Bitcoin Forum

As I'm new to Bitcoin I don't have a good sense of Bitcoin's current or potential rise in value.  I would imagine that there are many who are ready to jump into Bitcoin solely due to it's meteoric rise in the past month or from the start of this year.  I would think, too, that as, or if, Bitcoin becomes very much mainstream it's appreciation potential would certainly taper off.

Does anyone anywhere track the growth of retail establishments, whether on-line or brick and mortar, accepting Bitcoins?  I would assume that the longevity of Bitcoin would depend on it's eventual fulfillment as a utility to make common, everyday purchases.

I'm cut short on this post as I have to leave, like, NOW.

But I've some other thoughts I'd like to add.  Later.

Hopefully Bitcoin will get more and more popular, as that will happen it will appreciate more.

It already is getting more popular, and that will trigger a flood eventually, or at least it seems to me.  I feel like there was some kind of spark a month or three ago to trigger people finding out about BTC. 

I should tell my boss to start accepting bitcoin and displaying such. ;p 

I don't think there is such a service out there right now, at least from what I've looked into. It seems like a mixed bag, with varying degrees of success.

the expected appreciation is unknown...
but the facts are;

- there is a limited amount of coins that will ever exist. (aprox 21 mill)
- centralized banking has proven to do anything to protect its own currency (EG Cypress)
- as time goes on it will get harder and harder to mine the remaining bitcoins

As with any currency , value = trust.

If it gets going, whats to say a government wont run a big fear campaign to destroy the trust people have on bitcoins.

My advice, just buy what you can afford to loose, and enjoy the ride!

I agree with your assumption, and I doubt that rise in bitcoin value matches the increase in goods and services which you can buy for btc. A lot of people are buying bitcoins now just to sell them for fiat in the future. And they will begin to sell soon, because there is nothing else to do with them. And this is when bitcoin value will fall back to adequate level.

its parrallel to trust and ease of use

There's absolutely nothing backing the bitcoin, but then again there's nothing backing any of your currencies at this point in time.  I can certainly see where getting more folks interested will force the value up via simple supply and demand, but the real long term value will be determined by what you can actually do with the currency in the coming years.

depends on how much the feds focus on it

I think BTC will end this year somewhere between USD300-USD1000. Could be more....

The future of Bitcoin is bright IMO  :)

here is aethir86 comment on this video below
Holy shit :D this is mindblowing indeed,
you haven't understood Bitcoin without this video... we ain't seen nothin yet ;)

Mike Hearn discusses "The future of Bitcoin
http://youtu.be/mD4L7xDNCmA

enjoy  ::)

I think if the Silk Road has any form of schism or even remote competition that bitcoin will drastically lower in price

You need to think of it from a practical standpoint, not just trends.

people use this stuff to buy drugs, period. That is what drives this economy. The sooner you accept that the sooner you realize bitcoin, litecoin, terracoin, whosgivesafuckcoin, all that matters is that its anonymous and some form of currency with backing projects like SR, BitInstant, Mtgox, btc-e, etc behind it that matters.

In a couple years it will be as popular as Paypal. Why would you shop with Paypal when you can use Bitcoin?

Agreed that it will surpass paypal but a couple of years is pretty optimistic, the majority has no idea what a cryptocurrency is much less what it can do. It will take some major retails to adopt it before anyone will notice its existence, then its value will skyrocket.

How much business does silkroad do? The average person cant even find it. It's probably like 1% of the bitcoin economy.

I cant imagine drugs make up a significant portion of the BT economy, speculation/money transfers alone seems to account for most of it. I suppose the only way to know is if one of these drug sites go down and we see the impact on the trade volumes.

bitcoin is worth the price people that are willing to pay for it.

CNN said it was only worth $15. Guess they must know more than you!

What about other coins based on it?   Think they hurt/help the value at all?

Yeah what is all this drug rep about on the news? It's like - how many drugs are being purchased everyday in USD? BOOM - A currency is harmless, it's the people that decide the future of it. 

Mt.Gox say they are worth $165.

Yeah, somebody should tell CNN.

I can't imagine what would happen if the public would know the potential of BitCoin.

people speculate over it but the actual goods and services provided is mostly drugs / ways to fund drug websites (bitinstant, bitcopia, etc)

im telling you

drugs