Yes, this has been the song of the Bitcoin fan for a half-dozen years at least. It doesn't work yet, but in the future it will be amazing. "Jam yesterday and jam tomorrow, but never jam today."
In 1995, the Internet was a vast improvement for things like email and file transfer and online forums and some games. It delivered actual value for 30 million people. Yes, there was more that it could do. But it delivered value on a daily basis for a lot of people. (And that was also true in 1985, albeit for something like 30,000 people.)
Bitcoin will never offer lower fees and greater convenience than existing payment networks. If it actually becomes a threat, those existing payment networks will get their shit together. And they can be far better than blockchain-based alternatives, because blockchains impose unnecessary technical limitations.
Look, for example, at M-Pesa. It's an electronic currency that leapfrogged existing payment systems. It started about the same time as Bitcoin. Except that it's actually useful for normal transactions and has real usage. In 2016, it was averaging 190 transactions per second, about 100x what Bitcoin is doing. Transactions are instant, and its fees are already lower than credit cards.
We could have that today in Western countries, but we don't because incumbents don't want to change and we're mostly fine with that. But if incumbents come under threat, they can do at least that well, and probably better given their much larger tech and research budgets.
In 1995, the Internet was a vast improvement for things like email and file transfer and online forums and some games. It delivered actual value for 30 million people. Yes, there was more that it could do. But it delivered value on a daily basis for a lot of people. (And that was also true in 1985, albeit for something like 30,000 people.)
Bitcoin will never offer lower fees and greater convenience than existing payment networks. If it actually becomes a threat, those existing payment networks will get their shit together. And they can be far better than blockchain-based alternatives, because blockchains impose unnecessary technical limitations.
Look, for example, at M-Pesa. It's an electronic currency that leapfrogged existing payment systems. It started about the same time as Bitcoin. Except that it's actually useful for normal transactions and has real usage. In 2016, it was averaging 190 transactions per second, about 100x what Bitcoin is doing. Transactions are instant, and its fees are already lower than credit cards.
We could have that today in Western countries, but we don't because incumbents don't want to change and we're mostly fine with that. But if incumbents come under threat, they can do at least that well, and probably better given their much larger tech and research budgets.