Is Bitcoin digital gold or digital cash?

[d5000]

Well, you can't sell it as both. There's only one way: digital gold. Big blocks kill the digital gold feature, which kill the digital cash feature too (you can have digital cash when digital gold is not an option), since big blocks centralize the network.

With conservative blocks, you can get digital gold, and you can build on top a second layer, which is debatable if it would be considered digital cash or not, but it's definitely more private than traditional payment systems and fiat currencies.

I agree somewhat on your opinion about (too) big blocks, but your conclusion, for me, is wrong.

It's actually the other way around: Bitcoin can only be digital gold if it's also used as a currency ("digital cash"). It is not that important how it's used (e.g. if used in supermarkets or mainly for transactions) but it should cover as many use cases as possible. (Micropayments, for example, is not really an important on-chain use case and for this case I think LN is better).

The reason is that for the "digital gold" feature Bitcoin needs at least a certain level of value/price stability. Stability can come from usage (as a currency) and liquidity. If there is no usage and liquidity its value will be vulnerable to speculation attacks, because Bitcoin itself is not "backed" by anything but its users themselves. The more users and the more usage, the more stable it can be.

What to do, then, if bigger blocks are not desired? There is no single answer, but LN, pegged sidechains, extension blocks and on-chain density improvements (without too big blocks) are as well needed as a gradual and conservative block size increase (17% per year as in BIP 103 is a good orientation point although I don't like the automatism behind this proposal).

PS: I voted for "Both" and although I don't agree to the full post of the OP, I think this phrase is worth a quote:

Bitcoin's value depends mainly on how many people can safely use it, and if it's not in use by the largest number of people possible, it will not achieve it's full potential/value.

[Farma]

Maybe sometimes bitcoin looks like gold, because it has a high price, but bitcoin also can be said very easy to get like cash. Maybe bitcoin is a combination of both, so can be said bitcoin is cash and gold money depends on the use.

[karinaA]

Maybe sometimes bitcoin looks like gold, because it has a high price, but bitcoin also can be said very easy to get like cash. Maybe bitcoin is a combination of both, so can be said bitcoin is cash and gold money depends on the use.

Yes, bitcoin is a combination of these two phenomena. This is a coin and payment system. But now I use more bitcoin for investment. I buy bitcoins and just hold them, then to sell more expensive

[rajasumi3]

Well i dont think bitcoin is either of this .because 90% of the people use bitcoins for earning ,that is sell the bitcoins when the price is high.Bitcoins being used for groceries is not being widely used,if used in this manner will change the face of the earth in many ways.

[megynacuna]

Well i dont think bitcoin is either of this .because 90% of the people use bitcoins for earning ,that is sell the bitcoins when the price is high.Bitcoins being used for groceries is not being widely used,if used in this manner will change the face of the earth in many ways.

Well if it has the ability to effect the changes you're talking about then it is a digital gold yet to be mined and refined for people to see its value. I think it's both digital cash and digital good because it's electronically operated yet has semblance of both cash(fiat) and commodity (gold).

[bohr]

Bitcoin is supposed to do both but at the moment bitcoin is behaving a lot closer to gold than to cash, also bitcoin has a big weakness compared to cash it is not truly anonymous and that hurts it is usage since if you want to be anonymous you need to use tumbling services.

Cash is anonymous only in p2p environment. So you are going to tell me that you are not using any 3rd party service to process your fiat payments?
You don't have a bank account, you receive your wage directly from your employer in cash form, and no one keeps tabs how much you earn?
Bitcoin was pseudonymous at best, if you want full privacy there are better altcoins (Zcash, Monero) dedicated to keep your payments confidential.

Like most I do have a bank account and while you recommended the use of altcoins there is no doubt the lack of anonymity features in bitcoin hurt its usage somewhat.

[aTriz]

Maybe sometimes bitcoin looks like gold, because it has a high price, but bitcoin also can be said very easy to get like cash. Maybe bitcoin is a combination of both, so can be said bitcoin is cash and gold money depends on the use.

Yes, bitcoin is a combination of these two phenomena. This is a coin and payment system. But now I use more bitcoin for investment. I buy bitcoins and just hold them, then to sell more expensive

You are saying that most of the bitcoin community use it only in investment purposes, but that is not true.
You can find many articles in cryptocurrency news websites where it is said that someone bought e.g car or a whole company.
I would also tell that still, the things are you talking about can be defined as a digital gold, which is because you also use this precious metal to invest your money, and most likely get returns.

So i think that you may consider bitcoin as a digital gold, because you may just simply get great profits on both of the assets just by holding them.

[squatz1]

Digital Cash, Digital Gold simply wouldn't work based on the simple narrative of that Gold can't really be used as cash in anyway in person at all while cash can be used to buy things like it's meant to do.

Well i dont think bitcoin is either of this .because 90% of the people use bitcoins for earning ,that is sell the bitcoins when the price is high.Bitcoins being used for groceries is not being widely used,if used in this manner will change the face of the earth in many ways.

Well if it has the ability to effect the changes you're talking about then it is a digital gold yet to be mined and refined for people to see its value. I think it's both digital cash and digital good because it's electronically operated yet has semblance of both cash(fiat) and commodity (gold).

Mining Process is something that I wouldn't really compare as one is a computer solving problems to confirm legitimacy and another is ACTUALLY MINING with machines and such.

Maybe sometimes bitcoin looks like gold, because it has a high price, but bitcoin also can be said very easy to get like cash. Maybe bitcoin is a combination of both, so can be said bitcoin is cash and gold money depends on the use.

Well, you could probably say Bitcoin is like a ton of other items due to the similarity in price. Wouldn't use that to call them similar It's cash bud.

[freedomno1]

It's an asset class having features of both a currency and a store of value.
In essence it is both digital gold and digital cash even with the sizing and transaction debate the focus is on a store of value but people still use it as a means of cash.
Of course if the fees outweigh the costs of doing that for a long period of time then it hits a bottleneck and the transactions will transition elsewhere leaving the store of value and asset class as the heaviest leaning.

[cengsuwuei]

bitcoin is digital curency
you can use bitcoin to payment procesor same with paypal, you can buy anything in online use bitcoin, domain, hosting
or you can buy in amazon, but use bitcoin buy amazon gift card
another payment procesor bitcoin can use investment, trade can get profit

[Rinder]

Bitcoin is digital cash, but his potencial is very above then the gold, soo some people does use bitcoin to store value against their fiat currency, as well used for saving purposes as well investment at the same time. For me bitcoin is the digital gold, with amazing potencial to grow.

[grobura]

Bitcoin is digital cash, but his potencial is very above then the gold, soo some people does use bitcoin to store value against their fiat currency, as well used for saving purposes as well investment at the same time. For me bitcoin is the digital gold, with amazing potencial to grow.

Yes, bitcoin has great potential. I see that the popularity of bitcoin grows every year. And many companies are implementing the system of blocking. For me, bitcoin is digital gold.

[Sarah08]

Bitcoin is both digital gold as well as Digital currency.
Bitcoin can be used as cash to buy products.
At the same time,since bitcoin price is constantly increasing,it can be stored as a long term investment.thus it may be called as Digital gold.

BItcoin is a digital gold and digital cash  digital gold because like a gold it has its own mining reg like gold in mining and also a digital cash you can buy in many store by just using bitcoin and also we know that bitcoin was so successful and the price is already a thousand dollars so you can start investing in it so you can also sell bitcoin for cash.

[klf]

Bitcoin is digital cash, but his potencial is very above then the gold, soo some people does use bitcoin to store value against their fiat currency, as well used for saving purposes as well investment at the same time. For me bitcoin is the digital gold, with amazing potencial to grow.

I too think bitcoins got a good potential, but I will never grade it more than gold, not in terms of market price but to hold it for a long term. Gold is gold and nothing can replace it. Bitcoin is another good option for an investment since its prices are more volatile so I don't want to keep more money in bitcoins. Because it has a chance of going up and down quite fast so I will invest more in gold and less in bitcoin.

[DoublerHunter]

Bitcoin is digital cash, but his potencial is very above then the gold, soo some people does use bitcoin to store value against their fiat currency, as well used for saving purposes as well investment at the same time. For me bitcoin is the digital gold, with amazing potencial to grow.

I too think bitcoins got a good potential, but I will never grade it more than gold, not in terms of market price but to hold it for a long term. Gold is gold and nothing can replace it. Bitcoin is another good option for an investment since its prices are more volatile so I don't want to keep more money in bitcoins. Because it has a chance of going up and down quite fast so I will invest more in gold and less in bitcoin.

You don't need to treat bitcoin as literal digital gold because we all know that bitcoin is just LIKE gold but digital version because it is increasing every year and its price is expensive like gold and they are both good for long term. So i think it is considerable for bitcoin to call it gold v2 (Virtual Edition). But the only thing that bitcoin made different from the gold is, we can use it like cash also.

[Oralmat]

I am happy to see the voting result, that mostly people think that bitcoin is seem like gold and also cash. Because for me, it is both, bitcoin is for me, not less than gold, because it is expensive digital thing like gold.
Also whenever i want to use my bitcoins in any place, than i could use it like cash.

[nenengede]

Bitcoin is both digital gold as well as Digital currency. One thing that makes it better than the digital gold or digital cash is it's evolution within the system or technology unlike the commodity value. The value has now getting closer to gold and soon it would cross it growing big.

[Milyonarya]

Bitcoin is like gold because it will increase or decrease of its value sometimes. It will has be a high value and low value. It will keep as gold and will preserve for the future.

[Lauren Smith]

Why not both ? S payment system and an asset. An asset because it's like gold and goes up in value. Unlike good a currency too. That can be used to directly ourchase things. Bitcoin is so much more then merely a currency and asset.

[Biggapp]

Bitcoin is like gold because it will increase or decrease of its value sometimes. It will has be a high value and low value. It will keep as gold and will preserve for the future.

yes bitcoin is like gold because the gold is valuable metal due to its price, as it has the highest price and increasing day by day.as we know that bitcoin price is also increasing and has very high value as gold,so for me it is gold which people can preserve it and can sell it at high price.