Old Hacker news discussion about Bitcoin

[Baofeng]

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=599852

Found some replies regarding bitcoin in the old hacker news websites. You just have to to look at the first reply and see how 'ignorant' people are back in the early days.  . We can't blame them though, we haven't seen this kind of technology before, so it's understandable that people will question its intention and the impact it could 'potentially' bring to the world.

[pakhitheboss]

Why back in the days, Presently 70 percent of the world still believes that. This is after knowing about Bitcoin. I had asked one of my friend few days back about investing in Bitcoin and the answer that I got was the same. There is still lot to be done for mass adoption. I can see many new initiative but still it is not enough.

What can we do to make other understand Bitcoin?

1. We can participate in other non Cryptocurrency forum and initiate a conversation about Bitcoin
2. We can start a Blog on Bitcoin or Cryptocurrency
3. Talk to friends whenever there is a get together or a casual meeting
4. Organize a Blockchain and Bitcoin conference at a local school or a college.

Some of us may be shy to talk to others as we fear negative reply. Just talk to them and if they are okay to hear explain them more.

[BrewMaster]

the internet is filled with naysayers specially when it comes to new things that scares them because of being new!! you didn't have to go that far to find such cases though, this forum is filled with examples too and this is a "bitcoin" forum not an off topic matter. just go to old pages of this board or speculation board and you will find them...

[Kakmakr]

OP, that was not ignorance.  Most people are immediately pessimistic about new things, even more when they do not understand the technology. It was also a time when projects like this was done in the dark corners of the Internet and when everything was hush hush. 

A lot of people got arrested for creating their own currencies back in the day, so some pessisim should have been expected. So, be honest.. would you have reacted any different if it was you back then? 

[boyptc]

Well, hearing out the idea would make you skeptic and negative about it and that's a pretty normal reaction for someone who haven't looked at the potential.

Where that guy could be right now?

[peter0425]

Well, hearing out the idea would make you skeptic and negative about it and that's a pretty normal reaction for someone who haven't looked at the potential.

Where that guy could be right now?

Good question, maybe that individual is still leaving under the mom's basement and banging his computer screen for ridiculing bitcoin.  . But seriously, who wouldn't have thought that after 10 years, bitcoin still lives and the price could go as high as $20k a pop in 2017.

[hatshepsut93]

I think the more interesting here is that it got only 3 comments, rather than the content of those comments - it just shows us how Bitcoin went from a tiny project known only to a small group of enthusiasts - to a hundreds of billions market, a whole new industry and millions of active users. There are plenty of stories about huge corporations that started in a garage as a small business, but what makes Bitcoin different is that it grew without any marketers, executives, offices, government support - people simply bought it on exchanges or mined it, and brilliant programmers worked on absolutely for free.

[bitvalak]

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=599852

Found some replies regarding bitcoin in the old hacker news websites. You just have to to look at the first reply and see how 'ignorant' people are back in the early days.  . We can't blame them though, we haven't seen this kind of technology before, so it's understandable that people will question its intention and the impact it could 'potentially' bring to the world.

People only need to be subjective in reading and seeing the news. If not, they will be carried away with assumptions made by the media and look like fools. In today's modern era, everyone should have the opportunity to be smarter, easier.

[figmentofmyass]

Why back in the days, Presently 70 percent of the world still believes that. This is after knowing about Bitcoin. I had asked one of my friend few days back about investing in Bitcoin and the answer that I got was the same. There is still lot to be done for mass adoption. I can see many new initiative but still it is not enough.

What can we do to make other understand Bitcoin?

i think this process will be more organic than people think. people didn't particularly "understand" the internet either but it's completely revolutionized the way they interact with the world now.

"the masses" will be the last on board with bitcoin---they are always late to the party. the price will be driven orders of magnitude higher than now before the masses catch on.

i'm not worried about getting regular people to understand bitcoin. they'll be swept along into late adoption just like they were with smartphones/apps in the internet example.

[jak3]

yah! those were the dark times for bitcoin. I first saw the coin in 2011 and by that time it has actually grown pretty popular (at least I saw it first on discovery channel). I don't think there was anything which me(14year old boy) hated about this new system. I found the concept very amazing and when the host said how he lost his coins because he lost his private keys I know exactly what level of security it is (but I don't know how cryptography works at that time).

[Carollzinha]

yah! those were the dark times for bitcoin. I first saw the coin in 2011 and by that time it has actually grown pretty popular (at least I saw it first on discovery channel). I don't think there was anything which me(14year old boy) hated about this new system. I found the concept very amazing and when the host said how he lost his coins because he lost his private keys I know exactly what level of security it is (but I don't know how cryptography works at that time).

Well you know what level of security it is when you see someone (a few months ago) inside this forum sharing all the infos he still could remember to a lost wallet with over 100 BTCs stored.. he was offering a 10% to who could help him to recover his private key

[BitHodler]

Well, hearing out the idea would make you skeptic and negative about it and that's a pretty normal reaction for someone who haven't looked at the potential.

Close minded people maybe. They are keptical about anything that doesn't fit in their ideal world, and we have seen how gold bugs still can't fathom the idea of why Bitcoin can and already works as gold.

I have always been open to changes and improvements, and this is how it should be. I immediately saw value in Bitcoin because of how it allowed me to store value outside the legacy banking system that's corrupted to its core.

Gold allows you to do the same, but it lags behind in almost every possible way when you put it against Bitcoin. Bitcoin picks up where gold stopped providing usefulness as money in the current digital age.

[FlightyPouch]

We can't blame them though, we haven't seen this kind of technology before, so it's understandable that people will question its intention and the impact it could 'potentially' bring to the world.

I thought there are a couple of digital currencies made before bitcoin right? They are a failure though so I think this is the reason why they are saying that. The technology of bitcoin is the reason why it became a success as a crypto currency, the blockchain. I think it is better to not suspect things without even knowing it carefully.

[Genemind]

These are two types of people's reaction about Bitcoin before and this will define if they're successful now or not.
We can't blame those who people who were doubting about Bitcoin before, even if we don't admit it, we had that kind of reactions before as well.
But Bitcoin proved us that it could develop to a great digital currency which exceeds beyond all our expectations.

[gentlemand]

I think the most interesting archival conversations are on the cryptography mailing list where Satoshi first launched it. The people on there had been working towards something like Bitcoin for a couple of decades. There it was popped out of nowhere yet most other than Hal Finney were full 'meh'.

I read about it in 2009. The geezer writing about it insisted it was going to change the world. I nodded vaguely and forgot about it until 2013.

[Oceat]

They may sound skeptical or curious but we can understand that because we are just like that if we know nothing of a new project.
Critics are always there when we don't know what its capable of but look at Bitcoin today, i never imagine them not investing in it these days.

[traderethereum]

Like the OP said before, we cannot blame them because they don't know about bitcoin at all, and they are not reading the purposes behind of bitcoin itself.
They don't follow the bitcoin journey from time to time, they keep busy with what they did and not trying to explore what is happening in out there and that makes them cannot accept new information in around them.
That will always happen to them especially if they cannot open their mind with something new, especially in the technology development because the world will change with much new technology that will help humankind to live their life.

[Twinkledoe]

the internet is filled with naysayers specially when it comes to new things that scares them because of being new!! you didn't have to go that far to find such cases though, this forum is filled with examples too and this is a "bitcoin" forum not an off topic matter. just go to old pages of this board or speculation board and you will find them...

Very true. But at least joining in this forum is a good start for them to look at crypto in a different perspective. Only a matter of time, these noobs will become a true crypto enthusiast. At one point in our lives, we started from that notion also. It is not the case that we fully embrace crypto the first day that we hear about bitcoin or crypto, right? So give those people a break and let them truly understand crypto on their own way at their own pace.

[Ailmand]

Back on those days people were skeptical about the idea of bitcoin since a new technology. However, people who have taken thw risk to embrace the innovation were those who really benefitted it. Bitcoin had come so far and improved a lot since the day it was created. I think what is posted there is not ignorance.

[pooya87]

Well, hearing out the idea would make you skeptic and negative about it and that's a pretty normal reaction for someone who haven't looked at the potential.

not necessarily this case but generally speaking skepticism is not the same as negativity. you have to be skeptic about new things you see, specially when you see something like that which may have looked like money out of thin air on the internet at first look. but automatically being negative is to be extreme and that is only the case with naive people who jump to conclusion without research. and in some cases with those who want to spread FUD.