He saved himself, or BTC saved him??

[Swordsoffreedom]

But only bitcoin remains your loyal assistant in any difficult moment (In any point of the world. This is a unique phenomenon, which has no analogues). Even after many years. Especially, after many years. Only bitcoin remains a real "loyal" friend. As ironic as it may sound, but that's exactly how it turns out. All you can rely on is bitcoin. Not a bank account, not a pension, not your wife or children. Just don't forget the seed phrase, because it can be your "lifeline" at the last moment, when there is no help left to come from.

Your wife can disappoint and betray you when you need her the most, your children can choose their new family over you when you might need them the most, your friends might get tired of you and move on if they consider you to be a problem to them, your bank can decide not to give you your money when you want to make use of it as they can come up with any excuse, but as long as you store your bitcoin in a self custody wallet and have access to your private key you don’t have anything to worry about, with internet access you can save yourself from any financial situation which the money you have their can solve.

What you two are saying sounds like bitcoin is the only savior in this world and there is no one more trustworthy. Should we give up everything in life like religion, relatives, banks, friends...and put our trust only in bitcoin? LOL

In this case, it was he who saved himself, not bitcoin. Because if he doesn't hold bitcoins but instead has some money in the bank or any valuable asset, that could save him too.

After all: bitcoin is just a financial instrument and we can only own it if we have money, Bitcoin is not free. Meanwhile, parents, wife, children or friends will be ready to help even when we are in dire straits. We can't assume that everyone in the world is as bad as this guy's relatives , this is just a rare case.

[Hanadawa]

But only bitcoin remains your loyal assistant in any difficult moment (In any point of the world. This is a unique phenomenon, which has no analogues). Even after many years. Especially, after many years. Only bitcoin remains a real "loyal" friend. As ironic as it may sound, but that's exactly how it turns out. All you can rely on is bitcoin. Not a bank account, not a pension, not your wife or children. Just don't forget the seed phrase, because it can be your "lifeline" at the last moment, when there is no help left to come from.

Your wife can disappoint and betray you when you need her the most, your children can choose their new family over you when you might need them the most, your friends might get tired of you and move on if they consider you to be a problem to them, your bank can decide not to give you your money when you want to make use of it as they can come up with any excuse, but as long as you store your bitcoin in a self custody wallet and have access to your private key you don’t have anything to worry about, with internet access you can save yourself from any financial situation which the money you have their can solve.

What you two are saying sounds like bitcoin is the only savior in this world and there is no one more trustworthy. Should we give up everything in life like religion, relatives, banks, friends...and put our trust only in bitcoin? LOL
In this case, it was he who saved himself, not bitcoin. Because if he doesn't hold bitcoins but instead has some money in the bank or any valuable asset, that could save him too.
After all: bitcoin is just a financial instrument and we can only own it if we have money, Bitcoin is not free. Meanwhile, parents, wife, children or friends will be ready to help even when we are in dire straits. We can't assume that everyone in the world is as bad as this guy's relatives , this is just a rare case.

I think talking about assets and relationships is a different story. I agree with the fact that our closest ones can still leave us. Your wife can leave you if she no longer has an emotional bond. Your daughter can leave you because she has a partner. And your son can leave you because he has his own life. But that is in the scope of social relationships. I mean a person can choose to be an individualist or get into a relationship with someone else and start a family. And talking about assets I think the important point here is that you should have your own assets or money that can help you when you are in a difficult situation. And it doesn't have to be Bitcoin. But you should make sure that it is not a joint property with your wife (in the case mentioned by OP). And yes Bitcoin is one of the options. If we talk about blocked bank accounts or stolen property I think it is very unlikely. But still provide a place in your finances to store your assets in the form of Bitcoin in a cold wallet because it cannot be intervened by anyone.

[Mastercon]

Reality is in this current time and for foreseeable future if you store a meaningful amount of wealth in bitcoin it’s better off with multiple custodians that self custody.
People buying bitcoin ETF aren't looking to use it as money and neither are most Bitcoiners. Bitcoin smiles upon those who help themselves. Decentralization is faster in practice... if you're really trying to move large amounts of money, then you can remove the process of vetting trusted third parties with Bitcoin, thereby saving loads of time, days, weeks, even. Wild isn't it? How they will adopt crazy ideas about Bitcoin that are blatantly not how it functions because they wish it functioned like that to make the cool stuff they want to do easier. I suspect a lot of this comes from traditional development environment norms where you can dictate the software users are using. One aspect to the trilemma is that we can build the new financial system on top of Bitcoin. On chain does not necessarily need to scale to achieve that. The LN shows us that we can achieve speed and security at the cost of some centralization and that this is an acceptable trade-off. The base layer needs to be decentralized and secure.
 

[eb66]

But only bitcoin remains your loyal assistant in any difficult moment (In any point of the world. This is a unique phenomenon, which has no analogues). Even after many years. Especially, after many years. Only bitcoin remains a real "loyal" friend. As ironic as it may sound, but that's exactly how it turns out. All you can rely on is bitcoin. Not a bank account, not a pension, not your wife or children. Just don't forget the seed phrase, because it can be your "lifeline" at the last moment, when there is no help left to come from.

Your wife can disappoint and betray you when you need her the most, your children can choose their new family over you when you might need them the most, your friends might get tired of you and move on if they consider you to be a problem to them, your bank can decide not to give you your money when you want to make use of it as they can come up with any excuse, but as long as you store your bitcoin in a self custody wallet and have access to your private key you don’t have anything to worry about, with internet access you can save yourself from any financial situation which the money you have their can solve.

What you two are saying sounds like bitcoin is the only savior in this world and there is no one more trustworthy. Should we give up everything in life like religion, relatives, banks, friends...and put our trust only in bitcoin? LOL
In this case, it was he who saved himself, not bitcoin. Because if he doesn't hold bitcoins but instead has some money in the bank or any valuable asset, that could save him too.
After all: bitcoin is just a financial instrument and we can only own it if we have money, Bitcoin is not free. Meanwhile, parents, wife, children or friends will be ready to help even when we are in dire straits. We can't assume that everyone in the world is as bad as this guy's relatives , this is just a rare case.

I think talking about assets and relationships is a different story. I agree with the fact that our closest ones can still leave us. Your wife can leave you if she no longer has an emotional bond. Your daughter can leave you because she has a partner. And your son can leave you because he has his own life. But that is in the scope of social relationships. I mean a person can choose to be an individualist or get into a relationship with someone else and start a family. And talking about assets I think the important point here is that you should have your own assets or money that can help you when you are in a difficult situation. And it doesn't have to be Bitcoin. But you should make sure that it is not a joint property with your wife (in the case mentioned by OP). And yes Bitcoin is one of the options. If we talk about blocked bank accounts or stolen property I think it is very unlikely. But still provide a place in your finances to store your assets in the form of Bitcoin in a cold wallet because it cannot be intervened by anyone.

I think "all you can rely on is bitcoin" is a step too far.

You have your self, your intelligence, your talents. Remember Matthew 6:21, "where your treasure is, there your heart will be also", and prioritize accordingly. There will be rough patches, sure, but bitcoin is simply a tool.

[betswift]

Reality is in this current time and for foreseeable future if you store a meaningful amount of wealth in bitcoin it’s better off with multiple custodians that self custody.
People buying bitcoin ETF aren't looking to use it as money and neither are most Bitcoiners. Bitcoin smiles upon those who help themselves. Decentralization is faster in practice... if you're really trying to move large amounts of money, then you can remove the process of vetting trusted third parties with Bitcoin, thereby saving loads of time, days, weeks, even. Wild isn't it? How they will adopt crazy ideas about Bitcoin that are blatantly not how it functions because they wish it functioned like that to make the cool stuff they want to do easier. I suspect a lot of this comes from traditional development environment norms where you can dictate the software users are using. One aspect to the trilemma is that we can build the new financial system on top of Bitcoin. On chain does not necessarily need to scale to achieve that. The LN shows us that we can achieve speed and security at the cost of some centralization and that this is an acceptable trade-off. The base layer needs to be decentralized and secure.

They want everything centralized..And the more opportunities they see, the better for them.

Unfortunately, if we want BTC to flourish, we will need them to allow it to become mainstream and used, otherwise, there will be loopholes, but no real usage of BTC as an alternative.

[eb66]

Reality is in this current time and for foreseeable future if you store a meaningful amount of wealth in bitcoin it’s better off with multiple custodians that self custody.
People buying bitcoin ETF aren't looking to use it as money and neither are most Bitcoiners. Bitcoin smiles upon those who help themselves. Decentralization is faster in practice... if you're really trying to move large amounts of money, then you can remove the process of vetting trusted third parties with Bitcoin, thereby saving loads of time, days, weeks, even. Wild isn't it? How they will adopt crazy ideas about Bitcoin that are blatantly not how it functions because they wish it functioned like that to make the cool stuff they want to do easier. I suspect a lot of this comes from traditional development environment norms where you can dictate the software users are using. One aspect to the trilemma is that we can build the new financial system on top of Bitcoin. On chain does not necessarily need to scale to achieve that. The LN shows us that we can achieve speed and security at the cost of some centralization and that this is an acceptable trade-off. The base layer needs to be decentralized and secure.

They want everything centralized..And the more opportunities they see, the better for them.

Unfortunately, if we want BTC to flourish, we will need them to allow it to become mainstream and used, otherwise, there will be loopholes, but no real usage of BTC as an alternative.

"They" may prefer to see bitcoin centralized, however decentralization is necessary for bitcoin to be used as medium-of-exchange.

It's a balance of dependencies.  Store-of-value is a necessary pre-requisite for medium-of-exchange, and likewise store-of-value depends on usage as medium-of-exchange.

Why is this?

b/c value isn’t created in a vacuum:

- If bitcoin is only a medium of exchange but nobody wants to hold it long term, then it won’t store value—people will only pass it on and dump it (Monero here as an example)
- On the other hand, if it’s only treated as a store-of-value without meaningful usage in exchange, then its value is fragile, because markets are thin and demand depends on pure speculation

The two reinforce each other. Store of value is naturally centralizing imo, but decentralization is what gives bitcoin value as medium of exchange.