The guy is full of hyperbole, making tenuous connections where none exists and blow them out of proportion to create a narrative.

In fact, 90% of the time a headline says collapse, it means sensationalism.

But yeah, good to listen and critically judge every source by yourself.

Thanks. But it seems liquid is something that has not really caught up, so that I could spend it at merchants. Even some f my Bitcoin friends who can take sats or lightning, cannot seem to accept liquid.

Aqua uses Liquid to store and swaps on the fly using Boltz. You can use Boltz to swap (without aqua as an intermediary) as well, just by going to the website.

But the goal behind the question is to find whether there is an in app or a cheaper option.

But previous cycles had no institutional effect? The average plagues were buying in the previous cycles then? What drove average plebs away then?

I did not mean the inefficiency of my personal mining setup makes my sats fetch more.

This is what I mean.

If a new miner joins a pool, he consumes his share of energy, which is not-zero even with the most efficient hardware and cooling agents imaginable.

But total sats mined globally (per day) remains fixed.

Assuming the operations of the old miners remain the same, kWH per BTC (global energy consumption dedicated to mining divided by coins mined) is higher than it was before the new miner joined.

And this is what I mean by each bitcoin costs more in terms of energy. Is my reasoning correct?

And if so, does it also impact how much do those miners (each seeing smaller yield) sell their coins for, again, ceteris paribus?

orange-pilling

Basically, trying to convince others to buy bitcoin.

May be it was justified with the very OGs, because, unless they orange-pilled each other, we would not be here today.

But I believe now it has reached a critical mass where Bitcoin is inevitable, hence my priority is to stack more sats before it becomes unaffordable. I do not have to worry about evangelising it anymore, because it will spread anyway. I want it to spread slower so that I have time to fill my bag.

Bitcoin is the economic gunpowder of this century. You either acquire it, or you get annihilated by it.

Thanks a lot for the clarification. If you don't mind a follow up, what happens if the blockstream server crashes (as a theoretical possibility, however unlikely)?

I can still recover my on-chain coins, I assume, as those UTXOs are in the Blockchain, not on Blockstream?

But my lightning and liquid sats are gone?

Thanks a lot for the advice. How do people pay at a shop (using lightning or on-chain) then? I cannot carry my trezor HWW around, can I?

The adoption may be slower than some would expect or like, but the major barrier is peoples' stupidity, and I see it as my opportunity. So I see no incentive to accelerate the process. That is why I do not orange pill, I do not talk about it to anyone I know, I do not go to Bitcoin conferences or meetups, do not wear a Bitcoin t-shirt.

I consider myself a latecomer to Bitcoin, not because I ever believed in Fiat (stacking Gold since I started having any meaningful savings), but somewhat because of my own laziness to understand Bitcoin-the theory (secure hash, elliptic curve cryptography, Blockchain) and operation (how to work with a node and wallet). I didn't put money into something I do not understand. But now that I see the light, I need more time to stack enough and a faster adoption (meaning an inevitable price surge) is not helpful to me.

I remember a YouTube video from a Bitcoin blogger who went to some Philippines island where a shop said they took Bitcoin for payment last year. Asked why not this year, the nonchalant answer (from the owner) was he found it difficult to convert, and forgot some password. This was a year when Bitcoin had a big bull-run, and their peso was going down against USD. He does not want more money, he just wants familiarity.

My conclusion (after watching many such episodes) is, too many poor people, would rather suffer, watch their savings evaporate and complain, than spending a tiny bit of intellectual horsepower to think and act outside their comfort zone. Their inertia is my opportunity.

This also brings me to my next point and that runs contrary to what many maxis and BTC evangelists imply, who say adoption happens at grassroot. Not really, a few BTC circular economies you see in Latin America or Africa stay alive only by Bitcoin donation from some NGOs. To me, it is functionally like Keynesian money printing when a massive NGO (the Federal reserve) is injecting Sats (liquidity) into a small village to keep the circular economy alive. The ones close to the money spigot (whoever gets the donation) benefits the most, then they spend the Sats to buy groceries. That is as sustainable as a Fiat ponzi scheme.

The very bitcoin OGs, starting from Nakamoto and the Pizza guys...were not necessarily ultra-wealthy but easily among the top rung in terms of intellectual horse power. But beyond that, and a few who see the light, most of the adoption eventually has to happen via institutions, whether Blackrock, JP Morgan, Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund, Emarat (the Dubai oil company taking Bitcoin) or massive treasury adoption by Apple, Google etc.

Yes, of course, if an ordinary guy could pack his bags well before Blackrock or JP Morgan came in, the reward could be mind blowing, but most ordinary guys prefer their comfort zone. They will adopt it too, either after they (or their kids) get repriced in it, or as their national currencies collapse. Remember Gresham's law followed by Their's law? Your next door pizza seller? He would adopt when he can command ~500 sats for a large pizza and rue the day when someone offered him ~10,000 sats for the exact same pizza.

Fair enough, but I never tip anyway, so this specific scenario does not arise.

Friend or colleague? While doing peer-to-peer transfer, I have asked for BTC address (not lightning, and if they don't know BTC, as in on chain, there is not a chance in hell they will know lightning), and in almost all cases the answer has been negative. Most don't show any interest to begin with, some just say it's a scam. So I just let it slide, and kinda gave up. Now a days, I just stay humble and stack my sats, instead of trying to be a Bitcoin-bro.

Use for saving. For spending, you can still do it at sites like Travala, which I have done occasionally. But I am surprised BTC adoption is that low in America as BTC map shows a good number of retailers taking it, at least much more than here in Singapore.

Also, about spending BTC, it seems sites (like Travala, BitcoinTravel etc.) charge horrendous amounts, sometimes even > 10% more than what I would pay at a competing fiat travel agent to book the same flight/hotel.

I have a feeling that since retailer BTC adoption is abysmally low, these sites know some BTC rebels will happily pay a premium to make a statement, as part of the revolution. Me personally? I love BTC as a tool for freedom go up and numbers go up, but not passionate enough for the cause to pay a premium to use it.

I will wait until there is more competition among retailers for my BTC, so that premiums turn into discounts.

Also, let me take the opportunity to recommend one of my favourite write-ups on BTC. Written about eight years back, the author proved to be prodigally prescient. If you read, you will see how some assets become money, and they go through (roughly) the phases like

Collectives->Store of Value->Medium of Exchange->Unit of account

Bitcoin is still maturing as a store-of-value, so the next steps will come with time. Be glad because it shows you are still early. Not as early as the guy who could mine 20,000 coins in with a GPU at home and spent them for a pizza, but still early.

I don't understand your urge to orange pill. Their ignorance is your opportunity to stack for cheap, why would you try to influence them to frontrun you?

Further, you know people have been kidnapped for their wallets/keys, right? By blabbering about bitcoin everywhere, you are painting a target on yourself.

I don't see bad UX anywhere. It seems most wallet interfaces are at least as much and usually more usual friendly (less clutter) than any typical online banking interface. How much simpler can it get?

That said, the challenge (if one is to custody and send his own on-chain coins) is not at the UX level, which is a frontend. A user should spend some time on mastering basic concepts of Bitcoin address, seed phrase, transactions, UTXO and how these concepts link together. No matter the front-end, these are absolutely the bare minimum to understand. Unless one is clear about what is a bitcoin, what it means to receive it, and what causes it to be sent/spent, he will inevitably make some mistake-thus blowing up his entire fund (lost keys, sent to wrong destination or gave away seed phrase to some customer support guy). Then he will go on for his whole life telling people Bitcoin is a scam.