Forbes: Bitcoin Prevents Monetary Tyranny

reply to post by ChaoticOrder


It's not all an exploitation of stupid people. The June 19, 2011, hacking of Mt. Gox (which you say is professional below) dropped the price of Bitcoins to $0.01, transferred out of Mt. Gox, and all-in-all affected over US$8.75M.

I found an even more comprehensive list of Bitcoin thefts, hacks, and scams.

With a currency so young, being so terribly plagued by these types of exploitation, having pretty much nowhere in the real world to spend it, and generally being something the majority of people without computer knowledge can understand, it's no surprise it isn't taking off. It's a great idea, but I just can't see it going anywhere.

reply to post by ChaoticOrder


I live in Michigan. There are, by that map, nine places I can spend Bitcoins in the United States, four of which are in NYC. Accounting for all the places in North America and you get a whopping twelve establishments. That hardly makes it easy to spend in the real world. Not everyone buys everything, or wants to buy everything, online.

reply to post by cmdrkeenkid

It's not all an exploitation of stupid people. The June 19, 2011, hacking of Mt. Gox (which you say is professional below) dropped the price of Bitcoins to $0.01, transferred out of Mt. Gox, and all-in-all affected over US$8.75M.

That hack was caused by stupid people at MtGox... but MtGox is a 3rd party exchange. Trusting the integrity of that exchange has nothing to do with trusting the integrity of bitcoin. That exchange was hacked, but the bitcoin network remained perfectly secure. They have learned from their mistakes and their level of security is now several factors stronger. They repaid all the losses from that attack and they still remain the most popular exchange... but really if you don't want to trust them, there are other exchanges which have remained uncompromised. These are complex exchanges being built from the ground up for a totally new currency, some hacks like that are totally expected within the early stages.

With a currency so young, being so terribly plagued by these types of exploitation, having pretty much nowhere in the real world to spend it, and generally being something the majority of people without computer knowledge can understand, it's no surprise it isn't taking off. It's a great idea, but I just can't see it going anywhere.

There are not all that many real world shops yet because it is "so young". And it's not terribly plagued by these attacks, I've never once lost any bitcoins and neither has anyone I know. Most of it happens due to a trojan which steals bitcoin, and honestly if you are stupid enough to download a trojan onto your computer you deserve to have yoru bitcoins stolen. It's not very hard to protect a god damn file on your computer... and now days the wallet file is encrypted anyway. So really the only thing left for thieves at this point is scamming people... and if you fall for a scam you also deserve to have your bitcoins stolen. And it's not very hard to use if you use simple online wallet services... it's easy as pie.

I live in Michigan. There are, by that map, nine places I can spend Bitcoins in the United States, four of which are in NYC. Accounting for all the places in North America and you get a whopping twelve establishments. That hardly makes it easy to spend in the real world. Not everyone buys everything, or wants to buy everything, online.

Give it time buddy... everything takes time. If you expect shops everywhere to immediately start accepting bitcoin you are going to be disappointed. It's called patience... long term thinking. Just because something doesn't immediately succeed doesn't mean it has failed. Bitcoin is getting stronger every day.

Originally posted by benrl
Bitcoin is awesome, and I wish more people used it.

I made a few grand just of trading it, buying low and than sitting on it till it spiked, was pretty cool.

My experience with it sold me on its uses.

How do you get started doing something like that...

Originally posted by dayve

Originally posted by benrl
Bitcoin is awesome, and I wish more people used it.

I made a few grand just of trading it, buying low and than sitting on it till it spiked, was pretty cool.

My experience with it sold me on its uses.

How do you get started doing something like that...

You start by buying some BTC. Then you sell when the price is higher. Rinse and repeat... obviously there are all sorts of trading tactics but that's the basic idea.

reply to post by ChaoticOrder


Until you can convince the fortune 500 to start operating purely through bitcoin I imagine you would have trouble having any negative effect on the international banking cartels.


I have such a love hate relationship with the system.


Bitcoins only practical use is basically a bartering agent for illegitimate business.

Originally posted by ChaoticOrder

Originally posted by dayve

Originally posted by benrl
Bitcoin is awesome, and I wish more people used it.

I made a few grand just of trading it, buying low and than sitting on it till it spiked, was pretty cool.

My experience with it sold me on its uses.

How do you get started doing something like that...

You start by buying some BTC. Then you sell when the price is higher. Rinse and repeat... obviously there are all sorts of trading tactics but that's the basic idea.

Whats a good site to buy them from? Im still trying to figure the currency thing out, like how many do you get for $20?. I've tried to search it but get pointed in too many directions, its confusing..

reply to post by dayve


I would suggest you perhaps do a bit of research into this topic before you really start buying and selling bitcoins. To buy them you can use mtgox.com. Just create an account, log in and check the account funding options they have.

reply to post by dayve


You farm, but you are to late.

EDIT
Better hope your security is up to scratch as well otherwise say goodbye to your investment

Originally posted by On7a7higher7plane
reply to post by ChaoticOrder

 

Until you can convince the fortune 500 to start operating purely through bitcoin I imagine you would have trouble having any negative effect on the international banking cartels.

You need to remember bitcoin is global. Anything could happen within the next few years... another financial collapse may happen and the dollar may implode. The economy of a small country could fall apart and its citizens may decide to adopt bitcoin as a major currency. There are so many things... the internet business community may become sick of PayPal and their absurd fees, and the majority of online transactions could eventually shift over to bitcoin as it gains a critical mass of people who realize just how much better it is than PayPal and all the advantages it has.

Bitcoins only practical use is basically a bartering agent for illegitimate business.

It's clear you've been watching too much mainstream media and their sensationalist crap about the hidden web. There are so many other active uses which you are clearly overlooking. Bitcoin was not designed to be an "underground" currency, it just happens to provide the anonymity such illegal activity requires... like cash provides the same type of anonymity. I never have and never will use bitcoin to buy drugs off the internet. That's not why I like it or why I use it.

reply to post by ChaoticOrder


Why bitcoin
Why not any of the other e-currencies?

EDIT
It will never be mainstream


EDIT
For the craic
www.dailytech.com...

reply to post by ChaoticOrder


I think the freedom that the internet is opening up to the masses is obviously why tptb want to shut it down.

reply to post by aivlas

Why bitcoin
Why not any of the other e-currencies?

Do you not know anything about bitcoin? Bitcoin is the first of it's kind decentralized P2P currency. Until recently no one knew how to set up a decentralized currency system. It was assumed some sort of centralized organization was needed in order to detect and stop double spending and other fake transactions. The originator of bitcoin solved that problem, by developing a network which would keep track of all the transactions in something he called the blockchain. All the peers in the network decide which transactions are accepted into the blockchain... and that leads to a system where no one can undermine the integrity of the blockchain unless they have more computing power than the majority of the network, which would require more computing power than all the super computers on Earth. There simply was nothing like this before bitcoin. Of course now, there are variants of bitcoin floating around, but none of them have really gained any considerable traction because bitcoin is the original and the others offer essentially no real benefits.

All other e-currencies are centralized, and they can be taken down at any moment, as we have seen with several e-currencies. Bitcoin cannot be taken down any more than BitTorrent can be taken down. It also can't be manipulated or debased with the ease of a keystroke, like typical e-currencies can.

reply to post by ChaoticOrder


So all these bitcoin spinoffs I've read about are lies?

Originally posted by aivlas
reply to post by ChaoticOrder

 

So all these bitcoin spinoffs I've read about are lies?

Did you even read a thing I said? I said their are variants of bitcoin but none of them have gained any real traction. Not that competing crypto-currencies are a bad thing... the name of the game is alternative currencies. Bitcoin is just the most popular because it already has a large infrastructure, including currency exchanges, built around it. And most of the spinoffs don't offer anything knew so they don't have appeal. But really at this point I'm failing to even see where you are going with this.

Trouble with bitcoin is that it's the most speculative form of fiat 'currency' online. Might as well be trading in World of Warcraft gold.

The best of the ecurrencies was eGold, it was tied directly to the value of gold. It's drawbacks of course was that it was tied to a company based in Florida and was subject to laws by US authorities (it was raided for not providing records to police in a 'timely manner'). It was a great form of ecurrency, but lousy in security and anonymity. Bitcoin is a lousy ecurrency, but has great security/anonymity (but even then gets hacked).

Bitcoin users now are just riding the bubble.

reply to post by ChaoticOrder


I see, so this is an advert, fair play.

reply to post by ChaoticOrder


Even if the actual concept and lines of code behind Bitcoin is the most secure thing ever created, it can only be as secure as the infrastructure needed to run it. If the exchanges and sources for buying, selling, trading and so forth can easily be corrupted it's essentially corrupting Bitcoin. With that in mind, Bitcoin is essentially insecure.

reply to post by ChaoticOrder


Even if another financial collapse happens, or a country's sovereign currency is falls apart, or some other wild circumstances there is no guarantee that the switch to Bitcoin would happen. They could just as easily switch to JPY, USD, CNY, a new form of currency (ie Zimbawe over the past thirty years), or anything else that they deem necessary to alleviate the situation. Any country is more likely to develop its own new currency due to national pride or switch to something already established before switching to a system such as Bitcoin.

Other than cash, PayPal is the second way we do business. The fees are hardly outrageous. If we bill someone for $100, the fee is right around 3%. That isn't too bad for us. And if we take a credit card through the use of PayPal here the transaction fee is even less, at 2.7%. There aren't any hidden or absurd fees, and it's a lot less than paying transaction fees directly to the credit card companies. PayPal has a pretty clear advantage over Bitcoin. While it has been hacked before and surely will again (just like Bitcoin) it is not attempting to be a new form of currency, it is already very well established, and it's easy enough that people without knowledge of computers can use it.

While you may not use Bitcoin to buy illicit items off the internet, thousands of people do. With over US$22M in sales the Silk Road is one of the largest places people are using their Bitcoins to buy items. So the negative stigma associated with it is not unwarranted. Forbes.c om

reply to post by Blackmarketeer

The best of the ecurrencies was eGold, it was tied directly to the value of gold. It's drawbacks of course was that it was tied to a company based in Florida and was subject to laws by US authorities (it was raided for not providing records to police in a 'timely manner'). It was a great form of ecurrency, but lousy in security and anonymity. Bitcoin is a lousy ecurrency, but has great security/anonymity (but even then gets hacked).

Clearly it wasn't the best ecurrency because it doesn't even exist anymore... and how is bitcoin a lousy ecurrency exactly? It's extremely hard to destroy, has good security and anonymity, it's highly granular and the money supply it finite, you can send money to anywhere in the world within minutes, the transaction fees are extremely low... there's not much to dislike about it honestly. I think you're failing to see the true beauty of bitcoin.

Originally posted by aivlas
reply to post by ChaoticOrder

 

I see, so this is an advert, fair play.

Yes, I'm being paid by the bitcoin gods to promote the word of bitcoin.

I don't even know how you get such a thing from what I just said.

This is just a thread by a person who likes bitcoin. As for you...

reply to post by ChaoticOrder



Why does someone need to be paid to advertise? I have never understood this path of thinking

No idea maybe the dismissal of any other online currency and the bitcoin is best talk