maybe "donating" to the cause? I mean, at this point, all investors in bitcoin are essentially funding a start-up project, with the hopes that it succeeds and they will get paid off in the end.
This is exactly what I think of bitcoin "investing": as shares in a startup. When a venture capital company gives $100M to a startup and takes a 10% stake, thus valuing the company at $1B, rarely is the company actually worth $1B at that point. Like the 8 month old Square.com:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304665904576383813592144744.htmlAnd I can guarantee that Bitcoin has more users, more publicity, and more man-years of development than Square, and is more deserving of $100M in capital.
How much money has actually been put into the Bitcoin ecosystem? I think MagicalTux said $6M in total transactions in June, so call it $4M in and $2M out, and perhaps $10M for the year. Sure, some of that is going to speculators, but even if 1/10th of that is going towards supporting engineering effort, its comparable in money utilization to a startup. So, sure, we might all be throwing our money away, but I think we all know that - we're in the speculation subforum, after all.