Quote from: Carra23 on November 01, 2014, 09:42:50 PM

Quote from: JorgeStolfi on November 01, 2014, 09:24:04 PM

Quote from: Cheeseonastick on November 01, 2014, 09:08:24 PM

Bitcoin is done for. The experiment has failed.

That is a big exaggeration.

The ultimate goal of bitcoin was the development of an e-payment system that did not depend on a trusted authority (including a centralized server). It was not to develop a great investment opportunity, a long-term store of value, a way to hide money from the IRS or your spouse, a way buy illegal drugs or child porn, or a way to drive banks and governments to bankruptcy. It was not even meant to replace credit cards, cash, gold, or old paper checks.

Indeed, bitcoin was not even meant to be an e-payment system itself; it was only a technical experiment, meant to prove that a certain protocol could solve ONE particular obstacle in the development of such a system, namely how to motivate volunteers to maintain the blockchain rather than sabotage it. For that experiment to be carried out, all that was needed was an open community or volunteers willing to maintain the network and trade BTC among themselves, plus a few friendly pizza parlors and merchants to make the test more realistic. That, AFAIK, was the bicoin community in 2009; and the experiment would have worked if it had been remained that until now.

Ignore him, he is just trolling.

Bitcoin as an experiment is a huge success. The question was whether something like this backed by nothing can have actual value, and the answer is a resounding yes.

Agree Jorge is trolling, because everything he said is inconsistent with Satoshi's white paper.

*edit*

No sarcasm intended. Seriously.

*2nd edit*

Seriously, seriously.

*3rd edit*

Yup, I re-read white paper 5 times. Proving something backed by nothing can have value is clearly the goal. In fact, I can easily interpret every single paragraph to state this obvious goal.