Bitcoin Forum

The main reason why Bitcoin is not yet breaking through: BTC is much to expensive! When I tell people about Bitcoin, and when they hear how much 1 btc costs, their jaws drop down and there's nothing more to be say. People dont want to pay 1$ or 1€ to get 0.00something. Nobody is interested in Millis, Satoshis, etc, they want to get Bitcoins!
Thats one reason why Dogecoin gains that much popularity, it's cheap!

The solution: we just have to shift the decimal point, that's all. Once people get not less than 1 BTC for 1$, we will immediately witness an increasing demand, and the new ATMs will be drained dry :D

No. Just no.

THIS
Agreed!

You should think twice before giving a laconic answer.

Nobody has ever suggested this before. Evar.

Just display your prices in mBTC.
This will result in the price 0.46 EUR / mBTC (at this moment)

I think some of the exchanges already did this.

I know ;). However what you are suggesting is cutting the price of a bitcoin by around 500 back to 1 again.
or moving the decimal seperator by 1. Which is just the same as mine suggestion only 3 times less effective. 

It's human nature: people feel much happier buying whole things, instead of tiny fractions of a large unit. Also, most people (including me before joining the community) are not even aware that submultiples of Bitcoin can be bought, because coins are perceived as indivisible units.

My first instinct was that this was a ridiculous idea. Then I remembered that these are the same masses that perceive $4.99 to be a dollar less than $5.00. So if education is not possible, perhaps simple mind games are the way to go.

How 'bout if education is not possible, neither is having something good?

People should not invest in BTC because it's cheap. They should invest because It's a new way of thinking.
If you want to earn some money quick and dirty just use the USD daytrader ponzi scheme.

You have come up with a solution to a non-problem. Bitcoin has no need for more investors, speculators, or hoarders. It needs more infrastructure and more users.

In fact, your solution would just make things worse. These people that won't buy bitcoins because the exchange rate is over $1 are not the kind of people that should be investing in a currency (or anything really).

This is a non-trivial problem.  I have a friend who uses bitcoin to sports bet and will still call me every now and then when placing a bet to make sure he is betting the amount of money that he actually thinks it is. Using mBTC would be beneficial for the network.

That's why we need to move the decimal places to the right several spaces.

Maybe just propagating the convention of pricing things in mBTC on exchanges and other sites would be a good place to start.

Think of the media value if Bitcoin announced a 1000 to 1 split...yes, it would be meaningless from a mathematical point of view...but most people would just eat it up.

Most people can't figure out that 10% off of $2 is $1.80. My last boss used a calculator once to figure out $3.10 times 10. Think about how many times you make a small purchase like say for $.77, you hand the cashier $1.02, she looks at you like you are an idiot, hands you back the two pennies, then proceeds to give you $.23 change.

But just like the average person is incompetent in the field of mathematics, I would guess the average Bitcoin developer is ignorant of how really bad the average person is at math.

Nothing will change with Bitcoin.

But don't despair, eventually we will all just start pricing everything in satoshis.

You've got the point! By shifting the decimal separator, Bitcoin doesn't lose in value, it gains attraction!
In fact, all we have to do is to shift the currency unit, i.e. 1µBTC -> 1mBTC -> 1BTC, i.e. for 1$ Joe will get ~1.60BTC instead of just 0.0016BTC (1.6mBTC). It only takes a simple client update. The bitcoin amounts in the wallets will automatically be adjusted so that the (fiat) value stays the same.

But you're probably right, most of the Bitcoin devs are strong in math, but have no idea of market mechanisms and consumer behavior.
http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/market-mechanisms.html

Your friend is an idiot.

If that's true, then it's probably best that Bitcoin does not "break through".  The masses would only hurt themselves.

The problem is that bitcoin is a deflationary currency, there is an exact number to divide among all. Considering that some bitcoins will always be lost daily due to private key loss, the other acquire more value, unless there is a crash.

Do they also not buy gold because they want a whole bar? What kind of logic is this FFS...

It's easy to do

If we deal in mbtc then amounts should say 567mbtc (0.567btc) for example

This way people will be more used to mbtc and talk in that unit aswell

no fway... it's because is too cheap ...

I think you missed the point.
Sadly

It would have been a good idea a while ago.. isn't it kinda too late and would only end in mass confusion?

On the other hand...
Isn't the large number compared to fiat precisely that incentives many people to hear more about Bitcoin?

If you don't understand that you don't have to buy a whole coin after just initial research, you are going to be a late adopter anyway.

Why to focus on late adopters?
They will resist anything new and act stupid regardless.
I don't think the numeric value is the most challenging thing to comprehend with the complex learning curve of cryptos...

And if someone doesn't "afford" Bitcoin... Let them buy altcoins so they can get "more" for the dollar..  :D

I don't think that is an issue. For common people that might be an issue, but for someone who is paying for goods/service he doesn't care if he is paying in a cryptocurrency that has value of 1$ for 1 or 650$ for 1. It's a trade system, like monetary market with currencies like Rubles, Dollars, Euros, Pounds...

I think the idea is great

Bitcoin doesn't have to be breaking through in terms of dollar price in the first place, does it?

Well, I can most certainly say this will never happen.

While you're right in the sense that people like to say they have a whole of something rather than a piece of something, it's far too late to make such a drastic change to Bitcoin. Although I do think this is part of the reason Litecoin will eventually become very popular, perhaps even more popular than Bitcoin for everyday purchases (and the faster transaction times certainly help as well).

Litecoin also has the advantage of lower prices; too early to tell if DOGE will survive.

THREAD : When to "move the decimal points" ? (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1833.0;all)


Answer of Bitcoin devs mafia :

Oh no, we don't need to do that, if "the people" are too stupid we shall ignore them.
Bitcoin don't need "the people". We don't need "the people".

OP: Your example kind of stinks because doge has steadily lost value for months now. So yeah, getting many crapcoins for your dollar doesn't magically make the coin successful. In fact most of the altcoins that have massive amounts of coins, are not doing too hot.

Some people make the same kind of argument about stocks. They don't want to buy google or apple stock because it costs several hundred dollars for one share and they would feel better to own 100 shares of a company that cost $50 per share, rather than a handful of shares of a company that costs $500-$1000 per share. Even though in reality it makes NO DIFFERENCE.

I think bitcoin is already popular enough that a scheme like this to change the decimal place is totally unnecessary. What is needed is further economic development. Right now it is still a little too inconvenient for ordinary people (ie those who are not very tech savvy) to get their hands on bitcoins, and it's a little too easy for them to lose them via scams, hackers, lost keys, computer failure, etc.

No one is getting paid in crypto either, which is a big issue. If I'm a regular guy and I want to buy something, why bother going through the hassle, risk, and fee-laced process of buying bitcoins just to exchange them for something else? I might as well just use a credit card or cash. But if people were getting paid (even just for side jobs or short contracts or only part of pay, like their bonus) in crypto, then the economy would be more balanced.

More on this here: http://www.cryptopros.com/2014/03/working-for-cryptocurrency.html

It seems The solution is not obvious.

the solution proposed here is for those that only have 0.00016btc can get sexually excited and spray their man juice everywhere while telling their 2 only friends that they "have a whole bitcoin"

while the other 7billion of us laugh at him and tell him that he only has a couple dollars to his name and he is a fake.

No one cares about is it 0,000... or not.

In informatic everything will change one way or another.

 ... so many assholes in this forum
  /ignore

Anyone would feel richer if he/she had a bed of a million  $1-dollar notes than a single $1m dollar note.

I think it's a good idea to make people feel richer even if the they are practically the same value.

I don't want to own "a piece" of something. I'd rather own something that I can imagine as a whole.

Manipulation of perception, it's very important in marketing...

It is a lot about calculating more easily for the average bitcoiner as well

0.000367390-0.00002 require more time in average than 367,390-200,000 when you are not good in mental calculations

Good point. That's one more reason to use whole number units.

The fact that we can add a comma "," after every 3 numbers in the sequence greatly reduces confusion. Having 0.000,02 or 0.000,367,390 really doesn't make sense to anybody.

Basically, we take advantage of the comma in separating numbers. It's already used internationally for scientific or accounting purposes to speed up reading numbers so it may be a good idea to apply it in bitcoin too.

The problem with doge is the number of coins makes price growth nearly unsustainable. 100 billion with inflation is freaking nuts. Other coins like litecoin, ruby, hbn, etc with more reasonable coin caps have a better chance of surviving. The community isn't EVERYTHING you have to have a reasonable economic model AND a good community.

I think if the price of BTC is not that high as of now, they will not see it as a really good investment. It will pain a lot those who have several BTC if it will drops dramatically.

But I like the idea cause I want to have the BTC (as I do not have 1 yet), I just have Satoshis! :P

You can use the coma for thousands of bitcoins but being able to use it for thousands of bits would help

Btw not every county use the coma for thousands

Agreed that 100 billion is pushing the limits of sanity.
There is a need for spare change/"almost worthless" gambling money/micro-payments and the faster confirmations/low fees make some alt coins a valid option.

I don't think the reason is just in amount of it. The problem is not as obvious as it may seem. The main point is to show the full potential of bitcoin. There are a lot of pros in using cryptocurrency, such as nobody knows on what stuff you spend your money, another great bonus is that you can earn this money doing anything, just let you pc stay turned on all night. Of course I colored the truth, but people need this.

I agree with OP. We need something like a split.

Split hairs!!!

You should think twice before giving a laconic answer.
[/quote]

No.

+1

The average IQ is 100, you need simplicity not elitism to make a product that will get mainstream success.    The OP is correct but it might be a question of labelling or marketing



They buy a gold coin and the coin is minted and marked to a certain value of gold in it.   Those coins often trade at a premium to their real gold content, the brand itself takes on an extra worth.    It is a valid point being made, the use of BTC has to be seamless as possible

Never say never, I think bitcoin needs to innovate to really succeed.   That talk of side chains recently might be one way to relate multiple consumer friendly versions back to a solid standard like bitcoin

never,it's much too cheap,the price will rise 100 times.

Bitcoin is still the front runner by far

I can see Doge still being here in 5years, I can't say that of all altcoins

As a fairly new Bitcoin user I wouldn't mind adjusting decimal point. That said what about other users with a higher seniority? I'm pretty sure they got use to the value of Bitcoin.

There are a few other things one must learn about bitcoin before using it effectively.  One of them is that they are divisible.  Some of us learned that a dollar was divisible into 100 cents, remember?  It's not rocket science. 

100 years ago when prices were 1/20th of what they are today, people didn't have problems with decimal points. I think they can easily adjust.

Imagine someone from Japan where a Yen is worth 0.006 euros coming to the U.K. What would you say to that person when they complain about the decimals?

You're providing answers but it's like being able to write many essays about a topic where each version tries to disprove the others to a degree. However, facts remain facts and some facts don't ever change.

- He should be using a simple calculator and I'm sure not even a 70 IQ is required to do that. Being bad at simple math doesn't mean lack of intelligence but not trying to find ways to eliminate a handicap does.

- I admit that wallet softwares still have room for improvement but the use of Bitcoin is seamless already. You(not you - you) can even type in the local currency value of transactions if somehow you're uncomfortable with the numbers being dealt with. BTC to have more or less decimals doesn't change it's usability because you don't physically carry and count your Bitcoins. Just stop seeing it like and comparing to any physical value; stones, metals, liquids or gases with different metrics. Your wallet software does all the counting and value conversion!

- There will be a time when you'll realize why it is like it is. A chewing gum for one Satoshi maybe?.. "Never say never". Yes and no, but there you go.

This idea has no ground and is completely unnecessarily sentimental.

We need Par value of $100，we also need Par value of 1 cent

This is illogical. Changing the price of bitcoin would not change the underlying fundamentals of it as a future currency. The same is true for when a stock splits.

A bitcoin can be divided into 8 digits and can easily be spent this way.

The issue with BTC is the large number of "scandals" and lack of ease of use