I love how threads like this appear around any time the price has dropped considerably. Likewise you see it on reddit and other tech sites too. When the price drops mining is suddenly worthless, small software bugs become network-threatening or simply "the death of bitcoin", and everyone who's ever known anything about bitcoin is someone who you should feel sorry for.

But wait until the next price boom and wow, suddenly bitcoin is the #1 cool thing to have: the most trendy geek possession imaginable ("make MONEY with your GTX99999 COD-Renderer after your parents have sent you to bed"). Bitcoin becomes once again the magical internet money system that news anchors struggle to understand or explain. After all, how are those basement dwellers printing money on their computers and buying their parents house with their profits? It's again what the non-tech-savvy read about whilst starry eyed about how this new thing will let them retire at 35, or buy that Italian power yacht before they develop arthritis. And of course, if you don't have at least whole-integers of bitcoin in your possession during a boom phase, well, why haven't you bought more yet?

When I started mining bitcoin they were worth <$0.30 USD each. I once sold over 400 of them to help pay part of my power bill. Back then bitcoin was a novelty to throw unused computer resources at, not many people would have expected them to reach a high value in the near future. Now only a few years later and they're worth $400. They were worth (gox-manipulation-vs-real-value-of-the-coins arguments aside) >$1000 for a while. Most people now have heard of bitcoin, thanks in part to conventional media. Every now and then I come across someone who I find out is a miner or who actually has some bitcoins or altcoins. I assume there are more who do not wish to share this information with me, and good on them, it's a smart move. Bitcoin has some challenges, especially with adoption by non-tech savvy (My cat pulled the cable from the Wi-fry thing again, Now Mozilla says something about a page? Should I buy a new laptop?), and those who simply do not care about their money. So I consider bitcoin to not be a failure.