Not even Freicoins? Or do you mean weird, un-innovative altcoins that seem to add no real value to the ecosystem? Generally, it’s hard to tell, but it seems certain altcoins try hard to differentiate themselves. Monero and Freicoin stand out as sufficiently different that they could turn out to be valuable (as far as altcoins go).
EDIT: Read the rest of the comments and noticed that you explicitly stated Freicoin is a possible exception to the rule. People may also be interested (although may also choose for various reasons not to invest) in other altcoins such as Ethereum (too complicated?), Zerocash (untested moon math?), Counterparty (“let’s reduce the size of OP_RETURN and see how XCP reacts!”), Swarm (based on Counterparty) or Darkcoin (ninja premine?).
Disclosure: I am long on both bitcoin and freicoin.
You got me! I am, in fact, the co-author of Freicoin, and obviously very bullish, although my estimate of its future value has non-trivial discounts due to outstanding risks. In the economic model of Freicoin, the two currencies perform different, non-competing functions (store-of-value vs medium-of-exchange) and are perfectly capable of co-existing. Indeed, one can argue from inside the Freicoin perspective that both currencies are inevitable.
There is no proof that no other mutually compatible coin is possible, but nor is there any example other than Freicoin. Altcoins generally fall into three categories: those which are param tweaks of bitcoin (e.g. Litecoin), those which add features (e.g. Darkcoin), and those whose differing monetary policies from bitcoin make them stand apart as generally useful and compatible. The first two categories are useless as anything which tweaks params or adds features could be done in bitcoin directly or in a side chain, and Freicoin stands alone as the only example of the third case.
I try to say this from as unbiased a perspective as possible, but of course accusations of bias are incredibly easy to make here. I co-created Freicoin and still hold a large but decaying number of freicoins. However I spent as much time as I did on Freicoin because I believe the above.
Every other alt out there is junk—including the ones you mention—although I won’t rule out the possibility of a another coin which differentiates from bitcoin and freicoin in a compatible manor. Although honestly I don’t know what that would look like.
That’s a very nuanced view though. So honestly it’s just easier and less likely to be misunderstood to simply say “all alts are junk”, and leave off the special case of Freicoin unless I have time to explain in sufficient detail.
Freicoins is relatively unknown and doesn’t appear to have a strategic advantage
Litecoin and other non-anonymous alt-coins are very poorly strategically differentiated and small market share with most predicting they will be dominated by bitcoin eventually
Bitcoin has already been heavily invested in and majority mined. Institutional investors are in, market efficiencies are out.
how about the anonymous coins:
Zerocoin is coded to allow for backdoors for government
Darkcoin (now Dash) is poorly administered
bytecoin is centralised
Monero is promising, high market share, hard working movement and complimentary tech/web-site/feature building community
Monero is promising given that if say corporations who want to minimise tax, Cartels or other (criminal) organisations and entrepreneurs get into it, it is likely to spike up the price. The assumption is that they aren’t already and that it is more efficient than current financial hiding stuff.
Note: Author does not hold these because her portfolio geared exclusively towards shareholder activism, but would be delighted for rationalists to win some. On the other hand, it kinda hurts me to know I’m probably increasing the probability of some dark rationalists sharehouse roomates getting charged for their dark market orders,
appreciate any criticisms, etc. For one, way to illiquide market. It’s a huge hassle to send ID docuemnts to bitcoin trading websites to get approved...and there are literally 2 sellers on the peer to peer website. So either huge opportunity to make a buck selling, or huge opportunity for a tor based buying system, or both, or I’m wrong. I reckon another high impact, intellectually stimulating and profitable venture would be discreet, anonymous, data analytics, paralleling what commbiz does for dark net market businesses and such.
I’m betting on Bitcoin partially because lots of competent, high value people are willing to build out the core functionality and infrastructure for free just because they are excited about it. So owning bitcoins is partially owning a stake in all that labor. Altcoins don’t really have this.
Prediction: This investment strategy won’t end well.
Edit: Wanted to delete this comment since it adds nothing to the discussion without the reasons as to why I am predicting so, but all i can do is retract it.
I see that http://crypto-prices.com lists 483 (as of this moment) digital currencies, of which, as it happens, Emoticoin is not one, despite one of those Emoticoin pages purporting to link to its listing there.
How would one assess which of those currencies, if any, has a future? Or whether one should instead invent a 484th? What will it take for a digital currency to succeed, where others fail?
How would one assess which of those currencies, if any, has a future? Or whether one should instead invent a 484th? What will it take for a digital currency to succeed, where others fail?
In case it’s not clear, if you do not know the answers to these questions, you should not be investing in altcoins.
Yeah I meant that comment for other people. I figured that you figured that ;P
Basically the short answer is that there is absolutely no reason for any two p2p coins to exist which share the same or significantly overlapping monetary policy. Just about every alt out there is a scarce commodity, and therefore will be subsumed by bitcoin eventually. There is at least one that is different, e.g. freicoin which is explicitly designed to fill a different role and not compete with bitcoin, although whether such currencies will stand on their own remains very much up in the air. None of the others have a future. Those which provide new features that are useful will either have their changes merged into bitcoin, or be available for use with bitcoin via a sidechain value pegging mechanism.
(Disclaimer: I co-wrote Freicoin, and hold some of both Bitcoin and Freicoin, but nothing else.)
[removed]
Do not buy altcoins. It will not end well.
Not even Freicoins? Or do you mean weird, un-innovative altcoins that seem to add no real value to the ecosystem? Generally, it’s hard to tell, but it seems certain altcoins try hard to differentiate themselves. Monero and Freicoin stand out as sufficiently different that they could turn out to be valuable (as far as altcoins go).
EDIT: Read the rest of the comments and noticed that you explicitly stated Freicoin is a possible exception to the rule. People may also be interested (although may also choose for various reasons not to invest) in other altcoins such as Ethereum (too complicated?), Zerocash (untested moon math?), Counterparty (“let’s reduce the size of OP_RETURN and see how XCP reacts!”), Swarm (based on Counterparty) or Darkcoin (ninja premine?).
Disclosure: I am long on both bitcoin and freicoin.
You got me! I am, in fact, the co-author of Freicoin, and obviously very bullish, although my estimate of its future value has non-trivial discounts due to outstanding risks. In the economic model of Freicoin, the two currencies perform different, non-competing functions (store-of-value vs medium-of-exchange) and are perfectly capable of co-existing. Indeed, one can argue from inside the Freicoin perspective that both currencies are inevitable.
There is no proof that no other mutually compatible coin is possible, but nor is there any example other than Freicoin. Altcoins generally fall into three categories: those which are param tweaks of bitcoin (e.g. Litecoin), those which add features (e.g. Darkcoin), and those whose differing monetary policies from bitcoin make them stand apart as generally useful and compatible. The first two categories are useless as anything which tweaks params or adds features could be done in bitcoin directly or in a side chain, and Freicoin stands alone as the only example of the third case.
I try to say this from as unbiased a perspective as possible, but of course accusations of bias are incredibly easy to make here. I co-created Freicoin and still hold a large but decaying number of freicoins. However I spent as much time as I did on Freicoin because I believe the above.
Every other alt out there is junk—including the ones you mention—although I won’t rule out the possibility of a another coin which differentiates from bitcoin and freicoin in a compatible manor. Although honestly I don’t know what that would look like.
That’s a very nuanced view though. So honestly it’s just easier and less likely to be misunderstood to simply say “all alts are junk”, and leave off the special case of Freicoin unless I have time to explain in sufficient detail.
Freicoins is relatively unknown and doesn’t appear to have a strategic advantage
Litecoin and other non-anonymous alt-coins are very poorly strategically differentiated and small market share with most predicting they will be dominated by bitcoin eventually
Bitcoin has already been heavily invested in and majority mined. Institutional investors are in, market efficiencies are out. how about the anonymous coins:
Zerocoin is coded to allow for backdoors for government
Darkcoin (now Dash) is poorly administered
bytecoin is centralised
Monero is promising, high market share, hard working movement and complimentary tech/web-site/feature building community
Monero is promising given that if say corporations who want to minimise tax, Cartels or other (criminal) organisations and entrepreneurs get into it, it is likely to spike up the price. The assumption is that they aren’t already and that it is more efficient than current financial hiding stuff.
Note: Author does not hold these because her portfolio geared exclusively towards shareholder activism, but would be delighted for rationalists to win some. On the other hand, it kinda hurts me to know I’m probably increasing the probability of some dark rationalists sharehouse roomates getting charged for their dark market orders,
appreciate any criticisms, etc. For one, way to illiquide market. It’s a huge hassle to send ID docuemnts to bitcoin trading websites to get approved...and there are literally 2 sellers on the peer to peer website. So either huge opportunity to make a buck selling, or huge opportunity for a tor based buying system, or both, or I’m wrong. I reckon another high impact, intellectually stimulating and profitable venture would be discreet, anonymous, data analytics, paralleling what commbiz does for dark net market businesses and such.
I’m betting on Bitcoin partially because lots of competent, high value people are willing to build out the core functionality and infrastructure for free just because they are excited about it. So owning bitcoins is partially owning a stake in all that labor. Altcoins don’t really have this.
Prediction: This investment strategy won’t end well.
Edit: Wanted to delete this comment since it adds nothing to the discussion without the reasons as to why I am predicting so, but all i can do is retract it.
I see that http://crypto-prices.com lists 483 (as of this moment) digital currencies, of which, as it happens, Emoticoin is not one, despite one of those Emoticoin pages purporting to link to its listing there.
How would one assess which of those currencies, if any, has a future? Or whether one should instead invent a 484th? What will it take for a digital currency to succeed, where others fail?
In case it’s not clear, if you do not know the answers to these questions, you should not be investing in altcoins.
I figured that, I’m wondering whether i should ignore the questions or look for answers.
Yeah I meant that comment for other people. I figured that you figured that ;P
Basically the short answer is that there is absolutely no reason for any two p2p coins to exist which share the same or significantly overlapping monetary policy. Just about every alt out there is a scarce commodity, and therefore will be subsumed by bitcoin eventually. There is at least one that is different, e.g. freicoin which is explicitly designed to fill a different role and not compete with bitcoin, although whether such currencies will stand on their own remains very much up in the air. None of the others have a future. Those which provide new features that are useful will either have their changes merged into bitcoin, or be available for use with bitcoin via a sidechain value pegging mechanism.
(Disclaimer: I co-wrote Freicoin, and hold some of both Bitcoin and Freicoin, but nothing else.)