by steve

How about that for a click-bait-y title?

A friend sent this to me today. Most of the short article is a bit whiny, but the last bit is the important question... and one I couldn't readily answer.

What happens when all the bitcoin is mined? Bitcoin transactions are authenticated by the thousands of people who dedicate their computers and electricity to building the blockchain. They’re not donating all this money and computing power; they are being paid in bitcoin. Mining for bitcoin and authenticating transactions is the same thing.

What is the incentive for people to spend millions of dollars on computers and power once there’s no more kickback of coin? I have asked this question of the world’s leading blockchain investors, miners, and scholars, and none of them have offered a satisfactory answer. The best they can come up with is “we’ll figure out when the time comes.” (How is that good enough justification for a combined quarter of a trillion dollar bet on cryptocurrencies?) I spoke to the CEOs of four companies that have either just issued or are about to issue tokens, and none of them had even considered how the blockchain is administrated once the coin is all mined, or what that means to the future of their operations.

I'm curious about all y'alls thoughts on this.