Wharton marketing professor Eric T. Bradlow, who is also co-director of the Wharton Customer Analytics Initiative, argues that is it unclear exactly what market need Bitcoin is fulfilling or what problem it is solving. The current electronic payments system works effectively for the most part; making payments, getting cash or transferring money is relatively easy, Bradlow points out. While many merchants complain about high fees, as a practical matter few would have reason to use Bitcoin unless it became far more widespread.
"At the moment, why do people need Bitcoins?" Bradlow asks. "The 'product' has no obvious customer segment, point of differentiation and obvious consumer need that it is satisfying in comparison to other competing products. Therefore, it will struggle to be highly adopted."[...]
Bitcoin is also swimming in uncharted waters when it comes to its legal and regulatory situation, says Wharton legal studies and business ethics professor Andrea Matwyshyn. The most obvious question is whether Bitcoins are even legal. In the U.S., as in most countries, only the federal government can issue legally recognized tender. "Whether these types of alternative currencies can co-exist with traditional models is an unanswered question," says Matwyshyn. "It's such a new regulatory space that the law isn't there yet."
Ok should the Wharton profs just be considered old school or is this the establishment firing another warning shot? Keep in mind that some CFTC members have started making noises about bitcoins and that the chairman of the CFTC is Wharton grad Gary Gensler, who was considered the smartest guy in his Wharton class and who was aggressively recruited by Goldman Sachs right out of Wharton.
"The 'product' has no obvious customer segment, point of differentiation and obvious consumer need that it is satisfying in comparison to other competing products. Therefore, it will struggle to be highly adopted."
ReplyDeleteSuch hubris. There are a LOT of people who find the privacy of Bitcoin appealing, isn't that a "customer segment"? Does it ever have to be "highly" adopted to be worthwhile? Maybe it will become the means of choice for getting your assets out of a country with currency controls. It may never be "money", but it may be useful. It may never be legal tender, but that legality should be done away with. For thousands of years money and other tradables were just used, without "law" around them. The professor can't think out of the box he's been given.
In other news, Wharton professor removes all doubt about qualifications to be teaching anything or anyone, by publicly suffocating in a self made tomb of ignorance.
ReplyDeleteDidn't Houdini try something like this? Oh right. He was able to escape...