What does the future of bitcoin look like??

[float_]

the future of bitcoin is sky is the limit. the community just keeps on growing and a lot of alt coins are not trying to dethrone bitcoin but to complement bitcoin 2018 is going to be the prime year of bitcoin and cyrpto community in general

[Indrawan77]

To still stay on top there are some homework that need  to be done by bitcoin, solving the transaction fee and the speed problem that had been haunting bitcoin for a long time, we can see how quickly ripple swap eth place, so btc problem need to be fix as sson as possible before a lot of people  decide to use other coins as the sub currency, and there are tons of alt coins that are good coins and ready to swap btc place

[romero121]

To still stay on top there are some homework that need  to be done by bitcoin, solving the transaction fee and the speed problem that had been haunting bitcoin for a long time, we can see how quickly ripple swap eth place, so btc problem need to be fix as sson as possible before a lot of people  decide to use other coins as the sub currency, and there are tons of alt coins that are good coins and ready to swap btc place

Yes, to be the leader there is surely lot many things need to be considered and a development or updation is required. Now itself the fear is found over each and every user from the recent ripple bump as mentioned. Same time this could be easily overcome if the developer community give priority to what is necessary to keep the functioning of the entire network in an efficient manner same as that when the user network is low.

[thecryptillian]

At the time of writing about 8% of market cap are being accounted for by Bitcoin hardforks. Ignoring those, BTC is not worse off than in June 2017. What actually seems to be happening is that more alts that were previously widely ignored are gaining traction. This seems to be mostly at the cost of ETH, which is down to 13% from its peak of 31%. In other words, while people previously focused their alt coin portfolio on ETH, they seem to invest more diversified right now.

Excellent theory on the Ethereum. As for the hardforks, I don't tend to group them collectively when discussing market cap, but fine I guess.

In general I see the Bitcoin hardforks as alts of their own as well. But for the sake of argument it is important to keep in mind that those coins appeared basically out of thin air. Insta-alts, so to speak, complementary miners, community and issued coins included.

Entering Bitcoin mining has become incredibly hard, that is true. I'm not sure about mining profitably being completely out of reach for the average person though, as electricity costs vary a lot even in rather close geographical areas (at least in Europe) and I don't know how hard or easy it currently is to get your hands on mining hardware for a reasonable price.

Either way.

Bitcoin mining as a business is undoubtedly alive and kicking, otherwise we'd see a plateau in hashrate. However it keeps growing, courtesy of ongoing miner production, research and development.

Bitcoin mining as a community effort... yep, that's mostly gone, unfortunately. I don't think that the loss of this part of the community has much effect on Bitcoin's growth however, as each wave of newcomers will likely be less tech oriented than the one before. Or put differently, each wave of newcomers will care more about cryptocurrencies as speculative asset / payment method / store of value than about the technicalities of mining.

Just out of curiosity, are you an independent bitcoin miner?

In summary, I just think what other coins are offering the newcomers in terms of mining is far more beneficial than bitcoin in its current state.

In the long run I expect the coin that scales best in terms of transaction throughput, without having to rely on centralized entities, to be the most dominant one. In their current states all coins seem to be equally shitty in this regard. All things being equally shitty, BTC remains on top.

Admittedly this statement was a bit of a hyperbole, but as far as scaling is concerned, none of the alts that I've looked at closely so far have convinced me of offering a viable alternative approach.

Dash I have yet to take a closer look at, but its masternode based consensus algorithm smells to me like an even worse version of PoS, which by itself already is an instant turn-off to me. Arguments for / against PoS aside, I know too little about Dash to give full judgement. Unless Dash approaches blockchains vastly differently from Bitcoin -- such as a blockchain-abandoning, DAG-based currencies like Iota and ByteBall, both of which have issues of their own right -- it will likely fail to convince me (not that this should matter to anyone else).

Ethereum comes to a halt whenever a major ICO takes place or crypto-kittens clog the network. And that's not even what I would call real world applications. Any network that gets smothered by vaporware and memes has a lot of work ahead. Granted, one can expect Ethereum's scalability to improve over the next few years. Arguing about future Ethereum improvements is moot, however, as then you'd have to apply the same standard to other alts and Bitcoin itself.

Remember, I'm talking only about scalability in regards to transaction throughput here, as I believe that this will be the most important factor in the long term. Other pros and cons of the respective cryptocurrencies are ignored, as these would be discussions of their own. Also note that I'm mostly ignoring centralized solutions such as Ripple and Iota, as at that point I would consider crypto to have officially failed.

I think we are looking at it from different angles. You seem very knowledgeable on the technical side and I totally agree with what you're saying there. I guess for me, It's like most investments in that I am looking at it from a consumer facing perspective. I feel as though it will be whichever coin is the most attractive to consumers will take off.

Just think, Myspace came before Facebook, and Yahoo before google. But who is sitting on top of the market right now? Motorolla were the pioneers of the mobile phone which was one of the biggest inventions to hit the world, yet kids these day' wouldn't have a clue who Motorolla is because they have been virtually sweeped to the side for newer improved versions.

I know crypto is a new world, so nobody knows, but I think it would be naïve to think that bitcoin will remain at the top just because they were the pioneers. Especially when all the other coins are aiming to solve the btc problems.

On a personal level I agree with you on the decetrilisation part too. But look at the popularity of the centralised coins. They are booming and it's because of the consumer facing perspective. Most people are seeing that centralisation is the only way for digital currency to fully evolve. I think there is some truth to that argument too, that's why I am a fan of NEO. They have the motto that, Government's are not going away whether we like or not, so it's best to work with them on some level.

[Synaesthesia]

2 month - people start invest back to bitcoin
2 year - they will think bitcoin is just like gold. can't use like fiat because too high fee

[weav]

It will be dead or used as a store of value , i don't see bitcoin being used as a currency. At the moment i rather accumulate more altcoins then bitcoin.

[wxa7115]

The future of bitcoin will depend entirely on the success of the lightning network, if the lightning network fails then bitcoin will become a store of value and nothing more and another coin will need to be used as a currency, but if the lightning network does in fact succeed then bitcoin will become a currency once again and with it, its spot at the top will be secured for a long time.

[kaizerblitz]

I think people are now looking for bitcoin as everyday use in life in  making trasaction they all needed bitcoin bitcoin will be popular compare to fiat currency and i think the price of bitcoin of it is $ 60,000 USD.

[Gogochen]

In fact, the currency is now rarely used in crime, because the currency is not anonymous, crime will find more anonymous substitutes, so the currency is most in speculative hands now.

[thecryptillian]

That is good news for bitcoin regarding the lightning network.

[HeRetiK]

Just out of curiosity, are you an independent bitcoin miner?

I used to dabble a bit with mining and the surrounding ecosystem. Would probably mine if I had a house instead of being a city dweller though.

In summary, I just think what other coins are offering the newcomers in terms of mining is far more beneficial than bitcoin in its current state.

Agreed.

On the other hand it gives me comfort that BTC has only few alts to compete with regarding hashrate. Especially the BCH / BTC hashrate oscillations showed the negative effects of hashrate competition on network stability.

I think we are looking at it from different angles. You seem very knowledgeable on the technical side and I totally agree with what you're saying there. I guess for me, It's like most investments in that I am looking at it from a consumer facing perspective. I feel as though it will be whichever coin is the most attractive to consumers will take off.

Which is why I expect the most important factor to be transaction throughput, since people want cheap and fast transactions.

You can always put a fancy user interface on top afterwards. Bad technology with a fancy user interface is still bad technology. Anyone who used Kraken lately should know. (I kid, I kid! Kraken is still a solid exchange regardless of performance issues!)

Store of value comes in a close second. However I assume that Bitcoin's viability as a payment network is of great importance for Bitcoin's role as store of value, which brings us back to transaction throughput as mentioned above.

Bitcoin competes with gold on the store of value side and with credit cards -- or at least PayPal -- on the payment side. Combine both and we got ourselves a winner.

Just think, Myspace came before Facebook, and Yahoo before google. But who is sitting on top of the market right now? Motorolla were the pioneers of the mobile phone which was one of the biggest inventions to hit the world, yet kids these day' wouldn't have a clue who Motorolla is because they have been virtually sweeped to the side for newer improved versions.

The argument goes both ways:

AMD came before Intel.

Ebay came before Amazon.

Microsoft came before Apple. Wait. Nevermind. You get the point.


Given enough foothold, even deprecated technology -- whenever Bitcoin reaches that state -- can stick around amazingly long. Just look at IPv4 vs IPv6. A struggle that has been going on for decades, yet IPv4 still prevails. The network effect at play, quite literally.

I know crypto is a new world, so nobody knows, but I think it would be naïve to think that bitcoin will remain at the top just because they were the pioneers. Especially when all the other coins are aiming to solve the btc problems.

I fully agree with you.

On a personal level I agree with you on the decetrilisation part too. But look at the popularity of the centralised coins. They are booming and it's because of the consumer facing perspective. Most people are seeing that centralisation is the only way for digital currency to fully evolve. I think there is some truth to that argument too, that's why I am a fan of NEO. They have the motto that, Government's are not going away whether we like or not, so it's best to work with them on some level.

That's what worries me. Most people don't care about decentralization and trustlessness. Dismiss both principles and you can scale to your heart's content.

Not sure if a tokenized version of PayPal makes for a compelling value proposition to the average consumer though.

To some extend decentralization is just an ideal. But it's why I'm invested in crypto in the first place, otherwise I would have just continued lamenting PayPal.

[justyourkuya]

A brighter future and greener pasture awaits for those who save and invest bitcoin or even those actively participating in the forum who are goal-oriented and focus on seeking every opportunity that comes in their way.

[cizatext]

So Bitcoin's market dominance in the cryptocurrency world is currently at the lowest level ever with 36.1% of the total value.

In my opinion, it's because the interest in alternative coins is rising rapidly for one, but you also have to consider how much of the bitcoin world is criminal. Seriously, for the first 5-8 years, the digital currency was mainly used as a means for criminals to launder money and sell illegal goods on the dark market. Think of all the massive hacks in the early days also, and all those darknet markets that disappeared with huge amounts of bitcoin.

Literally millions and millions of the 16 million coins out there would be owned by criminals. And now with bitcoin becoming more centralized and less anonymous, they are swiftly exiting the market and looking for alternative dark coins.

I also personally avoid using bitcoin all-together because of the extremely slow transaction speeds and high cost's associated with it.

The bitcoin mining business is dust, so that interest will die quickly.

I just don't see a very bright future for the god of cryptocurrency and it will surely be surpassed by one of its rivals soon enough.

I'm torn between predicting it to be Dash, or Ethereum, and I recon it could be about 2 years before that happens.   

Would love to know peoples thoughts on the future of bitcoin.

Where will bitcoin be in

2 weeks?
2 months?
2 years?

Will it be surpassed by another coin? If so, which one and when?

You are right to some extend in your analysis, but before bitcoin can be overtaken by any other alternative cryptocurrency is going to take a while is too early for bitcoin to say good bye in the cryptocurrencies world. Bitcoin is the king of crypto and at that it potential is so great and you talked about bitcoin being centralized that is not true bitcoin is the most decentralized among all other cryptocurrencies the recent fall in price is engineer by so many factors ranging from the Christmas celebration where many holders change their bitcoin into faint in other to enjoy the holiday with family and secondly the break down of mining farm in Japan which lead to thousands of unconfirmed transactions and further leading to higher transactions fees.

[thecryptillian]

I used to dabble a bit with mining and the surrounding ecosystem. Would probably mine if I had a house instead of being a city dweller though.

Lol. Well that was probably when mining was still profitable. It's not an environment for people like you and me anymore with an average in-home system. You might have better chance at success than me because you are probably more familiar with hardware, programming, ect. But when considering the larger population of today and their chances of getting involved without breaking the bank, then it's not sustainable.

Which is why I expect the most important factor to be transaction throughput, since people want cheap and fast transactions.

All the other major alt-coins are soaring past bitcoin in terms of cheap & fast transactions. Dash for example has the fancy interface and is close to instant transaction speed and Ethereum is super quick and cheap. These alt-coins are not weaker in security either.

The argument goes both ways:

AMD came before Intel.

Ebay came before Amazon.

Microsoft came before Apple. Wait. Nevermind. You get the point.

Well the argument doesn't go both ways, because my argument is that the king can be dethroned and I have put before you similar cases where the king (or pioneer of a new technology) has been dethroned.

For you to dispel my argument, you would have to prove that no market pioneer has been dethroned.

And for the record Intel actually came before AMD and Amazon actually came before Ebay.
Also, Apple are a bigger company than Microsoft, but Microsoft is still the dominant operating software.

All of these companies that you mention in your desperate attempt to win an argument have veered off into different markets and technologies, whereas I gave you examples of very when a creation was overtaken by a direct competitor. Like Facebook v Myspace and Yahoo v Google.
It's all irrelevant anyway because my point is that don't be fooled to think because BTC was the creator it will stand the test of time against competitors.

That's what worries me. Most people don't care about decentralization and trustlessness. Dismiss both principles and you can scale to your heart's content.

Not sure if a tokenized version of PayPal makes for a compelling value proposition to the average consumer though.

To some extend decentralization is just an ideal. But it's why I'm invested in crypto in the first place, otherwise I would have just continued lamenting PayPal.

I am in your corner here. Eventually I also hope to move towards a completely decentralised internet.

[thecryptillian]

You are right to some extend in your analysis, but before bitcoin can be overtaken by any other alternative cryptocurrency is going to take a while is too early for bitcoin to say good bye in the cryptocurrencies world. Bitcoin is the king of crypto and at that it potential is so great and you talked about bitcoin being centralized that is not true bitcoin is the most decentralized among all other cryptocurrencies the recent fall in price is engineer by so many factors ranging from the Christmas celebration where many holders change their bitcoin into faint in other to enjoy the holiday with family and secondly the break down of mining farm in Japan which lead to thousands of unconfirmed transactions and further leading to higher transactions fees.

Yeah it will definitely be a while before it could happen.

Yes Bitcoin is great, it is the king of crypto. But, like most pioneering technologies, its riddled with issues. Sadly, when you are the pioneer of a new technology, you just can't foresee all the problems that will arise. So what ends up happening is the pioneers end up paving the road for everybody else. And everybody else then has the advantage of scrutinising the technology from outside the box. It leads to further inventions and greater discoveries.

I will agree with you that I was maybe a bit too harsh on Bitcoin being so decentralised nowadays, but too say that bitcoin is the most decentralised is a bit far fetched.

And all coins took a huge hit leading up to Christmas not just bitcoin. So that does not really explain why they are losing market cap to alternatives. It does explain the price drop though.

[hajimasan]

So Bitcoin's market dominance in the cryptocurrency world is currently at the lowest level ever with 36.1% of the total value.

In my opinion, it's because the interest in alternative coins is rising rapidly for one, but you also have to consider how much of the bitcoin world is criminal. Seriously, for the first 5-8 years, the digital currency was mainly used as a means for criminals to launder money and sell illegal goods on the dark market. Think of all the massive hacks in the early days also, and all those darknet markets that disappeared with huge amounts of bitcoin.

Literally millions and millions of the 16 million coins out there would be owned by criminals. And now with bitcoin becoming more centralized and less anonymous, they are swiftly exiting the market and looking for alternative dark coins.

I also personally avoid using bitcoin all-together because of the extremely slow transaction speeds and high cost's associated with it.

The bitcoin mining business is dust, so that interest will die quickly.

I just don't see a very bright future for the god of cryptocurrency and it will surely be surpassed by one of its rivals soon enough.

I'm torn between predicting it to be Dash, or Ethereum, and I recon it could be about 2 years before that happens.   

Would love to know peoples thoughts on the future of bitcoin.

Where will bitcoin be in

2 weeks?
2 months?
2 years?

Will it be surpassed by another coin? If so, which one and when?

A big truth is that in the old time bitcoin was used by illegal activities doing people ,but now as bitcoin is not much Annynomuous than was it , so people who are involve in illegal activities are not use it for bad use/illegal purpose Because now bitcoin buy sell is no more annonymous , government are taking attention towards such transactions at exchange , so here we can say that digitization is going on and bitcoin is available to use for legal purpose only .
And also segwit2x is near to happen by the team , so fee and confirmation will get into.speeder , so we need just wait for bitcoin to be more advanced ( for 4-5 months only ) and we will see bitcoin has no need to further improvements .

[lishuun]

As an important part of  cryptocurrency and payment system. Furthermore, a way to store value.

[Rinsend]

I think people are now looking for bitcoin as everyday use in life in  making trasaction they all needed bitcoin bitcoin will be popular compare to fiat currency and i think the price of bitcoin of it is $ 60,000 USD.

now a lot of people who use bitcoin as a place of trade and long-term investment.
because the growth is very prominent and cause a lot of large investors who come in and follow bitcoin as a source of income from their investment

[Blueblade]

Bitcoin growth will increase.Bitcoin will have the status of accepting a number of companies.Bit coin investment will increase.Whether the government brings some terms in favor of the Bit coin Or encourage use,Bitcoin will become part of people's lives.

[markleal]

Hi there thecryptillian! The future of bitcoin is very bright as the sun and moon. Let me answer your queries one by one.

2 weeks?

Probably, It will raise from $15k to another new level like $17k or maybe $18k, it is because people are in buying mode right now. Have you read the news about facebook investor buying massive amount of bitcoin?

2 months?

Probably, above $20k mark, and most ICO is competing bitcoin those months. There are bunch of ICO that will be competing and taking advantage of the limitation of bitcoin, but I think without proper usage, those will not succeed.

2 years?

I’m Millionaire by that time, just keep in touch and maybe I’ll donate some of my bitcoins to you, if you stay loyal to bitcoins.

Will it be surpassed by another coin? If so, which one and when?

Nope, not really. It’s hard to surpass the pioneer of the crypto. Right even today, the price of altcoins is way back far from bitcoin. You can even check the transaction people do in bitcoin compare to others.