Euro fears boost virtual currency Bitcoin

Euro fears boost virtual currency Bitcoin

business.financialpost.com

Fearful of the future, Europeans are moving their money out of their banks and dumping it into safe havens such as U.S. Treasuries, Government of Canada bonds — and apparently the virtual currency Bitcoin.

‘We’re getting requests from people saying, can we mail you euros? We can’t do that legally, but they keep asking’

“European volume has been skyrocketing,” said Charlie Shrem, chief executive of BitInstant LLC, a company in New York that enables clients to transfer funds between Bitcoin and U.S. and Canadian dollars, British pounds, euros and other major currencies.

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Related News Links:
en.wikipedia.org
rationalwiki.org

Kind of wierd - does anyone on here actually use bitcoin??

From the article:

But why is Bitcoin caught up in the frenzy?

The darling of techies, hipsters and, increasingly, currency traders, it was created back in 2009 as an Internet-only currency regulated by a network algorithm. Traditional currencies, the thinking went, are cumbersome and expensive to use in online transactions. Every time a purchase is made, fees must be paid to a bank or credit card company. Costs are even more onerous when one currency is converted to another.

Bitcoin solved these problems and others as well, since it operates outside the payment systems operated by the banks. More importantly, it’s not under the control of any central bank or government. In fact, the supply of Bitcoins is controlled by an algorithm.

Some reviews of it are less "kind" than the wiki link - Rationalwiki has this to say about it:

In order to prop up the initial system, Bitcoin "mining" was designed to bribe early users with exponentially better rewards than latecomers could get for the same effort. This effectively makes Bitcoin a pump-and-dump scheme wherein these early adopters, who have more bitcoins than anyone else ever will, hype it up so they can offload their bitcoins onto fools who think they'll strike it rich as speculators, or whomever else will accept them as payment. Basically, this means the system runs on opportunism, especially among people who like the idea of decentralized techno-money.

Although this setup is defended as an acceptable trade-off and/or a fair reward for propping up the system,[15] this presumes that it will actually result in a widespread, reliable currency. This has yet to happen, and in the mean time, speculators and opportunists remain Bitcoin's main beneficiaries

Also noted in the article is a bit of a surge in linden dollars from Half Life.

business.financialpost.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Economist article on bitcoins

I use Bitcoins. They're essentially like a virtual form of gold. As governments tighten up controls on monetary policy Bitcoins are a great way to hedge bets and give you a good way to transfer your wealth from one currency to another free of government restrictions.

The one argument I get from some people is "what if the whole system collapses"? I'm not sure why they'd even ask this question because if/when that happens all the fiat money will be worthless anyway.

Bit-Coins are non centralized. That's why you should use Bit Coin

bitcoin,,they will never BYTE lol

I have a few bitcoins, paid a bit too much at the time but looks to have quite a stable base and plan, in it more for the long term. If you are interested with buying in mtgox.com... is the site I used.

I like the theory and all, I have researched it extensively, but I am still worried about hackers and security and that type of nature. Plus what happens if all the bit coins ever created got mined ya know. Then only the rich would remain rich in bitcoin economies...

reply to post by THE_PROFESSIONAL

You’re not wrong, virtual currency sounds even more vulnerable than the current markets we have.
You only need to see that hackers are hacking physical PC systems now days, not the software itself. Meaning your virtual bit coin is only as safe as the hardware running the servers. I wouldn’t have any confidence any sort of manmade virtual security would protect it from funded hackers.
Plus, if all the world went to hell in a hand basket economically, I can’t image the grocer with a short supply of bread and water would take your 'virtual bit coin'.

Originally posted by Aloysius the Gaul

Kind of wierd - does anyone on here actually use bitcoin??

Yep, I use Bitcoin regularly for market trading, money transfers, and to buy precious metals.

Everyone should invest in bitcoins...

Because it will be funny to watch the sheep running around in a panic when they switch the internet off.

Bitcoins are not protected by manmade virtual security, but by the laws of mathemathics and decentralised nature. As long as the bitcoin network processing power remains decentralised (meaning noone controls close to half and more of its processing power), the probability of successfull bitcoin fraud is astronomically small.

Its similar principle as in encryption - if you dont own enough processing power, its guaranteed by mathematics you cannot break it in any meaningful time.

en.bitcoin.it...

Bitcoin isn't infallible. It can be cheated. But doing so is extremely difficult. Bitcoin was designed to evade some of the central problems with modern currencies – namely, that their trustworthiness hinges upon that of people who might not have user's best interests in mind. Every currency in the world (other than Bitcoin) is controlled by large institutions who keep track of what's done with done with it, and who can manipulate it's value. And every other currency has value because people trust the institutions that control them.

Bitcoin doesn't ask that it users trust any institution. Its security is based on the cryptography that is an integral part of its structure, and that is readily available for any and all to see. Instead of one entity keeping track of transactions, the entire network does, so Bitcoins are astoundingly difficult to steal, or double-spend. Bitcoins are created in a regular and predictable fashion, and by many different users, so no one can decide to make a whole lot more and lessen their value. In short, Bitcoin is designed to be inflation-proof, double-spend-proof and completely distributed.

Nonetheless, there are a few ways that one can acquire Bitcoins dishonestly. Firstly, one can steal private keys. Key theft isn't something that Bitcoin security has been designed to prevent: it's up to users to keep their's safe. But the cryptography is designed so that it is completely impossible to deduce someone's private from their public one. So long as you keep your private key to yourself, you don't have much to worry about. Furthermore, one could theoretically create a new block chain, but due to the way in which the block chain is constructed, this would be extremely difficult and require massive amounts of processing power. A full explanation of the difficulties involved can be found in the block chain article.

Bitcoin can be ripped off – but doing so would be extremely hard and require considerable expertise and a staggering amount of processing power. And it's only going to get harder with the passage of time. Bitcoin is isn't impenetrable, but it's close enough to put any real worries in the peripherals.

Could miners fundamentally change the nature of Bitcoin?

Once again, almost certainly not.

Bitcoin is a distributed network, so any changes implemented to the system must be accepted by all users. Someone trying to change the way Bitcoins are generated would have to convince every user to download and use their software – so the only changes that would go through are those that would be equally benefit all users.

And thus, it is more or less impossible for any person to change the function of Bitcoin to their advantage. If users don't like the changes, they won't take, and if uses do like them, then they'll help everyone equally. Of course, one can conceive of a situation where someone manages to get a change pushed through that provides them with an advantage that no one notices, but given that Bitcoin is structurally relatively simple, it is unlikely that any major changes will go through without someone noticing first.

The fact that such changes are so difficult to make testifies to the fully distributed nature of Bitcoin. Any centrally-controlled currency can be modified by its central agency without the consent of its adherents. Bitcoin has no central authority, so it changes only at the behest of the whole community. Bitcoins development represents a kind of collective evolution; the first of its kind among currencies.

Originally posted by Citybig
Everyone should invest in bitcoins...

Because it will be funny to watch the sheep running around in a panic when they switch the internet off.

You should be aware that Bitcoin doesn't require that the Internet be operational in order to function. It can operate on dark nets, phone2phone via NFC, and even paper.

So my second life is now Half...

Hmmm...Didnt notice that

Originally posted by Aloysius the Gaul

In order to prop up the initial system, Bitcoin "mining" was designed to bribe early users with exponentially better rewards than latecomers could get for the same effort. This effectively makes Bitcoin a pump-and-dump scheme wherein these early adopters, who have more bitcoins than anyone else ever will, hype it up so they can offload their bitcoins onto fools who think they'll strike it rich as speculators, or whomever else will accept them as payment. Basically, this means the system runs on opportunism, especially among people who like the idea of decentralized techno-money.

Although this setup is defended as an acceptable trade-off and/or a fair reward for propping up the system,[15] this presumes that it will actually result in a widespread, reliable currency. This has yet to happen, and in the mean time, speculators and opportunists remain Bitcoin's main beneficiaries

Money is always rotten, simply because it is always the most rotten people who are primarily attracted to it. The question isn't whether or not Bitcoin is rotten; it's whether or not Bitcoin is less rotten.

To those that have put in the time and effort to research bitcoin, can you supply one or two links that really cut to the chase, or those resources you found most useful in your research?

thanks so much

Bitcoin's are virtual money backed by what? The US dollar is in a way virtual money. The Dollar is only backed by consumer confidence. It would be one thing if there was a tangible commodity backing the Bitcoin. I'm not taking sides, but what is to prevent the bottom from falling out of the Bitcoin?

Looks like I'm going to log into my bit coin accnt and trade off the 300 I have sitting there...

Interesting that it took all these problems in Europe for that to really take off..

~Tenth

reply to post by tothetenthpower


Don't your going to start a run on the bitcoin banks!!!!!!!!

reply to post by NoRemorse762


Hahah, nah I would not trade them all off at once that would be silly.

I do have a bit coin farm though that's been drudging away for a a year now. I should probably just build another platform and get into a proper pool.

Originally posted by Esotarious
I use Bitcoins. They're essentially like a virtual form of gold. As governments tighten up controls on monetary policy Bitcoins are a great way to hedge bets and give you a good way to transfer your wealth from one currency to another free of government restrictions.

The one argument I get from some people is "what if the whole system collapses"? I'm not sure why they'd even ask this question because if/when that happens all the fiat money will be worthless anyway.

Bitcoin isn't one of their creation. So they have to destroy it then clone it.