Bitcoin Forum

Hey all. I found out about Bitcoins about a month ago, and I've been sharing the idea with my friends since. They all think it's a good idea, and I've nearly convinced them to start using it to make tiny, simple transactions with each other.

But the last thing they need to trust the bitcoin economy is a test dummy to try it out… introducing yours truly. And from the very beginning, I can't figure out how to actually get bitcoins.

I've been trying to generate bitcoins for a month with no success. I did some research on bitcoin mining, and joined a pool for a little bit, but didn't stay for more than a few hours to actually make any profit, because I wanted my computer back. And I don't have enough trust in the system to spend a ton of money building/buying a mining rig so I can still use my primary computer. So mining is still out for a while.

So now there's buying bitcoins. I've spent a few hours now creating an account on Mt Gox, trying to figure out how to create a Liberty Reserve account, then trying to find some kind of exchanger so I can get money into it (and lose transaction fee), then get funds (and lose transaction fee) into LR, so I can get funds into Mt. Gox (and lose transaction fee there), so I can get bitcoins into my wallet (and potentially even lose a transaction fee there too?) Ladies and gentlemen… what the f8ck?

So the last option is just providing a service and receiving bitcoins for payment. I would actually be cool with that, except my service (I've been a web developer/programmer for several years) is usually pretty pricey. I would be willing to work at a crazy reduced fee just to get bitcoins, but I don't know if I can do a block of work small enough to get the tiny amount of BC I want.

Really, for right now I only want to get 10-20 bitcoins, which I can distribute amongst my friends, and then I'll trade them beer for the bitcoins back. I'm waiting on emails from several exchangers who supposedly do paypal transactions. But the problem there is that I have to tell me friends that you have to "know a guy". I'm waaaay more trustworthy of complete strangers than my friends are. But I don't want to be the exchanger for them!

Why is it so damn hard to get BC? Wouldn't adoption of BC skyrocket if this process were much easier?

Thanks to anyone who read my rant. As payment for listening (and because I have no BC to give), here's my frustrated/sad face:

EDIT: I'll shave my face for bitcoins!

https://i.imgur.com/vhYbW.jpg

Because it is real money.

Have you ever tried to buy gold bullion?

CE's face when he found out witcoin has a 'free' section ;)

I'll give you 5btc if you draw fake glasses on your face with a thick black marker.

But I'm sure there's plenty of little programming jobs out there... just need to post something in the 'marketplace' section of this site, and detail what skills you have.

No. But the first couple of links I found had credit card processing. I guess that's what I'd like to see for bitcoins, instead of things like sending money orders to home addresses or paying shady websites in foreign countries so I can pay a ton of transaction fees. Hey, I have experience with Shopify, Authorize.net, and other payment gateways… anyone want to take credit card payments for bitcoins? You can pay me in bitcoins!



You spelled 'witcoin' correctly, right? The social networking site? Looking at it now…

If you can mail a letter then you can use my service. It's pretty simple and I'll walk you through it by email if you still can't figure it out.

Welcome to the community.

Actually it's pretty easy to get bitcoins:

a) coinpal.ndrix.com for small orders using Paypal
b) Visit #bitcoin-otc at freenode IRC for buying middle size volume using various payment processors and bank transfers
c) Use mtgox wire transfer for large to huge volume

LibertyReserve is probably the most complicated and expensive way how to get bitcoins...

I can do a mail order for the going rate for 10 BTC tomorrow at noon EDT, if I don't get a response from other exchangers. And thanks for the introduction!

Agreed... I'd say that option is just for people that already happen to have some LR.

A) I tried that, but it told me my bitcoin address was invalid. I sent an email to the site owner, and I'm waiting for a response…
B) Haven't heard of that, and I'm pretty familiar with IRC. I'll hop in, thanks for the tip.
C) I saw that website first, and thought that was probably the easiest way at first. If it's more popular for large volumes, then I'll keep that in mind when we're ready to really start using BTC for day-to-day transactions.  :)


Thanks for the tip. I'll stay away from that then, it looked pretty ridiculous. Hope no one here takes offense to this, but it looked like a money laundering operation.  :P

I agree, most of the BTC-money exchanger fees are complete rip-offs. At present, they have a first mover advantage so can charge whatever the hell they like and they do. Some more competition is sorely needed in this area, but it will come.

I'd say buying bitcoins is about as difficult as buying yen---that is, not hard at all if you know where to find a seller.

When I decided going through Mt Gox was too complicated, I went to the Marketplace forum and made an offer to pay ACH direct credit for bitcoins, and got a bite within a few hours. You could probably do the same. In fact, right now I'll invite an offer at a 1.15 exchange rate, for up to 500 BTC---message if you're interested.

There's also Bitcoin 4 Cash (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/), which has been operating as long as I've been here. 2% commission, which really isn't bad overall, though you need to make a 10 BTC deposit if you want to lock in the exchange rate.

Welcome to the bitcoin community.  Credit cards are really tough right now, but a few of us are working to make it that simple.  Fraud is basically the credit card killer right now, and all the burden rests squarely on the shoulders of the merchant.

Personally, I've set up a bitcoin-selling site and even added credit card processing, but it's on the back burner until I can secure a bank that allows adequate fraud detection.  And working with banks... oh my god.  The first person I called at one bank didn't even know what "merchant services" meant.  Another person in the merchant services dept. couldn't answer my first three questions.  She had never heard them before.   ???

They're supposed to get back with me tomorrow.  Keep your fingers crossed.   :P

You would need to grow some hair before being able to shave your face!

As far as the difficulties of buying bitcoins is concerned. I have no idea, I never plan to buy any.

Man, good luck with merchant services. I have a horror story about a bug I found in a bank's processing service that I'll tell later.

…for 10 BTC I'll attempt to grow a beard.

For 10 BTC, I'll sell you mine.

Err wait, did I just contradict myself? Does selling body hair for BTC count as buying BTC. Damn it...

My offer expires in 10 minutes :) hehehe

Haha, if I didn't have a job tomorrow morning (which only pays me in USD, semi-sadly), I'd take you up on it. My goal is to have enough bitcoins in my account by the next minor US holiday (maybe Easter?) to distribute enough bitcoins to my friends, which will force them to open Bitcoin accounts. And then they'll say "What do we use these for?" And then I'll tell them I'm actually buying them a round of drinks, but it will cost them X BTC each. Tada, that's the gift! Throw in a little random paranoia about the value of the US dollar dropping, and we'll start using it on transactions with each other. In theory.

How powerful is your video card? You might be able to meet your own requirements by then if you start mining now.

edit: Oh right, you've already said you've been mining for a month with no result...

And as an added bonus, if all your friends have bitcoins, it'll be easier to get them to draw fake glasses on their face. Okay I'll stop now :)

But definitely go and detail your skills in the Market Place section.

Yeah. Should I have seen results by then?

And I was only CPU mining then, on nights and business hours when I wasn't using my computer. I was still surprised that I didn't make anything. If you see much better results with GPU mining, I'd be willing to give that a shot. Especially if you see more frequent returns in a pool with a GPU miner.

FINE.  ;)

Here's my post in the marketplace. Clicky if you want to see me at work! (https://www.bitcoin.org/smf/index.php?topic=6026.msg88493)

Also, I contemplated making another thread about this, but the thread IS called "Ease of Use". What's the typical waiting period for a transaction to show up, and then how much time does it take to be confirmed by 2-3 people? From a theoretical POV, say businesses in my hometown start accepting BTC as a form of payment, and the local government starts taking it as well. (YAY!) If I'm standing in front of Mr. Hot Dog Vendor with my BTC ATM card, how long will I be holding up the line waiting for transaction confirmation?

GPU is the way to go. For now.

Up to 1.5 hours, depending on the price of the hot dog.

And depending on how many confirmations Mr Hot Dog Vendor wants before trusting that the transaction is valid.

And depending on whether you've opted to pay a transaction fee or not.

Sorry I don't have any links at the moment for where this has previously been discussed... but it has, and it's not as bad as I make it sound ;)

Not true. By the time hot dog vendors start accepting bitcoins. There will be a third party that creates "instant" transactions. Gavin said it best, instant transactions by your bank are a fantasy. Most bank transactions take a few days.