Bitcoin Forum

https://i.imgur.com/txO6X.png

Looks like bullish signal to me.  :)

nice, but chart of the last 2 days looks like "upcoming shitstorm"

For those interested, here is the link to the Google Insights tool

http://www.google.com/insights/search/#q=bitcoin&date=1%2F2012%2012m&cmpt=date

thanks for this.

That is pretty sweet.

Too bad this pirate crap has to be f'n everything up atm.

Where is the chart that shows the "Bitcoin for Dummies" episode of Good Wife coming out, the producer downloading a wallet, then killing himself because it takes too long?

wtf? Scott did a lot more for Bitcoin than you ever will.

Sorry if I offended. It was meant to be a joke, honestly. Probably really poor taste. That said, your statement is presumptuous and frankly we have yet to see.

The media sure took that ball and ran with it.

If nothing else, think of all the people that also just learned that there is a BitInstant, and that you can buy bitcoin with cash because of them.

Here's my take on why the bitcoin-denominated debit card concept is significant:

1.) This allows for a very cheap international remittance network.   It gives the ability to transfer purchasing power from people in developed countries (who hold bitcoins) to their relatives back home (who use the cards for purchases or withdrawals at ATMs, in whatever currency).

With a card that can be loaded using bitcoins, you can add funds to anyone else's Paycard.


2.) This becomes an easy to use point-of-sale terminal for a merchant.

A merchant processing company, BitPay.com, offers a very similar service already, but they work with your bank account (e.g., ACH transfer).    

This lets the merchant spend the funds wherever Mastercard is accepted and for use when withdrawing cash from an ATM.

Faster access to the cash is important to many merchants.  [Use as a point-of-sale terminal assumes that there is some notification to the merchant, such as an SMS text message, each time a payment is received.]


3.) This makes it easier to get by without having a bank account.

I can store my wealth in bitcoins, but spend in dollars when that method is more convenient or less expensive.

Sure, long term it would be nice to not even do any payment card transactions and to pay for everything using bitcoins but we are a long way from that.

This is like a bridge that helps get from here to there.


Even though there have been other methods to load/reload a debit card using bitcoins that have been offered already, the details on this one were sweet.  $10 to get the card and a 1.5% cash out fee.  That's a much better deal than any existing alternative (e.g., OKPay, ArumXChange's reloadable card, self-managed method where you register any reloadable prepaid card and buy MoneyPak at $5 per load and a conversion fee.)

Here are a couple threads discussing the Paycard:
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=102613.0
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=101838.0
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=102494.0

thanks for that review Stephen.  this could be big.  any further news or implications of the MC denial?

I just wish they would deliver first and then start the media hype. We've seen way too many big announcements never coming true already.

Until there is ink on paper, there is no Paycard.  


To be fair, BitInstant wasn't the first to think about offering this. Mt. Gox described this over a year ago:


 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=22018.msg277763#msg277763

The difference with BitInstant's Paycard as it is being described is that the load fee is so inexpensive and fast.  That isn't something normally that occurs in real-time.  But perhaps there are innovations allowing this to occur.  If Dwolla can build a system to essentially make a same-day wire transfer that is as cheap as ACH (FiSync), then there's probably some bank that figured out how to transfer money from BitInstant's account to and individual cardholder's account in under two hours.

It is hard to comprehend how in 2012 man can send a rocket ship to another planet, deliver a rover from a space crane supported by parachutes in a low density atmosphere, but we still can't get electronic bank ledger entries to occur in real time.   Truly bizarre.

There is some info on Bitinstant blog: http://blog.bitinstant.com/blog/2012/8/22/public-statement-regarding-the-bitinstant-paycard.html

If you take an honest look into data, you'll notice that "interest" (search volume) generally follows price, not the other way around. The Good Wife, and likely Paycard announcements are an exception, interest raises without the ongoing rally. I don't see how you conclude that it's a "bullish signal."  There was no increase in price after the January spike in your plot above. In fact, it kept going down for the following six weeks, then it stabilized for many months.

The only way this can be true is if it's a self-fulfilling prophecy (you convince yourself it's a bullish sign, start buying, price goes up, voila!).

Now if we move up in prices now that validates that there is no such thing as bad publicity quote since that this is obviously related to pirate.

I mean it does shorten the supply after all  :-\
Personally I don't think we move up now only after this thing has been "officially" declared over. There is simply not blood on the streets yet to bring up another platitude.

Love Bitinstant and their efforts to popularize bitcoin but I've gotta +1 this.

Put your money where your mouth is.

Where is your bitcoin debit/credit card?

If BitInstant wants to pursue a particular viral marketing program to test and gauge market demand for an expensive undertaking then that is their business prerogative.

Sure, criticize BitInstant's low investment high yield marketing tactics, which have generated a ton of interest and press for free, while you armchair their business decisions without actually producing something yourself. Why don't you put your money where your mouth is? BitInstant's market research has shown the market demand so you can even free-ride off that work. :D

Step 1: Find, by sheer chance, leaked IRC log on PasteBin, write up article and promote the hell out of it
Step 2: Get re-blogged by CNN without attribution
Step 3: ? ? ?
Step 4: CNN capitalizes on the biggest media frenzy Bitcoin has ever seen, reaps all the profit.

(Optional Step 5: Hang self in closet with belt?)

The most recent data point of the google insights tool is known to be imprecise (changes day to day or upon refresh). But the uptick on trends.google.com is also becoming more pronounced:

http://www.google.com/trends/?q=bitcoin&ctab=0&geo=all&date=ytd&sort=0

the wikipedia traffic stats make it very clear:

http://stats.grok.se/en/201201/Bitcoin
http://stats.grok.se/en/201208/Bitcoin

the spike of 20000 is not reached. we are instead steadily accelerating towards sustained 6000 views/day

Have a look at the overlay of search volume and price, and tell me what you think:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=102919.0

Just came in with the highest number of forum page views (daily) since March (when the Linode hacking was the big story).

Just under half a million views in 24 hours.  (And about 99.5% percent of them pirate related ...)

 - http://www.bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=stats

The amount of transactions on the blockchain continued over 10 million again for the second day in a row (never had exceeded 10 million in a single day before this week):

 - http://blockchain.info/charts/output-volume?timespan=all

But since BitcoinDays Destroyed didn't really spike much, the coins moving are pretty much just the same ones tumbling around.

lol

off put by the GW episode?

Like 99.999% of viewers went from thinking "......." to "<anything else>" about bitcoin.

It was way not a hit piece either. "Real is going to change", old people hating on it, protagonist on the bitcoin side.

I didn't read this thread yet, but was drawn in by the fact that I read the title as "Good Wife beaten"

...

New record! News titles are bit off tho i think.

https://i.imgur.com/lHs3o.png

Another explanation would be that this peak is only about Bitfloor, and that the peak about Romney is yet to come  :o

Yesterday bitfloor news was much lower, so either this is bug, or it will change later.

Little update:

https://i.imgur.com/1tz1T.png

To put things into perspective, compared with obama and romney, bitcoin line is flat. :(

https://i.imgur.com/jLmRt.png

hmm.. "obama" spiked with the bitcoin news

Let's compare them when bitcoin has a week long nationally televised and artificially over hyped convention.

Good point.

Nice spike: http://stats.grok.se/en/201209/Bitcoin

Could you point me to that announcement pls?

Hes talking about the election.

Obama and Romney's numbers are over inflated due to the recent political conventions that just occurred.