No, this isn't related to the Bitcoinica hack. The hack just makes the choices obvious and straightforward.

I, Zhou Tong (Zhou is my surname), will discontinue all involvement in Bitcoin-related projects after the Bitcoinica incident has been fully resolved until further notice.

I always believe in Bitcoin, or simply anything that brings people financial liberty. I have heavily invested in Bitcoin (I purchased one 1,000 BTC gold coin from Casascius and will keep it for as long as I can). And I have enjoyed what I have done for the Bitcoin community.

Really, thank you for all the wonderful support. It feels great to have an experimental project become the "best thing since sliced bread", and run one of the most profitable businesses in a new economy. Bitcoinica has a total historical revenue equivalent to about 0.67% of the whole Bitcoin economy. Not even Apple can match this record in the real world economies.

The first time I read about Bitcoin was in late 2010. My first reaction was "these coins are cheap, maybe it just doesn't work". I learned about Bitcoin again in mid 2011, when the first bubble started. I bought my first Bitcoin when it fell to $8. I told all my close friends and classmates about Bitcoin, simply because I think it's a cool idea. The idea of a margin trading platform quickly went into my mind, and I started working on Bitcoinica.

I lied about the time it took to build Bitcoinica. (I said I spent one week on it.) I started on September 4, 2011 and launched on September 9, 2011. Just four and half days. In a week, trading volume passed one million dollars. I started making profits like crazy.

In November, an investor approached me to acquire Bitcoinica. Due to regulatory concerns, I agreed to the deal and signed the agreement. Bitcoinica was sold for a good price. However, since the investor is unable to arrange for a replacement team, I continued to become the sole operator until Team Intersango took over two weeks ago. The investor let me keep all profits until late January, the official handover time. After handover, he continued to offer generous salary and performance bonus every month. The investor demands his identity to be protected so I won't share more information on this.

I left school in Singapore and decided to continue my education in Australia. I made the decision because of the Internet industry, and the hacker culture. I'm a web developer and I want to become a really good one. I want to work with smart hackers and wonderful designers to change the world. Singapore isn't particularly good at this. (Obviously, US West Coast should be a better choice, but for some other reasons I didn't consider US.)

I have started working on another project (not Bitcoin-related) that is going to make a little difference on the Internet. So far I have achieved great progress and I'm pretty confident about this new venture.

My life hasn't changed much except that I became more confident after Bitcoinica's success. I realized that I have the power to make something profitable. Such kind of confidence is extremely hard to get, until you really experience a significant success. I worked on several projects before, and all of them failed eventually. I thought I was confident because I kept building new stuff and improving myself. But the real confidence comes from the success itself.

I failed at one thing though, that is generating value for the society. Bitcoinica did create a place for people to trade more efficiently and provide liquidity to the market. However, speculation is a zero-sum game (or negative-sum, strictly saying). I know there can be many justifications for Bitcoinica's value, but all of them are against my intuition and values.

With the confidence and the innate intuition to build wonderful things for a better world, I decided to move on. I didn't quit Bitcoinica because it's the only source of income that I currently have.

I know that my time is valuable and industry establishment is really important. I don't want my name to be remembered by only Bitcoiners. It's true that I believe in Bitcoin's potential, but not everyone believes. If I'm a influential person I wouldn't have to do this, but the best way to be known in the Internet industry is to build products that save people time, money and headaches.

I'm going to be a young entrepreneur that solves problems for everyone. I leave Bitcoin only because it doesn't help address my real needs. Making money isn't that important after all.

I'll be a Bitcoin lover forever, and I will come back to this forum regularly to discuss about the future that's in our own hands! I will keep the 1,000 BTC  gold coin as a lifetime investment and I'm pretty confident that it'll be the best investment ever in my life.

Bitcoin FTW!

If some big companies in bangladesh have started using cryptocurrency, then surely there will be many other big companies that will use cryptocurrency. This can make the bangladesh government will legalize many other cryptocurrencies.

Yea if you use proper risk management and invest in certain projects at early stages.

The Ministry of Finance of Germany signed the Decree on recognition of bitcoin  legal tender.  The document specifies that purchases made for cryptocoins, are not taxed!What do you think about it?

Hello guys. I just want to ask for your opinion or an advice.
I started trading since May 2017. I calculated all my loss, I already lost 50% of my capital  . Some coins are still in hold.
I just want to ask what can you give to me an advice or any learnings  about trading. I'm using bittrex.

Yes ofcourse it is a must. Before putting your money or joining bounty campaign it requires deep research about the project and the team behind it. As more and more ICO are turning to scam we need to be extra careful which project we will support.

I think it will still take some more time to get legalized. Banks think of it as a big threat which eventually affects bitcoin to get accepted worldwide. I hope someday bitcoin will get legalized in most of the countries because it can change the world's economy.

Be patient, this is what we need to do
Bitcoin's price fluctuations have slowly been stable. Now everyone is waiting for the arrival of the bull market.
The constant good news is the best support for our patient people.

So far I can buy what I need with bitcoin, but I need to convert it to conventional currency or real currency. Bitcoin is an investment and not a way of payment. Therefore, you really need to convert your Bitcoin into Fiat in order to buy what do you want/need to buy.

I would recommend starting out with a small sum like $100-200 and trying to make short term profits by investing in altcoins as the Bitcoin market has seen a significant crash lately. This would ensure you experience and with the right choices and timings, you will end up with some profit too. Just look around in the altcoin section for potentially up and coming coins and divest into multiple alts just to be sure that you won't go down in one bow.

It is very unfortunate on your part. Sorry to hear that your country banned bitcoin. But if I were you, I'd rather abide and follow the rules which your country sets,  maybe they have good reasons for not allowing bitcoin in your country. Follow the rules so you cannot have problems in the future.

Of course we have to be picky with ICOs, because some of them are scam and they just want to get money from investors so we need to be alert in choosing ICOs.

I think it's better to hold bitcoin for a long time than to put it on a coin that has not had a clear development yet. Because bitcoin already has a strong potential that can clearly develop its value. With me holding it for a long time, I will also get a decent result.

Bitcoin is decentralized, and can not be managed by a government. maybe that's why the government does not legalize Bitcoin in the country, probably because they are afraid of Inflation if Bitcoin is legal in a country.

Even bitcoin is old and outdated, bitcoin still useful to all people and as you can see the history price of bitcoin every year the price of bitcoin is increasing so bitcoin will not be down.

I think it's more risky to invest with bitcoin because if investing with a bank if there is a problem already there is a legal institution that handles if bitcoin we will lose all without any legal entity that can help us, investment with big risks of course produce big profits too

As much as you can afford. I believe in bitcoin and it's capacity to grow. I usually use it as my hedge fund.

I think bitcoin is a way for us to get out of poverty, because it's easy here to earn extra income for the better in life and with bitcoin we can achieve life's success. In addition bitcoin as a new job for the unemployed.