Digital art piece NFT sold for record breaking $69 million

[badass]

No, that wasn't my argument. Don't be ridiculous. My argument is that it's trendy to bash it, and decry it's existence without looking beyond the name, with assumptions being made that it's all just wasteful, unproductive proof of work with no tangible benefit.

The simple fact is that it isn't going to go away and still largely in it's formative years, so it's a natural progression that people will seek to improve efficiency and reduce environmental impact.

Just about every major industry that began by scarring the landscape, producing pollution or was seen as hugely inefficient despite being adopted has undergone changes to mitigate the damage. Quarries and mines have to put forward restoration plans before receiving approval to extend or break new ground. The automotive industry has fuel efficiency targets. Even planning for new housing estates or retail developments is contingent upon the developer earning "green" points for anything from the type of insulation used to installing biomass generators to reduce load on the grid.

I only quoted the renewables bit. I actually agree with comparing bitcoin to gold extraction being lazily argued part of your post.

[DanceswithUnix]

I only quoted the renewables bit. I actually agree with comparing bitcoin to gold extraction being lazily argued part of your post.

I struggled with most of it tbh, but was trying to avoid some big whingy wall of text so stuck to one point. So I'll try and throw in a further point.

There are established alternatives to Ethereum that exist today, right now, that are massively more efficient and hence would help the environment. No-one within the crypto community is adopting them. They just keep pumping Eth to the moon to get rich quick.

I've read and watched a lot of so called news items and youtube channels over the last few weeks and my take away message is one of greed with a thin veneer or "we want to change the world" as an excuse. But with China minting all the Bitcoin and so much Eth coming out of ethermine.org I struggle to call it decentralised. Feral would seem a better word.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Good way to launder money.

[DanceswithUnix]

Good way to launder money.

I can see it's a good way to export money across borders if you are an internationally unpopular government or have some already laundered money you want to conveniently disappear.

But launder? People keep saying this, I thought that laundering usually started off with "I have this huge bundle of bundle of used 20's", and the crypto currency exchange seems to want a credit card (not that I've actually tried). Perhaps I'm missing something. Not sure how you get from one to the other without popping into that awkward questions asking bank.

[Scryder]

I can see it's a good way to export money across borders if you are an internationally unpopular government or have some already laundered money you want to conveniently disappear.

But launder? People keep saying this, I thought that laundering usually started off with "I have this huge bundle of bundle of used 20's", and the crypto currency exchange seems to want a credit card (not that I've actually tried). Perhaps I'm missing something. Not sure how you get from one to the other without popping into that awkward questions asking bank.

I assume they can make the laundered money completely untraceable once it goes Crypto?
My knowledge on laundering comes from TV and movies (Lethal Weapon 2 comes to mind, here's Leo Getz Explaining It), so could I be totally off the mark on this!
I'm still learning about crypto....

[DanceswithUnix]

I assume they can make the laundered money completely untraceable once it goes Crypto?

Not really, amount of a transaction and when it occurred are completely public in the blockchain ledger. That's a ton of information linking people together. The fact the wallet addresses don't have a public directory of names against them seems pretty small beans, I suspect governments already have some pretty exhaustive lists made up so they can pick at the corners of any web of contacts. Google "blockchain explorer", everyone's transactions are there.

As someone who has done computer security (pinpad design) in the past, I find most of the crypto currency claims quite laughable. You just need one of your contacts to slip.

and then at some point,you need to withdraw the money... https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...ps-got-caught/

[DanceswithUnix]

John Cleese is selling a really bad drawing of the Brooklyn Bridge as an NFT. Apparently in an interview he said "The world has gone terminally insane".

https://twitter.com/JohnCleese/statu...18969344790528

Current highest bid is $50000. Buy it now is $69M