I just realized something. Bitcoin is literally worthless. Hear me out.
Yesterday I was arguing that Bitcoin is a failed digital currency, and then people were saying it’s not a currency it’s a store of value. That’s when I responded that store of value is a characteristic of an asset, not the defining feature. And it got me thinking about gold.
People immediately assume Bitcoin can succeed as a digital gold. But there’s a lot of things that separate Bitcoin and gold.
Gold isn’t *just* a store of value. It was used for thousands of years as a currency. It was liquid, widely accepted, and valued by everyone. Even nowadays it’s used in art, as a status symbol, and is integral to modern day electronics. None of this is true for Bitcoin.
Think about it. Sure Bitcoin is scare. But does that really mean *anything* in the digital world where everything is infinitely replicable? Imagine if we had the ability to make an infinite amount of metal that all worked and looked exactly the same. Do you really think gold would continue to be worth anything? No, of course not.
Being rare isn’t enough to make a digital asset worth anything. It must also have utility, which is the same thing that gives USD it’s value.
The ONLY thing that keeps Bitcoin up is that people are willing to pay that much for it. However, when crypto and blockchain starts getting taken more seriously and becomes more mainstream, I think people are going to realize this and jump ship into things that actually provide value.
Steve Jobs said in this day and age tech becomes obsolete after ten years. Bitcoin is no different. There are dozens of projects that do everything Bitcoin does but better. The only thing Bitcoin has going for it is a head start. But like I said, over time it will fall to other projects.
