The DAO as a concept is a great idea - it enables potentially large funds to be gathered from a large number of people in the world with very few barriers to entry - no regulatory barriers, only technical ones dealing with a crappy Ethereum Mist wallet (in German Mist means dung!) and quite complex procedures for voting etc.

($48 Million raised so far in THE DAO!)

Once these barriers are more or less removed so that non-techie participants can join in, I can see billions or more flowing into these DAOs. After all we are in a world of huge debts and huge savings sitting doing nothing as there seems little point in keeping funds in banks earning nothing or putting them into an overvalued stock market.

One potential barrier for investors in DAOs is that the funds are stored in ETH rather than BTC, with the risk of the ETH value plunging on conversion to fiat. I wonder if there can be a way for a new DAO to be created on the Ethereum blockchain with its smart-contract abilities but with storing the value in BTC rather than in ETH?

Because the DAO is autonomous and will send funds to a public key once the voters agree to do that - it must hold the ETH private key somewhere (encrypted of course) - so why cannot the DAO funds be deposited in BTC, the DAO hold the BTC funds and private key - and disburse BTC to the projects.

If this was a possible scenario then I can see huge funds flowing in to such a DAO.

Any ideas?

Great idea - this POV (proof of Validation) appears to be a real development and something new beyond POW and POS.

I've been looking for an algo which can replace the rewards to a small coterie of miners with a reward to every participant who runs a full node and thus supports the entire system.

Once you have a large network of participators, each getting a regular if small income, then you have the potential for a powerful global crypto which challenges all others.

Can POV do this?

In order to use POV, the participants need coins in order to bond them and participate - how can you do a fair distro of coins in the first place? - has this been considered in this context?

Reading these posts and observing the views of the traditional media I notice a couple of things.

1 The traditional media have no clue about the potential for BTC to supplant the sovereign currency system and talk about BRICS currencies and SDRs are a replacement for the current system.

2 Actually I think that we must not be passive, that if we as a global BTC community want 1BTC=$1M within say 12 months from now then yes it is possible - as long as we act in concert and not individually.

We as a global community of x millions? have tremendous power if we act together, and if we can engage with the present failing system on an equal basis and not as irrelevant upstarts.

If we can somehow organize behind an initiative with a goal of 1BTC = $1M by September 2015 we can achieve it - we have the spirit of the time on our side and the power of the crowd againt failing oligopolies who have no idea how to move forward except with more of the same.

Responses?

Well said, Marcelus.

As long as the people who are buying Ethers are doing so in a spirit of assisting in the launch of what can be a truly revolutionary idea and not just speculating on the price, then that is sufficient justification for the effort.

The advent of BTC makes it easy for funds to flow quickly and in an unimpeded way from many individuals to a common entity.

The $6m or so is really very small in this context compared with what the Ethereum team are setting out to achieve.

Do not forget that they plan to open-source their code so that the crypto-community worldwide will stand to benefit from their work.

Bitstamp has all of its operations in Slovenia and as far as I can see never needed to incorporate in the UK.

I heard that they wish to move operations to the UK hence maybe re-animating the Ltd.

So far it looks like the Ethereum pre-sale has raised 6300 BTC or nearly US$ 4 million - so there is every expectation that they will reach their $30 million target in the time-frame they set up.

If this happens it will become the largest ever Crypto-IPO and the Ethereum team will have their work cut out dealing with the influx of cash after striving for so long on very little.

Good luck to them for pulling off what is a very ambitious scheme - they have done their homework and attracted a lot of confidence that they can succeed.

We need these kind of initiatives in the crypto-world as they stabilize and strengthen the whole eco-system.

It is too easy to call these initiatives scams - I think there is far more at stake than that.

The Ethereum team seem to have done their legal stuff right, and in so doing they have set a precedent for a new kind of fundraising for projects - simply selling an essential part of your crypto as a piece of software and therefore selling a product.

This seems a neat way around the SEC, FCA rules and regs and enables loads of people from around the world to participate in a crowd-sale.

Expect to see a lot more fundraisers designed around the Ethereum model in future.

This is certainly a risky proposition seen as an investment. However seen as a support for a really smart bunch of people with very ambitious plans for a Web 3.0 system it makes total sense.

The original investors might not make any money on this but similarly to the dot-com boom a lot of goood stuff may eventually come out of this.

Overall though this kind of pseudo-IPO shows more and more how easy and quick it is to raise substantial funds in a very short time without going through all of the expensive hoops of a traditional IPO.

We will be seeing lots of these type of fundraisers in the near future - showing how much the crypto world can overcome the institutional barriers in the failing world of fiat.

Soon perhaps raising $100 million plus in BTC fundraisers like this will no longer be surprising.

As it seems so  easy and direct just to use BTC to fund-raise, why did Maidsafe need to include Mastercoin and why did Swarmcorp need to include Counterparty?

Ethereum is a great idea - I've talked to some of the devs and they seem really competent and enthusiastic - altogether a nice team of folks.

Unfortunately, looking at the detail of the pre-sale (not an IPO as they're selling software - a product) there is so much complication and lack of clarity that much has to be taken on trust.

For me the confusion about how many Ethers will exist in total is in sharp contrast to BTCs 21 million cap which is one of its greatest selling points.

Therefore any investment in this pre-sale is really just a support of the team and a wish to see this very ambition project succeed - eventually.

I do not see this as an investment but as support to the team.

I had a similar situation.

I extracted my private key and imported it into a new wallet and re-synced - all went well.

Nice guide.

What your guide emphasises is that Bitcoin is not at all like old money but a niftily combined accounting system which anyone with coins can update

We need this kind of perspective to see what a paradigm shift this represents.

It just needs a tipping point to be reached in understanding and adoption will soar.

There is away it may go  to $0 = if another altcoin takes over the market = however that is very unlikely now,

A lot of the new alts have short emissions in the POW phase - then they move onto a POS stage which saves power and is perhaps nowadays the only way to overcome BTCs massive advantage in hashing power.

Its all about adoption - that seems may need a quantum leap - catalyzed by external events probably = another financial crisis.

Otherwise it will shoot up anyway - way past $1000 = or it goes to $0 - its a binary system