I've a simple question to ask - can you meaningfully spend any cryptocurrency in your local city centre?
A few months ago, my wife and I went on a 30 day Interrail holiday across Europe. 10 countries, over a dozen cities, making over a hundred payments.
I looked in the window of every cafe, restaurant, corner shop, pub, bar, museum, and tourist-trap that we went into. All of them accepted a wide range of credit cards. Some politely informed us that they were either cash-only or no-cash. A few gleefully accepted foreign currencies at ruinous exchange rates.
None advertised accepting crypto.
Due to the language barrier and the risk of looking like a bellend, I didn't actually ask anyone if I could pay with crypto. But every bill we were handed told me which (fiat) currencies I could pay in. The tip-jars let me tap my card or drop my (metal) coins. There were signs warning that I couldn't use American Express.
But, again, no mention of crypto.
I literally only saw one sign that cryptocurrencies existed. Tucked away in Zagreb train station, next to the left-luggage lockers, was this:
I've never used a crypto ATM before. I've no idea if it's safe or whether it'd give me a good deal. I also didn't know whether a guy with a crowbar would follow me out of the station. But, hey, YOLO!
There was no queue of people waiting to use it, so I thought I'd investigate.
Delightfully, it wasn't just Bitcoin that it offered:
Including two subtly different stable coins. Which is nice, I guess.
I clicked through a screen confirming that I wasn't a Politically Exposed Person and got hit by this screen:
I've never had a cash ATM warn me about those kind of scams. Progress!
And yet, after wandering Zagreb for a few days, I didn't find anywhere to spend whatever crypto I could've purchased from there. I went to laundrettes, museums, galleries, bougie little eateries, and had dark kitchen deliveries. None advertised their acceptance of crypto.
Perhaps I'm not cool enough to go to the hip underground club where all the cocktails are only purchasable with an obscure shitcoin. Maybe there's an exclusive casino where all the beautiful people spend their evenings playing baccarat chemin de fer for tokens?
Or perhaps I'm just unobservant.
In the last few years I've wandered through the twisty passages of the Marrakech Medina and pounded the mean streets of Halifax, Nova Scotia. I've drunk in the bars of Kuala Lumpur and slurped food-court noodles in Hong Kong. From Sydney to London, I'm not exaggerating when I say that no one has ever offered to let me settle my bill with a cryptocurrency.
I've paid by mobile, in-app, using loyalty card points, instant bank transfer, and fairground tickets. No crypto.
In London, my home city, there are maybe 50 places which say they accept Bitcoin. London's population is about 10 million. It is one of the most visited cities in the world. There is, effectively, nowhere to buy a coffee using the blockchain.
Perhaps crypto is more like gold? I don't know any shop which would let me pay with an ingot or doubloon. Yet plenty of people have gold as part of their investment portfolio. Although gold is a physically and chemically useful metal whereas the utility of crypto is yet to be demonstrated.
It's the same with shares. I can't go to a pub and buy a round with GME:NYQ. I need to convert it into something more liquid before I can enjoy something more liquid.
So crypto can be an opaque speculative investment. Maybe it is the next tulips, maybe it is the next Ford Model T. But it is obviously so far from infiltrating normal payments that it can be safely ignored.
I've been writing about Bitcoin since 2011. I even studied for the Certified Blockchain Professional qualification and wrote about it for my MSc a couple of years ago.
I'm just so tired of all the unjustified hype. I despair about the amount of energy that's been wasted - both electrical and mental.
It has been seventeen long years since Dr Craig Wright published the Bitcoin paper. How much longer are people going to keep pretending that this is a transformative payment technology ready to be embraced by the masses?
Think I'm wrong. Don't bother arguing in the comments. Instead, you can put your money where your mouth is by sending Bitcoin to me at bc1q60rt4rrnky7syxdw6234zqnmy84ah2gphra5ev 馃槀
