You can compare it to a creditcard payment, the transaction takes places almost instantly.
With a creditcard sweeping your card only confirms you have the funds to pay, but the actual payment is done days later and can be charged back up to 90 days.
If you're trading for a lot of money waiting for a couple confirmations is in fact really short comparing it to other payment methods.
^^^^ What he/she said.
Bitcoin is the fastest electronic payment protocol in existence.
Exactly this.
I no longer want to have to keep records of my spending to figure out what my real bank balance is