Non Sequitur by Wiley Miller for March 08, 2022

Not really crypto, not really currency.

Crypto is like playing “Liars Dice”. Its all fun and games until the music stops and the value disappears.

Next, he explains NFTs!

I can’t even begin to understand Crypto and something tells me that i don’t want to undersrtand it.;-D d

Crypto seems to be the new ‘program the time on your VCR’

He will then hypnotize them by explaining blockchain.

Criptocurrency isn’t complicated. You give someone else your money, they give you nothing in return, and… That’s it.

He’s going to need smoke, mirrors and a bigger hat.

Crypto-Currency: It’s for people who want money for nothing.

If you think of it as a giant pyramid scheme, but WITH computers…

The Great Confoundo. Great name.

“When you invest in things, That you don’t understand, Then you suffer,

Crypto-Currency ain’t the way…..” apologies to Stevie Wonder

Wow. He’s good.

You mean you’ll get it to make cents to them?

The old 3-card monte game shows up somewhere in every generation. Bitcoin is it for now.

Rather than making sense of crypto-currency to you with his explanation, he might caution you how it could make you centless.

When you know how it works (like how a trick is done), it’s not as amazing.

Why do a sense a parallel to the 1920’s when it comes to crypto, and fear we’re walking into another Black Tuesday?

And for my encore, I will make money disappear. Viola! Higher taxes! ta da!

Gee, I can’t handle REAL money so I will invest in FAKE money instead, what could go wrong.

Crypto-Currency works just like a pyramid scheme. Don’t think so? Wait.

Crypto currency is like the stock market – it’s only worth what people think it’s worth. It’s like betting on public opinion.

If I buy an NFT with cryptocurrency, nothing really happened, did it?

Yes. Go on. I’m listening. (For the record I didn’t invest in the dot-com bubble either)

Maybe explain how gas can go up $2 in one day?

Just because “it makes sense” that does not mean that you have an accurate understanding of it.

Has anyone ever tried to cash out their millions in crypto-currency for real cash or fungible assets? Has anyone bought a house or a car with crypto-currency?

Redd Panda: #1: speculators #2: the US exporting millions of barrels of oil and distillates per day…

CROOK-TO-CURRENCY…

“I will get crypto-currency to make sense to you. This may take awhile.” /s

There is nothing inherently special about government issued money when it has nothing to prevent its unlimited creation. The US has created more “money” in the last few years than it did in the past 200+ years. Nixon took us off the gold standard which prevented dollar inflation because gold is hard to find and extract.

Think about it this way. Remember when long distance phone calls were expensive? Then we got “Voice Over Internet Protocol, or VOIP”

Now look at email protocols. That’s messaging over Internet protocol, or email.

Next look at HTTP, hypertext transfer protocol, which is information over Internet protocol, or the World Wide Web.

Blockchains enable Money Over Internet Protocol.

Money is what people think it is. Government money that has nothing behind it is prone to excess as people demand more from their government than they are willing to pay for. Cryptocurrencies are valuable because people have decided they are. The dollar is valuable because people have decided it is.

Just because something is hard to grasp does not make it mysterious except to those who don’t make the effort to understand. But not understanding something doesn’t automatically mean that something is not worth understanding.

How many here can explain an integrated circuit? How about Maxwell’s equations about electromagnetic phenomena? Can anyone here explain mass spectrometry?

Fine, then. Here’s an easy one. Explain how to design and manufacture an iPhone.

You use it, but don’t understand it.

The same is true of money. We use it, but most people don’t understand what it is and how monetary systems work. Here’s a hint. You want inflation? Just create more money. That’ll do it. In fact that’s doing it right now.

There are advantages to being poor. Cryptocurrency is one thing I’m not concerned about.

It’s sort of a Ponzi scheme with digital smoke and crypto mirrors.

If you can’t feel it,it ain’t real.

is that even possible?

Next he’ll explain how wind and solar provide energy for the entire planet!

Finally some clarity on the subject, some but still fuzzy.

The value of the dollar is based on the value of the US economy. The value of crypto-currency is based on the collective value of the currency-holders; in other words, their portion of the economies they live in. A currency only has the value that people who trade in it give it.

While he’s at it, maybe he could explain why people spend huge amounts of money on NFTs.

Forget it. It’s worse than Federal Reserve Notes.

The concept of crypto-currency makes perfect sense: being able to transfer money from one person to another in a completely trustworthy way with no intermediary knowing about the transaction, as if one person handed the other cash or traveler’s check. Of course someone has to be willing to translate the “play money” back into real money, like American Express traveler’s checks (for which they charged a percentage when one bought the checks) (and they were also making money on the “float” of having your real money for some period of time before they had to pay money back out to whoever you gave your check to). What does NOT make sense is the idea that one can “mine” or create value simply by running a computer. That’s the part that makes the rest of it look suspicious.

Understanding crypto-currency isn’t magic. It would be a miracle.

I don’t think that’s possible!

crypto is like a cloud of smoke, one good puff and it is gone

people want something for nothing, and crypto gives you nothing for something, like pulling a rabbit out of your a$$

Proof that cryptocurrency isn’t real money: Nobody says “I have 1 Bitcoins”, they say “I have $40K worth of bitcoin.”

NFTs too?

Great illustration for the meaning of crypto, I wondered when you’d address that issue.

It’s actually super simple: rich people invented a way to become richer by using computers in a totally legal way. It’s not fraud if you pretend each precious little crypto coin is unique in its own way!

NFT’s next please..

Nevermind Crypto currency… explain NFTs to us!

Crypto is easy. It’s like if idling your car 24/7 occasionally produced solved Sudoku puzzles that you could then exchange for heroin.

¡Feliz Día Internacional de la Mujer!

Yes, please do!

And for this gig, I will be paid in… hang on a minute … cryptocurrency!!

cute bunny

Might as well go BitCoin (et al)…after all our US Dollar is total fiat money based upon absolutely nothing but good faith.

First you make them pay more money up front, then you walk off stage with it.