Quote from: Pamoldar on December 05, 2017, 08:20:48 PM

How people use their bitcoins is up to them, this is what decentralisation is all about.

Well I don't blame them at all. I just point out the fact that bitcoin is, in its vast majority, not used for what it has been created. Just stating fact.

Quote from: Pamoldar on December 05, 2017, 08:20:48 PM

Lets blame it on greed

Let's not blame it at all, it makes perfect sense to want a nice investment.

Quote from: Pamoldar on December 05, 2017, 08:20:48 PM

Quote

It looks like a Ponzi scheme because, when every potential bitcoin users of the population will have exhausted all of their "potential of speculation", there will be nothing left to sustain the price of the bitcoin.

You might have overlooked this but altcoins do support bitcoin too

I don't see your point.

Quote from: BTG-BTC on December 05, 2017, 08:29:14 PM

I do not think it's a ponzi, but a bubble, though the difference is very small

Quote from: buwaytress on December 05, 2017, 08:10:51 PM

A Ponzi pays out profits to early investors by using the money of new investors. New investors, are promised the same profits, but the system eventually cannot pay it out when outflow overcomes inflow. A ponzi is managed by a central system that determines who gets paid, that processes profits.

There are no promises in trading Bitcoin, except for the ones that investors imagine for themselves. There are no benefits for recruting newcomers, you don't earn referral fees for new people buying Bitcoin. There is no central scheme in Bitcoin, traders decide between themselves what price the buyer is willing to pay to the seller. For as long as someone is willing to pay the seller's price, a trade happens. There is no exchange of new or old money, there is exchange of existing value.

If Bitcoin looks like a ponzi scheme, then in general, the trading of every stock, commodity and asset can be seen as a ponzi.

Quote from: Betthisnow on December 05, 2017, 08:01:40 PM

In a Ponzi scheme you give your investment to a foreign company and they pay your winning rate from the money of other investors. This is obviously not the case with bitcoin because it's always peer to peer. I am happy that bitcoin and cryptos are getting more and more popular and I don't care at all that speculators also contribute to its fame.

Please, let's not review every possible definition of a ponzi scheme.

The main characteristic of a Ponzi is to give capital gain to 1st investers with the money of the 2nd investers, give capital gain to the 3rd with the 4th, etc... other stuff, like centralized or not is detail.
I said bitcoin "looked like" a ponzi but it is more than that.
On one side, there is the trading part, giving sometimes huge fluctuations to the value (panic selling, incertitude, external actors...). I think THIS part is the bubble part. Sometimes, price increase drastically and then crashes. Bubble.
On the other side, the price is sky rocketing (and also helps bubble crashes recoveries) because bitcoin exposition controls the number of people coming in (and also the global point of view, even of the bitcoin first enthusiasts : "oh yeah, we talk a lot about bitcoin today, I'll buy some more because I think it will make the price rise").
Finally, on the last and sadly small small side, small fluctuation due to people actually using bitcoin as a currency.

There are of similarities between ponzi and the sky-rocketing part, as I said (simplified): 1st buyers buy ultra low, sell higher to new buyers 2, new buyers 3 buy to 2 and sells higher to new buyer 4... (alongside with pumps and dumps).
This is possible because more and more people are away of the bitcoin.

Only, as long as people doesn't use it as a proper money (or big players like amazon allows the masses to do so easily), when new buyers XXXX will try to sell to the next that never come... the law of supply and demand suggest a dramatic price drop. This is my fear (and this is also my explanation to why some people see similarities with ponzis)