Thread: Bitcoins

I'm just curious if any users on here have looked into using Bitcoins as a form of payment, or if anyone is interested in finding out about Bitcoins?

I've been using it for about 8 months now and it's been a pretty cool experience.

Anyone?

I haven't heard about them for a while until now. I like their concept, but it's hard to get a new currency going since people have to accept it as value. I don't recall ever seeing something I wanted to buy that had a "pay with Bitcoins" option.

Originally Posted by Futures Passed

I haven't heard about them for a while until now. I like their concept, but it's hard to get a new currency going since people have to accept it as value. I don't recall ever seeing something I wanted to buy that had a "pay with Bitcoins" option.

Well, what would you like to buy with it?

I've seen everything from gift cards, entertainment, services to food, medications, illegal drugs, and even assassinations. Not that the bad stuff isn't bought with our current system.

The beauty of Bitcoins is we, the users, create our own value.

BitMunchies.com

That sites shutting down

Originally Posted by 01gpgt01

That sites shutting down

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Trade#Restaurants_and_cafes

so, this is like monopoly money??

Originally Posted by 01gpgt01

That sites shutting down

Dang. That was just updated today then. Too bad. That is one of many sites though that have been popping up. A couple restaurants in New York accept it as payment.

Originally Posted by Lenny

so, this is like monopoly money??

Not at all. It's digital, has value, and can not be counterfeit, and there is a set amount (21 million.)

Originally Posted by Lenny

so, this is like monopoly money??

A lot of people, this is their first reaction. "It's a Fiat currency." "It's worthless." However, they know nothing about it. Until they take the time to understand what it is about, usually they come back with "that is actually really interesting," and "that really could provide some awesome benefits."

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=7269.0

This write up about it is a lot easier to understand. The mining aspect is the confusing part for beginners, but just know they are "verifying" all the coins before they get released into the world. It's truly is amazing.

I've sold and bought items with bitcoins. I've sold Xbox games. I just sold some "entertainment." It's in the works but involves a Twilight book and a glittery explosion! I've bought computer parts. I even bought a basketball. A nice authentic NBA regulation one.

If anyone is interested and car savvy, maybe someone would be willing to pay you for your auto mechanical services in it.

What I love about bitcoins is the promotion of small business, and the potential to cut down the governments control on our money.

Ifs its digital someone will counterfit it somehow

Originally Posted by boostedcompg

Ifs its digital someone will counterfit it somehow

This is what I'm talking about. Statements before understanding the system.

"What problem BitCoin solves: Mathematically, the specific implementation of the bitcoin protocol solves the problem of "how to do all of the above without trusting anyone". If that sounds amazing, it should! Normally a local currency has to trust all kinds of people for it to be able to work. So does a national currency. And in both cases, that trust is often abused. But with BitCoin, there's no one person who can abuse the system. Nobody can print more money, nobody can re-use the coins simply by making a copy, and nobody can use anyone else's coins without having direct access to their keys. People who break its mathematical "rules" simply end up creating a whole different system incompatible with the first. As long as these rules are followed by someone, the only way BitCoin can fail is for everyone to stop using it.

This marvelous quality of not having to trust anyone is achieved in two ways. First, through the use of cutting-edge cryptography. Cryptography ensures that only the owner of the bitcoins has the authority to spend them. The cryptography used in BitCoin is so strong that all the world's online banking would be compromised before BitCoin would be, and it can even be upgraded if that were to start to happen. It's like if each banknote in your pocket had a 100-digit combination lock on it that couldn't be removed without destroying the bill itself. BitCoin is that secure.

But the second way of securing the system, called the blockchain, is where the real magic happens. The blockchain is a single, authoritative record of confirmed transactions which is stored on the peer to peer bitcoin network. Even with top-notch digital encryption, if there was no central registry to show that certain bitcoins had already been "paid" to someone else, you could sign over the same coins to multiple people in what's called a double-spend attack, like writing cheques for more money than you have in your account. Normally this is prevented by a central authority, the bank, who keeps track of all the cheques you write and makes sure they don't exceed the amount of money you have. Even so, most people won't accept a cheque from you unless they really trust you, and the bank has to spend a lot of money physically protecting those central records, whether they are kept in a physical or digital form. Not to mention, sometimes a bank employee can abuse their position of trust. And, in traditional banking, the bank itself doesn't have to follow the rules you do--it can lend out more money than it actually has.

The blockchain fixes all these problems by creating a single master registry of the already-cryptographically-secured bitcoin transfers, verifying them and locking them down in a highly competitive market called mining. In return for this critical role, the BitCoin community rewards miners with a set amount of bitcoins per block, taken from the original limited quantity on a pre-agreed schedule. As that original amount gradually runs out, this reward will be replaced by fees paid to prioritise one transaction over another--again in a highly competitive market to ensure the lowest possible cost. The transactions are verified and locked in by the computational work of mining in a very special way so that no one else can change the official record of transactions without doing more computational work than the cumulative work of all miners across the whole network."

I hope, with a set limit like that, there's a way to spend fractions of one bitcoin. I don't know what they're going for right now, but I recall my friend saying they were around $30 a coin, but that was months ago.

Originally Posted by Futures Passed

I hope, with a set limit like that, there's a way to spend fractions of one bitcoin. I don't know what they're going for right now, but I recall my friend saying they were around $30 a coin, but that was months ago.

You are correct. You can divide the bitcoin into as many fractions as you wish. This is so the system can't die. If somebody passes away, those bitcoins are lost forever unless someone knows their password to their wallet.

They were worth about $32 USD back in June. It had a spike because the media coverage had hit it and hit it fast. Everyone saw it as a huge investment. I'm in it because I want the system to work and thrive. The coins dropped drastically and hit $2. I snatched up a ton at this value. Now they are steadily increasing. You can track it here.

Bitcoin Charts / Markets

Can I use them in tinytower?

Originally Posted by boostedcompg

Can I use them in tinytower?

I don't know. Can you?

bump

i already have enough problems with spending too much money. i dont need it to get more complicated.

ill stick to real dollars

Originally Posted by Lenny

i already have enough problems with spending too much money. i dont need it to get more complicated.

ill stick to real dollars

What's complicated? Once it's setup it's actually easier and instant!

Dealing with multiple currencies whose values fluctuate independent of each other can get a little complicated. Some people make a living off of it.

Originally Posted by Quicklynx

You are correct. You can divide the bitcoin into as many fractions as you wish. This is so the system can't die. If somebody passes away, those bitcoins are lost forever unless someone knows their password to their wallet.

They were worth about $32 USD back in June. It had a spike because the media coverage had hit it and hit it fast. Everyone saw it as a huge investment. I'm in it because I want the system to work and thrive. The coins dropped drastically and hit $2. I snatched up a ton at this value. Now they are steadily increasing. You can track it here.

Bitcoin Charts / Markets

That's because the wallet files were hacked and set to sell every bitcoin avaliblefora fraction of a cent. There may not be a way to counterfeit them. But you can crash a market by stealing their.wallet

Sent from my Kindle Fire

Originally Posted by z3r0

That's because the wallet files were hacked and set to sell every bitcoin avaliblefora fraction of a cent. There may not be a way to counterfeit them. But you can crash a market by stealing their.wallet

Sent from my Kindle Fire

Luckily the transactions were made through Mt. Gox, and only $10,000 worth of coins were actually "stolen." Minor in the broad scheme of things. It was unfortunate how it happened. There is a lot to think about here though. In my opinion this was at a volatile moment in which thousands of people were getting into BTC and not really understanding how it worked. They just saw $$$. When it crashed the way it did, of course people panicked, sold, and left. Most of them probably have no idea the true concept behind Bitcoin.

You are right though that something like that had a massive negative effect, but since then security measures have been increased and within the past couple of months a lot has been learned and it has become a much safer "investment." Mt. Gox has now made it so that you can't withdraw more than $1000 worth of BTC at their current rate without answering security questions, etc..

Bitcoin is still risky, but the market is a little more steady. I also think there are more people involved now that actually like the idea of what Bitcoin is, and with a ton of sites popping up that support BTC as a currency, it definitely helps.

Overall, very few things in this world are going to be implemented and run flawlessly first go. It takes time to perfect a process, and even then, the process may never be perfect. It's a young fledgling open source software. Linux was by no means perfect when it started, but after many years almost every one owns something that is Linux based, such as your Android phone.

I just think the concept is pure and for the better. It may not work, but to me, it's something that could be better than what we have now.