Oh Bitcoin. Great currency:
1. apparently every client must be aware of ~all transactions, meaning practical trouble once a certain treshold is crossed
I don't think that's correct.
Well, yes, theoretically it wasn't, this is corrent:
Because transactions are broadcast to the entire network, they are inherently public. Unlike regular banking, which preserves customer privacy by keeping transaction records private, transactional anonymity is accomplished in Bitcoin by keeping the ownership of addresses private, while at the same time publishing all transactions. As an example, if Alice sends 123.45 BTC to Bob, a public record is created that allows anyone to see that 123.45 was sent from one address to another.
I don't know how well that would scale. Probably not well.
3. It's used by drug dealers and Russian mob for money laundering (or so I've heard) which means it's future is already compromised. It's not wise to invest into something that is both unstable and used in illegal matters and that is not under control of any national authority.
...and the USD isn't used by those same people?
Not to the extent, no. You really can't control USD money supply and use dollar for money laundering that well
8. people get brain damage from bitcoins lol
What?
You haven't heard? BITCOIN:
http://www.bitcoinminingaccidents.com/?p=271 BITCOIN
9. Awesome ponzi scheme: the founder and the early investors could just mine ****load of bitcoins and have a huge supply of them, but the latecomers can not :v well not exactly a ponzi scheme but...
Yea, it's not exactly a ponzi scheme. The system is actually designed for that though; when it first started, it was easy to "mine" bitcoins; as there are more people mining, it gets harder, thus limiting the supply. It's a purely theoretical currency.
What happens when you cannot provide currency but the economy grows? I mean, why do people even mine bitcoins since it's so obviously a net loss?
speculation
10. Value is completely speculative. Transfer of currency is peer-to-peer and unencrypted. Suffers from hyperinflation and hyperdeflation in short term. Fixed supply of 21 million bitcoins.
Pretty sure that's not true. There's been a big deal made about the encryption code used. IIRC isn't it the same one that Wikileaks used on their "insurance" file? Like RS 238 or something?
What, the unencrypted transfer? could be seriously i'm just pissing on this because it's so lol
12. Well anyways, most of those problems (except the ridiculous creation process and fixed supply) could probably be fixed it was accepted more widely but come one. Who, except of weird internet superheroes, is going to adopt this kind of currency?
So you negated all your points by basically saying "if more people used it, it would be ok"?
No it wouldn't, because it would still cause economic stagnation, there's no central control, there's no effective monetary policy re: economic fluctuations, it would still deflate... I mean, yeah, it could be good, just like Zimbabwean dollar
could be good, but whatever.
You can't pay your mortgage with bitcoin. You'll have your nations' tax police in your tail if you make one wrong step. The currency's value is based on pure speculation. Right now it has no redeeming qualities whatsoever, and as such, it's extremely unlikely that it
would become a real currency. If it did, it would be... Well, it's not like we hadn't tested fixed money supply before.
13. quote=a guy on another forumThis is amazing. It's WoW gold without the videogame attached to it, has no relationship to any tangible assets, there's not even the suggestion that anyone on the outside would want to own 2 of them much less 20 million, and yet humans are trading them back and forth on the assumption of "well, what if they're worth more later" and trying to hedge against the collapse of the currency that, among other things, they use to pay for Internet access so they can generate more of these phantom things.
I like the WoW gold comment, though there's an argument to be made that much of our money these days is the same way; that dollar bill in your hand is worthless, it can not be used for anything of value (for instance, you can't eat it). The only thing that gives it it's value anymore is that it's backed by the credit of the United States, which many people are arguing is getting less and less trustworthy.
Well, there are other currencies in the world as well. Since I have no direct ties with US dollar, the trust itself has only indirect consequences for me. But the point is this: you have real, practical use for $. It has a relatively stable rate, it does not fluctuate wildly, it works as a currency in one of the world's largest market, it is a global trading currency, it is a money reserve currency. US alone has 300 million people using that currency as their... well, currency. It is controlled by a central entity that can control the money flow when necessities dictate. It's value is not based on wild internet speculation.
Bitcoin is just... I just can't wait.
