Bitcoin discussions usually focus on price, adoption, and market cycles.
But what do you think gives Bitcoin its strongest long-term value: decentralization, scarcity, security, utility, or something else?
As a thought experiment, imagine there was a base metal as scarce as gold but with the following properties:
- boring grey in colour
- not a good conductor of electricity
- not particularly strong, but not ductile or easily malleable either
- not useful for any practical or ornamental purpose
and one special, magical property:
- can be transported over a communications channel
If it somehow acquired any value at all for whatever reason, then anyone wanting to transfer wealth over a long distance could buy some, transmit it, and have the recipient sell it.
Maybe it could get an initial value circularly as you've suggested, by people foreseeing its potential usefulness for exchange. (I would definitely want some) Maybe collectors, any random reason could spark it.
I think the traditional qualifications for money were written with the assumption that there are so many competing objects in the world that are scarce, an object with the automatic bootstrap of intrinsic value will surely win out over those without intrinsic value. But if there were nothing in the world with intrinsic value that could be used as money, only scarce but no intrinsic value, I think people would still take up something.
(I'm using the word scarce here to only mean limited potential supply)
These are the words of Satoshi.
My take on this post would be the same, because unlike Satoshi, who did not know, what the price of BTC would be in 2026, I know, so I will say that random reason could be scarcity. Although I might be wrong, scarcity is what worked for me. In 2018, I heard about BTC and then left without studying, but here on this forum I learned about halving and fixed supply, how demand is increasing, and due to halving, the supply is getting cut. So I was like, if there is more demand than the supply and the supply is even fixed and cannot be increased then this is something worth holding. I did not care about regulators because I am sure anyone who was here knew what they were doing.
I think Bitcoin posseses other valuable qualities apart from it's price appreciation, and increases, and one of the valuable things is decentralization. Bitcoin is not controlled by any individual, not satoshi, and not the government of any nation. Every Bitcoin holder is entirely in control of their asset, and uses it the way they seem fit. After the creation of Bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto disappeared, and remained anonymous till date. This is unlike other cryptocurrencies, and even some of the top cryptocurrencies we know their creators, and they have reasonable quantities for themselves. The scarcity of Bitcoin is another thing that makes Bitcoin to be very unique, and can not be altered by anyone. Bitcoin has gained so much trust from investors across the globe because of of it's originality in the cryptocurrency market, and because it not controlled by anyone all the qualities of Bitcoin remains intact without any changes.
