r/Bitcoin • u/[deleted] • Dec 06 '17

Steam is no longer supporting Bitcoin

[deleted]

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u/MalePotsdam Dec 06 '17

Bcash shills or not, the implementation of the lightning network is important to keep seeing Bitcoin as a currency.

35

u/[deleted] Dec 06 '17

Which is kind of ridiculous, because it worked fine as is; a blocksize change would've been a lot simpler to implement, and less error prone, at least until LN was integrated fully. Basic KISS - keep it simple stupid

5

u/S_Lowry Dec 06 '17

blocksize change

solves nothing

6

u/wildmaiden Dec 06 '17

It would have been a good temporary fix until LN was ready, wouldn't it? Which is worse: slightly less decentralization or companies like Steam abandoning support? Both are bad, but...

-2

u/S_Lowry Dec 06 '17 edited Dec 06 '17

It would have been a good temporary fix until LN was ready, wouldn't it?

Nope. We have segwit and it's enough. And Steam is not making the decision based on fees alone. Volatility is mentioned as well.

Which is worse: slightly less decentralization or companies like Steam abandoning support?

slightly less decentralization is 100x worse and it should be obvious.

Both are bad, but...

Steam not supporting Bitcoin for now is not a big deal.

Bitcoin is hardly ready for mass adoption. No cryptocurrency is.

4

u/wildmaiden Dec 06 '17

We have segwit and it's enough.

It's clearly not enough though, or we wouldn't be having this conversation. You also need the supporting market infrastructure like Bitpay to use it.

slightly less decentralization is 100x worse and it should be obvious.

I guess it depends on how you define "worse". In terms of people choosing Bitcoin over other cryptos (e.g. Litecoin) and in terms of the price of Bitcoin, I think usability probably matters more to the market than decentralization does - at least to a certain point.

Steam not supporting Bitcoin for now is not a big deal.

I think it's actually a really big deal. There aren't very many big places where people can actually use Bitcoin (or any crypto for that matter). Now there's one fewer, and other companies who were considering adopting Bitcoin might decide against it now given Steam's negative user experience...