Bitcoin Forum

I think we can all agree that those who mined hundreds and thousands of bitcoins on their PCs way back in ~2010 would be considered early adopters today. They knew about Bitcoin before the rest of the world found out about the potential for cryptocurrencies. Back then, Satoshi was still posting in the forums and 20,000 BTC could buy you two pizzas. You couldn't really spend bitcoins on anything other than alpaca socks (or so I've heard).

So then who are the mid and late adopters?

For example, those who invested in Bitcoin from 2011 onwards when it first became known to the rest of the world and the mainstream media first took notice of it might be considered the mid adopters. This would have been around the time after Slashdot and then Forbes published articles about Bitcoin soon after it reached parity with the US dollar and during its first crash when prices fell from a high of $33 to about $3. The mid adopters would have bought their coins from Mt Gox and/or mined the coins with high-end GPUs.

Those who invested after the introduction of ASICs or the months preceding the November 2013 peak might be considered to be the late adopters. By then, governments had taken notice of Bitcoin and more and more startups were entering the field.

Anybody who is currently involved in bitcoin is an early adopter. We have not yet reached the stage of mid-adopters.

How can we have mid-adopters when the bitcoin software is still in beta release, and is still considered experimental?

Agreed. Bitcoin is still in the early (possibly early-mid) stage, before mass adoption and all that.
Welcome the the bitcoin world.

I'd consider anyone getting into BTC right now to be a possible early adopter. Right now early adopters are those who got in when the price was in the single and low double-digits. People getting in right now are late adopters. If we reach the point of mass adoption then these current late-comers could be classified as early adopters.

Check this graph:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/11/Diffusion_of_ideas.svg/330px-Diffusion_of_ideas.svg.png

The world population is 7 billion, and I'd assume that 2 billion might be the maximum possible Bitcoin adopters in the future. So we are all early innovators.

I would generally agree with this. We haven't reached mainstream adoption yet - so it can hardly be thought that we are anything but early adopters in that sense. However, if you are taking this on a financial timescale we might already be at mid level adoption considering that we have reached heights far, far above what we started off with at least.

Additionally I'd differenciate between Bitcoin in general and Bitcoin mining. As far as mining goes looking at the investment needed to get started mining decently I'd say we are at least in the mid adopters stage, allthough looking at the number of bitcoin created and the max number creatable we are still early.

We are all early adopters, probably very early adopters.

Bitcoin is far from reaching mainstream and even if it reach mainstream in your country, it doesn't mean that it is accepted worldwide.

+1


when the london city boys and wall street boys came in it will be mid adopters fase.

People tend to think they're not part of the early adopters just because they missed the time where a btc wasn't worth a dollar.

Yeah. But they're wrong, they joined before btc has reached $100,000 anyway.

I guess I can agree with this although we can subdivide the early adopters to years or developer levels
Although when we hit bitcoin qt 1.0 then can we say its starting lol kind of wondering when we can finally say we moved the s curve a bit.

Hahaha, true, true. Lots of people will though. :)

To me early adopters = got in before GPUs and ASICs. Mid = Got in during GPU era. Late = Got in after asics came out and dominated mining.

And the ones that get in in a few years time when Bitcoin has reached mass adoption? What are they?

Erhm, überlate-snail-adopters, obviously.

I define Bitcoin as an opportunity to control you own funds for your own peace of mind. 

Everyone that has bitcoins now is still an early adopter. They are far from widespread in use or as widely adopted as they could be. Of course, it's also possible that bitcoins never become widely used, in which case being an early adopted doesn't do you any good.

Well I see the utility in digital currencies and this is the largest community, hopefully we will be able to see the future as we are already here now and be ready for the shift if we do move beyond Bitcoin to another currency.

We are still in the early innovator phase

Definitely, bitcoin is sooo far from becoming a mainstream phenomenon. Until it is, we're still in the earliest stage of it.

I can't believe people are seriously arguing that we are still in the early adopter phase - what?? Someone who starts using a technology 5 years after it comes out is an "early adopter" ? Wtf do you call the first people who started mining with CPUs then? Prehistoric adopters?

Ok. Arguing without a point again.

lol, so in 5 years you'll be a late late late late late late adopter ?
In 20 years you'll be a late late late late late late late late late late late late late late late late late late late late late adopter ?

Everyone is an early adopter right now and for some time. That's it.

This is a circular argument. Okay so what do you call people who start using the internet for the first time now, late late late adopters? Come on you guys are just being ridiculous and spiteful.

I think there needs to be at least some differentiating between people who started using bitcoin back before the average person had even heard of bitcoin. A few years ago if you asked 100 random people what bitcoin was, most would have told you they had no idea whatsoever. Now just about everyone I talk to has at least heard of it and many know a few basic things about it.

I cannot answer the question because it's not even worded correctly. Be specific. What period of time are you indicating for the ones that "started using the internet"?

They would be considered early adopters, I suppose.

There's no guarantees that bitcoin is going to reach x amount of dollars or mass adoption. If bitcoin never rises above the current ATH then people buying recently are late adopters. If it does then I guess we could call the first generation of adopters 'pioneers', anyone buying under $1000 an 'early' adopter, and others can be the 'late-comers' :D

Reading comprehension? I said now. Didn't think that was a confusing term. If you can't understand a few simple sentences maybe you shouldn't be trying to make an argument here.

For the Internet, I'd say it went something like

pre-'94 innovators,
94-98 early adopters
98-2002 early majority
2002-2006 late majority
2006+ laggards.

Found this...
http://blogs.computerworld.com/sites/computerworld.com/files/u193/internet_adoption.jpg

Which makes me look closeish.

Agree with this and think his adoption lifecycle graphic is about right...
http://bitcorati.com/2014/03/23/bitcoin-tipping-point-mass-adoption/


Early majority will happen when you don't have to come here to find out where to buy bitcoin. Back in late 90s, maybe there'd be articles in PC magazines about "how to get online", and AOL CDs coming in the junk mail, before that, you first had to be aware of the internet, then research options to get online.

Anyway, when you see Cosmo with "Shop online with Bitcoin" on the cover, you'll know we're in mid majority phase.

Sorry about that. Didn't read it correctly.
I would simply call them newbies.