Bitcoin Forum

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1) A friend of mine ask me to explain what's bitcoin just like that.
2) Another one who was complaning about euro get a answer from me like who is still using euro?. He answers attacking bitcoin (not enough bitcoin ponzi scheme, no demurge). I was very happy He did his own search about it!

They both knew i was a btc fan because i post something like "bitcoin UPUP" on facebook when kimdotcom twitted...

Yesterday I spoke with a sales rep from mobile app service that provides online ordering for restaurants.  I noted how they only accepted VISA/MasterCard/AMEX, etc. and I said that I preferred to pay in Bitcoin and asked if that was possible.  

Not only was the response not "Um ..., what's that?", the response instead was, without hesitation, that to be lean on their end (being a startup) they had to choose just one payment provider and Stripe was that one they chose.   So they definitely knew what Bitcoin was and apparently had considered it.  Bitcoin as a Brand is growing thanks to the free press it gets and because of the cheerleading from everyone holding bitcoins.

my mom just asked me a couple days ago.  "Hey, whats this bitcoin thing all about?"  She had ran across the Cyprus MSNBC story on the internet.  I kinda laughed to myself because its been over two years since i first heard about bitcoins, but i try not to tell my parents anything technology related, because they have a hard enough time understanding stuff like spam and malware. 

I browbeat my kid into buying 100 back when it was $2.95.

A few weeks ago it was:  "HOW much?"

Now she's beating up her friends to get into it.

Was at a birthday part 2 weeks back at a friends. Met some very old friends. 2 years back I was there, too. Noone was interested in bitcoin back then (although I kept blabbering on about it).

This time the interest was much higher. And they came asking me.

Other friend who I've been basically pestering to put some money in bitcoin since 2011 (he never did) now wants to buy on the next crash (lol) and is asking me all the questions. He admitted he didn't believe me when I said "this will be big".

Vladimir why are you not answering Hitler's calls?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4axmD2YvPnA

Had Bitcoin discussion a week ago with an upper-executive of a company that makes optimization software for large hedge funds, financial institutions (Deutsche Bank, etc.), research centers (US Naval Research, etc.,), and government agencies (The Fed, etc.,). He is a libertarian from a Nordic country who is based in Panamá for domiciliary reasons. I brought up BTC and he confirmed that he had heard of it and seemed to know enough to discuss it. He was adamant that Bitcoin would ultimately not succeed because the concept itself can be replicated infinitely. That is the achilles heel, in his opinion. He is dumping all of his USD holdings into hard assets in emerging markets but would never consider Bitcoin a safe alternative.

There is lot of interest from random people in central Europe too. Sad thing about it - they're mostly kids trying to get rich over night with their laptop gpu. Some e-shops are considering to accept btc, there is lot of media attention  but everybody seems to be obsessed with mining.

The counter argument is, that yes this is true, but the current incarnation of Bitcoin is based on a huge amount of collected computational power. Replicating _this_ amount of work is the real challenge, not the concept itself. You can even go further and explain, that you have to motivate and finance all this work which is ultimately based on power consumption. That doesn't come for free, neither automatically.

My comparison was Facebook, actually.....and that BTCs value is based on the network effect (hence why LTC, PPC, et al are not worth anything). I agreed with him that current BTC market activity is a bubble (IMO) but that BTCs brand appeal and role as progenitor does give it credibility in the same way that Facebook has virtually no competitors and a massive market cap, so I would not completely discount the network effect.

His problem with this is that Facebook is a company while BTC is simply a means of transferring value whose process can be replicated (a better comparison is Paypal, Moneybookers, Dwolla, Zashpay, WePay, or the other countless payment companies). He asked me to imagine if I would continue to use Paypal if I had to worry about enormous exchange rate fluctuations.....or to imagine if to make Paypal purchases I had to buy and sell its stock as a means of transfer......and he asked what problem BTC solves for the average person.

That's a great explanation.

exchange rate fluctuations are not such a big deal for me since they tend to mostly fluctuate up and rarely down =P

This, what in some people's eyes are weaknesses of the bitcoin are actually its great strengths, if alt-coins were to compete with bitcoin, they have to survive:

1. Early-adopters pump and dump, I can just mine a lot and even scam you out and run;
2. More directly, a 51% attack.

Both cannot be rid of without great computation power back-up.

I would add that to motivate that amount of work and finance,  there would have to be something fundamentally different about the new protocol to make current Bitcoiners switch.  But it seems obvious that people prefer  a fixed supply that is autonomous.

Also being open source,  I'm sure the network would immediately adopt significant changes that were deemed beneficial.

And the people behind it are as far the best, alt-coiners would bitch about it but it's a fact. Right start with the creator, who open sourced everything then disappeared, this is quite a statement indeed.

Yesterday couple of husband and wife contact me via phone after they saw my ads on localbitcoins and setup a meeting for BTC dealing, When met, I'm surprised while figured out this is firstime they trying to setup wallet and dont have an idea what it is, I'm helping to setup wallet and give them some explanation about bitcoin. He knew about bitcoin on news regarding what happen in cyprus and want to kept few BTC for savings.

In the end sold them 3 BTC for fiat.  ;D

I have had 3 interesting talks the last week.

1. A guy in my church asked me about this thing called Bitcoin and how to buy it.
2. Another guy from my church asked me the same thing.
3. I called a friend that I helped buying bitcoins back at $12, telling him not to throw away or sell his computer. He was a bit surprised to hear that the wallet on his computer was worth a lot more than the computer costed when he bought it.

Bitcoin gives average person freedom to own money. Fiat money is debt based and belongs to the country that issued them. You can own gold, but bitcoin can transfer value much easier and cheaper.

I talked to several of my friends in IT branch, the more knowledge they have in software engineering, the more likely they regard bitcoin as a programmer's scam. Just like the other guy mentioned, from a programmer point of view, this kind of software worth nothing because it can be easily duplicated

But I think the reason is that they barely have some knowledge in finance and economics, especially people's behavior. It is time and the community build up the trust of bitcoin concept and made it valuable, not the technology behind it. But this obviously not in their best interest because they are getting well paid from existing fiat system

People should be hit by the fundamental flaw of today's monetary system before they start to consider bitcoin, normally it is difficult, but Cyprus crisis is opening a window now

To those who think it is easily duplicated, I encourage you to do it.  You'll get rich if you're right ;).

johnyj makes a good point.  It is not the software that is valuable, it is the community and the businesses that embrace bitcoin that give it value.  Building communities is hard.

That  said, I'm a programmer, so not all programmers agree with the ones you work with.  A lot of programmers don't know how humans behave and are surprised when they don't act like machines.

My friends are intrigued by Bitcoin, but consider it too risky as an investment.

I think it was in january or so when my coworkers phoned me in my office and told me I had to explain something to them. So I went to their office and said "what's this about?". And then they asked me to explain how bitcoin works to them. They are programmers/techsavy people and they knew I was into bitcoin since I told them once how I was mining them.

Since the recent price surge the IT guys in my room keep asking me for the current bitcoin value haha and they kinda regret not buying a few a while back.

I confess, all this sudden awareness is partly my fault.  I'm constantly commenting on articles I see online, posting on Facebook, tweeting, etc.  Today I commented on a couple of articles about the Fed, saying: "Dear Fed. You really blew it, so we're taking back control of money. You can keep what's left of the dollar, as we're switching to Bitcoin. Let's see you try to quantitative ease that!"

I've even ordered some Casascius physical bitcoins to give away to the groomsmen at my upcoming wedding.  I'm not sure they will appreciate them now, but when I tell them that a version 1 Casascius coin recently sold on eBay for over $500, I'm sure their interest level will rise a bit!

But getting to your question, what problem does Bitcoin solve for the average person?

It solves two big problems.  First, it will eventually become a stable currency free from government abuse.  Once it is widely used around the world, it will stop the politicians and central bankers from tinkering with the economy by manipulating the money supply.

Second, much as email made handwritten letters virtually obsolete, Bitcoin will eliminate many of the functions (and costs) of banks.  You can send any amount of Bitcoins (that you own) to anyone, anywhere in the world, any time of day or night, for a fee of about $0.05, and the transfer will be confirmed in about an hour.  No longer will you be forced to choose between checks or ACH, which take days, or wire transfers that cost $25-50 and only work while the banks are open.

Bitcoin is Money Version 2.0.  It's easier, faster, and cheaper to use than fiat.  In fact, because it is free of government manipulation, it is perhaps the most important technological innovation of our age.

I always thought that Bitcoin's most probable end point will be a superior fork - the concept is impeccable and will prevail, but the execution will be replicated and probably improved

Nevertheless, this is not going to happen overnight.

Oh, and now the anecdotical evidence: yesterday BTC was on prime time news on TV. But they fucked up the exchange rate - they said 37€ when it's ~70€  ;D

nice analysis. +2 insightful

njjjhihi. so you're saying man faces 2 problems: state and banks... and bitcoin does away with both of them while being the geatest invention of our age?

Love it!

After explaining the advantages of Bitcoin, I tell them this.  This is like buying Google stock three years after their first IPO.  Yes, it is risky.  Yes, you've missed a tremendous run up, but there is probably still a long ways to go. 

It doesn't require a huge investment.  $1000 is enough.  If Bitcoin fails, you're out $1000 at most.  But if the price keeps going up by a factor of 7 each year, you're a millionaire in 4 years.

Can they really afford NOT to take the risk?

Just this week, 3 co-worker (on 50 employee) came up asking me about bitcoins.  They know I love/know about it because I'm wearing BTC T-Shirts at work.  I was glad, for the first time, folks I did'nt told them about  (ok, my T-Shirt talks) ask me about Bitcoin :)  This made my day !

I've answered short answer like :

"Bitcoin is a new currency and paiment system all-in-one, no fees, as fast as debit cards, and not controled by anyone.  Within a few years, we will be able to pay for our food with bitcoins.  Better know about it sooner than later, google it !"

:D

Bitcoin is about to deliver, the baby is comming to the world :)

David Morgan says something like: Most people don't buy at the low. They stand on the sidelines for a long time until they decide to get in, at which point a good part of the move has already happened".

Thing is: with Bitcoin the move could potentially be so massive that it doesn't matter, regarding your personal well-being, wether you buy for one or ten thousand. That's probably just the difference between a good life and a very good life with a bad conscience.

ooouuuh! and it's beaAAUUUTifulll, a gift of god! So innocent and pure. What will happen to the creature in his lifetime?

Well, I think it's more like getting in Google before the IPO. Not sure what the offering was, but Google was around $100 the day it started trading. Still, it's a decent analogy to get across the point that one isn't too terribly late to the party yet. But I think my friends can't shake the idea that e-currency is "cheezy" somehow, and that any e-currency that has appreciated as much as Bitcoin has must be a bubble.

Exactly.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Google

great thread, i've told all my non believing friends that i'm still willing to hire them as servants when they come running screaming and crying as Fiat World collapses and they realise that the only safe haven is powered by the people. I will still offer them food and water for we still need to help the weak.

A few of my more tech-savy friends are aware of it, certainly.  What their interest or involvement with BTC is thus far however, I don't know.

One friend I'm trying to bring him around to the concept but he is to be fair, quite busy so I don't think he's just had a chance to study the concept and benefits to his business.

One other friend feels that it's just a bunch of techy ideas spread by Libertarians and "radicals" to the state.  While that may partly be true, I think there's just a lot of normal techie oriented people here too that have come to enjoy the benefits of Bitcoin as-is.  You can be for or against what the Government (or a government) does but that doesn't make Bitcoin any less awesome.

...and to think, I suggested to the one friend to buy a few a few months ago when the price was probably in the mid-teens to low 20s!

I get this all the time: "The idea is great, everything is great, I just don't want to put my money into it.". Well OK. You don't have to. I'm usually saddened that people are not willing to support an idea that they agree is good, but I can understand that they don't want to risk.

But the fact is.. they are already taking a huge risk with fiat money! There is a reasonable chance (insert your own number here) that in the near future there will be a big value transfer from fiat currencies to open decentralized money. It might not be bitcoin, it might be something better. Open decentralized money idea is just too good to go away.

By not trusting bitcoin now, you are trusting fiat money too much, which might be an expensive mistake in the long run.