In my personal experience, I first heard of it 1 year ago in a online forum game, people sold gold for Bitcoins, around March, gave it no importance at first. Now im kinda utterly commited to it. Really an interest subject of study.
It was a friens who told me about this. I was in great financial trouble during those time and thank God, he gave me this friend who taught me and explained to me bitcoin. It was one of the major turning point of my life and I can't imagine my life changing if it wasn't for him. Now I am earning a lot and I don't forget giving token of appreciation to him every time I recieve great money.