Elon Musk is definitely interested in digital currency, but does not seem to want to understand it. At least, I am worried that he does not know enough about Bitcoin (Bitcoin) And the general decentralized system.
Decentralized systems must be secure, and Proof of Work (PoW) is Bitcoin’s solution to protect its digital assets. The more successful Bitcoin is, the more energy PoW needs to protect the network. In other words, the reason why Bitcoin consumes much more electricity than Dogecoin (dog), for example, because BTC is much safer than DOGE.
related: Expert answer: How does Elon Musk affect the crypto space?
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Elon Musk’s irony
From the perspective of power consumption, BTC consumes more energy in Bitcoin mining. This is because Bitcoin is in a leading position. Ironically, electricity is amorphous—in the sense that you don’t know where it came from. Just look at the one kilowatt transmitted to you, unless someone tells you, you don’t know where it comes from. You have to track the source. Sometimes the source is green and renewable energy—such as solar, wind, hydro, or geothermal—but sometimes the energy is dirty coal, nuclear power, and other dirty energy supplies.
The main problem is that the energy itself is neutral. I don’t know where the energy comes from. Energy is only energy-electricity. Therefore, it is ironic that for Elon Musk, the energy used in the electric cars he sells in Tesla is the same as the energy used in the coal-fired BTC mining machine.Ironically He has been criticizing the mining machine Consumes a lot of energy, because Tesla cars use a lot of energy from all over the world to provide power. If you are to manufacture and sell 10 million cars, in principle they will use a lot of energy.
Who is right and who is wrong?
The real way to get rid of dirty energy is to shut down production at the source: power plants. This is the only way to get rid of unsustainable energy. If Bitcoin mining is necessary, you might think that Christmas lights are okay, or turning on the air conditioner is okay, but in reality, Christmas lights-in my opinion-are really unnecessary. I can also argue that air conditioning is unnecessary. On the other hand, washing machines and dryers are necessary, but if you really want to, you can try to wash clothes naturally, by hand, and in the creek behind your house.
These subjective concerns about what is right and wrong, or how a person uses their electricity boil down to society. Do we allow society and mature adults living in it to choose the way they want to use electricity? Should there be some standards, rules or even laws to regulate it?
If you can use a washing machine or air conditioner, why can’t you use a Bitcoin mining machine? All these appliances waste energy, but these examples are designed to make our lives easier and better.
Whether it is Paris Agreement Or some other important international law, the goal must be to eliminate dirty energy from the source, in the power plant, as mentioned earlier. To be fair, many other industries use a lot of electricity: aluminum, steel, gold and silver mines-they all take up a lot of electricity and use a lot of energy, whether it’s electricity or fossil fuel energy. In the final analysis, this is a question of judging whether the activity is good or bad. The answer here is entirely subjective: for some people, mining gold or processing steel is a good thing, while mining Bitcoin is harmful to the environment. On the contrary, I think mining Bitcoin is good, and processing gold and steel is a waste of money, energy and resources. After all, this is subjective.
Why did Musk choose Dogecoin?
Elon Musk likes to be famous, he likes power-many people may like it. Interestingly, for Bitcoin, he has no influence on it, because Bitcoin is already very powerful. In other words, he cannot take over and set direction for Bitcoin because it is already too powerful.
Look at some of the top cryptocurrencies besides Bitcoin: my brother, Charlie Lee, Is the public image of Litecoin (LTC). Ether (Ethereum) Has a very public founder, Vitalik Butrin. Behind the tether (USDT) Yes Jean-Louis Van de Velde. Binance Coin (Bitcoin) Has Changpeng Zhao, Wait, they can’t be taken over because there are famous people in the driver’s seat, so to speak. Finally, you have Dogecoin, which was created to resemble a hobby project, but then the founder of Dogecoin seems to have disappeared, and Dogecoin is not actively maintained.
This is an interesting theory: Elon Musk discovered the tragedy of Dogecoin and realized that he could control it. He may become the new head of Dogecoin. (This is why I think he did not choose any other cryptocurrencies because they have their beloved founders and leaders). With such a strong and famous Dogecoin leader, the price skyrocketed. This is my theory, but in general, I don’t like centralized digital currencies. The fact that you can take over Dogecoin and set the direction single-handedly is a bad omen for Dogecoin. For me, this is not very interesting.
This article comes from an interview Max Jakubowski with Bobby Lee. It has been compressed and edited.
This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading action involves risks, and readers should research on their own when making a decision.
The views, thoughts and opinions expressed here are only those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.
Bobby Lee He is the former CEO of China’s first cryptocurrency exchange BTCC, which was founded in 2011. Lee received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in computer science from Stanford University, and began his technical career as a software engineer at Yahoo. His current business is Ballet, a cryptocurrency hardware wallet designed for public accessibility and adoption. Lee is also the brother of Charlie Lee, the vice chairman of the Bitcoin Foundation board of directors and the founder and advocate of Litecoin.
