The system is now straining at the seams. Its computational underpinnings have collectively reached 100 times the performance of the world’s top 500 supercomputers combined: more than 50,000 petaflops. Bitcoin’s success has revealed three weaknesses in particular. It is not as secure and anonymous as it seems; the “mining” system that both increases the Bitcoin supply and ensures the integrity of the currency has led to an unsustainable computational arms-race; and the distributed-ledger system is becoming unwieldy. Will Bitcoin’s self-correcting mechanisms, and the enlightened self-interest of its users, be able to address these weaknesses and keep Bitcoin on the rails?
And this is how you spread misinformation and create fear. Bitcoin certainly has its risks, but either the author is fear mongering, or really does not get it.
yea that article was a waste of everyone's time. i think it's ok for people to have their opinions though. There are certainly many "pro Bitcoin" articles written that highlight its keys to success and conveniently forget to mention any flaws.
In fact a lot of pro BTC articles still paint it as perfect and Nakamoto is idolized. If the community were more willing to admit to possible errors perhaps they'd have a shot at fixing them. And I'd wager that the people they're idolizing (if they are true to their vision and not just profiteering) see these mistakes and are wracking their brains, rather than watching the numbers and smiling complacently.
i think the key with Bitcoin is to get people thinking... some are inspired but many just want to profit. Decent lesson about greed, I believe...
That's like the days of whitchhunts. You're a whitch if you can't prove otherwise.
You can't be guilty unless proven innocent. If you're going to claim bitcoin is at some kind of technical-limit, you have to show it. Otherwise, it's more reasonable to believe it's working as intended.
> Every participant in the system must keep a copy of the block chain, which now exceeds 11 gigabytes in size and continues to grow steadily. This alone deters casual use.
Is 11GB really that much? Downloadable video games and movies easily top this size, and it's not at all uncommon for a person to "have" several pieces of similar media.
This piece was clearly not written out fear from misunderstanding the technicals of Bitcoin, which is forgivable to some degree. It was written out of fear of something uncontrollable and different.
And this is how you spread misinformation and create fear. Bitcoin certainly has its risks, but either the author is fear mongering, or really does not get it.