Bitcoin Forum

Other people call Bitcoin a "Pyramid bubble"


Wikipedia
A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that pays returns to its investors from existing capital or new capital paid by new investors, rather than from profit earned by the individual or organization running the operation. Operators of Ponzi schemes usually entice new investors by offering higher returns than other investments, in the form of short-term returns that are either abnormally high or unusually consistent. The perpetuation of the high returns requires an ever-increasing flow of money from new investors to sustain the scheme.[1]

When a Ponzi scheme is not stopped by the authorities, it sooner or later falls apart for one of the following reasons:[1]
The promoter vanishes.

Satoshi Nakamoto vanished

What do you think?

There's no person or company that is paying out profits to investors. 

study ponzi, then study bitcoin, then tell me how its a ponzi scheme?


ponzi schemes generally have little or no value or utility/use and are controlled centrally by an individual who knows its a scam.

bitcoin doesnt fall into any category of a ponzi scheme.

Let people believe it is if they so wish. Why should you waste energy with stupid people anyway?

This.  In a Ponzi scheme, you pay money to someone, and they pay you a return.  But that return that they pay you is actually stolen from someone else.

Bitcoin is just like a stock or a commodity.  You buy a piece of a limited resource, or you're given a piece of that resource, and then you re-sell your piece later.  If you pay $1000 for a Bitcoin and you're only able to re-sell it for $100, that might make it a bubble, but it doesn't make it a pyramid.

what if AMD created BTC?

Bitcoin's properties allow me to do amazing things with my money that I can not do with any other kind of asset on the planet. It allows me to securely store and send value to anyone in the world without help from a middleman or permission from an authority. I can protect my money in ways that are impossible with traditional assets (multisig addresses, m of n wallets, encrypted wallets).

I suggest anyone who thinks Bitcoin is a Ponzi Scheme take a hard look at the properties of a Ponzi Scheme and a hard look at the properties of Bitcoin. Just because some people might get rich does not automagically mean Ponzi Scheme. Early Google investors are getting rich thanks to late Google investors. I suppose Google is a Ponzi Scheme as well!

There is no fraud in Bitcoin. Everything is open and available for the entire world to see. The source code is open. The block chain is a public ledger of every transaction that has ever occurred using Bitcoin. Price discovery takes place in a global marketplace. There is no one entity in control. The network is distributed and decentralized.

Bitcoin doesn't pay returns.

Satoshi is not a promoter, he is the creator. He disappeared when the exchange rate was a few dollars at most. He is certainly to blame for Bitcoin's adoption, but only because Bitcoin is a fantastic idea (or merging of ideas) which has extremely useful properties, not because he has been actively promoting it to anyone.

Finally, if all else fails, I would just call the person claiming Bitcoin was a Ponzi Scheme an idiot (because they are clearly incapable of thinking for themselves) and tell them to stay far, far away from Bitcoin.

I've been involved with Bitcoin for three years and I haven't received any returns from AMD (or anyone for that matter). What am I doing wrong?

"In a Ponzi Scheme, the founders persuade investors that they’ll profit. Bitcoin does not make such a guarantee. There is no central entity, just individuals building an economy.

A ponzi scheme is a zero sum game. In a ponzi scheme, early adopters can only profit at the expense of late adopters, and the late adopters always lose. Bitcoin has an expected win-win outcome. Early and present adopters profit from the rise in value as Bitcoins become better understood and in turn demanded by the public at large. All adopters benefit from the usefulness of a reliable and widely-accepted decentralized peer-to-peer currency. "

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Myths#It.27s_a_giant_ponzi_scheme

Simple:

Bitcoins entire purpose is "decentralization".

Ponzi schemes are centralized.

Anyone who calls Bitcoin a ponzi scheme doesn't grasp the most basic element of Bitcoin.

The very reason Bitcoin was created:  To eliminate the need to "trust" a centralized authority which could become corrupt.

I think AMD profits have increase by huge amounts cuz of BTC.(please note I dont think BTC is ponzi)

a ponzi scheme would have been desroyed a long time ago.  Bitcoin is experiencing some growing pains but is definately not a pnze scheme and has far passed the "FAD" label. imo

This is my answer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7u4F8cpzqao (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7u4F8cpzqao)

Bitcoin is not a pyramid scheme but an altcoin could be easily developed to duplicate that model.

Basically the addresses recorded in previous blocks would receive small fees from rewards/fees collected in subsequent blocks. The addresses would perpetually receive coins much like a stock that pays a dividend.

NEM coin would seem to be a partial solution... it takes away the power of early adopters and the bitcoin millionaires, huge mining operators, and the rich in general and distributes the coin in a more even manner.  Bitcoin is still far too concentrated seeing all these wallets with more than 10K bitcoin in them there is a small number of people who got obscenely wealthy from it. Good for them.. wish I had heard of bitcoin back on 2011.

In any case I'm backing a coin that I have a vested interest in obviously... the answer to this ponzi scheme thing would be the ultra wealthy distributing these massive number of bitcoins in giveaway threads of course that would take a generosity of spirit that even I admit I would not have was I an early adopter. I'd be slowly spending my bitcoins out in small increments on this and that.

Lots of 'investments' or 'commodities' could be called pyramid schemes. Anybody guilty of pumping gold, silver, or any asset in an attempt to get others interested is ultimately promoting their investment in a way that they want others to invest to 'drive up the price' which is a pyramid scheme. This would also include the stock market, collectables, anything with a fixed supply and increasing demand.

If you bitcoin millionaires were smart you'd be taking your bitcoin and buying all the platinum, palladium, and rhodium you can get your hands on. ;) Why? Russia stockpiles of palladium are gone. South African mines continue to have labor problems. Demand for auto catalysts will continue to increase, and the supply will remain tight for the foreseeable future.

Distribution of wealth is not equal in all walks of life, not just for Bitcoin. But that doesn't mean that it's unfair by definition, or not good for society. People who work harder, come up with new fantastic ideas, invent something awesome, or take risks have more chance becoming rich. And with that money they tend to do good things again.

I think wealth should be distributed in such a way (and not more than that), that all children should have the same chances when they're starting their life's. After that it's up to them to make something of it.

But it doesn't mean wealth should be redistributed just because some people have a lot of money and a lot of people have only a little.

Exactly. Satoshi is gone and it didn't collapse. Ponzi schemes have no similarities to BTC.

I answer with the fact that anyone who thinks that doesn't know what a Ponzi scheme is and doesn't understand Bitcoin either

"At some level almost everything is a like a 'Ponzi Scheme' in that they derive value from new input.  Bitcoin valuations could still be reaching a point which represents their potential utility.  Impossible to know at this point."

Bitcoin is almost a full fledged super-currency not a ponzi scheme. Facebook would be considered a ponzi scheme if looked at in the same way, actually more so because facebook stocks were initially closed to the public. Whereas anyone could purchase bitcoin on day 1. Alot of people have made a killing on bitcoin and anyone could have gotten in. Ponzi schemes are unfair and rigged. Bitcoin is open to the public and fair for everyone.

Hopefully you understand what I'm trying to say. I'm not exactly collage graduate material.

When businesses can run on nothing but Bitcoin it will be a full fledged currency.

By that I mean pay all expenses like employees wages, taxes, supplies, rent, utilities with bitcoin and accept bitcoin for services.

There  is no central authority receiving all the funds and paying people out. Everyone is involved.

You can also see what money is going in and what money is going out,  and money does go out and value goes down as well as it goes up when people buy.  You can see every transaction thats on the blockchain compared to a ponzi scheme where you dont see who's putting in money or where its going.

"You are probably just too stupid to understand it anyway, so yes it's a Ponzi Scheme" I'm done trying to explain it to people, I tried, people don't want to get rich I guess.

All the fiat money is a Ponzi Scheme, it cost almost nothing to make, and the only way to use them is to find the next guy who accept it, but when everyone has accepted this Ponzi Scheme, it becomes a currency :D

Bitcoin is not, since it has a cost corresponding to its value

Bitcoin is a Ponzi Scheme? No Way

Ponzi = early "investor" make a profit, new comer get fucked
Bitcoin = early adopter? some a make good profit and some other have a sad story and I think new comer especially bigguys make a lot than early adopter :D


  

Bitcoin is not a Ponzi scheme. (Technically, it's a pump and dump.)

Mt. Gox, with all their withdrawal delays, is probably a Ponzi scheme.

[1] it is, now give me you worthless ponzi BTC....yeah I thought not.

[2] It is but much less of a ponzi scheme than central banking/fractional reserve banking and quantitative easing, which is breaking your back by reducing you to wage slaves at the behest of a few rich banisters, and their hangers on.

[3] Its not read the multitude of reason in this thread.


QED.

Gox, is likely a fractional reserve exchange, both for FIAT and BTC by now, having said that the higher highs and lower lows, may allow it to survive indefinitely as a kind of weird hybrid alt GOXBTC/GOXUSD

You guys clearly all have vested interest in Bitcoin, this is the hornets nest after all. I am heavily invested in Bitcoin, but I see it for what it is.

It is a Pyramid, the price is determined by miners and the mining manufacturers who produce the hardware at a set cost. When you purchase that hardware, that is your "buy-in" price. From the time you purchase that hardware, you are unlikely to see a ROI, unless you are lucky. The Manufacturers mine with your hardware for a few months until ROI is no longer possible and blame it on delays, the Manufacturers then begin producing the next wave of machines with 3-10x the amount of hashing power. For the 90% of people who get their machines and start running into ROI problems, they begin hoarding all the coins they have mined, as if they were to sell them they would be selling at a loss. They hoard them in hopes the price will go up, as the entire network of consumers who does this occurs, there is less Bitcoins on the exchanges for sale. Less demand --> higher prices. All it takes is a wift of good news at these points and you will see the 20-90x increase hills that have happened time and time again. This process usually occurs in 4-8 month periods.

Also, every time a bitcoin is sold on the exchange, that is passing the "floor buy in price" of one coin, or the bags so to speak, this means more hoarders for the market, less supply of Bitcoins for sale, leads to higher demand --> higher prices. People are less likely to sell their coins for less than that price, and tend to wait until they see huge gains afterwards before they are happy enough to sell.

We are on the cusp of the next huge increase in price, it will occur within the next 2-3 months, the manufacturers have mined the crap out of all their pre sales, and have finally began to ship all of their units within the past few weeks give or take (and 90% of them will not see a ROI, go work it out), that is until the price of Bitcoin will go up, which I have no doubt it will.  They have began manufacturing the next wave of high hash rate ASICS that will come onto the network as they come off the production lines, in the next 2-3 months the difficulty will make bitcoin unprofitable, that event will trigger the hoarding, and you will see the price catapult as a result.

People 'buy in' to the idea that the Bitcoin protocol is amazing and will be the future. This is the source of new money coming into the market, however it does not fully determine the price as I explained earlier, you probably only need a fraction of % to maintain that 11 bn market cap. When the institutional funds come online in June/July and come to buy earlier adopters/whales coins, that will be a good thing for the price as there won't be 500million+ $ worth of BTC dumped onto the exchanges when someone decides they want to cash out.

When the dollar was created, it was done the same way Bitcoin was today, the pyramid is on the damn US dollar bill.

After the price surges, a new wave of bagholders comes to the party, looking to get in on it and make a new fortune.

If left unchecked, Bitcoin will swallow up all of the worlds wealth, at that point it will become a world currency, as there will be no need convert it to dollars and back.

If it gets to the point where there is not enough interest and purchase power, then it will collapse at some point in the future, but this is not for a long time, I'd give it at least another 3-5 years of life. It will succeed if it turns out that the powers that be are behind it, if the whole world buys into it, then it will never collapse, and become the world currency, like I said earlier.

This is something the NWO has been pushing for a long time, Bitcoin was created by an NSA scientist.

The clueless regulators are just normal people trying to do their jobs. What better way to push a NWO one world currency than by letting the people do it themselves, over the internet.

It will wipe out all of the worlds debts, and people holding large sums of nations currency will lose out, like China who owns nearly all of USA's debt/$'s.

You don't have to believe my opinion on the NWO theory, but believe that the price is driven by a pyramid.

No, it's not.


Bitcoin is not unsustainable. It is not a business model. There is no one promising payment or services.

Bitcoin does offer real utility though. It allows users to securely store and transfer value without the help of a middleman or the permission of an authority.

The exchange rate is most certainly not set by the miners. Why wouldn't they just set it to $1,000,000+ each if that were the case? You never even need to involve yourself with mining to be a Bitcoin user. The exchange rate is set by people who are willing to trade other things (usually fiat) for Bitcoins. You can try to sell something all day long for whatever price you want, if you don't have a buyer you can't really claim to have an exchange rate (you can, but it will be an exercise in futility). No one would even be producing mining hardware if there was no prior demand for Bitcoin. I'm not going to bother pointing out any further errors in your post.

Proof please.

You are applying it directly to the definition of maybe a wikipedia on pyramid, you take that definition as if it's written in scripture and holy. Bitcoin does not have to be a business model to be a pyramid, no one has to promise payments or services for it to be a pyramid, you couldn't possibly know if Bitcoin is ultimately unsustainable or not. If you for one second took away your biased opinion, and actually read what i wrote earlier you would understand, you are just another cog in the wheel, or should i say block in the pyramid (lol). If it was this easy to conquer the world, because of the lack of IQ points from the masses, i'm going to gladly join the other side and sharpen the axe. Where do i sign up?


http://www.informatik.uni-trier.de/~ley/pers/hd/o/Okamoto:Tatsuaki.html

That's conjecture, not proof.

" Why would someone who went to such great lengths to remain anonymous choose a name that is so similar to his real name?"

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=235289.msg2556950#msg2556950

But definitions help us to understand things. If you're expanding the definition that much, everything could be called a pyramid. Don't argue on definitions.


Your biased as well, that's inherent to your standpoint. IQ, really? That's just mud-slinging.

Who wrote the definition? You clearly don't understand what a pyramid is if you have to read what someone edited in on Wikipedia.

Just don't argue on definitions. Just say what you think a pyramid scheme is and continue the discussion.

Another example about arguing about a definition is what exactly is a continent. Some say there are seven, some say six, some say there are even more.
But it's not really important, just say what you think how many there are. A definition is quite arbitrary.
Watch this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3uBcq1x7P34) and have a laugh. :D

While this is true, you are forgetting the other angle.

As hardware is very scarce, the demand for good hardware will be high, both from savvy miners that calculate precisely the ROI of a machine and from filthy casuals that click forum/google ads regarding BFL miners with hope to get into the game. This causes the price to be higher than perfect ROI, thus leading to your scenario, but not from the offer's side but from the demand side. Higher price demands more mining and raises difficulty, too high difficulty demands a higher price.

However, once new Bitcoins cost X dollars to make and because miners will raise the floor and acquire the cheaper ones (remember they WANT the actual bitcoins as collectibles, not necessarily to ROI on hardware) the system will mostly grow in size and adoption, the new price of Bitcoin is set in stone slowly by having transactions made on this new price.

Without a technological or infrastructure flaw, or maybe a better replacement with simpler and better design (like Dogecoin) , Bitcoin is still and will be valuable and will have no reason to drop in price until it engulfs sufficient value to replace some currencies. Even if we end up using only Bitcoin, it's relative value will still increase as coins are lost, destroyed or saved for later. Consider for a bit just how cheap Bitcoin will make our financial system. No more banks, safes, coins, bills, stock markets, people to operate them, places to store them, buildings, communications, infrastructure, risk funds. How many resources we can release for other constructive purposes in our society, besides handling our collective effort rewards.

Not a bubble, in the same way as trains, automobiles, radios, televisions and internet connections are not.

Yes, BTC is 100% Ponzi scheme.

Come on, miners and ASIC manufacturers, set the bitcoin price to 1 million USD now!!  :D

Your problem is you stopped reading after that line. How's that attention span doing for you?

The greed in miners is a self regulating system, and i didn't use the word set, it's not like someone goes and enters some arbitrary number somewhere. The trend will keep on continuing. Go chart difficulty vs price.

Too bad, I lol'ed at that sentence so hard that I can't breathe...
I just can't continue reading it... :P

Okay, seriously, I can't agree with your analysis, and I truly believe bitcoin is not a ponzi scheme nor a pyramid...

if this happen then many bitcoiner need heart medicines because mostly cannot affored this price right now  :D

this. Another point: Transparency. In a Ponzi scheme investors do not really know, how the profit is made. The scammer tell people something and the investors have to trust the scammer. In Bitcoin: Open Source + properties of Bitcoin, which makes it valuable (fast, cheap, anonymous, etc.). Maybe some investors don't know about this and just invest, because they see the huge price raise, but this is their fault. The informations are there and easy accessible by everyone, in a ponzi scheme never. 

You couldn't have said it better, the investors don't know how the profit is made.

I just pointed out to you in plain sight how it works, and you still can't see it. You are the dumb investor, getting scammed. Open source, cheap anonymous, blah blah blah. It's all the same regurgitated bullshit each time.

A currency = successful ponzi/pyramid.

Greed, #1 motivator.

I'm going to stop posting here, it's like arguing with a school kid, I probably am...

Are you suggesting we do away with currency?

The good thing is: You don't have to invest ;)
But it is not a ponzi scheme. Bitcoin is scarce and has its properties which people consider valuable. You can open a shop and double profits if every client paid in Bitcoin. Therefore the price for the product would decrease. And it is fast.

Don't you think Bitcoin has value?

If Bitcoin is ponzi, gold must be ponzi as well. Both should be used as a way to store value, but because of greed in us, we hope (and expect) to profit with both Bitcoin and gold

Satoshi was arrested, and never seen again. That alone should tell you if it's a ponzi scheme. >_>

what is the source?

I don't see how bitcoin can be a Ponzi Scheme.
If I'm not mistaking a Ponzi Scheme means that you pay out now for something that is supposed to give profit later on (Never happens of course)
With bitcoins you get what you pay for immidiately, and can sell again at any time with or without profit. Its all up to you.

I think the average age of people in this thread <17yo, real simplistic way of thinking. Not much problem solving skills. Thinking in a linear fashion.

A ---> B
if
A -|-> C - You can't figure a way to go around.

I broke my no post rule, last one.

An easier comparison would be if i programmed a robot with hard coded rules that it must never break. I give it definitions of behaviors and words that is must take as gospel. Didn't know humans were turning into robots.

I say:

"Yes, Bitcoin is a dangerous Ponzi scheme.  By the way, if you have any I would be glad to take them off your hands in order to protect you from this insidious threat."

The source is when I infiltrated Guantanamo Bay. You can trust me. <_<

It is a bit of a ponzi scheme though isn't it? When the price rises the early adopters get rich at the expense of the new comers. Those early adopters then get to enslave the rest of us. The coins they bought at a $1 or even less are now worth over $800. They don't even have to spend whole coins anymore. Fractions of a coin can buy you a lot of a person's time. The early adopters are now spending a lot of their coins on bitcoin propaganda because they know that is the best way to increase their wealth.

Not at all.

No. Explain why you believe it's "at the expense of the new comers".

Okay ???

Well, yes.

The worth of an hours' work of labor is still the same, no matter what currency you use to pay for it.
I fail to see where this is even Bitcoin-related.

I don't see a lot of Bitcoin "propaganda", let alone any paid for by "early adopters".

Reason being? Don't call insult Bitcoin when you can't even explain why.

It's funny that you should be the one to say that

...yet nothing fell apart.

The coin's goal isnt really to just replace the dollar etc.Otherwise it would be that everyone could replace their currency for it always for same value and mining would be just enough for transactions right?

It shant be called "Ponzi Scheme."
Its a entirely new scheme so just call it the Nakamoto Scheme

No, I do not take that definition as if it is holy. Yet, definitions are important because words are how we interact with other people. If I'm talking about a furry, four legged animal, and you are thinking cat, when I actually mean dog, we are going to have a hard time seeing eye to eye.

We can use investopedia's definition if you wish:


The differences between that and Bitcoin are glaring. Bitcoin is not an investment, it's a digital currency. Bitcoin is not fraudulent, there is nothing hidden from the users, everything is open and available for everyone to see.

Bitcoins do have an exchange rate, and I can see how an increasing exchange rate would lead some people to think that it's all a scheme to make the early adopters rich, yet it doesn't play out like a pyramid scheme at all. Bitcoins are bought and sold at market value. If you purchase a bitcoin, there is no promise or guarantee that you are going to be able to sell it for more in the future. Many, many people have sold their bitcoins for less than what they paid for them. There is also the scenario where an individual purchases a bitcoin, and never sells it for fiat. They've moved from one type of money to another. They will never receive any fiat from later investors. Bitcoin can and will continue to function even if no new people get involved from this point forward.

Obviously, I can point out these differences until I am blue in the face. We can get deeper and deeper into details, basically wasting a lot of time. It's clear that you are going to ignore these glaring differences and shrug off these fine details because you've already painted the picture in your mind. You are focusing on the aspects of Bitcoin that look like an investment and ignoring the aspects of bitcoin that look like an asset and a value transfer network.

Ultimately, a Ponzi/pyramid scheme is based on a fraudulent investment. Those involved never receive any product or service. Early investors get returns paid out from the investments of later investors.

There is no fraud with Bitcoin. When you buy a bitcoin, you receive a new form of digital currency, which has been proven to function exactly as described in the white paper. I can, right now, send value across the world, using bitcoins (the distributed decentralized currency and the value transfer network) without asking for help from a middleman or permission from an authority. There is an actual use case, which is being used everyday by people around the world.

I'm finished with this thread. It's up to an individual to decide for themselves. You are either stuck in the box or you aren't. I will continue using Bitcoin to improve the way I am able to store and transfer value. The rest of the world can stretch definitions of words until chimpanzees turn into elephants for all I care.

All of those traditional wisdom have one thing in common: They use USD as an unit to measure value. This is questionable

In fact, the value of 1 USD can be anything from 0.001 to 10 Bitcoin, when the exchange rate between them fluctuating, there is no way to tell if USD's value is dropping fast or bitcoin's value is rising quickly

People might say that all the other goods' value is relatively stable if purchased using USD, this is also questionable. You can never tell if it is because all these goods' value are dropping together with USD or not. (In fact they should be much cheaper than before, due to much higher production efficiency)

If measured by bitcoins, the improvement of production efficiency will cause all the goods' price to drop, which indicated a healthy development of economy

but they are not doin any auction for these bitcoins they are giving in faucets to this community  :D

I can not believe what I paid 1000 USD.   ::)
Just now, I understand, Bitcoin is fog.

It's not a ponzi scheme per se, but it can still turn out to be a scam if satoshi wants anything for his 2 million bitcoins.

It's a satoshi scheme.

+1

thats what i thought too.Its a scheme but a new one so lets name after Satoshi (if its real name) just like that one is after Ponzi

+1

BTW, OP what is your agenda ?

i tell people that no body owns or controls Bitcoin, it is not an entity it is completely decentralized so it can't be a ponzi. That explanation usually convinces people from my experience

its niot Ponzi its a Satoshi Nakamoto he got at least 2mil btc!

Name any other ponzi scheme or pyramid that survived three crashes? You won't, because for every one of them the first crash is the last crash, as ponzi differs from a breakthrough product in that it has no actual innovation, but pure marketing bullshit. You have to be pretty stupid to say that bitcoin does not bring any innovation to society. So any open, transparent, innovative product that is already working in the real world and does not seem to be crashing no matter how hard dumbasses of various caliber try, can not be any kind of ponzi.

Fuck that, Satoshi deserves whatever he gets should he decide to part with his coins. He certainly deserves to be wealthier than say... the inventor of Facebook (which he isn't even close to yet).

Most people put the figure closer to 1 million, btw.

what do you mean by "agenda"

well bitcoin has potentioally good values but whoever made it could dhave done better than what s/t/he/y did

The world is your oyster. Go do it better.

will you help Me?

I'm happy with Bitcoin, but if you show me something that is better, I will help you by adopting it.

The satoshi deserves this and that argument is hogwash.

Very good observation. Maybe in Wikipedia someone should start a new article on this 'Satoshi scheme'.

very good post. that should do it.
ponzi schemes collapse when no new money gets in. when no one buys btc, price goes sideways and does not collapse.

the fairy tale of the bitcoin ponzi made to the centralbanks:
http://www.coindesk.com/estonian-central-bank-warns-bitcoin-ponzi-scheme/

i have a hard time to believe those guys don´t know the difference. they must really hate/fear bitcoin to roll out this obvious crap.

Bitcoin, even if it fails tomorrow, revolutionized the way we store and transfer value. Money will never be the same.

I think a large fortune for giving this to the world is not too much to ask.

The thing is, our opinions don't really matter all that much. Bitcoin has value and he has a whole lot of them.

just thanks him to spread whatever because it's probably a FUD :)

bitcoin is a scheme, but its an open source scheme and ponzi schemes require secrecy.

if you know about bitcoin, you know it's not a ponzi scheme. If they call it a ponzi scheme then they must be ignorant. How can one argue with an ignorant person? I would love to have a witty answer but it simply doesn't work no matter how valid it is.
I reserve ad hominem for all these special people.

"What is your answer to "Bitcoin is a Ponzi Scheme" ? "

Answer: Scoreboard.

Lol at the ignorant kids on this forum. Please rename the domain to highschoolbitcoincirclejerk.com,

you're not gonna make friends with anybody talking like that.
if you got nothing to say just say nothing.

does this mean......... Bitcoin is gonna go up forever??!

Yes, too the moon. Until it eats up every single fiat dollar, every single asset, in every country. Then it becomes a global currency. If not then it will collapse at some point. The dollar was a ponzi, look at the US dollar bill. Tell me what do you see?

No.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigmoid_function

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHUPPYzzZrI

Just for a number of more years.

that is a nice visualization of what you percieve when you look deeper into the new technical possibilities of the bitcoin protocol .. ;)

Yes, I bought 10 000btc for $100 (1Cent each). When the price was at 1$ people called it Ponzi Scheme and it was. I got scared that more and more people would find out. So I sold all for 11 000$. Nice profit, 11 000%.

But no police caught me and the buyer of my bitcoins got scammed really hard. Because he was so stupid. Hahaha

The differences between a Ponzi scheme and a legitimate business are actually more subtle than people realize. When a public company makes enormous profits and those profits are not invested in the infrastructure, financial responsiblities, or growth needs of a business then that business collapses. We don't call those types of businesses Ponzi schemes but in fact they are no different.

The simplest and most obvious Ponzi schemes are when the owner of the funds makes zero attempt to actually manage the funds in a legitimate fashion, he spends the money on what he wants. These type of Ponzi schemes always collapse when the investors ask for their deposits back and a run on the fake bank ensues, exposing the scheme.

Bitcoin is an investment only supported by 1) actual usage of the coin as a transaction medium and store of value 2) investor confidence that the controls in place can secure that value

Both of these attributes are almost non-existent in any Ponzi scheme. #2 for a little while, but there is no way for Ponzi sheme's to recover if #2 ever collapses.

Bitcoin has one other magic bullet up its sleeve that makes it almost eternal, barring a world ban and barring world war, that magic bullet is that regardless of the value you place on Bitcoin, you can always buy it and sell it for the current market price. Ponzi shemes don't have this eternal nature and it is what makes Nokamoto's disappearance irrelevant. He can sell all of his bitcoins if he wants, so can the FBI. The price may go down to 10 dollars, but the market will still exist, as will the users and the people that are now willing to buy in at $10.

You might better describe Bitcoin as perpetual bubble wave whose end of days is correlated to the end of humanity.

more like bitcoinmillionaireswhofinditamusingtotalktodummies.com

 :) ;) :D ;D

wow. 10k btc.  :o

I don't see any revolutionary changes. The only thing is some people, especially satoshi have revolutionary capital gains... on paper.

Revolutionary would be to see the level of economic growth happening which is implied by it's price. A revolutionary currency could for example provide a closed loop economy instantly, or have each unit correspond to the same amount of value every time, or....

That's because you are being intentionally obtuse.

I know that you know that we can do things with Bitcoin that you can not do with any other asset on the planet (except other cryptocurrencies which came after Bitcoin). Just one of those things makes Bitcoin revolutionary and we both know that there are several.

It provides a digital asset under exclusive personal control and non-reversible transactions.

That's a new thing, but it's not revolutionary. Revolutionary is when a novelty changes the way the world economy works.

Revolutionary inventions to date:
Engines working on the Carnot cycle.
Electric Motor/Generator.
Chemical fertilizer.
Transistor.

that's pretty much it.

In today's world of ever increasing capital controls, that is revolutionary. And that is just the tip of the iceberg. The systems that can be created from this new control we have over money is where the real fun starts.

Just off the top of my head.

Language
Wheel
Soap
Antibiotics
Black powder
Radio
Internet

A digital asset is not money.

Anything can be money.

Of course, though I wouldn't include The Internet.

We wouldn't be having this conversation without it.

For me money is a shared accounting system where each unit represents a certain amount of economic activity. Fiat Currency is the only money currently.
Gold wasn't money for example, but gold ducats were. (Only certain mints were allowed to make them).


Perhaps we would have it on some dial up bbs instead?

goodbye bitcoin, goodbye my USD,

http://www.dodaj.rs/f/32/In/SPAa3Hn/sad-bye-emoticon.gif

Why not?

this is what electricmucus looks like to me :D

https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRsHpBbCj_TfK4FuN2cQuAaquVuFKzw4ttkm-6wI8F1H0xGdy6G

I tell them it is not a ponzi, but that I could care less if they want to believe it is. Good ideas don't need my help or explanation. Perhaps in five years when everyone they know is using it, clarity will come.
It's kina like bigfoot. I know no such thing exists, but I don't care when some fool thinks otherwise.

what about plastic ?
printing ?
electricity ?
trains ?
mobile phones ?
software ?
clocks ?
lsd ?
 :D

like know what each person used it for

(EXAMPLE: I forgot what his method is called but lets say there are 8bilion people on planet.And you buy something with btc.Lets say a red car.Leys say only 200 milion people have a red car.Then you buy a g.un.Lets say only 2000 people have a red car and g.un.Lets say you buy tickets for Olympics Games.Then all it takes is to find out your name and add your btc address to whatever dtabase that has all that info.Now your "anonymous" bitcoin address is identified cuz you are the only person who has bought all three. OF COURSE you would have been identified by your car letters and numbers on that thingie or by gps in your car whatever.  )

Most people dont take necessary steps to remain anonymous.Some just dont bother

600watt,

Those are important inventions which influenced the world very much yes, but they haven't really revolutionized anything. Just made existing things more efficient.

Bitcoin is neither of those things. It could be a stepping stone to something that might qualify into the important category but on it's own it falls short of that and even the level before it.
The ponzi scheme accusation highlights one of it's major shortcoming: There is no correlation between it's perceived value and the amount of economic activity.

Also it's more a product than an invention, I know you don't wanna hear it but you can't deny it if you are honest.

Also true for fiat currency.

bullshit

The money supply in the world is growing faster than the economy, because money is made out of money. It misses every correlation with the real world economic activity.

This is also not true. But please post the infamous currency base+excess reserves hockey stick chart. It's already debunked, and even the FED itself published an article specifically about this misleading claim.
Do you want a link?

Yes please. I always have an open mind for both sides of the story. Maybe I change my opinion if I think it has a point. ;)

Emucus,

i disagree. plastic did not make wood carving more efficent. it opened an entire new world that was not imaginable before. and printing is more than more efficient handwriting. it changed the world. electricity, illuminating the dark nights for the first time changed the way people lived in cities. trains are more than very efficient public stage coaches, they shrank the distances for the masses. never been done before.  

what exactly is the difference between an product and an invention ? distributed trust of the bitcoin protocol WILL change the economy: all of a sudden i can trade with anyone in the world with a click of a mouse. i don´t believe you don´t see some of this. entering the age of encryption, bitcoin is a start.

I'm glad :) (http://www.newyorkfed.org/research/current_issues/ci15-8.pdf)
There is also a more laymans term blog post which doesn't take as much of your time to boil it down.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2012/08/03/the_monetary_base_is_irrelevant.html

Bitcoin is software and a p2p network. Bitcoin is FLOSS. Also its protocol is constantly being adapted by social consensus and not by any sort of central authority.
Its creator, Satoshi Nakamoto, never did a single commentary about "investing in Bitcoin", nor the core devs...

So tell me, how could Bitcoin be a Ponzi Scheme? if you think about it the old-fashioned stock market seems more ponzi than bitcoin :D

Yes, plastic is almost kind of revolutionary, it made it much cheaper to make certain object which used to be made of wood or metal. But it didn't really lead to drastic changes in a sense that enabling things that were not only too expensive but unthinkable.
Electricity is not really an invention, it's a concept out of physics. Electric generators provide it, well there used to be batteries before that but they didn't really lead to drastic changes.
Of course some things on your list were important, getting into that isn't really the point of the debate here so I think we can leave it at that.

The rest of your post is sadly double speak. Distributed Blockchain ledgers and hash based proof of work is the innovation if you will, but Bitcoin is the product. It already comes with the ledger, which isn't really nessecary, so I say it's a product, not a protocol, if you strip the ledger you have a protocol (altcoins are using it) the rest is software.
It's not even an invention, in computing some progress in computer science is an invention. FFT for example, or more fundamental kernel bootstrap. Then you have applications, Linux for example or you have standards, like POSIX.
So:
The Bitcoin white-paper describes a standard for a protocol, like a RFC. (This raises the question why wasn't it published as an rfc...?)
Bitcoin is two different things: A proof of concept implementation of the protocol described in the white-paper and the product of the satoshi genesis block ledger (and perhaps this community)

Yes, market/economy/society is a centralist, collectivistic monster. Crypto/p2p is THE revolutionary tool to bring all of that to an end. 10'000 years of collectivism and citizenship (instead of humanity) is enough.


http://scienceblogs.de/evolvimus/wp-content/blogs.dir/66/files/2012/06/i-c353e2656383d6b832f91b77ddc93c01-evolution_of_man1.jpg

FIXED

should i sell now ?

Kazakhstan (country in Asia) calling Bitcoin Ponzi Scheme!

http://www.coindesk.com/kazakhstans-central-bank-ban-bitcoin-protect-bankers/

If Kazakhstan goes through with declaring bitcoin a Ponzi scheme, we'll have to pool our BTC together to get Sacha Baron Cohen (Borat) to do a TV commercial for us.  He could talk about the wisdom of his great country and the dangers of bitcoin....much hilarity would surely ensue.

It would take Proudhon's pre-emptive pseudo-FUD spreading to the next level. 

hahahhahah rofl

its not only Kazakhstans its also some other countries also calling thisn Ponzi even in European countries

like Estonia

If someone tells you Bitcoin is a Ponzi scheme just agree with them and keep buying bitcoins before they figure out it is not.

hahaha good one :D

The last few posts before this one are so full of hubris.