Quote from: NotHatinJustTrollin on January 23, 2015, 02:34:05 PM

Quote from: oda.krell on January 21, 2015, 11:55:56 AM

"Nobody has any interest in using Bitcoin"
=> Network grows exponentially, 5 years in a row

Does that give an indication that the number of people owning bitcoin but especially USING IT AS A CURRENCY (and not just for speculative purposes as an end to itself) is anyway significant? No. The only indication of how many people owning bitcoin is this:
https://bitscan.com/bitnews/item/how-many-people-really-own-bitcoins-and-why-does-it-matter

Low numbers, and that was in january-february 2014, any new guys coming in that were not traders got screwed with it because of price.
Don't know how many more people actually got into the game and stick to it after that.

Aside from reasons related to drugs or child pr0nz or wild speculation (profitable and easy trading of a volatile asset), who is using BTC? Mostly people who already own bitcoin for these purposes.

Why should the average Joe buy bitcoin and use it as a currency, if he is not interested in the use cases I just mentioned?
I mean, why are you here? Why do you own bitcoin? For speculative purposes amirite?
Me too tbh, to trade it.
Now why should the average Joe give two shits about all that?

-as a store of value? bitcoin is a shitty store of value, you said it yourself in a post recently. And 2014 clearly shows it (a whole year of terror if you hodled like a fool).

-because no fees? Volatility can fuck that over real good, so no point in saving 1-3% when you can lose 10-30% in a few days. You might argue that over time (IF bitcoin succeeds) volatility will gradually decrease. While I have doubts about that, in the long run bitcoin transaction fees will be higher anyway. I guess you know that miners need to be paid in order for bitcoin and the blockchain to exist, whether thanks to ridiculous inflation, or transaction fees. The blockchain is not gratis.
Peter Todd said it himself: regarding fee economics, were fucked.

So why should the average Joe put up with bitcoins volatility and the possibility of having his funds easily stolen (if he has to move his money around, you cant just keep it in cold storage forever you know) and no consumer protection?
Why?

For musical chairs-ponzi speculative purposes or drugs or child pr0nz, thats why. But guess what, not enough people care about that to justify a high BTC price.

The masterplan for bitcoins world adoption and earth domination might not work out as expected Im afraid

Quote from: oda.krell on January 21, 2015, 11:55:56 AM

==> "Okay, nobody other than a few nerds and libertards is ever going to use or accept Bitcoin"
===> Microsoft online, Overstock, Dell, Newegg
====> "They don't really accept Bitcoin, they convert most of it to USD immediately. Big money despises Bitcoin."
======> $75 million investment in Coinbase, by New York Stock exchange, among others
=======> "They don't actually think Bitcoin is useful or is going to stick around.

As you said, these companies "accepting bitcoin" is just self-promotion and marketing, since they actually DON'T really accept bitcoins.

Who said big money dislikes bitcoin? Some big money bought it and is now bagholding it, as I showed in my first post.
Not only that, but VC money can easily fail, these guys are humans and not perfect. Like Tim Draper, Bill Miller, Barry Silbert and others. But most importantly, NSYE invested in an exchange not in bitcoin itself, that simply doesnt imply that bitcoin price will be higher and that it wont crash.
Simple as that.

They invested in an exchange in the cryptocurrency space.

What is other big money/names saying about the cryptocurrency space for example?

What is the Federal reserve bank saying about it?
Lets have a quick look:

http://newsbtc.com/2015/01/22/federal-reserve-bank-vp-acknowledges-ripple-bitcoins-original-ledger/

What about Bill Gates about saving the unbanked and giving them access to financial services?
Lets check it out:

http://www.coindesk.com/bill-gates-bitcoin-alone-wont-solve-global-payments-challenges/

To return to my dotcom bubble analogy, yes, bitcoin = world.com, pet.com

Now, the ripple network better represents the internet-dotcom analogy because its simply a technology (sure there is XRP the currency, but its not necessary to give a fuck about that as opposed to bitcoin in the blockchain system, which is a flawed concept), like the internet.

Ripple is just an example that takes what is promising about distributed ledger technology but without all the fuck ups (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=927036.msg10177316#msg10177316) that make the bitcoin blockchain not viable long term and without the NECESSARY incorporated pets.com get-rich-quick-but-without-a-real-purpose ponzi investment (bitcoin).

The analogy of the internet works because bitcoiners represent the dudes that during early internet days wanted to buy shares of the internet, but since you cant technically do that, they stick to pets.com because at least that investment could make them rich quick, in theory.
The analogy works perfectly.

Its pretty understandable why bitcoiners dont like ripple the network. Right?

Again, ripple is just an example. Others projects in the cryptocurrency space might come up with something similar and better, replacing the ripple network and become the internet of my analogy.
Im not promoting the ripple network itself, just to be clear.

Again; bla bla bla bla bla bla pure 100% horseschit.

Go read this idiot; http://www.nasdaq.com/article/big-wall-street-players-investing-in-bitcoin-startup-cm435611#ixzz3PeetWZxz