Fair enough. The promoters of Bitcoin should not tout the “free transactions!” since this will only apply for the next twenty years or so and transactions thereafter will impose a fee orders of magnitude lower than most services if you want them confirmed quicker.
I do not think the transactions are free even now, it is just that they are spread out across the entire money supply rather than charged only to the participants in the transaction. The cost of the block are the 50 coins added to the money supply, which slightly decreases the value of every other coin.
Fair enough. The promoters of Bitcoin should not tout the “free transactions!” since this will only apply for the next twenty years or so and transactions thereafter will impose a fee orders of magnitude lower than most services if you want them confirmed quicker.
I do not think the transactions are free even now, it is just that they are spread out across the entire money supply rather than charged only to the participants in the transaction. The cost of the block are the 50 coins added to the money supply, which slightly decreases the value of every other coin.
In most contexts, that would be close enough to count as “free transactions”.