Quote from: CryptoYar on Today at 01:53:41 AM

Exactly I agree Bitcoin value first grew naturally means people traded it with each other. Creation of Mt. Gox boosted this growth making it easier for people worldwide to buy and sell Bitcoin. Governments ignored Bitcoin first thinking it was temporary trend but as it became more valuable they started to worry about its use for illegal activities. This led them to force centralized exchanges to require user KYC with this they trying to control technology designed to be free from control. But most people see Bitcoin as investment other than as pay for things and exchanges are big part of that. Bitcoin open ability to send money directly between people would still work even without them. Entire story of Bitcoin is continuous struggle between its original idea of decentralization and rules of traditional financial system.

Starting with P2P transactions, P2P trades, Bitcoin users had exchanges to trade on third party platforms. Over time, with better adoption for Bitcoin, Bitcoin users have have more options to do their trades through P2P, Centralized Exchanges, Decentralized Exchanges, and other methods like giftcards for example.

Pizza for Bitcoins?
Raw Thai Honey (First 40 BTC of profits go to the forum!) 8 KG for sale!
Very early Bitcoin exchanges.

Governments like the USA and CIA put their eyes on Bitcoin years ago but they did not shut it down and wasted golden time to do this. Now it is impossible for them to shut Bitcoin network down after it has reached to very good decentralization and strong network status.

Gavin will visit the CIA.