>That's what really bums me out. Both pro-crypto and anti-crypto have become such cults that even as a curious person it's hard to make sense of anything anymore. No matter what side you're on, there's little room for reason or middle-ground.

Not every topic has middle-ground though. Things can be overwhelmingly negative or positive. I've been following BTC passively since 2011 and I've seen the messaging change from "It's going to revolutionize transactions" to "Its a great store of value!". It's no closer to reaching widespread adoption as a currency than it was in 2011 because it doesn't function well as a currency. If its not a currency then what is it and why should people want it?

>Yet I'm glad that Bitcoin and other coins exist; in an increasingly authoritarian world, such things can be a last resort for those who become "depersoned", and I suspect that one day I'll be depersoned. And if there comes a point where cryptocurrency becomes so perfect that the banks can't compete, then what's there to complain about?

It would be very very very bad for your average person for the government to not have control of the monetary supply. The actual risk of the government "deperson"-ing someone is nearly zero, why would they? I feel like this is a classic crypto argument though. Crypto is good because it might solve some abstract problem that doesn't actually exist.

>Unfortunately, countless hordes looking to get rich quick have latched on to these things because they're so accessible to anyone with too much time on their hands. The tired word "blockchain" is so abused that upon hearing it I have sadness in me. There's nothing particularly revolutionary about blockchains. A blockchain without a consensus algorithm won't amount to much, but you can have consensus algorithms without necessarily having a blockchain. But blockchain sounds more mysterious to the average person, thus it's the buzzword of favor. You don't even need to know what a blockchain actually is. Just say the word blockchain and you'll be one of the cool people!

This has been crypto since I started watching it. I'm not sure when you started counting but crypto has always had 'get-rich-quick' boosters pumping it up and selling wild fantasies about how crypto is going to change the world with blockchain/trust/decentralization. This pumping is the core of any other pyramid scheme.

>A lot of people on the other side of the coin (yuk yuk) don't even have the faintest clue of how cryptocurrencies work or how even traditional fiat currencies work.

Lots of people into crypto also don't understand how it works or how fiat currencies work.

>Effectively, he believed that the value of Bitcoin was entirely in people's perception. He didn't understand that there are a fixed number of Bitcoins, and that it wouldn't be easy to change that number without a majority of the nodes agreeing, and that there are practical reasons why some would want to use Bitcoin over fiat. If anything, fiat currency better fits his mental model. This is not uncommon, in my experience. Very few people actually read anything.

It IS entirely in peoples perception. Something being scarce doesn't give it inherent value. There is only a finite amount of my dirty underwear but I somehow don't see my used underwear becoming valuable.