Quote from: jwcastle on April 10, 2015, 01:06:13 AM

I'd like to ask the users here about how you got started in bitcoins and how you acquire bitcoins.

So the two questions are:

1. When you started, did you MINE or did you BUY bitcons?

2. If you are a regular user of bitcoins currently, do you MINE or do you BUY bitcoins?

To start off the discussion, I can only answer question 1. I mined bitcoins when I started. Then I bought and sold bitcoins through an exchange.
I cannot answer question 2 because I'm no longer a regular user of bitcions.

You could also earn bitcoins by doing tasks for someone else or running a business. It doesn't necessarily have to be between those two choices. Gambling and investing are also other ways to get BTC but you need some BTC to start off with.

As for me, I attempted to mine with my laptop back in 2011 but even back then, I only made about ~60,000 satoshis or so for two days worth of effort. It sounds like a pretty good figure today as far as mining on consumer hardware goes but remember that BTC was worth about 50 times less back then and ASICs weren't around.

I lost interest in BTC from 2011 until 2013. Since then, I either bought via LocalBitcoins or earned from my signature campaign, although it's been a while since I bought any coins. Never really touched mining again unless you count USB miners which I bought for fun.

Quote from: fox19891989 on April 24, 2015, 02:40:37 PM

1. buy, I started my bitcoin investment in March of 2013, at that time, mining rigs cost a lot of money, avalon mining rigs were ridiculous expensive in 2013. It cost over 3000 USD. BFL mining rigs were scam and didn't ship machines at all.

Those first batch Avalons were also highly profitable.