2015

We have yet to see any meaningful adoption in the retail world and the institutional world seems quite lukewarm. . . . The deflationary quality of [Bitcoin](https://99bitcoins.com/) – by design and not by accident – is a major drawback. Deflation naturally encourages hoarding and delays spending, which is the behavior we are witnessing with BTC holders.

Sometimes it’s hard to tell whether Bitcoin is more like Ponzi scheme or a pyramid scheme. Whatever it is, though, it isn’t a currency. . . . It’s not clear what Bitcoin is or what it will be, but it is clear what it’s not. It’s not a currency.

I don’t think Bitcoin is the correct technology to build these sorts of ideas on. I understand and strongly sympathize with the desire to move to decentralized systems and plan on eventually working in that space myself, but between Bitcoin’s efficiency problems and poor tolerance of network partitions, I do not think it’s suitable as a general purpose global decentralized database in the way people want to use it.

Bitcoin, at its core, is an attempt to solve big socioeconomic problems through technology. But so long as it remains an overwhelmingly male domain, it’s going to continue to concentrate on the economic problems, while missing the big social problems. Which means that it’s going to continue going nowhere.

The price of Bitcoin lost most of its value since its parabolic rise and speculators have lost a lot of money. The next electronic payment technology will be very large. We eagerly await the next version of electronic money to appear.

Another multi-million dollar Bitcoin heist could be the nail in the coffin for the troubled cryptocurrency.