September 21, 2020
Opinion/Editorial
The medium of exchange meme (MoE) in crypto is all but dead. Enthusiasts and investors have moved on, pouring time, resources, and talent into exotic cryptocurrency-related projects focused on everything except MoE. Digital gold continues to dominate the discussion, such as it exists. Decentralized finance (DeFi) is gaining legitimacy by the minute. World computers and metanet dreams are capturing more press and attention. In the background, battered, beaten, forgotten is Bitcoin Cash (BCH).
Remnant
Bitcoin Cash is the peer-to-peer electronic cash ecosystem remnant.
You want tokens? BCH has tokens. You want DeFi? DeFi works on BCH. Stablecoins? Yep. Privacy tools? Most definitely. You want bells and whistles? Doo-dads and whiz-bangs? BCH has it all.
But those are not why Bitcoin Cash is valuable or will be valuable in the future.
The project, brought to life in mid-2017 and maintained faithfully for three years, exists to be a hard global money, a side-by-side alternative to governments' monopoly on money and their emphasis on softer properties such as inflation, manipulation, loose credit.
Bitcoin Cash is private, stateless money, and that's already super ambitious before any other distractions.
Don't Get it Twisted
Some get it twisted further and argue Bitcoin Cash is solely a MoE, that it's somehow not a store of value (SoV). That's wrong -- totally, utterly wrong. The MoE fixation has led goofier BCH influencers to discard saving, to insanely dismiss the hodl wave.
That mistake has been costly, besides being just plain stupid.
Hodl, taken in the Misesian tradition, is arguably the basis for advanced economies. Savers aren't to be scolded; they're, in fact, rewarded in freer societies. Anyone who says differently is illiterate or pushing a less-than free market agenda.
And so, thanks in large part to the disproportionate amplification of influencers within the BCH universe, SoV was vilified -- a tragic mistake for which markets have made the project pay, and pay dearly.
It's not either, or; it's both and. Bitcoin Cash is both a SoV and MoE; or, better put, it was designed to be both on purpose.
Bitcoin Cash is Bitcoin Better
In fact, arguments in favor of Bitcoin (BTC) hold true for BCH as well, from the 21 million coin cap as a form of digital scarcity and limit on inflation, to its reliance on proof of work (PoW) consensus. At a technical level, Bitcoin Cash works like BTC, but better.
Where BTC clung to the SoV meme at the expense of MoE, and retarded adoption by every metric, Bitcoin Cash has the lone opportunity to move an open source, public distributive ledger project, begun more than a decade ago, forward and on-chain through adhering faithfully to hard money elements.
At present, the MoE argument in crypto is losing, and losing badly. Recognizing that fact is important. But why is it subject to so much ridicule? It's due in large measure to MoE over-emphasis by influencers and their the chastising of digital gold. Again, that was a giant error in strategy.
In a way, ignoring hard money properties of Bitcoin Cash sunk its appeal. Rather than being viewed as something valuable to hold, it was seen as a novelty, a silly way to buy coffee or tchotchkes or pub food. Look at this neat parlor trick. What should have been a powerful demonstration, Earth shattering if rightly understood, instead was soon forgotten.
Nearly everyone who received Bitcoin Cash wanted to get out of it fast and into other things, internet of things-things, gadgets and services. That's not entirely terrible if we're back in 2013, and folks are just beginning to grapple with the tech. By late 2018, my friends, the trick was losing its snap, its verve. In 2020, it's safe to type that it's all but dead in lasting effectiveness.
The Hard Money
Taken together, however, showing Bitcoin Cash retains hard money properties by being a preeminent digital gold while tempering transaction fees through the rational policy of expanding block size in a goldilocks manner, makes BCH a killer application, an epoch-changing invention long before anyone considers tokens, smart contracts, stablecoins, shiny new things (none of which make any sense if the underlying BCH is worthless).
Emphasizing BCH as hard money also makes it a lot easier to convince average folks of Bitcoin Cash's value proposition as they're increasingly searching to hedge against government money (which continues to look shadier and shakier to even the least observant). Not only can you use it, an improvement on gold in a variety of ways, but it retains value better than the money your politicians control (among other advantages).
I can buy everyday items with this stuff? It's cheaper than alternatives, including legacy methods? Nice. But if the value of this digital money plummets because every BCH dabbler who gets a chunk dumps, why the hell I am holding it again?
This vicious cycle doomed the MoE meme because Bitcoin Cash influencers lost the plot. Hardly anyone was around to offer cogent counter-arguments. Don't worry! Spend, spend, spend! Leave it for the next guy to figure out!
Many never returned, and promises of bigger blocks could be found among dozens of alternative coins. The god of decentralization was morphing everywhere as well. BTC digital gold solidified to the degree possible with mempool clogs and crazy-high fees. Bored, the vacuum left in the MoE meme crash meant an opening to lure adopters and investors away using new gizmos and complex finance schemes (sexed up degenerate gambling, if we're being honest).
Reclaiming MoE and SoV, the Paradox
Paradoxically in late 2020, as of this writing, Bitcoin Cash finds itself alone and in a position to reclaim a mantle seemingly few know they want, and by sheer network effect. Irony of irony, most everyone has left the MoE meme behind in search of Lambos. That's a giant hole, a value proposition for only BCH to fill.
As the Bitcoin Cash ship slowly rights, no other project is so singularly focused on MoE by way of earning a SoV status ... and not through speculation and hype, but as a result of utility and on besting government soft money.
BCH has long since proven its worth, its viability in the wild. Transactions are seamless, quick, frighteningly cheap. Bitcoin Cash markets itself the more it's used, put into practice, without too much of a push. Use it a couple of times, and you're sold.
Indeed, merchants after souring on BTC due to notorious hiccups and fees, were attracted to BCH, and found it relatively easy to incorporate. It acted like Bitcoin, everybody knew about Bitcoin, yet it operated clearly superior to Bitcoin.
All that's missing is understanding what Bitcoin Cash already has, value, and that it will eventually keep its value, if not more, over time as the tech undergirding it is maintained and streamlined toward hard money ends.
Incentives are Aligning
In fact, the BCH roadmap points to hard money properties no other crypto project can touch. Additionally, incentives are aligning to keep BCH priorities straight -- get the tech right, sound money right, and everything else follows.
Shore up infrastructure maintenance, keep it humming, and marketers and merchants will not need blind confidence in some hotshot influencer. They'll have it rather in a sustainable combination of world-quality code and the economic foundations that built flourishing human civilizations.
Thankfully, a small cadre kept alive the peer-to-peer electronic cash idea, one coffee at a time, one network upgrade at a time. And though BCH was attacked on every front in its short history, it's now the perfect moment to unite MoE and SoV by way of sealing the go of Bitcoin Cash: hard money tech.
For BCH, hard money means a kind of intrinsic value in a common publicly distributed ledger and payment system rolled into one, un-censorable, immutable, reliable, scalable, user-friendly. And while it's arguable as to the type of commodity, or even if it's a commodity we've maybe never witnessed before, Bitcoin Cash is more than just supply and demand money floating in the ether, a speculative plaything.
Bitcoin Cash is readying to be world money. The debate is over as far as it has ever been over -- enough people have used BCH online and in real life to provide organic testimonials. Folks around the world demonstrated its power and utility. All that is left to do is tighten infrastructure within the hard money paradigm, and incentives will do the rest.
Donate directly to Coin Fugazi:
bitcoincash:qzkdw8axyh8y6n38crp8k6herdlvvlmrp5k5tqdsm6
_____
C. Edward Kelso is CEO of Coin Fugazi
CONTACT: cedwardkelso@gmail.com
Well, I disagree with what you say (if a pure SoV were possible it would NOT be a good thing) but I like how you say it so upvoted.