So, what do you think about BitCoin?

[Azuruish]

Month ago i met such thing as Bitcoin. It's cryptocurrency which allows to purchase some stuff in internet.
Trick in that it's anonymously. No one can figure out who are owner of that wallet and government can't control it.
If government can't control it than it means that it must be prohibited. But not every country prohibited it, Japan's government for example officially allows to use it.
Government says that such cryptocurrency will blow economy of country plus customer can buy weapons and drugs... But really? Customer can't buy this stuff by real moneys?
Thuh...

I think Bitcoin it's cool stuff except that it's a little risky as you can't take back your money. Damn. If i knew that 1 bitcoin = 420$ i would buy this several years ago and became billionaire =D

[Spectre01]

I'm not sold on cryptocurrency. The price of Bitcoin is not exactly stable and there have been some major crashes, which according to the fanatics was still good for Bitcoin. I see it as something that 20-something pot smoking hippie fuck da police IT nerds invest in, convincing themselves that prices will go "to the moon!" because their brains are fried on illicit substances. Nevertheless, this thread is good for Bitcoin.

[Li'l devil]

I still don't really get what's bitcoin. Is it some kind of Schrodinger's money, that sort of exists and sort of not?

[Remilia Scarlet]

Eh... I was enthusiastic at first, but that enthusiasm quickly waned. The currency isn't that stable in terms of price, and there's not a lot I can do personally with it except cash it out back into US dollars (and hopefully profit a bit doing so).

Also, it's not totally anonymous. The blockchain is public, and depending on how you use Bitcoin, you could trace a transaction back to the originator.

[pritch]

I think anything where you have to buy a powerful graphics card to mine currency is a tech/gamers/nerds wet dream gone out of control.

[HavoX]

The concept seems good on paper, but I'm a bit concerned about its legality.

pritch said:

a tech/gamers/nerds wet dream gone out of control.

LOL, that is classic. You do need more than one card to make that happen though... :P

[AndrewB]

Scalability is the biggest problem for Bitcoin. Ethereum will likely surpass it as the #1 cryptocurrency in the next few years.

[Azuruish]

ChekaAgent said:

I still don't really get what's bitcoin. Is it some kind of Schrodinger's money, that sort of exists and sort of not?

Yep... Something like this. I wonder why it has some price.

[DooMAD]

<-- See title

[Mr. Freeze]

Stupid and impractical at best.

[fraggle]

The technical details are very interesting if you're a programmer and are curious how it works.

But the entire online community of people who use it is in my experience a toxic cesspool that I wouldn't touch with a barge pole. My advice is to stay well away.

[Quast]

Azuruish said:

So, what do you think about BitCoin?

LOL

[chungy]

I still want to like Bitcoin but after six years, I think I have to peg it as a failed experiment. The toxic community fraggle mentioned is one thing, and pushes in which changes the community actually needs and wants (like increased block sizes) conflict with how the Bitcoin Core developers treat it end up harming the network and creating needless forks of the blockchain.

Certainly Bitcoin's concepts can be (and are) reapplied to both other cryptocurrencies and other uses for a block chain as well.

[axdoomer]

Azuruish said:

Damn. If i knew that 1 bitcoin = 420$ i would buy this several years ago and became billionaire =D

It's not easy as it seems. You need to find people who want to buy your bitcoins. When tons BitCoins are sold, their value goes down, so you would make less money out of them.

You could wait until the next time the CIA attacks the BitCoin network, then their price would go down and maybe a month later, the price would raise again, so you'll be able to profit from that. It won't be a huge profit, like if you had bought them in 2011 for 25 cents each and had sold them all on December 4th 2013 when they were 1230$ each. But like I said, it would take a lot of time to sell them all. People may not even buy them when they are above their average price.

I don't suggest you use them, because it's very risky. If you'd still like to use them, I suggest you start with small amounts until you are at ease with them. Speculating on currency is hard and it's even harder for virtual currency because it's not linked to any country's economy.



http://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=XBT&to=USD&view=5Y

[fraggle]

I forgot to mention: you can experience what it's like to use Bitcoin using this advanced Bitcoin simulator. Even though it's a joke parody game, as far as I can tell it appears to be perfectly accurate.

Don't get suckered into wasting a single penny of your money on this nonsense.

[LexiMax]

Azuruish said:

Month ago i met such thing as Bitcoin. It's cryptocurrency which allows to purchase some stuff in internet.
Trick in that it's anonymously. No one can figure out who are owner of that wallet and government can't control it.

Bitcoins are not anonymous - the ledger is public, and wallets can be traced back to human beings if you're clever - or have the resources and investigatory power of a nation/state.

If government can't control it than it means that it must be prohibited. But not every country prohibited it, Japan's government for example officially allows to use it.

The United States also allows you to use Bitcoin - the IRS considers it property, which means that you must keep an accounting of all Bitcoins you buy and sell so you can pay taxes on them.

Government says that such cryptocurrency will blow economy of country plus customer can buy weapons and drugs... But really? Customer can't buy this stuff by real moneys?

No nation state worth its salt is actually afraid of Bitcoin supplanting their own currency. A good currency requires ease of use, but more importantly stability and just a teeny little bit of inflation, to encourage investment. Bitcoin is incomprehensible to the average layman and is notoriously volatile in both directions.

Also, people have been banned from exchanges for using their bitcoins on darknet markets and gambling sites.

I think Bitcoin it's cool stuff except that it's a little risky as you can't take back your money. Damn. If i knew that 1 bitcoin = 420$ i would buy this several years ago and became billionaire =D

There are a couple of problems with this.

First, it was not a forgone conclusion that Bitcoin would actually take off.

Secondly, if you held your bitcoins with MtGox, or any number of shady exchanges, you were likely screwed and lost your investment.

Third, if you improperly used the Bitcoin software and accidentally transferred your entire balance into somebody else's wallet, which people have complained about repeatedly on bitcointalk and r/bitcoin, you were also likely screwed.

Fourth, if you truly held bitcoins and tried to cash out, you had to be VERY careful not to crash the price.

[june gloom]

Another wet dream for depressing geeks that resulted in nothing but broken promises. Like transhumanism and the singularity.

[Doomkid]

Anyone else envision a coin straight outta Mario Bros when they hear the word "bitcoin"?

[GreyGhost]

Paging Doom Marine to the thread!


There's plenty of money to be made in the BitCoin market if you're at least mildly unscrupulous and can afford to lose your investment, but for paying everyday bills I'd stick to fiat currency.

[Creaphis]

AndrewB said:

Scalability is the biggest problem for Bitcoin. Ethereum will likely surpass it as the #1 cryptocurrency in the next few years.

Lack of scalability is a symptom. The problem is that BitCoin is under the control of a handful of developers and Chinese miners. BitCoin was supposed to be a peer-to-peer payment system where no government could call the shots. Unsurprisingly, the free market did what the free market always does: it concentrated all the power into a few hands and left the rest empty. I figure if you're going to be a slave to something no matter what it might as well be a state.

"#1 cryptocurrency" is an inauspicious title when none of them have gained traction as a value store or trade token. Plus, flooding the market with new, improved cryptocurrencies just highlights their individual insignificance. Everybody and their doge can make their own cryptocurrencies. At least fiat currencies have artificial scarcity.

[Graf Zahl]

Anyone investing time and effort into such a scheme must be completely delusional.

[Azuruish]

AlexMax said:

Bitcoins are not anonymous - the ledger is public, and wallets can be traced back to human beings if you're clever - or have the resources and investigatory power of a nation/state.

That this is public is not enough. Yeah. You see who sent and who receive bits but to figure out who are owner is quite problematic if user use fake IP or better TOR Browser for transactions.

The United States also allows you to use Bitcoin - the IRS considers it property, which means that you must keep an accounting of all Bitcoins you buy and sell so you can pay taxes on them.

Yep... In USA... but in Russia you could go to jail for using bitcoin for 5-10 years

Yeah... unstability of this cryptocurrency is the worst thing.
For me Bitcoin is great way to save some money (Translate RUB in USD and back is more flexible for me)

axdoom1 said:

It's not easy as it seems. You need to find people who want to buy your bitcoins

Not a big deal as i know quite a lot shops which receives bits for purchasing.

Also about losing all moneys. Do you think some bank where you put your moneys can't cheat you and just to disappear? I don't think so.

[Gez]

What's great with crypto currencies is how money laundering is built-in.

It's not a tech/gamers/nerds' wet dream; it's an embezzler/tax dodger/drug cartel's wet dream. It's white-collar crime as a way of life. Tired of having your dirty laundry aired by leaks such as the Panama Papers? Embrace bitcoins.

[Captain Ventris]

Doomkid said:

Anyone else envision a coin straight outta Mario Bros when they hear the word "bitcoin"?

Every single time, and I assume that mining them makes the relevant sound.

[AndrewB]

Creaphis said:

"#1 cryptocurrency" is an inauspicious title when none of them have gained traction as a value store or trade token.

Don't even know what you mean by this. The market hasn't matured, therefore valuations are meaningless? I can't make sense of that.

Plus, flooding the market with new, improved cryptocurrencies just highlights their individual insignificance.

This logic makes no sense. It's like arguing that the millions of shitty garage bands somehow prove that Metallica was insignificant.

Everybody and their doge can make their own cryptocurrencies. At least fiat currencies have artificial scarcity.

See above

[fraggle]

Azuruish said:

For me Bitcoin is great way to save some money

Get out while you still can. This is not going to end well for you.

Graf Zahl said:

Anyone investing time and effort into such a scheme must be completely delusional.

Pretty much, yeah. This happens pretty much every time someone comes up with a get rich quick scheme. With Bitcoin there's this whole toxic community of people reinforcing a shared delusion about it. It's kind of cult-like - reminds me of when I read about the nonsense that scientologists convince themselves of, for example. But just like with Scientology, good luck convincing any of these people that they're being conned.

[Csonicgo]

AndrewB said:

The market hasn't matured, therefore valuations are meaningless? I can't make sense of that.

I guess because it's a factual statement?

Any such interim valuations on bitcoin, or any cryptocurrency, are meaningless. What will ultimately determine the success or failure of these things is the price that will be agreed on by many businesses and shops, and you need people actually using this stuff before that will ever happen. Right now it's just "what ifs" due to what a few people on the internet using a ticker program deem the prices to be. Today's valuations are irrelevant in this regard unless it is mature enough to be used without worry that the prices will be bouncing around in the ranges of tens,er,hundreds of dollars.

Even then you're still going to have to pin the Bitcoin against the dollar and if anything, that undermines the entire point of bitcoin to the average consumer. Once banks started to ponder the idea of a blockchain but with actual currency that matters (USD and GBP), which would combine the "benefits" of bitcoin with the stability of the dollar, well, looks like there are less reasons to use the funbux.

[Azuruish]

fraggle said:

Get out while you still can. This is not going to end well for you.

Probably... I know. I never bothered about to keep there really big moneys as they can suddenly disappear to somewhere but to lose 15$ for me not so horrible.

[fraggle]

Azuruish said:

Probably... I know. I never bothered about to keep there really big moneys as they can suddenly disappear to somewhere but to lose 15$ for me not so horrible.

Glad to hear it. You described it as "a way to save some money" so I interpreted that as meaning that you had spent considerably more.

[Quast]

Azuruish said:

Also about losing all moneys. Do you think some bank where you put your moneys can't cheat you and just to disappear? I don't think so.

Well, I don't know about russian banks, but in the US all deposits (except stocks and bonds) are federally insured up to 250k usd by 99% of banking institutions.