transmission, is the best. Too bad he included something like this. It diminishes his credibility and colors the entire article.<p>Edit: So I seem to be quite wrong. Well, at least now I know. I stand corrected.
Nothing stops alt-coins from continuing to exist independently as they do today if sidechains are implemented.<p>I liked the VoIP analogy, although other examples abound where an initial network effect was supplanted by competing implementations (e.g. search engines, social networking).
Ah, the weekly Bitcoin hype thread. That there is still future for BTC other than a specific niche. The make believe story. In case there are still people not fooled yet. Don't get me wrong, I like BTC. But this speculation driven value investment is not the right way.